In Tartu now until Saturday night
Trip Start
Dec 16, 2007
1
12
28
Trip End
Jan 11, 2008
Tartu,
Estonia
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Today we start working. There is lots to do prepare the mailing. There is a complex process to the Estonia mailing. It actually produces a good rich mailing with useful items to the reader and, in the end, produces a rich mailing that includes the Good News magazine, the proper number of the Bible Study Course (if they are ono the course) and two articles from the Good News magazine that are translated into the Estonian language by Toomas Schvak. Then there are Bible Study courses in Russian that are mailed to Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Poland, Belarus and to Russians living in Estonia
a Tartu U 375th annivserary
. The mailings within in Estonia are divided into three zones apart from the Russian Bible Study courses. This is where I'll stop explaing it. To Johnnie (the designer of this system) I call this one of the mysteries of the ages. It cannot be explained to the uniniated. Johnnie understands it fully and I am having it revealed to me. There are databases using Word and Excel. Each of the elements has its own database, so there are about eleven databases. When arriving to Estonia the process begins with taking the articles translated into Estonian to the copy shop. 250 copies are made of each of the articles. Large mailing envelopes have to be purchased at the Post Office. Then labels with return addresses to the two Estonian PO boxes (one in Tallinn and the other in Tartu) are pasted into the response card inside the GN. There are two response cards in each issue of the GN. Why we have two and a third subset for mailing is still not quite clear to me but has significant meaning. Actaully, it is quite useful to track how our material gets distributed and who responds to what.
Then some of the envelopes receive Bible Study courses which have to be the correct number in sequence. Then each of the Russian-speaking ONLY countries must receive their lessons, but all the mailings have to be sorted by the different weights and countries
b Mural of U - impresive!
. At first it seems daunting, but this is my second time through this and lots is coming back. In the morning, I take the articles to be copied to the copy shop. I walk about one mile. CLOSED! Not open the day after Xmas. So, I continue down to the Post Office to pick up the our PO box mail. CLOSED! Can't even get into the PO box area. Oh, well, back to the apartment and do what we can with putting return stickes on the envelopes and Estonia PO box numbers on the response cards and getting all our work prepared for the stuffing part the next day. It does take quite a while and care needs to be taken to not get the various addresses mixed up.
We pray that God our puny human efforts in this effort to propogate his word. When I see what goes into the envelopes, it really looks great to me and we pray that our work will be used by God.
All through the day Bev and I work. We did take a break in the mid-afternoon to go get some groceries and then stopped at the Oscar Wilde restaurant for old times sake. It has happy memories of the Feast as it is one of more popular haunts bringing back the good feelings of being with the brethren. The back part of the restuarant and the patio are closed off for the cold season.
We returned home and worked until the late evening. Sunset comes early...shortly after 3:00 PM. Tomorrow, hopefully, everything will be open. We were glad that DHL had previously delivered the Good News magazine. We are waiting on a special shipment of some shorted Estonia and Russian Bible Study course lessons from Johnnie.
