15 AUG 2010

Dear Family,

What an incredible week it has been. I'm back in India and it is tuesday night. I did not get the chance to write yesterday, so here I am now. Again with little time. I feel bad that I am unable to find adequate time to write. It does not make sense really, I am in the office, I sit by the computer all day. There are just so many things to do. We are working right now on this new program called the simplified curriculum. I think I mentioned it before, but it includes a training meeting with all of the leaders in the mission. So right now we are trying to figure out how to bring in all the leaders from southern india and train them for 3 days. That is one of the many events we are planning for right now. There are so many things for us to do, I am just grateful each night for sleep.

Sri Lanka! What an experience. I loved every minute we spent down there. We arrived on Thursday afternoon, we took a flight down to Chennai and from there to Colombo. It was so exciting, it took me a while to realize that we were no longer in India. I would bobble my head in the usual Indian manner, and would get blank stares from the Sri Lankans. Many of the little indian habits we have developed over the past 22 months didn't make it down there. Ha for the first time on my mission when people would ask me where I came from I would say "India!" It was very strange, I could say this much. In Sri Lanka I felt more Indian than ever before. Does that make sense.

There were many miracles associated with this trip. But time allows me to only share one with you. So I selected the most inspiring missionary moment. Go figure! We spent 2 days in Negomobo visiting less active members. We went on splits with some of the brethren down there, we probably visited over 30 families. That was great, but on saturday night we rolled down to Colombo. It is about an hour south of Negombo, oh and by the way they are building a stake center in Negombo right now. Anyway we went to church in Colombo on sunday morning. It must have been the first time in 2 years that missionaries(Elders) had been to the branch. We were invited to bear out testimonies and that was fun. But after church we were introduced to a new family that just happened to be there for the first time. Their son is investigating the church in New Zealand and they found the address for our church on the internet. We met up with a return missionary sister and taught the gospel principles class together. The family of 4 were the only students, I think on a regular sunday they don't even hold the class. But this sister missionary suggested that we teach the Restoration. So we did, even President Funk joined in on the lesson and it was a great time. As we finished teaching about Joseph Smith the mother started speaking in Singhala to our sister friend. She got very excited at something she said, then turned to us and stated that this sister asked when she and her family could be baptized members of the church. Amazing. President Funk met them after the block and they organized a plan so that they could be baptized on september 4th. So how about that? The one week we go to church down there...I know that the Lord leads his children to the right place at the right time. We just need to be ready to receive them.

So that's a long experience. Sorry. But I hope that it was faith promoting, I would say it was a huge surprise but I have been on my mission too long. God is a God of miracles. My faith continues to grow stronger each day. Oh yeah, I don't know if you remember the experience I shared about Elder Shepherdson and I finding my former investigator SriNivas down in Chennai about 2 months ago. He was baptized this past sunday. Wonderful things are happening over here.

Thank you for your prayers, I love you all and hope that you are well.
Elder Tuscano