February 26, 2012 Another Baptism

The first picture is Mt. Ararat.  The Armenian Church is in Yerevan.  The next pcture is the National Art Gallery.  The baptism was Friday and this is Gayborg who was baptized and his sister, Ina.  The group is Sister Kohler, Gayborg's non-member brother, Gayborg, Elder Gerber, and Sister Bailey.

February 19, 2012 Trivia

The first 2 pictures are some art work in Yerevan.  They are metal sculptures:  Carl with a bull and me with a big spider.  The other pictures are a few items I have gathered.  Many tourist items have pomegranate designs.  The Russian stacked dolls and the St. Basil's Basillica decorations are from Moscow.  The church ttower turns and has music.

February 11, 2012 The Baptism

Carl had his first baptism today on our mission and gave the prayer in Armenian.  I learned it too!  The pictures are Carl and Sara and then Sister Kohler, Sister Bailey and Sara.  The group is us, Sara, the sisters, her cousin, her mother, and a little boy in the branch who happened to run by.  The last picture is Sara with the yellow rose the sisters gave her.  She was wearing a CTR ring one of the elders gave her.  Pretty nice!

GOOD BREAD February 5, 2012

Bread is a main stay in the Armenian diet and they bake great bread.  Every morning Carl walks downstairs to a very little store and they have fresh bread.  They are strange little hard loaves, but Carl thinks they are great.  The first picture is a kiln for baking bread.  We saw it in a little village we visited with the humanitarian missionaries.  One of the workers reached way into the kiln to put the bread in and then later to take it out.  The other picture shows some of the shapes of bread.  The Gook Will sign is the name of a grocery store (still small) where we buy some of the basic groceries.  The dancer was at a Georgian restaurant we went to with the senior couples when Elder and Sister Stone arrived.  Georgia is one of the neighboring countries and is part of the Armenia Yerevan Mission.  At the dinner we were able to meet Elder and Sister Reece, the senior couple serving in Georgia.  They are from Elk Grove where Jim and Kathryn live and attend church in the same building in a different ward.

January 28, 2012 To Russia with Love

The senior office couple knew we were waiting for the Russian visas.  When our passports arrived at the office on Sat., Jan 21st with our visas they sent us an email entitled, "To Russia with Love".  We were able to take a walk downtown to see Red Square.  I have seen it so many times in movies and pictures.  The first picture is St. Basil's Basilica, the next picture is entering Red Square, then us in front of the Kremlin, and then Lenin's Mausoleum.  The art work statues were at one stop in the subway.  Notice Carl's hat which he borrowed because it was so cold.

January 22, 2012 THE WATER PROJECT

We had been in Armenia about 2 weeks when the humanitarian couple invited us to go with them to the countryside where a water project had been completed.  The countryside looks a bit like Utah in the picture.  Elder Rich, the humanitarian missionary, is in the picture with the mayor of the village and his wife.  Notice the clothes on the line behind them.  The project included putting in the pipes to the village so they don't have to carry water.  We also went to a city hospital where the humanitarian project had supplied medical equipment.  The people were all very appreciative and grateful.

January 15, 2012 KHOR VIRAP

We were able to visit the Khor Virap monastery where St. Gregory was held for 12 years in a well for being a Christian.  A woman who lived in the area lowered food to him through a small hole in the ceiling of the underground area where he was held.  The story goes that King Trdates became insane because of persecuting the Christians.  The king's sister told him that St. Gregory could heal him.  The king was healed and accepted Christianity.  In 2001, Armenia celebrated the 1700th anniversary of the adoption of Christianity as a state religion.  The pictures show Khor Virap and how we went down the 60ft. ladder into the chamber where St. Gregory lived for 12 years.