Last Day in Udonthani! (Aug 11)

Aug. 12, 2013

 

Hello family!

This is my very last day in Udonthani! I was informed that I have to be in Bangkok for transfers TONIGHT so I can go to a "trainers" meeting tomorrow morning before transfers on Thursday. So I'll be in Bangkok for 3 days staying in Saphansung.

I found out that I will both be leaving my area (transferring), whitewashing (two new missionaries not familiar with the area) because I am getting a new greenie! I'm starting over again! I don't know where I will be, but I know I am leaving Udon.

I want to reflect on this area a bit. I really loved it because of the members-- I have some eternal friends here. It was also the hardest experience in my life thus far. But from that, I learned a lottttt. So I'm taking everything good that I've collected and taking it with me to this new area, and leaving anything bad here. :p This'll be a brand new Sister Painter. A brand new trainer, and a brand new attitude! MY NEW AREA WILL BE MY MISSION'S GAME CHANGER! I'm stoked.

Last night I rode home side by side next to Yuuy while she was on her motorbike and I rode my bike. It was like I was on an outing with a friend I'd known forever. She is literally my Thai twin in so many ways. We finish each others sentences and thoughts! When I hugged her goodbye, It hit me how much I was going to miss these members here. Especially Yuuy, Jack and Bii. They are my closest friends here. So mom and dad-- expect to be taken to Udon when you come get me!

As a fun fact, a little boy playing the computer in front of me keeps tapping my foot. I can't tell if he knows it's me, or he's just taking his computer game too seriously. Now he's singing in a tiny Thai voice. This is real life.

So Melissa asked me if I had seen anything more gross and weird than a chicken leg on a playground. To answer that: Every. Day. Of. My. Young. Life. In fact, just last night, was eating at my branch mission leader's house at a massive party. One of his millions of huge dogs got in (its fine their all nice) but it was hungry! So it went straight to the kitchen. I saw it walk passed me way fast, then it was gone. Then it was swaggering back again with a CHICKEN HEAD from the neck in its mouth. No body, just the neck and sad dead head. Hahahah. That was more funny than gross.

 

This week my favorite part was going on exchanges to Sagonakhon. Not the bus ride, because it was long and not fun, but actually being there in a different area. I'd never left Udon before! That's when I started thinking that maybe it was going to be time for me to go. And hey-- apparently it is. I know I need to move-- with change comes progression.

In Sagonakhon I felt like a real missionary-- happiest day of my mission. That area is so amazing! It is seriously so clean (well, comparitively... my standards are fairly low. I'll probably freak out upon walking into a Walmart in America.) I saw giant Buddhist temples that were soooo cool!

We went to their park there and it was gorgeously green and happy. We went inviting there for a couple hours (Sagonakhon has never had sisters there before, and there hasnt been Elders there for like years and years.) So I found this student named Naam Phueng. That means Water of the Bee (AKA Honey.) Cute right? She turned into Sagonakhon's new investigator. I have never made a faster relationship on an invite, nor taught more smoothly upon first meeting. It was probably the best example of a good invite that I've ever done..... and of course it wasn't even in my area for my greenie to see! So I hope with all my heart that whoever continues working there will take care of Honey!

But either way, that day I felt a lot like Christ walking around in that park talking to the Thai's. I found myself feeding fish at the lake there and talking about the meaning of life with a man. It was so natural. AND SO COOL. I'm Thailand literally walking around telling people what they need to know to have peace in life while just smiling about. How cool is that.

But let me tell you a story. This is how to get blessed on your mission: prioritizing. So we're biking along and I see an elephant walking on the side of the road! This is literally only the second time ever in my life, so I think "I WANT TO SEE THAT ELEPHANT" but I knew we had an appointment that we needed to be at in a couple minutes farther away. So I rejected the opportunity and we went to our lesson. It went well! Then I told Sis Broeder this: "If God loves us, we'll find that elephant again."

