One month in Thailand!

Wait- what? I've been here for almost a whole month? Sooo much has happened! Wow. I love Thailand!! I'm so grateful for the chance to be here for another 13 months!!

So this week.. Where do I even start?

Happy Birthday to me!! It flooded

I guess we'll start with my birthday! So I turned yisip!!! Crazy thing about it- I will never be 20. I will only be yisip, because everyone who asks me how old I am will ask in Thai! hahahaha Weeeiiird. My birthday was great! It was the day before zone conference so we had interviews with Pres Senior. I really enjoyed having my interview. He helped me feel less worried and stressed out, and helped me see that I'm doing just what the Lord wants me to and to be happy!! He told me to keep working, and the miracles will come. Also, Sis Sahagun, one of my Phii Thais from the MTC is in my district, and she made me chocolate cake. Super fun! Also, all the Elders in my zone found out I'm a gamer so they spent a half hour just quizzing me on my game knowledge. hahah I think I passed. Every one was so thoughtful of me! One of my students at English made a clay rose, one of my investigators gave me donuts! They were all so nice!! Definitely felt the love. I also bought myself a piece of cake, which I thoroughly enjoyed. :)

My mini birthday celebration.

The view from Sis Wiganda's apartment.

So Zone Conference! AWESOME!!! I definitely needed some spiritual nourishment. Learned a lot about desire and diligence. Also found out that we were going on companion exchanges and having a full day of dan jonesing! WHOA. My new companion for the next day and a half was sister Wiganda. Every time I told people that, they would just give me a weird look and say, "Ooooohhhhh...." I was super freaked out!! And then I met her and I understood. She's CRAZY!!!! She's a khon Thai, but she's absolutely nuts. It didn't help that she kept looking at me and saying, "You're going to die." I was a little nervous. haha 

For lunch at zone conference we had subway, ice cream, cereal and chocolate fondue. Weird. But amazing!! After Zone Conference I reluctantly said good bye to Sister Reedy and headed to Srinekarin with Sis Wiganda, Sis Sahagun and Sis Itri. It's a cool area! I like it. They don't ride bikes there, just songthaws and taxis. Anyway. I ended up having a great experience. Sis Wiganda is nuts, but she works hard. We actually didn't have a full day of street contacting, the AP's allowed her to teach that day. We taught 3 lessons to investigators and one to recent converts! It was really nice watching her style of teaching. I got to contribute, too! I think I said relevant things. 

Our random temple display we used to lure people in
 when we had to spend a whole day contacting. haha
Please observe the huge storm that was just about to break
 and Tesco Lotus in the background.

When it came time for street contacting, Sis Itri had the idea to take this giant styrofoam cut out of the SLC temple and take it to the business area of Srinekarin and proselyte there. We somehow fit it onto a song thaw and found a place to set up.

Cool clouds!!

I was pretty scared about this, because I'm terrified of street contacting! I don't know how to talk to people!! Especially when I'm doing it in Thai!! But I prayed for the strength to open my mouth, and even though I wasn't perfect, the Lord placed people in my path to hear my message. I got three phone numbers for the Srinekarin sisters!

I think the biggest thing I learned was that I can have fun AND be a missionary at the same time!! Before I was so stressed and impatient with myself. But being with Sis Wiganda taught me that the Lord wants this to be a happy experience, and I can't be a good missionary if I'm way stressed and unhappy all the time. So I've really changed my view on things, I figure, I'm not going to be perfect RIGHT NOW. But I can be if I take baby steps every day. That way I can be happy and do hard work! 

Sis Reedy and I taking cover in a phone booth,
waiting for a taxi to come in poooouring rain.

Even though I was only gone from Sis Reedy for a day and a half, it felt really weird getting back to Don Muang! haha But we got straight back to work with new goals and attitudes and it's been awesome!!! We stop and talk to more people than before. Instead of relying on our English pass alongs we rely on the ones that have a picture of Christ and our own testimonies. It has been much more fulfilling that way! Yeah, we get rejected way more, but we have met some great people that way too! Like this one family by one of our investigator's house! We met them 'cause one of the little girls came out to feed her fish and Sis Reedy started talking to her, eventually the whole family came out and invited us in. We shared The Family: A Proclamation to the World with them and they said we can come back! Yayyyy

Riding a songthaw in the raiiiiiiin!

Our street floods every other day.

Also, we have a new dater! Her name is Ew! She is the mom of Donut and Cheetoh! One time we were teaching the house lady and she came. I think I talked about this already. Anyway. We taught a lesson at her house, and she was SUPER into it. She really wants to learn about God. She reads all the pamphlets we give her, and she even took the house lady's Book of Mormon and has already ready 17 chapters. In that first lesson we invited her to be baptised and she accepted! Yayy!! June 30th!!

Sis Mali is still struggling to come to church. She has a large debt to pay. We've been really wondering what to do for her. We called Pres Senior and he said, if she has money problems, teach her the law of tithing. It's true! It's weird to think that if you give up money to the Lord, you end up with more money in the long run, but when does the Lord ever weird in forward ways? So we're going to teach that and pray that she will be receptive to it!

Here is a dog just hanging out in the middle of the street....
Just staring.

We have a new investigator named Ran. He's 13 years old. He just walked into church yesterday! He's super sweet and diligent!!

The election is overrrrrrr!!!! FINALLY!!! So happy.

Sister Muk's baptism!!! We love her so much.
 She's gonna be so amazing.

OH! We had a baptism this weekend. Her name is Muk. She was the Elder's investigator. She was pretty worried and nervous, but after the baptism she was so relieved and happy and peaceful. I love her so much!!! All of us Don Muang sisters cried. haha

Also, there is a rockstar in my branch! He has a single out! It's really awesome. When we went to teach Ew his song was playing on the radio. You can look him up on Youtube!

Look up: "Ake Surachet Thailand Tee Ruk"

The food ran we usually eat at

Well, that's kind of it for today! I'm much happier than before, and I've been seeing a lot of miracles already! Hopefully we'll see some more in the near future. 

Love ya!!

Sis Zaugg