Happy Orthodox Easter and Happy Spring!

04/09/2018

This year Easter and General Conference lined up pretty well. Not only for all of you Americans but also for all of us here in Eastern Europe. For you Easter was on the 1st of April and so was General Conference. For us we watch General Conference the week after because it takes some time for all of the translations to be done and it just so happened that this year Orthodox Easter was on the same day that we would watch General Conference. Us missionaries here in Vinnitsya got to listen to it in English throughout the week and might I say that I don't remember a General Conference being so powerful. I felt so inspired to be better and to study the scriptures more intently and not to mention all of the surprising new changes in church programs. Here in the Europe East Area the Area Presidency has instructed that all ward and branch units hold sacrament meeting during general conference weekend. So the way it works here is that the week after all of you watch General Conference we have sacrament meeting but watch at least one session of General Conference after that ordinance of the sacrament. We got to as a branch watch the Sunday morning session and I think it was cool that when they would say something like "On this beautiful Easter morning. . ." it was actually Easter for us. 

Before we watched the Sunday morning session we watched and took part in the "Solemn Assembly". That was a really awesome experience to see these faithful Ukrainian members stand and sustain their church leaders. We have one Deacon and it was cool for him to stand and sustain the Prophet and Apostles. 

After we watched conference the branch put on a little Easter party that was pretty tasty. Here in Ukrainian there are a lot more traditions than we have in the U.S. Here it is very popular to back these special little Easter cakes called "Pas'hachki" and decorate eggs in very elaborate ways and take them to the Provoslovny "Orthodox" churches to get them blessed by the priests. It is always fun to see these families walking or getting on the tramvay to go to the church with their basket of eggs. So our members of course made the special Easter cakes (which actually aren't the best, mostly pretty bland but you can get lucky sometimes and get a good one) and lots of colored eggs as well as a variety of other tasty Ukrainian dishes. Another Easter tradition is to have "egg battles" where you and another person take and egg and hit them together to see which one will win and stay whole and which one will loose and crack. I grabbed an egg and with all of the little kids that were there had these little "egg wars" and without meaning to (because I think that there is some element of strategy involved) won every single time. I even tried to use the seemingly weaker part of my egg but still I remained undefeated. I feel a little bad that I broke all of those kid's eggs but mostly feel accomplished. 

We here have been trying to make a bigger effort in getting more new people to come to our pretty big English Practice. The problem isn't in getting people but in getting people who aren't young girls and 55-65 year old men. We are pretty good at getting those types of people to come, especially Elder Clifford in getting those younger women to come. We recently went out one night and talked with a whole bunch of people about English and we met quite a few people who are very interested in our English Practice and have seen a few of them in our most recent English Practice. 

Other than that we didn't get to do very much this week. I spent some good time in the beginning of the week getting all the way better from last week. But now I am 100% better. I think that I might have to do with the amazing Spring weather that we have been having. Today it has gotten up to 19 degrees C! I think that equates to about 67 degrees F. I thas been so warm and you can see all the green starting. Spring is something else here in this part of the world. It comes so fast, almost over night, and it is intense green. I have experienced two Springs in Eastern Europe before this and I can feel it here. There is also a special Spring smell that is only here that I have started to notice again. 

On a diferent note, I have been accepted to Utah State University and am very excited to see what my future will hold. I have had lots of help in getting these things all sorted out since I haven't done anything with applying for college after I graduated High School. 

Things are going well here in Ukraine. We recently got new missionaries which we are very grateful to have here in our little mission. Due to all of those missionaries that have been going home who have ended their missions we have been getting smaller and smaller but we have had some relief with getting groups of new missionaries.

I would invite all of you to pay closer attention to what our church leaders have counseled us in doing and make a greater effort in carrying out what they have said, especially our Prophet. 

I am very grateful for all of your support and prayers and am looking forward to another great week here in the misison field in the service of my God!

Старейшина Класон / Elder Clawson

Elder Clifford really wanted to play basketball so we went to a court that we knew of but it was locked tight. So we resorted to setting up to broken hoop that is at our church and had a little fun and ate some pizza form the "Silpo" grocery store near us. 

Zone Conference Photo

04/02/2018

Here is the picture from our last Zone Conference about three weeks ago.

An Eventful Week

04/02/2018

Yeah so here is the story of this week.

Once upon a time we had a family home evening with one of the families here on the Vinnitsya Branch. There we had some food. After that I got terribly sick and now we are here. That is the story of this week. I have been confined to my apartment since last Tuesday and have only gone outside once before today. That other time was on Sunday to try and download the Saturday Sessions of General Conference so we could take it back and watch it at home. But that didn't work unfortunately. 