AS LUCK WOULD HAVE IT, that same elephant was waltzing down the exact road we took!!!! Needless to say, I pulled over an elephant like a traffic cop I was so excited. I asked the guy: "Where you taking this elephant?" and he was so excited that I spoke Thai that he let us pet it and take pictures with it. It's hair was like 4 inches off its skin and so your hand wouldn't touch the skin because the hair was so strong and coarse! The guy that was with him said as emphatically as possible: "His name is DODO!!"

So there you have it. You serve God, you pet elephants. Then we let Dodo go his way and watched him cross the street at a stoplight using the crosswalk, running way fast (in elephant speed terms.)

And to end things awesome: Our investigator Knot has been feeling the Holy Ghost all his life in tiny blips, KNOWS it was the Holy Ghost, and it getting baptized next month! Every lesson we have with him, its like the spirit is POURING the words we need and how we can connect it to his concerns. Yuuy (my favorite member) said to me during the lesson that it was like she was a new investigator again the spirit was so strong. "You're teaching BOTH of us!" My favorite part was when they could NOT figure out how to describe something they were both thinking. They didn't have the write Thai words to explain. Then I said something and they both go: "THAT'S EXACTLY IT!!"

Trust the spirit to tell you what to say, and you'll discern the needs. EVEN in a foreign language than your own. The spirit speaks all languages!!

I'll keep you posted where I'm going!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Love,

Sister Painter

Baby Pee and Osteoporosis...and MISSIONARY WORK!

August 4, 2013



Dear Family!!

I didn't realize so much happened this week until I was making a list of things to write about. It's a stinkin long list! So here we go! As the title implies, this week had more exciting "WHAT THE" moments! Stay tuned!

So, first things first. Let's address the elephant in the room (sadly, that is just a phrase. I still haven't seen another elephant. IS THIS THAILAND OR NOT.) .... okay, but really. The strangeness of the title of my email: let's address the baby pee.

So I learned a valuable lesson this week. Even if you aren't sure if someone is about to hand you a baby, be aware that they are PROBABLY about to hand you a baby!! Which, as you may know, is against the missionary white hand book. I am not allowed to hold babies! BUT, in a split moment of confusion, she was handing over a baby and if I didn't take it, that baby was going to be dropped! So I'm like, "Ahhhck ahah, OK. 2 seconds just 2 seconds for this photo." because I am now literally holding this baby while she swipes out her iPhone. Needless to say: in my moment of disobedience, this baby acted as a fireman spray hose and pee'd ALL DOWN ME. Like, I have never seen so much force or magnitude as was in this jet-stream. What a power house. By the way, her name is Champoo which means the color pink. The members were cracking up because apparently the baby was SO HAPPY. Note, this baby is the same baby that I saw on its first day on earth. So she's 2 months old now. Photo to come... right before the accident. :p

Keep the rules and you'll stay pee-free. Also, God's sense of humor is pretty legit. So I now know what lesson I'll be teaching my children one day....

In good news, the mom of Champoo wants us to come back and see her! I think she's ready to finally start taking the lessons! She's the daughter of a faithful member who has never been interested in learning with the missionaries, but she invited us to come! Yay!

So now on to Osteoporosis. Now I'm considered an old woman: my knees have been KILLIN' for about 2 weeks. I had lifted my bike seat up to see if extending my leg more could make me go faster. Turns out, that was a bad idea and I pulled some tendons and now every time I ride, I'm dyin'. So they sent me to the doctor to see if I had pulled something in my right knee. Got an x-ray, all is well bone-wise except the tendons. Turns out tendons don't like all the bike riding I do 24/7, especially after overstretching. So he says: "I usually just give this to very old people." and he gave me osteoporosis drink mix for each morning. I am officially an old woman. (Sorry if anyone who reads this has osteoporosis... it's nothing personal.... :p )

So with that said, a member went to take us to see a referral right after church. I've never met this member before, so I didn't have her phone number. Anyway, she ends up BOLTING going 50 miles an hour on her motorcycle. And we're on our bikes. And now I'm a grandma, so, heaven knows she lost us miles back! With no phone number. Yeah. So that was a hilarious moment yesterday when we realize we have no idea where she went. Vastly underestimated our super-human-biking powers.

