Monday, April 26, 2010

4/26/10

Hey Guys!

Sorry, I'm writing kinda fast. Great week! We now have 3 guys with dates for June and July. I am way excited for these guys! Bog is coming along really well, and two others that we have been teaching for the last three weeks, are now preparing to enter the water. Sompong and Bird. These lessons were really great! I will tell you about them in my next written letter, coming soon. I can't tell you how excited I am for these 3 fine gentlemen. Way smart, hard workers. Please pray for them, that they may be able to overcome challenges, and be able to continue to work towards baptism. Sounds like you guys had a really crazy, great week. Yeah, Sompong told us about the volcano in Iceland, that's crazy!

To answer your question, Mom... For the birthday package you're sending, can you just put a bunch of snacks and stuff in it? Combos are really good, are you guys able to get macadamia nuts? Chex Mix, Gardettos, I have a lot of mac and cheese already,

Hey, so it was about 11:30 last night, and I was laying in bed, when there was a really freakin loud explosion not too far from our apartment, and then about 20 minutes later a big fleet of ambulances and police cars go flying by, holy cow. So this morning we were going out the door, and I asked one of the guards what happened. There was a little red shirt battle not far from the apartment, and someone fired an M-79 Rifle/ grenade launcher, wow, way loud. I guess that's not the first. This past week has been chaos in a lot of places. It was Wednesday when over in the See-Lome district, there was a big clash. The red shirts against the police, army, and as one person we talked to put it, "every other color in Bangkok!" I don't know, our side of the river seems to be really blessed, and I know it will stay that way. Anyway, no need to worry, we don't ever go over to see Lome, its in the other area, and it doesn't seem like during the daytime there is any action. I talked to the Zone leaders about this. Things will be alright. Anyway, I am actually running out of time. I may be moving this week. I'm not sure. Tommorrow we'll find out.

Love you guys,
Elder Schulte

Monday, April 19, 2010

4/19/10

Hey Family,

Songkran was way fun. we were all ready to go when we did email last week. As soon as I sent off my letter to you guys, we were both out the door of the cade running down the street, stealing water from various peoples barrels along the road, and drenching everyone, as wel as getting drenched ourselves! The Songkran hotspot was on the other side of the river, but that would have been kinda far away, so we stayed in our neck of the woods, and went up and down Jaran 35 for four hours having a blast getting drenched and drenching. We both had big buckets that we carried around, ah man, it was way sweet! It was Elder Coopers first time for Songkran and he had lots of fun.

This past week, with all the red shirt stuff, and Songkran, we still managed to get stuff done. Really, things are looking up. We now have seven investigators. Bog is still working toward baptism, but we will have to change the date. We still have a lot to teach him, and we didn't see him last week, because he went to Nongkhai up north for a week. And, a guy that Elder Parkinson and I started teaching in January, but haven't seen since then, showed up last week, and he wants to try again. His name is Bird, and we will see him tonight, because Dan and his family are out of town(We miss Dan!) That has been way sweet too. I'll have to tell you more about him later.

We had another switchoff this weekend, Elder Young and I went around Thonburi. That was really fun. He's really rockin this missionary work, its so great!

Well, that's way sweet that Mike got his Duty to God stuff finished, and also the conference this past weekend, I'm really going to miss President Tinscher. He's a really funny man. He always asked, "where are you going when you are 19..."

Well, hey I absolutely have to get a hair cut to day, and the timer on this computer is running out. I will be sending all the siblings letters soon.

Hey you know what tomorrow is?

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!MOM AND DAD!!!!!!!!!!

