Referrals Galore, Grease, and Agency . . .

Another exciting week! I question my ability to convey why missionary life is so great within the confines of an email, but here are a few highlights from this past few days:

-Last Wednesday, I had my last opportunity to participate in the musical missionary group. That took me back to my last area, Zuoying, where we performed outside of the Hanshin mall. Attendance snowballed throughout the performance, and by the end there were quite a few people. The mission office has made it known that over the course of all these performances, we've received over 500 referrals (which means that many people indicated on the referral cards we handed out that they would be willing to have missionaries contact them)! I almost feel sorry for the poor office elders who will process it all...but not quite, because that's so amazing, and they get to truly feel the amazing-ness, right?

-Sister Frasier went home. One of my companions has already "died" on me. I can't believe it. I got to see her at that last performance, which was a great blessing. Each of my companions has made such a difference for good in my life, and it pains the heart a little to not know when I'll see them again. But of course it's worth the mini-heart pain to have gotten to be with them in the first place.

-I verified that my dear brother David has not completely lost his sense of aesthetics. He probably never knew that I was in danger of thinking so. Let me explain. I got a most excellent Christmas package from my thoughtful parents (well, I know Dad put in moral support, but Mom was probably the mastermind and grunt work behind it all). It included pictures of family, one of which was my brother with his wife. Little did I know that they were dressed up as characters from "Grease" for a church activity, complete with appropriate hairstyle. I was really hoping that was the case, but the lack of explanatory note left me a little concerned... Fortunately, on the 26th I got to call home (one of my two annual phone calls home) and was quickly reassured that it was all part of a costume. *whew*

-This week we're on an English fast (or a Chinese feast, depending on how you look at it). Normally, my companion and I speak English at home and Chinese outside the apartment, but this week it's 100% Chinese (except for English class, of course). It's a pretty cool experience, actually, and a lot less exhausting than doing it back in the MTC.

Aside from those goings on, I've been thinking about agency a lot recently. I was thinking about what it means to have freedom of choice, and I think it's more connected with knowledge and understanding than anything else. I suppose really wealthy people have more options of stuff they can buy, places they can go, activities they can engage in, etc., but the scriptures seem to talk about agency in connection with a more eternally fundamental decision: "free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil" (2 Nephi 2:27). I don't think there's any external circumstance that can affect our ability to make that choice; they only thing that we need is to know the choice exists: "God hath given unto you a knowledge and he hath made you free. He hath give unto you that ye might know good from evil, and he hath given unto you that ye might choose life or death" (Helaman 14:30-31). Something that occurs to me frequently is how circumstances are strangely uncorrelated with things like happiness, at least as far as I can tell, which supports the idea that we really do have the option to choose our core attitude, feelings, and beliefs no matter our circumstance. I fear this may be robbing me of all my excuses when I find myself complaining about anything...

Apology from the Blog Mama

I'm so sorry for failing to get information from Emily's Tuesday email up on our blog sooner! It slipped my mind.

A Cellist in Taiwan

It's been another eventful week. Due to performances by our little missionary choir/orchestra, our usual schedule was thrown into disarray (all for the best, though). While that group is off performing, my companion is on exchanges with another sister whose companion is in the group as well. On Friday, I was gone all day, because we had three performances: two at a high school, one at a stake center. I didn't get home until almost 11:00pm, which is pretty much as edgy as my life has gotten within recent memory (and yet, not that edgy because it was with permission). The stake center we performed at serves my first area, Chaozhou. Two sisters that I started teaching while I was there came to see, and brought me a Christmas card with gift. It was so good to see them again, and see that they still remember me. (SIDENOTE: Being remembered by people isn't my primary goal, because I hope their own spiritual experiences and connections with the local church members are more significant to them than I am, but it's a nice side-perk when it happens). The program is a mix of large-group numbers and smaller ensembles. One of the highlights of our performance is a jazzed-up rendition of "God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman", including tenor sax, alto sax, drums, trumpet, and jazz piano. They just sort of made it up on their own, and it's a big hit every time. I'm accompanying "Beautiful Savior" with a violinist for two sisters singing a duet. As a result of my failing to practice diligently in my more youthful youth, I'm a classically mediocre cellist, but whatever talent I have is there for the Lord to use or not use as He likes. I guess something that I've thought about as a missionary is consecration, putting everything I have at God's disposal. I suppose that can be difficult when we have a lot (e.g. a very rich person being willing to use all her money for whatever the Lord asks), but it can also be difficult when we have a little (e.g. a new missionary whose language skills aren't great being asked to speak in lessons, even though his companion can speak more fluently than he can). I think I personally have an easier time neglecting the latter case, but if embarrassment over the meagerness of our resources keeps us from using them as God asks, that's probably just as bad as keeping them to ourselves for any other reason.

On Sunday night we had dinner at the Gao family home. Using my companion's knowledge of Mexican cooking (part of her extended family is Mexican), we made fajitas. Sister Gao couldn't restrain herself from contributing to the meal, so she prepared curry. I love curry. And fajitas. Also, this family is wonderful. As we were getting the food ready, Brother Gao asked if I would especially miss home around Christmas. I said it was alright; I'll get to call home in a couple weeks. He said their home could be my home for the evening, and it came surprisingly close. It's such a blessing to associate with the members of the Church here. For all my efforts to think of ways to serve them, I always feel like I get a lot more from them than they get from me.

New Things Learned and Blessings Received

Hello from the beautiful land of Yongkang! Well, according to our apartment security guard there's no pretty places to see here, but I like it. It's not super-rural, but it's definitely not the big city either. Here are things that I've learned since I got here:

1. How to tim tam slam. Tim tams are a type of cookie, and slamming them involves using them as a sort of straw substitute to drink milk. Then the cookie gets nice and saturated, so of course you eat that as well. I've heard of tim tam slamming since I got to Taiwan, and now Sister Angulo (an-GOO-low) has finally shown me how it's done. I'm pretty sure it's just a missionary tradition, but I really have no idea where it came from.

2. Danbaofan is really good. "Dan" means egg, "bao" means wrap, and "fan" means rice. It's basically fried rice wrapped in an egg, with ketchup on top, and it's delicious. I can tell Sister Angulo will do wonders for my familiarity with local food.

3. I can write notes in Chinese! Granted, I need to use a dictionary a lot, but I can do it. Every time we stop by someone's house and she's not there, we leave a little card. My companion said we should just take turns writing them, so we do. Every card I write is a little tender mercy, considering that six months ago I didn't know a thing about writing characters.

Other miscellaneous blessings I've gotten since moving to Yongkang:

1. Seeing Sister Du's baptism. Sister Du met with the sisters for about two months before being baptized, and I was only here for the last week of that. I'm sorry that the sister who just moved out didn't get to see an investigator that she taught baptized, but I'm always grateful for that opportunity myself. She has the happy gospel glow, which is apparently a big change for her :) This is how my econometrician-to-be mind looks at it: It's a natural experiment. She's living her life, and there are certain factors which can cause or alleviate stress. Over a period of time, we observe that she has become noticeably more happy and confident. Fortunately for our natural experiment, most of the factors have stayed relatively constant except one: learning the gospel and getting baptized. Not bad evidence that there is a causal relationship between the gospel and happiness (though my sample size is abysmal...I still have a year to collect data). I guess I have that personal conviction anyway, mostly from my own personal experience and faith in the teachings that come through prophets, but it's good to see it play out in the lives of others as well.

2. We've had some really good street contacts this week--just being in exactly the right place to meet someone who is totally willing to set up with us. With just the two of us wandering around a fairly large geographical area, it's a testimony to me that God helps us find those people who want what we're sharing.

3. Playing play-doh pictionary! Missionaries are encouraged to spend some time doing service every week. In Kaohsiung, we all teach English every week, but it's good to have an additional service. We have the sweetest service activity here, which is going to a home for disabled adults and doing activities with them. Last week we brought play doh, divided them into teams, and then had them draw words out of a bag. They had to shape whatever they drew (although we let people draw until they found one they felt good about). It was so fun! They are so sweet and amazingly loving, with each other and us. I'm really looking forward to going back every week.

Moment of Truth

Hello everyone!

