Zhenya's letter to Elder Ortiz (a good friend) serving in Long Beach, CA. She Gives Good Details About Her Area.

Elder Ortiz-

I can't believe we are in neighboring missions! That's crazy. I wonder if long beach is like Arcadia? What area are you in? I'm in Glendale 2 so I cover north LA to Montecito Heights to Burbank. It's a fairly large area and we don't have a car so it's like an hour long bus ride when the traffic is good. Hahaha I know what you mean about CA traffic holy cow it's more like California drivers! I don't know about where you live but in Glendale there are so many Armenians and none of them know how to drive and they're all super prideful and think they know better so they love to honk their horns every chance they get hahaha. But Armenians are great too! We've started tracting this week actually (just our zone) and Armenians are very hospitable. They've invited us in and offered us Armenian pastries, along with Turkish coffee and tea which we have to turn down which is sad because they take it very personally and it's hard to talk about the word of wisdom because of the language barrier. 

Speaking of language, Arcadia has 7 different language missions so there are 7 possible languages missionaries could be transferred to! T It's hard to contact and tract because they either speak, Spanish, Armenian, Russian, Farsi (Persian), tegolic (Pilipino), Korean, Japanese, or Chinese, oh and I met one guy from Norway! I'm trying to at least say hello in all of these languages. I said "kumusta" (hello in tegolic) to a lady who said she was from the Philippines and she freaked out she was so excited! It just makes me angry that I am unable to share the gospel because of a dang language. They could be so ready to hear the gospel, but I'm unable to communicate with them.

When you run into someone, be sure to bring the gospel up as soon as you can, especially when people ask who you are! I love it when people ask me that! I know that it's good to view people as Christ would and to talk with them as if they were your brother or sister or a really good friend and I can do that just fine. It's hard when people treat you like you're nothing or acknowledge you and ridicule you right away or get the wrong impression of what you do. What I do know is that everything that happens to us now or what we do now has some effect in the future, and because we are on a mission and dedicating our life to the Lord we cannot go wrong. Yes we are going to make mistakes that we're not going to be able to take back, but it's wonderful because that means we get to use the atonement. I have to use the atonement everyday, because with out it I'm lost. To be honest sometimes I don't know why I'm on a mission and I don't know what to do in some circumstances, but I know that God has never left me, and I know that he is guiding me and molding me into what he needs me to be for others. I love it! I love the feeling that I'm acting as Christ and doing as he did. Keep the faith alive!

Sister Plumb