Christmas Week

Hello,

I don't have a ton of time this week, so I will have to keep it short. 

We had a pretty great week enjoying the Christmas celebrations. Most people were pretty busy, and there was also a branch Christmas Activity that most people went to, so it was a little tricky to find people to teach. But it's ok, it looks like we have a good week ahead of us.

On Christmas, we went to a member's house, and they fed us some delicious Chicken biryani. It was awesome. Other than that, most people were not home. Everybody goes out and parties. On the 26th, we had zone conference. We had a devotional, had some good lunch, and watched the Christmas Devotional. Sister Berrett also gave us some nice Christmas stockings with candy in them. I had an awesome time skyping with my family on the 24th. It was really nice.

Yesterday, we picked up a new investigator named Sillian. We found her by accident a few weeks ago when we were trying to find a member. She is really nice Christian lady. We were able to visit her and teach her the restoration. She is excited for us to come over any time and teach her God's message. 

The big news for the week is that I discovered that green peppers here are quite crunchy. Not as good as the ones from the garden back home, but still pretty great. I attached a video of me biting into one, so hopefully it will go through. Make sure to turn up the sound if you watch it :)

Christmas was pretty great. We had some delicious chicken biryani with some members. Santa came and I got lots of good treats and toys! I also got your second package the other day at zone conference. 

Yes, there was a "low intensity, IED bomb" which exploded in Bangalore last night around 8:30. From what I have heard, one was killed, and three were injured. It is in my area, actually just down the street. It was near "Brigade Road" which is a place that we go all the time. That's where you go to get on the metro, Mcdonald's, Krispy Kreme, and tons of other stores and restaurants. A pretty busy area. Aditia called us last night to tell us about it. Pretty crazy. We were far from that area, and I don't think we will go back on Brigade for a while. Sketch right? 

Pretty awesome about the snow. The Hincks sent me a picture from Rexburg, and they got TONS I think about 20 inches... Lucky! 

We have had soooo much fun with the disc. We were throwing it in our apartment complex the other day while we were waiting for an appointment, and all of the kids came over to play. As kids are, they started to fight over the frisbee until one of the little boys pushed his twin brother into a metal pole. Nice going dude. He'll probably have a bruise on his forehead for a little while. 

Zone conference was good. We did some study activities, and talked about ways we can use family history in our missionary work. We also had lunch, sang songs, and watched the Christmas Devotional. Sister Berrett gave us a nice Christmas stocking filled with candy, and a cool shoe shine sponge. They got one especially for me, because I have brown shoes. I got some sweet compliments on my shiny shoes during church yesterday. I didn't end up playing the piano at zone conference, because they didn't have a piano there. Weird right? You'd think that they would plan ahead for that. Oh well, hopefully I will be able to save all of those hours that I spent practicing for next year. 

I had some trouble with the internet connection, so my time is short. 

Thanks for all of your love and support,

Elder Kent Richard Thompson

Chomping down on a fresh green pepper

Bangalore Zone at Christmas

Elder Stephen teaching the Bangalore Zone

Christmas Eve Skype

Family picture

Mother and son

Father and son

Siblings

It was so good to see his face and hear his voice!

Merry Christmas!

Hello all,

This has been a pretty fun week, and I can't believe that it's already December 22nd! It doesn't feel like Winter at all. The weather has been really pleasant over the past little while. It's warm, but not hot. I like to joke around because lots of the people here wear jackets and winter hats when it's super warm outside. (They have to bundle up, because it's quite a frigid winter this year.)... not. 

We had some pretty cool adventures this week. The teaching was a little hard, because we got bunked on a ton! But it's all good, that's part of being on a mission, On Tuesday, one of our zone leaders, Elder Mangum was being transferred to Hyderabad, so Elder Grimmett and I went to their area to hang out with his companion, Elder Gottipati for a while. We visited some people, and then went to the apartment to wait for his new companion, Elder Gill. Elder Gill is super super nice and cool. It will be fun to get to know him. I've come to a conclusion that all of the elders here are super awesome. I haven't met anybody that I didn't like. We met up with our friend Aditia, and he bought us doughnuts this time at Krispy Kreme. He is awesome. We are waiting for the right time to hand him off, because he lives in another area, so different elders can visit him.

I've been asked to play 6 Christmas hymns in zone conference on the 26th. Please pray for me, because I only know how to play one of them already. I've been trying to practice as much as I can.

On Friday, we were riding our cycles to an appointment. We were hauling down a road, and Elder Grimmett was ahead of me. He jumped off this manhole cover that makes a pretty sweet jump. There was a bike on the wrong side of the road, and they collided. Fortunately, neither of them were hurt, but Elder Grimmett's new cycle was totaled. (The front forks were bent back pretty far). I was following behind, and my view looked pretty g-nar-ly. I saw him go off the jump, and then I saw a bike (and by bike I mean motorcycle) fly up into the air. Pretty crazy. Elder Grimmett was super super mad about it, but I'm just glad that nobody was hurt. It could have been much much worse.  Us missionaries just need to remember to play it safe, and think before we do something that could have a bad consequence. It's all good :)

On Saturday and Sunday, I was on exchange with Elder  Gottipati. It was super fun to hang out with him for a while. Him and his family are converts from being Hindus only about two years ago. It's super great that he decided to serve a mission even with his short history in the church. He's one of the most chill and Christlike people I have ever met. He showed me some places in my new area, because he has served here before. It was great. Elder Gill and Grimmett went to do the baptismal interview for our investigator, Mahesh.

