December 3, 2006

We’re back and it’s morning again in
Krasnoyarsk it was a good time overall. We met up
with Pastor Pasha, who was a good friend of
Bruce’s the last times that he had come to
Russia. With him we met a girl named Nastye…
that’s kind of how it’s pronounced.
It’s short for Anastasia. She came along with
our crew and helped a bit with translation and with
some of Pasha’s songs(She had just got back from
spending 3 weeks in Canada… She wants to attend
school there). The girls really enjoyed having
another girl on the team, and she gave us some insight
into the mind of some of the youth there. I, for
example, have large mitts, a bright orange scarf and a
toque with a pompom on the top of it. Typical
Canada… sort of anyways.  It turns out
that there are two reasons to chuckle at my wardrobe.
Pompoms on toques are usually worn only by kids under
5. But in my defence, there are some people now who
are getting with it and have pompoms too! I am not
alone! Anastasia came up to me yesterday morning and
she had my mitts. I told her that they were and she
explained that she had borrowed them because they had
a ways to walk the night before in the cold and she
needed them. Then she added, ‘Oh, and I took a
picture of them and showed my dad and he had a good
laugh.’… lol… it’s the mitts.
They’re these large white skidoo mitts with a
trigger finger. Haha, she said they reminded her of
the Ninja Turtles off of TV. That’s life I
guess.
Rhys, Bryce and myself were able to stay in the house
of Ira (ee-ra) and Natasha her sister. They were fun
to have as hosts, but we had a rough time trying to
communicate. Most of the time we tried to use
gestures and different sounds. They were very kind to
us and we enjoyed staying there. We had an Indian
meal once (I guessed RIGHT!!!) and I noticed that a
particular tapestry in the living room had a very
oriental flair to it and so I inquired as such.
Unfortunately I was told it was Russian… hmm, I
was thinking… it has to be from China… or
at least from near China. Right then Ira came running
back in and got out one English word.
‘Mongolia!’ she said with a large smile.
That made my day… it was nice to have a piece of
China in a room with me again. It felt very homely.


We did 3 programs the first day, and come to think of
it, 3 the day after too. At all of them Pasha did a
couple Russian songs. They’re really catchy.
They’re kind of blues meets jazz meets typical
Spanish. I am hoping to get one of his cds from one
of the churches here in town. Pasha’s one of
those guys that humble you just by being
himself… He reminded me a lot of Pastor Rob from
my school years. It is very evident that God is with
him. He told us jokes and tried pieces of English
here there and everywhere. In fact, he was the only
Russian so far who was able to pronounce Saskatchewan
fairly well! After all the 2 days of programs we as a
team were a little stressed … so we took some
time in the morning to pray and discuss team
issues…After things had settled we realized we
had used up the time we were going to use for sliding
at the hill…(or hills as Divnygorsk is all
mountainous hill type country). We were planning to
go tour the large dam in the area… but we
thought about it a minute, and we all decided we
should go sliding and just enjoy being with our
friends there. So we did! And we had an absolute
blast!!! lol, for Tim and Nathan, missed you guys
here… it reminded me of old times at little Red!
 There was a childhood friend of
Pasha’s there who was flying around the area on
a Skidoo, and if we were at the bottom when he was, he
would give us a ride up to the top. That was real
cool. 7 of us loaded ourselves onto a skidoo and a
dogsled tied onto the back and he’d motor it up
to the top… He had to push it real hard to get
it up there. Heh, I don’t think that skidoo was
unused to punishment though… it had no shell and
constantly backfired… I saw him trying to ramp
it up a ditch incline that was covered in rocks the
size of my head… lol, it was quite the sight!

Eventually we had tea at Pasha’s to say goodbye,
and then we had a prayer, packed into the vehicles and
were off to do a children’s program at an
Orphanage. When we arrived, we were greeted by
several of the children… it was really cool. We
went and set up and we finished getting ready for the
34 kids that would be coming… and when they came
in, we knew immediately that we were going to have an
interesting program. Two Thirds of the kids who came
were in their early or late teens. AUGH! lol, then
our cd music and sounds went on the fritz… that
was awkward… but I was sure glad we had a
guitar. We whipped out the guitar and many balloons
for everyone. Anyways, it all worked out… we
had a great time and we finished, came home and
relaxed and went to bed.
But alas! Today is new, we have a program in less
than 2 hours for a youth event. Have a great one, and
thanks for your prayers!
Take care and God bless!
~J