Monday, March 8, 2010 12:07 AM
First off, question, around Christmas time I sent a big envelope to the bishop, and wrote letters back to everyone in our ward who wrote me during Halloween/Thanksgiving/Christmas time, like to every priest and young woman who wrote, and to a cute little Griffin family, to the ward, and the bishop, etc...but I wasn't so positive I could read his handwriting on the address...but it never came back to me, did the ward get my letters? Nobody ever told me.
Okay, so now we are in the last week of this transfer. Once again, I feel like I don't have a whole lot to say about this week, but I'll think diligently and try to send at least a couple paragraphs. Today we are emailing in the library, so I just spent the last 20 minutes scanning in a couple pictures that I only have one copy of. If I don't move next week, I have quite a few more pictures others have given me, that I only have one copy of that I will try to scan...but I'm at a university library, and even getting on the computers took some time with figuring out a password and how to boot up in an English system...so not too much time...
What I do think was really unique this week that I want to first mention, is we had an interesting experience yesterday. Sunday during church we get a call from a lady, a Ms. Liu who said one of us gave her our number on the train. She was doing some translation work for someone, as a service, but thought her grammar was bad, and was hoping we could find time to do some service for her and help her edit her translations. We happened to have some time that afternoon and agreed to meet with her over in Danshui by the MRT station.
We didn't know if either of us would remember contacting her, or remember who she was, since we talk to plenty of people and see lots of new faces daiy, but when she arrived, I remembered vividly in my mind that contacting experience, because first of all, I sat down on the MRT (Metro) and was going to talk to the lady on my left side, when a member on my right asked if I remembered her. I didn't know her well, but after her giving me her name, I remembered her family, since her brother was accompanying our lessons once or twice a week, since his best friend was our investigator Chen Zhirou. So then, she was a little sad I knew Li Wenqi and not her, so she introduced herself a little, then, after our conversation was dying out, she motioned to the lady next to me and said she'd let me get back to missionary business...well, I felt a little pressure to have a member sitting right next to me staring at me contacting, but no sweat, I just turned the the lady and started talking to her. She was already Christian so she was really accepting of me, and the Sister Li by me, we very nice and told her she was a member and this church was great, so it was a nice little side testimony..well, I told the lady I was about to have to get off the train in 2 minutes and gave her my track with our number, and took her business card...and she started to SING to me...haha, I totally got serenaded on the bus by this woman. Well, with our new referral system and having a lot of pressure to call people, I admit a weakness of mine occasionally is to take a longer time to contact my own contacts, since we have our investigators to call and the referral system people. So then, her card sat in my desk for a little while, until she called us, especially because she didn't express extreme interest in meeting with us when I asked, but did say we could call her sometime. But it was cool that she ended up calling us when she needed some help, and we really were able to go and help her. We ended up getting half way through the translation work, then having to go because we had the Fireside in Taipei that evening, but she set up to meet with us again Tuesday morning. We shared a small message about family history and how the gospel blesses families on Sunday, and are going to try to gauge if she will be willing to listen to our message Tuesday when we finish up the translation service...I just think it's a really unique blessing how the Lord really puts people in our paths. I mean, sometimes they don't accept the gospel, but you have the opportunity to help a lot of people and put some joy in their lives, and move them on their way to be more receptive for missionaries in the future. Plus I liked the Sister Liu, she was a character...we got up and said thank you for her kindness in giving us some bookmarks, and left, and we weren't far before she came running behind us calling our names, and said, she forgot to hug us, so she had left all her stuff on the 3rd floor of the McDonalds, and ran down to hug us, then went back in McDonalds to gather up her stuff. HAHA. Interesting.
That night, we had the new member, investigator fireside in Taipei, I thought the fireside was fun. It was a little unique at the beginning because they asked my companion to play the piano and said that they would have a congregational choir singing before the fireside to help the reverence level at the beginning. I was excited to see who the choir was. Once there, I am informed that our zone in the choir, so I try to gather up some Elders to start singing, and it's not easy, but finally we get a few, and E. Worthen notices the reverence is not getting any better and invites all missionaries to the front to sing. Well, tons of Elders came, but it was a little, interesting...because for about 10 minutes, I am the only Sister up there singing at all, but then S. Steck and Zheng saw that I was alone up there, and pulled themselves away from their investigators for a few minutes to help me sing. I just thought it was amusing, how as we look out at the fireside, about half the seats in the front are empty, because all the missionaries were up front singing. Quite a few didn't come up thought, or it would have been even more funny, but I understand, because what the fireside is, is lots of new members, members, investigators come to hear the message of the month and be spiritually uplifted, so sometimes it's really hard to leave your investigators who came with you. Ours were fine and happy to watch us sing. The fireside was themed around Temples and Baptism, and I just laughed so hard and appreciated how President Grimley got up and talked about the blessings of the temple, then told everyone, if they hadn't been baptized, to get baptized quickly so they could enjoy the blessings of the temple, and if they had been, to get to their bishop and start interviewing and preparing to receive the blessings of the temple. It was so straightforward and I feel like it was really effective, because Taiwanese people respond to straightforwardness, and one of the new members after had a deeper desire to go to the temple. I saw Jasmine at the fireside, and she shared that she was so touched as she saw the pictures of the temple. I'm glad that they have that fireside to help strengthen the new members every month. I could see the strengthening effects of it.
Okay, well, I have a little bit of a headache and still have to write my President's letters, so that's my email for this week. Hopefully you find some of it interesting. Love you guys, write again next week and tell you if I move or not. There is 8 sisters leaving and some areas closing this transfer, so it will be an interesting move call for some, but you never know. We get move calls Thursday instead of Friday because of Zone Conferences...so next week I can talk about Zone Conference and move calls if anything happens in our district...Interesting little statistics, Sister Ackerson and I have now been together 6 months as companions in all...A LOT...and Elder Smith and I have been in the same exact district for 9 months (he's only got one transfer left, lucky and unlucky him. haha). Crazy how I am put with the same people a couple different times on my mission. Well, talk more next week.
Sister Flora Bruno
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