Moving on.

We had a baptism for Naam (Water) and Phii. Way wonderful (and they're supposed to be in our branch. That's what happens when the area is all white-washed but you and you're the only one who knows the boundaries of the areas...oh well! It's perfect where they are for now.) They came up feeling completely clean and at peace! Love these testimonies!

Belle (my investigator and dater) decided all of a sudden that she wanted to be baptized this weekend. I was like, "What what?" because her date is the 24th, not the 1st! haha. But anyway, we're working to find a date in the middle that we can get her ready on her own time. She finally came to church for the whole time this week! She said she was so happy!

My stress levels have been a LOT lower since I've been breathing and not letting my heart go crazy. So life is good, I'm working hard, and I'm finally getting a real perspective of what I'm out here to do since we started switching up what we do to find people and serve others. Way successful: we even made balanced key indicators this week (to all missionaries who have just returned, you'll know what this is.) AKA we used our time effectively and people are progressing! And we made the goal of excellence as well! Let's do it again!

Oh, and remember how I can't make a successful cookie dough by myself? That statement still stands. BUT I WAS SET UP FOR NO SUCCESS. I was told that we had flour in the house. And so when I went to use it, I was like, "Hm. Flour smells slightly different in Thailand." But everything came out solidly looking like cookie dough. I was like, "YES. I AM AWESOME."

Until I tried it! It was nasty! I was like, "What the heck! This is perfect, why is this not perfect?!?" But in my pride I kept eating it, just to prove that I could do make a decent cookie dough. (wrong.) And so Sister Carter comes back from exchanges and told me she was so sorry that she set me up to fail. All we had was CORNSTARCH.

I MADE IT WITH 6 CUPS OF CORNSTARCH. AND I ATE IT. A LOT OF IT.

Sigh. Okay, next time, I swearrrr it'll be perfect. Because I got the order down pat. No juice, and no rocks. It was a perfect solid, it was just.... cornstarch. Not flour. Yikes.

So we put the dough in the waffle iron and ate a couple "biscuit" like things. Not bad. :p

I also learned how to make my own peanut butter! It is SO much cheaper here to buy a giant bag of peanuts and blend them yourself. I make a TASTY peanut butter. That's a shout out to Jared Hammer-- who did not have ANY peanut butter in Armenia. Hahah.

Last week I found marshmellows and sticks in our house (thank you Elders, who bought them from english class.) So I decided we should go make smores at my convert kids house! So we showed up and made a fire with them and roasted them. So fun. They loved it!

English Class this week was hilarious. I taught about going to school. So naturally I felt important that they knew what school items were called in English (something they'd actually use in the future, like 'backpack, pencil' etc, that is on a ton of things they buy here.) So I had them draw themselves going to school and what they'd need. Then I made it a competition. Whoever could label the most stuff on their drawing in english got a mondo prize next week. People started getting super creative. Also, a lot of very asian drawings. Soooo funny. One gorup of 3 boys had pictures that looked like Dragon Ball Z. It was precious. (And then later this week, one of those boys BAPTIZED the other boy! It was beyond adorable. They'd best friends, and one just got baptized LAST month!)

We served a lot this week too-- we went to the Amnuay's house (the 3 kids' grandma) and showed up with buckets. She couldn't refuse us then!! So we came in cleaned her walls, EVERYTHING was covered in 5 layers of dirt. I de-cobb-webb'd the whole place, and she had no idea everything was so white. I told her that when a home is clean, you can feel the spirit so much more. She looked at me and said, "I feel like I am at peace in here, that I can finally breathe!!" and she was so grateful that we just came and did it. She said she has been rejecting missionaries when they ask to help anything, but only because that's the culture. So I was so glad I followed the prompting to show up in dirty clothes with cleaning products. She invited us right in with gratitude and ended up getting us a coke for our help! (That's a lot for them!) It was so fun to scrub up the wood and watch my little 13yr old convert giggle and scream at how white it looked in comparison.

