Looking Forward to Christmas

Dear Family!

So! I don't know about packages still - if I find something affordable, I'll be sure and send the toy and such, but for now I have... something else for you. :) You'll have to wait to see what!

Funny thing about Christmas here, though is that - it doesn't really exist. Maybe as a by-product of Communism when Aetheism was the name of the game, almost all of the traditions I normally associate with Christmas have been surrplanted onto New Year's! Santa, Trees, lights, presidents, music, romantic images of snow and villages and stuff. Also - their "Christmas Day" doesn't happen until Jan. 7. The combined affect being that - no one acknowledges the Birth of Christ (either day), but every buys stuff and gets drunk out of their minds on New Year's.
hm.

There are a lot of interesting Seasonal things though. i.e. Here, Santa does all his work with his niece, a blonde girl dressed in blue who has apparently the replacement for Santa's elfs. Santa still does most of the work - I can't really figure out what her specific purpose is - but since she makes a prettier advertisement, she's equally common on billboards and stickers and cards.

There's a winter fruit here called the "hurma". Sister Jackson probably already described it for you, but it's absolutely bizarre. Orangish-red, and (as she describes it :) A hybrid of a tomato and guava. It's sweet and slurpy and good in small doses, though the last time I ate a whole fruit at one time, my mouth was coated in a weird filmy-grime that was not delicious nor comfortable. Luckily some bread cleaned it off quickly, but I still haven't tried it again since.

I definitely do have boots. I bought some cheap ones at the Market back in October, expecting that thy would fall apart and then bought another, really high-quality pair of boots for after the Rinok (market) pair fell apart.
The cheap ones are still strong though, and really perfect for the wet, but warm, weather that we're having right now.

SO! I'll try and write some more snail mail home. I sent another one last week so that should come...some time.
Until then, though - I LOVE YOU A LOT MORE THAN YOU THINK!! :) :)

Look good, smell good, be good!

Sister Laura Smith

Cvyashenneeya Korovka!

HI FAMILY!!!

I'M SO SO SO SORRY I "DIDN'T" WRITE LAST WEEK. :(

Phoo! The internet was wretched. I wrote a big long letter and then it was all lost and shortly thereafter logged me out.

For the rest of the day, I was writing a letter and buying Russian sweets to send but the post office was then super busy and they didn't accept my box unless I sewed it up in burlap first, and told me that even if I DID sew it up, it would be 1000 rubles (= 65 or some dollars) to ship and it would take two months. Argus blargus!

I wanted to send you a really cute toy that speaks in Russian too. :(

BY FAR, I think the hardest days for me have been when I've tried to write/communicate home and been foiled at every turn!

So...yeah.

Last P day was not my favorite.

I'll keep the toy and show it when I get home, though. :)

Also - THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE MAIL!!! Yes, I got the packages, Mom! But don't worry about anything - I have everything I need here already, the most valuable part of packages is just knowing that YOU sent them! :) But it's much more fun to get mail and read about all of your cool scriptural/life/anything insights. I'm sorry if I can't respond to every one individually - there's so little time for anything on Pday. But I save ALL the letters! And I especially love the picture-letters. That was a brilliant idea. :)

(Packages are too expensive anyway. And then I just have to carry more stuff in my suitcase.)

Anyway - yes, we went to Lithuania for a Visa trip, it was great - saw all our old district, exchanged drunk and/or crazy people stories.

Zone Conference was a pumper-upper. Loved it, as usual. We watched General Conference for almost half the time too - it was great. Elder Holland's talk stood out to me again as really really really awesome.

I'm still in Samara - same area, also still with Sister Melneekova, we're dropping investigators like crazy because apparently, it's not fashionable to keep commitments or answer phones these days. But we contact every night with the members and they're progressing at amazing speeds!! I can't even believe how solid and bold they are.

Oh no! I'm already out of time!

Okay, I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU!

Til next week - HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Sister Smith

Russia Samara Mission Photo

Ohmygoodnessit'salreadyNovember!

HI MOM AND DAD AND DREW AND EVE AND CONRAD AND CHRISTIAN!

Surprise! I AM writing home this week! Turns out our Visa trip is tomorrow so...neato! I get to talk to you again! (kind of)

What do you want for Christmas? It's just around the corner, I realized, so I'd better start preparing now. I don't know how expensive it is to send stuff to America, but I'll at least send some candy and pictures.

