This last week was super difficult, and super amazing. I've learned already that those two tend to go hand in hand. My dad always says, "If you're not bleeding, sweating, or both, it's not work." I full-heartedly agree. I've never spiritually bled or sweated so much in my life. 

I've taken some time this last week to think about myself. And when I say that I don't mean in a selfish way, but rather, I've been so focused on other people as the reason why I've come on a mission, and failed to focus enough on myself as the other reason I've come. I think about serving others and forgetting myself and going to work and things like that, which are all definitely good and important, and I also forget sometimes that my most important convert is going to be myself. I mean, I'm already converted in so many ways, but I've come to the realization that I, myself, am not entirely and completely converted to the Gospel. I suppose very few people are, and it's an extremely tough thing to do. To mentally and physically and spiritually make the decision that you're going to do everything and anything God asks of you is a big decision.

But, it's the only intelligent decision.

I've written out some personal goals as to what I, for myself, want to accomplish in these the next twenty one months or so. During this last Zone Conference the Assistants asked us to do something similar to that. But they told us that they didn't want us to write out what we would do, but rather, what we would become. Setting aside mission, career, family, future, any and all of that, and think only about me, myself. What attributes do I want to have? When people think of me, what do I want them to say?

Ultimately it comes down to developing Christlike Attributes one-by-one, and all of them all at the same time. It's so difficult :) 

But when things get difficult, I just think about that sentence, "It's the only intelligent decision." God either exists, or He doesn't. There is either a life after this, or there's not. We can talk about all of the gray stuff in between and confuse ourselves, but, ultimately, God works with black and white. It is or it isn't. And, supposing God exists and all of the things I've been taught are true, then, if I am faithful and do all that I can, I will receive blessings which cannot be comprehended. I will live for eternity and splendor and bliss and happiness and joy with those I love. 

When I think about that, it just becomes so simple and I just laugh at how silly it is that I struggled or doubted before. It's the only intelligent decision. And I've made it. And I'm sticking by it.

But enough about me, myself, and I. With New Years coming up fast things are getting really busy for everyone and our teaching pool is shrinking. We have plenty of investigators to work with, but most of them are super busy. I've been praying hard that they will continue to have the desire to learn and to meet with us even after the New Year. 

But, at the moment, we have two very amazing investigators. One is A-Cheung. He's super cool and we've been working with him for awhile. He's about this ----><---- close to baptism right now. He says that he believes this church is true, that it is what god wants for him, and that he wants to be baptized. Previously he had some family opposition, but that got squared away and now the only thing that he is worried about is a good friend of his who happens to be a very devout preacher from another church. I can tell he's a little nervous about talking to him, and so we've just tried to take it slow and encourage him. And of course, lots of prayers.

The other one is Patrick, who has now been taught for two years. Kind of crazy. He's a very nice guy, although a bit different. In the past he's been the butt of a lot of jokes, and even made it on T.V. and into magazines. He was named the Couch Potato of the year a few years back, and it's been a hard struggle for him. He's become a little closed off because of it, and at times it's hard to teach him and get him to really learn because he's so focused on saying what he thinks you want to hear. But we had an amazing lesson this last week where we showed pictures of Christ, didn't say anything, and had him share his thoughts and his feelings. He let out some emotions, shed a few tears, and in the end it was really good for him. I'm very grateful for this opportunity that we have to work with such a cool guy, and help him in his life.

This opportunity to serve a mission is beyond anything I had thought of or hoped for. As another missionary friend of mine said recently, "Being a missionary is legendary!" I plan to never forget that.

An awesome miracle that happened; Last week we met a guy in Mei Foo. He was super chill and super interested and that in itself was a miracle. We talked about prayer, than told him that next time we would share a special message, and gave him a Restoration pamphlet. We met with him this last Wednesday to give him a tour of the church and have a fast "get to know you" lesson. He informed us that he had read the pamphlet four times, just to make sure he understood it. That it all makes perfect sense, and that he wants to read the Book of Mormon, find out more, and if it continues to make sense, he'll get baptized.

Wait, what..........

Elder Barker says it's the first time he's ever met anyone so kahnlihk, so diligent in wanting to learn the truth. It's pretty sweet, and definitely a blessing I don't feel we deserve. But, who's to complain? :D

You guys are all so awesome and I can't wait to spend some time with you all!

Well, I can't send pictures this week, which means the subject for the main email will make no sense, but, nothing I can do about it.

The librarian gave my computer to someone else for no reason, so I moved to a vacant one, then that one got taken, and then this computer doesn't like me and says that I'm not cool enough to send pictures, so...yah, next week :(

Hello peoples!

Is it bad that the subject for this last email of your's didn't shock me at all? We're most definitely one of the strangest families on the planet. But, wouldn't have it any other way.

It's really interesting to see how different I am than others because of the family I've grown up in. I mean, everyone is different, but you really don't notice until you get away, get around others, and can analyze yourself. And that's what this mission is all about. Everyday, every hour, every minute you have to look over your performance, your actions, yourself, and judge it against the goals you've made and the examples you've been given and the things you've learned.

I read "The Fourth Missionary" yesterday, which is an amazing talk. It says somewhere in there something along these lines, "Change is easy. The second you think something in mind, you've changed. It might be imperceptible, but it happened. Therefore, the key to change is to think it." That's pretty much what we do. We realize what we need to change and we make the mental note, and we move on, because, out here, you don't have much time to sit down and make a detailed plan and all of that jazz. I've never been so busy in my life.

Ahh, but I keep thinking about haw amazing this is. Never, ever, will I get another opportunity such as this to really become what I need to become. It's actually kind of exciting because you really get to realize your personal potential. But then it's also a bit humbling. "The Fourth Missionary" slams you hard and just highlights all the mistakes you have and have had and will continue to have, and you kind of feel a bit stupid while reading. But then, that's not altogether a bad thing. Every change in a good direction is a good thing.

