“Ruski Izzihk” (That’s Russian Language)
My language training starts each day at 9am when Irina rings the “doma-phone” (the intercom at the front door of our building) with her usual cheery greeting of “Dobre Utra!” I spend the next three hours tied to a medieval torture device as she shoves a red-hot poker in my face screaming, “No! You got it wrong again! Why can’t you be more like Kellye!” OK, maybe that isn’t what really happens every morning, but some days it sure feels like it! Needless to say, language learning is not my gift and more often than not my tutor is tortured much more than I am. If you want an idea of what I look like when I finish my daily “exercises” click here and then click on the pig’s nose. OK, if you did that then you get some sense of what the past two weeks has been like for me. Two down…only 10 more to go!!!
And let me add here that we have WAYYYY too many friends and family members that are teachers. Why do I say this? Because the word for teacher in Russian is nearly impossible for me to say. “Pre-pa-da-va-teal” Yep, looks easy when you do it like that, but try saying it over and over again. My tongue just won’t do it. I always get the syllables mixed up and in the wrong order. And, if I do get it right, it is always slow and sounded out syllable by syllable. If I ever need to use it in actual conversation people will think I am “a very special boy.” So many of my lessons over the past two weeks have been done sitting in front of a stack of photographs with Irina asking me who people are and what they do for a living. Again I say…too many teachers. So, I thought I would be clever. When I got to Kellye I said “missionaire.” “And….,” Irina said, before forcing me to say it. When I got to Mikey I thought I would try “video producer”. “E” (that’s the Russian word for ‘and’) so I thought I would try “universitit professor”. “Neyt. Eeeee?” Prepadavateal. Dang! Got me again. And if the word does not sound scary enough, this is the way that it looks in Russian: преподаватель. That's right, kids. Don't try that at home!
So what have I learned over the past two weeks? Well, I have learned to introduce my family and friends and tell what they do for a living, which will be important if you come to visit. Today I learned a handful of adjectives, which will be important because now I can describe you to other people when you come for a visit. (Though I am not sure that hot/cold, heavy/light, short/long, etc. will be very helpful during an introduction. For example: “This is Kellye’s good, long, light, sister Kay.” But probably the most important thing that I have learned to say is, “I am studying the Russian language and speak Russian very poorly. Do you speak English?” There are usually three responses that come after that question. The first is the least common, but it does happen more often than I would like. It is when the person hears the question and rolls here eyes and turns away in disgust. (That happened yesterday when a girl asked to borrow my cell phone and I told her that I didn’t understand her and asked if she spoke English. The girl at the table next to mine gave me a similar look as she handed the first her cell phone to borrow.) The second response is most common. It is a smile accompanied by much giggling. Even the men giggle a little when they hear me. And the third response has come from probably more than 99-percent of the Russians that I have talked to. “Angleski? Nyet.” I cannot tell you how few people I have found in Moscow that speak English. It is a little surprising, especially considering that our building is right next to the dorm of a college campus and there are young people all over the place. Yet, very few speak English. However, they are almost always more than willing to help and they almost always do so while speaking Russian about a hundred miles an hour in the hopes that if they keep talking the words will magically be translated and I will understand what they are saying.
Well, while all of this is terribly amusing (if you are not me), I tell you these stories to tell you another one. So, here goes…
They said there would be days like these!
For all of my FPO buddies: “So there I was…”
Do you know how when you are being trained to do something new people always tell you stories about things that happen and you think to yourself, “That won’t happen to me. I am much more competent than that!” Wrong again, my friend. Wrong again. Well, anybody that knows me even a little bit knows that I have to constantly be “wired” to the world. The Internet has become has important to me as getting three meals a day. It is how I get information (in English) and, most importantly, it is how I stay connected to my family and friends and all of you who take the time to read this blog. Since we arrived we have been stuck using dial-up Internet, which in it self is bad enough. But the worst part about dial-up here is that you have to pay for it by purchasing an Internet card which are usually available at one of the kiosks outside of the Metro stations. That is not too bad, but the speed is not fast enough to download anything of any significance and as a result that burns your Internet minutes. And you ALWAYS seem to run out of minutes at a time when you want to be online the most and/or you are not planning on going to the Metro.
