Okay okay okay, I wasted so much time fixing my pictures on the computer this week, there are only like 20 minutes left so we'll see what I can type in that time frame, and that's that. And that's life.
This week last Preparation Day I spent in Taipei I went back to the doctor and the problem is still there, so more medicines....I'll go back next month and evaluate again. It's just annoying to me to see the doctor every other Preparation day, so I told him I'll go back next month. He said that's fine. Health issues on a mission are kind of like mosquitoes...if you can imagine what I mean.
After seeing the doctor, we spent the Preparation day...in the park next door that's really beautiful. We took pictures, but I didn't turn out very good in most of them. You can see the extra weight I gained at the New Year's Holiday...and I don't like it. I already made a goal to go on a slight diet next transfer so I can feel better about pictures. Ha. The curse of being short...not a lot for your weight to go.
After the day, at night we went and met with a new investigator, A Sister Lora Luo. She is really good. She came to general conference last week. We didn't even know until then...but that's so awesome she came. She is really searching for a church that is closer than the one she goes to in Longtan. Which, yes, is quite far from here. It was in my zone back when I was in Zhongli. However, she said she has to pick the religion that feels right to her...which is great.I thought she would really identify with Joseph Smith, but she didn't really connect their similarity as I hoped...but she is really awesome because she is completely willing to read and pray about the Book of Mormon. As missionaries, our biggest hope is only that, they will read and pray. That's what this church is about...the testimony that the Book of Mormon is true or not. So, I'm excited to teach her and continue to help her with her studies. She had a really cool experience with prayer that helped her see that God really exists, and now she's just in a learning process.
With Vera, she's had kind of a hard week. We usually keep in daily contact, but starting Thursday afternoon, we couldn't get in touch with her until Sunday. And especially me, because we did exchanges, so I didn't see her all week. It's weird, it's just we are used to talking to her or seeing her, so it felt really odd not to see or talk to Vera for a week. It's not that long, but you just get used to being in certain people's company. I'm keeping her in my prayers, and she's still coming to church, so I know she'll do okay. She's going to have to change her baptism, but that is okay. It's best she is ready when it happens then that she goes too fast and isn't ready. The ward has really been doing their part to welcome her in. The bishop called us himself this morning and asked when the next time we were meeting with her. He told us he would be coming, we didn't even need to ask him to. I think he talked to her yesterday and knows she's going through a hard time. He wants to help her out, so he's willing to sacrifice his busy busy time because he really wants to help as much as he can. It really touches me that the ward loves her as much as we do and is willing to do anything to help her out. Everyone is really rooting for her and praying for her.
This week we really saw a huge miracle. 15 people came to church. Back in a really progressing time in Zhongli, that was always our goal, but we'd be short a person or two every time. This week our goal was just 6, we thought that was optimistic. Last week we made a high goal, and didn't even come close. A lot of people who said they were coming couldn't come at the last minute, etc. The Lord sees our efforts and blesses us when we least expect it. It was amazing. 6 of them were girls who wanted to interview us about our church for their life science class, so we told them they could ask us questions and take some of our time, if we could teach them a short message and they could come to church. Even if they hadn't been willing, we would have done the interview, but they were really great and all came. One of them said after school ends at the end of May, she will think about coming back, because she really likes church. So that was cute. Then, we just had pretty much all of our good investigators we've been meeting with come. It was so amazing and such a blessing.
Ji Rushuang came and I was super super excited because I got to know her in a way I never did before. She's a 28 year old girl who works all the time. We are really similar in age, so we just had some time to have some girl talk in between the meetings and I came to love her a lot more. She's a really great person who is really dedicated to family and to work. She is doing her best to come to church, even though she works 13 hours a day, and has to come to church in the afternoon, after an 8 hour shift. It's a sacrifice, but I know its well worth it.
This week it was fun to see Melody too. We once again had to do splits with members, so I went with the bishop's wife and taught her the 3rd lesson. Her mother joined for the last 20 minutes of the lesson, so then, being a 14 year old girl, Melody got a little sulky that her mom told her that they had to read scriptures together, because the mom really likes to have time together, and sees the Book of Mormon as a way to do that, which I think is awesome. She's not really interested in meeting with us, but she's willing to do anything to help Melody progress and prepare herself for her baptism. But besides her sulky stage, she was really happy to see us, and really does love learning the gospel. She is coming to Young Woman's activities now, and is really consistent about church. Her friend, Jialin, also comes with her. We haven't met with Jialin yet, but I think after school ends she'll have more time...so they both are doing awesome.
I had fun this week on exchanges with Zhongli. I love Sister Ho a lot and I learn a lot from her example. She even contacts the girls who sell betelnut (a drug to stay away from in the Word of Wisdom. This nasty thing that makes their whole mouth red...she just sees the worth in every individual and wants them to know that God loves them. I just was really touched by seeing her contact that girl...and we had a lot of fun, chatting and just discussing things. Not to mention it's fun to go back to my old area. I get to see some people I love from back in the days. Chen Yiting showed up at the church and gave us 2 referrals. It was nice to work with her.
And also, Saturday we did temple tours. Saturday temple tours are really exhausting, but rewarding too. We see a lot of miracles. Towards the end of the day, a member brought in her daughter-in-law. Lately she's had a lot of deaths in her family, but we didn't know that. We took her to the temple book and talked about the importance of preparing to enter the temple, so that we can be with our family forever, and not have to worry about death. Then, we took her to talk about Joseph Smith and the first vision. It's a spiritual happening. As I was quoting Joseph Smith's words, this lady started to cry. She was feeling the spirit really strongly. At the end of the tour, she gave her name to be visited by the missionaries in Xinzhu. It was just a really good tour and the spirit was so strong. It's nice to go to tours twice a transfer and have the opportunity to feel the spirit as you give members and investigators tours for that purpose.
Well! one minute left! I guess no time to talk about the other stuff I could have. This was an awesome week. Love you guys!
Sister Flora Bruno
Showing posts with label Chen Yiting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chen Yiting. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Transfer 8 Week 5
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 9:24 PM
Hello. Again I'm sorry, but this might be kind of a fast and not too interesting of an email. This week has been a little slow, and a lot of it was dealing with a couple medical problems, so I don't know how much I can come up with to write about, but I'll try my best.
