P-Day Adventure (Week 23)

 

Check'en us out!

What we do everyday when we leave our condo.

 

Mannie break at the Mall.

 

Local resident, not a mustache.

 

God Bless America and Thailand!

Week 23 in Thailand, 30 March 2014

Week 23 in Thailand, 30  March 2014

This week had flown by!  I know that I always say that but this was probably the fastest.  Last P-day we had the opportunity to go to lunch with Elder Hartman’s Father who was here on business.  He talked to us about his mission and how it opened so many doors for him throughout his life.  But more importantly, he talked to us about how the Lord knows and loves us all and has greater plans for us then we can imagine.  I know that I'm here in Thailand because Heavenly Father has great plans in store for the people I'm teaching.  Greater things than they can even comprehend. The first step is being baptized and accepting the gospel. I've seen this for myself as I'm asked to do hard things and accomplish those things with the help of the Lord.

 

Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday were kind of a blur of contacting, teaching, and work work work.  Friday, one of our investigators got permission from her Father to get baptized, two had there interviews to get baptized, and another decided she was going to get baptized when she turned 18 with or without the support of her family.  All miracles...all examples of faith to me, and a reminder that the Lord can do his work with or without me, but he chooses bless me with the experience of serving.

 

Sunday was an even bigger example of that, as our investigator Grape and Nang were baptized!  We had two walk-ins at church who are very interested in learning about the gospel.  Grape (13) was terrified to go into the water, felt so bad but she was baptized, felt the spirit, and gave a beautifully inspiring testimony!  It was such a good day filled with tender mercies and I didn't really do anything but show up and share the message of our Savior... so humbling.

 

 

 

 

THE Funniest thing that happened to me this week,  :-)   Atigaan (bishop) wanted the missionaries to perform a play about home teaching...so that’s how I spent third hour at church,   this week semi-improving play about home teaching.  I think the members really appreciated it because it’s such a foreign idea to them and they need an example to launch them off.  You can add this to my list of things I would never done outside of a mission.  LOL  Not saying it was a quality play but after Sister Stevenson and I nixed the elders requests for a crippled grandmother on her deathbed, who couldn't talk, but wanted her family to take her to church one last time before she died...  I think it was pretty good.  :-)

 

An exciting update on the hastening of the work:  The Thailand Bangkok record was just broken!  We had 200 baptisms in the month of March!  The average before I came in was 30-50 we had 100 since November and in January we had 165.  The Lord is hastening his work!

Love, Sister Marina Peterson

Week 22 in Thailand. Big City

March Madness,  March 23 2014

This week I experienced my first rainstorm in Bangkok! Luckily we didn't get to much rain but I got my first taste of flooding and more importantly, proselyting in flooding.  :)  But it’s all part of the adventure! (but I’m getting nervous for rainy season).

 

We also started teaching a Book of Mormon class this week! The members here are so dedicated it’s awesome but a lot of the recent converts are still learning how to read and apply the scriptures in their lives.  They are really excited about this class.

This week was an adventure, as my companion and I didn't know we were teaching the class this week but some how we made through language handicap and all. LOL  Reading the scriptures in another language definitely gives you another layer to your understanding and its definitely strengthened my testimony that the Book of Mormon is meant to bless the lives of all who read it!

Our mission goal for this month is to have two baptisms per companionship!  My companion had one before I moved into the area so we just need one more.  When I first got here we weren't sure who that was going to be, but this has been a week of definite miracles and now two of our investigators have baptism dates.  And more importantly I've seen their testimony of the gospel grow!

I firmly believe that if we have faith and are obedient we can accomplish anything that our leaders ask of us. They are inspired servants of the Lord and they have been called to guide and direct us!  I was reading the story of Moses this week, in Exodus, after he had led the children of Israel out of Egypt.  Moses was trying to deal with and solve every problem, and concern of the people. When his Father in-law counseled him saying this is too much and you are wearing your self down.  Moses then, through the guidance of the Lord, establishes a system of delegation to help the children of Israel.  I know the people the Lord calls to lead us are truly inspired. I know that as we listen to and support our leaders in their callings, we will be blessed and as we strive to magnify our callings in this life with the aid of the Lord we can accomplish great things!

Love, Sister Peterson.

 

Our District

 

My New Companions (LOL)

 

 

The crocodile farm.

 

 

Special lunch.  We treated ourselves.

 

 

March Mini Transfers

Well I was in the middle of helping a member Yai Baans move this last Wednesday, when I got the call that said I was moving in a mini transfer.  When we have Thai missionaries come in they have to do mini transfers because the Philippines MTC is on a six week transfer schedule; Provo is on a eight week schedule.

So I said my many goodybyes to the wonderful people of Phitsanulok on Wednesday night and was at the bus station Thursday morning.  Several members and my investigator showed up to send me off which was so sweet! I love them !!!!!! and miss everyone. 

I'm now in Bangkapi, which is a city in Bangkok. Whoa I feel like I've jumped from the boonies in Idaho to, like downtown LA.  Just kidding...but really.  Tuesday I was truck surffing as we helped Sister Bow move and waking up to the sounds of cats in my ceiling and now I'm in a high-so one room apartment that resembles a display in Ikea and serving in a ward with a actual church building.  LOL  Thailand has it all!

I'm good.  Moving was stressful but Church was exciting.  One of the speakers started singing the song from Pocahontas, the listen with your heart, you will understand part.  Before that, the three grandma singing in the movie is speaking Indian language and the Thai speaker was just making up chanting sound...so funny!  I was trying not to bust up laughing because I was on the stand to bear my testimony.  LOL   #lovethailand/thaipeople

Well I will definetly have more next week but I love you all!

