We flew to Yerevan, Armenia from Kyiv at 11:30 pm April 28, and were picked up at the airport at 4:00 am by President and Sister Carter. They are the mission president and wife of the Armenia mission. We were all very tired, but they said they do it all the time because that is the normal flight schedule for that connection. Here we are with the city of Yerevan in the background.
This is a picture of the mission driver, the man at the far right, and his family. We got 3 hours of sleep then he picked us up to go to the city of Spitak to interview a senior missionary couple who are assigned there. On the way back to Yerevan, he drove the longer, more scenic route through the beautiful country. Then he informed us that we were going to his house for dinner. His wife fixed a yummy dinner of soup, fish, and lavash (I skipped the fish). We had a great time and stayed for hours.
Outside the church where we interviewed the missionary couple. The church is on the first floor of this building.
The pretty countryside on the route back to Yerevan and dinner at the Ghabarian's house.
More pretty country side.
This place is where Elder Oaks and Elder Nelson came to Armenia June 24, 1991 and dedicated the land for the preaching of the gospel. Elder Oaks gave the dedicatory prayer in the grove to the left of the picture. Since then there are 2 districts, many branches, and about 2,000 members in Armenia. You can see that this grove is next to a statue called 'Mother of Armenia'. Until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, a bust of Stallin was displayed on this monument. They quickly removed him, after winning their independence, and put up this new statue.
Us in the grove.
The grove with the 'Mother of Armenia' in the background.
A beautiful water show to lights and music in Republic Square, about a 5 minute walk from our hotel.
Once a year the soviet lovers gather with their red flags and remember the the 'good old days'. I took this picture from our hotel window.
This is Mt. Ararat where Noah landed the Ark. It's in Turkey because the Turkey people took it away from the Armenian people about 100 years ago. The Armenians still call it their mountain.
The city view of Mt. Ararat through the clouds. It has snow on it.
View (sort of) of Mt. Ararat from the monestary on the border of Turkey and Armenia. There is always a cloud covering the mountain. We know it's there because we saw parts of it as the clouds would re-position themselves. 
The Armenian Orthodox monestary at the base of Mt. Ararat.
Dennis, our driver, and President and Sister Fry inside the wall of the monestary.
They still do animal sacrifices at this monestary. This is the sacrificial alter...gross...I know! Yeah, they're behind the times by about...2 thousand years. We didn't tell them because they don't like Mormons. They usually kick the Mormons off their property.
We really did do a lot of work while we were there. This is the group we trained on Church History for 2 days. They made a yummy Armenian lunch for us.
A memorial from the genicide in about 1912. 1.5 million people died.
This monestary and the surrounding grounds is to the Armenians what temple square is to the Mormons. 
2 comments:
Looks like you are seeing some pretty cool things.
We had a FHE about preparing for missions last night - and showed your blog to the boys. They were really interested! Thanks for your great example.
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