The only real investigator update that I can really think about is we are meeting with someone named Susana (Huang) who is doing really great. I guess she contacted the Shilin Elders, and started meeting with them, but they passed her over to us sisters when they realized she lived in the Beitou Area. They had already set a baptism goal with her when they passed her to us, so her date goal is the 28th I believe. So far she's doing really good, and it's completely possible that she will be baptized on her first goal. She came to church on Sunday, and just really has a testimony that she knows that God is real and will answer her prayers and comfort her. She shared her testimony with us about how before she didn't think there was a God, but one day, thought really long and hard about it, and realized if there was no God, this earth is kind of a rotten place...but when she realized God really does exist, she realized she had a lot to learn and prepare for in this life. She's really great and I just am glad to be able to teach her. She's been a great friend to us, and just loves to meet and talk. She talks quite a bit, so I feel like we are good friends and know her pretty well, because she shares a lot with us. She just called..haha to make sure we were still meeting tomorrow. So yeah! She's doing really good. We were going to share a third lesson on Tuesday, but ended up changing the lesson plan a little, because not only did neither of us feel good, but Susana just really said she knew an important part of changing is following commandments, and asked us what commandments she needed to follow, so we told her we'd share one with her, and shared just the first principle, faith, of the third, and talked about the Sabbath and its importance. She said she'd do her best to follow that commandment, such as talk to her boss and see if Sunday could be gotten off, since she changes jobs soon. I'm glad we have such an amazing investigator who is willing to put faith into action.
This past week, we did companion exchanges. We also will do them this coming week and next week, as my companion is the coordinating sister for this transfer, and needs to exchange with each Sister once(which means 4 exchanges, and we have now done 2). I stayed in my area and went senior for the day. It wasn't a piece of cake day, but went pretty well despite the fact that we had a full schedule for the exchange, then every single appointment canceled. We were able to get on the bikes, which is a rare occasion in this area, and go out towards Beitou and leave some notes on some members doors that the relief society asked us to focus on. I was able to set with with one of them, and by some kind of divine set-up, we ran into her when we went to do tours Saturday, and she was really excited for us to come over again this next week when she is actually home. I think the note really helped soften her up, because she's usually been a little standoffish towards sisters, and more attached to Elders. So I'm excited to go meet her some more.
Which reminds me, we did temple tours on Saturday and it was BUSY. I kind of liked it...a lot. Even though I've always been close enough to the city to do tours every transfer since transfer one (which means I've done it a good 15ish times now) I've never been in on a Saturday. I mean, I was sick and completely exhausted by the end of the day, with being so busy and so sick, but it was just amazing to see so many tours and miracles. The typical number of tours for us in a week, in the past, was 4 or 5 on a good day. On Saturday, we did 11. More than double what I normally do. We were able to do investigator tours, member tours, everything. We saw 9 referrals that day, and the temple sisters also were doing tours, since it's busier, so the tour saw a ton of referrals that day, and it just made me more appreciative of temple tour, because the point of it is referrals, and we were able to see quite a payout on it. Also, a really cute family walked in and said they'd passed by a couple times, and had some interest in our teachings and in primary. We were able to give them a quick tour, a Book of Mormon, and they wrote down their names to learn more about our church. I was glad I was able to be a part of the beginning of that teaching process. We saw a lot of miracles that day. Also, Chen Yiting, a new member from Zhongli came down to see me and tell me about her dating experience with a recently returned missionary. She's really cute and it was good to see her again. She really wanted to see me, so I'm glad she was able to come to temple tour and get that opportunity.
Nothing else really going on that I can think of to immediately talk about...next week my preparation day will be normal Monday again. This week it changed because we will head off to the temple in a little while. They changed how temple day works, so we just go every 3 months now, and it changes preparation day to Wednesday that day. So, I'll just have one more temple day on my mission,so I will appreciate it while I can. I know in South Carolina we don't live too super close to the temple, so the weekly MTC temple experience I had might be hard pressed to ever have again, but I think once a month or two can be good if we are focused on the purpose. I'm glad I get to go today....Write again next week.
Love you guys,
Sister Flora Bruno (Fu)
Hello. Again I'm sorry, but this might be kind of a fast and not too interesting of an email. This week has been a little slow, and a lot of it was dealing with a couple medical problems, so I don't know how much I can come up with to write about, but I'll try my best.
The only real investigator update that I can really think about is we are meeting with someone named Susana (Huang) who is doing really great. I guess she contacted the Shilin Elders, and started meeting with them, but they passed her over to us sisters when they realized she lived in the Beitou Area. They had already set a baptism goal with her when they passed her to us, so her date goal is the 28th I believe. So far she's doing really good, and it's completely possible that she will be baptized on her first goal. She came to church on Sunday, and just really has a testimony that she knows that God is real and will answer her prayers and comfort her. She shared her testimony with us about how before she didn't think there was a God, but one day, thought really long and hard about it, and realized if there was no God, this earth is kind of a rotten place...but when she realized God really does exist, she realized she had a lot to learn and prepare for in this life. She's really great and I just am glad to be able to teach her. She's been a great friend to us, and just loves to meet and talk. She talks quite a bit, so I feel like we are good friends and know her pretty well, because she shares a lot with us. She just called..haha to make sure we were still meeting tomorrow. So yeah! She's doing really good. We were going to share a third lesson on Tuesday, but ended up changing the lesson plan a little, because not only did neither of us feel good, but Susana just really said she knew an important part of changing is following commandments, and asked us what commandments she needed to follow, so we told her we'd share one with her, and shared just the first principle, faith, of the third, and talked about the Sabbath and its importance. She said she'd do her best to follow that commandment, such as talk to her boss and see if Sunday could be gotten off, since she changes jobs soon. I'm glad we have such an amazing investigator who is willing to put faith into action.
This past week, we did companion exchanges. We also will do them this coming week and next week, as my companion is the coordinating sister for this transfer, and needs to exchange with each Sister once(which means 4 exchanges, and we have now done 2). I stayed in my area and went senior for the day. It wasn't a piece of cake day, but went pretty well despite the fact that we had a full schedule for the exchange, then every single appointment canceled. We were able to get on the bikes, which is a rare occasion in this area, and go out towards Beitou and leave some notes on some members doors that the relief society asked us to focus on. I was able to set with with one of them, and by some kind of divine set-up, we ran into her when we went to do tours Saturday, and she was really excited for us to come over again this next week when she is actually home. I think the note really helped soften her up, because she's usually been a little standoffish towards sisters, and more attached to Elders. So I'm excited to go meet her some more.
