Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Along came a Duk Duk in the Rainstorm

Elder Landon J Watkins Week 13
Week Four in Ayutthaya

Monday, September 9, 2013

Hey!

Well another good week down! We didn't do much last p-day because I had to rest but it was way nice and relaxing no complaints and my comp got his seven-eleven backpack, so he was happy about that. They have this seven-eleven stamp thing here in Thailand once a year from like August to November, I believe and you collect stamps and there are certain prizes for stamps. So you pretty much can buy certain things in seven-eleven and you get so many stamps or for every 50 baht you spend you get 1 stamp. So yeah, we save up tons of those, my comp needed 300 for his bag and now we are saving for me to get a mat for our floor which is 200 stamps and I already have 200, I just need to go to seven-eleven and turn in my stamps so I can get it! 

Tuesday was a pretty interesting day I went and got checked up at the hospital again and everything was good, so now I just put some cream to help it heal two times a day and I have to go get it checked again tomorrow which should be our last visit. It was so nice we went straight home after that so I could shower since it had been 3 days ha-ha pretty gross. This check-up was 305 baht for the appointment and cream so a whole 10 dollars back in America ha-ha. Then we went over for our English meeting and taught Brother Now before everyone got there and then had English class. We had another really good turn out and a principal of a school here came and his daughter because the other two Elders started teaching at his school once a week so I guess they just came to check out the class. Also, Winner came again and I talked with him for a while he is planning on going to America for a year, in a year, so he'd be there when I got home which would be wild and he wants to go to Utah, which would be cool and this kid has never even learned about the gospel or nothing which is weird. He knows a lot about America though and the news and the stuff between like Syria and the US. I guess something is going on there but we really don't know anything here ha-ha. After that the Elders taught the principal of the school a lesson and Elder Unsworth and I had to entertain Brother Sutaabs kids, so it was quiet, which was funny and then the principals daughter came and talked with us for the whole time because she wasn't feeling included in the lesson and she was literally impossible to understand her Thai, she spoke way too fast ha-ha but Elder Unsworth is good at filling me in about what is going on. After the principal and his daughter gave us a ride home which was sweet saved us calling a Duk Duk and was faster. Especially since I still couldn't ride my bike.

Wednesday we didn't do much at all besides we had tons of online training on the computers we needed to do, which was way annoying because the internet was so bad it made it take forever! 

Thursday was a good day though we headed out to Seyna where Brother Nong lives about a 45 minute ride in a van and we went out to see Sister Muk who is 18 and married to Brother Moo who is Brother Sutaabs son, but they haven't been coming to church and are having marriage problems and currently are living together and now she is living back at home, so we went to talk with her. Brother Nong came with us and we had a good lesson with her and she got a job to earn some money at KFC, but she is scheduled Sundays, so we committed her to ask for Sundays off. After we went back to Ayutthaya and the Rooduu driver was literally insane going like 160 kilos the whole way back and it was just funny and the fastest ride since I've been here, even for my comp too. We thought we were going to die, but that's the way it is here ha-ha, just kidding its safe. We then went and taught Mod and figured out why she wouldn't come to church and it was because of her son, so we think she will come now.  After we went to Boo and Baah and taught her and Sister Dooy joined also. We taught them as recent converts we have to faith and then I gave the baptismal commitment to Baah Boo's daughter, who is 12 and she said; yes, for October 13, so we had to teach her even more, which is good. I nailed the commitment the hard part will be her Mom we can't quite figure her out, yet. Then we got stuck in a rainstorm and we still weren't riding bikes and we didn't know how to get home and we waited out the storm for like an hour and a half and it still didn't go away. We tried getting like 7 different Duk Duk's and couldn't get one, then all of a sudden some random one was coming home and we snagged him which was way lucky! God blessed us with one, no fooling because no Duk Duk would come down there ever ha-ha. 


Friday was pretty chill we watched the District a bunch for training which gets boring, but Elder Unsworth makes it fun with his commentary. I love Elder Unsworth though he is a great first companion, I was blessed with a good companion and I get along with great. We then did our long planning for the next week and got all that done and then we had District Meeting and it was Elder Sowards b-day, so Sister Sowards made a cake which was way good, you just don't find good treats over here except ice cream really. Then while we were planning Sister Gade called and said she was in Asok which is where the mission office is and also where you get Change ties (elephant ties) and she bought me 6 of them and I got nicer ones than usual. Elder Unsworth said they are usually smaller and wider, I was so excited and they were 60 baht each so 360 baht only 2 dollars each, what a steal I love them!  Literally made my day and then we were supposed to teach PMG for Sister Gade but she showed up way late, so we just taught Brother Nong a lesson on faith because we only do the PMG class for Sister Gade because she is leaving on her mission in October to Australia, English speaking but she is 31, so it is pretty weird she is going, but she is way awesome and nice. Then we got home that night and literally had the most insane lightning thunder storm I've ever seen for about an hour and a half straight it was lightning, like 6 flashes and strikes in seconds, just constantly, I've never seen so much in my life over 100's of strikes. We just finally fell asleep and it was still going, so who knows how much longer that was.  


Saturday we had the YM/YW activity and did some treasure hunt thing that The Sowards planned.

Sunday was cool we all met at the church and rented a bus to go to District Conference down in Pak Kret! It was way cool, it was all in Thai and I was really familiar with tons of the words the speakers were saying. It was just hard for me to translate it in my head very fast, but it was still cool. We had a member of the 70’s there named, Elder Wong who has been in the 70’s for 6 years now and will most likely be getting released soon, he said. He then did training for 2 hours after that for Branch leaders and missionaries. That was way fun and cool and we did tons of focus and trying to make the North District a stake and we are so close we just need a couple members here and there. It is hard because Ayutthaya is like the armpit of the district we have the least in like every category we currently have 133 total members, so we need 17 more for 150 for a stake and 15 active melchizedek priesthood holders paying tithing and we have 6 of those, not good. We have a bunch of inactives because our branch has had some bad history, like the two former branch presidents are inactive and our current branch president is Elder Sowards, who is a senior missionary. So we have some work to do, so that is why we focus mostly on teaching RC/LA's. The district conference was way good though and I was with Brother Nong most of the time and practicing my Thai he is such a great member and friend, I love the guy.

For p-day today we went down to Pak Kret for Zone sports day which was pretty wild. We played ultimate Frisbee and capture the flag the whole time, because our ZL's keys wouldn't open up the sports closet. We couldn't figure any way to get in there, so we couldn't play dodge ball, basketball badminton volleyball or nothing, so we just had to make what we had work. It was still way fun. I talked with Elder Berbert who is serving in Rangsit right now, he is one transfer ahead of my comp and he is from Centerville, Utah and he is way cool. We had a ton of fun and went to Pizza Company for lunch after and had Cold Stone too, which was way amazing way similar to back home. Overall a fun great week! Hope everything is going great for you all!

Love,
Landon

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