Gorging your Trainee on Cake

So this week has been a bit crazy.  I am training.  I got the call on Tuesday morning.  I was kind of anticipating it because Sister Thomas had been here for a long time and with the training program being two movecalls, if I didn't train soon, I wouldn't train.  So Wednesday morning, we had a special train the trainers meeting with President Bishop, and Friday I went up to Taizhong.  We had a big meeting in which they gave us more training. 

My new companion is Sister Jarvis.  She is super great.  She is from Kaysville Utah and is just a delight to work with.  She has a great attitude.  Her Chinese is awesome.  Poor Sister Morey for having to deal with my horrible Chinese when I got on the island!  Sister Jarvis studied Chinese at BYU before she came, and she lived in China for a while.  She just has a great attitude and is really positive.  I am excited for our time together.   
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We have seen many wonderful miracles together already.  On Sunday our investigator Shu-feng came to stake conference.  She is a wonderful investigator that came to English class and in talking after the class we set up time to meet with her.  She has just been progressing wonderfully ever since.  She came to church and was sitting by Sister Jarvis while I sat next to another investigator.  I came up afterwards and there was this very tiny grandma talking to them.  Come to find out it is her aunt who has been a member for 30 years.  All of her children have served missions, and she has tried for years to share the gospel with her family.  She was so excited to see her niece there.  She started crying and expressing how grateful she was.  She looked at Shu-feng and told her that she has done work for a lot of their ancestors in the temple but that she needs to find the people that she missed and finish the work.  She cried expressing how much the church meant to her.  Shu-feng started crying and then Sister Jarvis and I started crying.  It was such a special moment.   
This wonderful sister who had been praying and waiting and trying for years to help her family accept the gospel comes to church to find her niece there!  It was very much an answer to her prayers.  Shu-feng was very touched by the experience and immediately afterwards reconfirmed her own baptismal goal, which she had previously been a little nervous about.  For so many members here, it is so hard to hold onto hope that their families will accept the gospel, but I have heard story after story that for those who remain faithful, the Lord always provides miracles.   
  
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Thursday there was a typhoon hitting Taiwan.  Since we are down south the weather was not too bad.  There was a lot of wind and rain but nothing too extreme.   We had been trying to find time to go visit this less active that the bishop had given us but who lived in the more rural part of our area.  Because this area is so rural we don't have a very good map of it, and we didn’t really have any idea how to get there.   We determined that the best we could do was start riding in the general direction and then ask for directions.  

We rode for a really long time. After passing a train station, and a distant 7-11, we kept riding really far down this deserted road looking for this less active’s house.  We get there and it seemed like no one was home.  We decided to go tracting for a while and come back.  We came back and said a prayer expressing our desire to find this less active and our concern that it wouldn't be very easy to come back very often given how far away it was.  We knocked again and nothing.  

Sister Jarvis 

I decided to call her, not thinking much of it (she has been called many times before), but  she answered.  I told her that we were in the area. She must have looked out the window because she said with surprise, "Oh you are outside!"  She came out, and let us in.  As we sat with her, she was amazed that we had biked that far to get to her house.  She said that she had been wanting to come to church for a long time, but she was afraid.  She didn't feel like she knew any one after so long and was nervous to return.  She said she had been praying that she would find a way to come to church.  It was such a special lesson and a testimony to me that God does answer our prayers.  He heard the prayers of this sweet sister , and he inspired the bishop.  He gave us a day with a whole afternoon to bike in the middle of a typhoon out to this sister’s house to let her know that He does love her and He does hear her prayers.   

The woes of Garrett, the long-legged Frenchman

I will start off with the most recent news.  Last night we got transfer calls, and I am transferring to a kite, or province, called Battambang.  Bat (the animals) dome (like a space dome) bong (read it like it sounds).  It is apparently pretty awesome up there.  Really pretty too.  

I am pretty excited to head out to the kites.  I am sure you can find it on a map; it is on western side of Cambodia, and it is really big.  The reputation of Battambang is that during the Pol Pot genocide that province was one of the worst places.  They have a certain word which sounds like, suhhow.  Which pretty much just means vicious or crazy.   

