3-26 Bangkok Thailand

Hey hey there Dad!

So you're right, it's hot season. They only have three seasons here though... Hot, Rain, Cold. Life is simple, no? But yeah. Hot. All. The. Time. At least our apartment is cool! We have air conditioning, and our apartment is actually pretty new, so it's not bad at all. It's small, but that's ok. We're close to the center of our area so it's all good. But today, it's actually raining, so that's pretty sick! I miss rain, and it's not cold, not warm. Just right. So it's pretty good. However, there was thunder yesterday! No lightning... but that's ok! I just want to see a wicked thunderstorm while I'm serving here! No matter if it was in Bangkok, or somewhere else, I just want to see something like that!

No big plans for P-Day today. Just a lot of relaxing, possibly some sports at the church (i.e ping pong). But it's all good! Relaxing is nice. A little bit of studying here and there but it's all fun mostly on P-Days!

Grandpa would need help still... Hahaha. What does he do for the Mission?

Spring huh? I don't even know what Spring is... Just hot. Hahaha.

A Thailand-Washington Missionary Family Gathering? That sounds like it would be fun!

Not started yet? That's sad... I think prayers would help, for sure! Hopefully, she can get a good teacher!

Moving buildings again? That sounds fun!

It looked like Kai did well! Good first steps. It all takes patience and time, patience and time.

Still waiting on the Branch, but that's ok! We have a lot of patience. We're going to be having 3 baptisms next week though! One will be one of our RC's baptizing his daughter, and then the other two are some of our investigators that I've also taught. It should all be pretty could! We're working with the family, the father and the daughter, a lot. There's a lot of potential for us to help that entire family! The family helps us a lot too!

Language is still going good, just learning still, learning to speak better, and I'm going to start trying to expand my vocabulary just a little bit at a time (mostly Nouns). Doing that will help me to make more comparisons and understand the people better as well! Reading also helps me to understand better as well! Just slowly, getting better, listening to how the members here speak, and try and speak like they do! Always trying to learn and improve. Definitely need a lot of help from the Gift of Tongues. But, missionary life is fun! The members are great, the work is difficult, so life is good. Hard work, is good work!

I uploaded some pictures already!

No transfers for me or my companion this time.  He will almost certainly transfer next time as he has been here for four transfers already.

As far as baptisms go, I'm happy for all of them! They all have friends and family in the church already so it will be great for them!

Contacting is mostly just walking down the street and contacting them. Sometimes we'll go to open air markets and contact there, talking with everyone. It's a lot of fun, as hard as it was for me at first! It got a lot better after we had an activity at the church this last saturday when we went out proselyting with members from the church! As in, my companion went with a member one way, and I went another way with another member. We went on switch-offs and it was great. The example this member gave was super great! I also liked the way he spoke, so i learned a lot about contacting and speaking as well!

Contacting can be brutal... but sometimes you just have to accept it and enjoy it! I'm starting to enjoy it, for sure. Members are great to help me learn, and for me to know that at least someone else understands what they're saying!

You did contacting in the library? That's pretty bold. I don't think I would contact in a library... I've listened to a lot of things now, but I'm still working on speaking better! I still have to use patience and time though! That's an eternal principle that can't be overcome! As nice as it would be to go to sleep and be fluent the next day... It doesn't always work that way!

Most people don't have a hard time understanding what I'm saying but I definitely don't sound like a Khon Thai either... Just as long as they can understand me I'm fine!

Memorizing words is 100x more difficult out here. There's just no time to effectively memorize words I feel sometimes, so I just content myself by trying to understand what the scriptures say. Learning that way, as I go along!

I'm trying hard! Just writing/marking words that I don't know, and looking them up! Trying that way anyways, or other church books I can find! I do have a pocket notebook, but It's hard fro me to review... but I try! Sometimes, it's just hard for me to do all of that, mostly just remembering to do it... but that's ok!

That building with all the white roof tiles is was where I had to do all my VISA papers and stuff like that.

Didn't get caught out in that rainstorm, just inside! It is a lot of fun to see though!  It was really raining hard!

Mission life is fun! Not really too tough, but it's great! I just need to take more intiative that's all! I've been pretty passive but now I have the go ok to just go and do stuff, contacting and the whole bit, which is good. Should be fun! DOn't know about the best, but I'm trying!

The work is great. I love the people, and I love Thailand!

Love you lots, hopefully everything is going good for you! sounds like everything is going great! I'll talk to you next week!

Love you! The work is great, the Spirit is great. The church is great. God, and Jesus Christ truly love everyone! The mission life, is a great life! I'm glad to be serving here!

Love you Dad! Talk to you soon!

- Elder Collin Decker