Today’s Pic of the week is a simple one.  This is Dogi and Onon playing Cori’s guitar and ukulele in our living room. Renee’ meets with several girls on a weekly basis for prayer, fellowship and discipleship.  This week they decided to spend some time in worship.  They sounded so good, I had to not only take a quick picture with my phone … but we also did a quick recording of the Mongolian version of “How Great is Our God“.

Listen and enjoy!

Today we’re posting a small gallery of shots from all of the Christmas related activities over the past couple of weeks.  From Christmas parties in our home to gatherings with our team and with the youth. It was a fun and memorable Christmas season, in spite of missing family and friends from the US immensely (particularly tough not having Jonathan here).

We are grateful to all who pray for us … and we wish you the Lord’s great grace in 2012.

I try to have the weekly “Friday Photos” feature of RememberMongolia.org have some relation to the week that just passed.  This week that’s a bit problematic because there were two somewhat interesting things which took place that warrant a picture.

1. I (Bernie) made a trip by train to the Chinese town of Zamyn-Uud to meet with some church leaders there.  It was interesting, to say the least … and about the only way I want to actually see the Gobi Desert (which is really a whole lot of nothing!) This is my train at the Zamyn-Uud Railway station.

I returned on Thursday.  On Friday evening, we had over 100 students show up for the kickoff event for Grain of Wheat Student Ministries. We had a great evening of live music, games, cakes and coffee … and an “open mic” for student performances.  It was an encouraging evening, and we look forward to having more student activities like this (another Open Mic night in two weeks!) So for this Friday Photo shot, I want a to share a couple of grabs from the evening.

This week’s photo was actually taken today (Saturday).  Every so often Ulaanbaatar shuts down the streets for “No-Car Day”.  It’s a bit of a pain if you have to drive anywhere (just ask Renee’ and the short-term team from Hawaii who tried to go to the market today). The streets are full of Mongolians who are teaching their kids to ride bicycles, skateboarders, rollerbladers and those just wandering the streets without fear of being hit by a car.  It’s about the only time here when “pedestrians rule”.

Today’s Friday photo is in celebration of our apartment finally being painted.  Renee’ once again did a beautiful job choosing colors and we’re now finalizing decorations (She should have been an interior designer). I love this view from our bedroom/office window.  The black and white filter kind of makes it look like 1957 … but that’s Ulaanbaatar.  We live here.