Monday, December 17, 2012

Ukraine week 23: The Final Countdown


What a week it seems to have been for all of you. Its been something else for me too.
So wow im going to be an uncle to a boy thats so exciting and thats a funny way you all found out, good work kyle and katie!!
Mom I was also right on my guess so we are both always right :) 
uhh im so jealous that you all got to see the hobbit im sad i missed out. I see advertisements for it all over and macey you got to tell me about it.
Im glad winter has come for all of you it has been here for about 2 weeks and it has been interesting, here in ukraine the roads dont get plowed they get shoveled by 60 year old women with shovels made of a piece of wood on the end of a stick. So everything is snowy except the places where they shovel dirt on the road and that only makes it worse cause then everything is muddy. 

So this week is the last weeks of our lives and man am i going to Party it up In KIEV, BROVERY yeah I am geting transfered a week befor christmas........ So the who knowing where im going to skype and if i will have to have you call me is something i will have to figue out cause Im white washing and...... Im the SR. COMP. yeah elder vernon has no idea what he is getting himself into. 

So Im leaving beautiful west ukraine and going east twoards kiev. I hear brovery is an awesome little urban are of kiev with lots of families and stuff like that, the branch is part of the stake they have about 60 members and there is only me and elder vernon for the whole branch so that will be nice and also scary because we have no idea what to do and no idea where to go (or even where the church building is) Im scared and excited. 

Now is the time in my mission where im freaking out because im getting to the part where im a sr comp. someone in my group is a district leader and sr. companion and the crazier part is that this last group that left only had 2 elders in it and the next group coming in has 8 and my comp. now is training and this group was in the mtc during conferance so that is before the huge wave of sisters and some extra elders. ( the next group of sisters goes home in may and the group of sisters coming to replace them is 13 strong so that stuff is crazy) Oh and that area near lviv is opening up called uzerod and that is way exciting cause it hasnt been open for like 7 years and the members will be crazy excited. 

So yeah thats whats happening to me but what i dont know is how we are going to call each other cause here in lviv i had everything all planned but now im going to where I have no idea what they have or what we are doing for Christmas so yeah and you also didnt give me any times you were available so i will just tell you what we can plan. So first our p-day is now on Tuesday Christmas and so we will not get another chance to talk about it so here is what you can do. 

So back back to other topics. so this week has been a fun one full of enjoyment and freaking out because on friday we got a call from president telling elder tribett he is training here and out of that i knew i was leaving but i wasnt expecting what happened to have happened. 

Erik im finaly glad to hear about your mistery girlfriend and yeah the picture you sent me was an interesting one but yeah my companion was glad to get the whole info about the mistery girlfriend before i left and the picture and name made it all the better for him. 

So im glad all of you are excited about mormon.org cause there has been a real push on it on my mission about mormon.org cause the church really wants it to be good they made all of us make a profile in english and ukrainian and so yeah my comp wasnt happy about that because he hates putting info on the internet but he did it so if you all want to see my companion his profial is taylor and his picture he has a face mask on for skuba diving so yeah you can see all the missionaries here have one if you look in the ukrainian section. 

Well not much else happened this week but i will talk to you next week but email me first sometime this week for times send me like 2 or 3 times you could talk and kyle too and make sure the time zones are right too. 

I love you talk to you soon 

Elder Naumann

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Ukraine Week 22: Mission Conferance + Temple = Snow‏

Hi Family,

Well this week has been a fun one filled with lots of snow. We also spent a lot of time with Roman this week and it came together in one big church meeting at the end of the week with Pres. Klebingat speaking here in lviv.

So this week was us spending full days with roman and doing computer work. So Monday we first had a meeting with this one really less active man named Brother yahoriv and we met him at his home first on Sunday and then again on Monday but at his work and we talked and we are really trying to just be able to get meetings with him because his testimony is awesome and he really knows the church is true but he has problems with the word of wisdom so mom if you could put his name on the prayer role at the temple that would be awesome (yuri yahoriv). So we met him and then had to run over to this families house who brother roman dogged and so we filled in for him and they were awesome.

Then on Tuesday we didn't have very much happen except we felt that roman would dog us for Wednesday so we kept up with him but then on Wednesday roman wouldn't answer his phone so we ran over to the church and found him there moping after he came from work and we just made sure he was doing ok and then he threw a ball at us telling us that the people who were called to do the family history work were not able to do it any more so we needed to do it with him. Good thing we didn't plan anything that day but being with roman. The whole day was spent in the computer room with roman and he was a bit bitter about transfers because that is his life, well at least that's what he tells us is his life so yeah the assistant Elder brathwate who served here in lviv couldn't tell him so he was really mad at him soooooo yeah he just needed to get over his little problem.

