It’s YOU, Champer Damper! It’s YOU!

Sister McQuivey said that all the time. Apparently it's from some cat video on youtube? I never saw it...but it's this woman who is obsessed with her cat and sings to him, "Who's the best cat in the United States? It's YOU, Champer Damper! It's YOU!" Haha, I will have to remember to watch that in SEVENTEEN MONTHS. How has it been a month already!? Time is flying!

Dead family,

(Yes, I said "Dead." In dad's most recent DearElder to me, he addressed me as "Dead Sister Sweetness." I cried—I was laughing so hard. It was classic.)

This has been another awesome week here in the MTC. I'm halfway done...only 4 1/2 weeks until I ship out to Thailand!! AHH!! I'm so ready to get out and go!! I'm not going crazy here, why do you ask? Haha. But I really am loving it.

So on Sunday this week at Music and the Spoken Word, it was all about Memorial Day. Memorial Day?! We forgot that there were things like that that happen in the real world! We were all shocked! All I could think about the entire time was being at the American Cemetery in Normandie, and walking along the shore on Omaha Beach. I am so glad I did that particular study abroad in Paris. That place changed me—Paris and the cemetery in Normandie. I kept thinking about that little old British veteran* at the hotel we stayed at in Bayoux before visiting the cemetery and Omaha Beach.

I was thinking about all of the boys who gave their lives for their cause at 19 and 20, and all of those blinding white crosses and Stars of David that stretched on as far as I could see. And I started thinking— obviously their mission was so vastly different from mine as a missionary—but at the same time, they are kind of similar. Let me explain. Those 19 and 20 year old boys believed in their cause, and they were willing to give their all for it. Why should I feel any differently about my mission? Interesting to think about. I am grateful every single day for the lifechanging experiences I had in France.

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* October 3, 2012  |  bayeux part ii

woke up, went to breakfast, and had a wonderful experience. at our hotel, there was a british wwii veteran who fought on the beaches of normandy. i typed out my experience on my phone (i didn't have my computer with me) while we were driving to gold beach later that day because i didn't want to forget it. here's part of what i wrote:

this morning at breakfast in bayeux, there was a british veteran from dday. 

i watched him and his wife eat their breakfast while i ate mine. i didn't want to approach him 

because i thought he wouldn't want to be interrupted. he was in his uniform, 

a navy coat decorated with pins and medals from the RAF. 

i finished my breakfast and realized that if i didn't thank him, i would kick myself for the rest of my life. how many times do you run into a veteran from normandy while you're in normandy? 

not often. i walked up to him and shook his hand while i said, 

"thank you." 

he locked his eyes with mine through his thick glasses while he spoke and said, 

"we couldn't have done it without you." 

his hand held mine the whole time. it was rough and worn and warm. 

"it was the americans who made all the difference." 

he proceeded to tell me a little bit about his experience in the war, and about how he was so grateful for roosevelt and the american soldiers coming to the aid of the british. he smelled like coffee, and in the hand that wasn't holding mine, he was holding a sugar cube. he asked me why i was in france, and i told him about our study abroad. he told me to cherish it because 

it is an amazing experience to live abroad. i told him i would. 

he smiled. 

i loved him and his british accent and his faded ribbons on the lapel of his jacket.

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Later Sunday evening, we had a wonderful devotional and then we all watched Sister Monson's funeral. I heard it wasn't broadcast, so I guess not very many people actually got to view it. It was beautiful, and she was an amazing woman. It got me thinking about family, and what I want for my family now and in the future when I am a mother.

I also decided on Sunday that I really should invest in waterproof mascara and eyeliner, because I am still a tenderheart. Ha.

