Cold in Cambodia?

Another great week here! I am loving it more and more every week I spend in this crazy country!

Yesterday it was cold?!?! What the heck haha. We went out in the morning and it was raining, and let me tell you when it rains, it pours!!! It soaked me to the bone.  I think I could have stayed drier if I had gone deep sea diving, but it was a fun adventure. As I was biking I looked down and had goosebumps, something I never thought I would see for two years! Crazy. We even turned our air conditioning off and it was actually nice inside the house. It was a fun surprise to make the week a little more interesting. 

Here are some things that happened this week: 

• I ate some weird food: Coagulated Pig Blood (actually kinda a disappointment because it was basically red tofu with less flavor and more jello-y if that is a thing), shrimp chips which were DISGUSTING, and a lotus flower which was really weird and tasted very similar to dirt. Fun stuff!

• Good food I ate this week: They have these fried bananas which are so dang tasty I love them. They also have this drink called Ovaltine which is like Nesquick but better and they mix it with sweet and condensed milk and it is so delicious. I also love buying their Fanta here. They have green, red, orange (obviously) and blue. The blue one is DANK. I already know I am gonna miss it when I have to go home. 
• Funny stories: We teaching a family and trying to get to know them because it was the first lesson.  This naked little girl just posts up next to me on a bucked haha and just uses it casually as a toilet. That was something you don't see every day in America. Then, I was in the Phsaa (market) just chilling and this lady comes up to me and just socks me in the shoulder, way hard haha, and I thought what on earth? She proceeded to tell me that I was very tall, white person and asked me what I wanted to buy. Casual.

One of the funniest things about Cambodia to me is the fact that they ALL wear knock off clothes. Some of them are actually pretty legit. I met this guy that was wearing a CUGGI shirt instead of a GUCCI shirt haha. And there was also a guy that was wearing sneakers with Nike, Adidas and Under Armour logos on them haha. Sponsored by all 3! Legend!

The work is really coming along here and I am loving it! We have a few people that are looking good and keeping their commitments. God is good. This week I had a cool experience. We called one of our investigators and set up an appointment, to meet with him the next hour. We called the District President to help us teach and then we biked to the District President's house to have him ride with us to go teach. After probably a 15-minute bike ride we showed up to the house, only to hear the guy say that he was "busy" while he was literally sitting on his bum listening to music. I kinda thought to myself, we prepared for probably an hour for this appointment by biking, preparing scriptures, arranging to meet the District President, planning for what we were gonna say and then it all just was shut down because he didn't want to meet with us. I thought to myself, why did I come to this place, so far away, so foreign, and make so many sacrifices, just to be shut down by someone who didn't want to listen to us. However, that night I thought back to a quote in Preach My Gospel in the first couple pages, by Elder Holland that talks about the fact that we are bringing these people salvation. Sure I have sacrificed and it is a bummer when they don't accept this amazing gospel. But how glorious will be my joy if I bring, but one soul unto God, as the scripture states. I had to refocus and realize how noble this cause is. It is the cause of eternity and salvation. I was being selfish to look inward rather than being grateful that we had more time to find people who were prepared!

That is all I got. You guys back home are the best! Know I love you and I am so grateful for all the amazing examples I have in my life. I invite everyone to go read Alma 34 sometime this week. That scripture is money. And let basketball season begin! Go BLUE DEVILS BABY!

Love,

Elder Gochnour