Sister Hammon: Week 54 - Saved by a Tuk Tuk // YAY AMERICA!

So these past 10 days have been some of the most eventful of my entire mission and kind of crazy as well...just to give a quick run though:

- Had a giant American party for English Class/July 4th

- My wallet + 3000 baht was stolen

- We survived a quick trip to Bangkok (for switch offs) despite floods

- Saw a completely random woman wearing a BYU shirt....weird

- Our investigator (เปิัล - Bun) gave away all her coffee and quit in 1 day!

- Accidentally deep fried pretzels in MSG oil (hahhahaha)

- Passed out 550 inviting cards in under an hour

- Our investigator (แอ๊ด - Addt) passed her baptismal interview!! (more to come next week)

I'll start from the top....

SAVED BY A TUK TUK

So we had to take a 24 hour trip to Bangkok to switch off and we called our Tuk Tuk guy to come get us to take us to the bus station...then it started POURING rain. It was bad, the streets flooded pretty bad and I had no idea how we would get to the bus station...at all. We called the Elders to see if they knew of a member who could come grab us. When we called the first thing he asked was, "well have you prayed?" I laughed a little and told him we haven't, he told us to call back after we prayed and I got annoyed because we were running late. We were outside and I asked Sister Henry if she would say a quick prayer so we could call them back.

It was the weirdest thing..ever. In the middle of the prayer I opened my eyes, turned around and yelled "พี่ค่ะ"(what translates to) "Excuse me sir!" And I kid you not, THERE WAS A TUK TUK IN FRONT OF OUR HOUSE, almost about to pass by but he stopped just in time when I called him! We have never, ever seen a tuk tuk pass by our neighborhood, let alone pass by our individual house!!! EVER. After hearing a story like that how can you not believe in miracles?! Since then we have shared that story with investigators and they all have said they will pray because we had proof of miracles!

DEEP FRIED MSG

This is a funny story but you will only get it if you've been to Asia. So here all the food has MSG all over it. MSG is super harmful but the Thai people put it on everything while it's basically banned in America. SO on Sunday night our dinner appointment was cancelled last minute so we (elders and sisters) went to our house and got all the food we had, which isn't much considering we never cook. What we came up with was ramen, 2 eggs, pretzel mix (no idea where that came from) and some rice. We decided to deep fry the pretzels in oil and Elder Headlee grabbed some sugar to throw in to sweeten it up....turns out he grabbed MSG. The church had a giant bag full of straight MSG in the fridge because it's so normal here. Hahaha we all died laughing, and died from the taste because it was so awful. But anyway if you hear about our district entering the hospital this week that's why.

AMERICA DAY

We teach English every Tuesday and last week had the most brilliant idea to throw a big Fourth of July party for our English class. We got all the members in on it to make it a big deal and it was AMAZING. We put forth so much work but it was so worth it seeing it all play out last night.

----550+ Inviting Cards--- So we decided to really 'advertise' for it and did so by going to a huge night market on Monday night and pass out over 550 cards and talk to as many people as possible. We thought it would take all night, but after about 50 minutes we were out...that is over 100 people talked to every minute! (we had 4 missionaries and 2 members who kind of helped) But it was so fun, I loved, but unfortunately the 'talking to everyone' they teach you in the MTC is kind of impossible in a situation like that because we still missed tons of people who walked by while we were inviting other people.

The actual party was the best, National Anthem sung by my famous companion, American Bingo, watermelon and hot dogs, a mock election and musical chairs! SO FUN. One of the best English classes I have had yet! Grateful that hard works produces great results:) Also grateful to be an AMERICAN. To quote a talk our district leader made us read this past week,

"I bear my solemn and sacred witness that the United States of America is the greatest nation on the face of the earth." (But Watchmen, What of the Night - Vaughn Featherstone)

Hahaha but Thailand is second best นะ?

But really, I am so blessed to be in a country that respects freedom as much as America. In the scriptures 'Thai' translates to 'free'! "The Spirit of God, which is also the spirit of freedom" (Alma 61:15) I am so grateful to be given agency from a loving Heavenly Father, without freedom the Spirit of God is restricted, and it is not restricted in this incredible country! (challenge is to do all that you can to show God gratitude for the freedom we have been given:)

Such a full week, but if anything it has increased my love for missionary work by 10. I LOVE THIS. So much. Our district is so focused and works so hard but we have so much fun together. We keep seeing miracle after miracle and I cannot deny that the hand of God is in our lives.Love you all, have a bunch of pictures this week too yay for me for having such a good email this week haha!

Much much love,

ซิสเตอร์ แฮมมอน