6 month mark

So what a fun filled week here in Perm!! Me and Elder A set the goal to talk to ten people individually everyday, hand out 4 Books of Mormon and receive eight new numbers a week. We did it! Meetings with members and in-actives have been tough, but we strive to get street meetings as much as possible! This past week we had 12 meetings and that was a ton of work trying to set up all those meetings, and now I know how hard Elder F and Elder H tried to get meetings set up! I have been getting better at carrying a conversation on the phone and setting up meetings with people, so I hope our weeks will become more filled with teaching opportunities.

Last Monday we went down to center of Perm and met up with the other elders to go on the hunt for PB! (800g) for 400 rubles. They weren’t open and then we went looking around and contacting among the streets and shopped for kepkas. The rest of the week we pursued our goals on the street and made some pretty sweet contacts. We met with an investigator and his nearly 16-year-old cat in his shanty apartment and the look on Elder A's face was priceless.

One area we were contacting in we contacted a guy who looks like Michael Moore ha-ha He came up to us and asked me if I knew Joel. I stated that it is a book in the bible and he was a prophet. The guy nodded his head and said what the heck is it!?  He then began to yell at us and call us liars and hooligan’s. I thought that it would be the last time I would see this guy but NO, we were walking and contacting the same area and then I turned to Elder A and said,"Awww, bleeen!" Sure enough the guy remembered us and ran up to me again and asked if I now knew. Of course I knew! Then he said, "That’s All" and started going off yelling to everyone about the second coming. I LIVE FOR THOSE MOMENTS!! hahaha

This past week we had two new investigators in our area and we are preparing to teach them the 2nd lesson! ha-ha YA SON! DO WORK! They are a little quiet and at times but they were good experiences for my companion and I. We come in every night super duper tired and wake up the same way! ha-ha It is funny at 8:00 am we have personal study and I will look across the table and my companion's head is bobbing his head up and down! ha-ha

We don't do English club regularly now because we switch with the other elders from time to time. Which is cool because we then don't have to go the church out of our area for 45 min. Reminds me this past Thursday, when we had a meeting at the church then a meeting in another town which is and hour away from the church. We left the church at 7:30 pm get there at 8:30 and it started to pour and the streets here are really bad and there are floods everywhere! My companion and I ran thru the rain with our umbrellas stepping in flooded streets due to the lack of lights and tried to make our meeting. Well, It didn’t work out for us and then we had to catch a bus back to our house! It can get frustrating, but just imagine the missionaries running through mini floods, and of course we turned a lot of heads and got shouts from old grandmas from windows! "BOYS COVER UP!" "AMERICANS!" hahaha

This week was eventful and I hope to help out my greenie as much as possible and it definitely has been a learning experience for us both this past week!

PS: If you send a letter through dearelder.com then a return address would be sweet because there is no return address unless you type it in the letter, then I can write back.

Love ya’ll and thanks for all of your support!

Elder LeFevre

First Week as a Trainer

So it was the first week back in Perm with Elder A and we are totally excited to show our faith to the Lord and give it our all here to achieve our mission goal of 97 baptisms and specifically 2 in our area, where Elder A and I are serving currently. Once we came back it was tough, because now I am the senior companion and the example for Elder A. 

Everyday this past week we tried seeking meetings with members, less actives, and investigators, but we only ended up having three meetings with less actives and members total. I knew that this was not going to cut it for meetings. I want to give Elder A and I the opportunity to have as many opportunities to teach together and practice the language. Now, I have a different perspective on things being the senior companion. I knew in my mind that it was going to take some down to the bone missionary work and the goal was to go to bed tired from our efforts and wake up tired as well. I know that sounds crazy but that is exactly what happened this past week as we did stop bys and contacting on the streets along the way.