Also, we helped a member dish out food at the college cafeteria. She LOVED having us there, and when I sat down with her to share a message (she's a less active because she's stuck at work and the guy that usually takes her shift on Sundays disappeared for 2 months now, leaving her there and unable to come to church.) When I was sitting down with her and the other 3 missionaries (all 3 greenies on exchanges), she was overwhelmed with the spirit and she was more emotional than any Thai I have seen yet. She told me she holds a picture of Christ in her wallet, and then showed it to me. She says she sees that picture clear in her mind all the time. She ended up getting up to get a tissue, but first threw her arms around me. I was surprised and overwhelmed as well by her love of Christ. Then as we were going to leave later, she looked at me, tears in her eyes and said: "My family, and your family, will be forever grateful that you came here."

I have never been hit so hard by something said in Thai.

So this week, here I go again, even more dedicated. If for nobody than this one tiny tiny Thai woman in a cafeteria rice shop.

I'm headed on exchanges (first time I will have ever worked out of my area!!) to Sakon Nakhon to help out there from Wednesday til Friday morning. I'll be with an MTC missionary from my group, Sister Broeder. Here we go! So we'll be having a 5 companionship switcharoo here in Khongaen before we head over to her area!

LET'S DO IT!

Love,

Your Sister Missionary, Sister Painter!

Photos:

1. Roasting marshmallows with Bin (4 yrs old) for FHE over a fire we made

2. Shyfully displaying their Dragon Ball Z type art skills in English class learning vocab for school products. Hahahaha

3. People eat those. They are dead now... but we saw some SKINNED and still squirming around and hopping! Uhmmm EWW.

1. We're planning on bringing Koolaid to the workers this week and inviting them to church. There's like 20 that are working on these homes out our back window.

2. A tiny Thai lady who I helped lift some GIANT fish into her ice cooler at the market. I LOVE this picture. Because it shows how happy they are working!!

3. This week Gaew is going on her mission to SLC, Utah! So here's her with a ton of the branchs' kids!

1. Me and Belle, our investigator! :) So cute!

2. Me accidentally being handed this baby. At least I LOOK calm. Sister Narayanan's face shows that the baby was about to explode.... Don't hold babies on your mission!!

3. Not a really cute photo (I dont look happy for real) but here is Naam and Phii! After baptism!!

The Priesthood's Power

July 28, 2013

Hello family!!

This week started out with ice skating! As a fun fact-- Thailand hasn't mastered it yet here in Udon. HAHA. In fact, it was definitely half melted, and if you fell (which I didn't--booyah) you literally fell in a lake. Or in Makayla's terms, a puddle. (Because Makayla's "spill depth perception, as we all know, is WAY off.) Haha. Love you Mak-Daddy.

So a few awesome things this week! Boss (Sis Jin's son) got his mission call! He's joining our mission here in Thailand in a few months! WOOOOO!

Also, a couple of my favorite girls got baptized this week! They were two of the very first people I met in Thailand. Story came with the picture I sent!

We have two daters again! Belle finally understands that our church is important because we're the only ones with the priesthood of God in order to do those saving ordinances like Baptism. With that knowledge, her whole mind is opened! WOO!

Other than that, we finally had a good find! Someone who is willing and and ready to meet with us, learn, and change! We had a second lesson with him (where he was actually EXPECTING US TO COME! WOO!) and he requested that we went to the church. So we did, and we (me and Sis Narayanan as well as Sis Bii and Sis Yuuy, two members) all headed over with him. Turns out it was much easier for him to talk to us there, because he was able to tell us how he was feeling about his relationship with his parents and their expectations for him without them being there to butt in like last time. He's 29 years old now and he feels like he both has to take care of them and gets pushed around like a kid and he isn't able to progress in life, feel confident, etc.

I can honestly say the spirit was SO STRONG in that lesson. Yuuy and Bii were even raving about it afterwords. I finally had a lesson where I literally felt the Holy Ghost testify through me. We had already talked about the priesthood before in the first lesson a little. But this time I felt like he needed to know who he was and that he was more than who he thought. He told me he so wanted to have the priesthood. But furthermore, I saw it in his eyes.

