Hulk. Smash.

So some exciting stuff happened this week.  Last preparation day, when Sister Taufa and I were out in the laundry room washing our clothes, a common occurrence happened - the difference in air pressure in the house with the two upstairs doors opened caused the laundry room door to slam really hard.  We're used to this, but I had just finished my laundry so I went to go open the door again and leave.  I turned the handle... nothing happened.  I turned it again harder - nothing.  Again - nothing.  We were locked out.  When the door slammed, it somehow automatically locked us out.  I started jiggling it, etc, but nothing happened.  We had other stuff to do that day, and that door was locked.  Sister Taufa didn't really seem to care, but after 5 minutes of trying to open it I got frustrated and purposefully broke the handle.  That didn't work.  Then I took the one opportunity I'd ever maybe have in my whole life to do this and aimed my shoulder into the door and ran.  It worked, the door popped open,and I felt like I was in a movie.  The other Sisters who live with us walked in the door downstairs just as I crashed through on the second floor door.  No obvious damage to the door--it works... okay now. That's what happens with all the not super great construction here, hahaha. My streak of breaking things appears to be continuing in this apartment as well, although not too badly this time.

Another note... last night as we were planning we heard something running around in our ceiling.  It sounded big and the ceiling was creaking and I was concerned whatever it was was about to fall through and eat us.  Okay, "concerned" really means that I and Sister Taufa ran out of our room screaming and finished up our planning in the hallway.  It sounded like it was probably a big rat like they have here.

For one of our investigators who has a problem with chain smoking, we decided to do the addiction recovery plan the Church came out with based on the program of Alcoholics anonymous.  As we started, Sister Taufa and I decided to give something up too while our investigator is overcoming his addiction.  I gave up chocolate.  I'm not going to eat any until our investigator stops smoking... or, perhaps, until I get transferred and I don't know if he's stopped or not.  However, 2 weeks without chocolate in any form now.  Success.  Sister Taufa gave up soft drinks.We're excited for his willingness to change his life, although he's been smoking for a very long time.

Everyone here has started calling me "Foreinai,"  especially in our new area the Elders just gave us.  There's some show here called that where they have foreigners read stuff or sing stuff or do Filipino things or in Tagalog for entertainment.  One random man came up to us, read my nametag one day, and said in Tagalog, "You should go on Foregnai."  And walked away.  The more popular that show gets, the more I'm probably going to get that yelled at me as we walk around.

Hey.  You all are the best.  I love you and stay awesome!  Keep it cool... it's about 90 degrees here every day and you have snow in Virginia.  

Love,

Sister Larsen

This is a ward missionary and I.   I bought a skirt that matches a dress she had, and I told her to wear it so we'd be matching.