So on Monday, we had the most amazing lesson we have ever taught as a companionship and in my entire mission of one month (haha). But in all honesty, it was the best experience of my mission thus far. Our investigator, Nike, is awesome. He has two little girls and a girlfriend. We learned in our last lesson that they’re not married, and we knew that if he wanted to be baptized, they would have to get married—but we didn't know how to approach it. We asked him to pray with his family, and to ask his fan (girlfriend, but it can also mean wife, so you never know if someone is married or just dating someone; ANNOYING haha) if she would be interested in hearing the missionary discussions. He also asked us how the gospel of Jesus Christ would be able to help his family. So when we were planning, we all suddenly felt like we needed to tell him about God's plan of Eternal Marriage. So we walked into the lesson, no notes, with two pictures of temples (Thank you Grandma Coco, they have definitely come in handy!). We had a "member present" (one of our other teachers in character of a ward member who was just sealed to his family two months ago!) and we told Nike that God wants our families to exist together beyond this life. He wants us to live together in His presence after we die. To do that, we need to be sealed together by the priesthood power in the temple. He was so excited. I was so excited. I couldn't stop smiling. The spirit was so strong, I have never felt anything like it in my life. I got teary-eyed, right in the middle of the lesson! And my hands started to get all sweaty...and anyone who knows me knows that my hands DON'T get sweaty. I am a human ice cube. Ahhhhh I just wanted to shout, "NIKE! DON'T YOU SEE?! THIS IS THE BEST POSSIBLE THING IN THE ENTIRE WORLD FOR YOUR FAMILY! I WANT YOU TO HAVE THIS!!" But I didn't...haha. Anyway, Brother Gang (member present) bore his testimony about being sealed to his family, and as he did, I had no idea at all what he was saying, but I cried. And I think Nike teared up a little bit, too. He wants to know how he can be sealed to his parents, who have passed away. We asked him to share this message with his fan, who wasn't interested after praying. We really want her to accept this. Because this is what it is all about. Bringing people unto Christ and showing them what complete and everlasting happiness they can have through his gospel. :)

I'm so grateful for my family. I just want everyone to know I have the best family in the whole entire world, and no one can even argue with me about that, so that's that. I'm so grateful for the blessings of the temple, and that they are stuck with me forever :) It is seriously the happiest thing in the entire world. I just want everyone to know about it!

So Thai! This week has been really rough in the language department—we're all beginning to read. It is rough. All I want is a constant supply of Advil and a magnifying glass. We are reading from the Book of Mormon and the letters are so tiny! It gives me a headache if I try to read for too long. But it's beginning to be really fun. Elder Hill put it all into perspective for us when during class he announced, "Not everyone gets to experience the magic of learning to read twice in their lives." It's so true :) I remember reading Go, Dog! Go! with daddy, and how fun it was to pick out the word "the" on the back of a Land Before Time video cover with mama. I'm getting to experience that all over again! It's so cool. Only a lot harder because #Thaiisagianthashtagandtheydontseparatetheirwordsyoujusthavetofigureoutwheretheystartandwheretheyendsogoodluck :)

One evening Brother Shipley was trying to help us remember all the different consonants with little tricks, because so many of the consonants make the same sound. Each consonant is associated with a word, like the first letter on the script card is kaa k<y. kaa is the sound, and the word it is associated with is k>y, which means rooster. So each letter in the alphabet has stuff like that. One of the letters, scc sxa, on the very bottom row in yellow (i sent photos of my script card, right?) is kinda hard to remember sometimes. Brother Shipley asked, "Does anyone know how to remember scc sxa?" Me, being the genius that I am, assumed he wanted to hear our tricks of how we remembered it. So I raised my hand. He called on me and I said, "I remember it because scc is an s-sound, which stands for Sydney, and it has a unicorn horn because Sydney likes unicorns." He gave me one of those, "Wow, I can't believe you just said that" looks and said, "Huh. Well, I remember it because sxa means tiger, and it has a tiger swipe through it." Good one, Syd. Good one.