Which reminds me, we did temple tours on Saturday and it was BUSY. I kind of liked it...a lot. Even though I've always been close enough to the city to do tours every transfer since transfer one (which means I've done it a good 15ish times now) I've never been in on a Saturday. I mean, I was sick and completely exhausted by the end of the day, with being so busy and so sick, but it was just amazing to see so many tours and miracles. The typical number of tours for us in a week, in the past, was 4 or 5 on a good day. On Saturday, we did 11. More than double what I normally do. We were able to do investigator tours, member tours, everything. We saw 9 referrals that day, and the temple sisters also were doing tours, since it's busier, so the tour saw a ton of referrals that day, and it just made me more appreciative of temple tour, because the point of it is referrals, and we were able to see quite a payout on it. Also, a really cute family walked in and said they'd passed by a couple times, and had some interest in our teachings and in primary. We were able to give them a quick tour, a Book of Mormon, and they wrote down their names to learn more about our church. I was glad I was able to be a part of the beginning of that teaching process. We saw a lot of miracles that day. Also, Chen Yiting, a new member from Zhongli came down to see me and tell me about her dating experience with a recently returned missionary. She's really cute and it was good to see her again. She really wanted to see me, so I'm glad she was able to come to temple tour and get that opportunity.
Nothing else really going on that I can think of to immediately talk about...next week my preparation day will be normal Monday again. This week it changed because we will head off to the temple in a little while. They changed how temple day works, so we just go every 3 months now, and it changes preparation day to Wednesday that day. So, I'll just have one more temple day on my mission,so I will appreciate it while I can. I know in South Carolina we don't live too super close to the temple, so the weekly MTC temple experience I had might be hard pressed to ever have again, but I think once a month or two can be good if we are focused on the purpose. I'm glad I get to go today....Write again next week.
Love you guys,
Sister Flora Bruno (Fu)
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Jasmine's Baptism
As for any information of anything we did this week, the news is in Jilong. Saturday I had permission to go to Jasmine's baptism. It was amazing, but quite an interesting experience as well. I felt really self concious because it wasn't my area and I didn't want to get in the other sister's way, but they were both really good. They had me introduce her and sit next to her. They sat next to her mom so they could get to know her mother better. I felt the spirit so strongly at her baptism and I know Jasmine was one of the most prepared people I have had the opportunity to meet on my mission. It was actually really not the perfect baptism for her, but she responded positively to pretty much everything. First, the boy she asked to baptize her, has a bad habit of being late. I remember last last week when she asked him to baptize her, she asked if he was going to be late. He even laughed at that. But then, he was honestly late!!! I got up and introduced her after a song and prayer...I got to talk about how helpful she was, from the first moment she met us how she wanted to know if we were lost and help us out, and how she would teach us as she learned to apply the scriptures in her life extremely fast...then I sat down and a new member Yiting gave a talk. I noticed towards the end of the talk Michael was still not there, and told the Elders to call him. They got up and stood in the back. After
Yiting, us missionaries did a little musical number from the primary hymn book. He finally showed up in his clothes during the musical number and sat in my seat. Then, it looked messy as we all had to change chairs since he was sitting in one of ours. Right after the number was the baptism, so he was barely in the nick of time...but he didn't show up early like he was supposed to! So, they never practiced. They get in the font, which was cold, and he baptizes her good, totally under, but then E. Leavitt is like...Um, you are raising the left hand to the square! So then, they had to do it again, but her knee came up, so they had to do it a third time. In the locker, she was cold and was like, OH MICHAEL, it's all his fault, I couldn't breath. But she got over it really fast and told me she was scared the first time, so God gave her the opportunity to do it so she wasn't scared and so that she was extremely clean.
She talked as she bore her testimony about how she was scared and it was really dark so she said a prayer, and before she even said Amen, S. Kunzler and I said hi. Then she talked about how she went to church a lot, but it never felt RIGHT. But, when she met us she was really able to read the Book of Mormon and feel the love of a Father in Heaven, a love she was never able to feel from a Father growing up. It was a beautiful testimony and I was touched that we got the opportunity to teach such an amazing girl! She really strenghted my testimony. I know that God will put us in people's paths who are prepared and willing to hear the gospel if we are doing what's right. That night we met her at the bus stop, we were just on the way to another lesson. Jesus performed miracles on the way, and I've noticed that us missionaries can do a lot of good on the way as we open our mouths and use the Spirit and faith. The Spirit is so important in our lives! Always live worthy of his guidance. I've learned it is just so important to have the Spirit as our guide. And that's the promise after baptism, is the Spirit. It's so important to us as we do the endure to the end part of our lives. How blessed we are that Heavenly Father gave us such a happy path to follow his Son. The only way. I read an article this week that helped me realize that the only intelligent way to do things, is the obedient way in which we give our will to God. I'm in no way perfect, but every day I'm trying to be a little more better. I hope you all can do the same.
I'm excited that I'm still in this area, I should see Jasmine Sunday at the monthly Taibei fireside, so there were no tearful goodbyes like with Sister Kunzler when she went far to Xinzhu. Just a see you all Sunday. We left
right away after the service because I did not want to be home late. We go t home in plenty of time.
At church this week, we went to Beitou and the member support there is really amazing. I was happy to meet people who are so supportive of the missionaries.
That's my week here! I love you guys! See you next week!
Sister Flora Bruno
Monday, September 28, 2009
Transfer to Keelung in the Mountains of Taiwan: Missionary Email
I have come to the conclusion that this transfer, is going to be incredibly xingku and tongku. I don't even know if that's the right pinyin and i'm too lazy to try to think of what tones those really are, so I think even people who speak Chinese might not know what the heck I'm trying to say. So I'll try to explain. In Chinese, when they say this xingku word, they mean to say that what someone is doing is incredibly hard and admirable because of it's hardness, so it's xingku. Tongku is something incredibly painful. Now, in all reality if you want you can say this is an extremely bad view on it, but it just happens to be my first impression of the surroundings I am put in.
Oh, by the way, I've moved to a new area, it's called Keelung. Well, correct pinyin is Ji1long. I've had to say it so many times over the last couple days telling everyone I was leaving, I don't even have to think twice to just know tones. Most words I just say them and have to say them like 10 times to remember the tones. It's a port town, and supposedly very beautiful. I haven't seen much besides our super huge apartment with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms...yeah I get my own bathroom. I liked my little apartment though, this one is going to be killer to clean..but on the plus side, since we have to sleep in the same room, my clothes get their own room! They are very happy and get a lot of air. My suitcoats even got their own closet. They look very dark and missionary like. I have more suitcoats than any other sister in this whole mission...Not kidding. And it's too hot to wear them until December I hear. But they do get used at mission conference and when we do temple tours. They called in on Friday and told me I'd be moving to Jilong. My initial response was not exactly excitment. I believe I told my companion that God wanted me to be incredibly sore and learn something from it. You see, something I was told I'd learn from my mission is humility. In transfer one I was told to pray for it every day. I can't say I'm exactly a very humble person. I've probably changed a little...but I'm still very me...like...