He came to us first thinking the church would help his temporal problems. I'm so glad Yuuy was there, because her experience was exactly the same. She understands now that there is more to conversion than feeling like if we get baptized and do this and this, we're entitled to fortune and happiness and yada yada. That is just not so. You know what the church does for us? It gives us spiritual strength! Everything we get from it is of a spiritual nature! The things that are IMPORTANT. The things you will actually carry with you, like family, love, hope: all the spiritual gifts.

And having that spiritual strength leads to a brightness of hope and a greater attitude-- making your temporal, worldly problems seemingly insignificant.

By the end of our lesson, a man who came searching for a way to better his worldly state, left hungering for something greater. His name is Knot.

And I so can't wait to see him be baptized one day.

Also goes to show, we need the strength of members!!!

Love,

Sister Painter

Funerals and Farangs

HELLO everyone! Sawadiikha!

So this week was full of weirdness. Why? Maybe because we had two funerals in the church (one was a member). That's not too weird, right? Wrong. We had the SECOND one because someone at the first one saw the funeral, liked the way it happened, and JUST SO HAPPENED to have a dead body already. Her husband apparently died that morning at 71, she went to her FRIEND'S MOM'S funeral (????) and decided, "Hey, my husband died this morning. I think we should do this again tomorrow!"

So the next day comes, and I get a call at 9am. Hey, we're ACTUALLY going to have a funeral for this guy! .... Needless to say, he's a guy from England (???), his wife shows up in jeans and his body never shows up. (I found out later we was being taken to be cremated, and then buried down the street at the Buddhist graveyard place.)...  But hey, me and Elder Wood did play a smashing violin duet. :p That we somehow put together 6 minutes before.

Then later the lady and my branch president were like, "Hey! Good! You speak english! The English Embassy is on the phone. Tell them this guy died!" ...... I'm like, "uhhhhhhhhhhhhh." So I'm about a millisecond from calling the Embassy in England for them, and luckily Elder Hart came around the corner. But her accent (the lady on the other end) was so cool. That was actually legit.

So anyway, other than that we had a really cool experience! Our mail notification showed up at our house, but it turns out it had been there the whole time and we didnt know, so the package was from June 26th. I felt for some reason we needed to go try and get it anyway. I go to go pick it up, and it was already sent back to Bangkok. Nooooooo!

But on the way home, we literally ran into everyone that we had been trying to help work towards baptism! And then, guess what? We ran into the same guy we've been randomly seeing. He waved at us, and I passed him. The spirit YELLED, "TURN AROUND RIGHT NOW." So both of us did, sat down with him, and he told us how awful a person he was, how much he wanted to change his life, and that he was willing to do whatever it takes to come unto Christ and change his life. We gave him a baptismal date then and there!! Holy cow it was the craziest best lesson ever! We taught him how to pray, and when I finished as the example, he was almost in tears. He couldn't express his feelings (and he kept trying so hard to), but could only say that his heart felt too big for his chest, that he was feeling a little warmth presence in him. That was insane. The spirit has never been so strong!

Sadly though, he doesn't have a phone. So we went back to try and find him for 3 days now. Couldn't find him. He didn't make it to church. And so that's why I'm bummed. What a shining glint of hope. :(

BUT WE'RE GOING ICE SKATING TODAY! :D With the Gumpawapi ("goom-pa-whap-i" lol.) branch, who recently got cut from our district to make a new one. Every morning the Elders go running with their Branch President through the monkey park. Yes. The MONKEY park. And they get chased by monkeys!!!! SCARY MONKEYS!

To answer Jared's question about districts: We had zone conference this week, I believe we have 4 districts. Mine is the biggest with 10 (2 seniors included), and we have the country of Laos as well, and the cities close to the northern portion. Like Gumpawapi, Nongkai, Kongaen, etc. The places in the Eesan. As for size, there's about 2-4 missionaries in the other areas. In Thailand there's really only areas used in the north and Bangkok. Other than that, there is a lot of unoccupied cities in between. It takes about 8 hours to get to Udon from Bangkok by bus, or about an hour by plane. We always take the night bus.