They also called me to be the Zone leader (the leader of a group of districts of missionaries) up there in Battambang.  I do not know a lot about it but it is a pretty big zone and when President Moon called me last night he said that they are actually preparing to split one of the branches into two, so things are definitely progressing up there.   

Quite honestly one of my biggest worries is being the Zone leader up there.  Also, the Zone leader I am replacing is a straight up baller.  He used to be an AP (assistant to the mission president), and he is ending his mission.  Really awesome missionary.  I definitely have some big shoes to fill.   

I will definitely miss the members in Sen Sok and our recent converts.  I am excited to start in a new area though.  

Channary and the member who would always teach her with Garrett and Elder Hem.

Channary is doing well.  She is now down to 1 tooth on the top.  She got four of them pulled and now has just one.  We met her the day after, and she had toilet like paper in her mouth.  It was kind of funny as she would try and talk with the toilet like paper, but we could not really understand.  She is doing well though.  I definitely will miss her.  

We were able to get some new investigators this past week.   We had one lady who is a referral come for all 3 hours of church.  We have also been working with the Branch President to get all the new recent converts callings.   

 Sen Sok

I had an interesting experience last P-day.  We went to a place in Sen Sok so Elder Hem could get his haircut.  It is a place that we go all the time because they sell vegetables and fruit and bread in front of their home.  Well, out of nowhere, a very drunk Cambodian man decided it would be cool if he came up behind me and started to kick my legs.  I am not saying he kicked me like he was kicking a soccer balls, but he definitely let me know he was there.  Quite honestly I do not remember what all he said, but I remember him saying the Khmae word for "French," "freaking French," and "freaking French and his long legs."

Well, we walked more into the house and he followed and was just annoying.  He was right up next to me on my left and was just crazy.  Speaking small English words (quite honestly not the smartest guy...calls me French and then tries to speak English with me...) and just being annoying.  Either way eventually, I sat down more inside, and he left.

I can happily say though that I do not even know his face because I did not even give him the time of day.  I just looked forward the whole time.  Elder Hem said I had good patience.  So, that was kind of fun.  One of the funniest parts was when the lady whose house it was tried to scare him off by telling him that French people know how to fight and that we hit people all the time if we get angry.  I think she was just trying to help because I am the only one in Sen Sok who buys her bread.

A young member couple invited us over to dinner. They also had several of the youth from the branch over. He made a whole chicken.  You just picked off a chunk with your hands. Also, I ate fried cricket/beetle bugs of some kind.  It actually had a good taste, but the legs were sharp.  

Chicken eggs are a thing of the past.  I eat duck eggs now.  Just slightly more expensive, and they are much bigger.   I am starting to try and make omelets and stuff, and duck eggs work great.  I buy 10 duck eggs for about $1 and 20 cents.  

Fun update on the old branch president.  Our current branch president told us that the old one (who is no longer with us and lives far away) told a few people that the elders receive a salary of $200 a month and that the branch president gets $700.  If only they knew…. (Missionaries do not get paid. They pay their own expenses. Branch Presidents, Bishops, etc. are all non-paid volunteers.)

Dinner with a young member couple (same as above) and some of the youth of the branch. 

I want to share a cool experience I had of my last district meeting lesson.   Last week I had no idea what I wanted to teach for district meeting.  I prayed, studied, started to prepare for certain topics only to come to a dead end and feel that those topics were not right.  I really struggled as to what I should teach.  Last Sunday we were listening to a conference talk and one of the speakers said something that just sparked something in my brain.  I feel like I was really inspired by the Holy Ghost, and afterward, I decided to teach about trials and tribulations.  That was a topic that I felt was the greatest item of concern in the district and in many of the individual companionships.  I am truly thankful for inspiration.