So yeah, my area is known for having ridiculous hills/mountains...this is because it's...mountains. I'm living in mountains and biking up and down them. I live uphill and it's just ridiculous! I have to shift from first geer to third geer all the time, i've only been here one day, and I was switching back and forth the 2 times I've gotten on a bike. So yeah, when people heard where I was going, they told me it was the most hard area in the North. This sweet member drew me biking up a 45 degree angle with the sun scortching hot, and rain in the distance...rain here, is often. But I have to admit, it was an exaggeration, because I haven't biked up any 45 degree angles YET. Mostly just like 25 or 30. But yeah, needless to say, it is not going to be easy to bike anywhere here in this new area, but Sister Kunzler says I'll get used to it if I make sure to run every morning? That's how her last companion got used to it, but her last companion is not exactly as fat as me...haha. Her companion was Taiwanese, so she was actually quite little and skinny. So we'll see if that helps. Zhongli probably trained me a little since it was a HUGE area...and we had to bike up some pretty nasty hills...but usually only once a week, not every day, and I would walk up some of it if I got too tired!
Hmm..My new companion is a Sister Kunzler. In meeting, we had a very awkward situation...you see, she's from South Carolina...and she has this best friend...well, this best friend of hers lived at my apartment back that semester I was graduating...well, not literally, but he was engaged to my roommate, so he was always there...and, as some of you might remember, the relationship that ended up occurring between me and those roommates and the fiance was one of I deleted them as my friends on Facebook right before my mission, because he was really mean to me and would mock my statuses. And I wasn't sad about it, because to be honest, I didn't know them that well and didn't feel too close. I just felt sad we were all immature and unable to get along.
So I'm sure we'll be fine, especially since this companion is an SYLer...so I think my chinese will get better...but it was just an awkward beginning, at least in my mind. I was excited to hear though, that roommate of mine married that fiance of hers...they had a date and hadn't married, then were like, not boyfriend girlfriend, then like girlfriend boyfriend during that semester. Quite complicated, so it's good that they figured it out. Yeah! She's a lot different from me, at least I get that impression initially, but nothing like my other 2 companions, so this transfer should be a blaaaaast. totally new people and area (minus my zone leader was with me back in Zhongli transfer one and 2...Elder Carter, a native...he's fun so it's good to be back in his district). woo. That is, if I live through all the death biking.
This areas investigators and numbers aren't exactly what I was used to in Zhongli, so I believe I will be seeing more what contacting is like in this area...I didn't really do it, hardly ever in Zhongli. Maybe just talk to the person next to you on the scooter, or a couple really down days we'd go out there to try to find investigators in the ward we had like none in...but I have to be honest, I haven't seen a ton of success with the whole self contacting method of finding, but maybe I'll see more this transfer...if I remember I'll tell you next week...which, next week will be a normal so Preparation Day will be your Tuesday night.
In last weeks news, Chen Yiting got baptized and it was a HILARIOUS story...well, you see...first of all, someone giving a talk didn't know and freaked out when they called her up...then we went downstairs to baptize her, and the water was only up to the first stair...the chain on the plug got caught underneath and so the water had been draining while we were upstairs!!! So we went back upstairs while it refilled and had a testimony like meeting, then finally she was able to get baptized...but man!!! So crazy! But a lot of fun because I've never seen someone so excited about being baptized. She was like jumping around and so excited. I loved it. It made the night totally fun. She was sad I was leaving so soon after her baptism, but she has such a strong testimony, she'll be fine. She wrote a cute note in my bye bye book and I promised I'd write her a letter.
Sunday was hectic packing and saying goodbye, but I survived through it and a nice member took me all the way here to Jilong! She even took work off just to take me. Aww Zhongli members are so great! If you can't tell, I'm a little weary of the change, but excited at the same time. It was hard to leave my district. Some of us had been together 6 months. But Elder Lords and Smith also moved! So yeah, lots of change. :) :/ Maybe I'll have a better attitude next week, probably! Don't forget to write!
Time to go!
Fu Jiemei
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Baptisms in Zhongli
Hello from Zhongli, although it may be my last week here (or maybe I have a long time left here, speculations and bets have begun to be made). haha. I think people always guessing transfers is amusing, and I'm definitely not "too good" to participate in making guesses of who is going where and who is training, etc etc. It's usually all in good Preparation day fun as districts hang out. I personally hope I leave, just based on the fact that I have been in Zhongli for 6 months now, my entire mission...but if I don't leave, I won't be too upset because I really love this area and there are a lot of people here to teach. So we'll find out what happens on Friday night, and I'll be back here online emailing on Monday, so don't forget to write me before then!
In other news, this last Friday's baptism went pretty well. Jasmine and Petrea Ge were baptized, but Leilani wasn't. She had a few hang-ups that were understandable. We'd like to see her baptized this week, she will call us tonight and tell us after she talks to her classmates when she thinks a good time would be...but even if in the end it's not this week, I know she will get baptized sooner or later. So I'm not too worried about that. Petrea was really cute at the baptism. She was like "I'm Ge Boya, and I think getting baptized is really AWESOME." Then she sat down. haha. Kids. Jasmine is also doing really well, she likes to hang out with our awesome Wu Mujun, who tuesday night just showed up to our lesson, we hadn't even told her about it, because she wasn't at church Sunday, but she must have heard from Jasmine we were coming over, and she came too. That's dedication. Jasmine also just really likes the missionaries, so that's good. She came early to church Sunday because she said her house is boring, so she just sat around well Sister Chen and I ate, and she talked to us and stuff. She also has started attending the Advanced English class on Wednesday, and thinks the teachers are hilarious. I think that is due to the fact that her High School English class is too easy, since she lived in Australia growing up and is half Australian, and even though rarely uses her English these days, shes really still quite good at it.
As for Chen Yiting, she's set-up for Saturday night and she's so super excited. She's such a funny 19 year old girl, so I'm excited for her. She's been like, I'M SO EXCITED FOR SATURDAY...whenever we see her. Haha. Really cute.
Besides that though, not a lot has been happening, we teach an okay amount of lessons and just try to invite everyone to learn about the church. This last week we must have had a really good increase in key indicators, because the Assistants called us and told us that they and President were very happy with the work we were doing in Zhongli, and they encouraged us to keep working hard, and that they could see our hard work is really paying off. That through our work and efforts many people were coming to know their Savior. That's the 3rd time we've received a call like that from the Assistants on my mission. I'm not sure how often they do it, but it's nice to hear from them, albeit a little stressing in that it's just a little pressuring that twice that it has happened, our numbers were inevitably going to drop that next week in some ways. But it's not necessarily a bad drop. So yeah, our mission has very good Assistants that follow-up. I seriously have never seen people so good at following up as the Assistants. If we tell them anything, they remember and ask how that is going the next time they see us. Their memories are almost uncanny. Gotta respect crazy good memories like that.