-Elder Schulte

Explaining Songran 4/12/10

Hey Family,

Wow! Crazy weekend! Conference was great, watched it in Thai. I caught the jist of it, it ended up being a great language study. Yeah a lot of redshirt activity this past weekend, 15 people died including a reporter from Japan, and they are not happy at all. About 500 people were injured. Basically, the government gave orders for the army to start spraying them with rubber bullets and tear gas them as well. We were watching conference at the church on Saturday with several members, and between one of the sessions, someone pulled out an antenna and connected it to the tv to watch the rioting, which actually was happening on a road three miles from the church. I suspect the deaths happened from the redshirts running away, a lot of trampling, it really looked like a lot of chaos on the tv. Holy cow! Now the redshirts are starting to vandalize and steal military vehicles,is what someone said yesterday, and soldiers on the streets and bridges that we use, as of last week, are starting to arm themselves with m16 rifles. But it seems to have died down today, thank goodness, they are not going to ruin my songkran play time. We will be going out to play in just a sec. Oh yeah, I got a phone call from Elder Young at about 10:30 last night saying that a lot of very worried moms called and emailed wondering why they didn't get emails from their sons yesterday. It was because today is our preparation day. It was changed to today because of interviews yesterday. So, we will go out and play here. We are all dressed up and ready to g! This will be a real relief after last week. Results didn't look very good. We'd make appointments, go to the respective places, and they wouldn't show up, or cancel. Alot of potentials (investigators) that we found either didn't have time, or decided that its not convenient to learn right now. I expect that being unavailable had a lot to do with Songran week. Alot of poeple go to other provinces for a week. This week will be especially fun. We will really try to find stuff to do. I told him (Elder Young) about this in the interview yesterday. He said not to worry about it too much, to keep finding, have a positive attitude, and everything will be alright. Also, I am just really going to take advantage of the time, and really study and understand the gospel and lessons better and the language, to be ready for after Songran week.

The Songran Festival marks the Buddhist New Year. To answer your question, Mom, yeah, people go "do good or make merit" at the wats (the temples), but members of the church don't do that. It's just way fun! There really isn't as as much of a religious theme in it like they say there is. It is the absolute most fun water fight you will ever be in. Three straight days of getting soaked and powder dumped on you, oh yeah!

Well, I got your package, thanks so much! It was great to snack on the goodies and share them during conference. Thanks for the pictures,Mike, you're huge! Sounds like a lot of fun in Virginia. You guys look a lot different!

Well, time is about to run out. That's really exciting about the new callings in the stake next week, keep me up to date, thanks!

-Elder Schulte

4/5/10

Hey Guys!


So this week I imagine the red shirts aren't really making many headlines. Its kinda lost its flare. Now they are just making some racket, and the prime minister is for sure not going to step down. Not much going on on this side of the river. Its really not as big as I thought it would be, Oh well. That's okay.

As far as missionary work here, the week was great. I think I have never had more appointments fall through, before I came to Thonburi. This happens a lot week after week for the last two transfers, and Elder Cooper is saying the same thing. But we managed to get some ligit lessons and new investigators this week. And we had another switchoff with the zone Leaders here, and found some more (investigators). Another thing too was we fasted this weekend, I've really been wondering about how we can get the members more excited to work, so this was some thing we fasted for recently. This past Saturday the ward had a big unity building getaway to the beach. I could really tell on Sunday that it had a way positive effect. Almost everyone in the ward got up and bore awesome testimonies. They had a blast, and really had a great opportunity to get to know each other better, and the spirit was really strong in the meeting, and I was sitting in the congregation thinking "Wow!..." and on top of that, one of the councilors approached us after the meeting and told us that he had two friends that aren't members of the church go to the activity, and he is going to talk to both of them to see if they are interested in learning about the gospel. Wow! The Lord does answer prayers.

No matter how hard it is right now, we are trying really hard to find and work here. I've just decided that re-opening an area is what we are doing, and also that Thonburi is a place that you never give up on. These last three moves, no matter how hard it has been, have been awesome.

Well, thats whats up, We will be watching General Conference this coming weekend, and then The Songrahn water festival is next week. We aren't sure what's going to happen next week, or what the mission presidents policy on participating is yet, but all I know is that it was a blast last year. Can you believe that was almost a year ago? Walking around for hours while getting drenched, people out with buckets and squirtguns , and barrels of water,way sweet.

Heydad...HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THANKS FOR EVERYTHING , AND I HOPE YOU HAVE A GREAT DAY!!!!!!!!!!