March 29 & 30 in Lviv

Poor Malcolm and Louis. I just read Malcolm's post for Sunday. He said they went to the bakery and bought "water & bread"! I cannot help but feel for the poor men. They were dipping their store bought bread in their bottled water, while we were feasting on home made pizza, cinnamon rolls and later - fresh home made raisin bread!!! That Flo is amazing in the kitchen.... Louis, you can move back to Lviv with us any day if Malcolm isn't treating you to anything better than bread and water!

We had some excitement at Flo's apartment building today. Ruslan picked me up at home and we drove to Flo's. When we got there, smoke was coming from somewhere (and it wasn't Flo's kitchen). We were waiting for the elevator and noticed the smoke coming from the elevator shaft! Well, we didn't use the elevator to go up. We went to get Flo and while we were waiting two fire trucks came down the road to our building. The firemen went from one building to another and then scurried about a bit, got the electricity turned offand while we were leaving the building, one of them was coming in with a pail of water! No hose in site and now that I think about it there are no fire hydrants anywhere. It would seem that someone threw a cigarette butt down the shaft and there might have been some paper there and that is what was smoking.
Got a few pictures of these firemen in their fire fighting gear....not very up do date equipment.

Sunday March 29

Had the meeting this morning with a nice turnout.
The doorbell rang at five to eleven and to our surprise there was Maria, one of the regular ladies. Flo was in pizza dough up to her elbows, (it would later turn into cinnamon roll dough – eat your heart out Malcolm in Ivano!!!) and asked Maria how come she was so early. It turns out we were the only ones who did not know about the time change. Thankfully everyone was coming to us for the meeting and not the other way around otherwise Flo and I would have been terribly late. So everyone came, Ruslan opened with a reading from Isaiah 53 and prayed then Misha gave a word.
Flo’s pizzas were a hit as is whatever she makes for the people.
Misha stayed behind wanting to talk to Flo about several issues.
I went by bus back home and then changed into good walking shoes and walked up to where our (Gilles’ & my) Ukrainian teacher lives. I had a nice visit with her and she & her daughter sang a couple of Ukrainian worship songs, one of which I knew in English. It was such a nice time. She walked me back part way home and we enjoyed looking at the various flowers growing in people’s front yards….and this just less than a week since the last snow fall. And as I am typing this, I heard that there was quite a snow fall in Northern Ontario?!?! Hopefully it will all fall before I return on April 10th and then be done till next November.

Monday March 30

Happy Birthday Gilles.
We left this morning to go buy a little bit of groceries for a couple of families we planned on visiting in Krasne.
Some of you might remember the lady who was housebound and couldn’t get up. She had problems with her legs and lived with her daughter. The daughter’s son lives in Kiev. Forgive me as I cannot remember her name right now…..the elderly lady passed away last year, leaving her daughter Anniah. We stopped by to visit Anniah and standing outside we could hear her music, but she was not answering the door. We knocked and knocked with no reply. Flo and Ruslan were walking back to the van and I thought to try the front window. After rapping on it quite loudly Anniah woke up and came to the door. We were very happy to see her as she is now living alone and we are not sure of her abilities to fend for herself. She was very happy to see us and took us inside where we found a very orderly house, clean and smelling fresh. There was some small talk and the subject went around to her mother who was now in heaven. Flo assured her that her mother was much better off now than before when she suffered and then was able to speak of Anniah about the gospel one more time. We are not sure how much understanding she has. We prayed with her and then left to go visit another family.
In the same town lives the grandmother and grandfather who raised their grandchildren after the mother died quite young of some kidney problems and the father committed suicide in his grief. This was 12 or 13 years ago. Now the children are 14 and 17 and the young lad is studying in Lviv. We brought some clothes and footwear for them along with some groceries. While these people require food and clothing what they are needing the most is money for medication as the 12 year old girl has the same kidney problem her mother had. The cost of medication has gone up tremendously and we are finding people who have to choose between buying food or meds. What a choice to be faced with.
Along the way we stopped also to drop some clothes off to a family whom we know of who have 8 kids living at home, one in college and one daughter who is now married but has returned to live with her parents because of the rising cost of living in Lviv. We were told that the man of the house used to work full time but now only works one day a week. Whereas they were doing very well before, suddenly everything has ground to a halt. With only one income and that being cut to one day a week things are not looking very good. The seven kids still in school are all boys and she asked if we had pants and shoes or boots. Boys will be boys and we are not surprised at the fact that pants are needed.
So we left there with a promise to return and to bring them some clothing.

We drove back home and Ruslan was going to buy some brake parts for the van. Regular maintenance of the vehicle is important and is never ceasing.
The work on the van gets done tomorrow so Flo and I will spend the day trying to sort out some more clothes and getting it ready to deliver. Also we have meeting tomorrow night. I personally enjoyed having Malcolm and Louis in Lviv because when they gave ministry it was of course in English so I got something out of the meeting. I find it rather difficult when everything is in Ukrainian. It doesn’t get translated into English because it breaks the flow of the message for the people….so I just sit there and read!

That’s all for now….. please remember us along the way and drop a line if you have time. We would love to hear from anyone reading these reports.
Helene and Flora