Barrett's email, Monday, August 13th 2012

Volga meets the Oka

Sand dune jumping

Contemplating the jump

Smolensk 

my "mattress" 

Tsaritsino park. 

Oh, my goodness! I am so sorry I didn't email yesterday. It was a crazy day. I don't have any time to write right now, but luckily I wrote the summary of the week on the iphone yesterday while traveling, which I will cut and paste. It sounds like you had a great week. Thank you for the pictures! To be honest I really could only skim the email, but it sounds like things were great, sunday dinner, etc. Be careful with those books. I trust you:)

Ok, here is the email

What a week. So from last p-day, let's see. So after I emailed last week, we went to a forest that reminded me a lot of Sly Park. We played capture the flag with watermelons as flags, but we ended up getting tired of that and just eating the watermelon. Then we went around this lake to these awesome sand dunes and jumped off them. It was a ton of fun. (Dillon Beach is better). Nizhny Novgorod is awesome. 

So then Tuesday was our office day. Transfers are coming up. Another big group of greenies: 6 new Elders and 2 new Sisters. We have to open up two new areas. There is a companionship opening a city up near Yaroslavl. Exciting times.

Wednesday we were out in Smolensk. Smolensk is the western most city in the mission (ie the closest to you guys). It was fantastic. Smolensk is also one of the cities in which a young missionary is the branch president. That's intense. We're there studying Preach My Gospel for the first hour, he's studying the Handbook 1. Crazy! Then on Friday we were back in Moscow for a second office day. I guess with school starting up soon, they needed some extra help planning travel for transfers and visa trips. So, that's always fun. 

Then Saturday we were with a companionship in Moscow. The miracle of the day was when my companion called an old number from the area book he got a lady who didn't even know the person we were looking for, but got interested in coming to church. One problem was that she didn't live in the area we were currently in, but (and here's the miracle) she lived in the area of the Elders were going to be with on Sunday! Granted she didn't end up showing up, but for a little while it was a way awesome miracle. Haha

Sunday we were with the Elders of the Sokolniki ward, so we went to church with them. It was my first time in that ward. 

We ended up staying with the Sokolniki Elders til p-day. The plan was to write home on the iPhone while we were traveling to the next area, but the iPhone was malfunctioning, so right now I'm on the metro writing this email in the "Notes" app. Haha. I'm so sorry I wasn't able to send this yesterday. I hope everything is going well. I haven't even been able to read your email yet. 

Ok, gotta go. Love you. Have a great week. I'll try to do better next week. 

Love 

Elder Hamp

P.S. How did the Olympics go?