it all started with... a not so preparational preparation day....

April 27, 2014

seriously. got done emailing last week. studied. ran errands. and it was 6:00. so depressing! but we vowed that we would make this pday even better. by coming back and napping. (pray that i actually get it in this week!) 

we had our "tree of life" experience.... so funny. and awesome. none of our converts had EVER done anything like this before... so we just said to follow the string. lots of tripping. lots of ducking under tables, stepping over boxes, and occasionally helping a person that JUST DIDN'T GET IT... they all eventually made it up the 3 flights to the tree. the best part was the one kid that knew what it was. zoomed past everyone else, and made it to the tree, past the tempters... he knew the goal! i definitely learned a lot. first of all... don't use plastic chairs if you are going to do the tree of life... they move WAY too easy. it looked like a war zone when we were done. we had a really good conversation about the tree of life. what it means. and how we are supposed to apply it. it's a culmination of things that we've been teaching them over the last few months. it is probably the most interesting experience ever - to start at square one. with EVERYONE. no one really has any better of a knowledge than the rest of them. so everything we teach is a new experience. 

 

 

we found out that elder kelley was moving. we got an envelope that said "the tribe has spoken" on it... (can you guess that was my idea???) and he has written ALL of our names on it. what??? we flipped them over and saw writing on the back. all of us stayed. except the aussie. 

the hard part about NOT moving... is that you don't get to go to transfers...

probably not as big of a deal for an elder. but we learned that almost every sister in the north zone (except us) was moving. so it felt like a party. and we didn't get the invitation. no worries. we had a super fantastic day on thursday. came away with 3 people with dates for the 4th. (one of them didn't come to church yesterday... so we're looking at the 11th for her now.) heavenly father does know what he's doing! and i am so grateful that i get to spend a little more time in kpp. 

the rest of the week has basically been getting adjusted to having all of the brains... gone. all of the people that knew how this area started... aren't here anymore. and some of us feel a little clueless. (mostly me) but we're all slowly finding out what needs to happen here.

we're in the process of finding a new building. becoming a branch. AND trying to find and teach people. it's.... a little more than the missionary work that i've become accustomed to. but OH! it's so much fun!!!! 

i think pretty soon i'm going to have part of my chemical makeup being... mango. here's sister ellis. 70% carbon. 10% oxygen. 5% mango. we eat them.... so much. i come home at night... and probably eat 3 or 4. not including what i eat for breakfast. and the new mangoes that we get from members. from investigators... 

so. many. mangoes!

 

mango sticky rice. i'm pretty sure that's the fruit lehi was talking about...

 

so that's basically it. there are moments when i think about things like... mexican food. and salsa. and other things from home... but the lord is too good to me. and he gives us lots of miracles here. i know that i don't deserve them - but it just shows me that this really is HIS work. and that it's all true. 

so if you ever think that the lord isn't mindful of you. that he doesn't care. or that he pays attention to other people more... it's a lie. he is SO mindful of every one of us. and he wants more than anything else for us to feel his love. sometimes we just need to make a little more effort, and to reach out to him. then he'll reach back. 

it's a great day to have a great day!

have the best one ever!!!!

sister ellis

 

waldo! I found him!

 

hello there friends!

April 20, 2014

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. ohmygoodnessitwassoooooodelicious! they were so small they pretty much just needed to fall off to the ground to be ripe. the best part was looking around. the elders. squatting on the ground... they turned into mango-eating-machines! brother sutep said they looked like aboriginals. even sister mullen was eating them. we all got back in the truck... and started moaning. they were SO good. and i've never seen them before. 

 

typical elders...

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

 

my home :)

other randomness that made me laugh!

 

run that race.

April 13, 2013

so what happens when you are halfway across the world for general conference?

you watch it a week late. in a room with no air conditioning... full of a bunch of recent converts... that may or may not really understand what it is or why they are there (it was almost comparable to the figeti-ness of their first fast sunday) with the thai version blasting on the TC. (YES! we  ACTUALLY have a TV.) and the 4 of us missionaries crowded around a laptop listening to the english. the english version may or may not have cut out halfway through the saturday afternoon session. hello language study! 

so. quick recap of my week (i've been hearing reports that weeks back at home have been crazy busy as well!)