Then we got on a train Wednesday night and headed off to kiev and it was a good night but then we got in to kiev and it was snowing... hard like really hard like a foot of snow and no snow plows and no sidewalks were shoveled so its a good thing i have high top shoes. We got in to kiev with the knowledge of who was speaking at this conference and it was funny because the last time Pres. Bennit spoke to our mission he chastised us and said I love you at the end of every sentence so thats what we were expecting but he had talked with our pres. and thats not what happened it was nothing about contacting or about obedience it was all about how we need to have charity and that is the only way our mission can go up in numbers. It was a really good meeting but really long like 8 or 9 hours but at least it was warm. Then we as a district in lviv had asked pres. if we could go to the temple because we didnt have to get on a train until 10:35 at night so we went to a temple session at 7 at night and we were rushing because we also met vlad up there in kiev and yeah he was doing really good he is about to take the test to get him into BYU Provo yeah i told you before that he would be in idaho but now he is coming to utah so I gave him your email mom and our home phone number so maybe some time soon he will give you a call saying he is hungry.... Just a warning. But we had an awesome time in there, having it im ukrainian and understanding it was awesome too. but the real fun part is getting a taxi to the temple and get us to the train station with all of us safe and all of the christmas packages safe too. 

That brings me to another subject I got your package and I opened it and started eating some of it and I hope I wasnt suposed to wait until christmas soooo yeah, Im glad you got my package and yeah I know that i dont have a lot of pictures of myself but its ok those were just my pictures not my districts pictures which I have so dont worry. But how did you like your package? Did you try to contiek slam yet? did you get my recording? how do you like the play money? Just really how was everything?

So yeah that was the big news for the middle of the week but something that just happened yesterday was that pres. came and made roman the new branch pres. and that was awesome soo cool he was really happy when he got relesed but then he called him as pres. and well lets just say his big im free plans just went out the window so yeah funny but im glad he is doing awesome here and helping everyone here so just was not seeing it coming so soon because elder moore is coming back soon like in 3 weeks so that is weird and also he is waiting for his missionary to come home before he gets married so yeah thats another 4 months so we just weren't expecting it but it was a good surprise.

So sounds like everyone had a fun musicly filled week. Im so glad that i got to miss being in the messiah this its worst year. Even though I am really sad i missed it im glad it was on its worst year... Macey im glad to hear your dating and going to dances and also doing the crazy music thing that i remember during the christmas season. 
Ok but someone has seriously got to tell me where erik is going to school and who in the heck is he dating because he for sure is not going to tell me....... and she is from iowa where does that come form man someone tell me. 

So the telephone call and transfers so we have a small transfer period because pres wants people to get home before Christmas  This is all i know about transfers one of our zone leaders just got made 2nd councilor in the branch presidency and the other one was told he was leaving and that some other places and guys who have been in an area for 6 transfers ( 9 months) are going to be staying for another one so hopefully i will stay because I really want to stay for Christmas here its like the best town to serve in Christmas time because its the most beautiful but who knows. So here is the deal with the phone call/ Skype Every city here has a computer club with Skype and even if they don't the churches here all have a web cam and computer and i have an i touch that has facetime so it wont be that hard the only thing that i need to know is what time do you have available for me to call with everyone home and I will also be calling Kyle and maybe if you have Skype + we can all Skype together and talk together so yeah remember im 9 hours ahead so pick a time whenever on Christmas Well we might have a Christmas party for the church at 6 or 7 so maybe try to avoid that time but if we need to i can step away and got to our church's computer room.

Well Love you family and talk with you soon. 

Elder Naumann

Monday, December 3, 2012

Ukraine Week 21: Random Exchanges

Well this week has been a fun one filled with surprises and I have loved every min of it. So on monday we went to a family night with a less active family who is starting to be active again and they were cool they have a problem with their lifes that the husband doesn't want to go to the temple and get his endowment and then ultimately get marred, the wife is a return missionary who actually served extra long because she was so good. So we had brother Roman with us and is made the husband download priest videos of his old friend who just became a priest.( I think I have told you his story right?) well if not ask and i will be glad to tell you. 

So after that meeting my back had been hurting but not too bad because when my back hurts I put on the back brace I brought and feel much better. so on tuesday we  went over to this one less active lady in the branch who wanted to get rid of her sewing machine that is from the 50's and still has a crank petal and so we did that and my back still was hurting but I didnt worry  about that too much. 

So on Thursday we got a surprise visit from some of the other missionaries in the mission from a place up in kiev and they came down and one of them was a kid that was in Elder Tribetts group in the mtc but had to go home, But now he is here and we saw him for a second and then had to go. We had a lesson that day with volodia and that was awesome he has been reading the bom and knows its true and before he gets baptized he wants to finish it but as soon as we get ihor a member who was his childhood best friend on the lesson it will be game over get in the fount.