Now, Moscow has high-speed Internet. As a matter of a fact, every other missionary in Moscow has some form of high-speed Internet in their apartment, but for some reason we could not find a single company that would service my building. Needless to say I was getting frustrated. We have a college dormitory on one side of us and a Mercedes dealership on the other and we cannot find a company that will put a high-speed line into our apartment. I was nearly at my wits end when I discovered that there is a company that has a high-speed wireless network in the city, but as luck would have it, their service area ends on the other side of my street. I discovered that if I put my laptop out on the balcony of the kids’ room I could pick up their signal, but that was the only place in the house. However, I found that if you purchased three months of service they would give you an antenna booster that would improve your reception. Frankly, that should have been my first clue, but you have to remember that after two weeks in the city, I have become a desperate man.
At this point let me add that I realize that missionaries have survived on the field or decades without Internet access and that I sound like a whiney baby. This I realize, but even all IMB communication comes via email and/or web pages.
So last Saturday I had determined that I would go to the center of the city where their offices were so I could pick up one of these antennas and finally get a decent Internet signal in the house. As I was leaving my apartment I met my next-door-neighbor for the first time. She and her boyfriend spoke English (two of the one-percent in Moscow) but unfortunately I met them as they were moving out of the building, so I am hoping that when I get a new neighbor he/she/they will speak English too, but I am not counting on it. Well, during the conversation I found out that there was indeed an Internet company that would service the building and she gave me their name and phone number. So, I decided to stay home and have our team leader help me speak with the company on Monday.
I finished my lesson at noon on Monday and had determined that I was going to have my Internet issues resolved by the end of the day. Jeff had called the company and told me that I had to go down there in person to get my account set up. He had a full day of meetings, so would not be able to go with me, but I figured I was a big boy and could do this all on my own. And, I was pleased to find that the office was located on the street perpendicular to mine – Ulitisa Mikukho-Maklaja. (Nope. I am not making that one up.) I have been walking the neighborhood on a fairly regular basis, so I know my way around and figured that it would be easy to find. So I got the address from the web site, wrote it on a piece of paper in Russian just in case I would need it, and with Hannah in tow, headed out the door. According to Jeff, the office was located on the 4th floor of building 23A. I pulled out my map and could not find building 23A listed, but building 23 was one of the large buildings that is a part of Pushkin Institute, the university in our neighborhood. I thought this was a strange place for the office of an Internet company, but I figured that maybe since our building is located on campus that they service only the university. When I got the fourth floor all I found there were classrooms. That took me back down to the main floor where I asked several people if they had heard of NetFort. Nobody had ever heard of the company. One nice guy tried to give me some help in Russian and wound up pointing me to one of the building’s security guards. He didn’t speak English either, nor had he ever heard of NetFort, nor did he know where building 23A was. So he pointed me to another guard. Same story. I then went outside and started walking back to the intersection of my street, Ulitisa Akademika Volgina, when I ran into the first guy who helped me. He pointed me back toward my apartment, which I knew was wrong because the address was Mikukho-Maklaja and not Akademika Volgina. So, I ventured up the street in the opposite direction. After asking three or four more very amused non-English-speaking Russians for directions I headed the other direction with much the same results. I again ran into the first guy who didn’t know where I was going, but was willing to help me guess. Looking at my map I discovered that Akademika Volgina has a 23A that is across the street on the other side, so we went off to find that building. We stopped into a women’s clothing store where a couple of young women proceed to giggle at me. They also pulled out a map to discover that 23A was not on the map, but they did point me in the other direction. (It is a good thing that Jeff had taught me the Russian word for crosswalk just two days before.) So, it was back to the area around the Institute. I found a couple of guys in the parking lot and decided to ask one more time, pulling the piece of paper out of my pocket, pointing to it and shrugging my shoulders. They pointed me to a small building behind where we were standing and said they thought that was the one. Hannah and I went traipsing through the mud, through a construction site on the way to this building, asking a couple of construction workers for help along they way and they confirmed that we were finally on the right track. We finally got to the building, which was surrounded by an iron fence and guard shack. “NetFort?,” I asked the guard. “Da,” he said as he activated the gate for us. Finally. Now we are getting somewhere.
We took the stairs up to the fourth floor because we couldn’t find the elevator and buzzed the intercom at the front door. They let us in and I went through my usual speech about not knowing Russian and asked if they spoke English. And then I heard music to my ears…English. However, what she said was, “Can you come back in about 15 minutes, it is lunch time.” It was around 2:15pm. So, I agreed and Hannah and I left the building. As we rounded the corner we discovered that we knew exactly where we were. We were standing on the back side of our own apartment building! The office was located right behind the dormitory that is next door to us!
