Update

So, I tried to post once, but it didn't post.

Today was the first day of classes. My classes are ok. I'm happy with them, but I'm not thrilled. The last group of teachers. I think in a few days I will know my kids better and will be better able to assess them. I have one class that will be a real test of patience and one class with 4 middle school age girls who don't speak a word of English. It could prove to be a long 3 months.

I enjoy a lot of the food, but there is some food that I hate. Every few days we go to a restaurant that doesn't allow us to order. They just bring us food. I'm never happy with that idea.

I rolled my ankle on the way to church yesterday. It swelled up like a watermellon last night. I know I'm fine because I can walk on it without too much pain. My ankle was too big to fit into any of my shoes (either of my pair of shoes!) so I had to wear my flip flops. Church was good, but not nearly as good as dawn prayer every morning.

The pastor took us to a very expensive Japanese resaurant one of the church Elders owns. We ate so much food we could have popped. Every time we felt full they would bring out more food. The food was great, except for the last course - fish bowel soup.

Over all everything is great here. I'm getting a bed and my own bedroom on Thursday. That will be really nice.

Another Beautiful Quarantined Day

Leta Gorham, Molly, and I have to spend the whole week together away from the children and the church members. It's kind of funny because we know we don't have swine flu, but they are being very cautious. We can leave the house, but we can't go to the schools or the church (except for morning prayer ... yeah the rules are kind of fast and loose) or the marketplace.

So today we went to dawn prayer and then walked around the city. We ended up sitting outside the French pastry store until the opened. Leta told us about her children and her young adult life in Africa.

We met with the Pastor and received our schedules. We took a ride from a stranger to the wrong market. Who can you trust if not a stranger in a van? Molly had a pedicure and then we ate at a restaurant with food that was much too spicy. I bought Mario brothers socks, a pink alphabet poster for my room, and ice cream from our favorite pizza shop.

We came home and Leta shared stories of ministry spanning 5 decades and as many continents. We want to write a book with her. The three of us have become fast friends, we have tentative plans to go to Kenya next. Well, the Philippines in July and Kenya next year. We just plan on working together for years wherever God takes us. We'll see how long our goodwill lasts. Hopefully longer than our quarantine.

We climbed up the hill behind our apartment to the personal burial tomb. It was eerie more than anything else. We don't know who is buried there. We love hearing Leta's stories. She has served in so many different ways. She's such an inspiration.

We ate fried chicken and drank Pepsi in glass bottles. It's a little soon to be wanting American food, but it looked really good. So we went for it.

Classes start on Monday, supposedly. This quarantine thing has been just great.

We have our first staff lunch tomorrow.

When you are new to a country everything is magical and the place has no faults. I'm almost certainly in that phase right now.

There are some foods I have tried that thoughts, "Well right now I love it, but I can imagine really hating it in six months." You know how when you wake up in the morning your breath has that nasty funky smell? Well, because of the different diet my morning breath has a new and different funky smell. I wake out of a dead sleep at 4 in the morning because I can't bear the smell anymore! How gross yet funny.

So far I haven't been to a single Korean families home. At the moment we are in quarantine because of the swine flu epidemic. Not that we have swine flu, but that as foreigners we could be carriers of swine flu ... I guess. They don't want us around the children or the elderly. It doesn't make much sense to us because we are around the pastor and the other teachers and then they are around the children and the elderly.

Yesterday Leta, Molly, and I went for a very long walk in the afternoon. We walked up and down a mountain and to the lake on the other side. Then we took the bus back into town. We bought pizza at a really cool pizza place. I got spare-rib pizza, Leta got Cheese, and Molly got sweet potato pizza. We ordered steak and onion, cheese, and chicken respectively. It was a good day.

Well, I'm on my way to dawn prayer now. Love, Michael.

I walked with Rev. Dr. Leta Gorham, the retired missionary I'm working with, to early morning prayer. However, this particular day there was not early morning prayer. Oops. I guess we'll try again tomorrow.

The country is so beautiful. Everything is very clean and very new. There are rose bushes all along the sidewalks and small parks on every block. So far the food has been good, no complaints. The pastor is very nice.

I'm excited for the day.

I'm in South Korea

Well, it's official. I'm here.

The flight from Pittsburgh to JFK in New York City was basically empty. The 6 hour layover was uneventful. The flight from JFK to Seoul South Korea was completely packed. There was only one empty seat ... in between me and the girl in the window seat. Janiye and I stretched out and layed our stuff over the seat so they didn't try to take it away from us. She confided how glad she was to not sit next to a smelly old Korean man. Janiye grew up in Korea and America and has a healthy perspective about both cultures. We talked and laughed a lot and I plan on hanging out with her and her boyfriend and their American friends in Seoul at some point.

I was almost quarantined because of my allergies. They thought I had swine flu.

I was met by an older gentleman who spoke no English. I wasn't sure for the first 45 minutes if he was even from my school or if he had just kidnapped me. But eventually the pastor called his cell phone and spoke with me. I was basically up for any adventure.

I'm staying at the girl's apartment temporarily(?) until they can find better accommodations for me. We'll see. I finally got to meet Leta Gorham, the missionary I've been speaking with on the phone for so long.

