I thought we were already on minimum power

Hey Crazy-Cool family,

The wedding sounded wonderful. I’m so pleased. Please post more photos for me, I love photos. Please also send photos in the next package so I can put them in my album that I show people; family photos and all sorts. That’s so nice that everything worked out so well. I remember when I was praying for it I was requesting something like “please bless the wedding so that everything will go ok..” Then I re-thought about how stressed everyone sounded about it and said, “please bless it so that it will be perfect.” So I was very happy to hear reports of its perfection.
We’re still as busy as ever with our two areas and just found out that the mission will still be getting smaller ‘cause 6 missionaries are going home this transfer, with of course, no one replacing them. So that means three areas are closing. I thought we were already on minimum power, I don’t know how they’ll choose which areas to close. There was a time when this mission had over 250 missionaries, soon it will have 50. That’s insane. Our zones are getting smaller and smaller, or rather, the zones are staying the same size and our missionary force is getting smaller and smaller. It’s nice to know that they’ll never close Revda because it’s already down to its minimum of one companionship in its branch.
We had a lot of member meeting last week and no investigators. It’s a shame because we have just lost contact with Alexander our great investigator ever since I left for Kazakhstan. He just doesn’t answer his phone. Strange and sad. We seriously almost don’t even have time for investigator work with us having to be in charge of Revda and Pervouralsk members in a missionary sense, and not to mention a Branch President sense. We have to plan really well to use our time. As taxing as it is, it’s much better than when the problem is the opposite; when you have too much open time and have to ineffectively tract or contact all day. They’re both extremely draining in their own ways.
Church was nice yesterday. I was able to assign a talk to one of our best members Nastya last week. She took the assignment almost too casually so I thought she might not show. And before the meeting her behavior was explained as she was reading the talk out of the Liahona I assigned her to speak on and complaining that it wasn’t understandable and she didn’t know how to speak on it. And I, slightly exasperated said, “Do you mean to say you haven’t even read it yet?” worried Sacrament Meeting was ruined. She just shrugged and kept reading. Then, ironically I sat down and prepared MY talk for Sacrament Meeting and all went well. I have an excuse though, I’m a full-time missionary, come on! Elder Taylor also spoke; he was the only one who had prepared his part in advance apparently. He did a great job and the difference was apparent between his first talk his first transfer and this one. Malajets Own.
We had a great priesthood conference in Yekat. All the branch leadership from around the whole mission came and it was so fun to see the old leadership of Perm that I haven’t seen in about a year. The general authority was unable to make it due to weather so we did a video conference which kind of made it fun and reminded me of episodes of Arrested Development. It was really funny to me when the general authority asked us if we had done what he had requested we do in preparation for this meeting and come with a plan for missionary work in our branches. I hadn’t because due to problems in communications I only found about the meeting 12 hours earlier. But the rest of the priesthood all kind of looked around and mumbled in response that they hadn’t. And it was funny because the General Authority didn’t really care and we just moved on to doing it right then. It just made me realize how this sort of thing happens a lot among priesthood leadership, where they all understand an assignment, but all know themselves that they are really busy with other things and know that when one of them assigns them something that’s not absolutely necessary that the assigner will understand when it’s not done. Kind of like how me, Andy, and any of my friends on missions never write each other because we understand each other's busy situations and know that it will all be ok when we get home. That might not have come off clearly but I found it to be a funny realization.
In other news I found out the answer to the riddle of the crazy Nazi general in “It’s a beautiful life” When he asks Roberto what animal makes the sound in his riddle, that’s the sound Russian toads make: “Whkey Whkey”! And Dad, I still remember that Danish pigs say “Nuff Nuff." In Russia they say “hlew hlew.”

Funny ol’ world in’ it.

Love,
Elder Makelby