so I'm short on time, today was a bit of a world wind p-day.
but first, I didn't get transferred. I will be in a KK for a long time I'm guessing. four or five more months at least.
so sister hite wanted to get a haircut today, so we went to this lady in the branch's shop. we went in thinking it would just be her getting the cut, I very politely said I didn't want my hair cut. but thank you so much anyway!! so hite gets it cut, no big deal. then the sister takes me and says I have to get it cut now. I politely said again, no thank you! but thank you so much for offering! but no, typical to malaysia, I had no say. haha. so I got a hair cut. I have layers on top shorter than my ears. dead serious. I am rocking a mullet, and despite all of my comments which turned into pleas to her to please not cut my hair, or to not cut it that short, nothing registered! so I have a mullet. thankfully, I can still manage to pull it into a bun on the top of my head. which is how I will be wearing it for the remaining months on my mission. :) what can you do? could you tell april I miss her though? and she's gonna have a doozy trying to fix my hair back to normal when I get back! haha. adoi. but it was interesting, she gave me this head/face massage while she was washing my hair to "pull out the wind." malaysians believe that if you shower at night, wind enters your body. and makes you sick. so she kept massaging and making these sucking noises and then she'd burp SOOOOO LOOOUUUUUUDDDDD! dead serious, she sucked and burped for thirty minutes straight. like 100 times at least. it was intense. but my head felt so good after. weird right? and she said that now my face was skinny again because I didn't have so much air stuck in it. I'm not sure I could totally tell the difference, I was distracted by my new 'do, but it felt nice and was an interesting experience nonetheless.
another funny little thing, we forgot to pay our electricity bill. so guess who didn't have air conditioning for a few days? :) hahahaha. no air conditioning and living in malaysia really isn't a super easy thing. you know? and there are still people who live in kampungs that don't have electricity!!! it helped me realize how much of a "new world" kind of a girl I am, and how much I take little things like that for granted! it wasn't all bad though. it was actually kind of fun. at night we were huddled around a candle, trying to write in our journals, when I started laughing soooo hard. I told hite I felt like joseph smith. we both got a good kick out of that one actually. haha. you just have to love life sometimes. but it came on today, and I won't lie I am SO grateful to have air blowing in my face again:)
our branch got split this past sunday, so now there are two areas. it was wild! elder subandriyo from the seventy came and spoke and it was really cool. it made me cry actually, one of the most incredible people on earth, her name is sister kate, who was the relief society president and is now in the other ward than us, she spoke and talked about how when she joined the church years ago, they met in some little small building. she said she was always late so she had to sit outside and had to strain her neck to try to hear what the speakers were saying. when they said they were going to build a nice church building, she said she didn't even believe it. but when they started work on the land, she said she used to drive and park her car there at night and just look at it. and she said now, two branches. it was really incredible for me to hear that, and to be able to see the spread of the gospel here. I'm so lucky to be apart of it.
I do want to share one cool moment with you, if I may. we were teaching at kamlan's house, but we were teaching to a new boy. we were sharing the message of the restoration, and it came time for me to start teaching. we were on the story of joseph smith and the first vision. I was struggling that lesson to stay focused, there was a ton of people and tons of distractions, and my malay was really struggling that night. so I said a prayer right before it was my turn, just to help me be able to share my testimony with this person, so that he could understand and feel how much it meant to me. so I opened my mouth, and I kid you not, I was using malay words I didn't even know. I wasn't even thinking about malay, I was just talking like I was talking in english. my heart was on fire, and I seriously wasn't even thinking about anything, just about joseph smith. afterward I asked sister hite what I said, and she said she had never heard me speak malay like that. cool right? it was really a testimony builder that the gift of tongues is real, and that when the lord promises that if we "open our mouths they will be filled" He means it. it was a cool experience for me.
this email is going to be short this week, I'm really sorry. we have a lesson we have to go teach really soon.
I love you all very much. thanks for all your letters, they are all little blessings!!!
Wednesday, July 27
Wednesday, July 20
hellooooo.
I can't believe another week is over. do I say that every week? I feel like it. but it's true. time is passing so crazy fast now I don't know how to handle it.
there were a few highlights this week, mostly funny. what can I say, it was a funny week.
first, last wednesday night we went to a member's house for a dinner appointment. she is this adorable phillipino woman with a chinese husband and two of the most adorable kids you've ever seen. the little girl is 8, her name is katherine, and I adore her. and she adores me. we ran around and played all these crazy games the whole time I was there. and then we had a photo shoot which was really hysterical. I printed out some of the pictures, I'm gonna include them in the next letter I send back:) I can honestly say though, I have never been as full in my entire life as I was that night. the sister is a typical hostess here, she serves you, and she puts the biggest pile of noodles or rice you've ever seen on your plate. and then she starts piling on the fish, the chicken, the veggies....every bite you take, she runs over and puts another bite on your plate. literally, it is an endless plate. you never make and headway on it until there isn't a grain of rice left on the table that could possible make it onto your plate. holy schmoley. and of course, you've got to eat every bite if you're not gonna offend anyway. it's actually really really sweet though, the sister literally cooked alllllll day for us. and that's how they are! so I have to remind myself to get over how full I am and show my gratitude for their service. anyway. unfortunately, katherine made me run run run and spiiiiiinnnnnnn five seconds after finishing the meal. I threw up in my mouth a handful of times, and almost started crying when we were walking home because my belly was so full I couldn't stand up straight. hahaha. it was a nice night.
also, we were teaching one of my favorite little girls her recent convert lessons. we were talking about Christ, and I honestly don't remember why I asked the question, but I said, "if you saw Christ, what do you think you'd say?" (it sounds like an entirely irrelevant question now, but I assure you, it made sense in the lesson!) and guess what she said? haha. "uhh........good............morning......?" HAHAHAHAHA. you would have to know her. and then it would really translate just how hysterical that moment was, but boy. I don't know how I didn't burst out laughing during the lesson. we hardly made it out the door though, until sister hite and I started giggling about it. and then dying laughing about it that night. and then again when I wrote in my journal about it. and again now. it was just funny. what a nice first line, eh? haha.
