Elder Jared Hammer: Keeping the Commandments

24 Days and Counting!!!!!!

Us and Karo and Hovhanes, our investigators. :)

"I haven't heard much about fires in Armenia - do they have any? Is there anything to burn there? Or do they keep that pretty well managed? "

I remember my first week in Armenia, we took a trip out to Armavir, a city on the western end of Armenia, and on the way back I saw a large blaze on the side of the road. I pointed it out to Elder Lush, to which he responded with little enthusiasm. I later realized why. Everyone here deliberately starts fires, mainly to get rid of weeds and to get rid of random brush. Everything is made out of concrete, so there's not really any fire threat. In terms of wildfires, things never really seem to get out of control. Most everything is wet and fertile here. If there ever was a major fire, I'm not sure what this country would do. I've seen maybe one fire truck? In Yerevan. I don't think there is really much of a department established for that. :p

Well, I got sick this week. Merrr....I could only avoid the coughing people for so long. A bug swept though Vanadzor so it was only a matter of time. Wednesday was Armenian Labor day. We ended up celebrating it with everyone else :p I was confined to my bed that day, not being able to stand more than 5 minutes without feeling sick to my stomach.

We're working with two main people right now. If all works out. Karo could be baptized on Friday! :))) He's the man that quit smoking from 70 a day. He's doing great and he's got a good support system in the branch.

Today we're also going to be finding out about Hovhanes, if he has to go to the army or not. So that will be uptight. He's so great though. We celebrated his birthday this week as well, which just happens to be the same as our Branch President's birthday.

So now we have these new things called Leadership Training Sisters, which are called throughout the world now because of the new increase in Sister missionaries. Since that name is too long, most of us just shorten it to sister APs :p

Our newly active young man just got back from his mini mission in Gyumri which was great. He told us how he got offered a job for a Sunday, but a voice came into his head that said 'You're teaching people to keep the sabbath-day holy, but you're going to work on Sunday?'. So he said "Well, I need money right now Lord, and I know you bless people when they keep your commandments, so please help me." So after that his friend found him a job where he won't have to work on Sundays (super weird here), and she was also able to help him pay off a substantial debt as well. :) I love those kind of stories.

Well, sorry, I don't have a whole lot of funny stories :p I wish this could be more interesting than it is. :p Well, after this one, there's only three more left. That's all you have to endure :p

Well, I love you all!

Elder Hammer