We have been doing the $100 chair each night at district prayer and we tell the person who is praying something we really appreciate about them. Last night was my turn, and everyone was very complimentary, especially Elder Passey, who told me he appreciates my "motherly nature." I had to laugh at that one. It's not like I've been told that before or anything. :)

And now I'm back to my little trio! Sister McQuivey left for Washington yesterday morning at 5 am. It was an early morning, because I had to accompany her to the travel office haha. BUT GOOD NEWS EVERYONE. The Lord blesses you when you do good things, because guess who found Diet Coke in the free bin? That's right, this Sister. Blessings, everyone. Blessings. Haha. Also, I would like to say that I am very good at finding things in the free bins in our hall, our room has quite the collection of hair products, cute clothing, and I have started a personal library of "The Plan of Salvation" pamphlets in as many languages as I can find. So far I have English, Thai, Cambodian, Spanish, Czech, and Korean. It's a pretty good start. Haha.

And if anyone is wondering about the food front...on Monday night we were served Cod Nuggets. I had Life cereal.

I love you all!! You are the best, and I can't wait to hear from you!!!!!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

Sister Hugh

PS. Sorry there aren't any pictures this week...there's only one lab in the MTC that has uploading capabilities and there was no room in there today.

Fun Fact

In Thai, you can't pronounce an S on the end of a word, so my name is just Sister Hugh. And Hugh means "hungry." So...I'm going to be Sister Hungry for the next 17 months hahahaha.

Quote of the Week

"Next time we say something in the wrong tone, can you say, "Don't you use that tone with me!"?" -Elder Hill, to Brother Shipley (PS I have no idea how to correctly use quotations with that one, so Kelly Benning, if you are reading this, I am so sorry! haha)

Khnyom, khnyom, khnyom!

Sisters Hughes, Phelps and Slaugh

Ok, the title of this email is from a song that one of our Cambodians wrote during her stay in the MTC. Her name is Sister Hartley. She's a riot. The song goes as follows:

Khnyom, khnyom, khnyom!

Khnyom, sraline, khnyom!

Khnyom sa-at, khnyom cha-lat

Khnyom, la-ah ching gay!

Translation:

I, I, I

I love my self,

I am pretty, I am smart.

I am the best.

It's pretty great. Now I know how to say all the really important stuff in Cambodian, so nobody should worry about that.

This has been a very silly week. It started out with me seeing my friend Janna (from my human development class, remember? I love that lady) here at the MTC (she's a teacher) and I literally screamed when I saw her. It was so good to give her a hug! Haha, so much for "quiet dignity..." Whoops :)

I have also been discovering that the Missionary Training Center is a gold mine of 18- and 19-year-old boy antics. I mean, I knew this...I knew it would be an adventure. But I am having so much fun observing all of the awesome things that go down. Like this week, one Elder Clawson, a Cambodian, got all the elders to snort jello at dinner. Yeah, that happened. Or when Elders Passey and Astle wrote a Thai word on the board and snickered the whole time...I found out later it was the verb for "to elegantly break wind." I had to laugh at that one. Last night we had a 40 minute conversation about tie trading and the rankings of different types of ties here at the MTC. Seriously?! It was a FORTY MINUTE CONVERSATION. You kinda run out of things to talk about after a while...haha.

Our schedule at the MTC is the same for 8 weeks in a row. I don't have it in front of me...but on Mondays there are 6 hours of class, on Tuesdays there are 3 with a devotional in the evenings, Wednesday is P-Day (preparation day) with a 3 hour evening class, and then Thursday thru Saturday we have 6 hours of class. And then there is Sunday with no class; we watch Music and the Spoken Word as sisters, have Relief Society, Sacrament Meeting, a walk to the temple, and then we have a Devotional around 7. When we have class varies from day to day, but it's the same each week. If that made sense :)

So speaking of Music and the Spoken Word, this week was so good. There were so many video clips of nature...I forgot how much I missed the outside world! Seriously, people, GET OUTSIDE!! To anyone who is coming to the MTC...SPEND TIME OUTSIDE. We have gym time every day, but it's just not the same. I realized that I haven't seen the stars the entire time I've been here. I miss that. It's funny the things you miss in the MTC. So far for me, it's Google and the stars. AND MUSIC. That too. We don’t to listen to background music here, not even church-y music. I don't know why, but once we get into the field that will change.

