Well, everyone, sounds like you're all having fun. Pretty much the same story here ;D Actually, I've enjoyed the last few days since P-Day. Usually when we go out to find I have to force myself to put on a good face and have a good attitude, but I actually was a bit excited for it. Now that I can understand where everything's going, (unless the other person gets into an argument about space travel with my companion, of course,) I am able to pitch in more, and the more unity we have, the better we teach, and the more "success" we have. Things are definitely looking up, and even though my self-esteem/pride gets squished when I go to do a language pass off or sihfaan (practice teaching) with Elder Barker, I can see how far I've come. We ask people on the street all the time how long they think I've been out. The lowest length we've heard is three months. When they find out it's only been one, they think it's super awesome, and they're more interested in listening. Pretty good if I do say so myself.

 

In any case, the work is moving along. We talked to a devout Catholic the other day and he asked us "what's the success rate" when we go out finding. Meaning; how many people out of all the people we talk to actually get baptized/join the church. I answered that "success isn't measured by baptisms. Our success is when we fulfill our purpose, which is to help others come unto Christ. anytime we help anyone in anyway, we count it as a success. So, our success rate is pretty much Yat Baak percent." The guy was super surprised by that answer. I've thought a bit about that, and it's really helped me to focus less on what I think I should be getting out of my mission, out of others, and more on what my mission should be getting out of me. There's a missionary who just went home this last transfer. He never got to see a single person get baptized. Everyone says he's a legend. I'm pretty sure we're one of the only organizations on the planet and in the history of histories that doesn't count "failure" as a failure. Pretty sweet if you ask me.

 

Funny story; praying in Cantonese is how we do it, obviously, and thus far I haven't had any goofy mess ups. But just the other day I prayed that God would help us to have the Holy Ghost's cheese. It's a new brand of spray cheese. Pray Cheese. Spray it on in the morning and have twenty-four hours of temptation protection. And now with new Life Guide enhancements!

 

All joking aside, though, I am learning a lot about the language and about teaching and about becoming a better missionary/man/husband/human being. I've been thinking about this experience, and realized that people will pay thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars for professionals to teach them how to be successful and happy people. They'll spend countless hours pouring over books and articles. And most of them will never quite make it. But I have the chance and the ability over the next two years to have all of that happen. I almost felt like I should be paying something more. But how amazing that the Lord does not ask for our money. Everything the world holds in value, to Him, is pointless. All he wants is for us to come unto Him, give up our sins, and be changed. It's a pretty good trade.

Just being missionaries

The hardest thing besides the language? Waking up in the morning. Usually I have a dream about going to sleep, and just as I'm about to fall asleep and everything is super good, the alarm goes off. I feel like I haven't gotten any sleep at times. But everyone else is like that as well. It's just part of the job.

 

You guys are all so awesome and I'm glad to have such a great family. I've been telling stories galore about the crazy things we do. Can't wait to spend time with you. Actually, I can, because I've still got nineteen months. But then it's home free. Love you all.

 

P.S. Sorry about the money situation. I was going to leave it on the card, but apparently the exchange rate will drop after Chinese New year, which is in two or three weeks, and won't pick back up till this time next year. So, Elder Barker advised me to pull the money out now so that I get the most bang for my buck.

 

Thank you for worrying about my situation, though. And I'm good with money. I haven't spend hardly any yet.

A pretty cool park in our area

riding the Sky Ferry back to mainland Hong Kong

 tall buildings

Wan Chai chapel which is the Asia church headquarters

1-13-15

I apologize that this is two days later than you expected it. You all are probably wondering if I died or something. Not quite. This week is temple week, and so P-Day was not on Monday, but rather today. So, yah. I'll try to remember to let you know beforehand on the next Temple Week.

So, life is still crazy. Imagine that. At this moment I am in an Apple Store using this psycho computer that thinks it's smarter than me. We're in the IFC Mall, which is connected to the IFC building, which just happens to be the tallest building in Hong Kong. There are a lot of peoples in here, and it's really loud and there's no privacy, but, mouh baahnfaat. 

Everyday something new and exciting happens. For example, last night I was doing calls, trying to invite people to English Class. A lady picked up and answered, so I said my name and who I was. There was a whole lot of yelling, and then she asked me how I had her number. Street contact. She then proceeded to state that she remembered meeting the missionaries, and that she told us never to call her again. It's a good thing I still don't understand a lot of the language. I just smiled (through the phone) and thanked her, then she hung up. It's a fairly regular occurrence.

Ahh, but the work shall go on. I read about the prophet Nephi this last week, in 3 Nephi. At this point he's been preaching the word of God for a very long time, and is visited and ministered to by angels every single day. Quite probably the most powerful missionary ever to live on the earth. And yet, the people reject him. The scriptures say that the people "could not deny the truth of his words." Paraphrased, and powerful. They could not deny because he spoke with the strength and the glory of God. But their hearts were hard, and they rejected the word, even though they knew Nephi testified of the truth. They knew God exists. They knew they would be judged according to their sins. And yet, they still rejected.