We then on friday convinced the zone leaders to get elder tribett on an exchange with Elder ward was his name and they had a blast they went out with roman and had a blast visiting some people in the branch and everyone loved elder ward soo much. So I was with his companion Elder jacox and he was a really cool kid and defiantly fun to hang out with, we contacted mostly the whole day except this meeting with a man we met on the street about 2 weeks ago on exchanges and his name is Yuri and so we had a good lesson with him he thinks that our church is true.... Along with all the other christian churches so that was fun but let me tell you about his story so me and elder Hansen ( zone leader ) were on exchanges 2 weeks ago and we contacted this man and he has one fake eye and is about 46 and we stooped him and he knew who we were and said yeah I have some friends like you from Israel and Utah and then he spit out the name Spencer Rogers..... Yes the Spencer Rogers we all know and love and call bishop.... So another random meeting with someone from the Rogers past. So he is a doctor and writing a play about moses and he speaks english and he told me the story of when Bishop Rogers was in France I think dancing with his dance group and then how he lived here. Right i know crazy and totally random so i will tell you how that goes. 

So something funny about Ukraine is that there is a holiday for every day of the year almost and there is a day for almost every named person in ukraine so Saturday was day of roman so that was a fun day with him.

Im so sad you didnt find the black ship I hope its not lost forever or else all the children in the world wont have presents.
So erik im interested to hear all about your interesting "friend" my companion thinks that she is black or not a member but i really dont have any idea what mom could be meaning by, I might need to be open to changes sooo email me something about it ok. Oh and where are you trying to go to school? 
Macey also you should tell me where you really want to go to school too?
And Josie Good luck on the tryouts im sure you will do great. 
shawn im glad you are doing better in school and that you are having fun with your new gun and dont shoot your eye out........

So i have a suggestion for all off you if you want to stay caught up with all things missionary in my life go to the mission web sitekyevukrainemission.com i think or something close to it. President writes us weekly news letters with really interesting things in it and this next week we have mission conference in Kiev and that will be a blast cause we are going to the temple afterwards and im really excited.

Love Elder Naumann

Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Ukraine week 20:Turkey.... anyone

Well this week was a fun one with thanksgiving and well thats honestly it. this week we did alot with getting ready for thanksgiving and then of course eating the food and feeling sick afterwards and having to clean up. 

So the beginning of this week was fun especially p-day so we had the regular stuff like shopping, Internet and eating out. Then in the evening we had a family night with a really cool family here, They wanted to go out bowling and they invited us and so we went and didnt really have a spiritual thought but it was a way fun time. The family has two really little boys about 5 and 3 years old and they got into playing and watching their parents. But unfortunately we all we awful but we were all bad together and yeah when we all suck its a fun time. 

Then Tuesday we had exchanges with the zone leaders and thats not really that exciting because they are in our district so we know them eat out with them all the time know all their investigators but its always fun. I went out with Elder Hanson he is a cool army kid from Texas and he is super at just doing alot of stuff and still keeping a cool head. He was a zone leader at his year mark on his mission and thats rather impressive. We had fun with fire too.....

 I know you told us that you would be having a meal with your district and I hope that was good? Well to answer your question yes it, it was really good we had alot of food and alot of prep time we spent 2 hours the night before making cornbread and brownie cookies and making phone calls to investigators.

 Do they sell turkeys there? Yeah they do but we had already bought a chicken so we made both and ate both. 

 Who was in charge of cooking? We all pitched in we had our own things to cook and have ready and then we brought them all over to the church and ate them in a big fancy dinner well with plastic utensils so Ukrainian Fancy Dinner.

So the morning of Thanksgiving we had a service project with this inactive sister who is sort of an extremist. So the project was to get her and her husband firewood and no we didnt just go cut down a nice big tree, we climed up to the top of the building and there was an atic there with a home made lader to get up there and then half of us had to climb up there and grab huge logs well not logs, suport beams they were big but the only way to lower them down was to ust a 200 year old rope and it was only about 4 feet long and it was a 15 ft. drop so we started with the rope on the log and me at the bottom ready to grab it and then the rope broke and then i broke my face... Not true I caught it and it was scary. We did that with 4 other big logs but wait thats not the end. We then set the logs infront of a cafe and grabed a cupple saws and started cutting. Imagine it 4 missionaries cutting wood infront of a nice little cafe so that was funny so then we cut the wood with an ax and then carried it to their basement so all in all a funny and good service project. 

So cool spirtual experience of the week. We have been teaching this guy named volodia for about 3 months now, we havent actualy taught him since the first month but he showed up to church out of nowhere and turns out that he is childhood best friends with one of our really strong members and they saw each other and he told him he was reading the book of mormon and this man gave his testimony and said that this was the best day of his life and that the lord truly does prepair people. I know he does and if he wanted to he could do anything with the work here. 