Anyway, so what I really wanted to say about Music and the Spoken Word...I FOUND CONAN / DINO GUY IN THE TABERNACLE CHOIR!! It took me three Sundays, but I finally found him. I laughed so hard...I pointed him out to my companions and now they look for him all the time, too! I kept thinking of General Conference with the Morgans and the Navas and it just made me so happy happy happy :)

Another fun thing that happened this week...during our lesson with Nike, we realized that we wanted to share a scripture with him. We decided to share something about Jesus being the "light and the life of the world" in Alma 38:9. I told him the wrong scripture. I asked him to read Alma 39:9. I'll let you look that one up. Needless to say, we all laughed really hard, even Nike (who is really just Brother Phan, our teacher). It was super awkward hahaha.

Oh, here is a fun thing I found out. So Sister Tilley found out in a somewhat unfortunate manner during one of her lessons the difference between Khaa and Kh>> (remember the backwards C?). Anyway. She related said story to us: She was teaching her investigator how to pray, and she said that you "khaa God," or "thank God." Or so she thought. She asked the investigator to try it, even though he seemed confused. It turns out she was asking him to "kill God." And we all realized that in our prayers we have been trying to kill God instead of thank him for our many blessings. Whoops-a-tulip! He knows what we were trying to say :)

So now that the silly stuff is out of the way, let's move on to the spiritual stuff I've learned this week.

The Book of Mormon. It is so incredibly personal! I have always known that reading the Book of Mormon is the best way to come to know Christ as our Savior and Redeemer. It is the best way that we can gain a testimony of Him. But the Book of Mormon is a way for the gospel and for Christ to reach people individually. It allows for each of us to have our very own experience with Christ as our Savior. It allows us to come to know Him on our own, for ourselves. The spirit will testify to each of us in a different way that He is the Son of God, and that He is our Redeemer, if we approach reading it with faith and commitment. It reaches people one by one, which is exactly how the Savior wants us to come to know Him. I love that. And THAT is why the Book of Mormon is the most powerful resource in the conversion process, for our investigators and for ourselves.

We've had some pretty big changes in our zone this week. All of our Pii Thais left for Thailand on Monday! I'm so excited and happy for them. Yesterday, almost all of our Cambodians left. In their district of 12, 11 left—10 for Cambodia, and 1 for Long Beach. Sister McQuivey, who is going to Tacoma, Washington, is the only one who is still here due to transfer dates in her mission. So guess who has a new companion? Yep! That's right! I do!

Yesterday is a long story. Yesterday morning, Sisters Phelps, Slaugh, and I were able to teach Pii Tom about baptism, and he accepted the invitation to be baptized. WHAT?! I AM SO HAPPY FOR HIM. Definitely the high of the day. During our personal study, poor Sister Stack had a pretty severe athsma attack. Sister du Plessis asked the elders to give her a blessing before they called medical services, and it was so awesome how all four of them literally LEAPED out of their chairs to give her a blessing in the hallways where she was. We stayed in our classroom for about 40 minutes while the medical peeps took care of her and took her off to the health clinic for breathing treatment. After the elders came back in, we had a district prayer all together (minus Sisters Stack and du Plessis, obviously), and it was the sweetest thing ever. Yesterday was a huge bonding day for our district, and Sister Stack is back in the saddle, never fear. Blessings work!