Yesterday, after church, Mahesh was baptized. It was super great to see our investigator be baptized. Elder Grimmett did the baptism. He was definitely ready, and I could tell that it was a spiritual experience for him. Mahesh has been taught by TONS of other elders before. He finally has decided that he wanted to be baptized. After visiting him, teaching him, and making sure he was ready. The time came. Awesome. 

I've started playing the piano in just about every meeting I go to. Nobody here knows how, and none of the other elders can either. I have learned how to "wing it" when I don't know how to play a song. Sometimes, I can only play the melody line, but people are just grateful that there is somebody that sort of knows what they are doing.

I attached a few pics to the email. The first is a pretty nice sunset at the Christmas activity for the stake. (well I guess it's the district). Those tall buildings in the back are some pretty sweet apartment buildings. That's where the AP's and office elders live. The next is a pic of me and Elder Gottipati. Third is the picture from Mahesh's baptism.

Some of you have asked if people here Celebrate Christmas, and the answer is yes! There is this huge church in our area called "Infant Jesus Church". If you walk down the road that the church is on, it is crazy! There are sooooo many people selling nativity sets, christmas trees, stars, lights, everything. At least where I am, there are tons of Christian people. I think this week will basically be a huge party week. All of the Christians will party super hard, and all of the Hindus will be jealous and try to party even harder. It's kinda funny because it honestly seems like people just make up holidays so that they can party the hardest. "Happy Merry Christmas to you all" 

I think that is all. Thanks for the support of all of you. It is blessing me so much. 

Love, Elder Thompson

Sunset at the district Christmas activity

Elder Gottipati and Elder Thompson

Mahesh's Baptism

End of My First Transfer

Hello,

This was a pretty great week. It was cool to finish my first transfer, and my first planner. Elder Rees and Mckamey are getting transferred to another area in Bangalore, so that means Elder Grimmett and I will have our area and their area as well. It will be crazy because those two areas together are almost half the size of the entire Bangalore zone. We are pretty pumped! We also get the whole apartment to ourselves, which will be weird. 

To celebrate our last P-day together, we did some fun things. We went bowling, visited the Lamborghini and Porsche showrooms, and also went to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. It was amazing. I got a real American burger with real beef. We wanted to look all cool, so we dressed up super fancy in our suits, and walked there. It was pretty funny. Elder Mckamey, Grimmett, and I all surrounded Elder Rees like we were his security guards and he was a famous person or something. It was funny because Elder Grimmett and I walked in front of him, and we just walked down the middle of the sidewalk. Everybody went around us like we were a rock in a river or something. It was pretty awesome.

The other day during personal study, I read a talk in the conference edition of the Liahona by Tad R. Callister called Parents: The Prime Gospel Teachers of Their Children. There was one really funny part of the talk that I thought I would share. He said "I remember my mother, age 90 or so, cooking in her condominium kitchen and then exiting with a tray of food. I asked her where she was going. She replied, "Oh, I am taking some food to the elderly." I thought to myself, "Mother, you are the elderly." I can never express enough gratitude for my parents, who were my prime gospel teachers" That made me laugh. But it also made me remember how grateful I am for my own parents and all the things they did to help me be ready to serve here in India.

On Wednesday, we were on our way to visit our investigator, Mahesh. We were riding our cycles, and Elder Grimmett got a little ways ahead of me. When I started to catch up, I went left, thinking I was following him. But actually, he went straight. When I realized that we were separated, I didn't know where I would go to find him, so I just rode the rest of the way there. Turns out that I went the long way, and we were trying to go the short way. Oh well. I called him when I got there, and he was relieved. 

On Thursday, a young boy in the branch named Jason was baptized. He was baptized by his father. It was cool because they had us teach the missionary lessons to Jason before he was baptized. When he was confirmed on Sunday.  Elder Grimmett and I got to stand in the circle. 

We've been teaching lots of people, and giving lots of blessings. It seems like we give at least a blessing a week to people. It's cool how they have the faith to have us come and use the priesthood. 

On Friday, we were at the church and there was a hawk who got it's wing stuck in a tree. This construction worker climbed all the way up and rescued it. It was impressive because the tree had a very long trunk.

I've been teaching piano to a boy named Benjamin every Saturday. It's great. He loves the piano so much, and is willing to do anything to learn faster. Teaching piano is pretty fun, and there is a book that helps me teach. Right now, we are learning how to count and play by finger number.

Yesterday after church, I made some delicious potato soup for everybody in the apartment. It was super good. Also, I made an amazing smoothie with some fruit that I chopped up and put in the freezer. We were all pretty excited about that.

