The Polar Express‏

Zdrastvuitye!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and that you're fasting earnestly to make room for the upcoming New Year's feast. (Just kidding, don't do that). This week was a blast, but along with the "blast-ness" came a lot of running around like chickens with our heads cut off. At the beginning of the week Sister Warnick and I had exchanges in Toliatti before our Christmas Zone Conference. We woke up nice and early on Tuesday morning, took a fast train to Samara, bought our bus tickets to Toliatti, and then finished our traveling adventure with a 2 hour bus ride. Great fun! 

Some areas in the mission definitely struggle a lot more than others, Toliatti is one of those areas, so the duration of our 2 day stay in Toliatti consisted of contacting, contacting, and contacting. A few days prior to our arrival, there was about 2 feet of snow on the ground. When we finally got there, it had been raining nonstop for a couple of days and all of that snow melted. I thought that the super glue that I used to fix my boots had been working up to that point. After wading through 2-feet deep puddles for 2 days straight, it was evident that the super glue didn't glue squat. I had a really great time in Toliatti though. It was fun to switch roles and be the Sister that guides the younger missionaries instead of the one looking up at all of the old Sisters. Kinda strange now that I think about it.

Christmas Conference was so great! Over the past couple of weeks Sister Warnick and I have been trying to hunt down some Christmas Sweaters to wear to the Conference. After much searching, we finally found a couple that we fell in love with! Sister Warnick's has a picture of Santa Clause on it and there's a pom pom at the end of his hat, but her hair's always covering it so you can't really tell that it's there. My sweater has a reindeer on it that I named Voldemort because it doesn't have a nose. His little scarf isn't attached, so it just does it's thing. Our sweaters were a hit at the Conference! Everyone thought they were hilarious!

The Conference itself was amazing! I'm not going to go into detail about everything that was discussed because that would take until next Christmas to go over every topic. There was a part in the Conference where we talked about Sacrifice a little bit and I really liked this quote: "The Seals in the Navy, the Green Berets in the Army, the Blackbelts in Karate, etc. are seen as being elite because of the hard work that they put in and the sacrifices that they have made to get to where they are. All of the tribulations that we face and all of the sacrifices that we make give us more zeal and make us more elite in the eyes of God." Just store that in your little memory box and pull it out when you're going through a particularly hard time in your life.

Shout out to Sister Schwab. She is literally the best! Every year for Christmas Conference she takes it upon herself to make us all a home cooked Christmas Dinner. At every Christmas Conference prior to this one, she has prepared a Christmas ham with potatoes, carrots, rolls, etc. This year, however, due to the sanctions, there was not a Christmas ham to be found in all of Russia. Since Mexican food is a not typically a common thing to find in Russia unless you want a guarunteed stomach worm, Sister Schwab put together a Mexican food feast! She made chicken enchilladas, beef tacos, chips and salsa, the works! It was super good. It's been over a year since I've had any sort of Mexican food aside from a makeshift cheese quesadilla, so it was a great surprise. Sister Schwab was also determined that we have a great Christmas breakfast, so she gave everyone a baggie of pancake mix and ordered us all individual bottles of mapeline from Amazon so that we could make maple syrup! Sister Schwab is the sweetest! 

I think the funniest part about Christmas conference was actually the bus ride back to Samara. Typically, the office will order a big chartered bus to take us all back to Samara, but I guess it was cheaper to order two small ones, so that's what they did. There were 15 seats in the bus and 16 bodies, so the Elders had to take turns sitting and standing so that no one would have to stand for the entire 2 hour ride. One Elder took it upon himself to carry every single Christmas package on his lap, so he basically volunteered himself to get smashed to death. And that's basically what happened. No pity. 

Since we got all of our Christmas packages at Christmas Conference, Sister Warnick and I decided to open our gifts on the train ride back to Penza. We turned our little coupe into a little slice of the Polar Express. There was candy, wrapping paper, gift bags, presents, pajamas, and decorations literally all over everything! The conductor looked a little bit thrown off when she saw all of our stuff everywhere. Whatevs. Christmas cheer! 