After class, we helped all of our Pii Cambodians move their stuff out of their rooms so they could board the bus to the airport. We also moved all of Sister McQuivey's stuff into our room. I moved to the top bunk, which is actually an adventure because of where the bed is, there isn't really a way to climb up onto it, so I just kind of climb on a chair and on the cupboards and fling myself onto the bed. We don't have a ladder. We can't do things the easy way in the MTC :) Anyway, watching the Cambodians drive away was such a happy, happy thing. I am seriously so excited for them!! But watching Sister McQuivey standing there, crying, was the hardest thing in the entire world. My heart broke into so many millions of little baby pieces for that girl. Her entire district of 9 weeks just left, and she gets to stay back for a week with the Thais. It was amazing how the Spirit told me exactly what to do to comfort her. I don't know her very well at all, but I just knew that she needed someone to hold her hand, and so I stood there with her, holding her hand, as the bus drove off. We held hands a lot yesterday. It was nice.

Our devotional last night was so awesome. Mom and dad, if you get the chance, could you maybe try to find a copy of it? It was Elder Marcus B. Nash of the Seventy. He gave the most amazing talk on the Doctrine of Christ. It was exactly what I needed to hear, and when it was over, I just wanted to listen to it on repeat about 27 more times because it was seriously that amazing. The final advice he gave us was, "Don't hold anything back from the Lord." I thought that was so cool. After devotionals on Tuesdays, we have a little testimony meeting with our district and someone from our branch presidency. And I realized in that meeting that if we don't hold anything back from the Lord, He won't hold anything back from us. He will bless us with everything we need to be the best missionaries we can be. It was the most amazing realization ever.

I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!!!! I hope you guys get my point :)

Until next Wednesday!

Sister Syd

QUOTES OF THE WEEK

"I can't even stick to a goal for ONE dayTHERE'SJELLOWHERE." —Sister Hartley, at dinner when she saw Elder Clawson with a plate of Jello

Each night we have a prayer as a district before we go back to our residences. Elder Whitney, of the Cambodians, was with us so we asked him to pray in Khmer. So he did. Somehow, though, Elder Hill missed the memo and in the middle of Elder Whitney's prayer, he said super loud, "WHAT?!" And we all busted up, even Elder Whitney. It was great.

"I'm not Asian, I'm 6'4''!" -Elder Black, who is half Thai

Sister Stack: "My power animal is like a mix between a pig and a t-rex."

Elder Hill: "How did those two meet?"

Elder Astle: "That's a funny joke. We'll laugh about that later."

Me: "Dang. Modesty is a really long word." I then proceeded to struggle saying "khwaamsuphaabriabr>>y" for about 30 seconds until Elder Passey said, "Ain't nobody got time for that!"

Me: "Kaanfuunfuu. That sounds like a good name for a bouncy house rental place, right?"

Elder Astle: "You know, those are the kind of thoughts that will make you a lot of money one day."

  

And that was my week in quotes :)

CARINE IS HERE! Hurrah! It's a beautiful thing.
The girl with the red hair is Sister Ralls, she is Dr. and Jennie Hurlbut's neice! 

Our two Thai districts with a Sister who is from Thailand! Wahoo!

Some of our district at the temple this morning. The girl with the Red shirt is Sister McQuivey! She will be my companion until Tuesday morning when she leaves for Washington! 

The sisters going to Thailand with the Thai Sister (who's last name I can't pronounce because it is 21398472358971204783 letters long) 

This is L Tom Perry. There is a vowel in Thai that requires his smile to make the right sound.
If that makes sense. Ha ha. So we hung those up :) 

HOLY CLOUDS! utah lake has never been so beautiful 

Look at this car!

Sister Tilley and I

“I’ve never felt fatter than when I woke up with crumbs in my bed.”

Yes, that is one of the quotes of the past week, said by our lovely Sister Tilley. We just eat cookies in our beds sometimes, no big deal. It seems like every package we get is filled with cookies!! I am in no way complaining about this.

