My Life:
Mood: silky/wet
Currently: sitting in an internet cafe in downtown Phnom Penh in a soaking wet twonk shirt (butt-flap included)
I'm not wet because of the rain. I'm wet because we have the best p-days ever and we all just played soccer together in a covered turf field for three hours. Just 20 missionaries doin their thing, yaknow? last week we had a meat party. i can't really explain it without a picture so here it is:
I love Cambodia.
Khmae New Year was this week! there was nobody out. nobody:
Usually this street is bumper to bumper. we didn't teach a lesson until Thursday. but the lessons we did teach were pretty cool!
Because of Khmae New Year on Wednesday we got a day to clean our houses and to some at-home work. that finally gave us a chance to rid our bathroom of the birds' nest. it was a long and hard fight, but we won in the end. we might have to go for round 2 though because i think i heard them back this morning. Then we finished the day by watching Meet the Mormons with all of the elders and sisters in Phnom Penh! super fun times! i got to see the old group again. there were a couple missing because they're out in the jungle, but it was a good reunion anyway.
Update on Om Ai: We taught him this week and when we went to his house he was actually wearing clothing!!!!!!!!!! normally he just has this loincloth towel thing that he ties around his waist. it's not very long.. i can't blame him tho because he does have some nice legs! anyway. our lesson went way good with him. he told us that when he was at the church last week he felt very good and that it was something that he should follow. cool stuff! he's also been reading and praying everyday which is awesome. I've got high hopes for Om Ai!
We "started" teaching a family last week. the mom is already a member but she has only one arm so it's always going to be a part member family even if they all get baptized. oh my gosh that was a terrible joke. she's awesome though, we've been teaching her kids for a while but her husband just started learning with us too. he didn't like us at first, but now he's learning and the lessons are going really well with the whole family. families are the best. the gospel blesses families.
The victorious river:
I took a spill on my bike this week. so that was fun! i was just riding and then i saw a stick on the road so i ran over it and one thing led to another and it got stuck in my wheel and i did an awesome nose stall. it was totally worth it because it looked super cool and i didn't really get hurt. also a guy who spoke English came to try to help so we contacted him up! super cool how life works.
i forgot to mention that everyone here wakes up super early and goes to bed super early. probably because electricity costs and they don't want to use the lights. idk. but that means that we wake up at 5:30 and go to bed at 9:30.
The nice part of Stung Mean Chey:
Everyone calls us frenchies:
New best friend:
The one and only Elder Allred:
spiritual SHPEEL: I read the talk on the 4th missionary this week. its way good. go read it. in summary it explains that there are different ways we can go through a mission or life. We can be bad and not get blessings at all, we can follow the commandments begrudgingly and get some help from the Lord but still not really grow in this life, or we can turn our will over to the Lord and make his will our will. Our will is the only thing that Heavenly Father didn't create. and so really the only thing that we have to offer to him in this life is our will.
my favorite quote from the talk is "You can't be happy if you don't want to do the things that lead to happiness, even if you do those very things."
ts super hard. i want to listen to Katy Perry and 2 Door Cinema Club sometimes. sometimes i sing them out loud. but i know the Lord will help me if i give my will to him and make my will his, which is for me to serve the people here with all my heart.
i love you all
love, elder osborne
** Note from Sam's mom -- we also read the weekly letters from Sam's companion and the following is an excerpt from his letter this week:
Elder Osborne is doing great! He's done great with the transition to being a missionary and
everything. He's doing super well with the language! This week we've shared several lessons
about Elder Oak's talk from conference regarding the different types of soil in the Parable of the
Sower. It's a difficult lesson for a young missionary to help give, just because of the vocabulary
that’s required to teach a parable about farming, gardening, and planting, but he was able to
participate and taught very well. I was super impressed!