the other day sister hite and I were both sick and so that morning we were going really slow through our studies. but we refused to admit we didn't feel well so we kept going. it came time for us to go out for the day, and hite went to the bathroom as I quickly went to fill up my water bottle. there I am, in a daze, minding my own, when all the sudden I hear water spurting eeeeverywhere. and then I feel it on my bare feet. and I look at the faucet and it's as though I nicked an artery. water spurting out of the top, and water spurting out of the cupboard in the bottom. haha I'm such an idiot, the only thing that came to my mind was yell, "sister!! ada masalah!!!!! ada masalah!!!!!!" hahahahaha. have a problem lah! so she comes running in and starts laughing so hard. I literally broke the faucet off the top. so then we had to call the elders to get the maintenance guy as I took out the mop and tried to mop out the 1.5 inches of water that had filled our kitchen, onto our deck where the drain was. and sister hite was standing there trying to plug up the hole. hehehe. it was a classic moment of our companionship, we always run in to really random situations like that where we both come out looking like idiots. but no worries, the maintenance guy finally came after his "lunch" break and we now have a brand new, still broken, faucet. wah. haha. no place like home.
whenever we go to teach two of our investigators, kamlan and jukilin, there is this mentally disabled little 9 year old girl that lives next door that always comes. she weighs twice as much as me. she used to be really mean to me. when we first started going, she was the one that stared at me and said, "how do you make your face so pretty???" and just as I smiled and was about to say thank you, she adds, "too bad you're so BIG!" haha. anyway, she used to be a little snot, and I loved it. but now, she has finally broken her hard exterior I think, because now she's sooooo cuddly. she sits on me. like every day, she tries to sit on my lap. when that ends in my yelping and everyone yelling at her, she then moves to sitting so close to me she's still sitting on my leg. haha. it's really funny actually. she also has really bad gas. last night, I had just sat down on the floor, when I look over to see where she is going to sit, my face in her butt region, when she decides to let one rip. yep. less than six inches away on that one. I felt the wind:) hahahaha. I seriously, just love life. I just do.
we just put this cute little Iban girl from sarawak on date. she is 17. and she used to be really really super quiet and awkward and scary, but now she giggles like crazy. she can't even stop. I always sit across from her when we are teaching, and she always has her head on her hands and she just stares up at me nonstop. even when I'm not the one speaking. the other day she was doing that like usual, and I kept trying not to look at her cause I could feel the laughter coming. so I kept avoiding her gaze, and she totally knew what I was doing. she wanted me to laugh. so it came to the point where it was my turn to speak, so I look at her, and she just starts dying laughing. and then I do too. and she threw both her hands up in the air and just was giggling like a mad woman. it was soooo funny. this super quiet and shy girl just bellowing. but really, it was actually a really really special moment that day. she had never prayed before in her life, and she was scared to do it. we taught her how her first lesson, but when we went back last time she said she hadn't done it. so we taught a lesson just on prayer. which is actually a really fun and cool lesson, I love teaching about prayer. so anyway, we taught her, and after a lot of encouragement and a little bit of missionary pushiness, she said she would say the closing prayer. which she did, and it made me tear up. I was there for her very very first ever prayer. that is really cool, right? I felt so special. I love her.
I discovered something that might just be the downfall of my health the other day. in the supermarket, if you go to the chinese one, in the frozen food section there are pre-made vegetarian chinese pow, or steam buns. remember those from china? they are like white on the outside and there is stuff in the middle? these ones have spice and carrots and turnips. I steam them up every night for sister hite and I, and I close my eyes and smile as I'm eating them. sounds creepy. it actually might be. but I don't like a ton of the food here, but MAN! those steam buns! do they have them in america? I'm gonna cry if they don't.
I have really been enjoying reading the new testament lately. I love all the parables. they make you think. it takes me a long time to sit and think them through. of course, I also love the words of encouragement Christ is constantly saying. I love the verse in Mark, 4:40, he says, "why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?" I don't think He was trying to be a snot, I mean of course he wasn't. He's Christ. but He is being honest, why were they so scared out there? I often think about that and how it applies to me. I was scared for a long time on my mission. really scared to speak, mostly. malay is scary, and people love to laugh in your face if you get it a bit wrong haha. so I was scared to speak. but really, why was I so fearful? why are we all so fearful? I think in chapter five, although I don't remember the verse, He says something like, "be not afraid, only believe." it's very true. it's been a struggle for me, something I'm really working hard on, is not letting fear take over my faith. they can't exist together. and really, what does fear accomplish, anyway? if we have faith, we are promised we can do anything. so what gives? why are we so fearful?
it has been a good week, and it's gonna be another good week for sure. the work is coming, and that adds joy like can't even be described.
I love you all and I hope everyone's doing well!!
jumpa minggu lepas.
I can't believe another week is over. do I say that every week? I feel like it. but it's true. time is passing so crazy fast now I don't know how to handle it.
there were a few highlights this week, mostly funny. what can I say, it was a funny week.
first, last wednesday night we went to a member's house for a dinner appointment. she is this adorable phillipino woman with a chinese husband and two of the most adorable kids you've ever seen. the little girl is 8, her name is katherine, and I adore her. and she adores me. we ran around and played all these crazy games the whole time I was there. and then we had a photo shoot which was really hysterical. I printed out some of the pictures, I'm gonna include them in the next letter I send back:) I can honestly say though, I have never been as full in my entire life as I was that night. the sister is a typical hostess here, she serves you, and she puts the biggest pile of noodles or rice you've ever seen on your plate. and then she starts piling on the fish, the chicken, the veggies....every bite you take, she runs over and puts another bite on your plate. literally, it is an endless plate. you never make and headway on it until there isn't a grain of rice left on the table that could possible make it onto your plate. holy schmoley. and of course, you've got to eat every bite if you're not gonna offend anyway. it's actually really really sweet though, the sister literally cooked alllllll day for us. and that's how they are! so I have to remind myself to get over how full I am and show my gratitude for their service. anyway. unfortunately, katherine made me run run run and spiiiiiinnnnnnn five seconds after finishing the meal. I threw up in my mouth a handful of times, and almost started crying when we were walking home because my belly was so full I couldn't stand up straight. hahaha. it was a nice night.