I'm getting up at 5AM for prayer in the morning so I had best sign off.

Love, Michael.

News

After graduation I will be heading to South Korea to teach English. Wesley Mission School is committed to training children and youth who want to become missionaries by teaching them the international languages of English and Love. I have committed to teach for one year.


The Korean Flag.


This is Kimchee, a daily Korean occurance. It is spicy fermented Cabbage.


A Kindergarten graduation class, the school ranges from Kindergarten to High School.


Wesley Mission school, and Sapgyo Methodist Church.

Michael Airgood.

God is love.

The following blogs were posted during my two month trip to Russia. During my time in Russia I worked with the United Methodist Church in Otradney, (a drug and alcohol rehab center in)Samara, (our church camp in) Voronezh, Moscow, Kirov, and Syktyvkar.

I tried to record my day to day activities, primarily through the stories of events and the lives of people around me. The blog is in reverse order, so you might want to start from the last page and work your way back through.

If you have any questions about my time in Russia you can e-mail me at mairgood@tfc.edu

Love, Michael Airgood.

(Ludmilla Garbuzova teaching the youth from her church.)



(One of the Russian youth leaders we worked with, Pasha.)



(Ludmilla Garbuzova standing in front of the stained glass windows at the art&design college where Moscow First meets each week.)

The youth camp was a great experience. There were about 20 Americans and 20 Russians. We met up with the Americans before the camp and did a little planning. The Russian youth were great. Some were Christian and some were decidedly not-Christian. It was difficult to speak to both audiences.

We told the kids about Jesus. It sounds so simple, and it really is that simple. We took a week, we got to know the youth, and we told them the good news.

Because it really is that simple. That's what it's all about.

We spent a lot of time investing in the future leaders in Russia. We want to make sure that if we (the Americans) can't make it next year, that the Russian leaders know they could have the camp without us.

(This is a picture of me and American friends wearing large Russian hats. No one in Russia wears large fur Soviet hats.)

I love international travel because you lose any notion of time you ever had. My computer tells me that it is Saturday, and I simply have to believe it for lack of a better source!

Last Sunday I woke up after sleeping in for several hours. I rolled out of bed, brushed my teeth, and went downstairs to the Korean church. I had spent the night at the United Methodist Seminary and it is home to at least 4 different churches. The First Service Sunday Morning (some time around noon or thereafter) was in Korean. The Koreans re-started the Methodist church in Russia over twenty years ago. There were many United Methodist Koreans living in the Soviet Union and they petitioned the government to allow them to meet. They were allowed access to a small concert hall with a very large statue of Lenin on the front platform. Some Sundays the Korean-Russians would cover the statue with a sheet ... after the fall of communism they moved the statue off of the stage for Sunday morning worship. They invited Russian-Russians and eventually planted the first Russian-Russian United Methodist churches. So we owe a lot to the Koreans, and attending their church service was a fun experience.



(The Korean churches' Sunday School.)

The Pastors Shishkin from Syktyvkar happened to be in Moscow that Sunday and were the featured preachers for the morning. The Korean churches visit Syktyvkar every summer (they never visit during the 9-10 month snowy season!) and on their last visit they gave money for a new air-conditioner. Haha. (The church used the money to install central heating as their building had used three different wood stoves.)

After Korean worship, I went with my Seminary student friend, Katya Li, to Ludmilla Garbuzova's church. Katya doesn't speak a word of English, and she continually encourages me in my Russian studies. She speaks with simple words and sentence structure and it feels great to understand and be understood. She tells me I have a "hot heart." I think the same about her - but more so.

The art and design college where Ludmilla's church normally meets isn't available during the summer so they do home churches. This particular Sunday it was just the youth at Ludmilla's flat. More than twenty of them (not all, she assures me) gathered in her comparatively large flat (Ludmilla had been an important government official before she became a Christian pastor - one perk of government service is incredibly spacious apartments! 5 rooms!) for worship and preparation for camp. She teaches on trendy clothes and the idea that God looks on the inside and that it is our heart that must be adorned - by faith. She held the room's attention - effortlessly going into long discussions with different youth about difficult topics. Several of her youth are orphans. Most of them aren't necessarily Christian - they are just lonely and crave a loving atmosphere. Ludmilla is altogether a realist ... after the sermon, when we were discussing camp, she said, "How many of us smoke?" More than half the room raised a hand. "Well, this week would be a good time to quit, but if you're going to smoke be polite to others and the environment. Smoke in the woods as a group and don't litter the butts." Could you imagine a pastor in the states saying that?!

On Monday we went to the youth camp. Our friend from Kirov, Zina, came to the camp and I met her at the train station and I brought her to the camp. We spoke entirely in Russian and when, most of the way to the camp, I called Kira and spoke in English half of the train turned to stare. They had heard my heavy accent, but American accents are rare and they probably assumed I was from Europe. They were more than a little suprised to learn that an American knew more than tourist phrases! Zina laughed harder than acceptable in Russian and I joined her.

Well, I am officially back in the states. Pastor Kira helped me find the airport yesterday morning. We left the camp at 6AM. It took 3 hours to get to the airport ... by taxi, metro, and train. I made all three of my connections and am safely in Boston with my sister.

I will try and post some pictures before too long, so feel free to check back.