The spirit is strong in Thailand

 This is a panoramic view of the park that I talk about in my letter.

This is an evening shot of the same park 

on our way home that night. 

I thought it was so beautiful.

 This is a "Wat".

 They call this a "gang monster" which is basically a boat taxi on a man made river. We rode it heading to our teaching appointment.

Some dresses for sale. I was wondering if the cat came with the dress.....=)

 My companion reached his 1 year mark in Thailand so we celebrated by smashing his face into a cake.

 We spent some time cleaning the church grounds of some fallen limbs.

 Cleaning the spider webs off of the ceiling.

 We are with some church members having a sing hymns in the dark party thing. Haha! As you can tell from this picture, Thai people have a lot of personality!

 We are eating lunch with the kid that calls me "Zombie". I talk about it in my letter.

This is a funny man who is a very active member of the church. His name is pronounced "Duhyee."

 This is a sculpture made of of drinking straws that some man who they call "straw man" made for me. He walks around and makes these straw sculptures for people and gives them away.

 I got a kick out of these tiny bananas. 

They were really good and I ate 8.

 My district at the zoo last P-day.

My Update:

Howdy yall!  This was a week full of miracles and fun! My new companion, Elder Steele, has his one year mark this week. He has been a missionary for a full year! I am really thankful for all of the help he gives me every day and I hope that I can be as good of a missionary and as good at the language as him when I'm in his shoes.

This week we have been teaching a ton! I love it when I hear a sentence that I know and I can answer. Most of the time I just write down all the words that I hear and I don't know so I can figure it out later and try to learn it for next time. I try to treat it like a game because that helps me to try harder and focus when I don't really know what’s going on. I always feel God helping me along the way. I know that if I do my very best, God will make up the rest that I can't do myself. Knowing this helps me know that it doesn't matter how well I can do things on my own, but if what I am doing is a good thingand if I am doing my best, God will help me with the rest.

I love going to church here! It is amazing how everything is similar to our church back in Arkansas! It is all the exact same church here with the same spirit. Everything is just in Thai. =) I got to bear my testimony of what I know about the gospel to the entire congregation last Sunday. ( I mentioned it last week.) It was completely in Thai and they all said I did a very good job and that I was skilled. I really hope they could actually understand my Thai/American accent. I know when I say something weird because I will just be speaking to someone in Thai and they start laughing in my face. Good times. =)

We had this one kid we taught who was very good at English, so we got to teach him in English! I was super excited to be able to teach him because he loved asking questions and I actually knew how to answer them. He loved learning about the gospel and so we asked him if we could teach him again next week and he accepted! That made me excited to see him again. 

Elder Steele and I went to a park called Suwan Nowameen. It was very beautiful and there were a ton of people hanging out. Elder Steele and I were meeting and talking to people and inviting them to church,  I had the chance to talk to some Thais all by myself. My plan for getting them to talk to me was asking them to help me practice Thai and telling them I had only been here for 2 weeks and most of the people I tried talking to would just say okay and try to speak with me. Everyone in Thailand is very nice and even if they don't want to hear about religion, they still talk to me and are friendly. Amazing people.

One of the people I was talking to was going on a walk so I was just walked with her. She was super nice to me. She said her name was "New". When the conversation about religion started I would say something about what we believed and she would respond with what she believed. It was very interesting. She was Buddhist and so I said we believed that we have a God and we are his children. She said Buddha is her God. I got into a conversation about sin and I said Jesus dies on the cross and preformed the atonement so we can repent and be clean from sin and live with God again. She said that they can't get rid of sin, but they can even-out their sin by doing good and the balance between how much sin and good they have, will decide what they will be in the next life. As the conversation went on, she told me that she wanted to go to church with us. I was super surprised and so I asked for her contact information and she gave it to me. I will contact her soon and see if she would like to go to church and learn more about The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. =)

Every Friday we have a game/sports night at the church with all the members of the ward and any other people we invite to play with us. They always freak out when I dunk the basketball and ask me to do it again. =D It is really funny because then they all try to dunk it and just throw the ball at the rim as hard as they can. 

Everyone here loves playing Uno. I like that game because I know how to say the numbers and the colors. I have fun playing with the kids. One of the kids started calling me a “Zombie” for some reason. I was glad because they are warming up to me a lot and joking around with me. It’s fun. (the Thai word for zombie is like “zum BPee”, they just over enunciated the B really hard.)

In our house that Elder Steele and I live in, there is an air conditioning unit that is only powerful enough to cool one room. The room that we sleep in. So we try to keep our doors closed so it keeps our room cool. We turn it on and off whenever we come and go so we save electricity. Lately it started dripping little by little each night while it was on and it was getting worse each night, this morning it was pouring buckets out of it! It was kinda hilarious because we didn't know what to do. Elder Steele tried to call our landlord but they didn't answer, so I just looked at the filter inside and it was way clogged with dust. We cleaned it out and put it back in so hopefully it works. 

Anyways, thanks for reading my email! I love it when I get emails from everyone. Have a good week!