also, we were teaching one of my favorite little girls her recent convert lessons. we were talking about Christ, and I honestly don't remember why I asked the question, but I said, "if you saw Christ, what do you think you'd say?" (it sounds like an entirely irrelevant question now, but I assure you, it made sense in the lesson!) and guess what she said? haha. "uhh........good............morning......?" HAHAHAHAHA. you would have to know her. and then it would really translate just how hysterical that moment was, but boy. I don't know how I didn't burst out laughing during the lesson. we hardly made it out the door though, until sister hite and I started giggling about it. and then dying laughing about it that night. and then again when I wrote in my journal about it. and again now. it was just funny. what a nice first line, eh? haha.
the other day sister hite and I were both sick and so that morning we were going really slow through our studies. but we refused to admit we didn't feel well so we kept going. it came time for us to go out for the day, and hite went to the bathroom as I quickly went to fill up my water bottle. there I am, in a daze, minding my own, when all the sudden I hear water spurting eeeeverywhere. and then I feel it on my bare feet. and I look at the faucet and it's as though I nicked an artery. water spurting out of the top, and water spurting out of the cupboard in the bottom. haha I'm such an idiot, the only thing that came to my mind was yell, "sister!! ada masalah!!!!! ada masalah!!!!!!" hahahahaha. have a problem lah! so she comes running in and starts laughing so hard. I literally broke the faucet off the top. so then we had to call the elders to get the maintenance guy as I took out the mop and tried to mop out the 1.5 inches of water that had filled our kitchen, onto our deck where the drain was. and sister hite was standing there trying to plug up the hole. hehehe. it was a classic moment of our companionship, we always run in to really random situations like that where we both come out looking like idiots. but no worries, the maintenance guy finally came after his "lunch" break and we now have a brand new, still broken, faucet. wah. haha. no place like home.
whenever we go to teach two of our investigators, kamlan and jukilin, there is this mentally disabled little 9 year old girl that lives next door that always comes. she weighs twice as much as me. she used to be really mean to me. when we first started going, she was the one that stared at me and said, "how do you make your face so pretty???" and just as I smiled and was about to say thank you, she adds, "too bad you're so BIG!" haha. anyway, she used to be a little snot, and I loved it. but now, she has finally broken her hard exterior I think, because now she's sooooo cuddly. she sits on me. like every day, she tries to sit on my lap. when that ends in my yelping and everyone yelling at her, she then moves to sitting so close to me she's still sitting on my leg. haha. it's really funny actually. she also has really bad gas. last night, I had just sat down on the floor, when I look over to see where she is going to sit, my face in her butt region, when she decides to let one rip. yep. less than six inches away on that one. I felt the wind:) hahahaha. I seriously, just love life. I just do.
we just put this cute little Iban girl from sarawak on date. she is 17. and she used to be really really super quiet and awkward and scary, but now she giggles like crazy. she can't even stop. I always sit across from her when we are teaching, and she always has her head on her hands and she just stares up at me nonstop. even when I'm not the one speaking. the other day she was doing that like usual, and I kept trying not to look at her cause I could feel the laughter coming. so I kept avoiding her gaze, and she totally knew what I was doing. she wanted me to laugh. so it came to the point where it was my turn to speak, so I look at her, and she just starts dying laughing. and then I do too. and she threw both her hands up in the air and just was giggling like a mad woman. it was soooo funny. this super quiet and shy girl just bellowing. but really, it was actually a really really special moment that day. she had never prayed before in her life, and she was scared to do it. we taught her how her first lesson, but when we went back last time she said she hadn't done it. so we taught a lesson just on prayer. which is actually a really fun and cool lesson, I love teaching about prayer. so anyway, we taught her, and after a lot of encouragement and a little bit of missionary pushiness, she said she would say the closing prayer. which she did, and it made me tear up. I was there for her very very first ever prayer. that is really cool, right? I felt so special. I love her.
I discovered something that might just be the downfall of my health the other day. in the supermarket, if you go to the chinese one, in the frozen food section there are pre-made vegetarian chinese pow, or steam buns. remember those from china? they are like white on the outside and there is stuff in the middle? these ones have spice and carrots and turnips. I steam them up every night for sister hite and I, and I close my eyes and smile as I'm eating them. sounds creepy. it actually might be. but I don't like a ton of the food here, but MAN! those steam buns! do they have them in america? I'm gonna cry if they don't.
I have really been enjoying reading the new testament lately. I love all the parables. they make you think. it takes me a long time to sit and think them through. of course, I also love the words of encouragement Christ is constantly saying. I love the verse in Mark, 4:40, he says, "why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?" I don't think He was trying to be a snot, I mean of course he wasn't. He's Christ. but He is being honest, why were they so scared out there? I often think about that and how it applies to me. I was scared for a long time on my mission. really scared to speak, mostly. malay is scary, and people love to laugh in your face if you get it a bit wrong haha. so I was scared to speak. but really, why was I so fearful? why are we all so fearful? I think in chapter five, although I don't remember the verse, He says something like, "be not afraid, only believe." it's very true. it's been a struggle for me, something I'm really working hard on, is not letting fear take over my faith. they can't exist together. and really, what does fear accomplish, anyway? if we have faith, we are promised we can do anything. so what gives? why are we so fearful?
it has been a good week, and it's gonna be another good week for sure. the work is coming, and that adds joy like can't even be described.
I love you all and I hope everyone's doing well!!
jumpa minggu lepas.