So yeah! Time is running out, but don't forget, write by next week on Monday, your Sunday night I think. I'll tell you then what happened Saturday, and with move calls. I'm excited to be moving into transfer 5. It's almost a halfway point for sister's I think. Time passes fast. Also with almost being in Taiwan 6 months now, I'm noticing I'm understanding a LOT more than I used to and I'm able to pretty much teach every lesson 1-4 decently and clearly. Cool! :) I can't say "It all sounds Chinese to me" anymore...how sad because I used that phrase a lot before my mission, but now Chinese makes sense...everything not Chinese sounds Korea, or Indonesian, or Vietnamese around here. Now my ear hears the difference between Asain languages.
Until next Monday,
Fu jiemei
Sister Flora Bruno
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Week 23 in Zhongli or Transfer 4 Week 5
Hmm...let's see, well, this is currently week 23 in Zhongli and not a lot has really happened that week that I have to talk about. Most interesting though I guess, would be the situation with the Ge Girls, or the Huang girls, depending on your take. Their mom is Huang but they are all xin'ed Ge. It took me like 3 transfers of knowing them to figure that out though...I never knew their Chinese names until recently. They wanted me to just call them by their English names like Mom did. Well, this Sunday was their baptism interview with Elder Lords, since their baptism is this Friday. In the morning, mom couldn't take them to church because she had something going on, so we went to their apartment and picked them up, but only 2 of them came and met us downstairs for their interview. The 2nd child, Leilani, didn't come. They said she'd come to church later with mom.
I was so sad, she was the most awesome about reading and everything...she was in Jacob in no time, but because of that responsible personality, she stressed herself out about the interview and didn't want to do it...So Jasmine and Petrea did it and passed fine. I was excited but still really sad about Leilani. I sat next to her at church, and she wouldn't talk to anyone, she just cried and slept the whole meeting. I'm not sure what the situation was. Then, in Sunday school, I saw her in there sitting alone, so I had Su DX go see why. The kids here are all really shy and our awesome Young Woman's who comes with us to their lesson, Wu Mujun was sitting by her sister. I really wanted her to have a good experience at church so maybe we could talk to her and she could interview later. Well, Su DX figured everything out, and I don't know how Sunday School was, but I went in there during the last hour and her sister and Mujun and I all sat together and Young Woman's was really fun. We ate prezels and cheeto puffs and talked about how to control our thoughts, and everyone was just being really silly, and Leilani was smiling a lot. Then, mom and Leilani were together with a counselor in the bishopric after church when we were in our meeting we have every sunday after church, and towards the end of the meeting, Huang jiemei and Leilani come downstairs and Leilani says she wants to meet with Elder Lords. So yeah! Then after the meeting, he interviewed her. It took about an hour, but she passed fine and Elder Lords says her testimony is really amazing and he was so happy after that interview, because he was really able to help her, and he said that's the best kind of interviews, the ones where you really see a change with them from the beginning to the end...so I'm glad for Elder Lords...he helped her a lot, and she looked SO happy after her interview, where as the rest of the day earlier she looked so happy and stressed out. So I'm REALLY excited for Friday. I've known these girls for almost my whole mission and now they are getting baptized...
Also coming up on Friday is Chen Yiting's baptism interview. She's so awesome, she's always like, I'm so excited to be baptized! I'm so excited to come to church on Sunday! I'm so excited to get to be interviewed for my baptism! So yeah. She's excited for Friday. Her date is that following Saturday. Move calls are Friday the 25th for a heads up, so if I forget to tell you next week, Preparation day will change to Monday not next week, but the following one. People have already started talking about them, maybe I'll be more wondering about them by next Wednesday, but for now I have a super busy week until Sunday with Temple day in Taipei today, then we are going to Taipei tomorrow to do the temple tours, and biking out to Shanziding on Saturday...which is about a 55 minute bike ride straight uphill we've been doing once or twice a week these days for some investigators. But since it's such a long bike ride...it takes quite a bit of time. Like yesterday, we went all the way out to Yangmei for an appointment. It was a 3 hour affair. Shanziding is like that, but luckily we keep meeting people out there, and now have 3 lessons for our hard bike ride, instead of just 1 like it originally was. So yeah, I thought briefly about it, but not too in-depth. I feel super busy, but next week is probably not going to be nearly as busy. Week 6 doesn't have many activities that happen, so we have nothing but time to try to fill in. We'll do our best! That's pretty much it though...not too many out of the ordinary things happened this week, we are just preparing for Friday, and our main focus next week will be Saturday. We are very blessed here in Zhongli. I've seen a lot of success. Not to say we don't have trials, we have a lot, sometimes we have days where everyone cancels the night before and we have like 4 hours to fill in, in really hot weather, but it all ends up okay, and time passes by pretty fast. Time really isn't the same on a mission as it was before the mission. It's hard to explain, but yeah...time, it's warped.
I was so sad, she was the most awesome about reading and everything...she was in Jacob in no time, but because of that responsible personality, she stressed herself out about the interview and didn't want to do it...So Jasmine and Petrea did it and passed fine. I was excited but still really sad about Leilani. I sat next to her at church, and she wouldn't talk to anyone, she just cried and slept the whole meeting. I'm not sure what the situation was. Then, in Sunday school, I saw her in there sitting alone, so I had Su DX go see why. The kids here are all really shy and our awesome Young Woman's who comes with us to their lesson, Wu Mujun was sitting by her sister. I really wanted her to have a good experience at church so maybe we could talk to her and she could interview later. Well, Su DX figured everything out, and I don't know how Sunday School was, but I went in there during the last hour and her sister and Mujun and I all sat together and Young Woman's was really fun. We ate prezels and cheeto puffs and talked about how to control our thoughts, and everyone was just being really silly, and Leilani was smiling a lot. Then, mom and Leilani were together with a counselor in the bishopric after church when we were in our meeting we have every sunday after church, and towards the end of the meeting, Huang jiemei and Leilani come downstairs and Leilani says she wants to meet with Elder Lords. So yeah! Then after the meeting, he interviewed her. It took about an hour, but she passed fine and Elder Lords says her testimony is really amazing and he was so happy after that interview, because he was really able to help her, and he said that's the best kind of interviews, the ones where you really see a change with them from the beginning to the end...so I'm glad for Elder Lords...he helped her a lot, and she looked SO happy after her interview, where as the rest of the day earlier she looked so happy and stressed out. So I'm REALLY excited for Friday. I've known these girls for almost my whole mission and now they are getting baptized...
