Sister Luthy and Henderson made up a game to review gospel principles taught to the Vajda family to help their 9-year-old son Nemanja understand what they were teaching.
We had a nice visit with the Turnic family. Aleksandar is Miroslov's nephew and he helped present the message. They live about 15 minutes away by car in the village of Mandjelos.
We love having this neighborhood fruit stand about five minutes away from our home. Even in wintertime, they have a great selection of high-quality fruits and vegetables. We are some of their most regular customers and we get personal treatment when we stop in (which is about every other day)
We had the Ibraimovic family over for lunch and games but forgot to get a photo until we were in the stairwell outside our apartment door.
The Vajda family come over for dinner and we got to know them better, the father, Nenad speaks some English and then the Sisters help translate. We enjoy playing a lot of Uno as it works without having to speak each other's language. Nenad and Nemanja won most of the games.
We have been given another hat to wear as country specialists for Self Reliance. We are responsible to train all the missionaries in Serbia on how to teach an abbreviated class in "How to Find a (Better) Job". We made a trip to Cacak (about a 3-hour drive south) to meet and train Elder Bradshaw and Elder Hoisington. While we were there we had a Palacinka party and met with the Zaric family from the branch. On the way, we enjoyed stopping at this monastery (Manastir Nikolje in Darkotosic). In the summer they have a regular stream of visitors, not so much in the winter. We had the place all to ourselves. The interiors of the chapel are amazing but we were not allowed to take any photos inside.
The sign in the background spells our Cacak in Cyrillic characters. (upside down backward h makes a ch sound)
While in Cacak we had some pretty good Beef Goulash. Merritt made a note of the restaurant so we can go there again next time we go back. Where ever we go Merritt is always on the lookout for good goulash since it incorporates Merritt's favorite flavor: Gravy!
We took advantage of our trip to Cacak to look for our favorite granola cereal which recently we had not been able to find at any of the four main grocery stores here in Sremska Mitrovica. We went to three stores in Cacak without any luck but then hit the jackpot at the forth store. We bought about 30 packages of granola which should last us a while. (we mix the chocalate flavor and the nut flavor together)
We made a special trip to Novi Sad to train the missionaries there as well. Novi Sad is about an hour by car and is separated from Sremska Mitrovica by a small set of hills called the Fuska Gora. We planned it on a P-day so we could take our sister missionaries with us. Novi Sad sits on the banks of the Danube across from the Petrovardin Fortress that was built in the early 1700's. Novi Sad has a population of about 300,000 and is the second largest city in Serbia. Belgrade (aka Beograd) is the largest city with a population of about 1.5 million in the city proper and about 3 million in the surrounding area. For comparison purposes, Serbia and the state of Virginia in the US have about the same population and have about the same land mass. Here is a photo of the Fortress.
We hiked across a bridge and up to the fortress and took this photo. You can just make out the bridge in the background. Missionaries are not afraid of long walks. They do a lot of it. (Sister Gunnel and Sister Mantz joined us)
We visited the town square and spent some time inside the Orthodox Cathedral.
The interior was stunning as well
We had a three hour training session. We showed a power point presentation then worked on "Me in 30 seconds" and "Power Statements" for everyone. (Dean and Louise Fitches are the Senior Couple in Novi Sad, Elders Beck, and Youngs and Jovan along with Sisters Gunnel and Mantz joined the training)
Sister Luthy and Sister Henderson were excited to get out the portable baptismal font and get it set up in foyer of our church building. (too cold to do it outside this time of year)
On February 9th Nenad, Aleksandra and Nemanja Vajde were baptized. They have made a great addition to our branch. Sister Luthy wrote up the story about how they were found and taught. You can find it here as a google doc.
Afterwards, we emptied the font in "bucket brigade" fashion. It went surprisingly fast.
Big Nemanja and Little Nemanja doing some sparing.
Since we work with the YSA's we have been involved with getting a weekly video Institute class set up. It is taught by Elder Peterson or Elder Rands in Slovenia and is taught in English. The first class we had 3 YSA's attend. We will look to grow this class in the future.
Milan giving his little sister Tara a piggy back ride.
This is a double sarcophagus for burial purposes from the Roman era.
This is one of the more interesting sculptures found reasonably intact. This image is often replicated in various places in Sremska Mitrovica so it must be important.
Like here on the side of this building a block from our apartment.
We ordered 10 copies of the first triple combinations in Serbian to give to our branch members. This is the first time the complete Doctrine and Covenants and Pearl of Great Price has been available in Serbian. Two our branch members were involved with it's translation.
That's all for now. Time to go do other stuff.
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