It's Bulking Season...

This week was pretty good, we were able to watch conference which was really really nice. I really enjoyed Garret Gong's talk about creativity. It's a very interesting concept to think about, and he said some really intriguing things in his talk, like how "there is complete harmony between nature, science, and the gospel." I really liked that statement. But this week was also fairly full of appointments which was really nice to have. I also got a gym membership, as did a lot of other people. President Harper gave us the go ahead on this because when it gets to 40 below zero, we need a place to exercise inside. And now because we are all working out every morning, our excuse to eat food is "It's bulking season." Really we are just eating way too much, and found an excuse haha. But honestly working out has helped a lot, really a huge stress reliever. 

Tuesday: For P day we decided to hike up these mountains by the ger districts, you can get a pretty sweet view of the city from there. Later that night we met with a member who's little sister is not baptized yet. And we couldn't find the house forever haha. And their phones weren't working, so Rand had a good guess on which house was theirs. So we went with it and knocked on this ger door, turns out it was their house luckily. We taught this girl who is 8, but she has no one else to teach her, the only other member in the family is the older sister. And the lesson went super good, this girl was so attentive, more so than most other people I've ever taught. 

Wednesday: We got a pretty sad text from one of our investigators, Adzaya today. She said her parents do not want her doing any church stuff anymore and she sounded super super sad and down. She asked us if we could come pick up her Book of Mormon and give it to someone else. So Rand texted her and said that we have tons of Book of Mormons, and she should keep it and just keep praying and reading it. Thats the most important thing. So she agreed to that, and then she just said goodbye and thats the last we heard from her. It was super tough, I actually haven't been sad like this in a long time. It was really hard. But then later I taught English again. And I thought that I taught the same class every week, but this week was different. So I guess it switches every other week now. I'm not really sure. But regardless teaching went really good. Everyone was super super attentive and it made class super fun. Then afterwards we had a lesson with Myadag. We taught her a short new member lesson and then taught English the rest of the time. And that went super good too. So hopefully she can learn enough to help her out in the future. And that was all we did that day. 

Thursday: Thursday we watched the Saturday session of general conference, and it was really good. I actually was able to see the new Come Follow Me hand books for individuals. And it's a pretty sweet new program. It should help get everyone ready for church, and then continue the church lifestyle the rest of the week, which in my opinion is what it's all about. I loved how in conference they said, multiple times, church helps us to become more like Christ. This is probably a really bad analogy, but the church is like the industry or program in place that helps us to become more like Christ. The gospel is a very personal thing, it's all about our relationship with God and Christ, and then how we apply that to the world. How we help people. Treat people. Stuff like that. I don't know if this makes any sense, but it was a cool thing to see that the people speaking all said how the church is here to help us progress. All the programs in place are here to help us grow closer to God and Christ. And then what we do with that information is up to us. I don't know, I just found that interesting. But after conference we went to Naarantuul (the black market) and I met this lady who is going to make me a winter deel. She helped me buy material and was totally making fun of me because I couldn't make a choice on which color to go with haha. But I went with a grey color with a gold belt. It should look super good. Well I hope at least lol. And then after that Perry and I taught English to a lady. Rand and I met with her a lot to teach her. It was super fun, she told us all about old Mongolian stuff, and how she is going to the Gobi pretty soon. And that was the whole day. 

Friday: It was nuts today. So Perry teaches at 10:00 am. So his teaching companion came over in the morning to switch, which puts me with my teaching companion. I had to help someone get water though, so because they were late, Ponton (my teaching comp) and I were late to this lady's house. She lives way up in the mountains too. But we eventually got her water and helped her clean some stuff, but that took longer than expected, so we were late to school too. But when we finally got to school it went really well. In my second class we talked about dreams with them too. And this one girl wrote up on the board "My dream is to marry a guy with a beard." So I peanut gallery commented "well my girlfriend said she would leave me if I grew a beard." And everyone thought that was so funny and was laughing so hard over that, and then all the girls agreed that beards are gross. So I sat there trying to defend beards the whole rest of class, but it didn't work. They refused to believe they were good. It was so stinking funny though, probably my favorite day of English yet. Then I literally ran from school to the BZ. Well not really, but briskly walked. I had an interview with President Harper and it went really really well. He has really good insights and perspectives on life. So we had a really good talk about life and God and he gave me some really good advice that I will take with me the rest of my life. Just a super good guy. And after the interview, I went on my district leader split with Cox. We had a dinner with a member, and it took so long to find their house. Addresses are non existent here, so it's all "go to here, turn right, go left, look for this sign" sort of directions. Impossible. So we were walking around and I was on the phone with the wife and she said she could see us from her apartment building, so she walked us right to her house haha. So she was telling me when to turn and I just had to go with it. It was pretty funny, but we got there and had a really good dinner. And then the husband (also a member) brought out this drink called airag, Which we aren't really supposed to drink, but because its mongolian culture, the mongolian people can drink it, and missionaries used to be able to. It's horse milk. But there's another catch haha, you can look it up. But he asked if I wanted some and I told him "no we can't drink that." and then he just poured it in Cox's cup. So we took one sip from it (what you're supposed to do, and what missionaries used to be able to do, one elder went too far and caused the new rule) But the guy really forced us to drink it, so we told him just one little sip. It was pretty freaking nasty, just gonna say. So gross. But yeah, so that was an interesting way to end the night. 

Saturday: I was still with Cox, and we had this English conference to go to. It was pretty painful at some points, but pretty interesting at others. So it went well, and we got a free lunch. It was weird though, it really made me seem like a legit english teacher, and really we aren't, but we went to a conference on how to teach better. I don't know, just such a weird mission here. So strange. But I like it, it's really sweet how different it is. But afterwards Cox and I went shopping for some stuff and hungout for a while. We then taught Chuka and her granddaughter Oiyunanden. It went really well. I felt the spirit, so I'm sure Oiyunanden did too. When we took a taxi back to the apartment, I was talking with this guy and he asked me "How many years have you lived in Mongolia?" So when I told him 6 months his mind was blown. It was super nice, I have been stressed about my language recently, so it was nice to get a compliment. Then I got back with Perry at the end of the night.

Sunday: We watched the second half of general conference, and it was super good too. Elder Gay's talk was probably my favorite. Then after that we had some service with some members in the ward. They needed to dig a trench for their powerlines, so we had to dig a 30 foot trench across this ger district road, and tunnel under the retaining wall into their yard. It was honestly super fun. They just gave us some pickaxes and hand shovels and a pike, and said have fun. So we got there at 4 and didn't get home until 8. But it was so much fun. Elder Crofts was having a hay day, he reminds me a lot of Easton. I seriously can't go a single general conference though without doing yard work haha. But I loved it, felt just like working at home. 

Monday: We got up and went to the church to get a new church gate key, and that took so long. Then we got some groceries and met up with Cox and Lambert afterwards. We are going to help them with a lesson, with the girl Cox found on the bus. The lesson went really really well. And she seems super super interested, which is super cool. Pretty crazy that she was just found on the bus. Then we went back to my apartment and made some snickers shakes and hungout. Pretty nice day. 

Love you all,

Austin

Digging the trench.

Crofts going to town on the trench.  Easton would have drooled over this project. 

 P-Day hike

 This is a grocery store.  Nuts huh

 My English class. These people are awesome. 

 District Leader splits with Cox. 

 It was rough getting out of bed.  Plus notice the air filter masks. We have to wear them at night now when we are outside.  The air is horribly already.

 I got Mexican food mom.  It was so freaking good. 

 Ogden, Sorenson, Cox and me during General Conference. 

This cracks me up.