this week... oh this week. t'was great.
it started out. with SONGKRAN!
the biggest. best. waterfight EVER. literally. in a small town like ours, everyone basically camped out around the river - they had big huge barrels full of water, and as the cars (or in our case bikes) passed by... it was free game for everyone to throw water. most of the time the cars would have a giant barrel of water in the back and there were probably 5 to 10 people stuffed in the back of each truck. when poor little bikers would drive past (aka US) we would basically have a constant stream of water being thrown at us. if this DOESN'T sound like fun... you are crazy. :) the OTHER part about songkran is the "bang". in thai, "bang" means powder. actually i think you can use it when talking about baby powder, flour... and anything with that same consistency. they mix it with water and then walk around and rub it on people's faces. imagine the fact that yours truly was quite the target... super tall, blonde... it almost seemed like an honor that they got to spread the gooey stuff all over my face. then it would all get washed off... and more people would get the opportunity.
it was so great.
oh. and those nasty shirts? EVERYONE has them. it is "the songkran shirt". if you play songkran... you must have one. i loved the fact that it made me look especially touristy.
when songkran happens... everything else basically stops. we managed to contact at big c on tuesday WITHOUT getting wet. which was a total miracle. we would just pray that no trucks with water-bearing fiends would pull up behind us when we were waiting at the stoplights. then we'd bike like crazy to the next one.
actually... songkran seems like it happened years ago. i almost forgot to write about it!
tuesday. english cancelled. (because of songkran. are you seeing any patterns here?)
wednesday... pretty normal. no more water. we met with a referral... her parents were in the middle of feeding birds (a tam-boon... a way to get rid of sins in buddhism) and we asked them if they wanted to lang-bab (our way of saying "to wash away sins") they said no. but they did say that their daughter was interested in jesus. ok.......... her name is ploy. she just seems so ready to be baptized! only she didn't have her phone on all this weekend... so we have to move her baptismal date. bummer.
we also met with a girl/guy/all i know is that it has an adam's apple..... said that he wanted to be baptized... but i think that he was a little less interested when we taught him (the guy wearing the lipstick and makeup) about the law of chastity. oh boy.
later that night, i lent my belt to an elder that had popped the seams in his pants. so that he could make it home without holding the seams shut.
saturday. oh my word. i acutally have so very few words for this day... because the only thing i can think of is MANGOES!
so many mangoes. big ones, small ones. green ones. orange ones. lightning ones..... oh wait. they're called "thunder mangoes". what started out as us going out to help our unit leader with service turned into a field trip to find us mangoes. i think he took home 2.
the best part. we're driving down some random back road... and he stops. Oi! you need to try this! we're like huh??? so we all hop out of the truck, and he runs over to our side with a small, round, green orb. smaller than a baseball. and takes a giant bite. it's a mango... but probably barely bigger than a golf ball. we started looking around, and they are ALL over the ground. so i pick one up and take a bite. ohmygoodnessitwassoooooodelici
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| typical elders... |
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| our district! |
we finally managed to make it home. we sprinted to the track, and met our RCs for sports day. played a really quick game of ultimate frisbee... it's bad. they are getting GOOD now. we can't dominate any more! then we came home. changed into our dresses, then got picked up to go to sister mullen's uncles house for dinner.
the back story to this. sister mullens mom is from kamphaengphet. so her whole family lives here. and this was the first time that we've been over there since the first weekend we were here. none of them are members. and we got to meet with them! last time... they weren't so interested. but we had fasted on friday night for some extra help, and i know it came. they listened. and even though they aren't jumping in the river.... they're closer.
it is wonderful!
the best way to end this weekend was with our recent converts getting the holy ghost yesterday!
oooh i love this sooooo much! :)
and i love you!
our heavenly father loves you all so much. and he will do everything for you.
keep it up!
love - sister ellis
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| other randomness that made me laugh! |
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