2 baptisms!

hey ma. i got about two baskets full of that rice. the natives got like 6 in the same amount of time though. they're fast. there's a lot of random grass that grows up in a rice field here. you have to sift around until you find the good stuff. the people we were with kept telling me about how good the rice is at hiding. it's so funny because they have this iban tradition about the rice getting mad if you change places while picking up the rice. they kept talking about how the rice was gonna get mad at us. i love the people here. so funny. then they fed us this huge thing of curry. oh man, curry is delicious. i love the way ibans cook. (but i think the food here would be even better cooked with boneless skinless meat, but i take what i can get!) i tell you what, ive never eaten so much rice as i have here. sometimes we get it 3 times a day. i'm getting a lot skinnier, and i'm a little worried about my all rice diet. but it's pretty good so i guess i'll just see how things go for the rest of my mission. that's really cool you got to see elder anderson speak. of course no apostles come to our stake until after i leave. but it's all good. in february we got to listen to elder nelson speak and shake his hand. that was pretty cool.

so speaking of the baptism, it did in fact happen. it was really good. the lady got up afterward and bore her testimony and it was sweet. she just talked about how she knows this church is true and how happy she is to join this church. it really is a special experience to work with people and see the change, especially when the result is them saying they know this church is true. i'm excited for her. also, tomorrow we have more baptisms. this 21 year old guy and his 15 year old cousin. both are solid. i'm so excited. we knocked into the 15 year old cousin and taught him and his mother. his mother wasnt interested, but he liked having us come over. one day, he said his cousin wanted to meet with us, but normally people just want to meet us because we are white. anyways, we call him up and met him that night (which was a saturday) and he had all these questions. so we answered them. and the weeks after that he just always had all these questions and just really wanted to learn. he was happy we came, because he had been to tons of other churches before, and that week he had prayed for God to show him the true church. so that was a pretty good testimony builder. i think he's gonna really help this area out. he took about 2 weeks to quit smoking, so we had taught him everything and still wanted to meet with him. anyways, we taught him about the priesthood and his duty to help people hear about the church, and he pulled out his phone right there and called his friend. so i have a feeling he's going to be a big help to us in the future. what a fun week this was. we even got to go hack our way through the jungle with machetes. that was so much more fun than i ever would have thought. we also felled a tree. just me and my comp. now that's unity. anyways, i'm glad you and dad are having fun at home. i'm having tons of fun here, and also success! what a wonderful country malaysia is. anways, i gotta go. i'll talk to you next week. love ya!
love, zac



hey dad
that's really cool taht you got to meet an apostle. it really is an
awesome opportunity. you really can tell there's something special
about them. that's a cool opportunity for nyss. i'm not gonna lie, i
would probably be like that before i came out. but i think now i have
the guts. haha. a mission tends to do that to you i guess. so how
often do you go out and do things with ward members? because that
sounds like a lot of fun. i just think it's funny because as
missionaries we are always trying to get people in the branch to be
friends with each other. what a cool thing a ward is. an automatic
group of friends that have your same values. i remember before the
mission i didnt really want much to do with the ward other that go to
church there, and now i really regret it. i'm excited for when i get
back, just because i feel like i know kind of how to be a member of
this church now.

haha i just got your letter telling me youd like a letter. i'm workin
on it! haha
i guess ill tell you a bit about my week before i let you go. we had
two baptisms last week. a lady and her daughter. what a cute family
that is. i love them, and they really know the church is true. their
baptism was pretty sweet. they seemed to enjoy it. also, tomorrow we
have two more people getting baptized. the work here is starting to
just go. it's nice to see such visible results of your labor, even
though it's not necessary to feel like you've been a good missionary.
our investigators and new members are so solid. i really am pleased
with the group of people we have found. in kuching i remember we used
to try to round up people for church, but our group here just comes.
it's really nice. we just sit and welcome people. and we get new
people all the time. anyways, this week was really good. hacking
through the jungle, road trip with investigators for birthday party.
i'm really super happy right now. everything is going well. i'll get
pictures to you hopefully next week of the bapstisms and maybe the
trip with investigators. who knows? anyways, i love you dad. be safe.
love, zac