I love you all im glad you had a fun time in st. george have a great week.

Love Elder Naumann

Monday, November 12, 2012

Ukraine Week 18: Snow Really?

Wow I love that picture of our back yard with snow in it I would play in that all day long. ( not as a missionary) but yeah it looks like fun. 

So this week has been a fun one we have really decided to work with members more. I think its because my companion who has been out for a year like 2 days aggo is really sick of contacting for 8 hours in a day so we have really tried to find new ways to find referrals and reactivate those who have been lost from the fold because in the zone conference we had this week our mission president told us that we really needed to focus on the sheep we have rather then finding new ones just to loose them in 12 weeks or abandoning them after they reject you.

Our relationship with some really cool members has really grown this week we have had an opportunity to work on the ward list and really figure out where people are and what standing they have with the church so we have been working with brat roman and doing alot of work with the less actives and its funny he takes us out like almost every day and we try to refuse but he insists and says that the missionaries in America get fed every night and is said they also have cars and members drive them around when then run out of miles they can travel and so yeah he then told us he had a car and that the next day he would bring it but we didn't let him do that but today is his birthday so we have some really good stuff planned for him so hopefully our efforts will show results soon.

We also had a really good zone conference this week with our mission president in which he told us that our zone was splitting and we were all like why but we still dont know but maybe soon we will find out but the next couple of transfers will be interesting because our mission is estimated to receive 50 more missionaries and like 40 of them will be sisters so yeah crazy stuff he said he hopes to have a sister companionship in every branch so that will be a change and really exciting and it will be cool to see how that also effects the rest of the world too.

We also got transfer information on Saturday and basically our whole zone is staying where it is and thats so boring but its ok because im going another transfer here in l'viv and I love it here i have been here for almost 5 months now and the time is going faster and faster and next transfer will be a mystery cause we will hopefully be opening a new city and who knows I may be training and staying here in l'viv and that would make it 6 months in one city and that will be crazy but who knows what will happen. I wonder if this happens in American missions if missionaries want to serve in specific cities of if its all the same to them.


So how are things going with your companion? Everything is going ok i still love him and he still loves me I just found out what he is, he is a 40 year old man in a 20 year olds body but im over it he is great and we do just fine.

 Are there just the 2 of you in your apartment, or are there more?Yeah there are only 2 of us and its a old apt. it is 130 years old but its a good one.

 Who does the cooking? Do you cook for yourselves, or together? Well yeah me and elder tribett buy our food separately and we cook separately and it actually has been awesome cause I dont have to eat anything I dont want, but as a result of my trying to lose weight I eat basically the same 4 things every 4 days but I love it its so simple and I get everything I want. 

 Have you received your package yet? No i didnt but i have a feeling it is in the mission office but i think it would have just arrived and so they cant get it out to us until the next time we are in kiev and since none of us got transferred or are going to kiev for any reason until the 6 of December i think thats when i will get it. 

Do you know if we will be able to Skye or face time? Just wondering...:) I think yes we will be able to but our transfers are going to be 2 days before Christmas and everything will be different if i get transferred but there are plenty of computer clubs and all i need is wifi and all the churches have their own wifi so all will be well.


Alexis going to Houston Texas East she will have so much fun and wow what a prediction from that one shirt she has and the guy who said that first. Also I want to know who her mission president is going to be because we were all in the MTC when all the mission precedents came and i want to know if I meet them and if one of the missionaries on the mission right now knows them personally... Alexis you are in for a world of  well if i said fun I would be lying but you are about to enter into a time where you will have the best memories of your life. I have been talking with my companion Elder Tribett from las Vegas and we decided why missions feel so short and at the same time can drag on at times, its because of the activities you fill your time. I doubt you will be doing much street contacting or tracking my companion said while he was in Virginia he only tracked twice and the most he did on the mission were car stop by's to less active members and eating out every night at members houses and really doing alot of good stuff but I dont know really anything about your mission but i do know it will be different from anything you have ever done in your entire life so live it up.(Alexis Texas) 

So love you all and am jealous that you all heard form elder Bednar but I hope it was awesome.

Elder Naumann

Monday, November 5, 2012

Ukraine Week 17: How many Book of Mormons?

Well this week has been fun and alot of the time was spent on the street doing a table of books. So on monday we got a shipment of ukrainian books of mormon and we got 8 boxes with 22 books in each box so yeah we thought we would be set for a while but man were we wrong. So our new thing instead of handing out english cards is we hand out books of mormon like they are candy and people eat them up. The funny thing about ukraine is that nothing is free absoulutly nothing so when we try to hand out books of mormon people try to pay us and we tell them that its free its free just take it and i think like 5 people have flat out just refused to take the book thinking that its a book and books cost money so that is always fun. So we have handed out about 50 books of mormon and man it has been such a high we dont even know what to do with ourselves we have already gone through almost 3 boxes and we just got them and we only did table of books 3 times this week well 4 times but the last time we did it on a saturday night in center and lets just say that we had to leave early cause people called the police on us Woopes. Well yeah doing table of books is like one of my favorite things to do i love it to death. 