Well, we had some time to kill and Kellye had given me a grocery list, so we headed up to the grocery store to pick up a few things. By the time we got back to the office, 45 minutes later and with hands full of groceries, we had walked no less than three miles that afternoon. We finally found the elevator and headed upstairs where there was someone who spoke English waiting for us. Once in her office she explained that it would be at least 10 days before they could get an installer out to our apartment. I said that was fine and she told me I would have to sign a contract…that was all in Russian. By that time I think I would have signed almost anything. I told her that was fine and that if she would give me a copy I would have a friend read it for me and I could come back the next day. So far, so good. She then asks what kind of computer I have. When I told her that I have a Macintosh she looked at me funny and said, “Only work on Windows XP.” This didn’t make much sense to me, so she called her tech support guy (who didn’t speak English) and he came up with the same conclusion. I thought that we were finally getting somewhere when she pulled out a piece of paper and began writing, but what she wrote for me was the name and number of the wi-fi company that I had planned to go to on Saturday!
Dejected, but determined Hannah and I walked the 50 yards back to our building and headed upstairs where Kellye was just finishing her lessons for the day (3pm). By this time I had decided that I was not giving up and not going to bed until I had some form of high-speed Internet in the house. So I traded children and Sarah Beth and I caught the bus to the metro and headed for the center of the city. The street the office was located on was just a couple of blocks from the Kremlin and I sort-of knew where I was going since we had been there just a couple of days before. If you haven’t figured it out yet, Russian addresses are a little funny. The address of this particular office was 9 Gazetny side-street Building 2, Office 5. So, I set out in search of Building 2. We got to the end of the street and on one side were buildings 1, 3, 5 & 7 and on the other side of the street were buildings 4, 6, & 8. Back to my map and broken Russian as I approach a police officer who motions to the end of the street where building two wasn’t. Well, we finally find that the office is located in building 9, which is divided into two sections. The girl at the counter spoke English and I was on the way home after sending a one-word text message to Kellye… “Success!”
After eight hours of trekking my way around the city on a wild goose chase I was able to connect my computers to the Internet at a speed just slightly faster and less dependable than dial-up. The good news is that I don’t have any time limits and that I am supposed to be able to connect most anywhere in the city…except for my building, which I am nicknaming “The Cone of Silence.” So, the quest for decent Internet service continues.
Assuming that I can get connected for long enough to post this blog, more updates are on the way. Thanks again for praying.
Blessings,
Marc
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Friday, October 19, 2007
Photos from Red Square!
We took Wednesday afternoon to be tourists and visit Red Square. We are going to try to take at least one day a week to do touristy things. There is so much to see and do here.
Stories to follow later this weekend.
Thanks for reading and leaving comments!
Blessings,
Marc
The family in front of St. Basil's Cathedral in Red Square.Stories to follow later this weekend.
Thanks for reading and leaving comments!
Blessings,
Marc
Marc & Kellye in the same spot...hard to believe that we are really in the heart of Moscow, Russia!
John-John plays on some cannon balls and old cannons outside the cathedral.
Hannah is becoming a natural Muscovite!
Statue to Karl Marx located outside of the metro station near Red Square.
The family outside of the walls to the Kremlin.
Lenin's Tomb.
St. Basil's again...one of Moscow's most famous and recognizable landmarks.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Have I mentioned that I love the snow?
I love the snow. I am saying that more for my benefit than yours. I know that six months from now when it is 90 in Florida and still snowing here that I may not be saying how much I love the snow, so I wanted something in writing to remind myself. :-) It has snowed since around 12:30 today and I love to be out in it.
Today has been a full day. I started my language training this morning. My tutor, so far, is kind and patient. But, man does she move fast. I guess that is what happens when you try to squeeze a year's worth of learning into just 12 weeks. I wish I could say that learning Russian was easy. I wish I could say that it came naturally to me, but both those statements would be a lie. In reality, I find it very difficult and confusing. For example, there are letters that make one sound when used at the beginning of a word and a totally different sound when used at the end of a word--and those are some of the consonants!! However, I am determined to learn it well and to use it regularly so that my conversational Russian is as good as I can make it.
Believe it or not, I have homework to do, so I better keep this short. Keep praying.