Oh my goodness. The beds here are the most uncomfortable things EVER. It feels like sleeping on a cardboard balancing beam. blech. So be grateful for beds too this year.

Oh my goodness II. Russians have like no holidays! I think this is a huge culture gap that is just always going to be huge because I don't understand how they can go without Halloween and Thanksgiving and (for the most part) Christmas every year and still want to live.

Wow.

Ummm, what else? I think I'm running out of time. Zone Conference this week, I don't think I'll be transferred, but...you never know.

Mormon 8-9 are so amazing. I read them today and had the strongest confirmation that Moroni really did see our day and was writing to us "as if we were present but we were not". Compare and Contrast with JSH - very interesting. I also thought of Elder Holland's talk on the Book of Mormon as I read his words - because after all that he had seen and endured if he didn't absolutely know that it was true and that those records were important - he wouldn't have done what he did.

Okay, I love you times a million!

Till next week!

Sister Smith

Laura's in Church News

Church News has a story on Elder Nelson's recent visit to Samara. If you look closely at the last photo in the story, you can see Laura in the front row of missionaries.

Brrr!

Здраствуете!!

You have no idea how long it took me to peck that out on a Russian Keyboard.

Anyway - HI FAMILY!

This week it got colder. My companion and I contact in Winter Boots now and that's cozy, but I'm still not sure how to best brace myself for December. The elders of our branch have had (as of now) Two baptisms this cycle! Woohoo! They're pretty great. Elders Hanson and Beck.

The funny thing about oncoming winter is that it makes everyone dress like Russians! (go figure!) What I mean by that is - the stereotyped image of Russians that I've had in my head ever since watching "Anastasia". They really do dress like that! It's funny. I like it. It makes me want to sing Anastasia-songs. And I do. Mostly in my head though, because English isn't allowed while we're on the street.

There are still tons of Women selling wares/vegetables/beans on the street though. I wonder how long they'll stay out there.

I think the trees are tougher here too - there are still some with green leaves! They're not full or luscious, but they're still lean and green.

When I get back I want to study the history of Russia. Especially WWII. I was talking to our RS President (Olga) last night after she'd been contacting with us and she was telling me about WWII in Russia - there are so many stories here that (I) have never been told!

The language is getting better. Thank you for your prayers! It's not easy yet, but I can understand most of what I hear now.

This letter is kind of scattered. Let's see, how to end this well?

Dad - you said we always have to be ready to teach in your letter. We already talk to all the ladies selling things around our apartment and everyone on the street, but our new effort is to find the members who have already been baptized and confirmed but for some reason fell away. I would second that and also ask you all to do the same thing. One of the biggest struggles here is the huge drop-off in members after they're baptized. We're trying to visit more inactives this week and get them to come back, but this is an issue church-wide - you can be missionaries too! It's all just getting his children on or back on the straight and narrow.

Okay, I love you with or without swine flu, but I hope that you don't get it all the same.

MUAH!!!

Sister Smith

Elder Nelson Visits Russia

HI FAMILY!

Dad - don't be afraid of worms, just think of it as a super-duper easy weight loss program. :) The only real reason you have for not wanting to pick me up is because it will be in DECEMBER. In RUSSIA.

The other night I had a dream that I was on a beach somewhere and I had the Beach Boys' song, "Cocomo" stuck in my head when I woke up. Then I had to face the uncomfortable reality that we were going to be contacting for 8 hours in Russian cold. woohoo.

And it's not even winter yet! This is "fall".

Deladna! (phonetic Russian = whatever.)

Elder Nelson was here this week and that was AWESOME. His grandson, Elder Preston Witwer, is serving here too (and claim to fame! He was my district leader last cycle which means I'm practically his great granddaughter). That was really special to see them reunite. He gave a conference for us missionaries and then for all the Russian members in the area the following two days. He talked a lt about family and the importance of strengthig homes as a fortress against the workings of the adversary - of teaching children eternal truths often and with love and expressing love for them and your spouse often. One funny thing - he talked about the importance of hanging images of Christ, the temple, the first presidency and the family in your home - especially on the Refrigerator and around the dinner table because those are prime spots for daily teaching opportunities.