-Elder Boston Barron

My First Week In Thailand!

 So awesome to finally arrive!

 This says, 

"The Church of Jesus Christ 

of Latter Day Saints"

 President and Sister Hammond will serve in Thailand for 3 years. We are the very first group for them to welcome.

 Receiving instruction.

 AWESOME food!

 Interesting fruits!

 Applying for our work permit and visa.

 My new tags.

 Headed to the zoo on our Prep Day!

 I found a basketball in Bangkok! It's flat...

Update after my first week:

Hello world! It is official. I am finally in Thailand! The flight was super long. All the people in my "district" that were going to Thailand woke up at 3 in the morning in Utah and said goodbye to some of our friends who lived in the same dorms as us, and we left to head to the bus that would take us to the airport. We traveled to the airport with the missionaries that learned Japanese, so I got to see Elder Taylor (My Bro in law Nate’s little brother) one more time. He is so cool!

Anyways, we rode a bus to the train and then we rode the train to the airport. When we got to our gate in the Salt Lake City Airport, we got to see the missionaries that speak Vietnamese again.  We were very good friends with them all at the MTC!  I was just talking to some of them when someone came up behind me and hugged me really tight. My first thought was that it was just another missionary, but I turned around and it was my MOM! Talk about SHOCK! Apparently she went to my cousins wedding and her plane back to home was leaving right across from my gate 30 minutes earlier. It totally just came out that way without anyone planning it. Crazy! She gave Elder Benteti and I some snacks for the plane, she let me used her phone to call the family and it was so fun to be with her even though it was TOO SHORT! Soon she had to leave on her flight. We waited a few more minutes and then we were off to LA.

The rest of that day was just a bunch of flying from LA, to Hong Kong, and then we got to Thailand. It was strange because we were flying for about more than 30 hours or so, but the sun never went down until we got to Thailand because we were chasing the sun in the plane all day to the other side of the world. When we got to Thailand, we met our Mission President, President Hammond, and his wife. They are both so nice and they care about every single one of us a ton. We all drove to the mission home and got to see that, and then they took us to our hotel so we could get like 5 hours of sleep for the next day.

The next day was basically a lot to getting prepared and settling in. Then President Hammond gave all the companionships 100 baht (which equals a little more than 3 dollars) and he gave us a few random items to go buy and a Book of Mormon to go try to talk to people about the gospel and give out the Book of Mormon. It was very fun walking around Thailand and experiencing Bangkok. There are SO MANY motorcycles. The first time I saw a group go by, I thought it was just a motorcycle gang, but then they just kept coming and going nonstop. 

As for the language, I know exactly what I am saying and how to speak the few words and phrases I know, but I don't understand the Thai for a lick. Haha! Their accent is very different then my teachers in the MTC and it is very hard to understand. I just have to get used to it though and that will just take time.

We slept in our hotel again that night and the next morning we went to the mission home again to figure out who our trainers will be! I forgot to mention one important thing. It is sooooooo humid here. I will sweat all the time without even doing anything. It rains like at least once a day and we don't even use an umbrella because we are already wet from sweat. It is totally fun!

Anyways, we had our meeting with our Mission President and I found out my new companion is Elder Steele! He has been out in The Land for almost 1 year. (a little bit of slang for ya) He is from Layton, Utah, super cool and very good at Thai. He helps me all the time because it is hard for me to know what is going on when we are walking around in our assigned area or teaching lessons to investigators. The area that we are in is called Bangkapi.

We travel everywhere by bus and I am getting to know all the members better. They are all so fun! One of the members named Clikes talking to me because I know a little Thai and he knows a little English and we both want to get better at the other language so we help each other out. He is 19 years old. There is also a little girl who everyone calls MJ who likes following me because she likes the Keychain of a bear I have on my bag. So in Thailand, everyone has their given name which is super long and hard to remember, so they give themselves a nickname that they go by instead. Their nickname is sometimes an English word that they hear and they want to go by. Some of them are pretty funny. For instance, these are names of some people I’ve met: Fern, Eve, Butter, Donut, and DotCom. It is very fun. =D

My first Sunday going to church here was great. I got to bear my testimony of what I know to be true about the gospel in Thai in front of everyone. That went well. I think all the Thai people were laughing because my white accent. =) It was still pretty much like a normal church day that I am used to in Arkansas except that it was just in Thai. After church we had a big lunch in the church building with everyone it is super fun getting to know all the Thai people without understanding Thai.  Haha!

Every Monday we have a preparation day that we call “P-day” it is a day to rest from teaching, prepare for our next lessons, and we have the opportunity to do fun things and see more of Thailand. For my first P-day, Elder Steele, Sister Rogers, Sister Harris, and I went to a zoo. It was super fun, and there were tons of awesome animals.

I totally had a great week! I have been dreaming of being a missionary and doing these things my whole life. So excited to finally have it be a reality! Thanks to you all for reading my letters. I love when I get emails from you! 

Love-Elder Barron