Thanksgiving in Taiwan

Thanksgiving was great.  There were a ton of Thanksgiving festivities this year.  Last year my companion and I treated ourselves to a dinner of turkey rice and a McDonald’s apple pie, which we thought was quite clever.  The ward also had a Thanksgiving party that Sunday, so it was festive but not a huge deal.  This year on Wednesday after English they had a Thanksgiving dinner.  Our ward correlator who is from the U.S. on Saturday treated us/investigators/recent converts/ward missionaries to a catered thanksgiving dinner.  He is like an ambassador to Taiwan and lives in a huge apartment where he regularly hosts government parties.  It was super nice.  We went home with leftovers, so Thanksgiving has spanned many days.  On Thursday my companion and I had turkey rice to stick to tradition.  This next Saturday our other ward has this huge Thanksgiving party that we are actually in charge of, so we will be making a ton of Thanksgiving food for it.  Thanksgiving just keeps continuing.  It has been fun.  

We actually had a baptism this week.  She is a really sweet sister named Ma Jiemie.  Sister Busath told me she was a little nervous about her getting baptized because she hadn't been to church a ton, but the baptism was already planned, and she met all of the requirements.   After meeting with her I felt much more confident about it.  She really does have a strong testimony.  I think everything will be fine with the ward too because she is getting to know more people, and the ward leaders hearing about the conversion process inspired more confidence in her.  She is a really sweet, sweet girl.  I love her so much even though I have just met her.  Sister Liang and Sister Jarvis got permission to come down for the baptism, and it was great to see them.  

 So a couple of weeks ago sister Jarvis and I had to come home to finish up some of our studies because we had had to leave earlier than normal because of a lesson.  While there we noticed a huge cockroach in our room.  This is the 2nd huge cockroach we have found in our room.  The last one was in my bed so this one wasn't as bad, but it was still huge - about 3 x 1 inches.  We didn't want to deal with it then so we just figured we would kill it when we got home.   

That night we decided to tackle the project and our roommates, Sister Bryce and Sister Walbrecht agreed to help.  Oh I wish we had it on tape.  Imagine 4 grown women completely freaking out as this cockroach runs back and forth.  It kept running under our beds making it super hard to get at it.  Finally we scared it out and Sister Bryce who had some kitchen cleaner (our cockroach killer spray bottle wouldn't spray anything out) starts spraying it continuously but to no avail.  It then runs in between Sister Jarvis's legs as she jumps up and down screaming hysterically.  After this I was like, "sister's we have got to calm down, or our neighbors are going to think that one of us is dying."   

We all tried to calm down and finally caught it in a corner.  I was armed with the dustpan and Sister Bryce with the broom as we successfully smashed it.  These cockroaches are super hard to kill.  One hit doesn't do it; it takes multiple hits.  It was pretty funny.   

I love my new companion Sister Busath.  She is so dedicated and funny.  We have just been loving diving into the work together.  We have been working on ward relations as they were a little in need of help before.  Maybe it is just in my head, but I think things are improving.  We met with both of the Relief Society presidents, and I called both of the Bishops and wrote out really detailed progress records to give them and talked with them both after church.  We just want them to feel confident in our abilities to get things done, and we want to actually get things done at the same time.