Elder A and I have been praying for the guidance of the Holy Ghost in our effort to find new investigators and restart the area's investigator pool for teaching. We decided that we don't need to spend so much time on investigators who were not progressing and we made plans this past week to conquer the language and the area! ha-ha Weekly Planning is crucial for success. We made the goal to make 18 contacts a day, 4 BoM a week, 10 new numbers a week, 3 New Investigators per month, and 100 push-ups in a minute! ha-ha (Gotta look good!) Our reward of course if we reach a certain percentage in the week is to go to KFC and chow down on delicious food on P-Day! ha-ha 

This past week we have been walking in the rain going up and down stairwells in apartment buildings, and talking with everyone!! Doing so led us to have a new investigator, six other meetings, 6 phone numbers, 1 meeting set for next week, 3 BoM handed out and two happy
missionaries. We put forth our faith this week and pressed forward through the crowds of people stopping as many as we could and we even went tracting in one apartment building. It was a fun experience and we traveled up 18 stories to knock on doors. We felt safe to do so and we did it legally. It was fun getting a couple of slammed doors and confused faces. hahaha However, we managed to talk to a few people who were interested. It was funny to get a few opportunities to ring the bell or the buzzer in most cases and end up talking through the door to the person. We would state who we were and most times they responded and said that they didn’t understand. HOW!! WE ARE MISSIONARIES!! (understandable) ha-ha

I am convinced that we will see the Lord's hand in the work here as we show our faith in our works daily! Training is legit and Elder A is tight! We are going to Smash it! (as Elder F from England would say) 

Thanks for the love and support and the packages.
Love YOU!
Elder LeFevre

First Visa Trip

This past week has been exciting with all the transfers and the arrival of the new missionaries! We got into Yekat Wednesday and I got paired up with Elder W for the day. A group of us missionaries put our priorities straight and decided that we needed to eat at McDonalds! We went to the mall to eat "Ocho Sinqo" (aka two big macs, large fry, and large coke) and some Big N Tasty's. mmmm REALLY AMAZING!! We will be getting a restaurant here in Perm soon. After we ate we went to the center of Yekat with a couple of missionaries who were leaving to go home to look for some souvenirs. While doing so, we stopped by the Temple on the Blood where the Romanov family was murdered and went inside the Provaslovnic Church. While we were there a couple of crazy бобншкы yelled at us for having our hands in our pockets and told us, "Well everything is free here, be respectful foreigners!" Then, she proceeded to ask, "Well, isn’t this a nice 'temple', you need to buy some icons!"  In the churches they have shops to buy golden icons to pray to the different apostles and get different blessings. It is really weird and the priests have long beards and wear all black! The lady sold us a Michael the Archangel icon and we asked what it gives and she replied anything you want! Really?! ha-ha..We had a great time talking to people on the streets and seeing the town.

After, our sight seeing we came back to the office elders' apartment to stay the night to wait for the arrival of the new missionaries. It was great! I got to see Elder P! (MTC companion) I got to see basically the whole mission that night and especially over the next couple of days at President R's house, which we ate stroganoff, scones, sandwiches, cookies, and Russian pancakes. It was great! Before, we went over to President's, all of the trainers sat down and had a pre-game pep talk and then it was off to see my new companion, Elder A.  We hung out at President's place for two days for training and in-field orientation and got to take our new greenies out into the Russian streets! Elder and I had an hour to do contacting then come back for dinner. I always lose track of time talking to people and my Russian is getting better to where I like to talk. We came back and we were the last ones at the table to eat and we were surprised to see there was still food! ha-ha.. It was a great experience and great to see the new companion show his skills out in the streets! All the training was fun! 

Friday night, Elder P and I dropped our companions off at the Zone Leader's for splits in order to fly to Finland to get our Visas. We left Sat morning from Yekat and arrived back on Sunday morning. Unfortunately, we didn’t go to the temple and we couldn't really go anywhere but the airport, so I didn't take a camera with me. After that experience going through Russian security several times, I think I will be a pro when I get back home from the mission. However, Elder P and me did order a giant pizza each and devoured it like champs!! haha... Finland was great, especially how green and beautiful it was. When we walked out of the plane I turned to him and said, "WOW, I can breathe considerably well!" haha.. It was a great experience to fly into Moscow as well, where we ordered some onion rings and watched the volleyball game between Russia and Serbia until our flight left. We came back into Yekat and then it was off to church to meet up with our new companions. Then it was to the train station to hit the ride to Perm! It was exciting and Elder A and me had a good trip. We were talking on the train and then on one of the stops a lady came in and sat across from us and then the fear crept into my gut. At first I debated if I should start the conversation or not, but I did, because I remembered my trainer's example for me, (Elder H) and he did the same by allowing me to practice the language and talk to someone in the train. Already, I was translating for my companion and understood the conversation enough to do so. It was super cool and the same happened to me while contacting with Elder A. God had blessed my companion and I for opening our mouths. This is a great opportunity for both of us and I know we will grow quickly with the Lord's help! 

