A Beautiful Baptism and A Not So Beautiful Swollen Eye

 Well, last week was influenza and this week was a mysterious swollen eye. (See the pictures below.)  I woke up Tuesday morning and while ironing my shirt noticed that my right eye felt weird every time I looked down.  So I looked in the mirror and noticed that my eye was swollen.  Actually it was not my eye, it was only underneath my eye.  Well, I tried some eye drops, which I knew would not make a difference...and it didn't.  So I went back to the hospital on Wednesday because when I woke up it was really bad and looked like a baseball was bulging underneath my eye.  The doctor literally did not know what it was and only came to the conclusion that "it was not serious" and that some kind of bug must have bitten me while I slept.  First off all, my face got huge and the swelling started to spread down to my cheek, so I think it was serious.  Either way some type of spider or something must have bit me while I was sleeping.  Well, I got on some anti-inflammation cream and pills and today it was pretty much back to normal.  The swelling is gone.  It is just a little bit red, but I am ok.  No worries.  I am hoping next week is a week on 100% good health.  

The highlight was that Kaliyan got baptized. (See pictures below.) I know that you know most of their story, but I think that it is cool so I will tell it again.  She is the future daughter-in-law of the district president.  She is 25ish and they are scheduled to get married in March.  Her fiancé went to the temple with his family and then went inactive and has been inactive for the last 3 years.  He has only been active for the past 2 months or so that we have been teaching his future wife.  He is really awesome though and is now the Elder’s Quorum Secretary. When we meet with her, we also check up on his reading and praying and stuff, and I have told them several times that our focus for them is to help their future family and to help go to the temple to be sealed together.   

 Well Kaliyan has done really well and this past week Sovann, her fiancé baptized her.  That was our goal from the beginning, but there was a question as to if he had been ordained to the office of priest before he was inactive.  Well, I searched through the records with the branch president and found enough evidence to say that he had so we went ahead with him baptizing his fiancé.  It was a really cool baptismal service because I feel like we helped 2 people – Sovann and Kaliyan.  The District President and his whole family were there, which was really good.  I have been told by the district president that apparently Kaliyan had another dream/miracle (you remember the car one before) which just confirmed that she really needed to be baptized.  We are going to meet her tonight.  Sovann baptized her perfectly.  He did not even look at the paper that I prepared the prayer on. 

In her testimony, Kaliyan thanked everyone and especially talked about Sovann and how she knew this would help them.  The next day her future father-in-law confirmed her.  It was a really cool experience, and I am most excited about the great support she has.  Her brother is a member and all of Sovann’s family members are really strong members.  It was a good weekend.

 We had a cool experience in giving a blessing.  One of the member’s 2 year old son got sick, and they called us over to give a blessing.  When we got there, he had an IV hooked up.  Quite honestly that is just their way of healing people.  If you are sick they stick a needle in your arm and drain fluid into your body.  Either way he had been vomiting, had diarrhea, and things like that.  He was asleep when we got there, and it was not a peaceful sleep.  His face looked like he was in pain and he would kind of mumble and complain as he slept.  Well, I anointed with oil and then after encouraging his dad, his dad blessed him.  After the blessing we sat there for a couple minutes just talking and before we knew it the boy’s eyes were open and he was shaking our hands and things.  Then he was standing up and smiling.  It was really cool.  He still is a little out of energy and not completely better, but we saw a HUGE improvement in a manner of minutes.  Cool.

 Elderly people participating in the walk to the wat for the funeral ride in a tuk-tuk

 Right now we are having a difficult time getting people to church because of three things: rice, weddings, and funerals.   I attended a funeral.  One of the members’ dad died and as usual most of their friends and relatives are not Christian, so they had a Khmae funeral.  In order to help support her, we participated with them in the walk or parade to the wat.  Once we got to the gates of the wat all the missionaries just quietly stopped and went back.  It was important that we went though because they were afraid they would not have many people join because they are Christian.  It was nice to help them.  We were also pallbearers.  We lifted it onto the moving float thing that you can see in the picture and then walked in the caravan to the wat.  We need a cemetery for the members and their families. (See pictures below.)

Transfer calls.  I am still up her in Battambang, and I am still the zone leader, but Elder Chan went back to the city.  Very surprising.  Most people, including myself, thought I would be transferred.  Saying goodbye to Elder Chan was sad.  I really like him, and I am already missing him.  I got a new companion, Elder Hang.  He is from Cambodia and just got finished training so he is very new.  He is just coming from Siam Reap.  He does not really know English that well, but that is not really a problem.  I am sure that we will get along together.  I am excited to be up here for another transfer.  I really love the members and people up here.  

Also, Elder Sok, my first companion, called me today and kind of said goodbye because he is going home in a couple of days.  He was a really good trainer, and I did not always realize that at the time.  I really love him though and will miss him. I hopefully will see him later in my mission.  He is a great guy. 

As I planned for the next transfer I sent some transfer goals that I wanted to accomplish in the Branch, personally, and in terms of our area. I really felt like we could help the Young Men’s Organization. We have a new YM President, and I really want to work with him because our YM’s organization is weak. I am afraid that the few Priests that we have were not participating in the third hour. We had a really productive meeting with our YM’s President yesterday and talked about his ideas that he had to help the Young Men.  I was very impressed with his vision and his focus. We set some goals to get a more updated list of all the Young Men and also set some plans to have effective activities to help the Young Men have more unity and build friendships with each other. I am very excited about the progress that we can make.

I really like this verse... D&C 59:23 “But learn that he who doeth the works of righteousness shall receive his reward, even peace in this world, and eternal life in the world to come.”  I like it because even if things do not work out the way we planned or wanted we can still have peace and happiness because of what will come in the next world.

All the recent converts are doing well.  Boramy was just called to work in the Primary.  She is also pregnant.  I do not know if I told you that.  

For the crazy family we went and helped them cut their rice, and then the following day we went and had a mini family home evening with them.  It was really good.  We are changing our tactic.  We decided to focus on the dad.  He is very loving with his kids. He doesn’t drink, smoke, etc. I know that he is shy.  With our change in tactic, we also saw some good progress. We met them one last time with Elder Chan and then we said goodbye.  He listened to us and tried to pray.  When I went back a couple days later, his prayers had progressed a lot.  The only thing that frustrates me is his wife.  I love her, but it is like she does not want him to succeed.  I just want her to support him and help him.  I hope this next week we will continue to see improvement.  He came to Kaliyan's baptism with some of his kids, which was sweet!  Then he came to church for an hour because right now he is busy harvesting rice.  He is on the right path right now.