Mongolia Mission Week 18 - Spring? in Sainshand

 Mongolia Mission Week 18

Our hope with this blog is to share highlights with our family and friends about our exciting opportunities and awesome responsibilities in Mongolia. It's an impossible task, though, because it's hard to condense everything into a few words and pictures. So ask us individually if you'd like to know more about anything! You can contact us by email (jrose219@gmail.com or krose213@gmail.com), Facebook messenger, or you can text Kathy's phone (515-537-3273). 

The Tsagaan Sar holiday, which seems (among other things), to be a celebration of spring, ushered in some warmer weather. We've had several days in the 50's, which feels incredible. Kathy has bid her long coat farewell. Kids are starting to wear tennis shoes to school instead of fur-lined boots. We hear that spring also ushers in sand storms, but we've only had one day of that experience, so far. Blowing sand and tumbleweed races!

The  warmer weather has caused small

children to appear on the playground

outside our apartment.

This downtown concrete framework has been

untouched all winter and now activity has resumed.

Building safety standards are not like the US ones.  

This is an enclosed balcony off our apartment. The
insides of the windows have been coated with thick ice
crystals all winter. We got to see what's really out there.

Turns out the answer was a dust storm. Maybe washing
windows is like washing your car, only instead of it
bringing rain, it brings dust. This was the next day!

Tumbleweeds piled up along our school fence.

Next topic, food again! Of course!

After Tsagaan Sar, we ended up with 15
very sturdy loaves of sweet, fried bread.
They last forever. People enjoy munching
on them or dip them in hot drinks.

We decided we could make them into bread pudding.
One loaf makes a 7x9 inch pan of bread pudding!

Tsagaan Sar may be officially over, but making and eating buuz (the traditional dumplings) is not. 

Chuka and Baagii invited some of us 
over for buuz. Their family is so warm
and welcoming and is the anchor
of our church group.

Alice invited all of us Americans who teach English at the 3rd School to join her and her daughter, Michelle, in making buuz. It was fun and delicious. Schools in town are numbered. The 3rd school is the third one that was built in Sainshand; it was built in 1957.

 

After buuz-making, Michelle, who is 5,
read us some stories in English.
Her English is awesome!

We ended the week with a Mutual activity where the youth worked on making "Look unto Christ" bracelets using the pattern provided in the church instructions for this year's youth theme. Turns out they take longer to make than we anticipated, but we had a great turnout and everyone seemed to enjoy the activity. A lot of attendees were from the English classes we all teach at the church.

Most of the kids just got creative and
made bracelets, necklaces, or phone
dangles out of beads.

Every Sunday turns out to be unexpected and amazing. Imagine preparing a Sunday School lesson knowing that you could be teaching only missionaries, only the one main family in our group and a bunch of little boys, or all of the above, maybe with an investigator or two. It's a daunting prospect, one that needs language interpretation and lots of inspiration. But this is the Lord's work, and He directs the lessons to suit the needs of whoever is there in beautiful and inspiring ways. 

On the 16th, there were very few of our local members in attendance - just 3 teens. But several people showed up who are interested in learning more about the gospel. In fact, 11 non-members attended. That's the most we've seen since we've been in Sainshand.

We had great discussions together, and the non-members actually took part in teaching each other. Two of the non-members, a boy and a girl, were teens whose English is phenomenal, and they helped translate! Asked to help translate John's sacrament meeting talk, the girl found herself trying to explain terminology she had never heard before, like "Restoration" and priesthood." She was assisted from the audience by the elders and sisters and also the other teen investigator. Afterwards, she said she really didn't want to do that again, but then she became so involved in the Sunday School discussion that she found herself translating it as well! When an investigator lady would ask a question, Kathy, the teacher, would answer it, but both the question and the answer needed translation that she, the other teen, and the sisters provided. It worked! The 3 people stayed after church for an hour to talk and ask more questions. And the Spirit was so strong. 

Then the investigator lady invited us to come over and eat and play games with her family. It was a delightful evening getting to know her family!

Every family plays Shagai, the ankle bone game.

The daughter, whose dance competition
medals are on the living room wall,
showed us a traditional dance.

In other news of this week, our sweet puppy who currently lives with Steven and his family in Nebraska, turned 5 years old. We miss her. And our family. But we appreciate their love and support. We have been blessed by prayers from home, and we thank you all!

And, even in Mongolia, we got to see the "blood moon."

We close this week with a quote from Alma 30:44: " ..... and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator."  

We see that witness of God in the animals, the sun, the moon, the stars, and the tumbleweeds. We see God's hand in the people of Mongolia. In how our Sunday meetings go. And in the help we receive as we teach lessons, meet people, and work with such amazing young people who are also here to serve the people of Mongolia. God's love for His children is amazing! We are so blessed to get to experience it and be witnesses of it.