This week was halloween and what did we do...... absolutely nothing i was kind of sad but i hope all of your halloweens were awesome but yeah. but the end of the night we ended up in a hanted house. So here is the story we have this one man in our ward who is less active and was recently baptized so we were trying to set up with him but like i have told you many times everyone here has the same name and his name was oleg and there are like 5 olegs in our ward and one of them is crazy and walks with a limp and also tries really hard to speak english but kind of fails so yeah so we have been out with this crazy guy on a table of books and lets just say we call him the shark cause he literaly chases down groups of 15 year old girls trying to invite them to english and so yeah funny nothing better that a 50 somewhat year old man to get you over the top. So lets just say we set up with this guy and he was just super stoked but we tried to set up with another guy but its was funny so we went over to this guys house and its this big apt. building where for some reason all the windows were barred and there was this 15 foot high fence up and we got there and called the guy and he said he would come out to get us and after 20 min of sitting there he called us and told us he was haveing a problem getting out of the building and my companion and i were like oh no this is a mental hostpital like we had thought earlier so we wait and talked about who on earth would baptize a mentaly handycapt man but turns out he live in the back building and he is not in the crazy persons house but his house was rather crazy.

But this week was also good i took the lead in having us talk and meet with members more and because the zone leaders were out of town the whole week we spent alot of time with roman listney and he is just the best we spent days with him doing missionary work with less actives but its hard to get meeting here cause none of the members want or have time to meet so i wish i had brother lloyds problem but we dont we are out on the street weither we like it or not we have to fill our time with something productive and so yeah we visited alot of less actives this week and really tried to get our branch list cleaned up so we could really start doing work here with all the less actives so yeah.

But yeah i hear the ellections are about to happen so once you know you need to tell me but yeah also i tried sending you a voice recording but it was way too long and the computer wouldnt let me send it. 

Kim I did get your letter and i loved it it was everything i remember about you but yeah i did get it. 
Alexis so yeah im really excited for you to get your mission call i know you will do great out where ever you go and it will be all good cause i will get home and then like 2 months later you will get home so not even a bad deal. 

Love Elder Naumann

Monday, October 29, 2012

Ukraine Week 16: Winter....

Well Winter has hit us too here in Ukraine and its about as cold as you can imagine yeah its way cold but luckily my companion has like 3 extra pairs of gloves that i stole and now my hands are a warm as my body and yeah but the weather is very brisk and not much snow and also half way through the week daylight savings changed and we gained an hour and so we felt like we were sleeping in but it was good. Now the sun goes down at 6 and i hear that it goes down at 4 when winter really hits so I,m excited for that....

So we have been thinking about the sister missionaries coming out to the field soon and we asked the zone leaders and they said it was reported that there will be 20,000 new sister missionaries soon and all i was thinking is can we really handle that many sisters its crazy. We also were told by one of our sister missionaries here that her sister went to her bishop at BYU and started getting ready and the bishop said almost every sister that can go is going and they really don't know what they are getting themselves into but they will find out soon. 
So exciting stuff because we have 10 sister missionary companionship's here in Ukraine and we could use more but not really we have a few areas that aren't open that could be open if we had a few more companionship's but who knows what will happen, i think that a lot of sisters will serve state side cause the requirements are a lot easier so yeah cool stuff.

I'm glad to hear that Erik finally gave his homecoming talk and that it was good. I have been wondering that same question myself lately and reading my patriarchal blessing too and its hard cause it says that I'm out here for a reason and that there are people out here that i only can help and that a lot to think about that someone Else's salvation rests on the fact if you like Erik invite them to church or knock on their door or stop them on the street. It really makes you feel inadequate and i have a really hard time now especially since we have no investigators and my companion really doesn't like working with the ward (active members) he feels like its a waist of time and yeah i don't know what to do there.

We had exchanges this week with the zone leaders and so i went with Elder Dorious and i was in his area and we had literally nothing to do all day so we contacted for 8 hours and got 1 potential man was that a long and kind of disappointing day we talked to everyone literally everyone if they crossed out path we stooped them or at least tried to but it was hard cause some days are just like that and then some days we are out for 5 min and we get a new investigator and yeah its interesting the way the lord works but i do know that he knows his sheep and no one that day was ready to talk i guess.