 My main point was to say that when we have many trials and problems on our missions first look at our work and our lives and see what we can do better.  We can all improve and qualify for more blessings.  But after we are trying our best we need to keep working hard, don't quit and just realize that Heavenly Father is just polishing us and helping us to become better.

I really like what I read this morning in Alma 1:25 about that even though they had trials and persecution they were strong in their faith and they continued to follow Jesus Christ will all diligence.  I love their example.  Missions have many challenges and trails, but we just need to continue to keep working hard and going forward.  I remember a line that I heard at leadership conference, ""accept whatever happens, and just keep working hard."  I try and apply that every day.

Each apartment or house in the mission has emergency food and supplies in case there is a huge problem.  Well, the senior couple gave us some new rice because it was getting old but still good to eat.  We found that one of the bags had some little bugs living in it.  Not a ton but little beetle type things.  The lady just told us to put it in the freezer and then pick them out and the rice would still be good.  So we put it in the freezer and then the next day we used the rice.  I did not put it in the pot and water and such; Elder Hem did that.  Well, half way through my meal I notice there are small black things in the rice.  Not a ton but enough to notice.  Well, I realize that they are the shriveled up little bug things that he never picked out.  I tried to pick out the obvious ones, but quite honestly I did not even think twice about eating it, and I know I ate some shriveled cooked bugs with my rice.  Welcome to Cambodia.

Only in Cambodia can a 40 year old man stroll out into the street and into the place where all of us are using the computers in just a towel and it be okay.  

Fish Sculptures and Many Miracles

From Nantun: Ruby Chen, an investigator McKenzie met at a stoplight who should, if all else held constant when McKenzie left the area, be baptized. 

We have been blessed with so many miracles this week.  There was a mom, Yang Jiemei and her daughter who walked into English class the other day.  While I was doing the spiritual sharing on the Atonement of Christ, the mom was listening so intently.  I talked to her afterwards, and they agreed to come to a meeting the next day.  They are really special, and while they have little to no understanding about Christianity, they have mentioned several times that they like this and they feel good even though they are struggling to understand. Yang Jiemei said that she told her husband that they were going to meet with us, and he really encouraged them to go which is huge!  We invited them to bring the dad to the next appointment, and they thought maybe they could.  Keep your fingers crossed.  I actually talked to their grandpa the other day on the phone when I was trying to find them.  He was super friendly and wanted to know if I was a 'real American' I assured him that I was.  He invited us to come over and visit.  We have a lot of hopes for this family.  I really want to work on not just getting the mom and daughter involved but everyone!  The only slight concern is that the family business is selling jade Buddhist statues, which always makes things a little more complicated. It can be worked with though.   

Sister Thomas  and I in front of an old fort that the Dutch built when the colonized Taiwan. Then when China  came and kicked them out, it was converted into a Buddhist temple. 

Shu-feng is doing great.  We met with her twice this week, and she is just so in tune with the Spirit.  She has gained all of these tremendous insights from the scriptures.  She had told her mom that she wanted to be baptized, and while her mom didn't say she couldn’t, she was concerned that it was too fast.  But I guess after that, her mom said she would support her in whatever she wanted to do.  We taught her the word of wisdom this week.  She was feeling sad about having to give up coffee and tea but acknowledged that if this is a commandment of God she is willing to keep it.  She has been keeping the word of wisdom since that point.  She said that she still wonders "why?", but she is willing to act in faith, which makes all of the difference.  She truly is a very prepared person.    

From Nantun: Wu and Guan Jimie, who is a really good member friend. She loved to be with the missionaries, and she spent a lot of time helping us. She is a really wonderful person. 

Well it has been a great week here in Tainan Dong Qu.  We have been seeing a lot of miracles and I am loving having Sister Jarvis as my missionary companion.  She is a lot of fun and she just has such a positive attitude no matter what happens.  I remember I asked her if she had gotten sore from riding on a bike for so long.  She said that for the first little while she was super sore; she of course very maturely kept this to herself.  I am pretty sure my trainer knew when I was saddle sore from riding in the first few days because I kept telling her. 

McKenzie and Ruby Chen