 

monday. sukothai. way too much fun to even express. time with all my favorite missionaries, seeing old ruins... missionary work can't get a whole lot better here. 

 

sukothai = "old ruins"

 

me and sista pete

 

cool little statues in a cool tree by a cool wat

some random wat by our house

and the hour and a half song-tow ride... will never be forgotten. (i want you all to imagine 10+ people crammed into the back of a pick-up truck with some kind of cage welded to the top. yes it has seats... but they are not backside-friendly... and yet it is the preferred method of travel here in thailand. go figure. i would PAY for air conditioning...)

 

tuesday. we had district meeting. we talked about our expectations in coming on a mission. me: learn the language like a boss, speak like a native, and have super crazy amounts of scriptural knowledge. i took a few minutes to reflect on that. i don't speak very well. i still got lots of weird looks when i'm speaking... and i know the scriptures ok. but then he told us to think about the things that we have REALLY learned on our missions so far. that was a better thing to think about. i learned that i have learned to LOVE far more people than i ever thought possible. and that i have learned SO MUCH about service. and how selfish i was before. so our commitment for district meeting: to keep trying to reach our initial goal. and to DOUBLE on the real things that we have been learning. if i had to say that is where my priorities should have been in the beginning... i'd be right. and it just proves to me AGAIN that the lord (and not me) is in charge. 

 

wednesday. we started visiting teaching. the weird thing about starting a unit (we aren't even a branch yet... but guess what? we're officially recognized by the church now! woot woot!!!) is that you have to start... everything. it's easy when you just have to teach a young woman what visiting teaching is... but it's weird when they just learned about joseph smith 2 months ago. it puts everything into perspective a little bit. about the importance of loving those around us. about helping each other build up the ward/branch/UNIT... wherever we are in the world. we all have something to give. 

 

thursday. we taught a new investigator. the shirtless man. we didn't know if he was a creep or not... but apparently he actually DID try to come to our first appointment... but his phone was 40 minutes late. so he showed up... and we were teaching english. and he was afraid to come in. lucky that we decided to do the wander-style of contacting. or we probably wouldn't have met him that second time. it's soooo not me in charge. 

 

we decided to start a piano class here. (well... my companion is teaching... i'm.... observing.) we made a bunch of cute little pianos (LITTLE is the right word) for everyone to practice on, since we only have one piano in the whole church. probably in all of kamphaengphet. and we taught them a song. so we had four people at a time squished onto the piano, learning how to play. hopefully a little more music theory will help them to be able to read some music... so i am not conducting for the rest of my life. that would be nice.

 

after piano class we had scripture study. our mission started it as a way to help all of the RCs that we've had finish the book of mormon within this next year. we decided to read about enos this week. teaching them what it really means to want an answer. so we read the story, and did an activity on "how bad to you want it?" we had everyone start by standing on one leg. i should have known thai people would have great balance. not as quick as i thought. then we had 2 people put their feet in ice cold water, to see who could stand it the longest. they.... never took them out. their feet were ice cold when they took them out later... guess they wanted it pretty bad? and finally... the best/worst part of the night. (just going to preface this... was NOT my idea.) we decided to have everyone chug a 1.5 liter bottle of water. ummmmm.... they did it. but everyone also ran out of the church to throw it all up as soon as they were done. ha. ha. um.... probably not an activity we will be using in the future. at least not with RCs, whose testimonies are still young saplings... ;) 

 

friday. i have to admit i'm not really a believer in asking contacts for referrals. it's just.... not a thing. they reject you, then they decide that they don't want to listen any more, so they just keep shaking their head and waving their hands.......... usually it doesn't work. but a few weeks ago, someone was like - hey! my daughter likes this stuff. ok..... can we have her number? sure. we got the number. called...... and she was in bangkok. she said she'd give us a call when she got back. suuuuuuuuuuuuuure. 

but she called. last week. said she had just pulled in... and that she wanted to meet us on friday. welllllll...... i can't really say exactly how i felt at the moment. i think i probably blacked out for a second. but we went through ALL the commandments. everything. she's good. and wants it. wants to be baptized. again and again. i'm not in charge here. 

