Week 13

Ni Hao!!!!

I made it!!!

It was a long travel ... and a little stressful... but I'm finally here!!!

I'm going to try to go in chronological order...

We got in late Wed night and did short introductions and then hit the hay....

On Thurs we had a full day of training, food, and interviews. We really got to know President and Sister Bishop. They are amazing!!!  They are both so sweet! They both love the gospel very much and are quite passionate about missionary work. I love them!

 That afternoon they threw us right into contacting as we were walking to dinner. It was crazy!!!! I loved it! Sister Rigby and I got to be companions for a little bit (she is the sister I met before I left and I could probably write an email just about how amazing she is and how blessed I have been to have her as my roommate and dear friend... oh I love her!) Anywho we were contacting and we stop to talk to this sweet girl when we noticed we lost our group...... of course it would be us to get lost the first day here... we actually didn't start to panic... we said a prayer and within a few minutes we saw President Bishop walking aka storming down the other side of the street... we were so happy to seem... we thought he was going to be mad but once we walked over we could feel how much he cared and how worried he was even if we were only lost for 10 min. He is great!

After dinner we went to the night market... oh is that a crowded place! We found out that we would be doing what is called Dan Jones night haha...YEP! So we started with singing Love At Home and then the AP's and office Elders got on the boxes and started yelling... Oh did we get a crowd! Then we each had to get on the box one by one and yell our testimony.... once we stepped off an older missionary would grab our arm and take us into the crowd to contact.... It was awesome! It really was so fun! Both President and Sister Bishop Participated. It was crazy packed so we talked to a lot of people and all together we got almost 300 referrals!!! Such a fun night!

Friday was the day of goodbyes, find your trainer, and find your area.... i wasn't a fan of the goodbyes but the trainer part was really cool! I was the last one to find out who my trainer is... talk about a test of patience... Her name is Sister Koay. She is awesome! She is from Malaysia (so she is fluent in Mandarin and like 30 other languages... English being one of them) She plays the guitar and loves to sing. She loves cities and is not a fan of the outdoors so we are quite different in that way... she's pretty quiet. She mainly gives me correction and the rest I find out from asking her. She is an amazing missionary and she really loves the people! I'm in the Gaoxiong (Kaohsiung) area. It's down in the south and its a crazy, big, and beautiful city!... and yes the city does scare me a bit but I'm getting used to it.

Friday night was pretty hard.... the language is tough. The roads are crazy. I like the bike but I'm still getting used to it. I was having a really hard time contacting on my bike and was about in tears when i went up to a couple and they were like oh you are the new sister... Song Jiemei.... they told me there names which i didn't understand but then the lady said just call me Susan!... It totally changed my feelings...

Saturday we hit the ground running! We had 5 lessons!!! 3 were progressing investigators and 2 were 1st lessons. It was crazy... I didn't understand almost all of them but they were all kind and smiled when I tried to teach or share my testimony... one of our investigators, Hao Mei, is pretty close to getting baptized! They are all so great and I love them.. even if i can't pronounce all of their names :)

Sunday was amazing!!! I needed it even though I didn't understand almost all of what was being said, i needed the sacrament.We cover 2 wards and they are both so amazing! Members are so involved! They are all so sweet. I really wanted to get to know the members so I tried hard to talk to them and it mainly went well.. I didn't understand alot and they didn't understand me but the spirit was there and that's what matters.

After church I talked to a sweet girl and helped her fill out an application to BYU Hawaii. Her English name is Phoebe. She attended Snow college so her English is really good! It was so great to have someone to talk to. She helped me so much! I love her!

Tonight we are having FHE with a few of our investigators and the ward mission leader. It truly is amazing how the ward gets involved and it is so needed. I'm so excited...

Over all it has been a great but very hard week... the Lord has given me a tender mercy everyday to help me get along... I feel so blessed to know that He is with me ALL of the time. I love Him!

Well the field is white so I must be going!

I love you all!!!!

Until next week!