Doug’s Journal in Kremenchuk

Saturday, March 1, 2008
Good Bible Clubs with 7 in each.
Sunday, March 2
We did sandwiches and went to the Potoki orphanage and then evening service at 6 with 11 people present.
Monday, March 3
Things are getting real crazy for Oksana (she is 19 and has been one of my Christian students for 3 years and one of my most faithful students and translators) as she prepares to go to see her Mother’s wedding at Stoke-On-Trent in England. Back in late January, when her Mom was here, they invited me to this wedding and I said I would like to go. Then I promised I would help Oksana go, if I could. Then this developed into the fact that she needed a Sponsor by the British Embassy for her to be able to go, so I said I would go – her parents would pay me back for Oksana’s flight when I got there. She didn’t get her visa until today at 4:10pm! 3 of did go to the Orphan Family for our weekly Bible Study today at 6.
Tuesday, March 4
I literally spent all day trying to get us last minute tickets to go to the UK. I started at 8 and finally finished up at 4:30pm! At 6 we had our evening devo with 12 present. Then a lot of last minute packing and early to bed for our drive to the airport – we left at 1am to get our early 6:30am flight!
Wednesday, March 5 – Tuesday March 18
I went to Great Britain or as they prefer to call themselves, the United Kingdom - England, Wales and Scotland. It was terribly expensive to go as it was a last minute ticket and everything there was very expensive - basically twice as expensive as the US. But I made a promise to help Oksana get to her mother's wedding and the only way she could get her visa was for me to be her sponsor. Our flight was good and the first 4 days was basically taken up by wedding planning for the family and the wedding on Saturday and family celebration on Sunday. On Monday, Oksana and I went to Manchester, a city close by to tour and it was good and fun. Then on Tuesday and Wednesday we went to London and that was great and great fun! Thursday and Friday we were back with her family - that city is called Stoke-On-Trent and there are many beautiful things to see and do around there. On Friday afternoon I rented a car for 3 days. On Saturday we went to what is called the "Lake District" - a hilly and mountainous region with many beautiful lakes - a national park. That night we ate with a pretty wealthy family from her parent's church in a beautiful 200 year old home. We had a great meal and conversation. On Sunday, I drove to a Church of Christ 38 miles to the south in another large city called Birmingham. It was a 2 year old congregation of about 50 people with a large variety of nationalities and persons. It was a good worship time with them and they had potluck afterwards! On Monday we did some last minute shopping. On Tuesday morning we got up at 3am to get ready to get to our flight that flew out at 7:30am. We arrived back into Kremenchuk at 7:30pm, worshiped and prayed with some of brothers and sisters, took Oksana home and crashed!
Wednesday, March 19
Today was a very busy catch up day, but didn't get everything done as I forgot to take time to buy groceries! We had 9 (we had 2 Christians attend – so that means 7 non-Christians in attendance) for our English Club at 6 and that went well. So I was really scrounging for food tonight after English Club!