Blessings,
Marc
Today has been a full day. I started my language training this morning. My tutor, so far, is kind and patient. But, man does she move fast. I guess that is what happens when you try to squeeze a year's worth of learning into just 12 weeks. I wish I could say that learning Russian was easy. I wish I could say that it came naturally to me, but both those statements would be a lie. In reality, I find it very difficult and confusing. For example, there are letters that make one sound when used at the beginning of a word and a totally different sound when used at the end of a word--and those are some of the consonants!! However, I am determined to learn it well and to use it regularly so that my conversational Russian is as good as I can make it.
Believe it or not, I have homework to do, so I better keep this short. Keep praying.
Blessings,
Marc
Sunday, October 14, 2007
This morning we woke up to...
SNOW!!!
Watch the video.
Well, how 'bout that?? It's the middle of October and we have our first snow fall. And it was a good one, too. You may remember from my previous posts that we have had nothing but rain since we arrived. Last night was no exception. And it rained hard. The wind howled all night long. But, this morning we were greeted to tons of snow falling from the sky. Because it has been so wet and was just barely 32-degrees it did not sticking to the ground until around lunch time. But after lunch it started sticking and by the time I walked home tonight there was at least 3 inches of snow on the ground in some spots! It has pretty much stopped for the night (I think) and the scenery is just beautiful.
This has been a bittersweet day for our team. One of our teammates is leaving tomorrow for the States (and that is bad.) She is getting married (and that is good.) So, we all gathered at our team leader's house for church this afternoon and then celebrated with her as she prepares to return home and get ready for her new life. Even though I only knew here in person for just a week, she will be missed by our family and we wish her well. Did I mention how much we love our team? If not, I LOVE our team. They are an answer to prayer and I am looking forward to the time that I get to minister with them. In the days to come I hope to write some about house church. It is an incredible experience.
Now, it is time for you to pray. Pray hard. Tomorrow is the day I have been dreading. It is the day that I begin language school. Now, don't get me wrong. One of the things I want most of all these days is the ability to speak the language. I long to be able to communicate with the people around me and pray each morning for the boldness to speak the few Russian words that I know. But I am scared about starting formal language training. Fortunately for me, Kellye does not start until next week, so that gives me a week ahead before I immediately fall two weeks behind! Just pray that my teacher is kind and patient and pray that I would have the tongue of a Russian.
We have a busy week ahead. In addition to language training and my weekly team meeting, we must go out and buy some essential supplies: cold weather gear for the family, and a big chili pot for Saturday afternoons. We also hope to carve out some time this week to visit downtown and do the tourist thing. We are hoping to visit Red Square, The Kremlin and St. Basil's Cathedral this week. We will uploda those photos when we get them. In the meantime, here are a few from our first snowfall in Moscow!
Blessings,
Marc
Watch the video.
Well, how 'bout that?? It's the middle of October and we have our first snow fall. And it was a good one, too. You may remember from my previous posts that we have had nothing but rain since we arrived. Last night was no exception. And it rained hard. The wind howled all night long. But, this morning we were greeted to tons of snow falling from the sky. Because it has been so wet and was just barely 32-degrees it did not sticking to the ground until around lunch time. But after lunch it started sticking and by the time I walked home tonight there was at least 3 inches of snow on the ground in some spots! It has pretty much stopped for the night (I think) and the scenery is just beautiful.
This has been a bittersweet day for our team. One of our teammates is leaving tomorrow for the States (and that is bad.) She is getting married (and that is good.) So, we all gathered at our team leader's house for church this afternoon and then celebrated with her as she prepares to return home and get ready for her new life. Even though I only knew here in person for just a week, she will be missed by our family and we wish her well. Did I mention how much we love our team? If not, I LOVE our team. They are an answer to prayer and I am looking forward to the time that I get to minister with them. In the days to come I hope to write some about house church. It is an incredible experience.
Now, it is time for you to pray. Pray hard. Tomorrow is the day I have been dreading. It is the day that I begin language school. Now, don't get me wrong. One of the things I want most of all these days is the ability to speak the language. I long to be able to communicate with the people around me and pray each morning for the boldness to speak the few Russian words that I know. But I am scared about starting formal language training. Fortunately for me, Kellye does not start until next week, so that gives me a week ahead before I immediately fall two weeks behind! Just pray that my teacher is kind and patient and pray that I would have the tongue of a Russian.