After we got back from Christmas Conference, we got to Skype our families! Always an adventure. Super weird that this was my last Skype before I go home. Time flies! Anyways, that night our Ward had a Christmas party and it was hilarious! The Primary acted out the Nativity and the kid who played Joseph was yelling at the 3 Wise Men to give him money... oh children. It turned out really well though and quite a few less actives showed up, so that was a plus!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Have a great New Year Celebration! Eat some Mexican food and wear festive clothing!

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Merry Chrismilk!‏

Zdrastvuitye!

MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL!!! Unless you live in Russia, in which case your Christmas isn't until January 7th. Sorry. For the first time in a long time, Sister Warnick and I have finally had a normal week on the mission. No traveling, no exchanges, no unnecessary stress. That all ends tomorrow. We will be getting up at 4 in the morning tomorrow to catch a train to Samara and from there we'll take a bus to Toliatti (about 2 hours) for exchanges. On Thursday we'll have Christmas Conference in Toliatti, ride the bus back to Samara, and then take a train back to Penza on Christmas Day. Phew! Should be a fun one. 

On to this week's activities! First of all, Sister Warnick and I had an unfortunate run-in with not one, but two consecutive bottles of sour milk. On Monday, we had been looking forward to ending the night with some cookies and milk, as you do, since we had spent a majority of the day literally hiking through the snow. Every once in a while our milk will start to separate as it sits in our fridge, but normally it's not that big of a deal. As we eagerly poured ourselves some mugs of milk at the end of the day, we noticed that the proportion of cream to milk was at a pretty disturbing ratio. Determined to enjoy my evening snack, I dunked my cookie into the mug and pulled out a cream-soaked pile of mush. Trying not to phase myself out by the slimy chunks of cream dripping off of my cookie, I took the tiniest nibble to test out the waters. Let's just say, this was a cookie that not even the Cookie Monster would want. Flushed that down the sink real quick. Thankfully we had another bottle of milk waiting in the fridge, so we whipped that guy out. A little hesitant to have a replay of the event that had just transpired, I poured the smallest amount of milk into my mug and tested the waters once again. Aside from actual vomit, I've never tasted anything so closely reminiscent of throw-up than this tiny sample of milk. Needless to say, we didn't get to enjoy our cookies and milk that night.

On the flip side, since I missed my baby Sister's Sweet 16 on the 19th, I decided to open up one of the presents that my family sent me (probably meant to be saved for Christmas) to celebrate her birthday! Upon tearing open the wrapping paper and seeing a box of Keebler Jif cookies inside, my companion and I immediately commenced in consuming the entire package. So good! Those cookies were literally sent from above. That definitely made up for the rancid milk and cookies incident. Hands down. 

Oh man, my winter boots are struggling. For the past month or so my boots have been trying so hard to rip apart at the seams, but I refuse to buy more boots since I only have a little over 2 months left on my mission. I have tested out many methods to keep them from getting any worse, and at this point not much is working. A couple of days ago I bought a small container of super glue and emptied the entire thing along the seams of my boots. Seems to be working... kinda. My feet are a little moist at the moment, but nothing I can't endure for the next couple of months. I would much rather have to reapply a layer of superglue to my feet every other week or so, than buy a pair of boots that I probs wouldn't even take home. But who knows. Maybe I'll cave. 

Aight, enough of that. So, one of the less actives that Sister Thomas (the younger) and I had started to meet with fairly regularly finally moved. She refused to meet with us for about a month because she was too busy getting all of her stuff together. Thankfully she gave us her new address and she still lives in our area, but we absolutely cannot find her house! I don't think the address that she gave us was fake, because you can find the street on the map, but we have been hardcore struggling to find her apartment building. On our first quest to find her place of residence, it was full on blizzarding outside. Guess how long we trekked through the snow trying to track her down? Yep... 3 and a half hours. Guess who still doesn't know where she lives? Us. I have never been so physically exhausted after a day of tracting in my entire life. A few days later, Sister Warnick and I decided that we would use another chunk of open time during the day to man-hunt her. 2 hours later, and still no luck. We will find her! Hide your kids, hide your wife! Once the missionaries know where you live, there's no running.

