Hey!

Hi everyone!!! 

I have been very busy the last week. Our speaker from last week was this guy Dima, who is from Belarus. He spoke on teamwork. We had 2 lectures as usual in the morning and then we were told that we would have an afternoon lecture as well because we would be going somewhere the next day. Tuesday we were taken out to the datcha (summer home) of the base leaders Sasha and Luda. We spent the whole day there doing "team- building activites." The first thing was a game where we were all blindfolded. We had to hang on to each-other's shoulders and one person in the front (who wasn't blindfolded) had to lead us through a forest. We had no idea where we were going so we had to trust the person leading us. Then we did a game they called "spiderweb." They had a rope wrapped around 2 trees so that it made a spiderweb, and we all had to go through to the other side without touching the rope. If anyone touched the rope at all, we all had to start over. The other catch was that each space could only be used once. I was picked up and passed over the top of the rope into Yura's arms on the other side. All of the small people were picked up and put through the ropes, so we had it easy. All I had to do was keep my body stiff and I was fine. Then we did the blindfold game again, only I was the leader. Then we all went over to this log that was like 1 ft. off the ground and got on it. Then everyone on the log had to change places so that we were exactly opposite of where we started. I was on the end, so I had to go the farthest. If any of us fell, we all had to start over. It took us and hour and a half to complete. Then we had a bbq for lunch. After lunch we did a game where there was a rope on the ground that formed 15 squares. There was only one right way to go through it, so we had to use process of elimination to find the right way through. After that came the hardest challenge of them all... a tightrope walk. They had a rope set up between 7 trees about 5 and a half feet off the ground. Each person had to walk the entire length of all the rope. There was 6 sections that you had to cross and each time someone fell everyone went back one section. For those of you who don't already know, I had a VERY BAD fear of heights, so this was VERY HARD for me. The first time I got up on the rope I was shaking so hard I couldn't move! Each section had something to help you get across, whether it was a stick or a rope or something. I had to actually get down and wait a few minutes before I tried again. The second time I was able to do it, but it was still hard. This challenge took us 3 hours to complete... there was 8 of us. Natasha was home so she didn't come. After that we did some fun games and then Dima taught us to squaredance... to the Baha Men!!! LOL We squaredanced to "Who let the Dogs Out?" It was... interesting. Then we had dinner and someone had a jar of Jif peanut butter!!!! I was so excited and the looks on the faces of all the Ukrainians at watching me put peanut butter on a piece of bread was priceless!!! :) I just told them that was how American's make sandwiches. We got home around 10 at night. 

Wednesday we went to an indoor water park here in Ternopil. It was REALLY FUN!!!! They had a whole bunch of slides and things. I went down all of them. They also had a Turkish Sauna... which I didn't like AT ALL!!!!! It was boring. 

Thursday we left for the city of Lvov, which is 3 hours electric train ride away. We went to a youth conference that was actually 1 and a half hour bus ride out of Lvov. Oh yeah! I HAD MCDONALDS!!!!!!!!!!!! There is a McDonalds in Lvov and I got a huge french fry!!! It was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO GOOD!!!! The conference was great too! I was a small group leader along with my leader Gyulnara. We had about 12 people in our group. We had to discuss the lectures we heard and prepare something for the closing of the conference. Some of our team wanted to do a skit, and some didn't. I taught Cotton Eyed Joe (again) so a bunch of the girls, Gulia, and I did that and the other people did a skit. We had a pastor in our group and we think that he just invited a whole bunch of people from his church so that was kind of a pain. Then he wouldn't shut up like the entire time!!! Ughhhhhhhhh... it was really annoying. Saturday night at 12:30 pm we had a dance party that went till 5 am!!!! I only stayed till like 2:30 or so... I was really really REALLY tired. Saturday when we were supposed to be leaving something happened to the back tire of the bus taking us back to Lvov so we sat an extra 2 and a half hours waiting for them to fix it. Then we got back to Lvov at like 11:00 pm and we were all starving because we never ate dinner. All the magazines (small stores that sell food and various other things) were closed. We finally found one that was open after walking around for like 20 minutes and we got 1 bag of tortellini to split between 5 girls... not cool. Sunday we went with Galya (my leader who is from Lvov) to her church. I had to do my song with Andrea, Nika introduced us, and Svieta shared her testimony. It was good. 

Today was the start of week 6. Our speaker for the week is a pastor from Ternopil, he is speaking on spiritual warfare. The guy who was supposed to teach us couldn't come this week, so we have this guy instead. He has been good so far. Friday at 6 pm I leave for Kherson by train, which could take like 10 hours or so... not sure yet. We'll be staying on a boat with a DTS team from Holland. We will be having lectures there for one whole week, and then on to Simfernopil. I don't know if I will have internet there or not... so I'm not sure when I can update next. I'll try to let you know sometime soon.Now I have to get going. I love and miss you all! Have a great day. God bless!

-Missy