4th of July Celebration

Their election was this last weekend. The results were not acceptable to many people. They believe that there was tampering of the votes. The Communist backed Peoples Revolutionary Party won and the Democratic Mongolians strongly protested. There was peaceful demonstrating that turned violent, with police injuring many of the demonstrators. This caused even more problems. Fire was set to the Peoples Revolutionary Party Building and it burned out of control long enough to destroy most of the inside and also an art gallery of Mongolian Art and Music next door. One of our Mongolian returned missionaries was killed in the voilence, by shots that were fired. The news video taping and the hospital personnel who treated him have disappeared. All missionaries were on told to stay inside for 4 days, except the seniors and they had to be in by 8 PM, only going back and forth to the office. We were out of town the whole time and knew nothing of the seriousness until we returned yesterday. The rest of the country was very peaceful. Because of the street closings, it took us an hour and 45 minutes to get from the toll gate of the city to our apartment. Things are back to normal today. We went to the July Fourth Celebration at the Ambassador's home. We had hot dogs, hamburgers, potato salad and cake. The young missionaries played tug of war and had a great time. We are home now and tired and sunburned. So, we're going to lay down and then go to the grocery. We have all the senior missionaries for FHE tomorrow night. Our neighbors, E & S Payne are in charge, but they think their apartment is too small for everyone. They really have too much furniture. We did too, but we streamlined our apartment, taking a lot out and either giving it away or storing it in the spare room. Now, we have plenty of room, and we have decorated it so sweet with pictures of all our children. We love it.