Now the moment of truth, when you will discover my fate for the next six weeks. Did I stay in the big city? Who is my companion? These questions were answered on Friday night, when we got the much-anticipated move call. Every transfer (or move-same thing) lasts six weeks. The mission president, his wife, and their two assistants (a companionship of elders) spend most of the sixth week each move doing the move board, in which they figure out who needs to go where with whom. On Friday night after 9:00pm, the assistants start making phone calls to notify people of their assignments (President will call if you are assuming a leadership position, which for me would mean becoming senior companion or training). We got our call around 9:45, at which time we learned that Sister Frasier would be staying in Zuoying, while I move to Yongkang with Sister Angulo. Yongkang is north of Kaohsiung, in Tainan province, and Sister Angulo is now on her second move there, but she's been in Taiwan about nine months. I packed up my things on Saturday and sent them by a moving company (which cost the equivalent of about 15USD). This morning I got up bright and early to gather up my remaining stuff, clean my bathroom, and take the train up to meet Sister Angulo. This area is definitely not as big city as Zuoying (most areas are not), but it's not as rural as Chaozhou. As I write this, I've only been here for about three hours, but I'm getting a very good vibe. I like Sister Angulo a lot (although I'm sad not to be with Sister Frasier for her last four weeks until going home...). Something that really amazes me about the missionary program is that missionaries get shuffled around among companions and places so often, frequently spending six solid weeks with someone they never had a relationship with before, and it works. I know there are problems, and every companionship has to learn how to work together, but it really astounds me how few problems there are relative to what I would predict. I guess there is a lot that can come from a common desire to do the same work, and also from a willingness to seek God's help to smooth over things that 20-something young men and women probably wouldn't know how to work out themselves.

My last week in Zuoying was a miracle week. It honestly felt like the windows of heaven opened up and dumped on us. We set a baptismal date with one of our investigators, we found several less-active members (one of whom came to church for the first time in years!), we were blessed with some amazing new investigators, not to mention lesson after lesson with a huge powerful Spirit. I'm still not sure if every lesson should feel that way (i.e. would perfect missionaries feel that every time they taught?), or if it is saved for special circumstances and needs, but we sure got a lot of it this week. I think one of the reasons that missionaries are so young is so that, if we are willing to be realistic, we'll know we cannot possibly give ourselves the credit for the blessings and miracles that happen. There's a scripture in the Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 15:17 that prophesies: ". . . it shall come by way of the Gentiles, that the Lord may show his power unto the Gentiles. . ." I think it's very interesting that the Lord uses the Gentiles as an instrument to do His work so that they themselves can see his power. The instrument learns in the process that it is not responsible for the work. That's what missionary work feels like to me.

Invitations

It has been quite the week. It feels like a lot has happened, even though I suppose it's mostly all within the business-as-usual categories of missionary work. I think we've seen a lot of miracles and blessings in our work this week. For starters, we met three less-active members who said they would come to church on Sunday. One is a mother who apparently just got out of the habit of coming, another is a college student who was baptized when she was 16, and the last is a woman who is vegetarian and feels bad about not eating meat at church activities. Every week we visit some less active members, and most of them do not come to church the following Sunday, so it's especially exciting to see the ones who do come. Another less-active sister that we visited this week felt like she couldn't come because she needs to be making sales. She is an older widow. She used to run a nursery, but the economy recently has made it less likely for parents to pay someone else to take care of their children. Now she sits in front of her house selling cell phone covers. I hope she can make ends meet, because her house is far from a prime location for finding cell-phone-cover seeking people.

We also set a baptismal date with one of our investigators, and we have another who wants to set a date with us this week :) Setting a baptismal date means that we invite an investigator to set a goal--a date by which they will try to prepare themselves for baptism. To be prepared for baptism, they need to have a personal conviction of some basic principles of the gospel (i.e. God is our Heavenly Father, Christ is our Savior, the gospel of Jesus Christ was restored through Joseph Smith and is led by a prophet today), be willing to repent of their sins and live life in accordance with the laws and commandments of the gospel, and have a desire to continue doing that and to take upon themselves the name of Christ. They need to attend several consecutive sacrament meetings, and be living commandments such as the Word of Wisdom and law of chastity. It's not unusual at all to set baptismal dates before all these requirements are met, but then the missionaries help the investigators learn and plan what they need to do in order to meet the requirements by the baptismal goal. So that's what we'll be doing with these two sisters in the next little while, and hopefully they can both be baptized next transfer. I would be extremely excited for both of them, especially because after baptism they would receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, and be able to have His constant companionship. I know from my personal experience that always having the Holy Ghost is the way to get all the peace, guidance, and protection that I need to be happy, so it's wonderful to see others enjoy the same blessing.

Cool Stuff Happens All the Time

I'm doing email a little early today so I can get off to rehearsal for the musical group that the mission is putting together for Christmas. I'm not quite sure what it will be like, to be honest, but I hope I can hold up my end. I actually get to go on exchanges with my trainer, Sister Lin, for practice. Aside from moving to a new area, we are literally always with a companion; since Sister Frasier doesn't need to be at practices, we're exchanging with Sister Lin (who is participating) and her companion (also Sister Lin, who is not participating). They're coming up to Zuoying this morning, and from here we'll split off into our temporary companionships. It already feels strange to me to think of not having a companion with me all the time; I'm sure that will be an interesting transition after my mission. It will be nice to have alone time occasionally, but I know I'll miss having someone around to be excited with, disappointed with, late with, see blessings with, etc.

Speaking of seeing blessings with your companion, this week was no exception to the constant stream of little miracles. One of the tender mercies this week was a street contact we made. We actually contacted her three times in the same day, twice at lights and once outside a 7/11 (coincidence? I think not). The third time we had a little more time to talk, and she gave us her contact information for us to set up with her. On another occasion, we went looking for a church member who hasn't been to church for a very long time (probably years). When we called, the man who answered said she wasn't at that number, so we decided to go knock on the door of the address we had. When we got there, no one answered. We were just about to leave, when a girl pulled up to that very house. She was able to get us the new number for the woman we were looking for, who we got in touch with later that day. I'm always amazed at how the timing on these things works out just right; just a few seconds difference and we wouldn't have talked to the woman at 7/11 or the girl pulling up to the house. So basically cool stuff happens all the time, and I'm not sure if it happens more now than it used to in my life, or if I just notice it more often, but it's really exciting to see every day.

Last Friday Sister Frasier and I celebrated Six Day. No, Six Day is not a lesser-known Taiwanese holiday. It is the day that marked my six months from entering the MTC, and Sister Frasier's six weeks from going home. To commemorate this historical day, we used our dinner hour to eat out, plus Coldstone for dessert (yes, my area has a Coldstone in it. When I got to Zuoying, Sister Frasier welcomed me to little America--which I always thought was just an overly-advertised tourist spot in Wyoming--because we have tons of American restaurants and stores here). Time is flying.

I Love the Book of Mormon!

Time is flying by. I can't believe that this Friday will mark six months from the day that I entered the MTC (also six weeks from the day my companion goes home). Last week we had zone conference for this move, and the topic was the Book of Mormon. Focusing on the Book of Mormon this move has been pretty awesome, and zone conference just made it all the better. The Book of Mormon is amazing for too many reasons for me to list all of them. Probably the one I've noticed the most recently is something President Benson (former prophet) taught: "There is a power in the Book of Mormon which will begin to flow into your lives the moment you begin a serious study of the book. You will find greater power to resist temptation. You will find the power to avoid deception. You will find the power to stay on the strait and narrow path." I couldn't explain why exactly (except that God designed things that way), but that statement is so true. The Book of Mormon really has the power to change anyone's life, even if he/she has already been studying it for years. When I think about the people that I've taught as a missionary, those who embrace the Book of Mormon, read it, apply it themselves, etc. are the ones who get the happiness they're looking for, and who find out for themselves what is true. I was thinking about how God knows everything, and out of all the vast store of stuff that he knows, He's picked out the most precious and necessary to our salvation, and given it to us through the scriptures. When I think about that, I'm always asking myself why He decided to stick different parts in there. I haven't come up with answers for lots of parts, but it wouldn't be any fun to get all the answers all at once (also, it would certainly be too much for me to take in one batch anyway). The other interesting thing about the Book of Mormon is that it exists. I mean, there's definitely a book, and it came from somewhere. And it itself contains a method to figure out if it came from God or not, which is sincere prayer. I think it's fascinating to have a piece of tangible evidence of God's existence and doctrine AND not be required to take anyone else's word that it's true. For myself, I know that I've felt the book to be the word of God dozens of times as I've read it, and I also don't think a false book would have the power to change lives that is within the Book of Mormon. Focusing on all these things has inspired my companion and me to rely more heavily on the Book of Mormon as we teach and study, which is great. I try not to take for granted the time I have now to have the scriptures so naturally involved in my life all day every day...