 

CONFERENCE! i know this is old news to the rest of the world - but it was AMAZING! 

after conference on saturday we went out to eat dinner with the crazy cop. at a "steak house"... it was funning realizing that a "hi-so" place here.... probably wouldn't pass a health inspection back home. i want you to imagine not a texas roadhouse... but an apartment with a kitchen in the back. playing the titanic theme song, george strait, and "she don't know she's beautiful"... i was in heaven. and the chicken "steak" was pretty tasty too. haven't died yet... so i think it's ok. 

the ONLY problem with conference weekend in april... is that it falls on one of the biggest "holidays" of the whole year. songkran. so.... we didn't tell them they couldn't play... we just told them not to invite the missionaries to play on sunday. 

but guess who gets to go play today???????

pretty excited. 

this weeks mormon message trivia (i spent a lot of time of this one...):

"help build robots... and stuff." 

 

i just love this work so much! even in despite of the heat, the rain (yes, we have had that too this week), the smells, the weird creepers... it is the Lord's work, and it is such a blessing that we all have to take a part in it! 

3 nephi 5:13 behold, i am a disciple of jesus christ, the son of god. i have been called of him to declare his word among his people, that they might have everlasting life. 

i was amazed at the answers that i got from this conference... even if they did come the conference AFTER the one that i was praying for. we are disciples of jesus christ. we have the opportunity to share the things that we know and the happiness that we feel with the whole world. and if we have courage, he will make us into the best disciples, into the peters and johns... the people that are able to work miracles. 

i love it so much. 

and i love all of you! 

i hope this week (hey! next week is easter! eat some candy for me k? they don't even know what easter is here....) finds you all well, and that you will take a few minutes to remember the reason that this life here is happening, and the hope that we all have in eternal life. 

it's good stuff.

loves!

sister ellis

 

 

bestbirthdayconferenceextravaganzaever!

April 6, 2013

oh what a wonderful week to write about! hopefully i can make it somewhat entertaining...

so. yesterday was my birthday! if you forgot... you have time to repent, since it is still technically my birthday on that side of the world... 

 

my birthday cake (from a member) tasted like old bread covered in butter. and dowsed in sugar. yummmmm. it's the thought that counts right?

i can't think of a better way i would have spent this birthday, or a single thing i would have changed. from being able to listen to the women's session of general conference (we're a week behind here...)

to a BAPTISM! of a wonderful couple of investigators. their names are james and บิว (sounds like biew) ages 18 and 19. they are also now best friends with all of our cute little RCs. i think that was the biggest miracle of all. to have them so completely accepted into the ward. makes the change... so much easier. i remember kind of sarcastically/flippantly saying that a baptism on my birthday would be the best present ever. who knew that heavenly father actually gave presents on birthdays too? that was a nice surprise...

 

 

 

 

oh. and brother sutep (our unit leader) breaking out into an opera-esque solo at the end of the thai version of "happy birthday" woah. won't experience that one again. for sure! 

we spent the rest of the day doing pretty regular missionary stuff. eating with the members. baptizing people. (they were both baptized by RCs in the ward that have been members for about 3 months. so cool!) pepsi said that he was going to go home and practice baptizing with a teddy bear... (as you can probably guess... it took a couple of tries....) 

i invited a christian guy to come to church. it's always weird when you find one of those. "i'm christian already! oh sweet! you wanna come to church with us? and have you been baptized by someone holding the priesthood authority of god? that one usually gets us some good looks. 

then we came home and guess who had a surprise birthday party on the roof? it was actually a surprise... despite my companions protestations that "i'm always there!" well sorry... i was just trying to follow the white handbook! ;) it was probably a little my fault... i kept saying i was going to take a shower at night... but then always felt too lazy. he. he. he. next time? the look she gave me was priceless. 

 

 

this week was just filled with all of those little moments that make life grand. like when we told our invesigators that we were going to clean the church... and they volunteered to stay and help. and while we were just sitting at the church calling all the people in our planners to tell them to come to church... we had a bunch of random people walk in and ask us about when we taught. i'll take walk-ins any day! even if they think that it's an office and not a church... 

 

the church.

the church parking lot.