Then yesterday we went to go visit the old woman who calls me savior to bring her the sacrament and she just talked the whole time about how she just found out she has Cancer and that was sad and so we read about the saviour and his love and how it applies in our lives and then we went over to this other less active to help her with her computer and teach her about charity and then we were on our way home and i had this impression that we should stop by this less active member we have been trying to work with and we showed up at his door and he was up the stair well chewing tobacco and he tried to hide it and he came down and talked to us for a sec. and then we left but who knows maybe us showing up will help him realize his addiction and yeah who knows i hope we did what we were supposed to.

Well dad your question about people here like coconuts yeah they are basically like that but i would describe them as like an orange not to hard of skin but hard enough that you have to dig alittle to get to the inside and once you get to the inside you never know if your going to have a sour one or a sweet one so yeah that is the way that i see Ukrainians they dont have many friends cause they don't just automatically call you a friend cause you said hi to them like we do in america but the friends they do have are as loyal as heck and they will go to the ends of the earth for you so yeah i really like when we make friends with someone.

Well that all for this week except im going to be an uncle but kyle already told me that and so yeah i dont know if he told you that a week ago but yeah my vote for the name is IGOR.

Love Elder Naumann

Monday, October 22, 2012

Ukraine week 15: Table of books

Wow i feel so honored to be on the ward news letter I dont even know what to say or how I will say how trully blessed my life has been from my mission but I will try.
This week has been rather good we have been trying to hit the streets more and more each day and it has been easy since we dont have any investigators so yeah we have spent lots of hours on the street and many of kilo meters walking around the city to try to find new investigators and people who are willing and ready to listen and be baptised.

At the end of the night on monday we were making our way home from I think a family home evening and we had like a half an hour to get home so we were like im kind of hungry we could just go home be we decided we could last and we could find someone that would want to know more about our church so we walked around center and tried talking to everyone and it is hard to want to talk to everyone when it is dark and you look like 2 weird guys from america in black coats. But we persisted and found this guy who is 19 named roma and he was way cool we told him where we were from and he was amazed that we were speaking Ukrainian because no one from america learned ukrainina and thats why im really glad im learning it. We talked with him for a while but he wanted to go get some coffee but we were like no thanks could we meet tomorrow though at our church so we can talk and meet he agreed and we met him the next day and we were there right at the time when this other guy was tuning our piano and its funny how deaf this guy was who was fixing the piano but yeah we called roma and he didnt answer so we were sad but then he called and we met and turns out that this 19 year old roma guy is a concert pianist and he was incredible and we were blown away about how good he was and we met and talked and at the end the tuner guy left and we told roma to see how good the piano is and it was already a little out of tune and I could hear it but that was a good get to know you meeting with him so hopefully we will be getting a new piano player in the branch.

This week we have been doing this thing that we call table of books where we stand at a busy part of town and give out pamphlets and books of mormon and family proclamations and it has been really successful we have found 4 new people who we can meet with and we have already met with 2 of them and it has been way fun to be out there doing something where people dont want to run away cause they come to us and i really am glad for all the prayers to help us do the work out here that is just the biggest blessing. 

We have also been working with this man here who is a less active and his name is yurie yahoriv and he is such a cool man he knows english perfictly he playes the piano and he is really funny but he has a problem with the branch he doesnt think anyone loves him and they dont really need him but we always get comments from other people telling us that they miss him and want him back but he also has a word of wisdom problem and that doesnt really help but we will be working with him more but pray for him please he needs it.

So this was the week that we were suposed to get our sr. couple back from america but sister moores heath is still bad and if they come back they wont be back for about a month so that has been a real challenge for us here cause no one can make decisions for the branch and the money or anything so we have been working around lots of stuff but we are praying for them so they can return here and continue doing the work they started.

This part of the letter is to the sisters of the ward who are almost 19 or who are.

Dear Future Sister Missionaries 


Do it Follow the prophet and do it all the sisters here were just like wow i really wish that i could have had this oportunity to do this when i was 19. Most of the sisters here waited cause they thought they should and they tell me that we should advise the girls at home to go on missions.

So yeah i know that my mission where im at would be so blessed with more sister missionaries they really help out here in lviv and if we had them all over the mission the mission would explode with baptisms so if you dont listen to anything else listen to the prophet do it.


Well i love you all.

Elder Naumann 

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Ukraine week 14: Not in Ukrainian‏

Well this week has been a fun week like i said last week i have a new companion and he really wants to change alot of things about this area and about really everything including our apt. We have been working really hard this week but for some reason we havent had very good numbers but numbers arent everything and we are surviving.

