Another transfer's done already!

Hello again! Well, transfers are this week, and due to a larger than normal group of missionaries going home, most of the transfers took place on Monday instead of Thursday, when they usually do. Basically, I'm still in Kharkivsky, but Elder Walk was moved somewhere else (not to be mean to him, but...it'll be a bit of a blessing for the area) and another elder, Elder Miles, is my new companion. Elder Miles is a lot more optimistic and upbeat than Elder Walk, so I hope that'll help the work in our area a bit. So far it's been fairly dead.

So we had an...interesting experience tracting the other day. We went out to an apartment building and started knocking it down without any success, and we were starting to get a little frustrated. Finally we reached one door where we could hear music playing on the inside, and we could tell from the electricity meter in the hallway that someone was definitely in there (one of the little tricks you pick up here); but, the first time I rang the doorbell, no one came to the door. Being, like I said, a little frustrated, I decided that letting them ignore us wasn't going to be an option, so I knocked, and we heard the music get turned down and someone walk to the door. We stood there, hoping that this was a change in our luck, and only felt more so when the lady who answered invited us in. We came in and I started to try leading into a lesson, but she kept saying, "Don't teach me yet, we haven't had tea yet!" So, a little apprehensively, we followed her into the kitchen, and after a brief struggle to make sure we had herbal tea instead of green tea, we once again tried teaching her a lesson. Unfortunately, the woman--who, by the way, was no doubt well into her sixties--wasn't so much interested in our lesson as she was...in us. So, I can now officially say that I have been hit on by a sixty-something year old Ukrainian woman. Yeah. I glanced at my comp worriedly, to which he comfortingly responded, "You got us in here, you get us out." Thanks Elder Miles. Anyway, we had a bitter struggle to leave. She kept offering us cookies, candy, salo (which is, literally, a block of straight pig fat that people here eat like cheese), and borscht--never mind the fact that borscht takes several hours to cook!--so finally, FINALLY, I just said, "Thank you, but we NEED TO GO." She laughed and asked us, like she did a lot, what our home address was, and so we just ignored it and left as quick as we could. Yikes.

Anyway, other than that...experience, things are going well here. I've got high hopes for this transfer. Good luck with everything on the home front, and I miss you all (especially my nieces and nephews...even if I've never seen them yet...)

Have a good week!
--Elder Brett