Tessa in Thailand: 9/14/14 - English classes are funny!

{Remember how last week Tessa's memory card was not working? Good news- it is now working! So there are a lot of pictures from this week and last}

Well this week was not the best but it was still great! On Monday my foot/leg was in a lot of pain and I had a really hard time walking so the mission office told me to go to the doctor. We waited for 3 hours and got 2 tubes of antibiotic ointment. They basically told me my whole foot/leg was infected from the mosquito bites. The hospital here was not like it is in the US and talking to the doctor in Thai was difficult! They called me Sister Hellman at the hospital. That night at FHE Sister Boom saw one of my infected bites and freaked out. There was a lot of puss in it and even touching it hurt…she said, "we need to get this stuff out!" I told her NO WAY! She then grabbed my arm and started squeezing while I was screaming!! haha! Contacting this week was really hard because my foot and leg were so swollen. It is much much better now.

So we have the most interesting pool of investigators! We have all teenage girls and a 100 year old...AND they all have some type of family situation. They are so amazing (for example…Sayaa is already working on Personal Progress in Young Women’s!) and they just want so badly to get baptized but they don't have permission from their families. We also have been teaching the little children. They are so cute. It is hard to teach them because their understanding is so limited. We give them pictures to color and one little girl said, "Next time, can I please draw Jesus?" Wow, that just melted my heart!!

Teaching English class this week was probably the funniest thing ever! Thai people literally laugh at things that are not even funny! For example, we were playing “Simon Says” and all the white people got out first and they thought that was so funny! Also we played telephone and the line was, "I love bananas" but they got, "I love Madonna." They were laughing so hard they were on the ground dying! So good!!

This week I also got sick with a sore throat but it only lasted about a day. I just pushed through it. A lot of our appointments with members and investigators were canceled. I hate when people just don't show up. It is probably the most frustrating thing ever! Another reason why people canceled a lot was because it has been raining a lot. Thai people HATE the rain. If it is raining they won't go to school, work, or anywhere...they just stay in their house until it stops!

We had a Sunday miracle this week! We were at the market contacting and I invited this girl who was Christian and had heard many weird things about our church. She said, "I need this Book of Mormon to see if what they say is true!" We told her we had one at the house and we would run back and get it. We ran back, got it, and then called her but no answer...we searched for her but couldn't find her. We were so sad. Then when we went to our dinner appointment, right as we sat down she called! We hurried over to meet her at the market! While we were waiting for her we pulled out our pass along cards and suddenly this random girl runs over to us and said, "I have been looking for this church for weeks!" You guys are an answer to my prayers!" So we have an appointment and we were able to give the Book of Mormon to someone who wanted to read it. It was perfect. SO AMAZING!

This week we had our district meeting focusing on accountability. It really struck me as I started to read and study the subject, how much I need to improve in this area. I have been noticing that when I am accountable I show the Lord how much I love him and really want to serve him. Being accountable is doing your job without being asked. It is giving 100%. When you are accountable you don't fear because you did what you said you’d do! One thing it says in PMG is to always give an accounting to the lord each night. I’m trying this. So awesome!

This week we celebrated Elder Okimoto’s birthday which was so fun!! One temporal thing I learned this week was how to kill a cockroach. Hahaha just kidding, I learned how to watch Sister Croft kill a cockroach!

Well, I love you ALL!! My mission is amazing and helping me to grow, really stretching me! I learn so much everyday and see the hand of the Lord in my own life and the lives of those around me--each and every day!

- Sister Herrmann