Also coming up on Friday is Chen Yiting's baptism interview. She's so awesome, she's always like, I'm so excited to be baptized! I'm so excited to come to church on Sunday! I'm so excited to get to be interviewed for my baptism! So yeah. She's excited for Friday. Her date is that following Saturday. Move calls are Friday the 25th for a heads up, so if I forget to tell you next week, Preparation day will change to Monday not next week, but the following one. People have already started talking about them, maybe I'll be more wondering about them by next Wednesday, but for now I have a super busy week until Sunday with Temple day in Taipei today, then we are going to Taipei tomorrow to do the temple tours, and biking out to Shanziding on Saturday...which is about a 55 minute bike ride straight uphill we've been doing once or twice a week these days for some investigators. But since it's such a long bike ride...it takes quite a bit of time. Like yesterday, we went all the way out to Yangmei for an appointment. It was a 3 hour affair. Shanziding is like that, but luckily we keep meeting people out there, and now have 3 lessons for our hard bike ride, instead of just 1 like it originally was. So yeah, I thought briefly about it, but not too in-depth. I feel super busy, but next week is probably not going to be nearly as busy. Week 6 doesn't have many activities that happen, so we have nothing but time to try to fill in. We'll do our best! That's pretty much it though...not too many out of the ordinary things happened this week, we are just preparing for Friday, and our main focus next week will be Saturday. We are very blessed here in Zhongli. I've seen a lot of success. Not to say we don't have trials, we have a lot, sometimes we have days where everyone cancels the night before and we have like 4 hours to fill in, in really hot weather, but it all ends up okay, and time passes by pretty fast. Time really isn't the same on a mission as it was before the mission. It's hard to explain, but yeah...time, it's warped.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Work Progressing in Zhongli
Wednesday, September 9, 2009 1:48 AM
Okay, I just wrote an entire email in an hour, then the website got all messed up, so this won't be nearly as long or detailed...and I had to spend another 25 kuai to type this. Sigh. We went and got lunch and now have to spend another hour in the internet cafe so I can write...But what can you do?
This week was really good. I had the best lesson of my life last night. Or at least it felt really good. Sister Hill will be excited to read about it if she reads by blog. We were at Huang jiemei's house, with Jasmin, Leilani, and Petrea, the Ge girls. Well, Jasmin has been getting really comfortable with the Young Woman's and attending the Friday activity, and Wu Mujun has been our pei ke and really being their friend, in fact, we went over last night, and Leilani was like, "mu jun jie jie zai nali? " Or, where is Mujun? We felt bad because we hadn't asked her to come that time, because we have been meeting with them twice a week these days, so we just wanted her to take time out of her busy schedule once a week, not every time, but now they are accustomed to her, so they were like, where is she? So yeah! When we meet with them on Friday, we will definitely see if she can come. But yeah! All three girls were there for the lesson, and it was just an amazing lesson. I was very STRAIGHT with them. At the beginning when nobody wanted to be the one to pray, I was like "Why are you guys so unwilling to pray?" and then eventually Jasmin repeated a prayer S. Chen said, then I taught them again how to pray, but I feel like they really listened this time. Then mom brought up a concern about them believing in God, so I had us read Mosiah 4:9-10 and I was like, "I don't want an I don't know answer from you..Do you believe in God?" and we went aroudn the room. Leilani and Petrea said yes, and Jasmin said she honestly was unsure. I said that was fair, and asked Leilani why she believed. Last week she was also testing it out. But we asked about her prayers and she said she prayed and prayed and prayed, to get a feeling to her prayers once or twice. And we talked about how you have to have a desire to prayer lots of times so you can get a feeling once or twice sometimes, and then you will know by that once or twice that God is listening. Leilani really progressed since last week, in a week since she committed to read the Book of Mormon, she read to the Book of Jacob. That's amazing for an investigator at all, but ESPECIALLY for a 12 year old girl. She's incredible. She was a great help in the lesson this week, because last week she went to unsure, but willing to commit to baptism because we told her it was really good for her, to this week, praying every day, so many times, and reading her scriptures. She still has a concern about Joseph Smith seeing God, but that will be easy to follow up on this week, because we told her about how the Book of Mormon connects to Joseph Smith, and she already believes in the Book of Mormon. She thinks it's "hai bucuo" which is really a compliment for her.
But yeah, so in the lesson we shared in Mosiah, then with Jasmin's concerns, I took us to Alma 32, and passed off to S. Chen who shared about faith is believing in something you can't see and how you just have to have a desire at first. Jasmin said she had a desire and was willing to start praying multiple times a day to find out if God was really there, but then talking about Leilani's concern about Joseph Smith really seeing God, Jasmin runs and gets out the children's book of Mormon and tells us that she read it all, and she believes it. She was showing us Joseph Smith's story in it. She said she believes he saw God and Jesus. So I think she believes in God, she just doubts whether or not he will seriously answer HER individual prayers. But she sounded very willing to find out now. It was just an amazing lesson! She committed to prepare to be baptized with her sisters also. So yeah! Now we just have created some very interesting lesson plans for this next week because they all attended different lessons, only Petrea has finished the missionary lessons, so now we just have to teach Jasmin part of a 3rd and Leilani part of a 1st, and a commandment here and there...but it's totally possible and I think they will be prepared for their baptism interviews in the coming week as long as we make sure to address all concerns on Friday and they keep their commitments like they said. So yeah! That's all I have time to talk about. I'm excited so excited for the Huang girls. I was really sad about Jasmin last week, and now I'm just so happy all three girls have this desire together. I felt like they were part of the reason I was still here in Zhongli, so I'm just really happy, like I mentioned like 10 times. :) They are doing really great! I remember when I first met them, they would hid behind mom, and not even say anything to me, or my companion. Now I can just act like I've known them forever and ask ridiculously bold questions, or if I hear one of them moving around during the prayer, I can just lean over and hit their knee to remind them to be more respectful...and when us missionaries come over, if they don't come straight out, I can just go in their room and be like, "We're here! Now we prepared a lesson and you guys will come listen" haha. I love it. People who respond well to my nice silly, bold personality.
Chen yiting is doing great too. She's on track for September 26th. She also is good for my attitude. She's sassy with me sometimes, because I'll be ridiculous and happy back. She went with my district last week on our P-day activity and had a lot of fun.
