5-29-11

Well, training is going pretty well. It's somewhat stressful, but I'm glad that I am training right now. Elder Smith is a great missionary. He's from South Jordan. He's a very hard worker and doesn't ever want to stop studying or working. I hope I can help him have a good start to his mission. I forget how hard it is to not be able to understand people. He wants to know the language so bad, even though he's doing very well. We're starting to warm up to each other and have more fun together and trust for each other. We found some new investigators that seem like good people this week. One is an older woman who has attended a pentacostal church (which is very popular in Armenia right now right behind Jehovah's Witnesses and the Armenian church of course) for a few years but didn't like some things she was seeing. She lived alone, but has taken in a man who is a little emotionally different but has a pure spirit and is a pretty good musician. There nice people and I'm excited to work with them. Our branch president was really kind to them. I love our Branch President. I've gained a lot of respect for him. He has a daughter serving in Ukraine right now.

Well, I hope everything's good. President Carter invited us to his house for Preperation Day today, so our district and another district is going to have root beer floats and maybe play some games. I like how President Carter leads us. He's a great leader and I've learned so much from him. Tell the Farnsworths that I'll be praying for them. I love you dad.

With much love,
Elder Bruce Wainwright
Hey Mom,
Thanks for being so wonderful. You should have Hykoohee email me. I would be interested to talk to her about a lot of things, especially what she thinks of America. People here idolize America and many think of it as paradise and the answer to all their problems. What they don't realize is that we have actually come to bring the answer to all problems to Armenia. We had an interesting conversation with a pretty devout member of the Armenian church, in english, where he starting asking why we came to preach to christians and to really think about what we believe. Elder Smith handled it very well and bore a strong testimony, even though the man didn't want to listen. He was pretty excited afterwards. And then, this was pretty random, a man named Bob Stone from Michigan or somewhere came and said hi (in english). He was an interesting man. He also didn't want to listen but he said he had only talked to nice missionaries, which was a nice compliment. We obviously wanted to know what he was doing way out here in Armenia, and he appearantly was just living here because it was cheap. I think he was waiting for stock to go up, or something. He was a funny guy, but I imagine he's got to be somewhat lonely. That's the second interesting man I've met lately who is not married and doesn't seem like that's very high on the priority list.

That's about how our week went. I hope all is well with you. That's wonderful that Matt got to go through the temple. I'm way excited for him and his mission. I love you all. Love,
Elder Bruce Wainwright