Saying goodbye to Sister Speas

Week 21 in Thailand. Planted coconuts!

We started off our week, last p-day, by celebrating my Khuu's (Sister Speas) half birthday.  We did this by eating a Minion cake…that actually didn't taste good because it’s Thailand and they use butter for frosting, literally.  It was really cute!  Then it was back to work.

This week I re-read the talk from Elder Soares of the 70s (I'm going to be way embarrassed if I mixed up names) from general conference.  He talked about developing the Christ like attribute of Meekness and it was something that I tried really hard to improve on.  In the talk he defines a person with meekness as someone humble, calm temperate, teachable, and a desire to do the will of God.  I don't really have a solid way of measuring my how successful I was, LOL, but I can definitely say that I will always be able to improve! 

Due to my experiment I feel like I was extremely blessed this week to recognize these qualities in a lot of the members and investigators we taught.  We visited this really sweet member, Sister Tdoy, her circumstances are very humble but she is so generous, humble, and calm- mannered.  She gave us delicious mango's from her neighborhood garden. We also visited a member who is wealthier and educated but I was touched by humble attitude and how teachable she is.

The biggest example I saw of meekness this week was in the willingness of the members to serve when we embarked on a small but intense project of helping Sister Nooy, a recent convert, plant coconut trees in her yard. We planted like 100 plus trees in the Thai style of farming  :-)  which was really hard and laborious.  I think one of the biggest rewards in life is the opportunity to put your faith into action and serve!  

 

 

Well I hope everyone has a great week filled with many service opportunities!

Love, Sister Peterson

Things I did this week that I would never have done in my whole life:

2 March 2014  Week 20 in Thailand.  Things I did this week that I would never have done in my whole life:

1.  Sing into a microphone, in front of any, let alone an auditorium of Khon Thai's.

2.  Eat things that I can't identify without asking what it this (It’s definitely better not to ask!)

3.  Walk around asking complete strangers if they want to wash away their sins.

4.  Teach a class in a foreign language that I don't quite understand.

5. Ride a bike…everyday experience.

6.  Ride a bike through Thailand traffic (equivalent of live Frogger).  An everyday experience.     

7.  Clear out pigeons nests from the Church house.

8.  Play charades with workers at Big C (equivalent of Walmart here).

Blessings I've received as result this week:

To numerous to count!

Here are a few, brief but sufficient explanations of the aforementioned tasks.

Tuesday, like everyday this week, we invited a lot of people to be baptized and received a lot of rejection, as well as the blessing of getting two new investigators!  #3 in the List above.

Before English class, a sweet member taught us how to make somtom/สมฅำ, which is quickly climbing the charts of my favorite Thai dishes!  I also learned that somtom plaa, somtom that is really fishy (tasting and looking), is gross and I should never eat it!  cing cing  It is somtom that is in black sauce, instead of red, and has random body parts of sea creatures mixed in with it.  #2 in the list above. 

Wednesday, my companion and I were in charge of finding balloons for the mutual activity.  When we got to Big C, we realized not only did we not know the word for balloon, but we didn't have our dictionaries with us.  Thus we began a game of charades or pictionary with the workers at Big C.  After several hand motions and attempted drawings, a worker took us to an air pump section.  Tired and creatively dry, we decided to go look for ourselves.  Tender mercy!  We ran into a member who found them for us and we were able to make it to the church and have a way awesome activity!  #8 from the list above.

Friday, the other Sisters had a baptism so we deep-cleaned the church.  It also, just needed some love.  We ended up destroying a few pigeons nest.  Pigeons had discovered unused nooks and crannies in the church.  We cleaned out a lot of pigeon poop but the church looks beautiful.  It’s like when you clean anything, it just that much better when its clean and the spirit was definitely stronger as a result.  #7 from the list above.

Saturday, The Elders had a baptism!  We made a lot of phone calls to members who hadn't been to church in a while and invited them. Sunday, we saw the fruits of our labor when four of them came to church! Yay!  Sundays can be stressful as a missionary that is when all your responsibilities come together and you have to deal with them all in a foreign language.

This Sunday, Sister Jackson and I had to teach a class during second hour, which was really hard because, A.  We hadn't prepared and B. We are the two youngest sisters in our area (our phii's were translating).  Even though I’ve been in country for almost five months, my understanding is…not that good compared to my ability to talk.  LOL  So as we tried to understand question of our RC's and investigators,  we were also trying to read the said lesson plan from a manual in Thai.  LOL  It was kind of crazy but we survived Thanks to the help of the awesome RC's in our ward.  Daa and Kwan, who basically taught a really simple and inspiring version of everything we were trying to say and answered everyone’s questions like the bosses they are!  Made me so happy!  #4 from the list above.

For the Grand Finally of the Week: 

We ended our Sunday stalling at charity function, for donating wheel chairs, while the Senior Humanitarian Missionaries and the other LDS charities representatives were racing to get there.  They had gotten delayed from their previous donation function in Chiang Rai.  Originally we were just supposed to go for support but then the people MC-ing the event (from Rotary Thailand) were like, hey you speak Thai, come up and talk to everyone while were waiting.  Somehow one of the representatives remembered us and said, you guys should sing (because we helped with music at the Christmas event at the orphanage).  We whipped out our hymnbooks and Sister Jackson started playing her violin,  (which was good) but my singing was not.  LOL  So awkward but a great memory which is a blessing in and of its self.  The Senior couple and everyone were really sweet and appreciative, which also made it a better experience.  #1 from the list above. 

I definitely feel like my tolerance of doing uncomfortable or awkward things has grown since becoming a missionary and I’m sure that I will have many more growing experiences.  LOL

Well until next week,  Love you all!

 

 

Sisters in Thailand

23 Feb 2014