Merry Christmas from Malaysia

好久不见!

This week was definitely the strangest Christmas I've ever had, particularly in terms of weather. While it is cooler than it usually is in Malaysia right now, it's about 80 degrees. The heat tells my body it's still August, and the lack of Christmas lights and decorations here hasn't helped convince me otherwise. None the less, Christmas came. I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, and although that day has passed, please continue to share the light of Christ within you through loving words and small acts of kindness :) Here's a quick rundown of some things I did this week: Monday: I don't remember Tuesday: We met with a half Buddhist, half Christian family and got to read the story of Christ's birth with each of them. Wednesday: Met a lot of cool people who were interested in learning more about the Gospel. One of them spoke like 5 different languages including English, Malay, Chinese, German, and Portuguese. He, Bryan, recognized us before we saw him and the moment we arrived, he decided to speak to me in Chinese because he'd seen a video in the past that told him "Mormons" learn languages very quickly and go preach around the world. It was really funny, and I was grateful God helped me to understand him. Thursday: Biked for over 3 hours today, read the prophecies of Christ's birth from the Book of Mormon with a pastor from another church, and gave him a Book of Mormon. Played basketball with a ton of Chinese kids (my team carried me), and now we're teaching one of them, Justin. Friday: Had a Christmas party with a ton of strangers. A couple were from some small country next to Russia, another Belgium, others Singapore, some Malaysians, and a German family from Switzerland. Saturday: Had dinner with the Kurup family. They made us a huge American style dinner on Christmas Eve. Although it was "American" they still provided tons of rice which I chose not to include in my one American meal. Sunday: Christmas! Got to speak in church about Christ's birth and His divine mission. Afterwards we walked the streets for 4 hours and eventually found one person willing to let us share a message about Christ. Her name is Moon. When I was in the US we didn't typically knock on a lot of doors during Christmas Day to allow people family time, but here I'm not sure I saw a single house celebrating Christmas the whole time, it's crazy different.

Love you all!

Elder Wardle