RAIN! you know it's going to rain when you feel like your skin is melting. (but it's still really sunny) and THEN the sky starts to look really angry. but it's not always "na-non" (aka a sure thing). (i promise. i'm going to make some of these thai words a thing in english. they are so much more saduik. i mean... convenient.)

our investigators being nervous for their interviews. passing. being so excited for their baptisms. me almost dying because they were late for church... 

buses in thailand. ALWAYS an experience. whether it's a VIP bus to chiang mai... or the school bus pack from zone training in pitsanulok.... (you know... the one that floorboards are missing and you can see the road moving underneath the bus?) always fun. 

in zone training we talked about the miracles that are happening here.

this month (march) was one of the first months that a country in south-east asia got over 200 baptisms! it was awesome! and they keep building. 

they also talked about finding joy in this work. because sometimes... during inviting... you feel like a robot. it's easier than feeling like a human sometimes. because being rejected is hard. i actually think i've now been rejected more times than i was ever rejected by boys... 

but you can always find joy. in the fact that i can now ride without hands on my bike... 

 

 

when it rains... and all other thai people run for cover... there's the tall blonde farang standing there in the middle of the street. 

i'm always an oddity here. and no matter how long i stay here... i don't get any less strange to these people. one day i'm going to wake up and think i am thai... then look in the mirror and be shocked that there's a white girl looking back at me. 

if there is one thing that i've seen over these last few months... is that baptism... and the gift of the holy ghost... empower us. not just when we receive them when we are eight... or for a few months after converts get baptized. they change us for the rest of our lives. i've watched people as they are baptized, and their growth... just accelerates. a member that was a shy, awkward kid comes to church and asks us if he can have a book of mormon to give to his friend. the gospel changes us. it makes us into fearless, strong, capable people. we really can do all things through christ. he gives us the power that we need to do his work. on a mission in the field or throughout the missions of our lives. it doesn't matter where we are. 

oh. one last thing. mormon message trivia anyone? i will eat a chicken foot if anyone can get this one: "filter out the static" and hint: "glitzy"

love you! 

sister ellis

it's a good day

March 30, 2014

so i don't know how much everyone knows about what us missionaries in thailand actually do. and i don't know how different it is from other missions in the world. so i will elucidate. (i have to try and remember BIG words in english... i'm afraid i will lose them all!)

basically it starts with contacting. we have a mission rule to go contacting for at least 2 hours every day. when sister mullen and i started in KPP (kamphaengphet) - spelled like กำแพงเพชร (you wouldn't believe how long it takes me to find these letters on the keyboard...) - we had NO investigators. only a bunch of RCs of about 2 months. if that. so.... we contacted. all the time. if we didn't have plans... it was a whole day full of... (shudder) contacting. it's actually not that bad. since we really can't go door-to-door... we end up going to places like markets or big C and talk to people as they go in and out of the doors. we get kicked out if we go inside........ 

so we run around. hey - how are you? do you recognize baptism? yes. that is literally what i say. if they stop... i then say, 'this is a way we wash our sins.' 'do you want to wash your sins?'

i get several responses. one. complete denial of my existence. this one is always fun. because then i throw the last comment out and it seems to hover there in the air as they walk away...

two. giggling. usually happens with a group of teen girls.

three. "i don't have sins." or really? everyone has sins. and through jesus christ you can get rid of them. 

four. a person trying to tell me how to get to the church. ugh. i'm blonde and american. not lost!

five. you can speak thai?????

six. occasionally. rarely. almost unbelievably. someone will stop. and talk to me. 

seven. even more rare. someone interested in long-ing their bob! (washing their sins)

the focus our mission has had over the past few months is increasing the numbers of baptisms that we have - and finding those people that are "ready". it's crazy. but the even crazier thing is that it works. we are finding people that are ready to be baptized... in a matter of weeks. we met a few of our investigators just a few weeks ago. they would have been baptized yesterday if they had come with us to chiang mai. unfortunately... their moms wouldn't let them come. they were even willing to sneak out... we urged them against that decision. but they are getting baptized this coming weekend! 

