Happy Father's Day!

Area: Chiang Rai
Companion: Elder Omer
June 17 2013

Whats Up!

Hey, what is this it’s Father’s Day and Dad buys the girls a car; I thought Dad was supposed to get the presents?! 55 That looks like an awesome BBQ don’t worry we also ate BBQ to celebrate Father’s Day over here too. We went and ate at Sizzlers. Soo good but so rich and like high quality food we were so full it’s so different from the Thai food we eat every day I don’t think I’m going to be able to eat regular food when I get home for a while. 555

Hey so how much was the car? it’s a stick shift right? Woohoo Mikaela put her papers in. that’s soooo awesome I can’t believe it ahh! I’m so excited!! I have no idea where you are going but I can’t wait to find out!

Glad to hear everyone is doing good with exams, summer break is right around the corner. Hey Chrissy nice work on Napolean Dynamite there is a youth in the branch here that said that was her favourite movie we were so surprised she had even heard of it! Teddy looks so gorgeous for grad it sounds like it was a blast Kenny I am getting eaten out here too not a lot which is good cause there have been a couple neighbours up here that have dengue fever. Ben I bet you totally aced your exam buddy and you did it in 40 mins? That’s sick Jeana you are such a good helper.

The work is going really solid up here we got some solid new investigators this week in fact we got one this morning even and she is way good and wants us to teach her kids too. We also had branch conference and a baptism on Sunday great way to finish off the week. I love you guys so much and I’m always praying for you! I want you to know that this is the Lord's work and Jesus Christ lives and loves us.

Love you to bits!

Elder Cahoon

P.S. We found somebody selling golden retrievers this morning they were only a month old and super cute. Also we are going to FHE at a members house and her dog just had a litter of 11 puppies I will send some pics next week :D

 

Slimy yet satisfying!

Ahh! Crickets on the desk!

Our Church (I especially like the parking lot, 55)

the same cast but different story

Area: Chiang Rai
Companion: Elder Omer

June 9 2013

I Love you Guys!

I’m glad you liked the pictures! Ben and Jeana and Olivia are soo cute! Dad nice work on the sale you are so เก่ง! Haha the Crowsnest always gets the best of you! Mikaela - oh my josh! You’re going on a mission!!! I can’t wait who are you working for? What kind of car are you getting? Chrissy- You Rebel not gonna lie that sounds like a sweet day! Good luck with those exams! I am sorry about your friend this is really hard. I am so grateful for our Savior for his sacrifice for his example and for the hope that he brings into our lives. I spent all day on Saturday with Elder Mateos one of the assistants and we talked to people about Jesus Christ and bore our testimonies of him all day. It was such a wonderful experience I really want to help everybody come to love Jesus Christ their Savior and have the same feelings about him as I do. I know that Ellie is right now coming to a greater love and knowledge of her savior she is learning of all the marvelous things that he has done for her and I know he loves her so much and that he is doing all he can for her I also know that he has that same love for you and for me. I am so grateful to be out here and sharing this love and sharing this knowledge, helping people who know nothing about him come to love him and seeing their lives change. I love you Chrissy!

Teddy- you’re awesome I am so glad you are going to the temple isn’t it awesome! Awesome! 555

Kenny - Those are some very sweet experiences the joy is so sweet as we serve others and serve the Lord especially in his holy house, I can’t wait to enter into his house again. I am so glad there is one in Calgary!

Wow Sis H is awesome $60 is almost exactly how much my ukulele was ya I can defs shop around for you they are very inexpensive and very good quality like my one and right around 60 to 100 bucks so send me your order and I will see what I can do ukes are way popular over here. I don’t know how the shipping would work but if it can get it back in one piece I will try to send one back in fact I will probably buy one for myself and send it back too I really want one but I don’t want it to distract me! Sorry I don’t have tons of time left but as far as the other questions: Highlight of the trip to Bangkok was traveling with Elder Slaughter and defs spending the day in Pakkret visiting less-active members and the places I know and love. At the same time it was kinda bitter sweet it was the same but very different the same people were there but they had changed it was the same cast but a different storyline and some of the characters had fallen away and new ones had taken their place. There was a baby that was born while I was serving there I remember going to the hospital and visiting the family, he is now 10 months old and huge super chubs way cool to see but kinda weird made me go woah what happened. It was great but it made me scared to go home. Its going to be my same family and friends but everything will have changed the same cast but different story. So much change happens as a missionary you even change where you live like every 3 months but you kind of bank on some things staying the same and you are surprised as they too have changed!