This last week has gone by so fast. I swear every time Sunday roles around that we just had it. I swear that every time I sit down to do personal study, it's time for companionship study. It's becoming less of a challenge to know how to speak the language and know how to teach and such, and more of an impossibility to manage everything you need to do and fit it into the schedule. I think I'm beginning to understand how you feel Mom and Dad. You run and run as fast as you can, then look back at the day and realize how much you didn't actually get done. But, such is life. It's hard to not get discouraged at times, but I'm learning how to control myself and just do what I can.

The language, as I just said, is becoming less of a barrier. I mean, it's still super difficult, but I'm learning vocab at a fast rate, my ability to hear and understand is going up, and I can teach quite well. The only really difficult thing is my accent. I have a super hard "American" accent, and it makes my Cantonese sound silly, so I'm working hard on cutting that out. But, in order to make that happen I have to speak more from the throat, and speak out of my nose. What the heck? I sound like Darth Spader the Chipmunk. More like a choking aardvark than a Buhndeih-Native. Elder Barker laughs every time I sit down to read Cantonese pingyam during language study, because I'm always getting mad at myself. I try to make the sounds come out right, but it's hou laahn teng, (very difficult to listen to, meaning, sounds really bad.)

Perfect practice makes perfect though, right?

I love you all so much. Kind of hard to put it into words, but, yah. If this mission teaches me anything, it's taught/teaching/wil teach the importance of our family, and how grateful I am that we're going to be together forever. I love being able to whip out my photo album, show it to an investigator and say, "This is my family. We're kind of weird, but we're eternal."

Pretty sweet.

Hope you all have a fantastic week! We're going to 10,000 Buddhas today, so, next week I'll have some cool pictures.

 In Mei Foo park

 A very cool Buddhist temple

 Big Buddha

 Elder Barker

 Me

some of the coolest architecture ever

1-1-15

Well, I'm once again in the Apple Store. No pictures this week :S

In any case, things are going well. This last week was difficult, but it was also fun, and I definitely learned a lot. We had Zone Training this week, which was good. For one of the trainings the Tseun Wan Sisters got up and pulled out a picture of Christ. They were very quite, and spoke very slowly. "This, is Christ." They talked about Him and His life, and then wrote on the board, "Why are we here?" It was very inspiring and made me think really hard about my reasons for being here. A little self evaluation. 

After Zone Training I got to go on exchanges with Elder Breedlove, the one from Arizona. It was fun and we enjoyed the time we had. It was super interesting to see how two trainees could handle several lessons a bit of time finding out on the street. Comparing is not a good thing, but I definitely came to realize that, even though it's been hard to work so hard and to struggle so much, it's paying off. I feel like I'm farther ahead in many ways than many of the other missionaries in my group. I made a few goals to keep me moving forward, and plan to Look Towards the Mark. Looking Towards the Mark is a speech that President Hawkes gave to the BYU students back in 2003 or so. It's all about focusing the Mark, or the line of 100%, rather than letting yourself look towards the Tolerance Line. If you're focused on the line of tolerance, which shifts continually, you'll never reach your full potential, and you most definitely will not be in tune with God's way of thinking. But if you focus on the Mark, then no matter where the Tolerance Line shifts to, you'll always be moving forward and drawing closer to your goal. President Hawkes has been really pushing us to think hard about this and what it means to us.

I love this example he gives in the speech; An American computer company wanted to create some new business opportunities in other countries. They signed a contract with a company in Japan to make parts for the computers. They sent a letter to the company that said they would accept only "10% defective parts," or, in other words, they expected 90% of the products to be made to specifications. The company accepted the offer. When the products finally arrived they found that the boxes were full with 100% made to specifications. There was an additional box, though, with a note attached that read, "We're sorry if this causes any inconvenience, but we weren't quite sure what you meant by "90%." Here are the 10% defective parts you asked for. We had to change our processes to make them and it took some time. We're sorry for the delay."

Just goes to show that it is possible and expected to be 100%. 

I think we should just marry the two things I've talked about; 

Look Towards the Mark

He is the Christ

I'm changing a little bit everyday :D

1-25-15

So, I don't have much to report on. This last week was pretty standard. We woke up, did some work, went to bed. The days are all mixed together and every time another Weekly Planning session or Correlation Meeting comes around I think back over the last seven days and can't remember where they went. It's been almost three and a half months! The weeks are going like hotcakes. Except, here, "chicken feet" would be far more appropriate.

 

One funny story; Just about everyone is busy here, as you probably know by now. They are all mhdakhaahn, or, gonsihgaan. When we are street finding and they say that, we just have to keep walking with them and trying to talk to them. A response we get a lot of the time is, "Wan daihyihgo yahn," which means, "Go find the second person," essentially, "Go talk to someone else." Something Elder Barker told me to say is, "Keihsaht, ngoh taausin yauh wan daihyatgo yahn. Keuih gong bei ngoh teng, wan daihyihgo yahn. Gam, leih haih daihyihgo yahn."

 

All of that means, "I just talked with one person, and they told me to go find the second person. So, you are the second person." It's pretty funny, and a lot of people laugh.

 

I'm still doing good and learning a lot. Things are difficult, I won't lie, but conquering easy tasks doesn't mean much.

 

 I love you guys. Hope you have a fantastic week, and thank you for the good Happy Birthday wishes. I literally almost forgot this morning. One year older and wiser to, right? Actually, that's kind of hard to do when you're already at maximum capacity.

P.S. I hate to ask for anything because I know that shipping costs so much, but spices here are extremely expensive. I was wondering, if possible, you could put together a few of the usuals for me?

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!