From Jon 1/3/09

Subject: Zoo siab xyoo tshiab

Nyob zoo os!

Well, here we are at a year that is not the one it was. It is indeed the one numbered one higher.

We've been having a good mix of all sorts of weather, which keeps things interesting.

We've also been having a good mix of various illness bugs floating around. My LifePaks must be helping me stave off a lot of malicious maladies.

We had a terrific lesson with Bao yesterday. We took her and her mom, who is an active member, over to a member named Xa's home, and Xa did a wonderful job testifying and teaching. Xa is a returned missionary. He served in Guatemala and had some great pictures. It turns out Bao finally called her husband, and got the go-ahead to be baptized. We set her date for the 10th---the same day as Peter. We can count on Lillian wanting to be baptized that day too, since she's been ready for a long time, and was only waiting for her mom. Peter has been having some small doubts, and I suspect he may be getting flak from some friends or co-workers. We are praying that he'll have enough faith to overcome opposition.

We are working with a less active member named Chia who is very close to becoming active. She has some pretty adorable children. Two of them, Pika, and Toki, are named after Pokemon (Pikachu and Togapi). The youngest is called "Boo", and is very silly. Toki is 9 years old and wants to come to church. I'm not sure how old Pika is, but she is interested too. So those are some potential investigators. We can't understand anything Boo says because she is only about 4 years old and is half Vietnamese, so she jabbers in Viethmonglish.

Elder Erickson is looking at classes and housing at BYU. ACK! It's too early for that, right? I was thinking I could figure all that out as soon as I got back to Utah....will it be too late to get into the classes I want? Hrmm... Did I tell you that they started the Hmong class at BYU back up again? That might be helpful in retaining the language.

I love you all, and I hope you have a smurfy year!
-Elder Moua Ying