Special Zone conference in Moscow

We had a special zone conference in Moscow on Tuesday September 11.  We were sent via email our electronic tickets and on Friday we walked (for the exercise) to the train station up the road about a mile or so from our apartment and had our actual tickets issued to us.  

Our train left Lipetsk on Monday evening at 10:55 pm.   They had purchased four tickets for us so we would have a coupe all to ourselves.  It turns out it was not a coupe, but they had purchased  four beds in an open car with about 70 people with no doors or curtains.  We called our Elders and told them we would not be going to Moscow under these conditions.  We have had trouble with our tickets in the past so we felt we needed to make a statement to the office that they need to pay attention when ordering our tickets.    Two of our Elders thought it would be an adventure and volunteered to let us have their spots in the Elders coupe.  So we shared the coupe with the other two Elders.  None the less, sleeping on these noisy, rough riding, and over heated trains is our biggest mission challenge.  

One short ride on the metro and we were at our meeting at the Moscow central chapel.  We first had a zone meeting until noon with our zone leaders who reviewed a laundry list (their words) of mission rules so that the new combined mission had no misunderstandings as to what they were.  They also emphasized the baptism commitment.  Too many commitments are falling through.  After a discussion, we did some role playing using real investigator situations to obtain baptismal dates.  

For lunch we went to "SUBWAY."  First time for a subway sandwich since we got here.  Love that spicy Italian with Southwest sauce.  

After lunch we combined with another zone for a meeting with President and Sister Sorenson.  After some training with assistants to the president Sister Sorenson spoke on the theme of the Book of Mormon.  We are challenged  to read the Book of Mormon by the end of the year. At the end of Sister Sorenson's training she always has a health segment.  She asks people to stand if in the last week they had certain fruits  and vegetables.  We stand or remain seated for each fruit or vegetable separately. Those who stand for all those given get a treat.  This time it was M & M's which stands for mission miracles.   

President Sorenson continued the Book of Mormon theme in his usual folksy way. We love his sense of humor.  He gave some good incites on the value of the Book of Mormon in strengthening faith and conversion.   Told how in the Book of Omni, Omni only writes three verses, tells that he was a wicked man and had not kept the statutes and the commandments of the Lord as he ought to have done.  He then says he kept the plates as commanded and conferred them on his son Amaron and made an end.  As short as it was Omni's confessed wickedness had convinced a young man that he needed to change his life.  He gave other examples of how the Book of Mormon has blessed lives and that these were evidences of the B of M being from God.

Because our tickets for the return were the same as coming they had to change them.  There were no coupes available on the train originally scheduled, so we had to decide on which train to use for our return.  One left before the meeting was over, one at 5:20 pm and one at 6:30 the next morning.  We didn't know how we would get to the train that early so we opted for the 5:20 which got to Lipetsk at 3:20 am.  So much for a good night sleep. I slept well between 9:00 pm and 11:00 and Sister Hoagland slept well between 9:00 pm and 1:00 am. I also fell asleep between two and three when we received a knock on our door that Lipetsk was in 20 minutes.

Buses do not run that time of morning and there were no taxi's at the station.  One man I saw calling for a taxing and I put up two fingers to indicate I needed one too.  He was very nice and let me know the license number of the taxi coming for us.  

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Elders Davis and Law, Samville, Elder & Sister Hoagland just prior to eating more than we should at Samville and Margarite's apartment.  We had a wonderful visit with this beautiful family.  Samville has a terrible degenerative disease thatl causes terrible back and neck pain.  He eventually will not be able to twist, or turn his neck  and the disease also results in blindness.     

 Margarite is an amazing woman who now is the sole provider.  She should become a strong leader in the church.  Armine is next to Elder Davis.

 Here Arpine is reading English to Elder Davis.  She has been accepted in a good school at no cost and as  you can see from this and other pictures, she is as cute as a bug.  We started out with a variety of fruit and melons.  Sister Hoagland being a little hard of hearing did not realize this was just the start and ate until   she was full.

 Then came the main course.  They just have this one little table and we all sat around as best we could.  At the far right Armine is doing what she loves, water coloring.  The man on the right is a friend of Samvilles.  His wife is in the hospital with some complication of her pregnancy.  He has two other children still in Armenia living with grandparents until they can afford to bring them.  Life is very hard for the Armenians that they would come to Russia where it can't be much better.  There is much prejudice against them in housing, and employment.  Having been so isolated for ever, Russians are not very open to foreigners anyway.  Most frequently asked question when we meet people is "why are you here?" 

 This trip was so hurried, that we did not think about taking pictures until we were on the train coming home. This is a freeway outside Moscow.

 Traffic stopped for the train going by.  It is apparent that they do not have weight limits on trucks in this country.  The dump trucks we see in Lipetsk look more like a mining trucks and they are really heavily loaded.

 Typical trees you see around Moscow.

 This is a very beautiful Orthodox church.  I really like the shiny blue onion shapes.

 Some Moscow suburbs.  They must take commuter trains we saw into Moscow.  Some new construction as well.

 A village a few miles from Moscow.

 Railroad bridge.

 Fall is on its way.  Don't like to see the trees change so soon, but we are in Russia.

 This is the first time we took a train before 6:00 pm and this one had a snack vendor who came by about every 30 minutes.  We left the door open because these little coupes can get stuffy.  We had a babushka stop by and try to talk with us.  She even came in and sat down until she realized we weren't communicating very well.

 A village train station.

We sat at train stations quite often on the trip.  At this one the sun began to set.  While they do have some diesel engines, the vast majority are electric as you can see the overhead wires.  They are quiet running and their horns are pretty wimpy, making less noise than our semi trucks.