Love you all!! Всего Хорошого! (All the Best!)

Elder LeFevre

Moving service & Zone Conference

So this week was crazy busy and we had about four meetings total that we had achieved due to the amount of service we had to do. The zone leaders called us up about four times this week trying to coordinate times to move the things from the church building to an apartment in the area not too far from the church. So we hopped inside a little truck called a gazel and moved three full loads of furniture to the new location with my companion. We unloaded it outside the door to the stairwell and then President said lets go look at where we are going to place this stuff. It was on the 3rd floor up a skinny stairwell and into a small apartment! OH GREAT, I thought! Let us say that I got my workout for the day and then to top it all off we went to eat at Rusteeks (KFC). Bocksmasters are the best!! 

Along with this event, the other day we moved the sisters to their new and amazing apartment, which our apartment is now the oldest in the mission. Hey I move for food!! While we were moving, I was sitting outside with Elder K and we got drinks to fuel the fun. I had my water but he fueled up with a 2 L Mountain Dew! ha-ha Mountain Dew is different here, it doesn’t contain orange juice, on the label it just says orange taste! ha-ha (Made in Moscow) Other than that this week has been full of weekly planning which takes 4 hours and transfer cleaning! I love to clean! And I am being serious our apartment still looks like junk after we hit it up with some cleaner. It needs to be remodeled. When we had zone conference, Sister Rust came and did inspections of our apartments and I admit we needed to clean. She seemed like she didn’t like the conditions too much, so we hope maybe we might get something better. YEAH!! Plus the other day my companion pulled the bed away from the wall to do vacuuming and the bed legs broke!! hahaha It is all good we made Russian pancakes to fix the occasion. So he will be sleeping on the floor last few nights in the country.

Zone Conference was AMAZING! We got a general authority to spend the day with us all Thursday and the topic was, "Go forth in Faith", and we were privileged to here from the R's and the Bennett’s, who instructed us and lifted our spirits to look forward and not behind. Elder Bennett served a mission in France and told us an experience of how quiet he was the first five months of his mission and how he regrets it and how we need to change our approach to contacting and make it fun. Satan wants us to place doubts in our heads and fears to replace our courage in order for this work to not progress and for us not to progress either. I really was taken back by the whole talk and realized that was exactly what was going and on and the main difference in how I felt last transfer compared to this one. I have been a little quieter! So I have set the goal to be out going as much as possible and have confidence in myself and in the Lord more. We went and did an hour of strait contacting and it was great! It just got easier and easier every minute that passed. I was with Elder L (AP) and we talked with some interesting people and it was a great experience in general. Elder Bennett is an amazing guy and he got us all pumped up and I felt awesome in general.

So with this new and inspiring outlook it was time to receive my next assignment from President R. He pulled me aside into the other room and we sat down and asked, " So...Elder LeFevre, You ready?!" I said, “I am ready to do anything you ask!" He said, "Good, because you have a great responsibility in TRAINING Elder A !" Whoa! I was taken back. I will be senior companion next transfer and I will be training. I am so excited and I am ready for this great opportunity which will allow me to grow immensely in order to help him out and I in all aspects of the missionary work here in my area. I will be carrying dictionaries cut into two in my pockets and I will be setting the example. This is going to be awesome!! One thing that is great about this is we are both fairly new and we will be doing a ton of contacting and tracting due to all of our investigators and potentials don’t really have potential. There are many things I want to accomplish in this area and I want to leave it better than I found it! (Camping code) We will be definitely going forth and showing our faith in the Lord and press forward strong! Nothing and no one will bind our tongues and our faith. 

I love you all back home and I appreciate the support! Y'all keep it real in America!

Love Elder LeFevre

Living off food storage

So this past week was quite different from the usual. We had the opportunity to participate in service and we were living off our food storage waiting for MSF! ha-ha (noodles, rice, noodles w/ketchup) You know all the good stuff. Mmmmm add a lil salt to spice things up. All the elders of the zone had exhausted their funds too and none of us wanted to go into personal, so we were toughing it out and we did get fed at member's houses. We helped move all the furniture and belongings from the southern end of Perm to the northern branch building, due the other building being renovated. President said it was going to take only four hours starting from 10 am to 2pm. WRONG! Took the whole day and more loads than we thought. It was fun and we got to play a bit of ping-pong while waiting for the load to come. On the way there in the electric trolley I was sitting in my seat when an undercover cop came over and tapped on my shoulder and said, "билет ваш!" (your ticket!) Took some time to register in my brain then it made sense, he was about to throw me out. ha-ha But no worries crises adverted, except for the guy ahead of me he literally got kicked out. So, while we were waiting at the southern branch building, Elder J and me went to the Vivat to see if we had obtained our funds from the Church and hey we did!! So we decided to celebrate with COKE, Super Snickers, and waffles.