I appologize for the short email but that was what happened this week. Pretty sad right?

On the bright side I got to finish the Book of Mormon again. 

Старейшина Класон / Elder Clawson

Tasty Taco Salad in Kiev

3/26/2018

So we went to Kiev againt this last week. Our train up on Monday night wasn't the best. But I guess all I have to compare it to is the "InterCity Plus" which is a really nice train. We are spoiled sometimes here. But Luckily our train back down was the InterCity Plus. 

In Kiev we had what President Kumferman called "Mid Transfer Training". This is what President Packer called "Mini MTC" and President Blair in the U.S. mission called "Extened MTC". You might be thinking 'Well wait a second Elder Clawson. You aren't a new missionary anymore and infact are going home in not too long." But let me tell you that even at this point you don't really feel old. But it wasn't my lack of feeling senior but the fact that my current companion is pretty new that we got this opportunity to go back up to Kiev after we had been there not even three days ago. 

There we had lots of fun talking about a variety of things most of which consisted of mental, physical, socal, spiritual and emotional health. We also talked about language study nand other topics as well. I personally was very very tried from having to get up really early to get there on time from the appartment we were staying at in order to get there early and I was pretty zoned out for a lot of the time. But it really wasn't for me anyways. Right?

We had a great English Practice on Wednesday and we notcied that one of the older ladies that comes to our beginner group might be interested in family history and after wards we asked her and she truned out to be very interested and have plans to meet after one of these days and get her introduced with Familysearch. We had an exchange with our Zone Leaders whcih came down from Kiev. I was with Elder Lundquist my old buddy from Borschagovsky. We vistited a less-active lady who taught us how to make these magazine paper tubes and basiclly basket weave with them. We both made jars and now have more supplize thanks to her to make more things. We;ll see what we come up with. We also talked with some cool people on the streets. On the way to that less-active lady's house I felt that I should stop and talk to this business looking man and he stopped with is a mircale in of itself and after explaining who we were he stopped me and asked me why I had decided to stop HIM. I told him that I had a feeling that I should and he ofund that very interesting and eventually execpted a copy of the Book of Mormon and comitted to read it. 

Saturday we had another awesome English Pracice where a lot of people came. We had around 55-60 poeple there this time and a lot of new people too. That was cool. After our spiritua;l thought a lot of poeple took a copy of "The Living Christ" document which was also cool.

After English Practice there was a Relief Society party where the sisters in the Relief Society did a little reenactment of the formation of the Relief Society. It was funny to see these Ukrainians in pioneer clothing and bonetts like you only really see on treck or "This is the Place" Heritage park in Utah. After that we had a Vereniky (meet or potato dumplings) where my team won. After that we had the projecor set up and played some sing alongs that were very hard to follow. After that they transitioned into the just dance videos where us misssionaries had the honor of starting the branch off with. They are really enjoyed that. I have never seen so many cellphones get whipped out so fast before. After we were al tired they brought out tables and we all ate.

On Sunday President Onyshuk from the Mission Presidency came and he spoke and after durring the second hour he instructed us. Seeing him there with his family as well was a reall treat but what was even better was seeing all of the sudden Irina (The formor investigator mom of a less-active recent convert) walk in. She said that she just felt that she should come. I wasn't really sure what to think but she stayed both hours of church. After wards she left and didn't really give me a chance to talk with her but she did talk with another member. 

Today we went and found Elder Clifford some knitting needles and yarn so he can learn. He has been wnating to learn, for what ever reason, and now is ready for his own project. 

On the tramvay home (I don't remember when) I sat down next to this younger looking guy and started talking with him. Here in Ukraine it is some what rare to find someone that will talk with you if you are strangers. granted everyone will help you if you are lost without a question but other than that they won't talk. So it was already a good sign seeing this guy talk with me. We found out that he is on the Vinnitsya basketball team which sport is Elder Clifford's favorite and a soon as the words "basketball" left this man's lips Elder Clifford swoopted in and joined in. He seem ed pretty interested in English Pracice and we'll see what happens with him. 

Well. That's it folks.

Старейшина Класон / Elder Clawson​

Spring?

3/19/2018

Spring was supposed to come. . . spring was supposed to be here. . .

The weather has truned very cold again. Elder Clawson hair freezing cold. Again. But there is hope. They say that this is that last time that it will get like this before Spring. Let's see how good of a metoirologist the babuski in the branch are.