Gu Junru...I don't know about her, she has her goal for the 25th and we are excited, but I don't know what will happen there because mom says no way dad will agree if she has to ask, so it's up to the bishop. If the bishop says it's okay to baptize her without dad's permission, we will, our rules just say we need a guardians signature, so we left it up to bishop. Mom says it won't change their relationship, it's just if dad knows he has an option it will be no. Or something like that. So yeah, Zhang jiemei needs to talk to the bishop, and we'll see what happens, but if no, she can just get baptized at 18. She wouldn't be the first to have to do that.
My district is also doing good. This week I was concerned about set-ups. This Elder in my district gets like 4 a day, whereas my companion and I got 4 last week. It is what we need to improve, so the Elders really helped us, we did role plays in contacting people on the street in 30 seconds and stuff. So I don't see us getting 4 set ups a day or anything, but maybe this week we can get 5 or 6 set ups, instead of 4, and go from there. We don't want too ridiculous amounts, because then we lose focus on the investigators we do have because there is no time to meet with them, but we do want around 7 a week, so we can be filtering through and find progressing people, and have options instead of nothing to do for 2 hours on this day, and 2 hours on this day. Next week is going to be crazy though, we have 2 days we will be in Taipei, presidents interviews, regular district mtg and WPS...and a baptism to prepare for, so next week is going to be insane, we are trying to do as much this week to prepare for the craziness of next week. I'm excited! I love crazy weeks :)
Okay, until next time!
Fu Jiemei.
Okay, I just wrote an entire email in an hour, then the website got all messed up, so this won't be nearly as long or detailed...and I had to spend another 25 kuai to type this. Sigh. We went and got lunch and now have to spend another hour in the internet cafe so I can write...But what can you do?
This week was really good. I had the best lesson of my life last night. Or at least it felt really good. Sister Hill will be excited to read about it if she reads by blog. We were at Huang jiemei's house, with Jasmin, Leilani, and Petrea, the Ge girls. Well, Jasmin has been getting really comfortable with the Young Woman's and attending the Friday activity, and Wu Mujun has been our pei ke and really being their friend, in fact, we went over last night, and Leilani was like, "mu jun jie jie zai nali? " Or, where is Mujun? We felt bad because we hadn't asked her to come that time, because we have been meeting with them twice a week these days, so we just wanted her to take time out of her busy schedule once a week, not every time, but now they are accustomed to her, so they were like, where is she? So yeah! When we meet with them on Friday, we will definitely see if she can come. But yeah! All three girls were there for the lesson, and it was just an amazing lesson. I was very STRAIGHT with them. At the beginning when nobody wanted to be the one to pray, I was like "Why are you guys so unwilling to pray?" and then eventually Jasmin repeated a prayer S. Chen said, then I taught them again how to pray, but I feel like they really listened this time. Then mom brought up a concern about them believing in God, so I had us read Mosiah 4:9-10 and I was like, "I don't want an I don't know answer from you..Do you believe in God?" and we went aroudn the room. Leilani and Petrea said yes, and Jasmin said she honestly was unsure. I said that was fair, and asked Leilani why she believed. Last week she was also testing it out. But we asked about her prayers and she said she prayed and prayed and prayed, to get a feeling to her prayers once or twice. And we talked about how you have to have a desire to prayer lots of times so you can get a feeling once or twice sometimes, and then you will know by that once or twice that God is listening. Leilani really progressed since last week, in a week since she committed to read the Book of Mormon, she read to the Book of Jacob. That's amazing for an investigator at all, but ESPECIALLY for a 12 year old girl. She's incredible. She was a great help in the lesson this week, because last week she went to unsure, but willing to commit to baptism because we told her it was really good for her, to this week, praying every day, so many times, and reading her scriptures. She still has a concern about Joseph Smith seeing God, but that will be easy to follow up on this week, because we told her about how the Book of Mormon connects to Joseph Smith, and she already believes in the Book of Mormon. She thinks it's "hai bucuo" which is really a compliment for her.
But yeah, so in the lesson we shared in Mosiah, then with Jasmin's concerns, I took us to Alma 32, and passed off to S. Chen who shared about faith is believing in something you can't see and how you just have to have a desire at first. Jasmin said she had a desire and was willing to start praying multiple times a day to find out if God was really there, but then talking about Leilani's concern about Joseph Smith really seeing God, Jasmin runs and gets out the children's book of Mormon and tells us that she read it all, and she believes it. She was showing us Joseph Smith's story in it. She said she believes he saw God and Jesus. So I think she believes in God, she just doubts whether or not he will seriously answer HER individual prayers. But she sounded very willing to find out now. It was just an amazing lesson! She committed to prepare to be baptized with her sisters also. So yeah! Now we just have created some very interesting lesson plans for this next week because they all attended different lessons, only Petrea has finished the missionary lessons, so now we just have to teach Jasmin part of a 3rd and Leilani part of a 1st, and a commandment here and there...but it's totally possible and I think they will be prepared for their baptism interviews in the coming week as long as we make sure to address all concerns on Friday and they keep their commitments like they said. So yeah! That's all I have time to talk about. I'm excited so excited for the Huang girls. I was really sad about Jasmin last week, and now I'm just so happy all three girls have this desire together. I felt like they were part of the reason I was still here in Zhongli, so I'm just really happy, like I mentioned like 10 times. :) They are doing really great! I remember when I first met them, they would hid behind mom, and not even say anything to me, or my companion. Now I can just act like I've known them forever and ask ridiculously bold questions, or if I hear one of them moving around during the prayer, I can just lean over and hit their knee to remind them to be more respectful...and when us missionaries come over, if they don't come straight out, I can just go in their room and be like, "We're here! Now we prepared a lesson and you guys will come listen" haha. I love it. People who respond well to my nice silly, bold personality.
Chen yiting is doing great too. She's on track for September 26th. She also is good for my attitude. She's sassy with me sometimes, because I'll be ridiculous and happy back. She went with my district last week on our P-day activity and had a lot of fun.
Gu Junru...I don't know about her, she has her goal for the 25th and we are excited, but I don't know what will happen there because mom says no way dad will agree if she has to ask, so it's up to the bishop. If the bishop says it's okay to baptize her without dad's permission, we will, our rules just say we need a guardians signature, so we left it up to bishop. Mom says it won't change their relationship, it's just if dad knows he has an option it will be no. Or something like that. So yeah, Zhang jiemei needs to talk to the bishop, and we'll see what happens, but if no, she can just get baptized at 18. She wouldn't be the first to have to do that.