SAWADII KHAA KHR>>BKHRUA!! :) 

(>> is supposed to be backwards Cs so just go with it. Haha

This past week has been really great. I feel a lot more settled into the MTC and life as an MTC missionary. I say MTC missionary because I know how drastically things will change once I get into Thailand. Are you all ready for this week's edition of the weekly epistle?! Here goes.

I've been thinking a lot this week about first impressions. There is an elder in my district that I decided was really quiet, and I just thought we wouldn't have anything to say to each other. Of course I was proven wrong, and I came to realize that he is one of the most deeply silly people I have ever met. So maybe that's not first impressions, but more of me making decisions about people before actually getting to know them. Anyway, whatever it is, it really got me thinking a lot about how I want people to see me when I meet them. I want people to see me as a missionary and to see me as a representative of Jesus Christ. Later in the week, we learned about that in class. It's cool how that experience prepared me for class. If any of that even made any sense at all.

So probably my favorite memory from the MTC so far. On Thursday night in class (we have class from 6-9 pm), I was so frustrated with Thai. Whatever it was we were learning about script was just DRIVING me INSANE. Even though I know I am being blessed, I was just frustrated with myself. Our teachers keep trying to reassure us, and fun fact; we are the fastest learning group of missionaries to ever learn Thai! But still. So I was sitting in class, silently being frustrated. I prayed to let me have some relief from the stress I was feeling, and not even five minutes later, our new teacher Brother Phan (remember Sam from the previous email? He's now our teacher!) was trying to help us pronounce a vowel. He was trying to say "apple" with a Boston accent and for whatever reason, it struck me as the funniest thing in the whole entire world. I kid you not, I had tears streaming down my cheeks for about 15 minutes. It was the BEST relief EVER. I then remembered mama's advice to me before I left, to laugh often :) It's so true that laughter is the best medicine and it cures just about anything.

So on Sunday, we had the coolest experience in the WORLD. In Relief Society, all the sister missionaries meet together and someone comes to talk to us. This week..guess who it was?!

JANICE KAPP PERRY. RIGHT?! I was super excited. Anyway, she gave a wonderful talk, and she had us all sing a medley of "A Child's Prayer," "I Love to See the Temple," "I Belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," "I'm Trying to be Like Jesus, "Army of Helaman," and "Love is  Spoken here." It was so beautiful! And if that wasn't enough of a spiritual boost...she then had us sing a song that she had just recently written for a new CD for Sister missionaries. It was called "The Sisters of Zion" and it is to the tune of "As Sisters in Zion," WE WERE THE FIRST PEOPLE TO EVER SING THE SONG!! I looked around me while we were singing it and I didn't see one dry eye. It was so amazing. One of my favorite lines (and one of the only lines I can remember is "the angels of heaven are walking beside us." It's so true. :)

Then at Lunch, I was sitting, eating and talking to one of the Hmong-speaking elders in my zone. And suddenly someone behind me said, "Ghraham Canyon." And I turned to the elder and said, "I'm sorry, I have to go," and I literally sprinted (just kidding I speed-walked) to the ice cream bar and got myself some Graham Canyon ice cream. DELICIOUS. I've missed that stuff. In fact, they also had Earnestly Chocolate...so maybe I got two bowls. Don't judge me. I don't eat a whole lot else here, it's all pretty nasty, so I figured it was ok :)

One of the coolest things that happened this week was actually reading something in Thai. Like in script. My teacher asked me to look up a word in the English-Thai dictionary that we have and do you know what?! I COULD READ IT and I didn't even have to think about it twice!!!!!!!! It was SO COOL.