Sister Warnick and I saw an amazing, unexpected miracle this week! There is less active couple that lives in our area that all of my previous companions and I have tried stopping by, but they were never home! Sister Warnick and I felt prompted that we should drop by with a Christmas Liahona to see if they were around for once. As we approached their building, a couple of old people opened the front door and we distantly followed behind them as we made our way up the staircase to their apartment. It wasn't until we were physically in front of the apartment door that we realized we had been following the couple that we were looking for! That was a little bit awkward because the wife kept turning around to look at us as we trekked up the stairs. Whatever. Had we showed up even 30 seconds later than we had, they wouldn't have answered their door (they never do), and had we showed up 30 seconds earlier, they wouldn't have been home. We ended up having a good lesson with them... well... kinda good. The husband, Vladimir, occupies his free time with reading books about how you can heal your body with a positive attitude, so he spent the first 40 minutes of the lesson reading snippets from the books to us. Good times. After that, we talked about the importance of prayer, scripture study, and coming to church, all of which they do minus coming to church. They committed to come to church on Sunday, but they never showed up. Bummer. They will come eventually. I know it!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas Celebration! Check your milk before you dunk and superglue your feet!

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff

PoPo Date

Zdrastvuitye!

This has got to be one of the most exhausting weeks ever! This week was jam packed with waking up early, traveling, and stress. My favorite combination! I had a blast though. Lots of memories were made. 

Before all of the stress of the week happened, Sister Warnick and I had a lesson with a crazy investigator named Olga, with Baba Katia (the old lady who yelled at me for falling down the stairs) as our member help. Let's just say that there was a little bit too much crazy going on in the lesson. Baba Katia... bless her soul. I love that lady so much, but she is just so old, she doesn't really think straight anymore. Oh yeah, before I talk about the lesson... Sister Warnick and I went over to Baba Katia's house last night and she was straight up peeing in her bathroom with the door wide open when we came in her front door. She started laughing hysterically and told me to close the door. Yikes. Anyways... This investigator is known for being a tad on the looney side. She randomly gives out big hunks of cash to people like candy and always dies laughing at inappropriate times during church. Nice. She was actually the normal one on the lesson for once. We decided to teach Olga about the Restoration using a bunch of pictures that correspond with each part of the lesson. There are words written on the back of each picture as teaching helps and to help the investigator understand what is being taught. Every. single. time. we would discuss a part of the lesson and then hand Olga the corresponding cutout, Baba Katia would rip it out of her hand while Olga was reading the back and demand to look at the picture on the front. Olga literally almost jumped out of her seat from fear after Baba Katia snatched a picture from her fingers. *Face palm. Unfortunately, Olga has no desire to be baptized, but I think if we keep moving through the lessons really slowly, making sure that she understands everything, she'll come around.

Sooo... the Visa Trip to Kazakhstan. 'Twas an interesting one, that is for sure. Here's the rundown on what happened. Sister Warnick and I woke up at 4am on Tuesday morning and took a train to Samara. We did lots of contacting around Avrora that night. Around 7 in the morning on Wednesday, Sister Thomas (the older) and I got in a surprisingly fancy mini bus and started our 3 hour drive to Kazakhstan. Probably one of the most boring, dragged-on experiences of my life. I think I like flying to Latvia better than driving to Kazakhstan, but it was still a good adventure. Once we drove out of the city, literally all we saw was dirt, dirt, dirt, and, oh... I almost forgot... dirt. No buildings, no civilization, not a lot of cars, just Russian countryside. It was actually really pretty, but it looked very reminiscent of the drive from Boise to Logan... Not that cool. There were only 7 missionaries in the van, but it was a really fun group! The ride consisted of occasional sleeping, eating, and chatting, but not much else. There was some nice Russian folk music playing in the background which added some spice to the ride. Not. I am so grateful that I don't get carsick because I think I would have died! I couldn't even really study because it was too bumpy to read the words in my books. We got to the Kazakhstan border around 10 in the morning and had to go through a couple of Border Control stations before actually crossing into Kazakhstan. Nothing too scary. We were still in the middle of nowhere, so I don't actually know what Kazakhstan looks like. After finally entering Kazakhstan, we turned the van right back around, and crossed the border again. This is where things got a little hairy. After we had our Passports stamped and received our migration cards, a couple of Elders decided that they were going to go search for a bathroom in a restricted building, so we all got pulled in to the coppers office after they got caught. Great. Thank you Elders. We were all pretty terrified at first, but it just turned into a big joke after that. Then it got scary again when the police pulled each of us individually into their office to be questioned. I was shaking a little bit when they called me in, but "flirt to convert" is a real phrase, my friends. They asked me questions like where I was living in Russia, why I was here, where I live in America (so sorry family if you get a pleasant visit from the Russian Mafia), what my phone number is, etc. I tried to play it as cool as possible and by the end we were all laughing and joking about iPhones and politics. Living the dream. Unfortunately no baptismal dates were set, but one of the police men wanted to set up a dinner date. Hard pass on that one. By the end of all of that, we had spent about 4 hours total at the Kazakhstan border. Fun. The ride back to Samara was about as eventful as the ride to Kazakhstan, except that there was a huge car accident on a very congested bridge, so we got home about 2 hours later than expected. We didn't make it back in time for the train that Sister Warnick and I were supposed to take back to Penza, but it all worked out okay. 