Stress Relief and Dumplings

I think I've really been seeing the fulfillment of Ether 12:27 from the Book of Mormon as I've been in this area. I was thinking about to the things that stressed me out when I first got to Taiwan, and prominent among them are making phone calls and contacting outside (especially at intersections). Since I've gotten to Zuoying, I realized that I am no longer apprehensive about either one. In Ether 12:27, the Lord promises that he can make weaknesses into strengths, and I'm pretty positive that's what happened. I know I could still learn a lot about talking to people on the phone and on the street, but my fears about it basically evaporated while I wasn't looking. I think a lot of missionaries probably have similar experiences, but that doesn't make it less meaningful to me. I know that I (along with probably every other missionary) am inadequate to do what is expected of us on our own merits, but that's what makes it all the miraculous when things come together. It's comforting to see how the Lord makes up the difference when we fall short ourselves, as long as we put everything we have out there.

The last few days my companion has been a bit under the weather, so we've spent more time than usual inside, which means more time on updating records and making phone calls. I think we're both excited to be outside more as she feels better, but there are still blessings to be seen from the indoors. For example, during one of my many hours of phone calls, I got in touch with several church members who haven't come to church for a long time, and haven't been answering their phones, and was able to understand more about their situations. Information like that is really helpful for missionaries (us now and others later) trying to figure out how to spend their time, who to meet with, etc., so we'll chalk those conversations up under tender mercies of this week.

On one of the occasions when we were out and about, we went to give cookies to the ward mission leader in 10th ward, Brother Jin. He and his wife have a little restaurant food stand thing. It's not exactly a stand--I mean, it's in a building, but it's mostly open to the outside (until they bring down the doors at night), and you can see everything they're doing to prepare the food. They sell things like noodles and dumplings. We actually didn't know it was their restaurant, because they just moved there. By the time we got there, it was quickly apparent that we'd be eating dinner there. At first I had a faint glimmer of hope that we might be able to pay ourselves, but that was dashed as soon as Brother Jin ordered for us. They ended up serving us delicious noodles with thinly sliced pork, a plate of appetizer things (tofu, among other things), a plate of dumplings (stuffed with shrimp and seafood), and soup. It was basically amazing. Of course, we offered to pay, and of course they refused. By happy chance, two church members came together to eat dinner as well, so we all ate together. It was one of those nights when I felt really at home, for some reason. Plus, I love dumplings.

New Companion, New Area

Hello!!!!!!!! It feels like forever since I wrote, even though it's only been a couple more days than usual. Here are some categorized updates:

COMPANIONSHIP
I love my companion, Sister Frasier. We are very very different (I've probably said that about every companion...), but it's been so good for us to be together. We decided to read the entire Book of Mormon together this move, and it's really awesome. We read it during personal times, mostly on our lunch and dinner hour, or before personal study in the morning. We figured out that if we read about 18-20 pages/day, we'll get it done buy the end of the move. Also, Sister Frasier is a record-keeper extraordinaire (did I spell that right?). She is teaching me a lot about keeping good records and organizing things, which is really important when missionaries move in and out of areas so often. I'm doing my best as long as I'm the junior companion (every companionship has a senior and a junior companion--the mission president says which is which; typically, after someone becomes a senior companion, they stay that way until they go home) to adapt to my senior companion's style and figure out how she does missionary work and why she does it that way. So far it's saved me a lot of stress, not worrying about carrying over everything I've learned from move to move. As long as we're obedient and trying to be diligent, I figure it's a good opportunity to learn different ways of doing things. Then whenever I become a senior companion, I can figure out which parts will work best for me. There are a lot of things that all obedient missionaries will do the same, but also a lot of room for interpretation or "style", as Sister Frasier says, not to mention adjusting to the area and companionship needs.

ZUOYING
I'm definitely not in Kansas (read: Chaozhou) anymore. One of the coolest things about being in a more urban area is that there are almost always people to contact at traffic lights. I really like contacting at lights. I came up with this sweet thing for my bike box so I can always have fliers ready to handout when I'm on the street. Best case scenario we have 68 seconds to contact someone (if we get there right when it turns red), and we usually do it together.

Another huge plus: I can take out my trash anytime. It's amazing. In Chaozhou, we had to wait for the trash truck to come (at supposedly set times, but they varied a lot), and take our trash out to it as it passed. Here, our apartment has a dumpster AND a recycle bin. I love it. I take out trash all the time, and rejoice in empty trash cans.

Here we cover two church units (congregations), one ward and one branch. The church takes up one floor of an office building, above a bank. Because of the way the meeting times are, every week we just attend two sacrament meetings, and no other meetings. I sort of miss Sunday School and Relief Society, but it's like this for sisters in a lot of areas (because there are fewer sisters than elders, each companionship covers a larger geographical area).

Out with a Bang

What a week! Really, this is one of my more exciting reports, I think, and next week should be pretty good as well. This email is being written from Zuoyin, which is part of Kaohsiung. As I told my new companion, Sister Frasier, I feel like I just stepped into Star Wars. Everything seems so high tech in contrast to my previous surroundings (like this internet cafe, for example--air conditioned!). It's going to be a definite transition; missionary work in the city and missionary work in Chaozhou are reputed to be very different. Chaozhou is basically the most country area that sisters go to in my mission, and Zuoyin is near the heart of the biggest city (in my mission, not in Taiwan), so you can imagine. I'm really excited, though. I have a good feeling about this move, like it's going to be very difficult, but exactly the right thing. I also love my companion. Sister Frasier was going to the Air Force Academy before she came here. She's almost done with her mission--only two moves left. She's full of life--one of those people who tells you how she's kind of exhausted at this point in her mission as she strides purposefully down the street at full speed. I suppose we'll have things to figure out in terms of creating unity in our companionship, but at this point I'm really looking forward to all of it. Our area covers a branch and a ward, so every week we just go to two sacrament meetings.

Now, the baptism. Last week, our investigator Xia Guo Ming Yue was baptized. It was amazing. I have been so grateful for the help and support of the church members. We met with her three times this week with three different members, which was really great. Also, the turnout at her baptism was really really good. She has a grateful heart, so she always notices things that people do for her, support they give her, etc. She also loves to do things for people. She's going to be a real strength to the branch in Chaozhou. It was actually a double baptism; the elders' investigator Fan Sheng Rong was also baptized. He is about 17, and his older sister is already a member. After the baptism was performed, they were each invited to stand and share their testimonies. When he got up, he testified that he knew he had joined God's church, and he said how great it was to be baptized because he felt like all of his guilt was completely gone. I just thought that was really amazing, because how often do you hear a 17-year-old boy rejoicing in feelings of purity? The gospel really changes people's desires. His parents came to the baptism. They sort of objected when their daughter got baptized, but they saw positive change in her. Also, the elders found opportunities to serve their family, and they really supported their son in going to church and being baptized. The father says he would like to baptized someday, but he feels too busy right now because every day he's out working with his crops. We were all really excited to see them at the baptism and see how the members care about them already. On Sunday, Xia Jie Mei and Fan Di Xiong received the gift of the Holy Ghost, completing their baptism and making them official members of the church. It was such a blessing to have that experience my last weekend in Chaozhou.

"Misc." Events

Here are some misc. events from this week (why am I using the abbreviation "misc."? It is the painful evidence of my gradual loss of spelling ability due to language immersion; after much agonizing I cannot for the life of me remember how to spell the complete word.):

Noble's
Noble's is a steakhouse in Chaozhou. The Wang family took my companion and me (see I still remember not to say "my companion and I"--all is not yet lost) there for dinner last week. Oh my amazing food goodness...It was excellent. We both felt bad that they spent so much money buying us such a nice meal, but we did love the food. First of all, the steak was great. Also, there was a salad bar, complete with fresh fruit, tasty bread, and other goodies, and ice cream for dessert. Probably one of the best two meals I've had since I got here.

Getting the monkey off my back
I know, you're hoping there really was a monkey on my back, forcing me to wrestle it off or something. That's not completely ridiculous, since there's apparently a place in my mission called Monkey Mountain where you can go and see lots of monkeys in the wild. But this time I'm not talking about monkeys so much as the brown book. The brown book is the first level of the mission's language study program. To pass it off, you have to memorize vocab, teaching phrases, and scriptures for each of the five missionary lessons. Then you are tested by a leader for each lesson, plus a midterm and a final. Sister Stratford's former companion compared the brown book to a monkey that you just want to pry off you back, but you have to get it all done before it stops harassing you. I'd say that's a fairly apt description; I did learn a lot from it, but I'm happy to be on to the red book. The red book is basically a list of 1000 vocabulary words that you also memorize and pass off. It's interesting what words are included in the first 1000 Chinese words one should learn after being able to teach the gospel (e.g. "Batman"). I've heard that listening comprehension goes way up with the red book, because it broadens your vocabulary a lot :)

General Conference!!!!
I love Conference! Twice a year, in October and April, we get to hear our church leaders teach us exactly what we need at that time, and they are always so right. Conference on a mission was like Christmas. I anticipated it for weeks and was a little forlorn when it was gone. I wrote down some questions to get answered, and, sure enough, I got them all answered in the content of the talks. I even had a couple questions that I hadn't bothered to write down answered. Two of our investigators, who are sisters, went to three or four (out of four) sessions, and seemed to really like it. One of them said that some of the speakers seemed to speaking directly to her; I think every earnest listener of Conference will feel that way at some point during the talks. I was really excited for her to have that experience and feel the power of their teaching. It sort of blows my mind to hear the current prophet, Thomas S. Monson, speak, and know that he is really speaking and leading for God, just as Moses, Abraham, Alma, and every other prophet has.