Not much to talk about this week except general conferance and how amazing it was. I dont think i have ever got so much out of general conferance as i did this time. (probably because i was awake the whole time) Well yeah so like you asked last week if we invited investigators well yeah we did but none showed up so we went down stairs and watched it on our computer in english with my companion and i was really glad cause none of the other missionaries got anything but the sprit out of conferance and now this week i have alot to think about other than waiting for the next leahona to come out and for us to read the talks so that was good. Our mission pres droped a bomb on us that morning, he said that because of conferance we wernt going to do study and that we needed to do something else for 3 hours in the morning when no one is out on the street. That was kind of frustrating but me and my comp. worked on the map we have been making to go visit people that are less or inactive members.

We didnt really do much other than making that map and contacting like crazy and i am sort of glad that elder olsen is gone not because i dont like him but because he was too good at the language and he just would really do everything for me and i would always think that i didnt understand the language and that i wasnt able to do much but be his companion but my new companion is only 7 months old mission wise and he doesnt really know the language all that well so i really have to step up my game and it has helped me to really understand what i can and cant do and what the heck i need to work on.
Like just yesterday i gave a blessing to an old lady in our branch who is always sick and i did ok it was hard but i did it and everything worked out and i am glad for that chance i had to give that blessing.

We for some reason have lost all 10 of our progressing investigators and my companion thinks its him and his curse. His curse is that every time he goes into a new area they never get meetings and they loose all the former investigators and its really sad for me cause i really liked some of the people we were meeting with i really thought i could help them i didnt believe it at first but now that it has been 2 weeks since any of our old investigators has answered the phone im starting to believe it.

19 Alexis Wow i don't know what to say but wow you too Kacey it is so awesome and such an example to me that the young women of the church can act so immediately and with such obedience What has it been a week and i bet that in 4 months the missionary numbers will go from 50,000 ish to 70,000 ish and that just blows my mind well yeah i was really wondering who that would effect i asked myself who would serve that i knew and it is cool to hear about things like that because there definitely are a lack of sisters out here. 

Well i have been sending you things that i wanted for months now but i will tell you the things that i remember and want for real.
zebra f402 pen it is my favorite i want some ink for it and maybe a pen or 2 
those ice grippers for the bottom of shoes that kyle had
measuring cups that colaps and maybe some table spoon stuff too
peaneut butter
Brown sugar 
That soda maker thing i told you about 
maple extract 
Rootbeer extrace and that goes along with the soda maker only rootbeer
a video of eriks home coming if there is one 
and yeah i think the letters that i sent have goten there but yeah 
I think thats it and i love you all and hopefuly this next week will be more eventful..



Love Elder Naumann

Monday, October 8, 2012

Ukraine week 13: 21 -2 = 19 Crazy‏


So this week started out kind of crazy there were lots of meeting with members and investigators and other people elder olsen wanted to say goodbye to and it was fun but sad for elder olsen he is dissapointed cause he thinks that if he had one more transfer here he would feel compleet and the work he did here would be done but obviously the lord thinks otherwise so he sent elder Trebett to me here in lviv and im really well i dont know what to think yet i cant really tell you about his work ethic or anything like that cause i have only been with him 4 days but i know he wants to change the branch here and make the less actives active and do stuff like that so we will see what happens. My companion is from las vegas and went to byu the year before his mission and he is a stud and i like him alot but he doesnt like meat so i dont know what to do with that and he thinks that he will change me to not want meat but i dont think it will happen we will see.

So we had two family nights this week cause we wanted to say goodbye to 2 families so we had one with the beckers on monday and one on tuesday with the malonoses and that was good they both have really little kids who are really fun and just a hand full but those days were full of packing and man does elder olsen have alot of stuff it is crazy and i hope that i wont have that much stuff when i go to my very last area... Well we al know i will i will go crazy and buy lots of stuff and just really go crazy but you know who cares i will deal with that when i get to it.


On wednesday we went out after more packing to lunch with one companionship of sisters and this one hawiian lady who was just here for a couple of days and she wanted to take us out to lunch and she said i will take you out anywhere and at any cost so we didnt know where to go but elder olsen remembered that he wanted to try this one really classy looking place called valentines and it was so cool in there it blew my mind and i just didint know what to do the thing i ordered was veil and it cost 195 greven yeah thats alot i mean its really only about 20 dollers but for us who only get 1800 greven to last us the month it was alot but she was so cool about everything and we found out that she is going to serve a mission in japan and that was cool.
After the lunch we went right to the church cause we had a baptism and yes i know that a wednesday baptism is weird but he was leaving and we decided that that would be the best thing to do as far as he goes so we didnt hold the whole thing we just did the ordinance but it was dumb we didnt invite really anyone but like 15 people came. It made me kind of mad cause when we do invite people no one comes really dumb right i dont know what to do its crazy.

Thursday we were in kiev to change our companions and we didnt really get anything else done becides that cause we had to get on a train at 4 and so we were on the train all day and all night and it was just so worthless and it was scary getting to the train station cause we barly got there in time for the train to leave but we made it and everything was ok but im just glad we made it in time or else we would have spent the night in kiev and another 2000 greven and that would have been dumb.

