VISA TRIP TO FINLAND

In Russia, all missionaries only have a three month visa.  So we are required to leave the country every 90 days.  In December we went to Helsinki, Finland.  It was 20 degrees F, snowing and windy and the humidity was very high.  But we thought, hey, we are from Siberia it is going to feel warm there.  Wrong!  We were so cold. Maybe because all the restaurants were cold and even our hotel room was cold.  We could just never warm up (except in the shower).  But, we were there to see Helsinki so we went exploring.  We went to the Helsinki Temple, which was beautiful.  We were able to figure out the train and the bus schedule so we had no problem getting there. It is also helpful that most of the Finnish people we met spoke very good English. We met and talked with several missionary couples from America, which was wonderful.  

A beautiful Nativity outside the Helsinki Temple

We then went downtown.  They had an outdoor Christmas craft fair that we went through, and found the customary magnet.  Then we walked downtown which decorates a lot more than Novosibirsk does for Christmas.

We saw this man playing some music on some bottles.  He was really quite good.

We then went to a Finnish Craft Store and found the most beautiful carved wooden nativity, which looks very nice in our apartment:-)

All in all, it was a very nice trip to a country that we had not visited.