Zone conference was stellar we went down the night before and the whole zone stayed at the zone leaders house. The drive down from Chiang Rai to Chiang Mai is probably the most gorgeous drive I have ever been on up in the mountains in the middle of a national park with forest and rolling mountains as far as the eye can see so tropical and so unlike anything I have ever seen.

haha Me and Elder Adams talked about our mothers adventures online she does the same stuff as you, we decided you should start a group on Facebook you could call it Mothers of the Thailand Bangkok Mission! It would probably make it easier on all of you! Um sorry gotta go!

Love you sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo Much!!!!!

Elder Cahoon

 

Pu Chi Faa What we did this morning!

I knew we should have taken that left at Albuequerque!

The wind blows hard on top of Phu Chi Fa, Yep 555

Paradise

We'll follow that trail! What trail? The trail, that we blaze!

Elder Cahoon in Paradise

Olivia's comment when she saw this picture "that water slide hurt my bum" Elder Cahoon got a laugh out of that one!

That's my Karate Kid!

Elder Thanawat

Awesome week, working hard, switch-offs with zone leaders!

Area: Chiang Rai

Companion: Elder Omer

Hello!!!

Guys it has been such an awesome week we have been working hard I got to go on switch-offs with the zone leaders we played church jeoprady for mutual we found 7 new investigators I had my firs baptismal interview, and I have laughed sooo much this week. Bo and Nuun are way funny and remind me a lot of my sisters as well Nuun is crazy like Chrissy and Bo is similar like Kenny they are cousins and act just like the girls do when they get together with Bethany the cool part is they live like 2 streets down from each other. We started teaching their other cousin whose name is Chompoo she is probably the Teddy of the bunch! She is awesome too she had sat in a couple lessons with Bo and Nuun before I had got here but hasn’t really learned but what she has done is read all the way to Mosiah on her own! Awesome!

We also got to teach a couple of Laotians while on the switch off with the zone leaders which was way sweet; Laotians are awesome! I am starting to pick up on northern a bit but I keep getting it mixed up with the Laotian I know cause its similar but at the same time very different. But in Chiang Rai they speak more northern than they spoke Essan. In the Essan, they use it more then Thai its way fun. Since we are right in the mountains there are also a ton of the hill tribes peoples and there languages are so crazy it sounds like gibberish kinda like what Thai probably sounds like to you. It’s funny Thai doesn’t sound Asian anymore it just sounds normal cause I know what it means, when I was with Elder Xaiyawong I got good at listening so now I can hear other peoples conversations even just a snippet and I know what they are saying, which is way fun especially when they are talking about you! So fun to jump into those kinds of conversations they laugh and laugh and then change to like Essan or northern and then you change too and then you laugh as their jaw hits the ground also sometimes there is someone who at least knows that we can speak and he warns them first like they can speak Thai and their like whatever and then we jump in and the one guy is always like I told you so! haha

This week we have zone conferece on Thursday so we get to take a bus down on Wednesday night and then as soon as zone conference is over we get on a train to Bangkok with Elder Slaughter and Elder Heras to go renew Elders Omer and Elder Heras visas and then we spend the day in Bangkok and get back at the crack of dawn just in time to go on switch-offs with the assistants. It is going to be quite the whirlwind week it’s going to be a hoot!

Love you all!

Elder Cahoon

เอ็ลเอร์คาฮน

The people are so beautiful and gentle and funny

Area: Chiang Rai
Companion: Elder Omer

May 26, 2013

Love you too! How are things! This branch up here is so awesome! I love it here so much the people are so beautiful and gentle and funny! The leaders are strong; there are many activities going on! It’s so nice to be in the mountains again. I didn’t realize how much I had missed them until I saw them again. The skies here are clearer too you can see more of the stars the trees are huge and so cool looking. It is so beautiful not rain foresty but gorgeous Thai style. The weather here is so much cooler it can still be hot mid-day but nothing like Bangkok and sometimes at night it’s really nice and cool like the cool season back in Warin I can’t imagine the cool season up here it might even get cold. I hear there are places where you see frost in the morning. haha khon thais freak out about that! It’s been raining every other day up here. One day it just straight poured while we were on our bikes we got soaked and when we got home and the roof troughs were like a waterfall so I ran over and stood under it backpack and all haha that rain cover for the backpack works way good!

