Tell the Other Phantoms

Dear Family and Loyal Blog Readers,

It does not some that long ago that I wrote you, probably because it really wasn't. The unfortunate thing about changing a P-day to the middle of the week is that when you get around to the normal P-day once again, you don't have a whole lot to write, since not a whole lot has happened since then.

Basically the end of this week was business as usual. I went and did my first round of missionary exchanges in Mitishi which is a suburb of Moscow that has a really Japanese sounding name. We have a set of Elders out there, and since it is in my district I get to do splits every transfer. This week I did splits with one of the Elders there, Elder Davis who is a really good guy. He is about a year younger than me on the mission, but we have both been serving in the Sokolniki district for the same amount of time and have become good friends. I enjoyed serving with him in the day, trying to find an inactive member (who actually wasn't inactive, our records were just wrong) and teaching a somewhat crazy guy who just wanted to talk to me about all the "fun" things that you can do in Las Vegas. We still ended up teaching him the Plan of Salvation though. This is something funny in Russia. People here get really really off topic and a lot of time we'll spend 45 minutes to an hour just listening to them talk about everything, since the Russian people are quite friendly and outgoing in close personal settings. Then, even with all the distractions, we still end up teaching a full lesson. No one we hear a lot about learning to take control of the teaching situation.

Lately I've been getting a lot of questions about the influx of missionaries after the mission age change. Basically all that happened to our mission is that our mission compliment increased by about 20-30 missionaries. Over the next few months (until July 1st, when President Sorenson goes home) we will be loosing around 35 of our old seasoned missionaries and getting them replaced by almost 50 new missionaries. So, the biggest change that is happening is that our mission is going to become a very young mission. A year ago almost every outer city had only two missionaries in them, but now all have between 4 and 18 (the biggest being Nizhniy Novgorod. I remember when we only had 10 missionaries there!) Our mission is just getting bigger.

The civil war between the spring and winter is continuing going along. Usually I like the winter but this year I can't wait for the spring to come. I am actually pretty happy right now and I can't pinpoint exactly why. Maybe it is the prospect of an exciting future, a great companion or the advent of spring. I think it might be because the coming of spring is my favorite time to think and reflect and ask important questions: Who is Russia? Why is Lenin? Where are the Elders of yesteryear? People are out on the streets more and we contact amidst scores of couples finally unleashed on the world with the perpetually concerned girlfriends clutching newly wilting flowers gifted to them for the celebration of International Women's Day. It is much better for us when everybody is out on the streets.

And thus spring is coming. I hope it comes sooner than later, for I am ready to thaw out!

As Always,

Elder Zachery E. Brasier