Wednesday, July 13
killing me softly, with his song.........
hello!
it's a lot later than usual that I am emailing, we decided to go on a little excursion with the elders and our branch president to the Mount Kinabalu park. wah! it was sooooo nice. so gorgeous. it was way foggy and green and cold and just so nice. I took some photographs, I'll try to get them printed and sent in the next few weeks. it was actually really really nice to get out of KK and do something more than just sleep on our P day. I just sat and looked out the window and marvelled a little bit about how beautiful God created the world. technically, He didn't have to make it this beautiful I don't think. but He did. I think it was for me. and any of the other people who are slightly obsessed with getting lost in nature. it was perfect.
the subject of my email has a funny story. of course:) one of my favorite people in the world, a member, loves to karaoke. she was telling me about her recent experience at karaoking and she said she sang that song, "killing me softly with his song, killing me softly! with his song!" or however the crap it goes. well, she was telling me this at church. and she wasn't whispering. and she also didn't just mention that was the song she sang, she actually sang it. in church. loooooouuuuuddddd! LOUD! I will give her props, she made it sound really nice. a very powerful voice. but in church! adoi. hahahaha. I was seriously, just, in heaven at that moment. the simple joys in life. right? oh the simple joys. her little niece is a recent convert so we go over to her house every week to teach her and we went yesterday afternoon. she usually waits outside for us or like right in her front room with the doors open, so she always sees us when we're walking up to her house. yesterday I started singing with as much power and strength I had, "killing me softly with his song!!!!!! killing me softly! with his song!" and then I hear the largest like, belly, gut laugh in my life. and she goes, "sister! you need practice before you can come karaoke with me!!!!" haha. we got a good laugh. I sure did try my best! I don't have tessbabes voice, what can I say.
so it has been quite the week. we put two really REALLY cool investigators on date the other day. basically if they get baptized, I think their whole long house will too. and it will be a miracle story. I don't know. it's hard to explain. it is this ghetto little house on the side of the mountain in the middle of nowhere, and we kept going there and going there and it was always like, really awkward and hard lessons that the people weren't interested in. but for whatever reason, we kept going back. then a few weeks ago we met Kamlan, the husband of a woman we had tried to teach. he is SO cool. he's such a kampung man, I don't know how to explain that either. but he is solid, and he has a desire to know the truth. and I have a feeling if he finds the truth and recognizes it, after he gets baptized his wife will follow. and I absolutely adore his wife. we also met Jukilin, who is sooo funny. he's young, maybe a bit older than me, and just a goof. so spacey. but one day when we were over there teaching Kamlan, he walks out of his room (we had never met him or even seen him yet) but he walks out of his room holding a book of mormon. so I like look at him, really confused, and started talking to him. turns out, about five years ago the elders had given him a book of mormon, but never taught him. and when we met him that night, he was in 3 Nephi. he had started reading it when they gave it to him and he had read all the way up until that point. I was like, shocked, talking to him, and he just goes, "so, I am still confused though. I figured out after a while this wasn't the actual bible....so what is it?" hahaha. so then we started teaching him. and he is my favorite person ever. the best word to describe him is just a goof. but anyway. they both have baptismal dates, and then another family that lives in the room next to him has started listening and participating in the lessons. we are going to try to put that husband, wife, and daughter on date as well. last night when we taught them all there was ten people sitting there on the floor with ants and cockroaches and mosquitos and dogs, all gathered around us reading together from the book of mormon. oh, and singing. Kamlan played the guitar and we tried to fit our hymns to his tunes. seriously, it is hard for me to put to words the feelings I have about them. I see so much in that little house, that I used to dread going to. I have eaten my words ten thousand times over. I love them all. I get very emotional just thinking about them all. missionary work is insane. it just is.
also, something I thought was pretty funny. I have been in charge of the phone for a few days, and something really occurred to me I had never noticed before. so here, it is literally impossible to have a conversation, big or small, from asking what time it is to a perfect stranger, to talking to someone about joseph smith, any time you speak to anyone, there are a series of questions you absolutely must go through. starting with, "apa khabar?" (hows it going?), "khabar baik!" (good!), "dari mana tadi?" (where were you just now?), "buat apa?"(what did you do?), "kau sihat?" (are you healthy?), "sudah makan?" (eaten yet?) if you answer "belum" (not yet), you get a few more sentences asking why, and then telling you to eat rice because it gives you "tenaga" (energy) that you can only get from rice. but basically, those questions I ask/answer around 50 times a day. and it is hysterical. I actually love it. do they have that stuff in america? I don't remember anymore! do you ask people if they're healthy? it is really hard to be on a mission sometimes. you seriously forget how to speak english. like, proper english. and I have completely forgotten any and every idiom. I try and fail. my favorite attempt was to sister hite the other day, "she didn't even know how to keep her feet from the sky!" we have laughed about that a lot. I'm not sure where that one came from. also not sure what it even could mean.
I feel very spoiled, in the last week and a half or so I have gotten letters from you and dad and tomas and christina! wah!!! I am so spoiled. thanks a lot. I'm not sure I'll have time to write letters this p day, we basically are out of time after this. but next. and then hopefully I will have them by then. it is interesting that letters seriously take 10 or 11 days from america every time. from greece, it takes anywhere from 10 to like 23 days. something ridiculous like that. I'm grateful you are all a consistent week and a half:)
I will share one quick little sad story. just because I can. so, the other day. it was a really rough night of no sleep, followed by just a hard morning. like, nothing that was gonna kill me. nothing absolutely earth shattering happened. it was just a rough time! so we were walking to one of our lessons, and I didn't feel super well, it was hot, and I was toooooootally feeling a bit sorry for myself because my glass had been half empty all day. of course karma soon follows that:) I am walking and decide that nothing shakes the blues out of me like running/leaping a bit. so instead of walking over the sewage ground gate thing, I decide I'm going to very gracefully leap over it. and hopefully make my companion smile too. well, I took a step on the gate thing, (it's like bars...like, I honestly don't know the word for it. but it's a bridge over a sewage with this iron metal bar thing you walk on) so anyway. I take my preparatory step, which was very powerful because a really nice leap was going to follow, but curse my crocs and my skinny jensen feet! my whole foot slipped in between the bars!! so I fell!!! and I fell hard! my foot was stuck and I just ATE IT. on the side of the road. in the afternoon, with rush hour. my foot was still stuck and twisted all skee-womp-us and I just layed there in the dirt. didn't even move. my comp started taking pictures. eventually I came to my senses and got my foot out of the stupid bars, and it hurt like a mother. but then I heard all these boys in one of the work trucks nearby stuck in traffic start yelling and asking if I was okay. and then I realized just how ridiculous life is sometimes. seriously. so I started laughing almost uncontrollably. but then also, there were a lot of tears. partly because my foot was throbbing, partly because it was like one more thing on top of my poor picked on me day!, and partly because it just serves me right. beware of self pity! when I feel bad for myself things like that always follow. but it was good. now I am laughing really hard just thinking about that blasted event. HA. you just have to love life.
