Duck embryos, exciting announcements, & the LAST transfer!!

Hello everybody!! Well, I hope that you all had a great week over in the good old USA!:) Over here in Cambodia it was a pretty regular week in the life of a missionary!!:) I'll just give you a quick rundown of everything that happened to us this week! Monday night we went to a family home evening and it was super fun! There is this return missionary in our ward and he invited us over to his house for dinner on Monday night, so we went over with the Sisters as well and ate! He had bought this food called ពងទាកូន…which translates into baby duck eggs. It's kind of hard to explain what exactly this is, but long story short, it's a duck embryo, meaning that it's only partially developed and then they boil the egg so that it dies and then they eat it! Haha so we ate those and they’re actually really good:) I know none of you will believe me when I say that, but I'm really not lying! Ha so family home evening was a success! Then on Tuesday I had to go to Mission Leadership Conference, which is just for all of the zone leaders and sister training leaders, and that was super good! It was from like 8 in the morning till 12 so it was pretty long, but we talked about a lot of great stuff and some things that we can do to help this mission grow even more!! Another cool thing that President announced was that there is going to be a worldwide missionary training video that will be broadcast to all of the missionaries throughout the entire world! So that's pretty tight! I think that the actual broadcast date is on the 20th, but we won't be watching it till the 26th! So when we watch it I will let you know how that went!:)

On Wednesday we got to go out and meet a lot of our investigators and members and that's always just the best!:) We had one member compliment us, saying that she just thinks it's so crazy how we can always be smiling despite the heat and biking and everything else! So that made us smile even bigger!:) ha Then later that evening we had English class and it was kind of sad because we did not have a ton of people show up, but it was also kind of cool because we had 4 non-members show up and usually our students are all our members so we were super excited to see some new faces and also invited all of them to tell their friends to come to our class next week as well! Then Thursday was a pretty regular day of missionary work! We went to this guy’s house named Pu Somnang and he is a midget and he is also really sick and can't walk by himself, but he loves to walk so we usually go to his house two times a week to help carry him around so he can practice walking! Basically we just hold him underneath his armpits to support him and then we go walking! It's a workout on my lower back because he is so short, but he is always so appreciative that it's definitely worth the sore back:) On Friday I had to teach Zone Training! So basically I just take everything that I learned in the Mission Leadership Conference meeting and teach it to the rest of my zone and also add things that I think our zone needs particular help on! It went really well! I am a solo zone leader and the meeting is 3 hours long so it's a lot of talking for me, but everyone helped participate and gave their input so it made things a lot more fun and exciting! Oh, we found out one amazing thing this week! I was in the middle of teaching at the Zone Training thing when the AP's called me! I knew that they knew that I was in the middle of teaching everyone so I figured that it must be important so I stepped out of the room to answer their call really fast and it turns out it was important! They told me that they had an exciting announcement for me to announce to the rest of my zone! They told me that starting March 1st, Vietnam will be considered their own mission!! When they told me, I just got the chills! I was so pumped! I went right back into the room to tell everyone and when I told them, they all started screaming and celebrating! It's a huge step for Vietnam to be their own mission and to have their own mission president! I think it's going to do amazing things for that country! :) So that was probably the most exciting news that I received this week! 

Saturday was just a regular day with visiting members and investigators, but then Sunday was Transfer calls!! Can you believe that it's already been a transfer!? SO CRAZY PEOPLE!! Where does the time go!? Anyway, so transfer calls came in! This transfer I was really hoping that Elder Riches and I could go one more together just because we really get along, but the problem is that he has already been in this area for a really long time! So I was nervous what this transfer call had in store for me! When the call came in, they told me that the ride for my companion and I had come to an end! I was sad, but then they told me that my new companion is Elder Bo! He is a Khmer elder and from what everyone has said about him, he is one of the coolest elders in the mission! I was super excited because I told myself that if I was not able to be with Elder Riches again, I wanted to be companions with a Khmer elder to finish out my mission! So I got what I wanted, plus he is an awesome Elder so I cannot wait! We will start being companions this upcoming Thursday! I feel like this is the best way that I could start the last transfer of my mission! I am excited for all of the fun times ahead these next 6 weeks! I love you all so much and am so thankful for all of the prayers that you send my way each day! They really are felt! I can't wait to talk to you all next week and tell you how everything is! Much love headed your way from the Kingdom!!

Elder Steadman:)