So that was my week-- I'm looking forward to being HAPPY this week. I want to be a happy camper, have fun with the work, and do the best I can. No more being bummed!

PERFECT LOVE CASTETH OUT ALL FEAR!

Love,

Sister Painter

I'M A TRAINER

July 8, 2013

So..... I'm still in Udon! My beloved place! But I got a new companion!

Remember how last week I was being trained? ............ This week, I'M A TRAINER! I'm literally on transfer 3, had no follow-up training, and yet I'm being entrusted with a BRAND NEW out-of-the-mtc greenie. I'm a mom!

Her name is Sister Narayanan, and she is from Sacramento, California. But she's 100% born in India! This week went really well-- training is going good!

Anyway, I have only found joy in it so far. It's a lot of hard work, but so amazing. We've already seen blessings. I know I've seen it in my ability to understand and speak with the people. I know it comes with the calling and trust put in the Lord.

My kiddo is doing great-- her desire to love the people and the country is amazing. She's not afraid to talk-- even if they don't understand her just yet. She shows no fear! And she is so willing to do whatever I ask of her. No fear! Just love!

So far she's on track with language and training (except she's too happy in some of her tones, haha). I am so grateful for this opportunity. It means so much to me. I really am just so happy.

As for stories, sorry I don't have a ton of time-- 4 mins! We had to go get her a lot of stuff seeing as it was her first Pday with no bike of her own! BUT, I did take her through a flood that was like 2 feet deep, feet immersed in the water. So fun.

We also cleaned out the whole house! We rearranged everything! It looks so nice!

Our investigators are all doing good. Trying to prepare Chelum for baptism, we'll have to work out his security guard schedule.

Sorry this email is lame. Just wanted to tell you that all of a sudden I have a million responsibilities. This is NUTS! I'm literally training a new missionary! My personal time has flown out the window.

I now know what it's like to be a parent-- do everything for your child, and they have no idea!!

I LOVE YOU ALL!

Sis Painter

 Me and my favorite people!! Sis June is moving to Bangkok (she's in the middle in pink with short hair) so this is our farewell photo! They all mean so much to me!

Me, my greenie, Gaew the member, Sis Carter and Sis Phelps

Me & my child

  Sis Jin :) We went to work out in Maa Pawn's rice farm--- this is us planting rice!

My greenie

Last Week of Training!

June 30, 2013

HELLO!

Somehow this was the last week of training already. And I hit my one year mark. I have less than a year! Also some crazy announcements: the President got revelation that we have to basically stop everything we're doing and make "inviting" for 2 hours our first priority. It's lead to some crazy finds. Like, where are this prepared people coming from? It's been a real push to open my mouth and it will be filled. Somehow I'm going around talking to people. They're understanding me, we're talking. People are giving me contact information-- they want better lives. It's true, even a 1 minute testimony can open a heart to the gospel. Always open your mouth!!

But with that said, I've had to be more smooth than before. Because it's weird to just come up and say: "Have you ever heard of Jesus Christ?" Honestly, people stare like, "Uhm...." and freak out. You have to make a connection first! You have to learn about them! Be friends! Let them trust you and they'll hear your message. I experienced that with a family that was out for a night together in UD Town. I saw them trying to take a picture together. So while my companion was talking to the other set of missionaries, I was like, "Hmmm." and went over and offered to take the picture. At first they were like, "Oh, no, it's fine." But I felt like I should stay. I stayed near but not awkward.

They then decided they needed me. YES. Needless to say, they were like, "WHOA she can speak Thai. You can speak Thai? What the?" Everyone's smiles came on, they were asking me a million questions. And I was answering them! Then a son says: "You don't have to speak Thai. You can speak English." I JUMPED. I was like, "WHOA you speak english!!!" and he says: "I'm from LA. I'm just on vacation to visit my family."

