Back home in Armenia

We stayed in the Anna Palace (the very yellow unique hotel) in Ruse.  The Danube River which has Bulgaria on one side and Romania on the other side was across the street from the hotel.  Carl is by the cannon by a war memorial in Pleven.  The house on the hill is in Plodiv and overlooks the old town.  The Roman amphitheatre in Plodiv is from about 300A.D.  We celebrated Carl's birthday in that city.  We taught at branches in all of those cities.

Bulgaria April 24, 2012

We have traveled to all of the 9 branches in Bulgaria and met with the branch presidency members and clerks (if they have all of the members of branch presidency).  We have enjoyed meeting these members and attending church here for 2 Sundays. 
There is a lot of interesting history in the country.  The Freeedon Monument, Shipka Pass, is a memorial to Russian and Bulgarian soldiers.  Tsarevets is the ruins of a hilltop fortress near Veliko Turnovo.  Nessibar is a seaside city with ruins of many churches.  The Basarbovo Monastery in the cave is near Ruse.  The Panorama is a memorial of the Siege of Pleven.

April 18, 2012 Bulgaria

The first picture is the name of the church in Bulgarian on the mission office building and then Carl standing in front of the Bulgaria Sofia Mission office building with his computer and projector ready to go.  The church is the Aleksandir Nevski Memorial Church in Sofia.  The next picture is the Rila Monastery near Bladoevgrad.  I really liked the Memorial to the defenders of Stara Zagora in the city of the same name.  It honored the men in the Russo-Turkiosh Was 1877-8.

April 8, 2012 Genocide Memorial

When the family visited us in Cambodia we took them to the genocide memorial in Phnom Penh.  The genocide in Armenia took place during World War I between 1915-22 and is an important part of their history.  Carl doesn't like this kind of thing, but he went with me to see it.  I thought it was quite impressive.  The description in the Lonely Planet reads "A broad pathway flanked by a 100m-long wall engraved with names of massacred communities leads to the memorial, consisting of a 40m-high spire next to a circle of 12 basalt slabs leaning over to guard an eternal flame."  They have music playing in the background and the museum is underground in a grey stone hall.  The site has a great view of Yerevan and Mt. Ararat in the distance.

April 1, 2012 Spring is Coming

The weather is warmer so we jogged two days this week.  This is the first time I have jogged since Christmas.  The first week we bought a stationary bike which we use each morning in our apartment.  The next picture is Carl installing the water purification system for drinking water.  We wash dishes in regular tap water and put a cap full of clorox in the rinse water.  Any fruits or vegetables we also soak for 5 minutes in clorox water.  The next picture is the building for Artashat Branch.  The last picture is a large Armenian church in Yerevan.

March 26,2012 Charma

Charmas are a favorite item.  They are made of pork that is barbequed and wrapped in thin flat bread.  The senior missionaries, Elder and Sister Rich, who showed us around the first day we were here took us to one of their favorite eating places for lunch.  We go there now when we take the metro to the mission office as the restaurant is on that side of town.  We took Jim there last week.  In the picture you can see me holding a charma, the worker cutting the meat, and the workers making bread and throwing the thin bread up into the air.  Friday when we were there it was pretty smoky as they had had a fire in their oven.  Guess that is how it goes!

March 18, 2012 Armenia with Jim

The opera house in Yerevan is a favorite and impressive site.  The weather was so good for the visit with mostly sun and clear sky.  The wind made the walking in the city pretty chilly, especially for Jim coming from Sacramento.   At Khor Virop we had a good view of Mt. Ararat.  We climbed down the old metal ladder into the well where Gregory, a Christian, was held for 12 years.  In 301 AD when Gregory was brought out of the well and was able to heal the king of a disease the king made Armenia the first Christian nation.