find joy in the journey.
anyway! I am out of time already. but it was a good week. and I feel basically totally healthy already. we have to go to a check up appointment at the doctors on friday, and after he clears us I think we are basically in the good. hallelujah!
I hope all is well at home:) I love you all!!!
oh and pray for greece. it's pretty scary crazy right now. also pray for the missionaries there. something like this could be just what the doctor ordered for some newly humbled people ready to receive the gospel.
I LOVE YOU!
it's a lot later than usual that I am emailing, we decided to go on a little excursion with the elders and our branch president to the Mount Kinabalu park. wah! it was sooooo nice. so gorgeous. it was way foggy and green and cold and just so nice. I took some photographs, I'll try to get them printed and sent in the next few weeks. it was actually really really nice to get out of KK and do something more than just sleep on our P day. I just sat and looked out the window and marvelled a little bit about how beautiful God created the world. technically, He didn't have to make it this beautiful I don't think. but He did. I think it was for me. and any of the other people who are slightly obsessed with getting lost in nature. it was perfect.
the subject of my email has a funny story. of course:) one of my favorite people in the world, a member, loves to karaoke. she was telling me about her recent experience at karaoking and she said she sang that song, "killing me softly with his song, killing me softly! with his song!" or however the crap it goes. well, she was telling me this at church. and she wasn't whispering. and she also didn't just mention that was the song she sang, she actually sang it. in church. loooooouuuuuddddd! LOUD! I will give her props, she made it sound really nice. a very powerful voice. but in church! adoi. hahahaha. I was seriously, just, in heaven at that moment. the simple joys in life. right? oh the simple joys. her little niece is a recent convert so we go over to her house every week to teach her and we went yesterday afternoon. she usually waits outside for us or like right in her front room with the doors open, so she always sees us when we're walking up to her house. yesterday I started singing with as much power and strength I had, "killing me softly with his song!!!!!! killing me softly! with his song!" and then I hear the largest like, belly, gut laugh in my life. and she goes, "sister! you need practice before you can come karaoke with me!!!!" haha. we got a good laugh. I sure did try my best! I don't have tessbabes voice, what can I say.
so it has been quite the week. we put two really REALLY cool investigators on date the other day. basically if they get baptized, I think their whole long house will too. and it will be a miracle story. I don't know. it's hard to explain. it is this ghetto little house on the side of the mountain in the middle of nowhere, and we kept going there and going there and it was always like, really awkward and hard lessons that the people weren't interested in. but for whatever reason, we kept going back. then a few weeks ago we met Kamlan, the husband of a woman we had tried to teach. he is SO cool. he's such a kampung man, I don't know how to explain that either. but he is solid, and he has a desire to know the truth. and I have a feeling if he finds the truth and recognizes it, after he gets baptized his wife will follow. and I absolutely adore his wife. we also met Jukilin, who is sooo funny. he's young, maybe a bit older than me, and just a goof. so spacey. but one day when we were over there teaching Kamlan, he walks out of his room (we had never met him or even seen him yet) but he walks out of his room holding a book of mormon. so I like look at him, really confused, and started talking to him. turns out, about five years ago the elders had given him a book of mormon, but never taught him. and when we met him that night, he was in 3 Nephi. he had started reading it when they gave it to him and he had read all the way up until that point. I was like, shocked, talking to him, and he just goes, "so, I am still confused though. I figured out after a while this wasn't the actual bible....so what is it?" hahaha. so then we started teaching him. and he is my favorite person ever. the best word to describe him is just a goof. but anyway. they both have baptismal dates, and then another family that lives in the room next to him has started listening and participating in the lessons. we are going to try to put that husband, wife, and daughter on date as well. last night when we taught them all there was ten people sitting there on the floor with ants and cockroaches and mosquitos and dogs, all gathered around us reading together from the book of mormon. oh, and singing. Kamlan played the guitar and we tried to fit our hymns to his tunes. seriously, it is hard for me to put to words the feelings I have about them. I see so much in that little house, that I used to dread going to. I have eaten my words ten thousand times over. I love them all. I get very emotional just thinking about them all. missionary work is insane. it just is.
also, something I thought was pretty funny. I have been in charge of the phone for a few days, and something really occurred to me I had never noticed before. so here, it is literally impossible to have a conversation, big or small, from asking what time it is to a perfect stranger, to talking to someone about joseph smith, any time you speak to anyone, there are a series of questions you absolutely must go through. starting with, "apa khabar?" (hows it going?), "khabar baik!" (good!), "dari mana tadi?" (where were you just now?), "buat apa?"(what did you do?), "kau sihat?" (are you healthy?), "sudah makan?" (eaten yet?) if you answer "belum" (not yet), you get a few more sentences asking why, and then telling you to eat rice because it gives you "tenaga" (energy) that you can only get from rice. but basically, those questions I ask/answer around 50 times a day. and it is hysterical. I actually love it. do they have that stuff in america? I don't remember anymore! do you ask people if they're healthy? it is really hard to be on a mission sometimes. you seriously forget how to speak english. like, proper english. and I have completely forgotten any and every idiom. I try and fail. my favorite attempt was to sister hite the other day, "she didn't even know how to keep her feet from the sky!" we have laughed about that a lot. I'm not sure where that one came from. also not sure what it even could mean.