So this past week was just like work in a way and hanging out with the guys from work. Lately, we have been trying to work with referrals, which we have received in the past or new ones. Not to much success in numbers, but we have been trying to hit our goals and surprisingly we have been almost exact every week. We have been meeting with some in-actives and one is a little out there. One of them we have been trying to get to sacrament and we got the branch to help us out on that! Whew but be careful for what you wish for! Last couple of visits the person told us that they converse with Michael the archangel and that Satan is bound. So this person shared some of this with everyone this past fast Sunday during testimony meeting. We were sitting there and I can only pick out a few words but I got the 'jist' and they spoke to the moon too!! Ha-ha-ha Eventful!

I am excited that today is P-day, well just for the whole week and President Bennett is going to be here in Perm for zone conference and interviews! I get to meet with a member of the quorum of the seventy! SWEET!! Today we are going souvenir hunting for Elder Fife before he leaves the country at the market and it may be a good chance to look for some pants due to the washer messing up my last pair of slacks! I have been told I am living in the dumpiest apartment of the mission so down the road it can only get better ha-ha-ha-ha. We also plan to look at music, ADIDAS, and stop inside a Proveslavnic Church and buy a couple of Russian dolls. It will be interesting, because then I will be able to see the icons and the shops inside the church. However, on most P-days we meet up at KFC or SUBWAY and play basketball, and I have only taken a nap once! So...yep our p-days are short due to transportation time. Love you all and hope you guys have a successful school year.

I almost forgot to talk about an amazing miracle in my eyes that I got to see this past week. We were teaching English Club, when a new guy comes in and sits with us. He was invited by his friend, who is a sweet member of the church here in Perm. My companion and I teach the advanced group here in Perm and he was able to speak a little bit of English just about the amount I can in Russian. So we got on the topic of history and science. My two favorite subjects! He is an astrophysics scientist in perm. So I showed interest in his job and asked more about Einstein's theories and we began to speak Russian, but I understood most of it due to the scientific theories and expressions in the equations are universal. It was really cool! We connected on the same level of interest and he wants to show me his theories and explain it through a model on his laptop this next week. ha-ha He even invited us to go lap swimming with him, but it was a bummer to say we couldn't I miss swimming. Plus we got to the point where we began to speak on informal 'you,' so it was LEGIT!! I believe it is necessary that as missionaries, we need to express interest in other people's lives and interests to create a level of trust and friendship. Once, this is established it is only a matter of time where they will say something, which you can connect to the gospel. Listening, listening, listening is the biggest form of respect, care, and interest you can give anyone and then they will show to same respect when you share something that is close to you, such as the gospel.

Love you all,
Elder LeFevre

Peanut Butter is GONE !

CRAZY that this transfer is almost over!  After serving in one area for a while it just seems like that is your area for like two years ha-ha But this next transfer is going to be exciting because we have 9 new elders coming into the mission.

This week was a good week and more celebrations at the apartment at the end of the day which plans had changed dramatically.

So my communication skills in Russian are getting better and more confident on the phone, which is great!! Got this last week set up with awesome meetings where we talked about the temple and got to show some pictures to some of the families here of back home. Talking about the temple so much last week made me just want to go really bad. We had 12 members here in Perm have the privilege to go for a week in Kiev and do work there.  It was cool to see their faces all beaming and better bet us missionaries have them help on meetings to testify, which we had them do. Of course it turns into about forty minutes of talking before the lesson sometimes, but I liked hearing from these modern pioneers and their experience at the temple. I showed my favorite temple, San Diego, to members in my photo album and they thought it was the coolest thing ever. (Because the San Diego is). But I like the Vegas one too, because you can walk around the backside and overlook the city and feel like you are standing on top of the world, which you are in all reality above the world living the standards of the church and above the adversary.

