At Channary's baptism from several weeks ago.
I am sending my first letter from Battambang province. Well, last week I was in Sen Sok unitl Friday. Not going to lie I was ready to go after we got the transfer calls. It was still hard to say goodbye to some of the recent converts and members, but I was ready to start fresh up in Battambang.
Part of their supply of bottled water. (They use bottled water so that they don't get as sick.)
Friday was transfer day so we took a tuk tuk to the mission home and then we all boarded a big coach bus that is run by a local company called Capitol Tours. Well, we left around 2:45ish and road all the way up to Battambang. We finally arrived at the church at 9:15ish at night. We made a few stops along the way for 5 min. or so to go to the bathroom or buy some snacks. It was kind of a long bus ride, but I was able to talk to my new companion, Elder Gerrard for most of the time. They kept playing weird Khmae music on a TV in the front and weird Chinese movies translated into Khmae. My back started to hurt after sitting for so long, but it was a fun experience. As we drove up it got very rural and we saw a ton of really beautiful rice fields, palm trees, heavily wooded hills and areas, etc. Really cool.
They cook over open flames. This is the gas used to light the flames.
A little bit about Battambang. It actually has a decent size city. No where near as big a Phnom Penh, but it is a decent size city. Very quiet though. Not a lot of people around. Battambang actually has a brand new branch/district building built about a year ago, and it is really awesome. Finally I am in a branch where regular people can find our branch building. It is on a main road and it is the big pretty building that everyone has seen before. So that is cool.
So, like I said Elder Gerrard is my new companion. He is a really good guy from Utah and has been out on his mission for 3 months in the country so about 5 months overall. I think we will be able to find a lot of success with each other.
At a Pioneer Day activity in Sen Sok. There were 50 children (very few of which were branch members) in attendance.
I rode through a path/road and my tire got stuck with mud so I pulled off to the side of the road and started to use my hands to pick mud out of the back. Well, as you know Cambodia has tons of prostitutes and it just so happens I stopped my bike in the general area of one. Well, she came over and kind of tried to ask me what was wrong with my bike and offer her help, which was nice of her. I got out of there in 1 second. I got on my bike and said bye bye and road another fifty yards and got all the mud out. My companion thought it was pretty funny.
Pig head soup
As for our area, quite honestly it is not that strong. We have a lot of "potential investigators", with only one that has been taught past the first lesson. That is kind of a bummer, but we can change that. We just need to start meeting with the people that are potentials that have met with the previous elders a few times before and really help them to start to progress. I really want to work with the members, because from what I have seen the members are awesome! There are a lot of them and many families. From what I have seen they are willing to share the gospel and are fairly strong. Right now I am trying to get to know them all. First, I am starting with their names. I know that will be the key up here, and I really just want to have the trust of the members so we can start to receive more referrals. I know this area has a lot of potential, and I am really just looking forward to a whole week of proselytizing and getting to know the area, members ,and potential investigators that we have a little bit better. Quite honestly, I just feel excited.
Pig intestines
Yesterday we
got stuck in a huge rain storm. Huge. I had to get to the church at
5 to interview an investigator for baptism. Totally soaked. That
was the first time I was legitimately cold in Cambodia.
No comments:
Post a Comment