Contacting

I thought you might be interested to hear some of the more common responses that I hear when we are knocking doors or contacting:

-I'm Buddhist/Daoist. (Indicating that we should therefore automatically realize that they are not interested or have no use for our message. Often this is accompanied by an indication of what neighbors are Christian, so we can go talk to them.)

-I'm already Christian. (Indicating that we pretty much believe the same thing already, so we should go find some Buddhist or Daoist person to teach.)

-All religions are the same, because they all teach everyone to be good. (A variation on this is all Christian churches are the same, except for Catholics. The Catholic church is some separate category, apparently.)

-I'm too busy.

-Oh, you're so hard-working, and you've come all the way to Taiwan. Xing ku nimen. (Still not interested, usually).

-Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou. (As far as I can tell, this is a way of politely telling us to go away. It's definitely not a way of saying, "Thank you, this is exactly what I want to hear right now.")

I'm not sure what missionaries in other parts of the world hear; I would expect some common ground, but probably some large differences as well. I don't think I've ever felt my religion lumped in with all Christian religions so freely. If anything, I think I got used to the complete opposite, so this has been educational.

Also, Dad, you asked me something about why I don't complain more about the weather in some letter a long time ago. The weather is gradually getting less hot now that we're in the fall months. Most days I do get drenched in sweat at some point, but it's not so bad, really. It's like camping: I feel like I'm supposed to be gross, or I wouldn't be doing it right, so it's almost satisfying. I still haven't decided if I prefer to be wet from sweat or nasty polluted rain...

This week I found a quote about discernment that I particularly liked:

"I believe [the gift of discernment] arises largely out of an acute sensitivity to impressions--spiritual impressions, if you will--to read under the surface, as it were, to detect hidden evil, and more importantly to find the good that may be concealed. The highest type of discernment is that which perceives in others and uncovers for them their better natures, the good inherent within them." (Elder Stephen L Richards quoted by Elder Bednar in the Dec. 2006 Ensign)

I really liked the concept of seeing the good in things as being the highest form of discernment. I believe that is much more difficult than finding the bad, at least in my own personal experience. He went on to state that we can all acquire this gift, I suppose through the usual combination of prayer and our own efforts. I think this is something that I would like to focus on during my mission, because isn't it wonderful to meet those people who help you see the good in yourself that even you didn't see before? I would like to be one of those people.

Travels, Exchanges, and Tender Mercies

It's been a pretty eventful week in terms of not-the-usual-routine things. Last Wednesday, Sister Stratford and I biked to Laiyi (pronounce sort of like "lie-ee"). Laiyi is in the mountains. It took us about an hour and fifteen minutes to get there, maybe 50 minutes to get back. The mountains here are mostly populated by aboriginees living in smallish village town things, of which Laiyi is one. It was really beautiful out there; everything is absolutely coated in green, except for the river that was running down. We saw a couple little waterfalls here and there. It's so nice to get out of town and realize you can't hear a single car or machine. It was worth being even more drenched in sweat that usual to see it all. Even with all that biking, we still haven't gotten that close to the furthest boundaries of our area (which we're not allowed to leave, except for approved meetings/activities). Most areas in my mission are not this large, because most of them are more densely populated.

On Thursday we had this move's zone conference. This time the topic was the Spirit, and especially how to invite the Spirit to be with us throughout the day during our study time each morning. It was really helpful to me. I know God wouldn't bring me all the way to Taiwan and then leave me without access to His guidance, and it's really important to me to keep learning and improving my ability to understand what He wants me to do. The last thing I want to do is come all the way here for Him without doing the things that He wants me to do, or finding the people He has prepared for me to meet. But I think most of this guidance comes through very subtle ways, and a lot of my companion and me thinking through everything before taking our plans to the Lord.

On Friday night we went on exchanges. Every so often, missionaries will change companions for a day. This has several purposes, among which are getting to find out about different areas, other ways of proselyting/teaching, etc. Sister Stratford and I took the train to Pingdong (only a 20-minute ride) on Friday night. I left her there, and came back to Chaozhou with my companion for the next 24 hours, Sister McIntosh. It was really interesting to work with someone else; a little bit of uncertainty trying to figure out how to work together in unity as quickly as possible, and a lot of interesting discussion about her experiences and what she has learned from her mission experience. Actually, I was sort of pleasantly surprised at how not difficult it was to work together. I suppose there is a lot of common ground that comes from a single purpose, a strong desire to be obedient to the same rules and standards, and a love of the same Gospel.

Sunday another typhoon came through. It didn't get here until the afternoon, at which point we couldn't leave our apartments (that lasted until Monday afternoon). Fortunately, we still got to go to church on Sunday. In my limited experience, Taiwanese people stay inside during typhoons, even if the only reason to think there's a typhoon is the news, because the weather isn't especially bad. For that reason, I was really excited to see that four of our investigators attended church with us, despite the impending typhoon! Tender mercies :)

Killing the Dead Stack

Sister Stratford and I are trying to kill the dead stack. How can you kill something that is already dead?, you might ask. Let me explain. The dead stack is old contact cards that are often found in missionary apartments. Missionaries go contact a bunch of people, and use these little cards to write down their name, number, sometimes address. If they're really on the ball, they'll make some more notes on the other side to remember the date, where they met, etc. Often, it is difficult to get in touch with people, or maybe the cards go astray, and somehow or other you end up with stacks of old contact cards. What should theoretically happen is that the missionaries try several times to contact the person. If they try a bunch of times and can't get them, or if the person says they're not interested/too busy, they can write them into a form that lists "potential investigators" (i.e. people that later missionaries could call to see if they would like to meet). Then the cards get ripped up, and the information is condensed and organized. The dead stack happens when cards never make the transition into the potential investigator form. In order to kill the dead stack, you basically have to do what the original missionaries might have done, except it takes a long time because you have all of their cards, plus any contact cards that you fill out yourselves. Thanks to Sister Stratford's super-awesome organization system, we are nearing success. Calling dead stack can be very interesting, especially cards that are a few years old. Most people just say they're too busy; sometimes they say they'll call us back (I would really love for that to happen someday). However, you never know if someone in that stack is looking for the thing you want to give them. One of the women we are currently teaching, who plans on being baptized in Octobor (Zhou Jie Mei), came from the dead stack. Killing the dead stack is just like knocking doors or contacting over the phone, and they're all sort of like a treasure hunt for the people that want to talk to you. Who doesn't like a treasure hunt?

This transfer our mission is focusing on chapter 4 from Preach My Gospel, which is titled something like "How can I learn to recognize and follow spiritual promptings?" (Preach My Gospel is a book produced by the church to help teach missionaries how to study, develop teaching skills, and present the doctrines of the Gospel...basically how to be a missionary. Members who are not full-time missionaries are also encouraged to study from PMG.) This emphasis is just what I need right now. I was studying from chapter 4 the other day, and I saw this statement on the very first page, "God loves you and all His children. He is anxious to support you in your practical and specific challenges." I think it's so great that the omnipotent, omniscient creator of the universe cares about my practical and specific challenges. Because I believe that God wants to guide me in the details of my life, I'm not afraid to pray about all those little things, and to try to apply the principles of the Gospel to any problem, however small. I have a lot more to learn about how to do that, but I think it's a great doctrine.

More Spoken Chinese with Random Photos

Blandness and Romance

OK, so blandness and romance are probably the worst words ever to describe my experience so far (virtually nothing is bland, and literally nothing is going on in my love life right now). I saw the phrase on a box of cookies at the house of a family that let us in while we were tracting (knocking doors to find people we could teach). I forget the brand name on the box, but the color scheme and choice of font indicated to me that the company was going for an overall impression of elegance and upper class-ness. I'm not sure how the word "blandness" got mixed in amid the poshititude, but I suppose it won't detract too much for the average Taiwanese person. More importantly, it was a real blessing to be let into this family's home to get to know them and see how our message could meet their needs. We're going back next week.

