The weeks seem to go by fairly fast and now it’s getting closer to October. We had planned on Saturday to do something with some of the other senior couples…and that is what we did. There were four couples and we all crowded into Eric Gasparyan’s van and he did the chauffeuring. Nice! He also could tell us something of the sights that we were visiting.
Our first stop was to visit the “Mother of Armenia” monument at the top of the hill. She overlooks the city and has (as you can see from the pictures that Elder Peterson just had to take) lots of weaponry, tanks, missles, etc. surrounding her. It was also a military museum of sorts with lots of old uniforms and pictures on display. It was all very dark and the ceilings were covered with what I suppose was a netting with camaflouge. Okay, but once will do. The Pincocks had brought along some Yum Yum donuts (like Bismarks and apple fritters…just like at home) and we all enjoyed the midmorning reminder of things given up…okay it just isn’t because we came to Armenia, but I think we gave them up some time ago due to our “figures”.
We then traveled on some rather distraught roads for quite a period of time, but eventually arrived at Geghard. It is an ancient monastery, partly carved out of a mountain, that is still in business. The main chapel was built in 1215 and the monastery was established in the 4th century so it is very old. As we were walking up the cobblestone road from the parking lot, we noticed some caged pigeons. I think they still do live animal sacrifices here. It was a busy place. There were lot of tourists, a baptism (of an infant) and someone taking wedding pictures…so lots of observe. It was a curious place…very old. Elder P took a picture of the floor that has a hole in it. The chanter would sing and they would open up the hole to the downstairs, so that the singing could be heard throughout the monastery. As we were coming into the room, some tourist from Holland was in the middle of singing/chanting, and he had a very nice voice. It sort of reminded me of when we sang in the old theater in Salem where we performed Sound of Music years ago. They have a chapel where you can go and light candles and put them in raised sandboxes…waxy smelling place. There were vendors selling jewelry, breads, fruit leather, date/walnut concoctions on a string, and we did get some bread and some date/walnut goodies. I’m always a little concerned with the flies that have landed on them, but we seemed to suffer no ill effect. As we were traveling to our next site, we did purchase some apples on the side of the road (400 dram/kilo or about 50 cents a pound) and they were very tasty.
We visited a place called Garni. Elder Peterson enjoyed seeing the van cats and fox pelts that were displayed by the vendors on our way in. Garni is the only surviving Hellenistic architecture type temple in Armenia. It was originally built as a pagan temple, called the Sun Temple, they say in the 3rd Century BC. It was destroyed by an earthquake in 1679 and rebuilt in 1949. We also saw the bathhouse and the foundation for another church. It was a peaceful place with nice vistas. If you saw the movie “Hercules” you’ve seen this temple as it was apparently used for that movie.
From Garni, we traveled to the “book” museum. The museum is located appropriately at the top of Mashtots Street. Mashtots is the one who invented the Armenian alphabet. There were lots of beautiful bibles on display with wonderful illuminations and illustrations. They were made from all sorts of materials and were all sizes from small (a couple of inches) to big. I read on one display that one of the books called the Homilies of Mush was made from 630 calfskins. When opened the book is about one meter wide and weighs 32 kiIograms. I didn’t see anything really old, but I guess if they were 11th Century…that would be considered pretty old.
At the end of our trip, some of the seniors enjoyed some Italian food and some others opted for sharmas (barbecued meat on a stick, put in lavash with lot of veggies added). It was sort of like getting a Subway in the States. We followed it with some soft ice cream for dessert. Great day!
Sunday, Elder Peterson added another assignment…that of Ward Mission Leader. He was released as Elders Quorum President as President Carter said being the Institute Director plus 1st Counselor in the Branch Presidency, Mission Leader and Elders Quorum President was too much…and I think we’d agree.
All the Senior couples were invited to eat with the Budds on Sunday. The Budds are a younger couple with 4 cute children (including two girls with red hair…and you know we love our red heads). Justin Budd is army military attached to the Armenian Embassy. We had a great barbecue with hamburgers and all the fixings…sort of American-like.