I feel very spoiled, in the last week and a half or so I have gotten letters from you and dad and tomas and christina! wah!!! I am so spoiled. thanks a lot. I'm not sure I'll have time to write letters this p day, we basically are out of time after this. but next. and then hopefully I will have them by then. it is interesting that letters seriously take 10 or 11 days from america every time. from greece, it takes anywhere from 10 to like 23 days. something ridiculous like that. I'm grateful you are all a consistent week and a half:)
I will share one quick little sad story. just because I can. so, the other day. it was a really rough night of no sleep, followed by just a hard morning. like, nothing that was gonna kill me. nothing absolutely earth shattering happened. it was just a rough time! so we were walking to one of our lessons, and I didn't feel super well, it was hot, and I was toooooootally feeling a bit sorry for myself because my glass had been half empty all day. of course karma soon follows that:) I am walking and decide that nothing shakes the blues out of me like running/leaping a bit. so instead of walking over the sewage ground gate thing, I decide I'm going to very gracefully leap over it. and hopefully make my companion smile too. well, I took a step on the gate thing, (it's like bars...like, I honestly don't know the word for it. but it's a bridge over a sewage with this iron metal bar thing you walk on) so anyway. I take my preparatory step, which was very powerful because a really nice leap was going to follow, but curse my crocs and my skinny jensen feet! my whole foot slipped in between the bars!! so I fell!!! and I fell hard! my foot was stuck and I just ATE IT. on the side of the road. in the afternoon, with rush hour. my foot was still stuck and twisted all skee-womp-us and I just layed there in the dirt. didn't even move. my comp started taking pictures. eventually I came to my senses and got my foot out of the stupid bars, and it hurt like a mother. but then I heard all these boys in one of the work trucks nearby stuck in traffic start yelling and asking if I was okay. and then I realized just how ridiculous life is sometimes. seriously. so I started laughing almost uncontrollably. but then also, there were a lot of tears. partly because my foot was throbbing, partly because it was like one more thing on top of my poor picked on me day!, and partly because it just serves me right. beware of self pity! when I feel bad for myself things like that always follow. but it was good. now I am laughing really hard just thinking about that blasted event. HA. you just have to love life.
find joy in the journey.
anyway! I am out of time already. but it was a good week. and I feel basically totally healthy already. we have to go to a check up appointment at the doctors on friday, and after he clears us I think we are basically in the good. hallelujah!
I hope all is well at home:) I love you all!!!
oh and pray for greece. it's pretty scary crazy right now. also pray for the missionaries there. something like this could be just what the doctor ordered for some newly humbled people ready to receive the gospel.
I LOVE YOU!
Tuesday, July 5
how are you?
I received your letters the other day, thanks for sending them. I love letters. also I laughed for a very long time about melissa's blog post. way too much information, like always:) I am bummed I missed the drama. and pour lijy. I am pretty good at catching vomit--miss if you are going to give birth again, wait for me to get there!
also, tomas has a BIRTHDAY TOMORROW! adoi! I can't believe he is 16. I sent him a package a few weeks ago, they promised it'd get to him before the big day. let me know if that rings true.
so, as sister clark has now informed you, we have typhoid:) ha. very fun. we were pretty sick for a few weeks before we figured it out. then we went to the hospital, got a test, they slapped us with some very intense antibiotics, and we've been taking those and basically sleeping all day since. we have tried a few times to toughen up and try to go out, (one on sunday, stories to follow) and every time, we get so wasted. come back and take a four or five hour nap. it has been challenging because we want to work. however, it has been good. sister hite and I have spent a lot of time bonding:) haha. to say the least! basically there are no boundary lines between us anymore! that's what happens when you get sick. but really, it has been good. we've grown stronger as companions. and I'm so grateful for her--if you had to get sick and stuck in an apartment with someone for a week, you'd want it to be her! we still laugh and do stupid things to stay entertained. also, it has been really cool to see how many people rally around us. seriously, the senior couple here the larson's check in on us every day, so does sister clark, the area doctor in hong kong, the doctor in the united states, ward members, the elders run us errands and make visits with our people all the time. we are so spoiled. there are a lot of amazing people here. but we are sick of being sick. hopefully we can finish out this week with work instead of sleep:)
this is a good story though, of one of the days we actually went out. sunday!! so sister hite mentioned that she has never missed a sunday on her mission. and I wanted to go to church, we had an investigator coming, I wanted to take the sacrament (hello, most important thing of the week!!) so even though we both seriously looked and felt like death, we slapped some makeup on our faces and out we were. on the walk to the bus stop, I felt like I was on something. my brain was floating and it was a very weird sensation to be walking...I don't know. it was weird. I was delirious. but off in the distance, far distance (plus I'm blind:) ) I see a man. don't know why I even really noticed him, there are plenty of men in KK haha. but I saw him and I was like, who is he? so we get a little closer and I can see that he is different, but I couldn't see why. he was a bit taller, still dark, but I just thought he looked different. so I'm freaking out. yes, it was weird, and yes keep in mind we were still in the throngs of our illness haha. but anyway, so we get close enough to see and I FROZE! I froze, and I put my hands on my heart and I just stood there. he was AFRICAN!!!!! hahahaha. I hadn't seen an african the whole time I've been here, they don't live in KK. so I was like oh my gosh sister hite! he's african!!! haha it was actually kind of ridiculous, but please keep in mind how sick we were and how long we had been inside! so anyway, he like walks away and we kept walking and my heart was literally pounding. like thub dub thub dubbing! and I was like, I have to find him!! but he was gone! and we were meeting our investigator at the bus stop! but I just had to find him. so I go back to go look, and I see that there was actually four of them!! four of my africans!! so I like look at them and freeze, I'm thinking...what language do I speak to them in!!? do I shoot for a swahili greeting and yell mambo? do I try out my nigerian pigeon I learned? do I speak malay? english? chinese? (except the only chinese phrase I can remember sister norton taught me, it means handsome boy! haha. she would.) so I was like panicking for a second, trying to decide, when one of them walks up to me and says hello! (english, phew) so we start chatting. they were from KL (Kuala Lumpur), students, perfect english, very poised, very serious, very african. ahhhhh I was so stoked talking to them. so I gave them a pamphlet and a little run through of the restoration, typical contacting style, and they left. I wish they lived here so we had a chance to teach them! but still. it was so rad. I was beaming and floating all the way to church. seriously, I was so happy. I cried about it later. wow, writing this now is helping me realize how out of it I was...haha sorry. so we get our investigator and finally get to church, and I sat next to my favorite person in the ward, sister josie. who is very loud, very phillipino. she is rad. and she just like yacked my ear off, making fun of one of the boys on the stand, and it was just funny. just hyyyyysterical for some reason. I could not stop laughing. and my head was seriously spinning. so between the african, sis josie, and the spinning, I was just out of my mind. it was a great experience. the only sad thing that quickly sobered me up-- there was a young white family there and they had a daughter. that had tessbabe blond hair. and huge brown eyes, also like tessbabe. and she was a little hefer, and misbehaving. and she kept making eyes at me. that was too much for me to handle. I couldn't even look at the little girl without crying. moral of the story, I love the malaysian babies, but the white babies that look like my darling girls at home is too much for my little heart to bare. the wound is still a bit too fresh!