Last week English class got switched up a bit. Sister Stratford doesn't like teaching children, and I happen to be the English leader in our district, so I switched us with the elders. They are very good-natured, and so were willing enough to oblige. Now my companion and I team teach the middle-level group. There's a local church member (who lives here, but is American) who usually comes to teach the 5 or so upper level students. The middle level is a wide range of abilities, and quite a change from teaching the little friends (in Chinese the direct translation of "little friend" means child), but I like it. I think I mentioned before that we focus on teaching English for an hour, and then do a gospel message for 30 minutes. Sister Stratford introduced a new format that I like a lot: Break the share into three 10-minute segments, and intersperse them throughout the lesson. This integrates the share with the English, and helps keep our students attention throughout the entire hour and a half. My favorite part of last week was our 10-minute segment of teaching a primary song in English to our class. The lesson was on family, so we taught "Love is spoken here", because it's about family prayer. Sister Stratford and I wrote up the words on the whiteboard, explained some of the more difficult words and phrases, and then sang it for them. When we invited them to sing with it, we were surprised by their willingness to do so. Of course there were a lot of mistakes, but as we sang together the Spirit really came in quickly. I know my companion and I both noticed it, and some of our class members did as well; they commented that while we sang, they felt peaceful and happy. Music really is amazing. We sing at almost every teaching appointment, and sometimes we sing for people while we're tracting. It took me a couple days to get used to, but now I really love it because I think songs that are sincerely written and sung to express sincere conviction can always invite those same peaceful, happy feelings.

Transcribed tape of the lost 9/3 email

Dad had asked me a few questions in one of his letters about my daily life: just the routine of being a missionary in my first area in Taiwan.

What is my apartment like? Do other sister missionaries share with me or is it just me and Sister Lin?
It’s just me and Sister Lin in Chao Zhou. It’s not a big enough area to have more than a companionship of sister missionaries in one apartment, but there are some areas of the mission that are big enough that one apartment will have maybe two companionships of sisters in it.

Our apartment’s really quite large. It has an area for eating and an area for sitting and an area for studying, a bedroom, a kitchen, a room with a clothesline in it for our clothes to dry on, and we each have our own bathroom, which is cushy. We have a washing machine on our deck in back, and every preparation day we can wash our clothes there and hang them up on the clothesline.

Our kitchen has pretty much all the normal things, except we don’t have an oven. We have a toaster oven. And we don’t have a dishwasher. I’m pretty sure that Taiwanese draining systems aren’t equipped to deal with the kind of food particles that might end up in a dishwasher or down a garbage disposal, because we don’t have a disposal either, and we put all our food waste in bags in the freezer. Every night around 6:30, trash trucks come into our neighborhood, and they play this one song really loudly, so you know it’s the trash truck. Then if you want to take your trash out, you have to go find the truck, like go wait for it on the corner, and put it in the back. And then a recycling truck comes a couple of times a week, and it’s the same: you just take your recycling down. So we just keep our food trash in the refrigerator until then, probably because if we didn’t there’d be a lot of bugs, like fruit flies and more cockroaches. I say “more” because there are already some cockroaches, but not that many. I’ve only really seen maybe two bigger ones since I got here.

We also have an air conditioner in our bedroom which we are allowed to turn on between 9:30 pm and 6:30 am, so we can sleep with it on and the door closed. So nights are not hot, which is really nice. And we have a water filter on our kitchen tap, because you can’t drink the tap water.

All the floors are hard. It seems like every home that I can remember being in had hard floors, except I think the mission home has some carpet. But I’m pretty sure the mission home is nicer than the average Taiwanese dwelling place.

In Taiwanese homes, you take off your shoes when you come in the door, put them just outside or just inside, and then you don’t wear them in the house. We have little sandals that we wear around the house–most people do–called “tuō xié”.

How often do we have district meetings and how many are in our district?
We have district meetings once a week, and our district has four missionaries in it. Besides Sister Lin and me there’s a companionship of elders (two elders). So every week we have a meeting for an hour and a half, and we just talk about principles of missionary work. We do training, or we’ll talk about a teaching skill and then practice, a role play or something. We’ll talk about the needs of our investigators (the people that we’re teaching the gospel to). I really enjoy district meetings. We have the meetings in Chinese.

I really like them because I think that things like district meeting and zone meeting (every six weeks) and just having personal study time every day, things like that kind of give me a chance to sort of spiritually recharge and remember what I’m doing and why I’m doing it. I think just the chance to think about the underlying principles–the foundation–of what we’re trying to accomplish is important for anything, including missionary work.

And I’m also thinking about the story in the Book of Mormon in Alma 15 where Alma and Amulek are basically missionary companions, and they’ve been teaching people together, and they’ve had some really dramatic and traumatic experiences. Amulek, especially, had just recently been through some kind of drastic life changes, described in verse 16. Then it says that after he made sure that the Church was established in the area where they had been working, Alma took Amulek “and took him to his own house, and did administer unto him in his tribulations, and strengthened him in the Lord.” I haven’t gone to my companion’s house recently to have her minister unto my tribulations, but sometimes everyone needs that time, not just missionaries. And I’m glad that the system that the Lord has established for missionary work has things built in to allow a chance to recharge and to remember and just to build up our own relationship with him and with other missionaries.

What do you eat, and who fixes the food? Where do you buy it?
So far, I eat most of my meals at home. For breakfast I usually just have cereal or sometimes this kind of wrap thing that I like to put an egg and cucumber and some mayo stuff into , and it’s pretty good. Or sometimes for breakfast or for other meals we’ll have mantou. It’s steamed bread that comes in lots of different varieties. I personally like a kind that has vegetables and meat inside or one with blueberries. There are also plain ones that you can eat like that or make into a sandwich.

Sometimes my companion will make some kind of fried rice or a soup or something. Actually, I really like everything that she’s ever made, so that’s been nice.

If we eat outside, we might eat rice or noodles or eat at one of the buffet places that have lots of different vegetables and maybe some fried rice or white rice (I really like this kind of rice that has beans mixed into it), and different meat and things. They charge you based on how much you get.

Every week we go to a grocery store and to a traditional market. At the traditional market we basically buy produce and meat, and then everything else we buy at the supermarket.

New Companions, Tasty Food, and Searching Spirits

Well, today is a very exciting day for me. Even as I type my new companion is sitting next to me. I am still in Chaozhou, but Sister Lin has gone to a different area (Fengshan), and Sister Stratford has come to join me. Sister Stratford is reputed to be awesome. I met her at zone conference a few weeks ago, and my impression was also awesomeness. She trained two of my friends from the MTC, so hopefully she knows how to handle green, clueless missionaries (I still include myself in that category). It was sad to see Sister Lin go, but I know our mission president, along with his wife and assistants, prays and ponders deeply over how to rearrange missionaries. I know that Sister Stratford (Xia Jie Mei--her Chinese name) will be a great blessing to me. I've done my best to prepare for her to come, writing down names and numbers, studying a map, setting up appointments, etc. I know I'll forget where a lot of stuff is, but I'm sure the Lord won't let my human memory get in the way of his work too much.

Sister Lin and I had dinner with one of our investigators on Saturday night. There's some kind of Moon Day next week, and this dinner had something to do with that. We didn't end up having as much time to eat as Zhaojun probably hoped we could (our rules say that for meal appointments we should only stay for an hour), but it was great while we could be there. Zhaojun has a two-year-old daughter who loves to get into absolutely everything. She wants everything she can't have, which is especially fun when there are things like raw meat and hot grills sitting within reachable distance. Zhaojun's husband made some really amazing soup for us. The broth was made by cooking vegetables together, and maybe adding some spices. There was cabbage, corn, fish in several forms, and all cooked to happy perfection. *happy sigh* It's great to eat with a family, because I think everyone kicks back a little and you get to know them in a different way.

Sister Lin gave me a very sage-sounding piece of advice before she left. It probably came out sounding that way in large part because of her flawed English. Regardless (irregardless?) of the fact that I don't exactly know what she meant when she said it, it made me stop and think. She said: "Keep your searching spirit." Now, she may have meant, "Keep searching for the Spirit," but I'm going with the interpretation that I should keep my spirit searching for good things (which include the Holy Ghost). I guess I feel like I've found the source of the answers to my most basic and important questions in my faith, but that doesn't mean I've found out what all those answers are yet. I think there are so many things to learn, from the general (How can I fill my heart with love?) to the very specific (How can I help Mr. and Mrs. Sun get over their alcohol problem?). I suppose one could get worn out looking for answers all the time, but I think it would be a mistake to give in to that. I guess I believe that anyone who earnestly searches for truth long enough, willing to act on it, will ultimately find it.

