One more post and done!

Jess needs some serious home cooking to put some meat on those bones!
It almost looks like it could be in Idaho somewhere doesn't it.

A fun p-day activity. They were able to take their 15 year old investigator along with them which I am sure he loved. Who wouldn't love spending the day with these great young adults!

Hey everyone,

Well, after this letter, I will write home one more time. I can't believe it, but it's true. It has been a long two years, but they have gone by fast at the same time. It seems like one big long dream. We had a good week, a couple of ups and downs but overall a great week.

First of all, last p-day we went bowling. I bowled a 141 the first game, not bad for not bowling for about 8 months. The problem is that by some kind of miracle, my companion bowled a 178, I still don't know how he did it. We bowled two more games and I won them both, so don't worry, I'm still the best :) It was a lot of fun. After that we had a lesson with Svetlana. When we got there, her 3 grandkids were there and her daughter in law was there as well, so we got to meet a few of her family members. She's not shy at all about us, which is really cool. She's doing great. She thought that black tea would be a really big challenge for her, so we fasted for her and have been praying for her. She told us at the lesson that she doesn't understand why, but she hasn't had a problem at all with the tea. We told her, we understand why, and encouraged her to keep it up. She is doing great and really has a strong desire to learn. She pretty much has been living the gospel the whole time, other than the word of wisdom with the black tea. Other than that, she herself had a lot of the same thoughts that we shared with her about the plan of salvation, the gospel of Jesus Christ, and all of the commandments. She's great. She wasn't able to come to church on Sunday because she had to take her grandchildren back to their parents who live a couple hours from here. Even without her though, we had 14 people at church. We had a great fast and testimony meeting. We had 5of our investigators there, including Venera's son Alibek, and a new lady, Natal'ya. Two investigators stood and bore their testimonies, thanking the elders for helping them to learn more about the gospel, and all of the members also bore testimony. I even noticed that Natal'ya was crying a little bit while I was baring my testimony. That night, we decided to go to a Baptist service. We found a huge Baptist church so we decided to check it out. Honestly, it was really boring. Also, they had a hymn book in there with 2000 songs! Crazy.

The downer of the week happened when we met with Gulnafis, the other lady who we want to baptize on the 18th. She I guess just decided to open up and get some things off her chest. She just unloaded for the first half hour of our meeting! She has had a really tough life, which explains why she's a little bit different. She's really shy and very nervous all the time. It's a long story, but I'll tell it in short. She was married the traditional Kazakh way, her parents made an agreement with the parents of some guy and they were married. She said that she never loved this guy and that he never loved her. They had 2 daughters and she said that she would have left the guy if it weren't for the kids. Eventually she did leave him for a while, about a month. While she was gone, this guy was sitting in his car one day and just got really sick. She came back but he ended up dying. She says that her relatives blamed her for the death, even claiming that she had probably poisened him somehow. She went into deep depression and her family, as happens far too often, put her into a psychiatric hospital. I have met a couple people who have been in these hospitals in Russia, they always come out about 5 times worse than they went in. These places are bad news. So naturally she came out for the worse. She says after the hospital, she was beginning to understand that her oldest daughter wanted to destroy Kazakhstan... okay... and that she is a really talanted girl so she probably could do it. in her words "I knew that I needed to kill her. Thank goodness I didn't do it... of course I tried, but it didn't happen" Elder Hasbiullin and I were just sitting there with our mouths open. We just kept listening and then finally at the end of the story we tried to teach our lesson. It didn't work that great, and to add to it, she started just saying how she really doesn't understand why we need to be baptized and stuff. She really doesn't quite understand repentance and some other things. We are still working with her, but I'm not so sure she'll be baptized on the 18th.

Anyway, in better news, on Tuesday we took our real p-day. Today we are just writing home and buying groceries then we will work. Tuesday, we, along with Elder Maxwell and Alibek, took a 3 hour train to a city called Borovoy. Supposedly the best nature in Kazakhstan. It was really pretty, but nothing we couldn't see in Idaho or Utah. There was a big lake, some mountains, some different trails and stuff to go on. We walked along a path that went along the lake. It was really pretty and really fun. A really nice relaxing day. We played cards in the train on the way up and back which was also fun. We played scum and a Russian game called Durak. I'll have to teach you that game, it's pretty fun. It was also good to spend an entire day with Alibek. I think he'll eventually get baptized, which will be really cool. While we were there waiting for our train home, the police came and did a check on our documents. They do that every once in a while. I have been stopped probably about 5 times since I've been in Kazakhstan. You just have to show your documents and they leave. I almost didn't even grab my passport that morning. I remember thinking, I probably won't need it, but I'll grab it anyway. Elder Hasbiullin just had a copy of his documents, the problem is that his copy has been in his bag for the past 3 months, so it is all dirty and ripped. The cops didn't like that, and started saying that he was a foreigner without documents. They actually took him and Elder Jensen away for a few minutes. Elder Jensen still doesn't have his registration or accredidation, technically he was illegal, ha. We were a little worried but we knew it would work out okay. We still don't know why, but they just let Elder Jensen go, even though he was clearly illegal. They also let Hasbiullin go, so everything worked out good.

Yesterday was the last time for me to handle English club. We take turns each week switching off between elders. It was a good English club, then after that we had our family night where we played musical chairs. I can't remember for sure, but I'm pretty sure I haven't lost a game of musical chairs since I was in like 3rd grade. Sure enough, I won last night as well. I even floored two girls, one of which was Sister Maxwell! I felt a little bad but hey, what can you do?

Anyway, things are going good. I'm trying to stay focused and work hard. It's really easy when you are on lessons to focus and teach the lessons, but on the streets sometimes it is tempting to think, I'm never even going to get to work with these people, and it is easy to be a little lazy. I really want to work hard my last couple weeks though, I know it will be worth it in the end. Of course I can say that I am way excited to go home and see everyone. I still can't really believe that it's coming, but somewhere in the back of my mind I can see that it is real and that in two weeks I will be with my family once again. That will be a sweet time for me, but as for now, I really need to dig down and find some strength to work hard these last weeks. It will all work out great. Thanks everyone for writing, next week I'll be able to write home for the last time. Have a great week, I love you guys.

Elder Geddes