Sep. 15-24, 2012 Yerevan with Dave, Dan & Jonna

We took a long walk from the mission office to the Mother of Armenia memorial on the hill above Yerevan.  We then walked down The Cascades which has about 600 steps.  The next day we went to the Genocide Memorial.  We are lined up on the escalator going down to the subway.  Dan took a ride in the amusement park by the big church.  The family picture is at Tatev and Dan & Dave are in Republic Square in Yerevan.

Sep.22&23 Echmiadzin Monastery&Khor Virap

Echmiadzin Monastery is similar to the Vatican for the Armenian Apostolic Church.  It now displays the spear which is said to have pierced Christ's side at the crucifixion.  The next picture is a framed piece of wood said to be from Noah's ark.  A small piece of the wood was given to Russia.  You can see the bottom left corner is gone.  Khor Virap is at the foot of Mt. Ararat.  There is a well here where pagan King Trdat III imprisoned St. Gregory, a Christian for 12 years.  Christian women secretly lowered bread to him through a small hole.  When Gregory was able to heal the king, Gregory was released and Armenia was declared the first Christian naion in 301AD.  Dave, Dan, & Jonna were able to go down the narrow ladder into the well.

September 20,2012 Tatev & Noravank Monastery

We left at 7am for the long drive to Tatev (about 4 hours each way) over bumpy mountain roads and got back about 8pm.  We hired a young adult member to drive his van and invited 2 senior couples.  Tatev Monastery is built on the edge of a steep canyon.  We took the gondola one way and came back in the van.  You can see the road is steep and winding.  Noravank Monastery is built in a canyon with rocks that are colored like the red southern Utah rocks.  There are narrow stone steps to get to the dome.  Tatev is from the 11th centruy and Noravank was founded in 1105.

September 18, 2012 Geghard Monastery & Garni Temple

Geghard is named after the holy spear that pierced Christ's side at the crucifixion, but the spear is now at Echmiadzin Monastery which we visited later in the week.  Geghard stands in a steep canyon and part of it is a cave church.  Garni Temple was a pagan temple dedicated to the Roman God of the sun.  It has 14 towers and a Roman bathhouse is nearby.  It was originally built by Armenia's King Trdat I in the 1st century.

September visitor

Dave arrived Mon., September 17th at 2pm.  He traveled Minneapolis, New York, Moscow, Yerevan.

September Visit

Dan and Jonna arrived on Sat., Sep. 15, 2012 at 8pm

August 23-27, 2012 Simferopol

The third weekend the training was in Simferopol, Ukraine which is in the Crimea.  It certainly was one of the most challenging training session as it was Russian as were many of the others, but we also had 2 branches participating on different screens with SKPYE.  The local branch and the 2 branches about 1 1/2 hours away were at the building and the branches on SKYPE were 350 km. away.  We had the materials in Russian and in English.  The elders were very kind to help with translating, however the finance terms are not in their usual vocabulary and they had not been out too long.  One of the SKYPE calls was not able to talk over his SKYPE and had to call on the phone with questions.  Each sunday we attended church in the branch where we had completed the training that weekend.  In Simferopol the branch president asked both of us to talk about paying a complete tithing and to share our testimonies.  Some of the missionaries translated.  They also needed a piano player for sacrament meeting.  We spent some time on Sat. with senior couple serving in that city.  The track and stadium in the picture was built onto the back of our hotel.  The hotel is to the left.  The old Russian tank was a monument in the city.  The flower stalls were in shops under the main streets when we crossed under.  The little girl was looking out of the window of a local bus.