He also talked about a temple in Russia and stated emphatically that Russia will not have a temple until the Saints here do two things: 1) get enough members to support a temple, and 2) convert their family history into a form that the church can use for records.

I thought it was interesting how much we talked about records/record-keeping. The scriptures are so vital to everything we do - so important to keeping us mindful of the commandments and covenants we have promised to keep. It's almost too bad that it's so easy to access the scriptures now - we forget how precious they are.

Yep, I was right. Already out of time.

I hope you are all happy and healthy and well. I LOVE YOU SUPER MUCH!

Till next week!<3 <3 <3

Sister Smith

Teach and preach and work as missionaries do

Hi Fam!

Wow. Busy week. We had a lot of meetings but not many leads. A lot of contacting, and at least two people we ran into this week were former investigators of the Elders who worked in this area many years ago. Unfortunately, they still aren't interested in progressing in the Gospel, but at least they have our number now - maybe someday.

Working with the members is great. I can't stress how vital they are - they give so much perspective to the Church/Gospel. We look a little like machines, I think, programmed to preach and teach, but they're real people and they know what it's like to live the Gospel and a regular life here in Samara. They have so much passion for the Gospel too! Since pretty much everyone in Russia is a convert of less than 20 years (usually less than 10), they also realize how much their lives have changed and they can share those experiences. It's great.

Has anyone told you that Elder Nelson is coming tomorrow!?!?! I'm super stoked. He's here for three days speaking to missionaries and members on Friday and then Saturday/Sunday, respectively. Don't worry, I'll take notes for you. :)

Okay, I have somewhat more to say on Russian oddities.

Food is very different. Have I mentioned the fleshy-colored meat-jello spread that my companion uses on bread every day? I haven't had the courage to try it yet.

Or Kefier? Which is like in between cream and yogurt and very sours until you add some sugar and drink it. That's delicious. I drink two litres per week. :)

What about Tvorog? It's kind of like cottate cheese, but drier, like sour cream, but thicker, like kefier but chunkier - anyway, you mix it with sugar and put on little blinchickee - Russian crepes - and it's delicious.

Also kind of about food - I think I have worms because I eat a cart load of food every day and never feel the effects. Sister Melneekova says that's normal for Americans, though, and that they'll give me pills to kill them when I come back. (haha, everything you didn't want to know about missionary work.)

I'm still wrestling with the language, but I can't complain because I remember saying multiple times before I got my call that I wanted to go some place where I was completely lost for the first three months and then felt the click of understanding. God gives us the desires of our hearts! :)

One cool thing about the gift of Tongues, though: Yesterday in companionship-inventory, Sister Melneekova told me that sometimes while we're contacting I'll be talking and using all kinds of words that I shouldn't know with as much experience as I have. She said, "I can't understand how your Russian can be so bad and then you something so intelligent!" (roughly translated). That was neat. At least I sound smart sometimes.

I hope you're all healthy (again) and happy and having a jolly old time preparing for Halloween. They don't celebrate it here, but I'M going to. And then play Christmas music that night.

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!

Sister Smith

Love in Russia

HI FAMILY!

Wow, what a week. We started a new program where we work with the members every night of the week - they sign up to have their apartments open so that whenever we have a meeting that night, we can just call them up and tell them we're on our way and they're ready. It's brilliant really, and saves us a lot of time looking for someone who happens to be home and available at the time(s) we need.

There's something I've been meaning to do since the MTC, and kept forgetting until now. I wanted to speak to my Grandparents: Grandpa Mumford, and Grandma and Grandpa Smith. (I can send messages to Moms whenever I want :) spirit-mail.)

I don't know if I've ever told you how much I love you. But here, especially, I think about you a lot. The sacrifices you have made to be good people and how you continue to love and instruct your children/grandchildren even when they're too busy or distracted to properly thank you for it. One of the important roles of the Gospel is turning the hearts of the children to the fathers and the hearts of the fathers to the children. As I listened to General Conference this last weekend, they talked a lot about Families and their eternal importance. I want you to know that I thought about you a lot. I thought about Moms and Neill an Marla Jean a lot too. I'm very sure that as the choir sang "I Need Thee Every Hour" All three of them were in the room with me.