You’d think we’d done enough eating to take a break for awhile…but not so. For Family Night we had some of the Armenians (Lusine, Samvel, Suzie Q, and Zara H) and the Pincocks come over and this time Lusine cooked a soup that had bamja (okra) in it and it was very good. We added a summer salad, bread and ice cream for dessert…so we have been well fed lately. Elder Peterson led a great discussion on marriage that involved how the Pincocks met and we were all educated and entertained. They are a great group of young people, and the old ones are great, too.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Back to Armenia #8
It’s always a small world out here. I was in our local market the other day and one of the workers in the produce (who was Armenian, but spoke some English) asked me where I was from. I said the United States…and she said, “I know that, but where?” I replied, “Utah, Provo, Utah”. She then proceeded to tell me that she had lived in Provo for five years and she and her children really wanted to move back there, but her husband did not, so here they stay, at least for the time being. She commented how she really liked Provo and how friendly and helpful the people there were. Way to go Provo!!! I think she has a favorable impression of the church and maybe even has some family that is LDS.
We had an opportunity to go to the airport to welcome home our returning dancers. They were so tired, but excited about the experiences they had had. One of the dancers was left in the Ukraine because she was late boarding and they had oversold the plane, so she stayed and I think had the opportunity in her delay to actually go to the temple to do some baptisms…an added bonus for her. She has sent off her papers to serve a mission and is waiting for her call. Another one of our cute sisters, Lia, is also waiting for her call. Lia has been serving as a “mini” missionary and so excited to serve full-time. Life really is about learning to serve one another, willingly and with a happy heart.
We had another opportunity to serve as we prepared a lunch for 30+ missionaries. We ordered rolls (kind of like hoagies) from our local bakery (not like the ones at home, I must say), purchased the other fixings (meat, tomatoes, cucumbers, cheese, mayo) sliced the bread, assembled the sandwiches, added, chips, grapes and juice and voila!, a lunch they all seemed to enjoy. The missionaries are participating in some training that is being done world-wide to help them become better teachers of the Gospel. This training is 4 days long and at the behest of the First Presidency. It is considered important enough that they are willing to pull the missionaries from their missionary work to receive the training.
September brought an additional assignment for Elder Peterson. He’s now the 1st counselor in the Yerevan Branch Presidency. The new president is Narek Tsatsuryan, and a returned missionary from the Ukraine of about 9 months ago. He’s been a member of the church for about 4 years, and has a lot to learn, but he’ll have an experienced leader to help him along. It was interesting to me that as we talked with Narek about his counselors, I was thinking in the back of my mind that Elder Peterson would be a good one…and then, I guess the Lord must have inspired Narek, too, because that is who he called.
We had a fun dinner appointment this last weekend…and we didn’t have to fix it. I did do a dessert and that is another story. We have an electric oven and I didn’t realize that is was set to only cook on the top…so the top looked cooked. but when I tried a little taste the bottom was still like cookie dough. So, I cooked it again (still not changing the settings, however). Then I commented to Rog about it and he noticed that the settings were wrong, set it right and I cooked the brownies for the third time. Less than satisfactory, but the missionaries who had invited us to dinner didn’t complain and enjoyed the brownie/ice cream dessert. We enjoyed the chicken enchilada they had made from scratch, using lavash, instead of tortillas. If they cooked like that every day, I’m sure they wouldn’t stay as thin as they are.