We have a busy week ahead. In addition to language training and my weekly team meeting, we must go out and buy some essential supplies: cold weather gear for the family, and a big chili pot for Saturday afternoons. We also hope to carve out some time this week to visit downtown and do the tourist thing. We are hoping to visit Red Square, The Kremlin and St. Basil's Cathedral this week. We will uploda those photos when we get them. In the meantime, here are a few from our first snowfall in Moscow!
Blessings,
Marc
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Our First Photos from Moscow
We have not had much of an opportunity to get out beyond our neighborhood and the IMB Russia business office, but here are a few pictures taken from the windows of our apartment. We live on the 8th floor.
The Moscow Chronicles
It has been an interesting first couple of days here in Moscow. We have only been here for five days, but already we are starting to learn our way around and are getting adjusted to our new life here. So, I thought I would try to recap the last few days to try to give you a flavor for living in the capitol city of Russia.
Let’s start with the weather…would someone please tell me what happened to the sun? We have been here since Thursday evening and it has not stopped raining since we left the airport! The funny thing is, they said it has been dry most of the summer, but that would be hard to prove to me at this point. We did see a few glimpses of blue sky today while we were out and about, and as Kellye was making supper tonight there was about a 20-minute burst of sunshine before sunset. Temperatures have been in the low 50s during the day and in the 40s at night, but fall has set in and that means that it gets a little colder every day. By the end of the week the high temps are expected to be in the upper 30s with lows in the low 30s. And, they are saying we may see snow flurries as soon as this weekend!
We really have spent most of the past five days getting acquainted with our small portion of Moscow. They were not kidding when they said this was a mega-city. One of the guys at the office today told us that if you take the entire population of Oklahoma, Colorado, Arkansas, Kansas and Missouri and put them into one city, there would still be fewer people than there are living in Moscow. Wow! The area we live in is around the Pushkin Institute, a small specialized university. Our building is next to one of the dorms, so we see a lot of young people walking in and out, but we have not really had an opportunity to meet any of them yet. Our building itself is rather unique. It was designed to be housing for both professors and students at the Institute. We live in the professor section of the building (our landlady is a professor of geology and her father was a professor as well.) There are just over 100 apartments in our section and they are anything but typical Russian apartments. More on that on another day. The other section of the building was designed to be student housing. However, the building codes changed just before the building was complete and it did not meet code for student housing, so that entire wing of the building is vacant!
We are starting to venture out a little more every day. One of the neat things about this city is that there is a mall at nearly every metro stop and the streets and metro stations are filled with little shops that sell anything and everything you can imagine. Last night I bought a rotisserie chicken from a street stand just down the road from my apartment. I can tell you, rarely have I tasted a chicken that was as good as these are. I cannot wait to go back! Speaking of food…because only one person on our tem has a vehicle, grocery shopping is something that you do almost every day. And you can’t let your eyes be bigger than your arms. I went yesterday afternoon on the way home and picked up what we in America would consider a small amount…and then I had to carry it all home! My arms were aching by the time I got back to our apartment. I learned a valuable lesson: you don’t buy two large bottles of soda and two containers of juice if you are the only person carrying the groceries. Note that in the picture above the metro stops are not labeled. That is because they are farther away that what you can see.
Now, lest you think that we are “Super-Missionaries” and that we are adapting without incident, let me remind you that I have only learned a few phrases of Russian…the main one being “I’m sorry. I am studying the Russian Language. Do you speak English?” So far, I have found only one person who did, and he worked at the chicken stand. Though most people are pretty nice about it and understand that you are trying, some are a little rude. This morning I went downstairs to meet one of our team members who came over to watch the kids so we could go to the office and was in the elevator with just a short-sleeved shirt on. The older gentleman who was in the elevator with me looked at me disapprovingly (because you must be stupid to go outside in this weather without a coat) and then said something in Russian. When I threw out my pat response, he just rolled his eyes at me.
We are also trying to get oriented to our ministry here. We have been to the office twice (once all by ourselves!) to get our papers registered and find out how to fill out expense reports, etc. And on Monday I attended our first team meeting. I cannot tell you how much I love our team. They are all great folks and are doing such fun things in ministry. I will write more about that at a later time, but everybody here has been just great. There are two other couples (the girls have taken Kellye shopping several times and are showing her the ropes of getting around), and there are two Journeygirls. And, in a week or so we will have another single man joining us. Yesterday, one of the Journeygirls from our team sat with the kids for the day while we went to the office. When she left John asked, “When is Aunt Tiffany coming back?” I think we are all going to be fast friends and am excited about what the next year will bring as we serve together.