 

the problem with going to chiang mai... is that our pday is pretty much toast. we slept in, emailed, studied... and finally got out of the house at 3. lame. our pday (which consisted of me buying a ukulele!) and annoying my companion with that for the rest of the week. i only got a limited number of chords... so the playing... was probably a little monotonous. even though somewhere over the rainbow is a great song... you can only listen to it a million times before it starts to get annoying... 

tuesday. english. district meeting. all that fun stuff. more contacting. 

wednesday. i almost hesitate to share this experience... because i probably should be less... i don't know. anyway. we had switch offs. and i wasn't excited. not one little itty bit. i thought that it was an excuse to come and judge me and my thai... and i wasn't having it. so i was thoroughly miserable most of tuesday night. i wasn't going to be happy. wednesday morning i realized how childish it was. so i prayed. a lot. just to help me to have a good day. 

i didn't expect anything. especially NOT the fantastic day that was in store. 

and it wasn't anything super special. it was just great. i loved the sister training leader that i went with, we had a great time, and i learned so much about being myself during contacting and about being fearless as well. (this sister positioned herself by the speed bump and stopped every single car that passed.) 

needless to say i had some repenting to do that night. and she said my thai was good. ok. i know i still have some work to do... but i was so good to hear a missionary that is close to finishing tell me i'm doing ok! (elders just don't give compliments like that.........)

she told me something i loved. from a t-shirt she'd seen. my new motto:

IT'S A GOOD DAY TO HAVE A GOOD DAY.

nuf said right?

oh. and we got 21 numbers that day. no big deal.

on thursdays we teach a scripture study class. for our recent converts (since most of them have never read the bible, let alone the book of mormon!)

we were talking about the story of lehi finding the liahona. and how it led them through the wilderness. we were trying to show them that with god, all things are possible! so we had them do a puzzle. all of them figured it out... except for one. when they would get it, they would say something like "i'm smart - like nephi!" poor kid that didn't figure it out... "he's a sam."

hahahaa. i shouldn't laugh. but it was funny. 

 

friday we were supposed to do double the normal amount of contacting. 4 hours. it's not the 4 hours that's hard...... it's the fact that it is 4 hours... in the worst weather of the year. it's miserable. we often treat ourselves with a trip into big c for an ice cream cone from dairy queen. 

later that night we were teaching our investigators the plan of salvation. and we had 3 different people stop by the church. it was nuts. we had a lesson going in thai, and a lesson for a couple of ladies from cameroon... one in thai and one in english. it was so strange teaching it all in english again! 

saturday was a special day. the day we clean the church. i don't understand where all the dust comes from. but it just...... appears out of nowhere! and we have a mouse in the church somewhere.....

sunday - BAPTISM! not ours... but the elders baptized 3 of their investigators! they were soooooooooo cuuuuuuuuuuuuute! i died. 

it was so great. 

i love it here. i love this work. 

it's crazy.... not the missionary work that i expected... but it is the missionary work that i love! 

 

 

 

this picture. makes me laugh. river baptisms.... they are a dangerous, epic endeavor. ;)

 

ok. this is already too long - but i want to thank everyone for their prayers - we've seen so many miracles this week, i know that we're getting sooooo much heavenly help! we must be stacking up prayers somewhere.... ;) 

 

thank you all! i love you so much!

keep up the good work!!!!!

pictures!!!!!

a few of our adorable rcs. they asked us if our patriarchal blessing told us who we are going to marry....

my favorite food. cucumber sumtam. 

oh. so stinking delicious!!!!

darth vader made a special appearance in thailand. 

 

never a more blessed people

March 23, 2014

i had a hard time thinking about what to write about this week.

mostly because it seems like ages ago that i was actually in kamphaengphet, 

thursday we all went to chiang mai, and rolled back into town at 1 in the morning... missionary life in the boonies. it's interesting. ;)

 

so we started out last week by getting a call from a member. telling us to come and eat lunch with her and her parents. who aren't members. she'd be paying for lunch. welllllll... it's hard to say no to a free lunch - even if it IS on a pday. so we went. ate lunch. and then got talked into riding out with them to their house. 8 kilos? i don't think so. it was wayyyyyyyyyyy far out there. but we did get a free ice cream and 3 jackfruits out of the adventure... so i'm not complaining. 

until tuesday. when i decided to cut into said jackfruit. big mistake. i didn't know what a jackfruit actually was. the pointy plant that looks like durian... i thought to myself... this will be easy! so i just into the plant. as i'm pulling it apart i see the sticky insides pull away from each other... like they didn't want to be parted and were holding on for dear life. i think i should have gotten a hint right there. but no. i persevered. next thing i know, i'm about elbow deep in stick. cutting away at the stupid basket-ball sized plant. massacring it is probably a better description...

finally. i finished the first half. so irritated and sticky that i decided that it was worth it to pay someone else to deal with it and just buy it at the market. never again. 