Alas!

Through an unfortunate series of events, I wrote an email that then got lost. Usually I'll copy before I send, but today I just forgot. I am well, everything is as it should be.

Black Ants and Open Doors

Yesterday I ate black ants. I have to admit, I never saw this one coming, but it wasn't too bad. We were eating lunch with one of our investigators (someone studying the Gospel with the missionaries) at a church member's home. This member likes to feed foreign missionaries strange things (last time he hosted the missionaries, it was monkey). He was borderline gleeful as he pulled out the little bottle of black ants and dumped out a pile for me to season my food with. They were mostly just sort of salty, and a little crunchy. Even though they were very much dead, their little pincher things are still sharp, so that was interesting. I guess it's something along the lines of the carbonation idea (small pricks of pain to create a sensation of freshness?).

The other night we were knocking doors once again. I really don't mind knocking doors. I just expect that someone we come across will be wanting what we have to share. It's much more fun to think that every door you knock could have that person behind it, and probably makes it easier to recognize them when they do show up. One knock brought a 35ish woman to the door (she could have passed for 20, but her daughter is a teenager, so that's unlikely). She immediately invited us to come in. Their family is Buddhist, but maybe not too devout. She was hoping that we would be able to meet with her daughter to help them improve their family relationships. In the end, the daughter came down, a younger son came home, and we all spent a few minutes talking about prayer before we were able to pray together. I think it's kind of amazing that a mother would look at my companion and me and think, "Oh wonderful, these people could be just what my family needs," and then willingly share with us her concerns. It's a blessing to be in a position that invites that sort of hope and trust; now I just hope that I do what I need to do to make their trust well-placed.

Two Taiwan Photos

With Sister Lin, first missionary companion.



On the streets of Taiwan, complete with super-sweet bag and well-equipped bike (rear & front lights, Church bumper stickers, rear box, and spray paint to hide newness).

English Class

I think this week would be a good time to tell you about English class. Every Wednesday is our preparation day, which is the day we get to take care of our own personal stuff (e.g. email, letters, laundry, most grocery shopping, errands). Preparation day starts after our study time ends (10:30am), and goes until after dinner (6:00pm). Wednesday evening is English class. All missionaries in Taiwan (and probably many other countries) teach free English class for whoever wants to come. We usually have two or three classes, depending on whether or not we have help from an English-speaking church member to teach the upper level. I teach the children (and some of their parents). The first week was a little rough; I had never seen class before and didn't know how to prepare very well. However, last Wednesday went a lot better. We were studying goals and dreams (we have a little handbook with material to teach each week), so I invited everyone to draw what they wanted to be or do when they grew up, and then my companion and I helped them translate whatever it was into English. My companion is very artsy and creative. She decided to buy sandpaper for them to draw on with crayons, and it turned out really cool looking. Plus, I have some dim hope that each semi-caring student will at least be able to remember the English for his or her dream. From 7:00 to 8:00 is English class, and then until 8:30 is a Gospel lesson (but we also use English so they can learn what they came to learn). I decided we could teach about prophets using a condensed version of the Bible Joseph's story (you know, the "Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat". I personally have never found the word "technicolor" in the Bible, but I'm sure that's what they meant). I told the story in English, my companion translated to Chinese, and we got some students to help us act it out, some more willingly than others, and it was really quite entertaining. We shared about the current prophet leading our church, President Monson, and taught that he has the same ability to tell us what we need to know and do to prepare as Joseph did. I think teaching it to someone else helped me appreciate how awesome it really is to have God choose someone who can speak for him to us, according to what we need to hear. Also, when you consider what would have happened had the Egyptians not prepared for the famine according to Joseph's word, it gives that little extra motivation to take the prophet's teachings seriously. So I guess English class at its best is a place of learning for everyone involved. Since I'll be doing this every week for the next 14 months, I'll let you know what other exciting or eventful things occur...



With Taiwan Kaohsiung Mission President Hsu and Sister Hsu

Open Your Mouth

I have to admit, time in Taiwan hasn't flown by quite as quickly as time in the MTC. I attribute this mostly to the cultural/lifestyle transition. A lot of former missionaries say that the first part was a little slow, and then suddenly they were going home, so I imagine I'll have a similar experience.

The other thing that takes some getting used to (but is definitely a good thing) is thinking about other people all the time. At college, most time is spent figuring out how to manage my studies, do well on my tests, which extracurriculars I want to participate in, etc. All of this is closely connected with my desire to prepare to contribute throughout my life to my family, to society, and to God, but the immediate questions are mostly centered around my own life and activities. Being a full-time missionary involves almost full-time pondering, and then acting, on how to find others to teach, how to help those others learn the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and then apply it, how to strengthen members of the church in our area, how to help my companion, etc. The good news is that my own personal problems and emotional quandries are best sorted out and done away with when I'm doing my best to facilitate the happiness of others. I wonder if there are professionals who feel the same way (school teachers, for example).

The other thing I'm focusing on the most right now is opening my mouth. There are all sorts of great scriptures in the Doctrine and Covenants (a book of scripture, which is a series of revelations mostly received through Joseph Smith) about the importance and blessings of opening your mouth to do missionary work. There are lots of times that I need to open my mouth: when we're talking to people at a park, or in 7-11 (Taiwan loves 7-11), or when we're knocking on doors. Here's a scenario that happens multiple times daily: My companion and I are sitting at a red light on our bikes. There's a motorcycle ahead of us with a woman on it. We have approximately 60 seconds. What do you say? "Hi, I'm Sister Andersen. What's your name? Oh, great, how are you today? Wonderful. Yeah, we're missionaries. Have you ever seen missionaries before. (Light changes). "We'resharingtheGospelofJesusChristCanwehaveyouphonenumberandshareitwithyousometime?" The balance between trying to get to know someone and also give them an opportunity to meet with us is tricky. Trying to sum up the whole message of the thing nearest and dearest to one's heart in just a minute or two is a bit difficult.I'm working on it. Trying to sum up the whole message of the thing nearest and dearest to one's heart in just a minute or two is a little difficult. But the best feeling in the world is when we find someone who wants to take a little time to talk. We share a bit about our message, they share a bit about they're lives, we talk about how the message means something in their life, and they say they are happy they talked to you; you made their day better, and yes, they would like to talk to you again. So I guess it's worth a few dozen (or hundred) of the other conversations to find the one who was looking for what you have.

A Comment from the Blog Mama

Faithful readers of this blog will notice a few changes that make it clear that Emily is not and has not been the one posting messages, photos,or anything else on it. LDS missionaries throughout the world are helped in directing their best efforts to their work by a policy limiting their internet activity to a weekly email to family.

Taiwan: The Saga Begins

Ah, where to begin. I am in an area call Chao Zhou (at least, that's how I think pinyin spells it...how sad that I don't even know). It is in the southern part of Taiwan. We spend the vast majority of our time in the city, but this move we're supposed to make our way out to the mountains to poke around there. I'm really excited about that. My companion is Sister Lin. She's basically the nicest, most genuine and loving person ever. Her family actually lives within our mission boundaries (very strange, I know). She joined the church when she was 15, and was studying art in Taipei before going on her mission. She's learning English, but I think her English isn't too far ahead of my Chinese. She knows a lot more vocab, but because she doesn't get to listen to it as much, I think it is more difficult to develop her listening comprehension. She really is wonderful and patient, and speaks very clearly. This is her fourth move here in the area, her seventh as a missionary. She's been incredibly patient with me. Culture shock may be getting to me a little bit (suddenly not interacting with anyone besides Taiwanese people for days at a time was a bit of a switch). I think I've been sporadically crabby the last few days, especially when I'm supposed to make phone calls. Of course, we both have to make phone calls, because there are a lot of them to make. One of my goals for this coming week is to overcome the irrational nervousness I have about calling people. I don't understand everything, but I can actually do things like set up appointments, find members to come along, etc.

I think the Lord has definitely blessed me with the gift of tongues. I don't want to be prideful, but if I get a blessing I don't want to pretend that I don't have it. It's been easier than I expected to understand people and to make myself understood. There is still a lot that I do not understand, but it's really not too bad. The mission has a super-awesome language study program with different things to pass off. It will take a while to work through, but it helps give structure to my language study time, which I have an hour of every day.