I continued to show the rest of my pictures and people kept saying how I had changed and that I was chunky in MTC and prior to going in but now "I am in RUSSIA" that is what they say ha-ha . So this relates to the fact of how my PEANUT BUTTER is gone and so is my RED HOT SAUCE!!

Oh and one cool thing is that the mission sent every companionship a DVD player to do the New Training on and it is a great way to listen to my inherited MP3's ha-ha (Alex Boye by the way is awesome and encourage you to buy his CD). we listen to it about 10 times a day and it does not get old so pick it up at the Deseret Book today! 

Along with our desserts we make Russian pancakes and have been living off soup! Living the Life here. Our investigators have been tough to meet with due to school starting on September 1st and the cell service is another thing, it is more like "can you call me now?...Now?...Good!" But one investigator has a hard time with smoking and drinking and he is trying to quit and says he will be baptized in this church but we all know we cannot stop there so we are trying to kick him in the behind and draw some steps to getting him there. Never knew how good the gospel and its principles are until we start living and teaching it!

от Россий с любовью Ст. ЛеФивэр
(From Russia with Love, Elder LeFevre)

It is getting HOT, HOT, NOT !!!

It is getting HOT, HOT, NOT!!!!! ha-ha  

Elder F and I go running every morning and get our body temperature up then we come inside and shower and the hot water, which by the way smells like onions, hits and it actually refreshing! ha-ha Last Monday we played basketball with some high school kids out in the neighborhood and it was great. We lost however. ha-ha  My skills were just so good that the "White handbook" prevented me from going to my full potential on the court. Don't want to get injured you know. Plus most of you have seen my skills before and can trust that we could have smashed them.

From there on out the week became COLD! Yes. I was sporting the sweater and the p-jack. My companion laughs when I say this is like winter in Vegas! He can’t wait until true winter hits because he is from Alaska. ha-ha  I am warm blooded!!   ALL THE HOT SAUCE IS GONE! (at least the Cholula) Yes crazy, I know the food is more bland than I thought, but healthier than American. We had splits this past weekend and I went with Elder W. He couldn't believe the amount of habanero Tabasco I put on my eggs yesterday. All I said, "Hey I am from Vegas!"

This past week we have been making our way to less active members and doing family home evenings at people's houses. Great FOOD! I love Family Home Evening. So it has been good and we continue to try to find. It is still nerve racking to talk on the bus with some people but I am proud to just open my mouth at least and ask how it is going. Because you either get three responses.

1-They fall asleep (FAKERS)
2-Stare
3-mumbled Russian
4- GO HOME YANKEE! hahaha

Yep and you haven’t been on a bus ride until you just lose all sense of personal space and cannot do anything about it, especially when a guy is staring at you and breathing his beer breath! yo Bro! Here is a Tic Tac! and by the way the closer you get to my name tag you aren’t gonna read it! Because you are hammered!" haha

I inherited the taco bed last week and I am actually sleeping well! Haha  See tacos are 100% perfect! (Every way, aspect or form). Same with the gospel.  It is like a tortilla shell that holds all the good fillings to make you happy! It can be folded or rolled anyway to fit what that person needs and what blessings they are going to partake.

Transfers were at the end of the week and I got to chill with Elder W.  It was great. We tore the sister's area book apart with phone calls then took a tranbus to go eat at KFC! aka Растикс! Which is totally different menu and a Coke конечно. Then we made our way back and handed a Book of Mormon! Then we had a birthday party with cake, ice cream, tea, and watermelon. We had two meetings and hey I got complemented on how good my Russian is coming along by several members. So that is a plus! Then we came home and hung out with the other elders who are still without an apartment. So it was sick!

My week was great! One cool thing was I and Elder F got to take a member around to throw away garbage, buy groceries, and get water. His wife is in the hospital and he is 100% blind and 70% deaf. So it was great to hang with him! He is an amazing dude. He pointed at me and said, “You ready for the cold warm blood!" ha-ha and then asked if my hair was curly yet because of the humidity. Then we had tea and cookies, which was awesome.

So our whole week was full of rejoicing here in Perm and to top it all off we made the best chocolate shake ever. Super Snickers (100 g), Chocolate ice cream (400 g), sweetened condensed milk, peanut butter, Nutella, 4% Milk, and 2 bananas!! (grams is how we measure) Yeah that will knock your socks off!  ha-ha   So try it out at home! It will put you to sleep really quick!

Love ya'll
Elder LeFevre