I finished the book of mormon a few days ago. WOW! seriously, I know I am a missionary and this is what I do, but whoever is reading this right now. pick up a book of mormon. if you don't have one, email me and I'll get one for you (we even have them in tamil and mongolian here!) seriously though, pick it up and read it. this last time just blew my mind. never has it had that strong of an effect on me. of course I have read it before, of course I knew it was truth, but when you feast upon the words and the stories and the people and the testimonies, it changes everything. at times it felt like I was fighting next to the nephites and crying with the prophets. amazing. I remember one morning in particular, it was really early and I couldn't sleep, and it was raaaaining. so I was there, reading in mormon, kindof just blown away at where I was. sitting on a deck, overlooking the ocean, on the other side of the world, eastmalaysia, reading my book of mormon. I read in chapter 6, verse 17-19 and I just started crying. how sad! I felt like I could feel the sorrow that he had. "ye fair ones, how is it that ye could have fallen!" I'm not sure why, but that was giving me a sakit hati. and then in verse 20, I think probably one of the saddest verses in the whole book of mormon, "but behold, ye are gone, and my sorrows cannot bring your return." does that kill you as much as it did me? I'm sure we have all felt like that at some point in our lives. we realize how out of control we are sometimes, how people have their own agency and their own right to choose. and we have all seen people choose heartache, we have all seen people with heartache because of what others have done. I choose heartache sometimes too! and right there, our sorrows cannot bring their return. I started crying quite uncontrollably (again, I am sick!) but it really hit me harder than I think it ever had before: God is. He lives. He created everything that we see, wherever we are. He created us. He knows us. He loves us. and I wonder if times he has felt the feeling described in verse 20 as well. it was all a lot for me to handle, but I vowed then and there to be more conscious about my decisions and my actions and more diligent about loving. loving these people, loving you guys, loving God.
on a lighter note, a few days ago the elders brought us a VCR player and some VHS's to watch. included was every mormon movie made in the last thirty years, including.....JOHNNY LINGO!!!! haaha. the old one. the goooooood one. we have watched, no doubt, 15 times. I hope my husband pays eight cows for me. a girl can dream:) it was a weird sensation though, trying to remember how to work the machine. rewind-stop-rewind makes it rewind super super fast. remember that? haha. wow time is such a weird thing.
anyway. I assure you, I feel better today. and never was I on the borders of death or anything. we mostly just slept. slept slept slept. we are taking good care of ourselves, and as you know, we have many other people taking care of us as well. thank you so much for your prayers and your concerns, I know they have helped. no doubt they have! but like it says in Mosiah 13:3, "...for I have not delivered the message which the Lord sent me to deliver....therefore, God will not suffer that I shall be destroyed at this time." granted abinadi didn't have typhoid...but I think the comparison is still there. we are fighters. and we are almost healed. thank you all so much.
I love you all more than I can say, and I hope everything is going well! send pictures of the rival! I will cry, but I want to see them. love you love you.
I received your letters the other day, thanks for sending them. I love letters. also I laughed for a very long time about melissa's blog post. way too much information, like always:) I am bummed I missed the drama. and pour lijy. I am pretty good at catching vomit--miss if you are going to give birth again, wait for me to get there!
also, tomas has a BIRTHDAY TOMORROW! adoi! I can't believe he is 16. I sent him a package a few weeks ago, they promised it'd get to him before the big day. let me know if that rings true.