Basically our only Investigator right now is a twenty two year old girl named Dasha. She is pretty awesome and is pretty interested in the Goepel and in my opinion something, or someone else as well. . .

We had a good meeting with her this week and talked about the Plan of Salvation after our English Practice. She has been coming to the biginner group that Elder Clifford and I run. She has pretty good English for a beginner and I think that the middle/advanced group would suit her more but she likes coming to our group instead. On the Wednesday practice after class during the usual story to get everyone together before the Spiritual thought she came and sat behind me and told me that the meeting we had planned with her after wasn't going to work because she was super hungry. I told her that it was alright but also that I had brought something to give her during our lesson. She thought for a second and then said "Okay I'll stay". I felt kind of bad so I gave her an "Артек" (a waffel cookie thing) and she gobbled that thing right up. We had the lesson with a member named Gena how honestly is the back bone of our little branch her in Vinnitsya. She still had lots of seemingly random questions but if you pay attention they are all good genuine questions. Gena is a returned missionary and is a huge help. I am very grateful that he was there with us to explain better what we believe (even though she already knows a lot about what we believe) and to bear sincire testimony. After that I gave her a cool little Plan of Salvation refrigorator magnet that I had made during my time in the office. I think she thought it was cool.

We had an eschanged with the other elders this week. I was with Elder Hart while Elder Clifford was with Elder Durtschi. We had fun and especially the three of them after we got home and started shooting hoops in our appartment with the miniture basket ball and hoop that Elder Clifford got in his Christmas Package. Our neighbor below us however didn't think that it was that fun. 

We took a train up to Kiev and had our interviews with President Kumferman. I always love getting to have an interview with him and talk for a while with Sister Kumferman while I wait. With the Packer's I never had an interview in the mission home let alone even saw it but ever since I left Odessa I have had one there every single time. Not that the Packers aren't hospitible or anything but I have jsut really drawn closer with the Kumfermans. It also helps that out of the three mission presidents that I have had, President Kumferman is the one that I have had for the longest. 

After that we went and did sports night in the Borschagovsky ward. It was nice to see members there and the missionaries as well. That night we stayed over at the office elder's apartment like many used to do when I was serving there and then the next day had an awsome Zone Conference where we talked about the Scattering and Gathering of Israel. It was all very interesting and it is really cool to see the progressing we have form one Zone Conference to the next in topic. After that we took our three and a half hour train ride back to Vinnitsya. Both times going and coming back from Kiev we had the nice InterCity train and ours both times was a double decker one and we got to be on top both times. Today (Monday after getting back from Kiev on Frieday) we are going up again to Kiev because there is a special training on Tuesday for all the new missionaries who got here in October and January. So we get top go up because Elder Clifford was one of those that got here in October.

Here in the Vinnitsya Branch we only hold two hours of church each week. We always have Sacrament meeting and then it switches off every week having either Sunday School or Relief Society/Priesthood meeting. This week we had Priesthood Meeting but since Elder Clifford is one of two people in the branch who can play the piano and the other being Elder Durtschi we were asked to go to Primary and play for them. I just tagged along and tried to help calm down the little kids that were going crazy. It was kind of funny. They had probably the most quiet and calm person in the branch teach the lesson in Primary. At first I wasn't sure how it was going ot work out but it turned out alright. 

One fun fact about Elder Clifford is that his two teeth next to his two front teeth are missing. He has these prosthetic ones that he wares though and it is funny sometimes when he forgets them and goes out in public. 

Старейшина Класон / Elder Clawson

This is me showing Elder Clifford the cool lights on one of the streets near the office elder apartment.

Half of our English Class on Saturday Were Girls Named Dasha

3/12/2018

Happy Spring! 

This week was so much more warm than the last. If I remember right it got up to +11 degrees C!

In our little branch here in Vinnitsya there is a member who's husband is from Nigeria i think and here was taken back to Nigeria for some reason and leaving here with four crazy kids. Every week one of us pairs of missionaries goes over and has a family home evening with here and her family. She has some of the craziest but cutest kids. Unfortunatly the oldest who is about 12 years old is not as mature as I would that she would be but the second oldest is pretty good but the other two are jsut crazy! I feel really bad for her because she has to take care of those little honey badgers. The youngest who's name is Samik is so crazy but so funny. He is always dancing and sticking food in his eyes and he slobbered all over Elder Clifford. But fortunatly Gena, our Branch President's second councilar who is a returned missionary, was on the lesson with us. 