I have such a testimony of the Plan of Salvation and that it was created so that we can go to meet God again together. We taught about the Plan of Salvation just last night to one of our investigators, Lubov, and the Spirit bore witness to me again of how sacred our time on Earth is. It also bore witness of how important the temple is in forging the eternal bonds that will hold us together after this life. If there is one thing worth doing in this life, it has to be creating (and respecting) that covenant. I love you and I'm very grateful for you.

I'm running short on time again.

I had one more challenge for everyone, because Conference talked a lot about Love. I thought about something Mom told me once, "There's enough hate in the world, you don't need to add any more to it."

My challenge to you is to Stop saying you hate anything. You can still look on sin with the least degree of allowance, but I think if we want to be filled with love, it has to start with the small and simple things.

And with that, I love you! Glad to hear you're well and that the weather's nice. I'll let you know in eight months when we can stop going outside with comforter-coats on.

Have a splendid week!

Sister Smith

Laura's New Companion: Sister Melneekova

And the race against the clock begins again! Or continues...depending on how you see it.

First things First, I GOT YOUR LETTERS! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! It's the first time in six weeks I've gotten mail and I didn't realize how badly I was starving to hear from you until they handed me a plump little packet of letters. I read all of them! And I'm so proud of you. I can't believe how much older you sound from just four months ago! wow. I'll try to respond to the questions I remember, but if I don't...my apologies! =\

Christian - I sent my badge home because that was my English-MTC badge, I got a Russian badge for Russia, so I didn't need the English one anymore.

Eve - Sounds like you're having a blast, guess what? I FINALLY found you a birthday card! Not that they're hard to find, I just haven't had time to look for one. But Eventually it will be sent!!!

Mom - In answer to your questions, YES, I got the letters. And I hung your hug-letter on the wall next to my bed. :)

Kristin and Mike - Thanks for the letters!! I think you're swell. Hope your rectus feels better Mike, and Kristin - keep me updated with Invader Zim. Especially if he lands the mother-ship (wink wink, nudge nudge).

Right then.

Zone Conference and Transfers were this week. Both of which were excellent. My new Companion is Sister Melneekova from Siberia. She's a little bundle of fun. And very clean. She wants to learn English and was disappointed when I said I wanted to speak Russian all the time, but she's a good sport about it and I try to give her random English lessons whenever occasion permits.

Holy cow it's getting cold fast! This is normal and even warm for Sister Melneekova, but I'm getting very worried about surviving until Spring. Luckily, the ward members all say that this will be a warm winter (due to global warming or something) and that is A-OK with me. Global Warming is my friend.

I've been thinking a lot about Obedience lately. It's a big theme of our mission....

In my experience, obedience is hard primarily because, as Pres. Benson said in "Beware of Pride", it means accepting someone else's authority over you, and accepting their choices as your own. With some things, you can see the benefit of the rule and obedience is simple because you can see why you should choose it too.
Most of the time though, rules are incovenient or unpopular or seemingly trivial and we don't know why we obey until after we do it. You gain the witness AFTER the trial of your faith. I've found through obedience to Mission rules, many of which are very small and may seem like they don't matter, that every rule you obey brings you a little closer in harmony with the Spirit. After all - God is order, and exact obedience brings exact order.

Missionaries and Church members are often accused of being "robotic" because they choose to be obedient. If that accusation has ever come against you, remember that it's really just an act of faith and that our job here is to make ourselves one with him - to follow His rules and prepare to accept the same responsibilities He has. Obedience is faith. Go read about the stripling warriors again. It was their Obedience that exhibited their faith and gave them power.

And after all - do we think that the Celestial Kingdom has no rules? We're learning incrementally so that we'll be ready to follow the big-league rules when we get there.

Now I'm out of time again. blast!

I LOVE YOU!

Sister Smith

First Transfer Week

Hi Family!!

First cycle is already over! Wow.

We had a mini-transfer this morning. I am now with a mini-missionary named Yulia. She's a member of the church here in Samara and volunteered to serve a short week and half mission while we wait for more full-time missionaries from the MTC.

Sister Horenko is serving in another part of Samara right now.

It's like Utah-November here already. I need to buy boots today. There's not snow yet, but My legs are getting really cold.

The trees are beautiful though! They're all changing color and leaf-littering all over the place. I love it.