so, as sister clark has now informed you, we have typhoid:) ha. very fun. we were pretty sick for a few weeks before we figured it out. then we went to the hospital, got a test, they slapped us with some very intense antibiotics, and we've been taking those and basically sleeping all day since. we have tried a few times to toughen up and try to go out, (one on sunday, stories to follow) and every time, we get so wasted. come back and take a four or five hour nap. it has been challenging because we want to work. however, it has been good. sister hite and I have spent a lot of time bonding:) haha. to say the least! basically there are no boundary lines between us anymore! that's what happens when you get sick. but really, it has been good. we've grown stronger as companions. and I'm so grateful for her--if you had to get sick and stuck in an apartment with someone for a week, you'd want it to be her! we still laugh and do stupid things to stay entertained. also, it has been really cool to see how many people rally around us. seriously, the senior couple here the larson's check in on us every day, so does sister clark, the area doctor in hong kong, the doctor in the united states, ward members, the elders run us errands and make visits with our people all the time. we are so spoiled. there are a lot of amazing people here. but we are sick of being sick. hopefully we can finish out this week with work instead of sleep:)
this is a good story though, of one of the days we actually went out. sunday!! so sister hite mentioned that she has never missed a sunday on her mission. and I wanted to go to church, we had an investigator coming, I wanted to take the sacrament (hello, most important thing of the week!!) so even though we both seriously looked and felt like death, we slapped some makeup on our faces and out we were. on the walk to the bus stop, I felt like I was on something. my brain was floating and it was a very weird sensation to be walking...I don't know. it was weird. I was delirious. but off in the distance, far distance (plus I'm blind:) ) I see a man. don't know why I even really noticed him, there are plenty of men in KK haha. but I saw him and I was like, who is he? so we get a little closer and I can see that he is different, but I couldn't see why. he was a bit taller, still dark, but I just thought he looked different. so I'm freaking out. yes, it was weird, and yes keep in mind we were still in the throngs of our illness haha. but anyway, so we get close enough to see and I FROZE! I froze, and I put my hands on my heart and I just stood there. he was AFRICAN!!!!! hahahaha. I hadn't seen an african the whole time I've been here, they don't live in KK. so I was like oh my gosh sister hite! he's african!!! haha it was actually kind of ridiculous, but please keep in mind how sick we were and how long we had been inside! so anyway, he like walks away and we kept walking and my heart was literally pounding. like thub dub thub dubbing! and I was like, I have to find him!! but he was gone! and we were meeting our investigator at the bus stop! but I just had to find him. so I go back to go look, and I see that there was actually four of them!! four of my africans!! so I like look at them and freeze, I'm thinking...what language do I speak to them in!!? do I shoot for a swahili greeting and yell mambo? do I try out my nigerian pigeon I learned? do I speak malay? english? chinese? (except the only chinese phrase I can remember sister norton taught me, it means handsome boy! haha. she would.) so I was like panicking for a second, trying to decide, when one of them walks up to me and says hello! (english, phew) so we start chatting. they were from KL (Kuala Lumpur), students, perfect english, very poised, very serious, very african. ahhhhh I was so stoked talking to them. so I gave them a pamphlet and a little run through of the restoration, typical contacting style, and they left. I wish they lived here so we had a chance to teach them! but still. it was so rad. I was beaming and floating all the way to church. seriously, I was so happy. I cried about it later. wow, writing this now is helping me realize how out of it I was...haha sorry. so we get our investigator and finally get to church, and I sat next to my favorite person in the ward, sister josie. who is very loud, very phillipino. she is rad. and she just like yacked my ear off, making fun of one of the boys on the stand, and it was just funny. just hyyyyysterical for some reason. I could not stop laughing. and my head was seriously spinning. so between the african, sis josie, and the spinning, I was just out of my mind. it was a great experience. the only sad thing that quickly sobered me up-- there was a young white family there and they had a daughter. that had tessbabe blond hair. and huge brown eyes, also like tessbabe. and she was a little hefer, and misbehaving. and she kept making eyes at me. that was too much for me to handle. I couldn't even look at the little girl without crying. moral of the story, I love the malaysian babies, but the white babies that look like my darling girls at home is too much for my little heart to bare. the wound is still a bit too fresh!
I finished the book of mormon a few days ago. WOW! seriously, I know I am a missionary and this is what I do, but whoever is reading this right now. pick up a book of mormon. if you don't have one, email me and I'll get one for you (we even have them in tamil and mongolian here!) seriously though, pick it up and read it. this last time just blew my mind. never has it had that strong of an effect on me. of course I have read it before, of course I knew it was truth, but when you feast upon the words and the stories and the people and the testimonies, it changes everything. at times it felt like I was fighting next to the nephites and crying with the prophets. amazing. I remember one morning in particular, it was really early and I couldn't sleep, and it was raaaaining. so I was there, reading in mormon, kindof just blown away at where I was. sitting on a deck, overlooking the ocean, on the other side of the world, eastmalaysia, reading my book of mormon. I read in chapter 6, verse 17-19 and I just started crying. how sad! I felt like I could feel the sorrow that he had. "ye fair ones, how is it that ye could have fallen!" I'm not sure why, but that was giving me a sakit hati. and then in verse 20, I think probably one of the saddest verses in the whole book of mormon, "but behold, ye are gone, and my sorrows cannot bring your return." does that kill you as much as it did me? I'm sure we have all felt like that at some point in our lives. we realize how out of control we are sometimes, how people have their own agency and their own right to choose. and we have all seen people choose heartache, we have all seen people with heartache because of what others have done. I choose heartache sometimes too! and right there, our sorrows cannot bring their return. I started crying quite uncontrollably (again, I am sick!) but it really hit me harder than I think it ever had before: God is. He lives. He created everything that we see, wherever we are. He created us. He knows us. He loves us. and I wonder if times he has felt the feeling described in verse 20 as well. it was all a lot for me to handle, but I vowed then and there to be more conscious about my decisions and my actions and more diligent about loving. loving these people, loving you guys, loving God.
on a lighter note, a few days ago the elders brought us a VCR player and some VHS's to watch. included was every mormon movie made in the last thirty years, including.....JOHNNY LINGO!!!! haaha. the old one. the goooooood one. we have watched, no doubt, 15 times. I hope my husband pays eight cows for me. a girl can dream:) it was a weird sensation though, trying to remember how to work the machine. rewind-stop-rewind makes it rewind super super fast. remember that? haha. wow time is such a weird thing.
anyway. I assure you, I feel better today. and never was I on the borders of death or anything. we mostly just slept. slept slept slept. we are taking good care of ourselves, and as you know, we have many other people taking care of us as well. thank you so much for your prayers and your concerns, I know they have helped. no doubt they have! but like it says in Mosiah 13:3, "...for I have not delivered the message which the Lord sent me to deliver....therefore, God will not suffer that I shall be destroyed at this time." granted abinadi didn't have typhoid...but I think the comparison is still there. we are fighters. and we are almost healed. thank you all so much.
I love you all more than I can say, and I hope everything is going well! send pictures of the rival! I will cry, but I want to see them. love you love you.
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