One of the things we miss as missionaries is personal face to face interaction with our families and friends back home. Skype is okay, better than e-mail, but not quite the same as in person stuff. We just received an e-mail from Alisa and she will have some great musical opportunities coming up in the next six months, and if any of you are in the area where she’ll be performing, maybe you can represent us with some hugs and kisses. She’ll be performing at the Lincoln Center in New York on December 19th as part of their Christmas program and makes her Carnegie Hall debut on March 14th singing John Rutter’s Requiem. There was also a fun article (http://issuu.com/philatknpr/docs/desert_companion_2010sept/58) about her that appeared in a local NPR magazine. We’re excited for her and I guess you could say, “busting our buttons”. While on the subject of family, we have one other request. Our oldest granddaughter has Retts Syndrome. There is an opportunity to register and vote every day at http://www.refresheverything.com/rettresearchtoreality . Pepsi is giving away dollars for research and we’re voting for a cure!!!
Hope you are enjoying life wherever you are!
We had an opportunity to go to the airport to welcome home our returning dancers. They were so tired, but excited about the experiences they had had. One of the dancers was left in the Ukraine because she was late boarding and they had oversold the plane, so she stayed and I think had the opportunity in her delay to actually go to the temple to do some baptisms…an added bonus for her. She has sent off her papers to serve a mission and is waiting for her call. Another one of our cute sisters, Lia, is also waiting for her call. Lia has been serving as a “mini” missionary and so excited to serve full-time. Life really is about learning to serve one another, willingly and with a happy heart.
We had another opportunity to serve as we prepared a lunch for 30+ missionaries. We ordered rolls (kind of like hoagies) from our local bakery (not like the ones at home, I must say), purchased the other fixings (meat, tomatoes, cucumbers, cheese, mayo) sliced the bread, assembled the sandwiches, added, chips, grapes and juice and voila!, a lunch they all seemed to enjoy. The missionaries are participating in some training that is being done world-wide to help them become better teachers of the Gospel. This training is 4 days long and at the behest of the First Presidency. It is considered important enough that they are willing to pull the missionaries from their missionary work to receive the training.
September brought an additional assignment for Elder Peterson. He’s now the 1st counselor in the Yerevan Branch Presidency. The new president is Narek Tsatsuryan, and a returned missionary from the Ukraine of about 9 months ago. He’s been a member of the church for about 4 years, and has a lot to learn, but he’ll have an experienced leader to help him along. It was interesting to me that as we talked with Narek about his counselors, I was thinking in the back of my mind that Elder Peterson would be a good one…and then, I guess the Lord must have inspired Narek, too, because that is who he called.
We had a fun dinner appointment this last weekend…and we didn’t have to fix it. I did do a dessert and that is another story. We have an electric oven and I didn’t realize that is was set to only cook on the top…so the top looked cooked. but when I tried a little taste the bottom was still like cookie dough. So, I cooked it again (still not changing the settings, however). Then I commented to Rog about it and he noticed that the settings were wrong, set it right and I cooked the brownies for the third time. Less than satisfactory, but the missionaries who had invited us to dinner didn’t complain and enjoyed the brownie/ice cream dessert. We enjoyed the chicken enchilada they had made from scratch, using lavash, instead of tortillas. If they cooked like that every day, I’m sure they wouldn’t stay as thin as they are.
One of the things we miss as missionaries is personal face to face interaction with our families and friends back home. Skype is okay, better than e-mail, but not quite the same as in person stuff. We just received an e-mail from Alisa and she will have some great musical opportunities coming up in the next six months, and if any of you are in the area where she’ll be performing, maybe you can represent us with some hugs and kisses. She’ll be performing at the Lincoln Center in New York on December 19th as part of their Christmas program and makes her Carnegie Hall debut on March 14th singing John Rutter’s Requiem. There was also a fun article (http://issuu.com/philatknpr/docs/desert_companion_2010sept/58) about her that appeared in a local NPR magazine. We’re excited for her and I guess you could say, “busting our buttons”. While on the subject of family, we have one other request. Our oldest granddaughter has Retts Syndrome. There is an opportunity to register and vote every day at http://www.refresheverything.com/rettresearchtoreality . Pepsi is giving away dollars for research and we’re voting for a cure!!!
Hope you are enjoying life wherever you are!
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