Alright well first off thanks to all you that wrote me! I got lots ofmail this week which was way exciting and kinda supprising consideringmy email kinda sucked last week haha. sorry about that I was just supersick while I was at internet. I had to get up 4 times before I couldeven get throught that little letter so I just finished it and sent itbut I am feeling 100 times better now so that is VERY nice. (mansomething about Ukrainian food I swear...must be Vladamire's revenge ;-)
Anyway so I hope this letter will be more interesting than last week. first off I should say Happy birthday to Corinn and kelsey. guess what?YOU'RE GETTING OLD! haha jk. Ok so next thing...my new Comp. well he is my third Companion from idaho which puts me at 3/3. His name is elder davis and hes been on hismission for a year and a half. He still struggles quite a bit with thelanguage which gives us both alot of encouragement to do better atlearing and understanding but it also, of course, makes things a lilharder but its still worth it. We get along very well. He is very openminded and we have had alot of fun with eachother. I think I havelaughed more inthe last couple days than I have the whole rest of thetime I have been here. We have been doing alot of work getting our areabetter orginized which was quite a task but so far so good. we dong havea whole lot of promising people to teach right now but we have a fewthat with a lil push in the right direction could get the encouragement needed to do very well. 
So I know one of the things that is on all your minds when ever I write is my knee so I guess I should get to that before I kill you all withsuspense. So heres whats up (as far as I know right now) I calledpresident Andersen last friday night and explained what was going on andhe said he wanted me to see a doctor here in Kharkov so he was going tocall down to Kiev where they have a list of good certified doctors wecan see. So right now I am just waiting for a call from him to know whoand when I should see. I'm guessing it will be relativly soon becausenext weekend (in a week and a half) is Zone conf (which also means Iwill prolly be writing thurs or friday just as a heads up) so I figurepresident will want me to see a doctor before Zone conf so we can talkabout it when he comes up here. I'm sorry to all you who have had toworry about me because of this. Althought it has, of course, made thingsa little more difficult while I have been here I have absolutely noregrets about the decisions I made before coming out here. I have beenable to grow and learn more here than I think I could have anywhere elseand I have had opportunities to see miricles in a place that is sodesperately in need of them so I am still very happy I am here. I alsohope through all of this craziness we havent forgotten corinn and kelseycause I bet they have seen many more doctors than I have lately ;-) Ihope both of you are well and healthy and as you are praying for myhealth and safty I hope you know I do the same for you.
So real quick I want to tell you a story I forgot to tell you last week(cause I was feeling like garbage). So this actually happend beforeelder Cox left . But we were going out to visit and inactive girl I havementioned before her name is Ellia Gardushka and she live clear the heckout there so trips to her place require alot of time but we felt likethat day we should go out and check on her since we hadnt seen her atchurch. we went out and she wasnt home but we talked to her mom who isnot a memeber. Her mom said she would be interested to meet with us aswell as her daughter so that was really excitig but that isnt even thegood part of the story. So we were walking back down the forever longdirt road and we saw a man who had fallen down on the side of the roadand was bleading. He had obviously had a difficult life (like mostUkrainians) and this day was not an exception. As we crossed the streetto go help we saw a young lady (in her 20s) going to the different doorsasking people to help her because she did not have the streangth to liftthis man by her self and it was obvious he did not have the streangtheither. As she saw us coming she asked if we had come to help her and weanswered that we had. We picked the man up best we could and helped himto slowly move down the street to his home. as we were helping him theyoung lady offered to hold our books which we had in our hands. As wewalked down the street helping the man the young lady stared at thebooks we were carrying with the gold letters "Book of Mormon" and at thetwo young americans in clean white shirts helping this man none of usknew. after we got the man to his house is aunt came out of the nexthouse asking what happened and asking why we had taken time to help him.We just told her we did it cause we felt like it was right and we wouldhope everybody would be willing to do that for eachother. As we wereabout to leave the young lady remembered she was still carrying ourbooks and offered them back and just told us "You are the first realChristians I have seen. Thank you for helping me." Missionary work isnt all about tracting and teaching, It isnt about "keyIndicator" numbers, its showing people how to love and through a humbleexample showing a fraction of the love Christ had for each of us and hebore all of our burdens, all of our sicknesses, and all of our pain. Heis our streangth and our best example. He has overcome all so we donthave too. Just trust, thats all we need to do. Well thats about it for this week. Thanks for all your support it reallyhelps. I'll try and keep you updated on whats going on here so you dontworry too much.
