Dear family and friends,
Another lovely week in Thailand has flown by! We started off the week with a trip to Rayong where we did some house inspections and attended our little branch. The rest of the week was filled with office work, housing inspections, pickleball, patriarchal blessings, and lunch dates! Our schedule for our remaining weeks are jampacked with a lot of "lasts" and trying to fit in a few of those things that we would "get to before we go!"
Without further adieu, I will get straight to the pictures!
But first, we love you and miss you and thank you for your love, support, kind words, and prayers.
Love,
Elder and Sister Brady (mom and dad, grandpa and grandma, John and Shelly, and so on!)
Saturday morning, we got up and headed to Rayong! Our first stop was a house inspection with Elders Tieman (brand new missionary) and Muir (who leaves in December).
These great Elders had a clean apartment!
Elder Brady goes over the checklist with Elder Myers and Elder Pan.
Makro sells an 8 Baht Ice Cream Cone in an area that reminds me of the Costco Food Court.
8 Baht is less than 25 cents USD. The Sweet Potato flavor did not disappoint.
I did not tell John the flavor until he had actually tried it.
Sunday morning, while we were eating breakfast in Rayong, we got a call from Sister Brown and Sister De Guzman! They did not know what to do!! "Elder Brady!!!! We don't know what to do! The house started smelling like smoke and so we decided to go outside but when we opened the door, a giant snake started to come in! So we shut the door and the snake is stuck in the door! And we don't want to go near it! And we can't go outside!!" Elder Brady is over housing so when snakes get caught in doors or scorpions show up in toilets, he gets the phone calls!
And they were fine as far as that is concerned.
But since we were hundreds of miles away, Elder Brady told them to call the landlord!
Their landlord came over right away and was able to take care of the snake! All is well in Kalasin!
After church on Sunday, we took a picture with Aujima! She is leaving soon for her mission.
She gave a great farewell talk in church! We will miss her!
But we are happy for her, and she will be a great missionary!
Rayong Branch.
On the drive home, we finally stopped at this Wat that we have driven by 50 times or so! It is right next to a McDonalds and a gas station. It is so pretty and it is one of those places that we always say, "we will stop next time." This time we stopped so I could take a few pictures!
By the way the name of this Wat is the Naja Sa Tai Chue Shrine. It is actually a Chinese shrine!
I love the detail in this dragon wrapped around the column.
You must always take your shoes off when you enter a Wat. I liked what the sign above said:
"Please take out shoes!"
The Dragon!
Another view!
Stone guardian Lion.
These structures are close to the highway and so there are phone wires in the background.
I didn't like the wires in the photo, so I asked Meta AI to remove them.
The picture looks much better now!
We also drive by this beautiful structure of metal trees on our way home from Rayong. I thought I would share this with you too!
Monday morning, waiting to cross the street. This is right across from the temple. No crosswalk, no light, we just wait until there is a break in the traffic to cross!
You can find beauty almost anywhere if you look for it!
On our way out of the SeaCon Mall we saw this cute boy kicking the soccer ball!
Lunch with Katie Bunker! Pictured above: two former SkyWest flight attendants who randomly met at the distribution center behind the temple! I'm talking about us! Haha! This was a great lunch and a much needed therapy session! Thank you for lunch Katie!
This Salmon Quinoa Salad is fabulous!
But the company was even more fabulous!
On our way home after lunch! Back to the office for me!
Monday evening, we dressed down to go play pickleball. We went downstairs only to find that work was being done on the gym floor. Sadly, there was no pickleball on Monday night!
So we went downstairs and walked our "track." P2 parking garage! Here we are able to stay out of the pollution, rain, and/or HOT sun!
Donnyy Osmonnd would like to be my friend. Should I confirm or delete?
Tuesday around 11:00 am we drove across town to get hamburgers. We really wanted the Calls to try the OMNI 60 Burger! And they wanted to try it too! When we got to the shop, they were not open because they had an issue with their meat delivery. So we decided to go to Sandy's pizza place. Buy a Slice Pizza. We have been wanting to go to her shop to say goodbye to her before we leave Thailand. She is the sweet woman whose husband passed away 9 months ago. We felt it was a little blessing that the burger place was not available and we could see Sandy instead. She was so happy we stopped by.
Traffic on the way home! Ugh!!
Look who is back from BYU Hawaii! We love Airin!
Wednesday morning pickleball at the Asoke Sports Club! Tessa and Katie are from the Bangkok International Ward and they were happy to play with the old ladies from the mission office! We had a great time!
Rick did a little AI improvements on a picture of us from their visit last week.
A little construction behind the temple.
Wednesday after work, we headed back to OMNI 60 and are happy to say we made it safe and sound and there was hamburger for the Burgers! And all of the food was delicious! Happy foodies!!
The Calls are great to work with and always down for an adventure!
We are so thankful to call them friends!
After our Thursday Srinakarin house inspection with the APs and Office Elders, we took off for lunch! The cheapest mode of travel is the bus! This is an old bus with wooden floors. We are sure it was around when John was here in the 70s! The trip cost 8 Baht - 25 cents - each!
