“We like Mormon. This is where we change.” —Nava

BABY ANIMALS. Blessings of baby animals while I am contacting.  : )

Dear Family,

This week was good! It was terribly "egg-citing" in the words of my beloved district leader, Elder Unsworth. Haha. I shall explain in a second. I am happy and sweaty (and hydrated)—all things a missionary in Thailand should be :)

For district meeting on Tuesday, we had an epic adventure with President Senior. Every once in a while, he will join in on our meetings. It's fun. This week Elder Unsworth, who is a hoot, organized this huge egg hunt around the outside of the church. We had to go and find our "egg-vestigators" and run around holding the eggs on spoons in our mouths. It was hilarious. I was the only one who dropped an egg in our district of 8...classic. I dropped Shelly (each egg was named). Which was hilarious after it was broken because the egg was just a shell. Anyway, it was good times. 

This week we also went to visit a family from Sri Lanka in the international branch. They joined the church about a year and a half ago (Elder Nirut baptized them!) and are so wonderful. They are refugees and have been living in Thailand for about 6 years. They are getting ready to be relocated by the UN to Holland. When they were telling me their conversion story, they explained that they have been Christian their whole lives. The father was killed for his beliefs so they were moved out of Sri Lanka and into Thailand. They found the church through a friend. Nava, the oldest son, explained that they had looked at a lot of different churches. But, "We like Mormon. This is where we change." The way he said it, he meant change by becoming members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. But on our way home, I was thinking about what he had said and I had the realization that sometimes, people who have learned English as a second language can speak it better than I can. There is more meaning in their words. There's something different and special about the way they speak. "This is where we change." Because of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, we can change. We can properly connect ourselves to the Atonement of Jesus Christ by making covenants with God through the priesthood power. It's how we can truly change; fully utilize Christ's grace and mercy in our lives. I liked that thought.

We also had dinner with the Nelson family this week; they fed us crêpes. I shared my story about how I thought crêpes were Japanese for years (because the only time I would ever eat them was when Cliff would make them or when we were in Japantown) and they thought it was hilarious. Maybe I'm not as awkward in English as I thought. Haha. 

This week we also had the opportunity to teach a man named Prince Leo (from Nigeria). He is our investigator and we helped him understand that the Bible and the Book of Mormon support each other. He kept saying, "I eat my Bible for my daily bread!" and couldn't quite grasp that the Book of Mormon was also a part of that daily bread. We suddenly had the great idea to ask him what he liked to eat on his bread. He said honey. We told him that reading both the Bible and the Book of Mormon was like eating his daily bread with honey. We didn't want to change anything, just help him enjoy it more! He got it after that, and he is really excited to learn about the Book of Mormon now. I always wondered how people taught Christians before...it really scared me actually. Haha. But I think I like it! It's fun.

This Sunday I embarrassed myself at the Linger Longer in the International branch because I ate so much. #noregrets

In our district, everyone is really fond of telling stories. Like making up stories and telling them. We've had an ongoing story with our district leader every night when he follows up with us. It's this really long saga and it is hilarious. I just wanted everyone to know that I have the best nightly follow-ups ever. Haha. 

And there was my week! It was really good. Lots of fun things happening, lots of good people I'm meeting, lots of biking through scary Bangkok traffic...all the normal :) 

I love you, family!!!

Sister Hughes

(Now that I'm in an International branch, people actually say my name right!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

With some of my girls! Sai (in the glasses), BookBeak, and Ooh.
My hair is crazy because we got rained on, and apparently my hair is actually curly now . . . like ringlet curly. Yeah.

BookBeak with a mouth I drew her. Haha. She's the greatest.

Backsweat all day longgggggggggg.

A PUPPY – it was so FLUFFY I almost died.

Goats wearing hats inside of Central.