Happy Monday!

Dear everyone,

What a week! Sorry this letter is delayed/short but internet cafes don't always want to make myldsmail.net work apparently.... I'll do my best! :)

So, last week a returned missionary from this mission came to church (he was in Europe and "decided to visit Chelyabinsk"). He actually openedthis city, so that was pretty cool. Well, we were doing less active stop-bys on Monday night, and we went to this nice old lady's house (she's soooo wonderful) and she teared up when she saw us. Apparently it was "her" missionary that had come the day before, and he visited with her, and she was soooo happy that we also hadn't forgotten about her, too. He had asked her if missionaries still came, and she had answered yes, and he asked "Sister Brown and Sister Blau, right?" and she said yes. And the next day we happened to stop to see her, and she told us that experience and was tearing up and said, "I'm so grateful I'm not forgotten!" (Not sure if that story made much sense in writing, but it was really a cool experience.)

Tuesday, President Christensen came to town. He and some of the senior missionaries introduced us to the 12-step recovery program for addictions that LDS family services has developed (it's based of Alcoholics Anonymous' 12-step program) and incorporates Gospel principles and scriptures into the lessons. It's basically 12 guides on how to use the Atonement, and it's wonderful because it really applies to everything not just addictions. The program is in Russian now, so we're going to start implementing it here with people, and it really will be a blessing. We talked about the difference between just repenting from an addiction and recovering from an addiction. They're two completely different things. Our role as missionaries in all of this is just to function as the translators between the certified "counselors" (the senior couples) and the member with addiction problems. I've already been participating in this program for a couple of weeks because we've started it with some people, and it's been great! It's really a wonderful program, and if you can find it online (https://addictionrecovery.lds.org/?lang=eng), I would encourage you to read it. As a district, we talked about how it applies to problems with pride/ego, low self-esteem, anger problems, and pretty much any problem that could really take over your life and prevent you from reaching your full potential.

Wednesday at English group we had a cool experience. A lady showed up to English group that was wonderful (she speaks 100% perfect English) and all of us were kind of wondering who she was. Well! Turns out that she is a former investigator from about five years ago, and she's again interested in meeting with the missionaries! I was able to get her number and set an appointment up with her, so that was really awesome. 

Saturday we had a really fun sports activity. It's at this huge park here, and it was so great. There were these really cool jungle gym structures, and they weren't little kid ones either. There were adult-sized HUGE jungle gyms. It wasn't for fun either. All these really intense-looking guys were doing really incredible workouts on these things that basically were just metal bars. It was crazy. There was also a 15-foot climbing rope. I'll try to take pictures next time we go. If that place existed in America, I'm sure I would go all the time. It was also in a beautiful location (right in the middle of a grove of trees), and we saw some adult yoga classes going on, too. It was sweet. We played volleyball, and that was so fun. 

That's all that I really have time to say this week other than.... I love you!!! Have a wonderful week!

All the best, 

Sister Brown