One funny thing about Samara - they have an amazing street-maintainance work force. Every day they're out sweeping the streets of leaves and litter (and there's a LOT of litter to pick up). They also have Street-cleaners that drive around cleaning the streets all the time. Strangely, though, there's not very much street-construction-maintaince. i.e. All the side walks and streets are really broken up and uneven. There's dirt and mud puddles everywhere and when it rains it gets really...fun. haha. Maybe that's why Russians are so OCD about their cars and shoes? Because when they're clean it really means something. who knows?

I've become the unofficial pianist of the ward. I don't know how that happened because I am not at all good at playing without practice and especially when people are singing with the music, but somehow it did. We've taken a keyboard (from the branch building) back to our apartment so that I can learn the hymns for meetings, choir and Primary. Speaking of which - our primary here is a grand total of six, if everyone comes. I think I know why I was called to serve in the Nursery last summer. Also - the primary songs are so much fun! I didn't know they'd translated so many into Russian already. :)

In personal study lately, I've been reading about Ammon and brethren again. Those stories are so much cooler when you're a real missionary! I've also been thinking about member-missionary work and a quote from preach my Gospel that talks about home and visiting teaching and the grand purpose of the church.

I think I had an epiphany.

In the past, I've always thought of missionary work as a separate thing - something important, but in it's own sphere in the church. Like the church was a big bubble, and missionary work was a smaller side-bubble. (I wish I could be drawing this...) Being here, though, has changed that vision though - it's really all just one bubble. This IS the purpose of the church - to invite people to come unto Christ. To get each individuals eyes open to the fact that our purpose here is to get outside of ourselves so that we can take his name upon us. Satan, of course, has gotten really good at distracting us and getting us to think that we own our own lives - that only what we feel matters - that a sport or a hobby or an occupation is more important than the Gospel because that's what's happening in OUR lives.

It's so paradoxical, but so simple at the same time! In Moses 7, we learn that we are really just given two commandments here - to love one another and to choose Him. Every other commandment can be traced back to one of those two.

And that's what really matters.

now I'm out of time.

love love love love love

Sister Smith

Laura braces herself for winter ... in September?

Well, that was a short week, wasn't it? :)

Hello again!

It's already getting really cold here. Members and missionaries were telling me horror stories about the REAL winter that's about to set in about a month. Apparently the enormous coat that I thought would surely be up to a Russian winter will probably only keep me warm for another couple of weeks.

Um, yes. I am scared.

The work right now is very interesting - I feel like I understand contacting a lot better now. And I'm much better at applying the Gospel to why they need it in their lives without sounding overbearing or like I'm trying to trample their religion. It's the greatest feeling to meet someone and after three minutes know that the Spirit is touching their heart for maybe the first time, then to ask for their number and have them say Yes! :)

Unfortunately, when we call back a day later, many of those people have already lost interest and prematurely hang up.

Luckily, I've managed to convince myself that all of those people will come back to the church later (the average person has about 7 contacts with the missionaries before they accept the lessons according to P. Bennett) and become fully active Relief Society presidents - they're just not ready today.

I've been reading a lot about the Restoration and the Atonement because I still don't understand how much of a miracle they were. The more I study, th more vast and miraculous they become. We take for granted how important the church is in our lives, but wow - without it, we would be completely lost. It breaks my heart when people walk by us saying "Don't need it" because they literally have no conception of how much they DO need it.

I think one of the greatest gifts the Lord has given me here is an identity. A mission strips you away from everything that made up your identity before: an artist, an animation student, a BYU student, a Wisconsinite, a Utahn, a Yogi, whatever -and lets you see what really matters. It's your heart that makes you who you are - how much love it has for other people, how much it desires an eternity with the One True God, how often it's compelled to reach out and be a friend instead of focusing on something else. I know that's been said before, but I never understood it until now.

I can't tell you how grateful I am to have the Gospel in my life. To have the privelege of the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost. To have the opportunity to talk to the Almighty Creator and our Father through prayer whenever I want. To be able to erase my (many) mistakes through the Atonement whenever I desire to Repent. What a precious, incomparable gift he gave us!

And it's free.

For everyone.

I hope you know that I know it's true. And that I love you and pray for you all the time. I'm so grateful to have you as my family. And to know that you will ALWAYS be my family.

Okay, I'm crying now.

Have a great week, much much love,

Sister Smith