So now we have two new investigators, Pii Tom and Nike. Yesterday morning, Sisters Slaugh, Phelps, and I taught Pii Tom for the first time. It was the first lesson that we have taught that went really poorly. I just had a really hard time understanding Pii Tom, and I felt like I couldn't answer any of the questions he had well enough, and it was just a total bummer. I was really disappointed. BUT! The Lord always comes through! In personal study, we all were studying about Christ so that later, we could teach Nike. And I came to the conclusion that the Lord loves me in spite of all of my shortcomings and mistakes. And He loves his children. He won't let my mistakes get in the way of someone learning about the gospel and coming unto Christ. I love knowing that. It just means that I need to work harder, and everything will be just fine :)

THEN GUESS WHAT HAPPENED?! Last night at our Tuesday night devotional, ELDER NELSON CAME TO SPEAK TO US!!! He gave such an amazing talk about how we need to lose ourselves in the work, and how we need to be happy! "For goodness sakes, we are that we might have joy!" :) He also said, "Obedience brings blessings. But exact obedience brings miracles." It reminded me about what Scott said about how there is nothing sacred about 6:30 am wake-up time schedules, the sacredness is in our willingness to follow rules. Thanks, Scott :) Elder Nelson’s wife also spoke to us and she assured us that our ancestors are with us. She said that there are always people who have gone on who will walk with us and help us. She asked us to pray to be led to people who's ancestors are praying that they will receive the gospel. I've never thought about it like that before, but I thought it was really cool.

This week is our last full week with all of the people in our zone. They are all shipping off to their missions (the Hmong speakers are going all across the states, the Cambodians to Cambodia, and the Pii (older) Thais to Thailand). Soon it will just be the 18 of us defending our table that we have claimed for the South East Asians in the cafeteria until the next group of South East Asians come in. We've heard rumors that on June 12th, there are going to be 48 new Thais coming in. I'm sorry. Let me repeat that with the proper excitement. THERE ARE GOING TO BE FORTY-EIGHT NEW THAIS COMING IN (if the rumor is true) SO PRAY THAT IT'S TRUE BECAUSE THAT NUMBER IS UNREAL! Even if they're not all Thai speaking, there is still going to be a CRAZY RAD number of noong (young) Thais coming in. And then we'll be the pii Thais! (older Thais). It's super exciting.

I'll leave you all with a scripture that Theresa Starr sent me in a DearElder! Seriously, that woman is the bomb. I love that she wrote to me! Will you make sure she reads this? :) She told me to look up Omni 1:26. Do it, you'll be so happy you did. :) It's exactly why I'm out here. I'm so excited to go to THAILAND!! Only 6 1/2 more weeks :)

I LOVE YOU ALL!!! SO MUCH!!!

Duay khwamrag (with love),

Sister Syd

PS. We're now only allowed to write letters on P-Days. Not even at night when we're back in our residence halls! Shoot. So if people don't hear from me for very long periods of time, it's not because I am ignoring them or anything...there just honestly is zero time to write back! But know that I want everyone to know that I love them and I'm so grateful for their letters!!

Noteworthy Quotes of the Week:

"Bagles in my EYES, I couldn't believe it!" -Sister Melton, going to Cambodia

"I've never spoken this much Thai in my life." -Sister Phelps

"Why do I have a fork???" -Elder Hill, who pulled a fork out of his pocket in class

"I'm just going to repeat everything our teacher says and I'll keep doing that in Thailand. And if I'm socially weird out there, I'll just figure it out later." -Elder Hill

FUN FACTS ABOUT THAI!!

So girls always refer to themselves in Third Person.

There are multiple ways to say "easy." Such as:

-"ngay - ngay"

-"ngoo - ngoo - bla - bla" (which translates to snake - snake - fish - fish) or

-"Gloo-ay gloo-ay" (banana - banana)

The word for pirate is joan-salat, which translates to salad thief. That's my favorite one so far :)

People often mess up tones and instead of saying "I would like to share a message" they say, "I would like to share some rice."

I said on accident, "I satellite signal that the Book of Mormon is the word of God" instead of "I promise that the Book of Mormon is the word of God."

It never ceases to be entertaining :)

Accidentally coordinated-matchy.

Script card—consonants

Script card—vowels 

New best friend—the script card

Sisters phelps and slaugh mopping and drying.