So I know one of the things that is on all your minds when ever I write is my knee so I guess I should get to that before I kill you all withsuspense. So heres whats up (as far as I know right now) I calledpresident Andersen last friday night and explained what was going on andhe said he wanted me to see a doctor here in Kharkov so he was going tocall down to Kiev where they have a list of good certified doctors wecan see. So right now I am just waiting for a call from him to know whoand when I should see. I'm guessing it will be relativly soon becausenext weekend (in a week and a half) is Zone conf (which also means Iwill prolly be writing thurs or friday just as a heads up) so I figurepresident will want me to see a doctor before Zone conf so we can talkabout it when he comes up here. I'm sorry to all you who have had toworry about me because of this. Althought it has, of course, made thingsa little more difficult while I have been here I have absolutely noregrets about the decisions I made before coming out here. I have beenable to grow and learn more here than I think I could have anywhere elseand I have had opportunities to see miricles in a place that is sodesperately in need of them so I am still very happy I am here. I alsohope through all of this craziness we havent forgotten corinn and kelseycause I bet they have seen many more doctors than I have lately ;-) Ihope both of you are well and healthy and as you are praying for myhealth and safty I hope you know I do the same for you.So real quick I want to tell you a story I forgot to tell you last week(cause I was feeling like garbage). So this actually happend beforeelder Cox left . But we were going out to visit and inactive girl I havementioned before her name is Ellia Gardushka and she live clear the heckout there so trips to her place require alot of time but we felt likethat day we should go out and check on her since we hadnt seen her atchurch. we went out and she wasnt home but we talked to her mom who isnot a memeber. Her mom said she would be interested to meet with us aswell as her daughter so that was really excitig but that isnt even thegood part of the story. So we were walking back down the forever longdirt road and we saw a man who had fallen down on the side of the roadand was bleading. He had obviously had a difficult life (like mostUkrainians) and this day was not an exception. As we crossed the streetto go help we saw a young lady (in her 20s) going to the different doorsasking people to help her because she did not have the streangth to liftthis man by her self and it was obvious he did not have the streangtheither. As she saw us coming she asked if we had come to help her and weanswered that we had. We picked the man up best we could and helped himto slowly move down the street to his home. as we were helping him theyoung lady offered to hold our books which we had in our hands. As wewalked down the street helping the man the young lady stared at thebooks we were carrying with the gold letters "Book of Mormon" and at thetwo young americans in clean white shirts helping this man none of usknew. after we got the man to his house is aunt came out of the nexthouse asking what happened and asking why we had taken time to help him.We just told her we did it cause we felt like it was right and we wouldhope everybody would be willing to do that for eachother. As we wereabout to leave the young lady remembered she was still carrying ourbooks and offered them back and just told us "You are the first realChristians I have seen. Thank you for helping me." Missionary work isnt all about tracting and teaching, It isnt about "keyIndicator" numbers, its showing people how to love and through a humbleexample showing a fraction of the love Christ had for each of us and hebore all of our burdens, all of our sicknesses, and all of our pain. Heis our streangth and our best example. He has overcome all so we donthave too. Just trust, thats all we need to do. Well thats about it for this week. Thanks for all your support it reallyhelps. I'll try and keep you updated on whats going on here so you dontworry too much. I love you all.
Ct Ctat