That's about all. All is well and my health is great! The mission is super fun! 

I've attached some pictures of our experiences for the week. Bowling and the Lamborghini, us trying to look cool in our suits, the burger at hard rock, the hawk, oh and we also got Krispy Kremes this week because they were on sale. And a picture of us with some of our hearing impaired friends.

Love you all,

-Elder Kent Richard Thompson

P-day bowling

Bowling scores

Lamborghini Dealership

Porsche Dealership

Pretending to be security guards to Elder Rees

An American burger from Hard Rock Cafe

Rescuing a hawk

Krispy Kremes in India

A few of the hearing impaired branch members

Ice Cream with Aditia

Looks like it was good!

Week in Indiranagar

Hello all,

Elder Grimmett and I have had a really great week this week. Here's what happened:

Our apartment got painted, so we spent most of the week in the zone leader's apartment in Indiranagar. It's about ten minutes away on the metro. It was fun to be with them. It's kind of funny because they are both American, and all four elders in my apartment are also American. It's really really rare to have 6 or even 4 American elders in the same apartment. But we enjoyed spending time together. Eder Mangum made us breakfast almost every day that we were there so that was really nice of him. 

Elder Grimmett and I got brand new cycles to use. They are pretty sweet. Vey simple cycles, but they are new and work really well for what we need. It's so fun to ride them around because we can weave through traffic really well. Whenever there is a speed bump, all of the cars slow down, and we find a gap and launch ourselves off the bumps. Whenever there is a red light, we snake our way through all of the traffic and get first in line for the green. It's pretty awesome. My cycle got a flat tire on the first day, but I found a really nice guy that fixes flats for only 25 rupees. 

Elder Grimmett bought me a coconut the other day. The guy just took the coconut, sliced off the top with a machete, and put a straw in there. It was pretty tasty.

The other day, we were on our way back to Indiranagar. It was almost 9:00 and we still had a ways to go, so we were trying to hurry. We got stopped by this super super drunk guy named Muhammad. It was funny because we were walking down the street, and he drove his car right into a pile of bricks. (He was driving really slow, so we were fine) he looked out the window with his very happy grin, and shook our hands and said that he wanted to chat a while. After making a pretty pathetic attempt to park the car on the side of the road, he came over to us and started to chat. It was hard because when people are drunk, they don't really listen to you, and just want to talk the whole time. I gave him a pass along card, so hopefully he will fix himself up :) It was also funny, because while we were talking to him, he almost tripped over a brick. He said "sorry I'm drunk tonight", and I said "yeah. I know." The smell of alcohol in his breath was so strong, that I think Elder Grimmett and I were a little bit drunk ourselves from simply standing there and talking to him. We had a good laugh as we finished our travels.

The other day, we had a really spiritual experience. We have a good friend named Adidia that we met on the metro. He doesn't live in our area, but he works in it, so we get the chance to meet with him from time to time. He texted us the other day saying that he wanted to meet up, and that he could also use a blessing. We went to Dunkin Donuts, and he bought one for all of us. He told us that work has been really rough, and his boss has been giving him a lot of trouble. After, we went to the church to give him a blessing. He told us that he has been having trouble with depression for the past few years, and has been taking medication for it. He just wanted to be comforted. All four of us gave the blessing to him, but he chose me to be the voice. At first I was a little bit nervous, because I haven't given very many blessings before. But the Spirit was there to help me. I know it was. The blessing went really well, and he felt so good after. After I gave him a blessing, he said a prayer. In his prayer, he told God that he was sorry for not believing in HIm for all these years, and that he could feel his presence during that moment. It really was an amazing experience for all of us.

One of the members, Sister Sri Davi took us to get dinner, and she also got us Ice Cream after. I got a banana split. It made me really happy to eat the banana split. Sri Davi is going to study at BYUI here in a little while.

I found a place in Indiranagar where you can get Snickers bars for 30 rupees. I may or may not have purchased a few of those while we were there... :) 

This week was so good because we picked up a few new investigators. They seem pretty interested. I took the lead in teaching the restoration to them. Also, yesterday we went to visit someone named Sirshendu, and his wife Paromita. Elder Grimmett has visited them before, but hasn't been there in a while because Paromita had some pretty intense knee surgery. We went out to their home after church yesterday. It was cool because they live in a pretty nice apartment, and they have both spent lots of time in the US, so being in their home was almost like being back home. They also spoke really really good English, so anything I said, they could understand. The lesson went really well, and it turned into a discussion because they had lots of questions. After the lesson, we just sat and had a conversation for a while. It was cool. They are super awesome people. They are also really good investigators because they are super willing to pray, come to church, and come closer to Christ. I'm excited for the day when they will have the chance to be baptized.

I attached a few pictures. My coconut, our new cycles, and the delicious banana split.

Hope all is well back home. I look forward to hearing from all of you.

Love, Elder Kent Richard Thompson

Fresh coconut milk

Elder Thompson and Elder Grimmett on their brand new cycles

An American banana split

Their Christmas tree

Christmas Decorations

More Decorations

A Christmas selfie