We run the mutual on Friday night and this week we brought the scriptures to life. We split the youth in groups and gave them a scripture story like Nephi and the plates or Ammon and had them act it out, it was way fun. We gave them a demo to from Ether. The kid doing drunk Laban was absolutely hilarious! And there is a kid named Bird who I actually met as a greenie with Elder Siperly he was down in Bangkok on a school trip we went and picked him up from a big convention center and took him to church and then it turns out I moved to his branch. He was Nephi trying to woo the daughters of Ishmael, sooooo funny, he was like whats up you want to go out with me she’s like where? In the wilderness duh! Oh well what will I get if I go with you? Without skipping a beat he replies pork kababs and sticky rice 5 baht! haha we were laughing so hard! haha I don’t know if that was funny for you but in Thai it was hilarious!

We also play sports every Saturday night with the branch and for both sports and mutual we had a bunch of investigators come too! After sports night we go pass out English cards for our class at this way sweet night market. It’s a market that happens only once a week on Saturday night and I swear all of Chiang Rai goes. We passed out 800 cards in like not even 20 mins! And people like wanted the cards! Everywhere else I go nobody wants to take them and passing out 200 cards a person would take like an hour but here it’s incredible! The English class here is doing way good too there are like 30 people coming. This past week our two investigators Bo and Nuun got confirmed and received the gift of the Holy Ghost. It was so wonderful, and they brought their cousin and grandma to see it too! Bo's siblings and cousins are way cute there is this one girl Pay she is 6 and way fun her hair is always way wild and thick and black, reminds me of my sisters that and she is always beating up her brothers, and she’s not afraid of the big farangs either she will take us on! haha but she’s not mean just cute we are buddies :) So it turns out Elder Omer is a Tae Kwon Do master that’s how he paid for his mission as a Tae Kwon Do instructor he is way good, so for exercise in the morning we either go play 2 on 2 basketball or he teaches me taekwondo and we spar. Soo much fun I have never been so excited to work out in the mornings!

Elder Omer is the 3rd of 5 kids he is from Lehi Utah and he is a stud! Way humble and together we are working hard he is helping me get better at talking to absolutely everyone even when we are just stopped at the light! He is way good and is teaching me a lot! This week we had a ton of lessons fall through but all of our back-ups were recent converts and less-actives so we got to teach a lot of them this week which was way good.

Last P-day we went to the white wat it is waay cool kinda weird but really cool on the inside there were these way cool murals that had like star wars and spiderman, superman, batman, jack sparrow, ben 10, the twin towers it was way cool but the weirdest thing to see in a wat. I think that Uncle Devin and Uncle Trent would really dig it. It was pretty groovy, amazing sculptures and murals it was way sweet. Today we are going to trek into the jungle . . . on top of elephants!! It’s going to be way sweet!

I love you guys heaps and bunches and I will get on those pictures for sure!

Elder Cahoon

เอ็ลเอร์คาฮน

Wat Rong Khun, Chiang Rai, Thailand

Just a couple of gents at the loo (yep thats a bathroom)

Elder Anderson, Chiang Rai, "even writing my notes in Thai"

Area: Chiang Rai
Companion: Elder Omer

May 19, 2013

Hello!

You would never believe the weekend I just had! Elder Andersen came, I got transferred, I got a new companion, I moved to Chiang Rai, I am a new District Leader, We had 3 baptisms yesterday, I translated in church for an American member and two girls from UVU, I am learning a 4th language, I gave a member a blessing, I lost my ukulele :( . . .

We will start off Friday we had a specialized training from the Zone Leaders that night we met with that awesome family of Oom Christian and Tan they are so sweet and so prepared I love them so much, that night Elder Haughton (my phi) and his companion Elder Nirut came and stayed at our house so they could go see the apostle in the morning. Then we went and saw Elder Andersen in the morning and got a mission picture with him. I saw the Redds again they are doing so good and they said Pong and Jan and their family are doing so well they are all actively serving in the church. Elder Anderson taught us about teaching about the Saviour and helping others to come to know him. He is not this power or a figment of imagination or some important figure in history or an an unknowable God But he is our Saviour and Redeemer, Jesus the Christ the Son of God. The resurrection really happened and Jesus lives today, tomorrow and for eternity and he loves us sooo much. And he bore his apostolic witness I love it when they do that it just blows you away. Also their son served here in Thailand on his mission!