 

 

 

on wednesday we decided to go find a members house. usually when this starts, we go to the post office. they recognize us now. coming to look for ANOTHER house. and they always draw us nice little pictures... 

we get to the house... have a nice little lesson with her, then her father starts talking to us. after about 45 minutes of listening to him talk about religion (he was very christian and knew a LOT about the bible), my companion says we need to go. whew. sometimes i wish i understood thai just a little better. he was starting to bible bash a little... in thai. now that's not fair! i can't even debate in english! so we just bore our testimonies and got out of there as we politely could. 

so interesting.

 

i love little miracles. i seem to get them a lot. like contacting on wednesday night... having all 4 missionaries there and having 3 of the new members come out to help us as well (they are the best!) standing at the very end of a LONG line of people all asking everyone passing by to be baptized... i thought there was no hope for me to get ANY numbers. lo and behold... i get a girl that walks up to me and asks me what it is. is interested. i get a number. 

i just stood there laughing for a few minutes because i knew that heavenly father was just making sure that i knew who was in charge. and that even the missionary at the very end could still get a number if he wanted her to. 

 

thursday. chiang mai. for zone conference. 

we left our area... for ever! but it was good. we took all of our recent converts with us to a missionary "camp" they had up there with the whole district. 

then we had zone conference. the theme was "raising expectations", which i feel is what they have been doing here. they gave us all sticky notes and told us to jump and put them as high as we could on the wall. this sister wasn't going down without a fight. :) i only had about 6 elders beat me... and i was in a dress. (back to the REAL point of the story...) then they gave us another sticky note and told us to beat the last one. i think i did a belly flop on the wall. not so graceful. but i didn't disgrace myself too much. all my family can still be proud....

 

saturday they asked my companion and i to go with a group to lamphang. they didn't have any investigators so we were supposed to go and get a bunch of numbers. the problem is that by the time we got there, we had less than two hours before we had to turn around and go home to be at the night session of conference. in the end, we ended up missing that too. so... the logical part of my brain kept asking if it was really worth it. but then i remembered 1 nephi 3:7... i will go and do the things that my zone leaders command... or something like that. ;) 

 

sunday was full of meetings, stress, the spirit, and all those other good things. 

we had to wait for our bus to leave at 8:20. which means we got home at 1 in the morning this morning. not the bedtime of the white handbook... but for whatever reason i could NOT go to bed. i hopped on my bike at 1 and was rearing to go... i only regretted my lack of sleep this morning when the alarm went off...

 

 

 

well that's it for this week! 

i was studying this week, and i was reading... (wow... that's a novel idea) 

i was reading in ether. chapter 10. verse 28. when it says there were never a more blessed people. it reminded me of another scripture i read. 4 nephi 1:16. and i thought about it a lot this week. it is so interesting to be here at the beginning stages of a unit of the church. you see everyone that is just baptized and they are so willing to learn and to be obedient. then you see them as they try to figure out how this is going to be a lifelong thing. of fitting the church into their lives. and then i realized - it isn't a matter of fitting the church and religion into our lives... it is a matter of making our lives fit into our religion. of realizing what is really important. the problems come when we make things in our lives more important than god. when we decided that we care more about what people think than what god thinks. 

so to everyone out there - สุ้ ๆ ต่อไป! (it means keep fighting!) 

 

 

love you all!

ซิสเตอร์ เอลลิส

bugs in room 209

March 16, 2014

it's sad when i have to read over my sent emails to make sure that i don't re-send a joke...

so i won't be telling joke number one. (i can't have you all thinking i'm getting boring by repeating a joke about the number of 7-elevens we have here...) 

but we frequently visit the 7s. and the worst part... the water is THROUGH all of the treats. sometimes... i do not like how smart these marketing people are. i just hear them and their wicked laughs - MUAHAHAHAHAHA! as they watch me struggle to make it past the oreos, fun-os, dewberrys... not to mention the multitude of candy-like treats... it's a dangerous thing. but... at the risk of suffering heat stroke... we push our way forward to the back of the store. i swear it's magnetic... they just find their way to my fingers before i make it out of the store! then what do you do - "I swear - I don't know how these 3 bags of candy made it into the bag with my water. guess i'll HAVE to eat it." 