So changes to my district are elder trebett and sisters irazary and moore and they are cool but kind of sad this week our other moores are back in america to get some stuff checked out with sister moore she is sick but we dont know what with probably sick of us. but pray for her and yeah.

 Who are you teaching right now? We are teaching alot of people but i really dont know cause we havent seen any of them this week and that is really sad but yeah we are working on it.


 Is there anyone that you want me to put their name in the temple?
 Valodia and mark and kostia and nadia so yeah them please

so conferance 19 years old yeah that is so crazy when our sister found that out some were really sad that they waited and they could be done by now and it is just interesting to think that in less that a year we will have 18 year old guys out here and 19 year old girls and i wonder if like when they changed the time period to 18 months if this whole thing in a cupple of years will go away but who knows it will be interesting i dont know if there are alot of 19 year old girls who could handle a mission ( just kidding ) but really and 18 year old guys i dont even feel like i am mature enough to be out here but obviously the age group behind me are just wayyyyyyy more elect and ready to serve the lord.

Well thats it i look forward to seeing conferance at the end of the week and i will tell you all about how much i loved it next week.
Love elder Naumann

Monday, October 1, 2012

Ukraine Week 12:5 months... Baptism

So this week has been a week filled with ups and downs and lots of weird things like 1 baptism that should have been two and going to kiev and learning transfer information.....

First your question about conferance 
Do you ask investigators to come? Honestly i dont know what we do as far as investigaors
 I am guessing you won't have the translated version this week, but maybe in a few weeks?  We get the translated version a week after on a cd and we all watch it as a ward on either one day or two so yeah it is all fun stuff.

So at the begining of this week we really didnt do much we got doged alot and thats always a sad thing but we are working with  8 progressing investigators and thy are all doing really well some we will be droping soon and some we have already baptized.
Something that was fun to find was on monday we found a tennis cort and so we went and played with the sisters and man we all are soooo bad it is crazy. we then had our district meeting on tuesday and it was rather funny cause the zone leaders were gone and the moores were gone so we went to one of the sisters apt. and they took forever to open the door and we found out why it was cause they were all in boba out fits and that word meens old woman. Yeah it was so funny apparently they bought them the day before at the clothes renok where i bought my coat yeah.



So then thursday was crazy we did alot of area book work and thats always fun, the best times.  Especialy when its my turn on the phone and i have to call  and test out my ukrainian on the phone yeah not very effective. Then we went and had another meeting with one of our baptisimal candadates and he was doing  really good and he was way excited to be getting baptized. Then we had english conversation. its called that cause its illegal to call it english class cause we arent teachers sooooo. yeah usualy we have       4 to 7 people come but ever since we have had some good advertizing this week we had like 20 so it was just a crazy jump and people were interested in other stuff becides english we had some peoples numbers by the end. and then off to kiev to a leadership conferance and it was a long train.....

Friday was so awesome we got off the train and went to another elders apt. and  showered and got ready for the day and it was good  then i 3somed it up with a russian and another ukrainian and we contacted all day it was hard and crazy fun we got 10 potential lessons or in other words 10 people we prayed  with on the street and got their numbers and i had to solo it on a few of the contacting sessions and it was hard and  i struggled but people are human and they helped me  it was a good experience. We then got on another train at the of the day and took it all the way to loosk and  then took  a 4  hour bus ride home.

We got back on saturday the day of the 2 baptism we had and it started off really normal mcl then clean the building then a lesson with a member then it came time  for the investigators to come for their interview and they didnt come so we called and they said they would be late but they would be there and so they got  there and  everything was normal they both were ready, nervious but ready so they  both did the interviews  and passed and  then  they went to change and the son walked right into the font with regular clothes on so we were like oh no is he drunk so we tried to help him but he was acting like nothing i have  ever seen and it was weird and no one knew what to do because he wasnt drunk so we thought it was just nerves but it was something else ( we found out later that he had taked 4 of  his anti depresent pills when he needed only to take one) 


So then we asked his mom what was wrong and she had no idea and so we  didnt end up baptizing him but we did his mom and it was really good she was so ready her testimony was so strong and she really understands the effect of the atonement in her life and i love seeing that in her. But we had no clue what was wrong with the son but everything is ok now i think we will baptize him soon so he is still on track so good day. 

Oh and  then we also found out transfer information and turns out i dont have the same companion  i get a new one his name is elder trabet and he is way cool i already know him but my trainer is leaving and going off to ivano frankisk and  i will be staying but its all good i think im ready.

Well that about it i love all of you and  shawn you look like a boss and i love how your teeth look too.....  and erik at least sence i cant hear directly from you i can at least  hear about you and it  looks like your doing good so i love you all and have a great week.

Love elder Naumann