After that amazing meeting we went over to the Bang Khen church to have a mini transfer meeting and in transit I left my ukulele in the taxi. For this meeting we all just went upstairs in the church and got envelopes with our new assignments and mine was to be the new District Leader in Chiang Rai and my new companion is Elder Omer who just finished being trained. The rest of my district is Elder Huntsaker (my nong who I always use to play ball with in the MTC) and his companion Elder Thanawat who is a member back in bangbuathong I taught with him a couple of times before he left on his mission he is such a stud! Elder Vandenberghe's new trainer is Elder Nirut the khonthai elder that had stayed at our house the night before, he is going to be way good at the language he is a little stressed about having to lead the area and having to speak all Thai but he is going to do great.

Next up was a the 13 hour bus ride to Chiang Rai from 5pm to 6am it was like driving to Utah except not nearly as much fun haha but we did stop at the equivalent of Helena where we got a free buffet! We got home and crashed for a half hour before getting up and getting ready for church.

This branch is amazing they have a ton of youth and they just got 2 more our investigators were sister Nuun 13 and sis Bo 12. There are a bunch of way funny ladies and the brothers are such great priesthood holders. In sacrament meeting I translated for a brother Tomlinson who is a less active brother from America and 2 girls from UVU Paige and Carly who are over here on a volunteer program teaching English. That was kinda hard but way fun! After sacrament I gave a brother a blessing because his neck was hurting way bad. And then was in meetings for the rest of church the first one was with some of the leaders who wanted to discuss our investigators. It was nice the leaders are so familiar and concerned with our investigators and they are so willing to help I have never been in a branch like it. After that I had a meeting where I needed to translate between the American member and the branch presidency the member has hit rock bottom and needs a lot of help but they were so loving and I was also able to teach and offer assistance and share testimony with him as I was the middle man in the meeting it was really a unique experience. Then we had the baptism our 2 investigators and the other elder’s investigator it was soo awesome made me so happy. After that for the rest of the day we biked around in a rainstorm and I was able to meet several of the investigators here. Both areas here are thriving with both companionships working their butts off and meeting a lot of success the last district leader Elder Saunders is an incredible missionary with a great work ethic and a gift with the language. I have got some big shoes to fill but I am so excited to be out here.

It is gorgeous we are in the mountains and it’s a lot more forested and theres hills and elephants and the air is amazing and the weather is actually really cool by Thai standards it’s still hot but nothing like Bangkok. haha I have had like 8 people ask me if I was hal thai in one day. It was ridiculous everyone from members to investigators to people we contacted on the street. I had only ever imagined coming up north but so few elders get to serve up here so I thought no way. But I am here and its absolutely gorgeous and the people here are so beautiful and happy and chill, kinda like the Essan but in the Essan they are chill and happy but tough but here they are the same but gentle and they have their own language like the Essan its derived from Laotian as well so it’s really similar way fun learning it and speaking it with people they freak out when you speak it! I am just so excited and happy to be serving up here with an amazing branch, great members with the work progressing and 3 other elders that are way boss! Oh yeah we all live in the same house too and its way nice like really really nice and it’s got like 3 couches that are all way comfy too. Like nobody has couches but we do and its awesome. I love you guys so much I’m glad you’re having a blast in Raymond! I love what that missionary said I feel like the same thing is happening in my life that the challenges are making me that much better and as I teach and testify I learn so much of God's love the miracle that is the atonement. Personal study is always too short. Lately I have been studying in all Thai even writing my notes in Thai and it has been amazing, it kinda just started I didn’t even make it a goal I just did it one day and have been doing it ever since. I love this work I love this country I love this language I love my Heavenly Father I love my Saviour and I sure do love my family!

Elder Cahoon

เอ็ลเดอร์คาฮูน

May 18, 2013 Thailand Bangkok Mission meeting with Elder Neil L Anderson

Baptism of Nuun and Bo with Elder Omer and Elder Cahoon (also investigator of other Elders, sorry don't know his name)