The next morning Sister Warnick and I had to get up at 4am to get to the train station on time. Everything went smoothly and we were both exhausted by the time we got settled in our coupe. About 2 hours in to our 7 hour train ride, a random lady showed up at our door and said that we had ordered food along with our tickets. Cool. Then she said some confusing things that I didn't understand and then she left. A couple hours later, I was literally starving and I was determined to figure out where to get this promised food. I kept getting whiffs of food from the hallway, so I was under the impression that I would have to get my food somewhere out there. I grabbed my comp and we started down the hall. Not looking where I was going (as usual) my foot got caught in the cord of an extension cord that was sicking out of the wall and everything that was attached to it came plummeting towards my body. I got karate-chopped in the ankle by two charging cellphones and a speaker that was playing music until I tripped on it... I was so terrified that I had just broken everything since the annyoing music that was coming from the speaker stopped as soon as it hit me. The owners poked their heads out of their coupes and just beckoned us to go away. Super embarassing. Thankfully we heard the irritating music turn back on after about 15 minutes, so we know that the speaker resurrected. After all of that happened and we still didn't have any food, I thought that maybe we'd physically have to go to the restaraunt car to get our food. Don't ever to that. It was super sketchy getting over the platforms connecting one train car to the next and the train conductor gave me a very confuzed, dirty look when we came back into our car. At that point, Sister Warnick and I came to the conclusion that we just weren't going to get our food and we moved on. Yeah, later on our food was delivered to us about 10 minutes before we got to Penza, so there was definitely some sort of miscommunication there. Oh well, we got our food and no one died, so all is well!

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Make sure you flirt with Government Officials if there is a possibility that you could be thrown in jail! Have a great week!

Do Svidanya!

Love, 

Sister Megan Wagstaff

Sleeping Bag Savior

Zdrastvuitye!

Transfer calls are in! I have 3 pieces of news, each varying in importance. First off, I'm staying in Penza with little Sister Warnick for another cycle! Yay! By the end of this cycle, I will have lived in Penza for 5 cycles (about 7.5 months). That's quite a while, but I love Penza with all of my heart and soul, so I'm fine with that. That seems to be a trend in Penza for some reason. There's always one Sister that ends up staying here for a million years whilst cycling through companions. That would be me. Sister Warnick and I just deep cleaned and rearranged our apartment to our liking, so I was actually really relieved that I would be staying. I've definitely nested, that's for sure.

Second item of news, I am now the Sister Training Leader over the Kazan and Toliyatti areas... for now. This morning I was informed that they might be giving Kazan over to the Sister Training Leader in Samara and I would be adopting a different area into my stewardship, but we'll see. For now, this is how it is, and I am pumped! Sister Thomas is still in Kazan, and Sister Warnick's companion from the MTC has taken Sister Wilson's place in the tri-panionship in Kazan, so both of us will be sad for a little while if we don't get to go on exchanges with the Kazan sisters, but life goes on either way.

