This week's email was short, in part because it was late yesterday evening when Matthew was able to write it.

He observed, as have many missionaries before, that "street contacting don't really work. It is a lot more [efficient] to find people through the members.", attributing this in part to it being a fairly affluent area on average.

Some interesting things that have happened:

- The sole on one of my shoes came off, so I need to fix that.

- Our apartment constantly smells like cigarette smoke.

- One of my companions has been out for 17 months. He just got word that he might be able to go to his original assignment, Thailand.

- The weather has been relatively nice here; there has been a cool front, so the highs have been from the upper seventies to the mid eighties. The humidity isn't all that nice though.

- We went fishing in the Stake President's pond. He keeps it well stocked. One of the 15 fish I caught ate my hook. I snagged the fish, but the hook came off and I lost the fish.

-Our washing machine in our apartment has a leak, so it is constantly, slowly, filling. So, we have to make sure to drain the water out every few days otherwise it will overflow.

- Everyone keeps telling me that I need to videochat with my family.