Ever since we both got here Elder Clifford and I have been wanting to make Borsch for us to subsist on. We don't haver an pots that are bigger than 3-5 liters. With that size of pot it ins't worth it to make borsch becuase you have to have a big one so you can make a lot and eat it all week. So we set of on a journy to find a big pot. And we found one. Oh did we fin done. We went to the rinok (market) called "Урожай" (harvest) and started on our hunt. We were surprized to find anything right off becuase of the commoness of items like that that are frequent in rinoks like this and becuase of the size of the rinok itself. But we past by one stall on our way out of the rinok after we had already given up. We saw a whole bunch of dishess and cookware and asked the man tending the stall whcih one was his biggest pot. He pointed up to this huge couldren and said that one. We notced that it was not only very expencive but insanly huge as to counteract our designs. We asked him for the second biggest and pointed again in the up direction to another failry large pot. We gave him 500 Hrivna which was the price for the large 20 liter pot that is now filled with delicous borsch. It is kind of rediculous how much we have. We ate it every day this last week and it seems like we haven't made a dent in it but then I remind my self that it was all worth it. Borsch, beet soup, is similar to musical instruments, baklava and juice, the older it gets the better it gets.

It has been pretty tough here trying to meet with investigators for two reasons. One, we don't really have any investigators at the moments and two, becuase the majority of the residents in the city of Vinnitsya are 17-27 year old girls. That causes a bit of a perdiciment for us young elder missionaries who jsut wnat to follow the rules but also not waste any of our time. However thus said we did have a pretty great meeting with Dasha our 21 year old female investigator who is kind of left over fromt he sisters who before served here. And yes we did have anothe rmale person on the lesson so everything worked out the way it should have. She has a lot of great questions and even came to Saturday's English Pracice. I can tell we are going to be seeing more over her. 

Our Branch Presidency is comprized of President Koshelev who is a member from Danyesk, his first counciler who is a long time member and the second counciler, Gena who is an amazing returned member and is one of the most put together young men I have met here in Ukraine. He is also not to bad looking and has a pretty attreactive girlfriend who works at the Levi's store in teh mall right next to us and has been coming more often to activities at the church. She is super nice and Gena says that she will get baptized. We asked her if we could meet and talk about the gospel and the Book of Mormon, which she already has because of Gene. She hasn't given us a deffinite answer yet but we can tell that Gena is right. 

About a week ago we met this other girl in Silpo (the grocery store we use) and she was really interested in the fact that we speak English and are Americans. Of course that is interesting to all of the women here in Ukraine but she was instesting because she is all about sience and biology and is learning Enlgish and all of the Siecnetific terms in ELgish and want ssomeone to talk with that can help her understand the American cultiure more in preporation of the fulfillment of her dream to study at a science univerity in New York. She has explained that she is not interested in religion but would like to meet with us and " talk about America and what has influenced out lives." So we went down by the Buh river whcih is right by our branch building and talked for a bit about our lives and many other things. It was directly related to religion but it had some good moments were I was able to she some the reasons why I have so much joy in my life. And the end of our conversations I had the chance to talk a little bnit about the Book of Mormon and topld her that it was my favorite book and that it is one of the most influencial things in my life. She seemed to have gotten interested becasue she asked what it was called and wrote it down. I offered to give her a copy but she said that it wasn't needed and that she would jsut look it up. Now at this point most of us would have had our heart drops becuase of all of the different things that she could read about us and the Book of Mormon. So I casually told her the site where she could find it and had her write down "lds.org". Good save. Elder Clifford and I think that she says that she doesn't wnat religion but that she actully inside is starving for it. This is actually true for most people. Most people don't actuaolly really know what they want or are lacking. We learn through prayer and inspiration that every one is thirsting for the good word of the gospel that can spring up into fountains of everlasting life. We believe stongingly that this is the case with our biologist friend Sasha as it is with many others. Also, when we met Sasha that one day to talk we met by the big clock tower and she took us inside and payed for us to see the musium. Inside it is actually a war musium from the Afganistanian war the the USSR was apart of. I wasn't awar that in the seventies and eighties there was a war that the Soviets helped Afganistan. We got to go up to the very top of the tower which was six levels and each level had different pictures and uniforms and letters but I most most interested by the pressure suit that was on the fourth level. 

We went out to this little village called "Медвеже Ушко" to meet with this old babuska who is one of the most faithful members we have here. It was a fun trip trying to get out there but in the end it all worked out and we met with her and her daughter who is also a babuska and is blind and their babuska neighbor friend who is also a member. they are the most kind and faithful people I have ever met. 

