'The Book'
Loved of The LORD, I will again back up a paragraph or two to lay out a little more ground work. Remember when I arrived in Minsk I was told that I had two weeks to be orientated and would then find another place to abide. See: Sunday, January 6, 2008. This trip was taken before that first two weeks were up.
The first move was to the flat owned by Olga Korbut (Four Times Olympic Gold Medal Winner)
This is where Patrick’s & ‘my newfound’ friend Rich Lived. He worked for a US Company that was working with the Belarusian Government for Agriculture and I believe something to do; with Toxic waste clean up. Nevertheless, they had offices all over. He became aware of our adventure and mission to Chisinau and said he would do what he could to make a connection down there for us.
When the four of us got off the train, we started to look around for someone who was looking for us and not a hundred feet and we heard this, maybe middle thirties, woman hollering in our direction as she was making a b-line for us. She came right up to me and excitedly started talking fast to me in Russian and before I could get out a ‘Ya ne pony mi yoo Paroskie’ all the way out, (I do not understand Russian.) the boys started explaining that to her.
We found out that Rich’s office there in 
'Ushanka' hat. (That is a traditional Russian winter headwear. Ushanka is roughly translated ‘Hat With Ear Flaps’) I was told that I looked like a Russian Gypsy Wood Cutter, but that would be an oxy-moron. Gypsies do not chop wood, … they steal it!
Talk about being blessed … She had a car and a four room flat and she was going to put us up and drive for us in the daytime for a hundred US Dollars. All we had to do was buy the groceries. She took us to the open-air market and we were going to be there about 5 or 6 days, so we bought a few vitals and headed home. She introduced us to her son who was an older teen, and Pat & I slept in a double bed in the guest room, the two boys slept in the son’s room, one in the bed and one on a mat on the floor and the son slept in his mother’s room. As strange, as it was to Pat and me, it must have been the norm in special situations; the boys never mentioned that to us nor we to them.
That evening Pat and I took her to dinner, so we could express our gratitude. The strangeness of our arrangement grew each day, while at dinner she explained to Pat that her husband had been killed a couple years before, not really saying how. He was apparently high military and so were her parents. When we offered her bread, she emphatically refused it, as she emphasized needing to keep her shape. Which I had noticed was in very good condition. Somewhere in the conversation, she let us know again that she would run us in the day time and we would have to make do for ourselves in the evening, as she had business appointments then.
The next day we went looking for Pat’s connection and to make some contacts for the time they would establish a beachhead there latter on. I think it was about two years later Pat had received his teaching credentials during the trips back home and Jamie was administrating in
The preacher we were looking for had moved and a neighbor explained where he had started a church and off we went. When we arrived, he was not there, but we met another preacher, who was looking for him, too. Mix as he called himself was a missionary sent out from an established faith church in
We finally placed the rest of the books and we had found a few other ministries that we conferred with about the work and the fruition of the same. One was a Baptist from
More next time. Be Blessed, 1