My district is also doing good. This week I was concerned about set-ups. This Elder in my district gets like 4 a day, whereas my companion and I got 4 last week. It is what we need to improve, so the Elders really helped us, we did role plays in contacting people on the street in 30 seconds and stuff. So I don't see us getting 4 set ups a day or anything, but maybe this week we can get 5 or 6 set ups, instead of 4, and go from there. We don't want too ridiculous amounts, because then we lose focus on the investigators we do have because there is no time to meet with them, but we do want around 7 a week, so we can be filtering through and find progressing people, and have options instead of nothing to do for 2 hours on this day, and 2 hours on this day. Next week is going to be crazy though, we have 2 days we will be in Taipei, presidents interviews, regular district mtg and WPS...and a baptism to prepare for, so next week is going to be insane, we are trying to do as much this week to prepare for the craziness of next week. I'm excited! I love crazy weeks :)
Okay, until next time!
Fu Jiemei.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Commitments on the Street
This week really has been something else. And exciting is one of the words you could definitely use. This last week was zone conference. Monday morning our district met up at the Zhongli train station and headed off to Taipei. Zone conference was really good, but I have to admit I was a little apprehensive initially at the message, but now I'm really excited. We talked about how President Grimley had went to this conference last week in Hong Kong, and they asked them, "Have you Become it?" So President asked us all if we had become it? So that's something I've been pondering lately. They also talked a lot about the baptism commitment. With the converging of Xinzhu to our area, we got a lot of missionaries from Taizhong into the Taipei mission. Taizhong does things a little differently than we had been and I think they want us to be bolder missionaries, so they had 2 of the Xinzhu sisters do a role play, then our zone leaders E. Worthen and Lu on how to invite someone to baptism on the street. They talked about make commitments as a tool to bring souls unto Christ. They taught us how to help someone understand in 3 minutes the importance of the Restoration and being baptized with correct authority. It was really amazing, because actually people have had a lot of success with it.
I'd never even THOUGHT about ever explaining the purpose of baptism and starting to prepare someone for that ordinance in my initial contact with someone, but I started to see how that could be very effective, that they were working towards their first covenant with the Lord from the very beginning. Especially since some of our biggest problems are a lot of our investigators who we end up stop meeting with is due to the fact that they are too scared of that first covenant and as that fear gets stronger, they lose hope and stop keeping commitments at all...so we end up having to spend less time meeting with them and focusing on people who are keeping commitments, and hope they will keep coming to church and one day be willing to make that jump.
So yeah, I have to admit, when I first heard them giving us these examples I was apprehensive, but they had us do roleplays, and Sister Andreason who was with me in the MTC was my partner. She was great for me because she knew me and she's similar to me in personality. She got transferred to Xinzhu this transfer, so in the 3 weeks she's been with her companion she's gotten a lot of practice on this kind of contacting, so she gave me a really great example, then I was able to do it following her example. It made me excited to have a new way of contacting, and I told my companion yesterday (Tuesday) we should invite at least one person to baptism. So even though we barely had time for dinner at all, we grabbed a really fast meal, and invited someone to baptism on the side of the street before we went back into the church to shove the food down really fast before MM meeting. It was cool. She didn't accept, she was too busy with school, but I think maybe one day she'll remember that when she has more time and maybe come back. I invited her to English class if she ever needed help with her English, so maybe we'll see her again! She said her brother is a member who stopped coming because of the lifestyle of a student in Taiwan. But the point is, I felt good about it.
It may sound like some crazy thing us Taiwan missionaries are doing, inviting people to baptism on the street...but its an effective way to find people genuinely interested in learning about the gospel and getting to know their Savior Jesus Christ. And fulfills our purpose to invite people unto repentance. It's not like I'll use it every time I contact, especially not when I have maybe 15 seconds on my bike talking to the scooter next to me to get out an invitation, but now that I know, I can use it and slowly ease more into letting the Spirit tell me which way to use to contact each person. My goal is eventually be able to have a different contacting experience with every person I contact, but right now my Chinese isn't all that great, so a pretty similar one each time is okay, adapted to their comments and questions. And as my Chinese improves, I'll be able to be molded into a more effective tool in the Lords hands.
So in other news besides a new contacting method I thought Dad would be interested in hearing, yesterday we went over to Huang Yujun1's house and met with Petrea and her sister Leilani. Leilani has been coming to church with her little sister most of the time and has been progressing, just a little slower than her younger sister. Yesterday we talked to her and she decided she also wanted to be baptized. So we moved back Petrea's date a week to help prepare her sister to do it with her. Mom is very excited. Leilani is a very sensible girl. Yesterday when we invited her to be baptized on a Friday, because the mom said that's the most ideal day for a baptism for her work...Leilani was like...Hmm I get off school at 4:45, then I have to do some homework so I won't have too much over the weekend and I need some time to watch TV for about 30 minutes, since I'll be very tired...baptism at 7..."It won't go over an hour will it?" She also had a quick conversation about baptism with her mother I really expected. She asked if baptism would be good for her? And her mom said, yes. And she said, " Super good?" And I told her, oh yeah, you weren't here last week when we taught the 3rd lesson to your sister, let me tell you about the gift of the Holy Ghost. So yeah, that's why it's pushed back for a week. She needs to hear the 3rd and I don't want to rush it too much. But she's awesome, she was willing to keep every commandment we taught, and totally had a testimony of Joseph Smith and everything. Leilani reminds me a LOT of Francesca. So yeah! Now if only Jasmin, the oldest would listen to our lesson and just even try to see what it's like to pray...but I think she'll start coming a long a lot more when her younger sisters both are willing to keep commandments and pray together.
This week was a lot of fun with Sister Chen. We laugh a lot together and just have a lot of fun doing normal missionary things. Also it is always fun to go to Taipei and see missionaries who I was in the MTC or in my district or zone in the past. See how they are doing outside of Zhongli. I'm lucky to have spent my whole life in Taiwan in Zhongli, but a little naive in some ways because I've never experienced leaving one area. I was just put here, and have been here since. I'm sure I'll get that experience one day, but for now, I'm happy in Zhongli. We have a lot of people progressing and doing really awesome, and I know Heavenly Father left me in Zhongli to help my new members continue to endure to the end and to help people I've known since transfer one, especially Gu Junru, and the Ge sisters (Jasmin, Leilani, and Petrea) my four kid investigators with mother members prepare to make their first covenant with Heavenly Father. Maybe I won't see all of them baptized, but I know they all will be one day, and I'm glad to be working with them right now.
Also! Chen Yiting is doing great! She's going to come with us on Preparation day today and hang out with us and the Elders...she's really excited...so yeah, now we have to go catch a bus! Later!
Sister Bruno
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