Smile :)
Elder Hanson (middle right) chats with a new friend on the bus! The guy standing up walks through the bus and collects money and hands out the bus tickets.
We went to Sizzler! We all got the all you can eat Salad Bar and it was sooooo good!
Healthy Eating!
Everybody smile! Our APs - Elders Hanson (leaving in 2 weeks) and Knapp (from John's Sister's ward in Utah!), Elder Collado (office Elder leaving in December), Elder Brady (mid bite - but he said I could go ahead post this picture - I always do this to him!! Sorry dear!!), me, and Elder Dollar (Office Elder leaving in November!!) We have known and loved these missionaries for so long now!
We stopped to cheer him on!
Friday morning Grab Ride to the Bangna Elder's Condo. We normally take the train, but we had a large box to bring to the missionaries.
The four young missionaries all ended up getting a Jumbo Pork dish!
And then I asked AI to remove the wires! 
Samut Prakan Elders Driver and Westcott did a terrific job cleaning! Way to go!!
Sneak Preview of the Marble Wat
Look who is back in Thailand! Sister Lundberg! I guess we call her Lily now!
She is with her mom and dad. We will be having lunch with them on Saturday! We love her and miss her and love that she wants to spend some time with us on her trip!
Also Thursday morning, we went online - like we do everyday - to see if there were any new names in the patriarchal blessing system. There were three new names! I quickly sent them a message on WhatsApp and asked when they would be in Bangkok. Turns out they were already in Bangkok and were leaving Saturday morning and wondered if they could have their blessings.
We were out with the missionaries when they messaged back. John took a couple of hours to decompress and get prepared for the blessings and by 5pm was ready. Fortunately, Elder Merkley (another Area Patriarch who used to live in Hong Kong) is living in Bangkok now so he was able to help with one of the blessings. John was able to give blessings to this sweet couple, Brother and Sister Porana, from India. Their lovely daughter is pictured with us here.
Look who we ran into on the first floor. Sister Vicky. John gave her a blessing a few months ago and now she calls him her "favorite patriarch." She is serving a service mission here in Bangkok.
Our Bangkok Zone Leaders, Elders Kelly and Schaffner did a nice job cleaning!
After the house inspection we met up with the Samut Prakan Elders for lunch! None of these Elders had ever been to Pepper Lunch! Elder Westcott is trying to figure out what to order!
The missionaries were a little hesitant to try Pepper Lunch, but it ended up being a hit!
It is always fun to hang out with these dedicated young men! Pictured above clockwise: Elder Driver (this is his 3rd transfer - from Australia), Elder Shaffner (leaving soon!), Elder Kelly (midway through his mission), Elder Westcott (former Rayong Branch President and also leaving soon!)!
After lunch ice cream cone from Mixue!
On our walk back to the train, we could see fish jumping in the klong!
So, I zoomed in a bit.
Friday evening after work, Sister Merkley and I headed to Phra Ram 9 to get Thai Massages. She is new to Bangkok, so I needed to show her the best local place to go! After the massages, we headed to the grocery store. I told her I like to get a Thai massage at least one time (and often two times) a week.
She thought she might need one once a day!
I will definitely miss 200 Baht Thai massages when we leave Thailand!
On my way back home, I saw this movie set filming in front of the temple.
From what I understand, they are filming something in connection with the anniversary of the translation of the Book of Mormon into Thai or perhaps the dedication to the sharing of the gospel. I am not sure exactly what, but hope to find out someday!
Pictured clockwise: Elder Stauffer, an unknown west mission Elder, Elder and Sister Brady standing, Elders Westcott and Muir also standing, Elders Fairey, Wright, and Richards
This is a throwback to our time in the MTC. This picture is likely in Blog Post - Letter 1 or maybe Letter 2! On this day, a fabulous group of Elders walked up to a random Senior Couple (us) at dinner time. They said, "do you mind if we sit here?" John responded "Yes! But you will have to talk to us!" They said, "Sure!!" Our first question was, "where are you going to be serving?" They responded, "Thailand Bangkok East Mission!" We were so surprised, and excitedly said, "That is our mission too!!!" I look at this picture and can't believe that was almost two years ago. We had no idea at that time how much we would come to know and grow to love these young missionaries! We have been with them for much of their mission. All of them have served in Bangkok at one time or another. We have inspected their houses, we have gone to lunch with them where we have heard their stories, miracles, and testimonies, and Elder Brady has helped them with housing and bicycles issues countless times! We love them so much. It is hard not to get teary just looking at this picture. These missionaries will finish their missions about 10 days after we finish. Where did the time go?
Well, that concludes this week's blog. It is actually Saturday morning now, so I will throw in a couple of sneak previews of next week's blog. We just got back from a senior missionary excursion this morning and I will have lots of pictures next week of the beautiful Wats we saw. Come back next week for more!
Saturday morning - Senior Missionary Field Trip!
Come back next week for all of the details!
Thanks for reading!
We love you!
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