Other than the regular English Practice and Youth night we have here we had a special holiday here in Ukraine. March 8th is Internation Women's day which as far as I know is celebrated everwhere except the U.S.

We had church as usual and Elder Durschi spoke and all the while a babuska names Aleksandra who has been coming for years but refuses to be baptized was taking notes of all of his mistakes because she is a Russian teacher. Elder Durtschi was a little bit offended I think but I think that it is pretty awesome to have some one that will do that for you. I also think that she just doesn't like his Russian.

This week wasn't too crazy despite the size of my letter this week. We manly jsut had things happen that doesn't usuallt go on. 

I am very grateful to be here in the service of my God and I know that only good can come from the work I have undertaken. 

Старейшина Класон / Elder Clawson

Elder Clifford walked across the Buh River whe it was about +10 C

Ukrainian Folk Dancing and Ice Everything

3/05/2018

So we tried to stop by a whole bunch of less-active member this week but they all didn't answer except two. One of them said that her family told her that they would either go to the Provoslavny Church together or no church at all. So she pretty firmly desiided that she is not coming back. The other lady said that she would "try to come if it works out" buit we all know what that means. It took some effort to catch her when she was at home. We think that she has been trying to avoid us. We called her last week and she said that she "wasn't feeling well". I aske if we could meet her on Tuesday next week and she just gave a a halfhearted maybe. We showed up and she jsut so happened to visiting her friend in the hospital. We stopped by again the next day and she answered and what looked like her boyfiend was there who and something in his arm and looked not to kindly dispossed towards us. She said that she couldn't meet and that she had to go visit her friend again. We hope that she can find some time to come back to church. 

We have some pretty good Enlgish practices this week. We teach the bignners group and the other elders the advanced group. 

We had a good fast and testimony meeting yesterday on Sunday. We don't have a pianist in our branch so Elder Clifford and Durtschi throughout the week when ever we are at the church they practice for that upcoming Sunday. They do a pretty good job playing for us. But that doesn't help our members sing any better.

Last week who what thought was a member came up to us after sacrament meeting and who we latter found out is not a member and refieuses to get baptized but comes every single week told us that she was willing to help us imrpove our Russian since she used toi be a Russian teacher. It was pretty good but it was mostly her roasting us on our acecnts, mostly the acents of one of us. I thought that it was good practice but someone else doesn't wnat to go anymore. So Elder Clifford and I will go and get good Russian while the others be content with what they have so far. 

We went iceskateing with an investigator which was awesome. He is a really nice guy from Lebonon but lives and works here in Ukraine. I think that going ice skating with him had an influence on him. After wards we got some fancy icecream. They had this little stand in the mall where the ice rink was where they had this little round metal plate that they squirted cream on and other falvoring things and then started to mmix it up. We noticed that the cream stareted to ge slower and slower and realized that the plate was being chilled so that it was freezing the cream right there. Then the guy starteded spreading it all out in a square sheet and let it sit then skrapted it off into little rolled up tubes of magicalk icecream. Then he plopped them into a cup and but some more stuff on top and gave it to us. It was pretty good but the fanciness of it was more worth it. 

This last week it has snowed every single day of the week and has been pretty cold. That hasn't stopped us though from runnisn every other morning. This last time we ran we stopped to take a short break before we ran back home and we noticed that we each had ice on our eye brows and lashes. So yeah that was cool. 

There is one guy that has started coming to English Practice who is super Ukrainain in the fact that he only knows Ukrainian and no Russian or English and has some craxy ideas. Most of the time we have no idea what he is talking about but we know enough to know that he is a traditional Ukrainian folk dancer. And he showed us a dance off he had with another guy on his phone and then showed us in real life what it looks like. He is pretty crazy. 

Through everything that has been going on the only thing that is consistant is that our appartment is impossible to warm up to a comfotable temperature and reading the Book of Mormon everyday. One of these things wakes us constantly cold and the other gives us a sustaining warmth that caries us through out the day. If you can't figure it out the appertment makes you cold while the Book of Mormon fills you with light, life and joy. I would invite each of you to more attentivly read the Book of Mormon each day individually and as a family. 

Старейшина Класон / Elder Clawson

Here are some pictures finally.

There this a Beatles monument thing across the street from the mall right by our appartment and there is always Beatles music playing there.

There is a street whick is trasnlated to "Street of Cosmonauts" and there are lots of less-active members that live on this street.

We went Ice sckating with a guy from Lebonon who speak English better than us.