Yekaterinburg Mission Conference

It's nice to be back home with my girls again. Early Tuesday morning I got back from the conference Natasha told you about. It was worth it. Lots of thoughts and impressions. Everything went really smooth with the young married couple who hosted me--what could could you expect from Vasilina (pronounced like "petroleum jelly"-a) and Oleg. They're awesome, been married for five years, just a little older than Natasha and I, and they both speak English wonderfully. Vasilina is a university professor who served her mission in England who's riddiculously good, so she can speak with either a virtually perfect American or English accent, and Oleg is really good with an American accent too, about like Natasha. He builds high-end wooden furniture for a living. I don't know what it is that makes it so much fun to be in a group of people who all speak Russian and English fluently and not of the stale Britishish out of the Soviet 1920's textbook variety, but it's a blast. I kept on wishing that Natasha had been there too, or that we could have another couple like that in our city to hang out with. meh, distance. isolation, foo.

 

They met me at the train station as I arrived at 1:30am Saturday night, and I was in a pretty good mood as my neighbors from the train ride were good. Then we crashed, in bed that is, and got up in the morning for choir practice. We also gave a lift to some bad legged elderly women in their branch. 

Then we went off to the hotel that was hosting the conference, a newly built 5 star. It was all modern, minimalistic, abstract themed, and pretty cool. The conference hall seated 500, and it was packed.  While everyone was gathering was a good chance to meet with members and missionaries from around our mission that we don't get to see very often. I had left the memory card to my camera at home in Ufa, but our German Elder Rusel had on old 32 mb one that he just gave me. phew. 

I also used this as my first real test of my shorthand skills. I'm still no master for sure, but I was surprised how well it worked out. I was definitely able to go faster than writing in print, not as fast as typing, and I spent a while transcribing my notes on the train ride home, and there were only a few parts I where I couldn't quite figure it out. I was able to keep much more of the original wording than I do in my regular notes too, less choppy sounding. 

Now going way back to when I was on the mission and remembering how I felt as we went through the first major church leadership change I could remember since President Hinkley was the prophet, Elders Maxwell and Haight left us. It was hard getting used to a change in the church leadership I had known so long, and it didn't help that Maxwell and Haight were my 2 favorites. Since then though there have been so many changes I guess I'm used to it. I still miss President Hinkley, but I guess I'm I'm learning that there is no shortage of outstanding people to carry on the work. 

I took an immediate liking to the newly called Elder Uktdorf, which I find to be the case with most everyone. It's hard not to like Uktdorf, especially the closer you get to him. He is as eloquent and down to Earth in real life as he seems on General Conference. He's very emotionally transparent, and he radiates with the Spirit when he speaks of the Savior.

It was a real treat having both President Uchtdorf and Elder Anderson here. The talks were edifying and inspirational. Some of the highlights were Sister Anderson giving her talk in Russian! Nobody expected that one. Elder Anderson shared some of his experiences in becoming a member of the Twelve. Sister Uchtdorf talked about the direction the Holy Ghost gives us. And President Uchtdorf talked about how he'd always wanted to land in Yekaterinburg while flying over it on his way to Beijing. Since I was in the choir I didn't get to see their faces too well while they spoke, but it was worth it for the chance to sing for them.

One of the other benefits of having both present was in being able to shake their hands and take pictures with them. Since so many people were swarming President Uchtdorf, I had a chance to have a normal conversation with Elder Anderson:D That talk, and reflecting on his example and comments gave me a lot to think over on the train ride home. I also found out that Sister Anderson had had help writing her talk, but had had little instruction besides that. She has a definite gift, and an excellent ear. She speaks several languages, and has given similar talks in several other challenging languages. 

It seemed that my leaving my memory card wasn't the last of my obstacles in getting a snapshot with President Uchtdorf though. I fixed the settings and handed my camera to some girl, showed her the which button to push and asked her to point and shoot when I got to shake his hand. I don't know what happened, but she looked at me after we'd finished shaking hands, and she hadn't done anything. Aw, missed shot. I figured I'd be more persistent though, so I got her ready, and asked him to please shake my hand again and pose for the camera, which he kindly did in spite of being very swarmed. Unfortunately, the girl only pushed the button half-way, so it never went off. arg. I chose not to pester him the 3rd time. Frustrating, but it definitely wasn't enough to spoil my mood. *Note to any readers who may be photographically inept, please tell this to people if they ask you to take a once in a life-time picture for them.* It's not so bad though because I found a picture that Oleg took where I'm in the same frame as his ear. very flattering too.

 

After we got back, Oleg and I helped Vasilina write the Liahona report in English of the conference. Then we went out to the his grandma's house to pick up his mother while Vasilina did cleaned up the report with the senior couples. The night finished off well as we all hung out with the senior couples talking over the day and eating snack food. Great end to a perfect day. 

Here's the church news article we contributed to, under Meeting with the Saints, starting with On Sunday, 600...

http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/news-releases-stories/church-leaders-visit-growing-church-membership-in-eastern-europe