Well, my friends. I have a million other things to share with you, but my brain is still kind of fuzzy. I will try to post a few more updates this week just to get you caught up. I am enclosing a few photos so you can see a little bit of what our new life looks like. Moscow is not what I would describe as a “pretty” European city like Prague, but God has called us here and therefore it is beautiful to us. We hope you agree.
Continue to pray for us. We miss each of you and love hearing from you.
Blessings,
Marc
Let’s start with the weather…would someone please tell me what happened to the sun? We have been here since Thursday evening and it has not stopped raining since we left the airport! The funny thing is, they said it has been dry most of the summer, but that would be hard to prove to me at this point. We did see a few glimpses of blue sky today while we were out and about, and as Kellye was making supper tonight there was about a 20-minute burst of sunshine before sunset. Temperatures have been in the low 50s during the day and in the 40s at night, but fall has set in and that means that it gets a little colder every day. By the end of the week the high temps are expected to be in the upper 30s with lows in the low 30s. And, they are saying we may see snow flurries as soon as this weekend!
We really have spent most of the past five days getting acquainted with our small portion of Moscow. They were not kidding when they said this was a mega-city. One of the guys at the office today told us that if you take the entire population of Oklahoma, Colorado, Arkansas, Kansas and Missouri and put them into one city, there would still be fewer people than there are living in Moscow. Wow! The area we live in is around the Pushkin Institute, a small specialized university. Our building is next to one of the dorms, so we see a lot of young people walking in and out, but we have not really had an opportunity to meet any of them yet. Our building itself is rather unique. It was designed to be housing for both professors and students at the Institute. We live in the professor section of the building (our landlady is a professor of geology and her father was a professor as well.) There are just over 100 apartments in our section and they are anything but typical Russian apartments. More on that on another day. The other section of the building was designed to be student housing. However, the building codes changed just before the building was complete and it did not meet code for student housing, so that entire wing of the building is vacant!
We are starting to venture out a little more every day. One of the neat things about this city is that there is a mall at nearly every metro stop and the streets and metro stations are filled with little shops that sell anything and everything you can imagine. Last night I bought a rotisserie chicken from a street stand just down the road from my apartment. I can tell you, rarely have I tasted a chicken that was as good as these are. I cannot wait to go back! Speaking of food…because only one person on our tem has a vehicle, grocery shopping is something that you do almost every day. And you can’t let your eyes be bigger than your arms. I went yesterday afternoon on the way home and picked up what we in America would consider a small amount…and then I had to carry it all home! My arms were aching by the time I got back to our apartment. I learned a valuable lesson: you don’t buy two large bottles of soda and two containers of juice if you are the only person carrying the groceries. Note that in the picture above the metro stops are not labeled. That is because they are farther away that what you can see.
Now, lest you think that we are “Super-Missionaries” and that we are adapting without incident, let me remind you that I have only learned a few phrases of Russian…the main one being “I’m sorry. I am studying the Russian Language. Do you speak English?” So far, I have found only one person who did, and he worked at the chicken stand. Though most people are pretty nice about it and understand that you are trying, some are a little rude. This morning I went downstairs to meet one of our team members who came over to watch the kids so we could go to the office and was in the elevator with just a short-sleeved shirt on. The older gentleman who was in the elevator with me looked at me disapprovingly (because you must be stupid to go outside in this weather without a coat) and then said something in Russian. When I threw out my pat response, he just rolled his eyes at me.
We are also trying to get oriented to our ministry here. We have been to the office twice (once all by ourselves!) to get our papers registered and find out how to fill out expense reports, etc. And on Monday I attended our first team meeting. I cannot tell you how much I love our team. They are all great folks and are doing such fun things in ministry. I will write more about that at a later time, but everybody here has been just great. There are two other couples (the girls have taken Kellye shopping several times and are showing her the ropes of getting around), and there are two Journeygirls. And, in a week or so we will have another single man joining us. Yesterday, one of the Journeygirls from our team sat with the kids for the day while we went to the office. When she left John asked, “When is Aunt Tiffany coming back?” I think we are all going to be fast friends and am excited about what the next year will bring as we serve together.
Well, my friends. I have a million other things to share with you, but my brain is still kind of fuzzy. I will try to post a few more updates this week just to get you caught up. I am enclosing a few photos so you can see a little bit of what our new life looks like. Moscow is not what I would describe as a “pretty” European city like Prague, but God has called us here and therefore it is beautiful to us. We hope you agree.
