Weekly Update

Our dear, dear Family:

Josh and Kim came to our apartment after our Church meetings and we talked and had dinner together. So, I did not get the letter to you written on Sunday as planned. It is now 4:15 p.m. on Monday, and I have been trying all day to write to you. We never lack for something to keep us busy here.

The past week has been very good but very busy (to a point, I guess busy is good; to a point).

We appreciate the e-mails we have received from you. Thanks to all of you who helped with the work on the house in Fremont. Especially, thanks to you, Les, for spearheading this and doing so much of the work yourself. We did receive several pictures from Tamar and Joe. The work and cleaning on the house look outstanding. Again, thank you. Now, we can hardly wait to get home to enjoy it (can you believe, though, that we have been here already three months?).

President Anderson has had our employment missionaries teaching a one-day seminar to all missionaries when they are released mostly about finding work when they get home. They have also taught about marriage and a bit about staying active. I have been assigned to teach the newly-released missionaries Gospel topics that will help them adjust to their release and stay strong and be leaders in the Church. I taught my first group on Monday and it went very well. I will meet with the ones who live in and near Ulaanbaatar each Monday evening for the next three weeks, and then once a month for the next five months. For those outside Ulaanbaatar, I will keep in touch by telephone and e-mail and travel to their branches as possible (some are a day's drive or more from here). I do think this will help us in keeping returned missionaries active.

After weeks of preparation, we had our annual returned missionary conference on Saturday. We had a meeting in the morning, lunch here at the headquarters building, Gospel workshops in the afternoon, and then a party and dance in the evening. I spoke on repentance in the meeting; President Andersen spoke on dating and marriage. We informed the returned missionaries that we will have two returned missionary trips to the Hong Kong temple next year, one in June the other in November. Some of the missionaries have not been to the Temple yet; others who have married since their mission have not been sealed in the temple. Linda will help them to not only get prepared themselves but prepare to do Temple Work for their parents, grandparents, etc. I also challenged every missionary to help reactivate at least one inactive missionary during the coming year. There are 656 returned missionaries called from Mongolia (many went back to the U.S. after their missions or are in other countries and we are trying to find all of them). We did have about 150 at the Conference.

On Tuesday, President Andersen and I had lunch with Amarjargal (I wrote about him earlier: he has been prime minister of Mongolia, foreign minister, and is now a member of parliament). Amarjargal heads the committee on finance and economics in parliament; President Andersen has been an international financial and business expert in Hong Kong for twenty-five year. They had a good talk together, and President Andersen made some suggestions about what can be done to strengthen the economy here. He also offered to help parliament with economic and financial concerns. I feel a lot of good can come from this meeting.

During the week I wrote an article for the Church News entitled "Mongolian Church in the Wilderness" about the little group meeting at the mine in the Gobi, and I selected a few of the pictures I took to accompany the article. President Andersen approved its being sent, so I will get it off soon. Did you see the article in the Church News about your All-Mongolia youth conference? t was quite good. But, because of this coverage of Mongolia I do not know how soon my article might be published.

I have also been planning our trip to the branches north of Ulaanbaatar: Darkhan I, Darkhan II, Zuunhara, Erdenet, and Selenge. I will visit all of them and spend some time with their leaders. Linda will teach family history to their specialists. It will be a lot of driving, but we have a fairly new Land Cruiser to drive, so it should not be too bad. I will tell you more about the trip next week. We return home on Sunday.

Many of us have been reading about Curtis Johnson's battle to get a new liver; I have also had that challenge here: a young mother came to my office just on the chance that our being Christian might mean we would help her son, who is in a hospital in Hohot, Inner Mongolia, for a new liver. I gave her all I could afford right now, and her son had had the transplant but is not getting the nutrition and medication he need. I will help more from our money for next month. And some money from a small "consolation" payment I will get from Linda's phen-phen case. China charges even more than the U.S.-- $63,000. This couple have sold everything they own, including their apartment and their cell phone to help.

Today we had lunch with one of Linda's assistants, Dashka, and her family. Her husband, Enkhtuvshkin, was the first member of the Church here. He was baptized in Germany and then came back home. They have a son in Provo, a daughter who just came back for a break from her studies in BYU-Hawaii, another returned missionary son, and three younger daughters. We had a very nice lunch in their ger on the outskirts of the city.

We are both in good health, but Linda still tires easily. I am making certain the she does not overdo.

The weather is not as bad as expected. The streets and sidewalks are clear of ice and the days are sunny. Morning temperatures are sometimes below twenty degrees but well above freezing in the afternoons.

We love you; we miss all of you very much.


Dad