OH crap... I'm 25

 I can't believe how old I am and not married. haha.  But I had a really good birthday. I went to this Restaurant that has an english menu and american food. Holy moly I cherish every burger I eat here.  I taught english in the morning only my 2nd graders though (which is a blessing).  Thank goodness! I love my 2nd graders so much. They don't listen that well, but their english is improving and they are adorable. And one of my classes really really loves to sings. And I love singing with them.  So we are going over colors and how to say "my favorite color is...". So one of my students who is adorable struggled with the whole sentence he said "My.... fabouuurite.... culur... is..... GREEN!". I wish I had a video of it.. it was so adorable. He did that a couple times cause he needed to practice.   Then I had zone training and one of the elders from my MTC group made me a cake... and it was really good.  Then I bought myself a cake because I wanted to get my favorite cake from this bakery.  Then we studied, did missionary work. Then came home and shorty planned (oops). Then we made french fries, my companion and sisters from another area who live a floor down from us came and sang to me. We had cake and home-made cheesy fries. NOT Healthy but soo good. I let myself go on my birthday. Haha but I am back to eating healthy or at least trying to.

So this past week I had dinner with my sponsor.  Him and his wife took the Lindfords and I to this restaurant called California.  The Linfords are a senior missionary couple, who also teach at my school. They teach 3rd and 4th graders.  They are from Midvale, Ut.  Anyway I was really worried because my mongolian is not good enough to translate and the linfords don't speak really any mongolian. But I can understand, speaking and translating is still very hard.  So I spoke in English to the linfords when my sponsor spoke and my companion translated for my sponsor when the linfords spoke.  It was very hard but we got through the night and it was so fun.  My sponsor's wife is not doing very well health wise so she is going to china for a few months. So they had a dinner with us to thank us.  I had a burger with Jalepenos... it was so spicy. I LOVED IT. I haven't had anything spicy for sooo long.  My poor companion got the same thing as me. I don't think she has every eaten a jalapeno before because it was too spicy for her. She didn't know it was spicy. Which I am confused at because the menu was in mongolian and English.  But she took off the jalepenos and it was alright.

So this next week are going to have 3 baptism!! Holy-Ray, bowthgan (I don't remember what it means)-nice, and urungaa (sorry I don't know the translation). I'm so happy for them. They are really my companions' investigators, who has been teaching them for 4 months. Bothgansaxhun's husband died from something. He was a police officer, so i think it has something to do with that but we are not sure. But she has been wanting to get baptized really bad, she had to have an interview with someone from the mission presidency.  So she finally had her interview last week and will be baptized on Friday. I'm so thankful I had the chance to teach her. She is really humble and a good example.  The next woman is Aryon-toya. She has been an investigator for 2 years! She understand really slowly. We don't know what, but something is not right in her mind. But she is amazing! She always goes to church and is so happy to serve others and be involved at church. She has such a humble spirit.

This week we ended up doing service for this less active woman. Her name is hobdzaya... her husband is deployed and her daughter is 3 years old. OH MY GOODNESS. Her daughter is sooo adorable.  She is so ADHD but so fun. She sung for me... hopefully I can send you guys the video.  But Hobdzaya i guess stopped going to church a few months ago. But after we taught her and peeled off paint of her walls she came to church.  I think we will keep meeting with her.  I get the sense that she is going through a hard time.

This week I am still learning about charity. haha I need to be better. But charity is a gift from our Heavenly Father. We will not merely gain charity through just praying for it or tying with our own efforts to get it.  Charity is only given to those who truly try to exemplify Christ.  "That man is most truly great who is most Christlike. What you sincerely in your heart think of Christ will determine what you are, will largely determine what your acts will be. … By choosing him as our ideal, we create within ourselves a desire to be like him, to have fellowship with him” (David O. McKay, in Conference Report, Apr. 1951, 93, 98). If you think about Him long enough, you will begin to act like Him. If you act like Him long enough, you’ll truly become like Him."  So we will only gain charity if we are thinking about how Christ would do things all day. That is truly a very hard task.  But to be a good missionary charity/love is required.  In Alma 7 or 8, i think, Alma is preaching and is depressed for the wicked people. He wants them to have the gospel so bad. He had pure charity for the welfare of other souls.  Also, in Bendar's talk "Character of Christ" he said "Christ is an anonymous giver, you will go your whole life trying to find all the gifts that he has given us"... or something to that effect.

Anyway go read Character of Christ... best talk ever.

Well family love you stay safe and healthy!

Sister Sara Eskelsen