I suppose that this applies to everyone, everywhere. It does not matter how well we teach, or how strong the spirit is, people still have agency. It's their choice to accept the message, and there's not much that we can do about it. Not much, except for keep trying. Hopefully one person in all of the eight million are prepared to listen.

In any case, we aren't going to just quit doing missionary work because of a few difficult days. In fact, we just work harder. Just do it. That's what everybody says here. If the day sucks and you can't speak the language and no one wants to listen, just do it anyways. I suppose it kind of sucks, at times, but in the end there's no better thing we could be doing, and I'm learning how to be grateful for my trials and challenges. 

Here's a good quote we talked about in District Meeting; "Courage is an outward defiance of an inward fear. It is not to be bold in the face of adversity, it is to be bold inspite of adversity."

So, pretty much, do the work.

1-05-15

Hello my Family!

 

I miss you guys. Even though we all butted heads at times, I look back and realize how good I have it. I have a full family, with two parents, who are still together and married and sealed in the temple. That rules out like ninety percent of the rest of the world. I'm so grateful that I have the ability to whip out a picture of all of us and show it to our investigators.

 

Things have been quite good here. I'm still adjusting and learning, but I know that everything will work out, so, no worries. I apologize for not having a lot of pictures, but the camera isn't super easy to carry around, and we're not supposed to look like tourists while walking around, so President Hawkes advises against taking lots of pictures. But, today we are going to Central, which is where all the big buildings are, so I'll be sure to get some good ones there.

 

I don't really have any exciting or interesting stories to relate. I mean, things happened, but this week was difficult. We didn't get much time to Chaam Jauh-Go finding-and the times that we did, people just didn't want to listen. Yesterday, though, we met this really interesting guy. He does construction for a job, so I instantly knew quite a bit about him. We realized after a little bit that he was just struggling. He didn't say a whole lot, but we could tell from his demeanor and his attitude that life was just hard. So, we decided to share a scripture and how we know that Jesus Christ has helped us.

 

He laughed a little and sort of blew it off, but there was no rejection. We could tell that he needed the Gospel, and that he wanted it. His heart is just hurting, and a bit hardened. I really hope and pray that our message sheds some light on him and his world, and that he decides to investigate a little more.

 

As far as the language, I've finally broken through the wall and can now see the light at the end of the tunnel. The first two weeks were extremely difficult, and I pretty much forgot everything I learned in the MTC. I can almost swear that the language they taught me there isn't the language the people speak. Actually, that is somewhat true as people use a lot of weird slang. They also use a little bit of a different language on the phone. Plus, they speak super fast and, who could have guessed, if you don't speak as fast as them, they won't understand you. I've never heard of a language that, if you speak it slowly and clearly, it makes no sense. But, I'll get used to it. Oh, and there are two forms of Cantonese; Spoken, and Written. Both quite different. Depending on the person and the situation, they may speak either/or, or a mixture of the two. So, you pretty much have to learn three languages instead of one, speak as fast as you can, and do all this while on the street talking to some crazy short Asian person while the buses fly past honking and all that jazz. It's quite fun, if I do say so myself.

Ahh, but a mission is not about the circumstances or the environment or the culture or the language or anything of that sort. A mission is about our purpose, and our purpose is about Christ. Go figure that I'd be learning something about Him.

Something President Hawkes said to me really got me. I was struggling, like everyone, and said that my "self-esteem" was low. Why? It might have something to do with the fact that I've left all family, friends, and past life behind. Traveled half way around the world to a different country. Attempted to learn the hardest language in the world (everyone says it's Finnish, but, for example; in Finnish you write Nephi like this, "Nefi." Very difficult. In Cantonese you write Nephi like this, "&*$!&#$&!@(#&!(@#&!)(^*%@ &*#(&*@." I'm not super good with the characters yet, but it's a pretty close translation.) And am now spending every minute of every day trying to talk to people who could truly care less that I have the world's most important message to share with them. It might just be me, but I don't know....

In any case, I was struggling. President Hawkes then said, "Is it self-esteem, or is it pride?" What?! Okay, actually it made sense as soon as I read it, because I've thought a lot about this. Long story short, there are two types of pride; 1) When you think you're better than someone or something else and don't need their help, 2) When you think you're not good enough for someone or something and you don't accept their help. Some people might think that the second form is just Humility. But true Humility is realizing that you most definitely are not good enough, and accepting the help despite your short comings. So, moral of this tale? My pride has/was keeping me from relying on the Savior's help. Once I realized that there was no way I could do this on my own, and just starting praying, things got easier.

I testify that the power of Christ's Atonement is real and works.

I love you all and think of you a lot. Happy New Year!