Third item of news... Please forget all of the release dates that I have sent you prior to this email. When Sister Warnick and I received our transfer call, I had my actual release date cleared up as a result of the following piece of news. FINAL PIECE OF NEWS. So... I kind of accidentally got my extension... emphasis on the "kind of." I didn't officially get my extension, but here's the story: In the coming months, the MTC is going to start keeping the English speaking missionaries in the MTC for a longer period of time. As a result of this, the group of missionaries that will be coming to our mission at the beginning of the year will arrive a week later than anticipated, which means my last cycle will be a 7 week cycle instead of a 6. I'm still not really sure how all of those things correlate, but they do somehow... so that's how it is. Considering that my original release date added an extra two weeks onto my mission, this additional week will make me 6 days short of serving a 19 month mission. Pretty cool. My release date is March 7th, whereas my previous one was March 1st. This news came as a pretty big shock. I know it's only a week, but it was very unanticipated, that's for sure. I am excited about it though! I guess the Lord thought that I needed to get my extension after all:)

So... On a cold and snowy night with no lessons ahead of us, Sister Warnick and I decided to stop by good old Baba Katia's place (the crazy lady that yelled at us for laughing at her singing) and have a little family home evening with her. The lesson went as expected; lots of constrained laughing during the Hymns, and an intense interpretation of Lehi's Dream: Baba Katia Edition. At the end of the lesson, Baba Katia gave us some tea and candy and sent us on our way. At the top of the staircase on her floor, in the process of turning to give Baba K a final wave goodbye, I twisted my ankle on the top step and sent myself plummeting down the stairs. I have never flown (or stumbled, rather) down a set of stairs so quickly in my entire life. I kind of blacked out for a couple of seconds in the middle of it all, but I just remember waking up laying flat on my side with my legs in the air. The only thing that kept me from breaking my arm or dislocating my shoulder was my poofy, fat, sleeping-bag coat. I ended up on the landing beheath where I fell and when I looked up at Sister Warnick, she was literally dying laughing. I heard a pair of legs bolt down the staircase above us and this random fellow peeked his head around the corner and died laughing as well. At that point I was laughing my head off because I was so confused about what had just happened, so I bet the kid was thinking, "Wow, that girl must be hammered." Then, a wild Baba Katia appears. She stood next to Sister Warnick and literally started yelling at me for falling down the stairs. Thank you Baba Katia. I do not recollect this part at all, but Sister Warnick told me that I literally slammed my body into the mailboxes at the bottom of the staircase and ricocheted onto the floor in an intensely dramatic manner. Somehow my legs ended up in a "sticking up" position, not really sure how. That's great. So graceful. No permanent damage was done. My ankle still hurts a bit a week later, but I'm totally fine. Just call me Grace.

It has been 6 months since my last Visa Trip, so guess what I have this week? Mhmm... my final Visa Trip! Yay! This one is slightly unusual though... actually... very unusual. Guess where I will be going for my Visa Trip? You won't be able to guess. We're going to Kazakhstan. Guess how we're getting there? By plane? Nope. Train? Nope. Mini bus? Yep. Bright and early Wednesday morning, me and all of the Visa Trippers will be loading onto a mini bus, taking a 2 and a half hour mini bus ride across the border into Kazakhstan, getting our Passports stamped, and then turning right back around. Sounds pretty ghetto... but I am excited out of my mind. President has sent out about 3 test groups to make sure that this method of "Visa Tripping" is safe, and no one has gotten thrown in jail or died, so it shouldn't be too sketchy. Should be an adventure, that's for sure. 

I want to share a quote with all of you that I have been thinking about nonstop for the past few weeks. I'm sure it originates from somewhere other than where I heard it, but nonetheless, I love it. Sister Warnick and I were watching some Mormon Messages a little while ago and somebody in one of the videos said, "God gives the toughest battles to His strongest soldiers." I'm not going to elaborate on this quote too much because I want you to apply this quote to yourselves. But anytime you are going through a trial or situation that seems too hard for you, or anyone else, to bear, just remember that Heavenly Father knows you and He knows that you can handle it. I would much rather experience a life of trials knowing that I am a soldier in the eyes of Heavenly Father, than coasting through life without any knowledge of why things are the way they are. You are soldiers! 

Welp, that's all for this week folks! Watch your step and take a road trip into a wierd country on a tiny bus!  

Do Svidanya!

Love,

Sister Megan Wagstaff