January 18, 2010

hello again my family and friends,

i'm happy to have the opportunity to write to you, and i hope some of my experiences and writings will help you understand how things are going here for me. another week has come and gone, and now we start another. things continue to be successful, and we're planning on having the baptism this saturday. if all goes according to plan, we'll have 3 sisters getting baptized. we receive more referrals each time we go to church and things get busier, but it's well worth the time and effort.

we had kind of an unusual experience this morning. i was woken up at 4:00 a.m. this morning by our district leader. he's also from layton and has been on his mission for 16 months. but anyway, he woke us all up cause he received a call from the zone leaders, that there were supposedly threats or signs of an earthquake that was about to happen. so, me trying to stay as calm as possible, just waking up too, i got some money and a few other things and we got ready to go and stand outside to await this planned earthquake. but as time went on and we wondered if it was actually true, we received a call saying the threats were false. we had stood outside for about an hour, waiting for something to happen. luckily we were safe. the reason why we would go outside, is because we're in a 2-story building that probably would've collapsed, and it being made of cement, that wouldn't be good. so, apparently, our whole mission also evacuated their apartments. so things are back to normal now, but i guess there had been a false prophet who had made a prophesy of the earthquake to happen this morning and some people believed him. that was my crazy experience very early this morning, haha.

the past few days, my companion's sort of been feeling under the weather, but i'm sure he'll be feeling better soon. i've been seriously blessed here, with good health and i have only the Lord and all of your prayers to thank. i try to do my best to eat things that look clean and only drink the clean water, so i've been pretty fine and havent gotten sick. i'm still awaiting the day that i get malaria or typhoid, but who knows, maybe i'll get lucky and won't have to ever experience what it's like... haha that would be nice. i can only hope and pray though.

thanks for all you do for me and i'm excited for the mormon tab music to come to me. that'll be so nice to hear haha. you guys are awesome. i feel privileged to be a part of the Newbold family and to have grown up in the gospel. everyday i realize how blessed i am to have grown up in our family and in the USA. God is truly gracious and loving to me. i'm glad to hear things are going well back home. tell the family hi for me and i'll talk to you all very soon! love you all so much!

- elder newbold