10 AUG 10 letter

Dear Family,

Well, another week has come and gone. I can hardly believe I'm writing an e-mail again. I can't seem to keep track of the days anymore, monday becomes friday overnight and everything just seems to blend together. I actually like it that way. So today was a zone leaders council, we got caught up afterwards and now it is quite late and I don't have too much time to write. Sorry about that. We leaving tomorrow morning at about 4:30 to get down to Sri Lanka. Sorry Mom, perhaps I was unclear but we are going there this week. I am super excited about that, it will be my first international trip as a missionary. I hear that it is beautiful, but I don't think we'll get much of a chance to see it. The district president just e-mailed President Funk and noted that Elder Naulu and I will be visiting over 25 families on friday alone. So were pumped, you should look forward to next weeks e-mail. There have been no missionaries in that country for over 2 years now, so I expect some incredible experiences.

Last weekend was in Mumbai! I love going up there, it is always a blast. We stayed with the Branch President this time. His name is John Lee and he is the dean of a film making school up there. Remember that Mumbai is "Bollywood." So he has got the hook up. He and his wife really took care of us. We got to teach and prepare Joseph for baptism. He is an incredible young man with a rock solid testimony. He was never formally taught by elders. Only us, twice. So he developed this strong testimony on his own, with help from the members. Mumbai is a wonderful branch. They are so unified and determined to do missionary work, they take their responsibility seriously. It is mostly due to the fact that they have no missionaries, but I just get this great missionary spirit each time I go up there. That branch is going to flourish. A new American family from northern virginia just moved in to the branch. But the cool thing is they just came from Dubai. Did you know there was a stake there? I just found out last week and I was fascinated by that.

We also met a sweet referral up there. Here name is Betty, she is anglo-indian. That means Indian, with british or irish heritage. Anyway, she lived in the states before. She was married but got a divorce. While living in California she had some LDS neighbors. They really seemed to have a great influence on her, she always had a great desire to learn about the church but her husband never let her investigate. So after the divorce she moved back to Mumbai with her mother. I have no clue where the referral came from, but we got it and went over there with President Lee on satruday afternoon. It was an amazing experience. This sister was so sincere and prepared. I could just tell that she was so eager to learn more about this church that made her neighbors such incredible people. We taught about the Book of Mormon to resolve one of her concerns and the climax of the appointment was this. She asked, if this church is true and good, why is there so many bad things surrounding it? We simple asked, well is what you have heard consistent with the lifestyle your LDS neighbors had? The answer was no. When she realized that I could see a light in her eyes. I feel like she will be baptized, but not because of anything we did. It will be due to the great example set by her neighbors, and its not like they did anything incredible. They just lived the gospel. What a profound impact we can have on others by simply following the commandments and reaching out to serve others in a christlike way.

So...My time is officially run out. I sincerely apologize. I have not even had time to write Mom and Dad individually. But guess what, our mission just changed the Preparation day to Monday. So although I do not have a P-Day it would be best if you could e-mail before every monday from now on. So if you get this soon, please write me again before monday. Sorry! I love you all.

Elder Tuscano