The members in the branch here are amazing. I seriously love them, even though I forget their names all the time. In a normal week we might have 10 lessons with a member present. It's great to teach a lesson with a member there, because they will really talk to the investigator and get to know them. This is even true of some of the youth. Yesterday, Sister Lin and I taught Yaci("ya tsih"). The ward mission leader's teenage daughter came along, and was totally willing to fellowship, share her testimony, talk about how the Gospel has blessed her family, etc. Yaci is really great. She set a baptismal goal yesterday, and I am hoping and praying that she keeps it. Her family life isn't that great. They run a beetle nut store (some kind of nut wrapped in a leaf that has opium on it--ergo, against the Word of Wisdom to eat). Her mom is also our investigator.

Four of our investigators currently have baptismal dates, and one or two more who could imminently set one. We try to meet with progressing investigators once/week, and call them every day that we don't see them. Teaching with someone besides Sister Nelson takes some getting used to, but Sister Lin is really great. She gives me many opportunities to talk and extend commitments.

Tracting and contacting aren't quite as excruciating as I thought they would be. The other day we tracted into He mama (I guess that's like saying Mama He in English, but it's actually normal). He mama was inside her house with the window open, so we started talking to her. At first she just told us she wasn't interested. This is where Sister Lin is especially awesome. She'll always keep bearing her testimony a bit beyond the point when you think someone is really done with you, and sometimes it turns out really well (I've never seen it backfire into angry outbursts). Anyway, so we talked to He mama, and I shared the Joseph Smith story. She said she felt very moved. She was sort of sick that day, but we'll go back sometime. I don't know what will happen, but I just really love experiences like that, where you get to share your testimony and teach a little bit, and you know that the person feels the Spirit.

Anyway, time is out. I love you all very much!

A Few More MTC Photos

Three Preach My Gospel Versions: English, Romanized Mandarin, Chinese Characters

Three Companions: Son, Andersen, Nelson

District Destinations

Fire in My Bones

Well, it's a little difficult to believe that the next entry of this blog will be written from Taiwan. I leave the MTC around 5:30pm today, and I am so excited. There's a scripture in Jeremiah somewhere (20:19 or 19:20 or maybe none of the above...). Jeremiah was just being really oppressed and persecuted because he was crying repentance, and the people weren't taking to it very well. He says that he wanted to stop preaching, but he couldn't, because the word of God was in his heart like fire in his bones. That's sort of what I feel like, minus the being physically hounded and persecuted part. I am really grateful that I can share the thing that has brought me the most happiness full-time. I don't expect it to be particularly easy, but supremely satisfying.

This last week has been really good. Sister Nelson and I taught together for the last time on Saturday, and that was very weird. When we first started trying to plan teaching together, we disagreed all the time. We honestly did not communicate well, and we didn't understand why the other would want to do things a particular way. It always worked out alright once we actually got into the lesson, but the planning was sort of painful. Now I can barely remember what we were so disagreeable about. I honestly love teaching with her, and we've had some really amazing experiences together.

I'm a little heartbroken about leaving my district. They have really been more of a family to me. One of the elders in my district doesn't have a very supportive home. He is one of the nicest, best people I have ever met. It really tugged my heart strings when he said that being in the district had taught him what a good family was like. I mean, I'm glad to brighten his life, but sad that it needs that kind of brightening.

I wish I had more time to pour out my soul in this letter, but I really need to be going. I hope you are all well. I love letters. Remember that Taiwan has a postal service :)

Sister Andersen

Speaking Chinese

You can't post an MP3 file on blogger.com, so this is in the form of a "video" with a still picture and sound.

A Privilege to Pay

"A privilege to pay" is part of a quote that one of the wives of our branch presidency shared with us on Sunday (the branch presidency are three men, a president and two counselors, who preside over and lead our branch of missionaries, which is also our zone). She was telling us stories about Mormon pioneers (Mormon Trek, any Iowa City-ites?), and she told us about a survivor of the Martin Handcart Company. This particular company went through some really grueling trials, in great part because they left so late in the season. When one survivor heard someone comment on their experience, part of his response was: "The price we paid to become acquainted with God was a privilege to pay" (as quoted by President McKay, I think). It's really quite impressive that someone would consider a journey from Iowa to Utah, much of it in winter, which killed off a good fraction of the participants, "a privilege" because it let them become acquainted with their God. Any experience I've had to date has nothing on that, but I still think that anything we go through that brings us closer to God is, in net, a privilege to experience.

This week I basically stopped speaking English. I only speak English to church leaders, sometimes MTC employees, and to translate for other missionaries (or myself, if no one is there to translate for me). Previously, my companion and I spoke English to study and plan together, but we did away with that. I think it's a really good thing, if a little tiring.

In another slightly entertaining blunder this week, one of the elders in my district related the Book of Mormon story of the Brother of Jared seeing God's toe. For anyone not familiar with the Book of Mormon stories, it's actually the divine finger that appears. My teacher did an admirable job stifling his surprised laughter. It didn't matter too much--we all know what he meant, and I suppose seeing the foot of God would also be plenty astonishing.

I leave a week from today! I have my flight plans and everything. Thank goodness visas to Taiwan aren't hard to get (unlike the countless Latin America-bound missionaries who are hanging around the MTC or shipped off to USA missions temporarily while they wait). If anyone wants to send me mail after today or tomorrow, mail it to the Taiwan address on. That's the mission office. If it comes to the MTC after I leave, it will be returned to you, not forwarded. (DearElder.com is also an option.)

Well, that's all I have time to share this week. Thank you again for your time to read about my experiences, and especially thank you to anyone praying for me.

Much love,
Sister Andersen

MTC Day 61

Hello once again, from the shadows of the something-or-other hills I greet you (I get to watch Music and the Spoken Word almost every Sunday. I think it may be affecting my speech patterns).

Well, it is my second to last week in the MTC. Barring any travel complications, I will leave Utah for Taiwan exactly two weeks from today. Any mail that comes to the MTC for me after that will be returned to sender, so start sending stuff to my address in Taiwan sometime next week. DearElder.com does same-day letter delivery at the MTC for no charge, if you really want to make sure I get something the Friday or Saturday before I leave. Also, I think mail to Taiwan takes three stamps. You can use DearElder.com for mail to Taiwan as well, but it's not same-day. It costs 94 cents, I think.

This week got started off well as we got to go clean the temple last Monday. The church has well over a hundred temples around the world, and as far as I know, all of them get closed for cleaning periodically. I spent my Monday afternoon in the temple basement, assembling new chandeliers. It was really satisfying, for several reasons: 1) chandeliers are cool; 2) you can see the fruits of your labor instantly as you clean each little piece and hang it up; 3) it's for the temple, and I love the temple.

My companion and I are participating in this progressing investigator activity. A progressing investigator is someone being taught by the missionaries who is showing their acceptance of the missionaries' message by doing things like reading the Book of Mormon, praying, attending church, etc. Missionaries invite their investigators to commit to do those things, among others; an investigator keeping his/her commitments is a progressing investigator. Anyone familiar with my life, or any other active LDS person's life, will probably notice that we do and do not do a lot of things for the sake of our faith. Willingness to act on belief is a central concept to our religion (and to many others), so unless someone is willing to do that, I suppose he/she shouldn't join this church. Anyway, so we have an MTC Chinese teacher (I mean he teaches Chinese; he's not actually a Chinese person) that we get to teach repeatedly as if he were a progressing investigator. It's really great, because we can really get to know his situation and plan our lessons around his needs. We decided that we wanted to give him a call, because in our fictional timeline we had a day that we didn't meet with him. We told the teacher, and we actually got to call him using phones in two different rooms. I was a bit terrified to speak and try to understand over the phone, but it wasn't as bad as I thought. Granted, he's not a native speaker, but I will take my small victories as they come. It wasn't a long conversation--I just answered a couple questions he had and shared a scripture that was relevant to his situation. It's interesting how much I can care about someone who's identity is sort of fictional. But then again, we are interacting with a real person, and all people have needs, including MTC teachers.

Well, I'd better get going. As always, I hope you are all well and happy. I always enjoy letters, so thank you to all those who have written.

Much love,
Sister Andersen

MTC Laundry Room

Me in the laundry room, writing letters.

Us with some of our friends, the Spanish elders (taken when Sister Son was still in our companionship). L-R, Back-Front:
-Elder Jensen, Elder Harmon, Elder Carroll, ElderChatwin
-Elder Graham, Elder Hardgrave, me
-Sister Nelson, Elder Hildreth, Sister Son

MTC Day 54

Yet another eventful week. How to begin relating the most recent events which have transpired (and some old ones that I didn't stick in my last letter). I guess chronologically is probably the best way to go about things in this case. Almost two weeks ago we got new missionaries in. I don't think I wrote anything about it this past Monday because of time constraints and other material to cover. Our zone (larger than a district--ours has four districts in it; see some previous entry about that) received two new districts to replace the two districts that had just left the week before. One of the new districts is all elders, but the other has a companionship of sisters in it, Sisters Chang and Fisher. Sister Chang is from California. She's really cheery and fun. She already knew some Chinese before getting here, which is good, because Sister Fisher had a degree in Chinese (and French) and had spent a year living in China. Sister Fisher is from just outside of London. I really like both of them, and am happy to have them in our room. They don't leave until late August/early September.