Oh my gosh, I was so surprised. It cracked me up. So there ya go. Its hard to describe the small success it was to be a lone missionary speaking with a FULL family-- over 10 people, young and old, all completely drawn in on you. It was exhilarating.

In other news..... 2 people preparing for baptism!!!!! WOO!

One of which is a man I've literally grown to love so much. She's like 60+ years old and probably the sweetest and most accepting and happiest old man there is. He's a security guard who wears crazy polka dot socks under his uniform boots. His name is Cheluum. I decided if I Grandpa Payne was Thai, maybe he would be like this man. I want nothing else but to see Cheluum get baptized. He's my Thai grandpa.

Other than that, I got sick this week. Merrr. But meds did the trick and I'm back and at it!!!

I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY! It's hard. It's REALLY hard. But oh, when you find that one old man you were meant to find, it's so sweet.

Love you all! You have no idea what your support means!!!

Sis Painter

One Year Left!

June 23, 2013

Dear Family and Friends!!

I don't mean to alarm anyone (or myself) but I literally have one year left on my mission as of this week. Uhm?? One year, only. I've already been a missionary for the first 1/3. Just shows how fast time flies.

But with that said, I am now on my last week of training. Meaning, this week my task is to be the senior companion. Easier said than done! What a headache! I kept wanting to just KNOW what I should go and do, who we should teach, etc. But it turns out people cancel and you have to remake your plan every single day if things fall through. It's a lot more of a mantle than I realized. I have a lot of respect for Sis Pannida's job. So I've been doing the planning, calling, directions, leading lessons, teaching by myself as if she can't speak Thai, everythingggggg. Needless to say this week came with a few hiccups and rough patches. But, in all sugar-coatedness, FIGHT ON!

As for my birthday! Thanks for all the birthday wishes!!!

I actually got real sick on my birthday (and lasted until this morning, really), so I ended up having to go home and sleep. So... I woke up the next day and my birthday didn't really happen? So I got ice cream the next day and realized, "Hey! It's still my birthday in America!" So I feel just dandy about it.

And the district celebrated my birthday during our wednesday's district meeting with cupcakes and a TERRIBLE rendition of the birthday song. Oh, it hurt the ears. Elders are hilariously.... whack. But they get it from the Thai verson of the happy birthday song, so really, they were just copying what we see allllll the time. So good!! Sis Pannida even took a video. It's worth 1000 words.

So as for weird and crazy things this week:

I literally saw a movie-style crash. But this time is was just a guy and a really fluffy orange dog. But somehow it was still epic and insane! Sparks flew (not romantically but actually quite unrealistically) as he tumbled, and his red motorcycle too. The dog ran away, clearly whimpering and gonna die or something. No doubt the man's arm was broken. His clothes were ripped up. So me and Sis Pannida basically saw the whole thing because we were riding perpendicular to that road and nobody else was around driving. But suddenly a crowd appeared from the not-so-busy-but-suddenly-busy road and I explained to this lady what had happened. She looked up and realizing I was as white as they come, said, "Was it a big dog? ... Whoa! You speak so chut!" It was kinda funny for the dramatic situation. It's the last thing I expected her to say. Kind of comical. The guy was ok, ps!

As for a few other things I saw this week, this is for Jared Hammer: "I'll tell you when I get home." (HAHA! My turn to say it!!)

As for spiritual: the house of 17 people is doing amazing. We stopped by almost by surprise and found them DOING everything we had committed them to do and more. We caught them being faithful without knowing we were coming! BEST THING EVER!

And what I learned most of all as I've had to figure out being the leader, is that people will walk in circles if they don't have a goal in the distance. Utchdorf said it, and I believe it. I highly suggest reading the 1st presidency message from this month.

Also, I don't know how best to describe it, but last night I had a coming-to-understanding and I realize that God actually speaks to his children. He is NOT silent. I know that for a fact. He is in the details of our lives. He knows exactly who we are, and how and when to speak. I testify of that.

"How far is Heaven?

It's not very far.

When you live close to God,

It's right where you are."

-Monson, 1986.

I love you all! Thank you for ALL your support!!!

Sis Painter