Taxi Ride

December 8

The highlight of the week was our taxi ride to the airport on Monday. We should have left about 30 minutes before we did, and our taxi driver didn't want us to be late, so we ended up experiencing the craziest car ride of our entire lives. It's awesome to be in a car that is hauling down a narrow and very dark highway, overtaking a truck while another incoming truck is heading at you in the opposite direction and is only 100 meters away from hitting you... and experience that multiple times in one car trip. My companion and I were laughing as we got out of the car at how many times we almost died! BUT, we made our flight, and that's what matters the most, right? Gowda is the master taxi driver!

This weeks we did our exchanges in the state of Tamil Nadu, and at one point I even forgot where I was... I was trying to help an investigator put yourself in the place of Lehi, and told her "Imagine God told you that you had to go tell everyone in Chennai they needed to repent, or the city would be destroyed... wait... not Chennai... Coimbatore! That's what I meant to say." Haha you know you are traveling around a lot when you forget what city you are in! :P

While I was on exchange in Coimbatore with Elder Cluff we went and saw the branch president and his family. I got to help the daughter identify a scam email she had gotten claiming she had passed an interview and was eligible to come work for some hospital in California. I read through the email that she had been sent, and although it was pretty good English, I have been in India long enough to be able to pick out the grammatical errors that are particular to India, and I told her this email was written by an Indian, not an american (at the bottom it was signed by the president of the company, an american)... sorry to disappoint you sister! Good thing I am fluent in two languages - American AND Indian English! Also, in the same house I was able to successfully guess the branch president's wife's calling and age: Primary president, age 31. Props to myself for my amazing guessing skills!

Elder Cluff and I also met a new investigator, and it was the first time he had every met Americans before. Naturally, he thought Elder Cluff and I looked pretty similar. Elder Cluff jokingly told him that we are cousins. Well, later when the investigator looked through my photo album he became pretty upset, and asked us, "Elder Anderson, why don't you have any pictures of your cousin in here? Where is Elder Cluff??" haha Elder Cluff had to retract his former statement... funny stuff!

After I got back to Bangalore, a couple of the missionaries told me that I was looking a lot tanner than usual. I guess that's what happens when I get to go proselyte instead of sitting inside an office! ^_^

This Saturday morning we had zone training. We had a practice for street contacting, and I got to be an investigator. As usual, I picked the same investigator that I always use: myself, if I wasn't a member. I sometimes feel kind of bad, because more often than not, including this time, I kind of shut down whatever the elders try to say to me, to a point where they really don't know what to say anymore... I'm a strong atheist, but still a kind person. I feel bad that many missionaries really have no good responses to an intelligent atheist. I wonder myself if the missionaries could have successfully taught me if I wasn't born into the church. Really, the only thing that could convince me is the Book of Mormon. For me, that really is the convincing evidence that this whole Gospel is true. 

In the Bangalore Zone we have all of my missionary batch. Me, Elder Mangum, and Elder Singh. It's awesome to see both of them, because I can see so clearly how much they have changed. Really, they have changed a LOT. And I believe I could say the same thing for myself. That's the best part of a mission, becoming the person I've always wanted to be.