As I think I probably mentioned previously, Sister Son feels insecure about her English, her familiarity with scriptures (which we rely on heavily when we teach), and her general qualified-ness to leave the MTC. I think everyone who talks to her for five minutes would probably think she was just fine to leave, but the importance self-confidence is not to be minimized. This week she ended up in a series of long interviews with an MTC supervisor. The whole thing was a bit emotionally stressful because she had to explain in rather painful detail what she's worried about and why she feels inadequate. I also sympathize with the supervisor; I mean, the MTC can't really start letting missionaries choose how long they're here, so it must be a bit of a rigorous process. Finally he presented her with a choice: July 16th (her original date), or August 26th (and switching to the other companionship of sisters). She chose August 26th. (Note: If you're wondering why the dates are so far apart, I suspect it has to do with the every-six-week changes that occur in every mission. Every six weeks, companionships may be switched around, missionaries may move to different areas, etc. For a missionary to come in the middle is probably much less convenient, but this is all just speculation). If she's waiting to leave, it's much better for her to be with the other sisters. She'd switch eventually anyway, and this way she can practice teaching in English until they switch over to Chinese. So the main gist of all this is that Sister Son is no longer in our companionship. Losing a companion is sort of like getting something amputated. You have these phantoms pangs, looking around as if she should still be there. I'm not upset about it, but it took a little getting used to again. I think having Sister Son actually helped Sister Nelson and I be more unified. Sister Son was in a difficult situation, and we got to work together to help her (we also received lots of help from her). Having someone to care for together was great for our relationship. It kind of brushed all of my silly complaints and annoyances away because it was so obvious that there were more pressing and important things to worry about. Now I just need to figure out how to keep in mind that there are always more pressing and important things to worry about, and things will be good.

We also have a new teacher. Did I mention that before? I think his name is Brother Barton (I know his Chinese name, but I don't know how to indicate the tones while typing, and you probably wouldn't know how to say it anyway). One of our other teachers left to get married, so Brother Barton came in her place. It's kind of fun, because it's like we're training him while he's training us. I like him a lot. He's really cheerful and excited about things. Even if he were complaining, I think he'd be smiling. Hopefully we can help him learn how to be a good teacher and expect good things from his missionaries.

Well, that's most of what's happened. For the MTC, it's quite a bit of change (especially considering it's so far into my time here).

I love you all!

Sister Andersen

MTC Day 47

Wow, so many things have happened in the last week. I'll have to pick and choose... Sister Nelson, Sister Son and I are figuring out this threesome thing. Sister Son is great; I love her, and I think I love Sister Nelson even more now that we've got Sister Son. It's still complicated to coordinate everything together, but definitely worth it. One of my favorite memories of the MTC will forever be the day I had to explain to Sister Son what the phrase "Who's your daddy?" means. Our elders have delighted in their Chinese translation of the phrase. After being asked the question several times (in Chinese), Sister Son asked me why they kept asking her--after all, explaining the identity of one's father is a bit difficult. With some help from an elder, I tried to convey the idea of a triumphant sports moment or something along those lines. She has since found several useful applications for the phrase (e.g. "I don't want Satan to be my daddy"). However, her most significant contribution to my life is definitely the feeling and spirit that brings with her. She is very patient and helpful with us, and also willing to express her gratitude. I think going out of our way to thank each other for things has been the best thing yet for our companionship.

In another amusing adventure this week, one of our elders accidentally thanked God for giving us death. He was praying in Chinese, and with just a little bit of confusion over tones and consonant pronunciation, he said "death" instead of "hope." I was actually quite impressed that no one laughed mid-prayer; we managed to contain ourselves until after. Fortunately, he was equally amused by his mistake.

I reread this really great talk by Elder Dallin H. Oaks (Elder Oaks is one of the apostles, a very important part of the general leadership of the LDS church. It's the same calling as that held by the apostles in Jesus' time). The talk is called "Why Do We Serve?", and it's all about our motives for giving service. He lists a few possibilities, from least to most desirable. The most desirable is charity. I've been thinking about the whole idea of being motivated by charity (defined to be the pure love of Christ). I've been thinking about it actively for about 24 hours now, and it's pretty interesting what things I do and don't say or do when I'm trying to keep that principle in mind. I think the exercise has helped me understand better why patience is so relevant to love, because really trying to be motivated by love all the time requires a lot of patience. In some ways it's easier to do one-time dramatic acts of service than it is to let sincere concern for others and God seep into every little action and thought. I think that's probably one of the more significant things I've been learning about, which is why I thought I would pass it on. If I only wrote about physical experiences or events, that wouldn't do much to reflect the most important part of my life experiences.

Well, I must be off again. Take care!

Love,
Sister Andersen

P.S. I leave the MTC July 28--exactly four weeks from today.

MTC Day 40

It has been nothing short of a very eventful week. Within the last week, the older districts of Mandarin-speaking missionaries left, I got a third companion added to my companionship (yes, gasp of surprise and, fortunately, joy), and the MTC became the site of intense mission president training.

The older missionaries leaving was sad, because I won't see most of them again. A lot are going to my mission in Taiwan, but plenty were not. Their leaving is also a clue that this week we will get new missionaries. Our zone will get two new districts of missionaries added to the two we currently have (a zone is the next organizational unit up from a district). We will get a new companionship of sisters, who will almost certainly room with us. We're pretty much all really excited to have new missionaries, and trying to think of ways to help them have a good transition to MTC life.

My new companion is Sister Son, from South Korea. Her Mandarin is already very good, as is her English. She is only going to be with us until July 16th, when she will leave for her mission at the Oakland, CA temple visitors' center. She has a really amazing story, which involves actually being baptized in China, where she was studying Chinese (so rare, because there are no missionaries there; the only people who can be baptized in China are foreigners living there). That was three years ago. She subsequently moved back to Korea, where she lived with her mother and brother. After having her visa application turned down three times, she is finally here. She is absolutely amazing, but insecure in her English and in her Gospel knowledge (familiarity with the scriptures, teaching abilities, etc.). Honestly when she teaches and shares her experiences, the feeling of the Holy Ghost is almost tangible. God teaches us truth through the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost can speak to our mind and heart in a variety of ways, including distinct thoughts, feelings of peace and joy, etc. [For anyone unfamiliar with the term "Holy Ghost", you can ask Emily's mom or look it up on lds.org if you want to understand better.] When we teach, our primary goal is to invite the Holy Ghost through our sincerity, preparation, and prayers. The idea is that we present information, but the Holy Ghost is what can actually help people recognize and understand spiritual truth, so if the Holy Ghost is not with us, the teaching will be ineffective. I love Sister Son. Learning to teach with three people, helping her catch up on lesson preparation and teaching skills, and trying to cultivate a triangular (maybe a pyramid, if you include God) companionship relationship is a bit tricky, but it teaches me a lot. I think something I've learned more recently than ever before is that when the Lord asks us to do something, he gives us extra blessings so that we'll be strong enough to do whatever it is. That's why commandments from God are blessings, because as we do our part in following them, the Lord makes us better than we could have been otherwise. That's what I think, anyway.

Oh, right, mission presidents' seminar. Basically, every mission in the world has a mission president. This man and his family live in the mission. He interviews missionaries, coordinates their training and placement, etc. This calling lasts for three years, so every year a third of the mission presidents in the world get replaced. When new mission presidents get called, they are trained for about a week by church leaders (the Twelve Apostles and First Presidency). That is this week. As you might imagine, security measures go way up, our space gets cut down a bit to make room, and staff are running around madly organizing. This afternoon, a mission president and his wife came to observe our district teaching, and to give us feedback. My companions and I taught a companionship of elders in my district as the mission president's wife observed. It was a little nerve-wracking, but over all a really great experience. We taught the elders as themselves (meaning they didn't pretend to be non-LDS church members investigating the church). We really only taught two out of the seven or so principles in the first lesson, but the Holy Ghost was very much present. The sister told us that she had felt the Spirit (another name for the Holy Ghost) more strongly then than she had since they arrived. We're not having spirituality contests, but I felt very grateful for her comment, because it indicated that we had achieved our main objective.

Well, I think that's the main news. I hope you're all well and happy!

Love,
Sister Andersen