7/29

I'm so excited to get to Suriname, one of my teachers went there on his mission and was telling us about his time there. We have to learn a dialect there called Sranan Tongo or Taki Taki, but we can just learn that in the field! We learned some of it during class a couple days ago and it's a mixture of Dutch language, English language and the Jamaican accent! It's fun to say but it's still hard to learn!

Also, I learned about the VanDeventer, it literally means (in Dutch) “From Deventer”, It's pronounced FanDayFenTur with a bit of an Irish accent. One of the branch presidencies heard us talking about family history and I told him about how your name comes from the Nederland and he told me about it. Now if only we could track the history!

This week was an interesting but fun one, the swelling in my face has finally stopped and I am finally back to my old facial structure again! Most of my zone (the other missionaries in my area) are flying out soon, they leave on Monday and my zone leaves the Monday after them. I wish that I could leave the same time as them, partly because we got here at the same time...but regardless I might as well make the most of my time here. The food here is interesting, I never thought I'd say this, but I miss healthy food, the better choices they have here aren't very good and the fruit here is next to plant in taste! I'm excited to get out of here because I feel trapped! My only relief from this place has been when I had to go to the doctor's office about 10 miles away but on the bright side I got to read a newspaper! I never thought I would be so excited or even really want to read a newspaper until I was old and had a rocking chair just for that occasion. Today is P-Day, which will be celebrated with a traditional "Not" Tie Draft, the reason "Not" is in the name is because the previous members of our zone were too rambunctious and the branch presidency decided to stop it. We adapted and now we whisper chant during the drawings! I've managed to avoid most of the bad ties but the worst one I've gotten so far was "the rattlesnake" the worst part about the tie was the fact how it began to shed on me! This weak my tie wasn't bad, it was dubbed, "The Dirty Mexican" because of an Elder who previously had the tie. Attached is my first "Not Tie Draft".