Continue to pray for us. We miss each of you and love hearing from you.
Blessings,
Marc
Sunday, October 7, 2007
A Word About Mail
Just a quick note about mail. We have only been here a few days, so we are still trying to figure out the best way to do things. However, for the time being, please do not try to send packages to our Moscow address. Letters are fine.
In the days to come I will tell you the best way to send care packages and Kellye might even give you a list of some of the things we can use around here. We can get most everything but peanut butter, but everything is VERY expensive.
So, for the time being, we would love to hear from you electronically. We hope to have high-speed Internet in our flat by the end of the week, but I am not counting on it. And, letters to the Moscow address are great. I will try to get you info about the best way to send things in the days and weeks to come.
Thanks again for all your thoughts and prayers. We are honored to be YOUR missionaries in Moscow.
Blessings,
Marc
In the days to come I will tell you the best way to send care packages and Kellye might even give you a list of some of the things we can use around here. We can get most everything but peanut butter, but everything is VERY expensive.
So, for the time being, we would love to hear from you electronically. We hope to have high-speed Internet in our flat by the end of the week, but I am not counting on it. And, letters to the Moscow address are great. I will try to get you info about the best way to send things in the days and weeks to come.
Thanks again for all your thoughts and prayers. We are honored to be YOUR missionaries in Moscow.
Blessings,
Marc
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Greetings from Moscow!
There is so much to tell, it is hard to figure out how to write it all down. We won't have high-speed Internet in our apartment for a week or so, so we are relying on dial-up right now.
Our flight arrived on time in Moscow Thursday afternoon and we are still dealing with jet-lag in our own way. It is almost 8am on Saturday and Kellye and the kids are still in bed sound asleep. I, however, have been up since around 4am. This is my second day to do that! Yesterday, I had a nice quiet time and then went back to sleep from 6 to 9.
We have met two "persons of peace" along the way, so far. The first was the woman who checked-in our baggage at the DC airport. "So there I was..." with 19 bags, most of them overweight, that had to be checked. "You are going one way?," she asked. "How long are you staying?" When Kellye answered that we were going to live there for at least three years, she smiled back at her and never measured or weighed a single bag. We paid the excess baggage charge and we were on our way. And, believe it or not, all 19 bags arrived at the same time and only two of them had been inspected by the TSA. Before leaving ILC, I decided to "seal" all of our Action Packer containers with strapping tape (the kind with strings in it) in the hopes that government officials would be too lazy to try to open them for a peek inside. It must have worked!
We had a pretty good flight. John-John stayed awake the entire transatlantic flight and then finally passed out as we were waiting to take-off from Frankfurt. SB has come down with a sinus infection, so she is feeling kinda crappy right now. The food was not bad. As a matter of a fact, the dinner on the plane was better than the ILC cafeteria!
Our second person of peace was found in the Moscow airport. After getting through customs, we found all of our baggage sitting on the floor next to the conveyor belt. We were told that we should get some of the free carts that are in that area instead of paying one of the porters, who will charge you up to $10 a bag and try to rip you off for even more if they feel that they can. The only problem is that these carts only hold two to three bags each. So, in the end we had 5 carts and at least 5 rolling suitcases that we had to get through customs. We lined all of the carts up at the entrance to customs and waited for the line to go down. About that time, an older, bored-looking customs officer walked by. I can't explain how, but I felt that God had sent him to us, so I used what little Russian I have to call him over and explained that our family was moving here and that everything I owned was on these carts. I told him that I did not know how I was going to get everything through customs by myself. Well, long story short, he asked me a few questions about what kinds of things I was bringing and then let me walk the carts through one at a time until all of our bags were out on the other side!
Traffic in Moscow was horrible Thursday, so we had to wait about 30 minutes for our team leader to arrive. (It took him 3 hours to get to the airport!) We then had to wait another 45 minutes for the van that was going to carry our luggage to arrive. However, we got to our apartment around 6:30 Thursday night. Our team had stocked our fridge with some frozen pizzas and other things so that we would have supper and breakfast for the next day, which was very nice. We unpacked a few things, including John's X-Box, and crashed around 10pm.
