We could have easily just gone home early for the day.

11/24/08 Email Message

Family,

You got to stay in the Opryland Hotel? That is so cool. I think that would be fun to go there together after I get back. I’m glad Kendall’s dance team did well. I hope she had fun, too. That’s the most important part really.

Also, I didn’t really realize Thanksgiving was this week until Dad mentioned it in his email. Its hard to believe. I swear I was just at uncle Brian’s house spending thanksgiving with him and going to see the lights at temple square. Its almost like the whole year in between that thanksgiving and this one didn’t even happen. Crazy.

But I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving together. It sounds like its going to be a packed house this year - sounds so fun. Ill try not to think about Moms sweet potato casserole, but I cant make any promises. Say hi to everyone for me - especially Aunt Tracy! I hope she has a fun time in Alabama. Make sure you tell her hi for me. Let her know I love her.

On Thursday it snowed for the first time here and it was pretty rough. It was FREEZING cold, snowing, raining, hailing, and lightning. But we were still outside walking around talking to everyone who would talk to us. We didn’t really have much success because the weather was so terrible and no one wanted to stop and listen to a couple of gaijins [foreigners] talking about God. And then it started to get dark and the temperature really plunged. I don’t think my feet have ever been that cold. It was miserable. But we still had a couple hours to work so we just kept going. In an attempt to get out of the cold for a while we decided to house a huge apartment complex near where we were streeting. We climbed the 8 stories to the top and began to work our way down. Everyone kekkoed [declined] us. But then we went to the last door on the last floor that we were going to house. And the woman that answered invited us in! We found out she is Christian and she is from Myanmar. She has two kids that read the bible everyday and are looking for a church to go to. Her Japanese is not good at all, but her English is just good enough to understand most of what we said. At some points her children had to translate some of the more difficult concepts for her. We taught them about the Book of Mormon and about modern day prophets. They were way excited and seem way nice. We are going back this Sunday to teach them more. It was awesome!

We could have easily just gone home early for the day. We were cold, wet, and miserable and anything else sounded better than dendoing [proselyting]. But we knew it wasn’t about us - it was about doing our job. And because we kept going we found this awesome family. So cool!

But that’s about it for me. I love you and miss all of you so much! Have a happy thanksgiving!

Much Love,

Elder Kingsford