Russia is soooo warm. It's been in the upper 80s for the past couple days and AC is hard to come by. I guess it doesn't help that we've also been out and about all the time either. It seems everyone realizes we are leaving soon and wants to get a few more meetings in. Can't say I disagree with them.
Just a few things we've been doing. First off, the AIM students are here and we've been accomodating them. They are a cool bunch and ever more diverse than our group. They come from Texas, California, Florida, and Texas. I guess God really did bless Texas eh? hehehe. They have been going with us to meet students and we've been taking them around town. Showing them the ropes. I hope they can keep up with the contacts we've made.
Speaking of contacts, we went to Alexia's house last night. He plays basketball with us and is very nice. Always apologizes for fouls and plays super hard. He has taken a liking to KT, so that was a bit interesting. He's 40 and married and his family is a beautiful one. His house is also amazing! Wood everywhere and AC and security and two hot water heaters, a dishwasher and a washing machine. He also has a banya (sauna) and a summer kitchen. I took lots of pictures. Jim says it was the nicest house he's been in in Russia and I believe it is up there in my list of American houses. AMAZING! He gave us jars of honey from his home in Kazakstan and some tea from Egypt.
We also got a chance to experience the open market. I bought a nice speedo and some other cool stuff. It's cool to haggle and we have a lot of fun doing it. BTW, those cool Russia hats run about $100 so we passed on them. It was kinda hard, but that's more than I want to spend for something I'll never really need.
As we get ready to head out, I think many of us are thinking this is somewhere we can see ourselves being missionaries. I personally would rather be an engineer here and also help the church. I think, though, that other places in Russia probably need me much more, but Tomsk is on my list to visit again. The people we've met seem to be very sad we're leaving and I feel their pain. We are going to have a shindig on Saturday to have one last talk with all the people we've met and introduce them to the AIM students. I know that will be fun and I hope it goes well.
Tomsk's been a great experience, as I am sure Germany was as well. For a town of 600,000 it has a very small town feel and I really like that.