On Friday morning we were met by one of our team members around 11 and we got our "Metro Orientation." We also stopped by the office so we could register with the Russian government. I bought cell phones for Kellye, SB and myself (we have to have them activated today...you have to go to a separate store to do that here). When we got home yesterday evening our Moscow boss and his family brought us supper and we were able to fellowship a little bit. It was a lot of fun. It was almost surreal though for us all to be together and realize that we were in Moscow and not Richmond!
Kellye and the girls are going shopping at IKEA for a few household necessities today. I am going to rearrange furniture and unpack some more. I am hoping to get the family to downtown on Monday so we can see Red Square and take some photos. I start with my language tutor on Monday the 15th, so I am going to try to rest some and enjoy the week ahead.
Well, Hannah and Kellye are finally awake. Hannah has been enjoying watching American cartoons in Russian. She is watching Aladdin this morning and the kids laughed themselves silly yesterday as they watched SpongeBob in Russian!
Blessings,
Marc
Our flight arrived on time in Moscow Thursday afternoon and we are still dealing with jet-lag in our own way. It is almost 8am on Saturday and Kellye and the kids are still in bed sound asleep. I, however, have been up since around 4am. This is my second day to do that! Yesterday, I had a nice quiet time and then went back to sleep from 6 to 9.
We have met two "persons of peace" along the way, so far. The first was the woman who checked-in our baggage at the DC airport. "So there I was..." with 19 bags, most of them overweight, that had to be checked. "You are going one way?," she asked. "How long are you staying?" When Kellye answered that we were going to live there for at least three years, she smiled back at her and never measured or weighed a single bag. We paid the excess baggage charge and we were on our way. And, believe it or not, all 19 bags arrived at the same time and only two of them had been inspected by the TSA. Before leaving ILC, I decided to "seal" all of our Action Packer containers with strapping tape (the kind with strings in it) in the hopes that government officials would be too lazy to try to open them for a peek inside. It must have worked!
We had a pretty good flight. John-John stayed awake the entire transatlantic flight and then finally passed out as we were waiting to take-off from Frankfurt. SB has come down with a sinus infection, so she is feeling kinda crappy right now. The food was not bad. As a matter of a fact, the dinner on the plane was better than the ILC cafeteria!
Our second person of peace was found in the Moscow airport. After getting through customs, we found all of our baggage sitting on the floor next to the conveyor belt. We were told that we should get some of the free carts that are in that area instead of paying one of the porters, who will charge you up to $10 a bag and try to rip you off for even more if they feel that they can. The only problem is that these carts only hold two to three bags each. So, in the end we had 5 carts and at least 5 rolling suitcases that we had to get through customs. We lined all of the carts up at the entrance to customs and waited for the line to go down. About that time, an older, bored-looking customs officer walked by. I can't explain how, but I felt that God had sent him to us, so I used what little Russian I have to call him over and explained that our family was moving here and that everything I owned was on these carts. I told him that I did not know how I was going to get everything through customs by myself. Well, long story short, he asked me a few questions about what kinds of things I was bringing and then let me walk the carts through one at a time until all of our bags were out on the other side!
Traffic in Moscow was horrible Thursday, so we had to wait about 30 minutes for our team leader to arrive. (It took him 3 hours to get to the airport!) We then had to wait another 45 minutes for the van that was going to carry our luggage to arrive. However, we got to our apartment around 6:30 Thursday night. Our team had stocked our fridge with some frozen pizzas and other things so that we would have supper and breakfast for the next day, which was very nice. We unpacked a few things, including John's X-Box, and crashed around 10pm.
On Friday morning we were met by one of our team members around 11 and we got our "Metro Orientation." We also stopped by the office so we could register with the Russian government. I bought cell phones for Kellye, SB and myself (we have to have them activated today...you have to go to a separate store to do that here). When we got home yesterday evening our Moscow boss and his family brought us supper and we were able to fellowship a little bit. It was a lot of fun. It was almost surreal though for us all to be together and realize that we were in Moscow and not Richmond!
Kellye and the girls are going shopping at IKEA for a few household necessities today. I am going to rearrange furniture and unpack some more. I am hoping to get the family to downtown on Monday so we can see Red Square and take some photos. I start with my language tutor on Monday the 15th, so I am going to try to rest some and enjoy the week ahead.
Well, Hannah and Kellye are finally awake. Hannah has been enjoying watching American cartoons in Russian. She is watching Aladdin this morning and the kids laughed themselves silly yesterday as they watched SpongeBob in Russian!
Blessings,
Marc
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