 

you know how i said it was hot last week? 

it got hotter.

according to an investigator... it gets hotter before it will rain. you also feel like you are swimming while you are walking around outside. agh. i think humidity has become my worst foe. but... on a positive note - it doesn't effect my hair the way i was fearing. ;) 

and sweat starts running down my face like a faucet... and we just stepped out the front door!

say hello to the handy dandy sweat rag. it's the best.

and yes. sweat. rag. it's a thing.

a very cute thing too.

and an absolutely necessary thing. 

so. more miracles. 

that's about all i have to report this week (other than the opressive heat.) there isn't much to do here in kamphaengphet... we went and "toured" Big C (the local wal*mart equivalent...) for pday with the elders. yes. that's what we do for fun here. that... and watch mormon messages. i can't tell you how many times we've watched expressions of love, living up to your privileges, and earthly father heavenly father. it's to the point now where we can tell exactly what one we are watching before it even starts. and we have favorite quotes from them all. 

"i'm stayin"

"not a spoonful... but a ladle-full of love. every. day."

"i'm awake"

"eat the cracker"

ok. enough of that silliness. 

it rained this morning! :) 

now. back to miracles.

last week we met shrimp. remember him? in thai it sounds like "goong" but your voice has to walk up and back down a mountain (aka mountain tone) 

he had just lost his job and was moping at the park when we met him. we saw him the next day and taught him how to pray. gave him a date. he prayed, and called us later saying that he had found a job! god works fast. he came to church last week... but the job. is now taking over. so... we are trying to get him to realize the importance of showing god how grateful he is for his job... by NOT working on sundays. it's... rough. that darned agency!

i realized this week that satan works just as hard as we do. if it was just up to us... we would fail. there is a lot of wicked and distracting influence in the world today (see mormon message: voice of the spirit) BUT we aren't in this alone. we will win because we have God on our side. and his side always wins. (see 2 kings 6:16)

another miracle. i gave a talk in church. 

ME. that's right. 

for all 10-something-odd minutes. about trials. 

i don't know if it was more of a trial for them to listen to me... or for me to have to speak... but it worked! :) and it actually wasn't as bad as i thought. good thing they all have testimonies too. ;) i don't want to be held responsible if any of them go inactive......

oh. and the super drunk guy we met last week. told us he was christian. is actually a VERY nice man that wants to get baptized. AND he brought his girlfriend/wife to church. and their baby. they ARE going to get married. pretty awesome. 

 

other things...

our investigator broke the chair during our lesson. i was laughing so hard... it was slow motion the whole way down....... just watching all the legs of the chair spread out ever. so. slowly... the finally one leg just giving out and flying across the room. 

the guy that called 7 times between 2 and 4 in the morning. and i slept through it all.... sorry sister mullen. 

contacting outside of a concert (i'm sure the biggest thing to hit khamphaengphet since bananas...) elder standing inside of a shopping cart bellowing "do you want to wash away your sins?" 

"yaag lang baab mie?" 

ate an earthquake. 

8 scoops of ice cream from swensons. in 10 minutes. 

should i be proud of this? probably not. 

they have a "food challenge" here in the mission. it includes: a large pizza from the pizza company. and earthquake. and slamming a whole sleeve of tim tams. in an hour. 

we've been committed to the challenge at the end of the transfer for "district unity"..........

i just had to practice. 

;)
 

before the unhealthy amount of ice cream...

 

after the unhealthy amount of ice cream.

 

pros to khamphaengphet:

quiet. 

it won't be long til everyone knows who we are. 

cucumber sumtam. arrrrrrroooooooooooooy! (delicious!) 

bananas. 

mango sticky rice. 

found the cutest shirt.

will get to play songkran here. woot woot! 

 

cons to khamphaengphet:

ants. everywhere.

even in my muesli.

:(

no bugs on the 8th floor. lots of bugs on the 2nd floor.

will not get a tv in the church until we become a branch. (means we need 3 MP holders. we have 1. and 2 AP.) gotta wait 6 more months for a tv. blast. 

 

other than that - life is GOOD! 

it always is. 

love you all to bits and pieces!