It has been a while

Hey friends and family,

I am sorry I haven't updated this thing in awhile. I'm not real great at it.

We finally feel like we can settle down here at last. Today Jillann and I went to pick up our resident registration cards and have officially become legal here in Baku. Lately, since everything has settled down, we feel like we can finally look around at the city and enjoy it. It has cooled down here and is usually about 65-60 degrees and sunny during the day and I don't have to sweat everyday with my mandatory pants on.
Since I last updated, we have found a school and are now a part of the staff of International House Baku. IH Baku is a British affiliate school that has been here in Baku for over ten year.

We work with students one on one and also in small classroom settings. I teach anywhere from 15 to 20 hours a week usually and have been really enjoying working here for the past six weeks.

Since we began, we have been developing relationships with students and our staff who are predominantly of the Islamic faith. They are wonderful people and really great to talk to and get to know. Slowly and surely we seem to be bringing some smiles and laughter out of them which we could tell were not entirely normal things before we arrived.

One specific request that I have for you to lift up is growing opportunities to spend time with local guys. Most of my students are rig workers who have their own families and also girls. The rig guys are 4 weeks on and 4 weeks off the rig so when they are home, it isn't always easy to spend time with them. The girls are mostly my age or a little younger and they have been great to get to know and spend time with. However, I can't just spend time alone with girls so I would really appreciate you lifting up more opportunities to spend with local males.

One other request is that you would lift up one relationship, with R, that is slowly, but surely molding into a great friendship. We don't get to see one another as much I we would like due to our busy schedules, but we try to get together when we can. He works 6 days a week and often times has meetings on the 7th day as well. Lift up his schedule and ask our Father that He would grant us time to spend together. It is possible that R and I may be getting together over this next week. Lift up that opportunity and ask for wisdom and guidance on my part to go about that according to the Father's will.

I miss home a whole lot and some days really wish I was there, but I know this is where I am supposed to be. I am thinking in future posts I will be recording videos to show you my students.

As for now lift up all my classes and ask that they would be given the knowledge of the Truth.

I love you all and hope you are doing well as the holidays approach!

By the way, up above is R... he loves Dr. Pepper. I don't know how we found it here, but we did.

Anyways, I hope you are all doing well and would love to know how you are. Keep me in your thoughts. I will be thinking about you.

Geoff