Week 38

Good evening to my wonderful family,

Hope everyone is having an amazing Sabbath and judging by the pictures becca sent me you are all having a wonderful home-cooked meal. Had I seen those pictures while I ate my rice and Tuna last night, I might have been brought to tears.... hahaha just kidding. I'm actually lucky because elder wang knows how to cook! Its just when its my turn to cook that we suffer.... hahahaha any simple recipes would be loved!

This week has been an awesome one. They're always awesome, just for different reasons. One of our Chinese members' wife came from china and she's been meeting with the sisters and we're hoping she is interested. They're planning to stay in Australia, and if we want a Chinese branch here someday, we really need families. So that was exciting. We Had trade offs with the Zone leaders on Wednesday. haha they called us Tuesday afternoon and were like, "we forgot to tell you but we need to do trade offs this Wednesday." hahahaha which stressed me out hard core because usually we plan for trade offs and try to have as many appointments as possible on that day, so we texted Trish to see what day we could come by this week and she said Wednesday! hahaha bam, tender mercy. So elder Tito came up to Wollongong and elder wang went down to dapto. Elder Tito is from Melbourne, but  is Samoan. He's been out just over a year now and it was the first time on my mission that I was with a missionary that has been out that much longer than me. It was really good and I learned a lot from him. We Visited with Trish and had an awesome lesson. She's doing really good and has that sincere desire to know if its true and I just know she will get an answer. It was cool though, because like 20 minutes before our appointment, we had nothing to do because a few people hadn't been home, and it's always the worst right before the appointment because you don't want to be way early, and you don't want to be late, so its always a tough decision, but we decided to go knock some doors. We knocked one and they said "Who is it?" through the door. I yelled back "missionaries!" and I heard them talking to each other in a different language, and then I heard "Shenma?" and I got all giddy and excited because I knew EXACTLY what language that was.... they opened the door and we started talking in English, which is what I like to do before the whole shock and awe technique. hahahaha they were very surprised when I asked them what part of china they were from in mandarin. But I had forgotten one very important thing... I didn't have my native companion for backup... hahahaha so I dove in head first! It was a guy and a girl and she straight off the bat was asking about the bible and I told her about it and about the book of Mormon. I asked if they had interest in religion and they said they did, but they didn't have any religious beliefs at the time. We talked for a bit about church and when we have it and what it's for, and then I gave them a plan of salvation pamphlet and set up an appointment for next week. Hahaha I was probably stuttering and stammering and I had to chinglish a little bit of it, but I was on cloud 9 when we walked out of there. So awesome.

The Rest of the week was pretty slow, we met with Gong and had a good lesson. He has a real desire to be baptized, but his parents are worried that if he gets baptized he won't be able to join the communist party back in china and if he doesn't join, it will be tough for him to get a job. So we're working on that a bit. He's really cool and for the most part I can understand his accent. hahaha I love it when I can understand the accent!

Saturday we had a funny experience. We Were walking to meet someone at the mall downtown and we were standing at a crosswalk and some guy walks up to us and starts staring at us. I said, "hows it going?" and he says "Mormon, right?" I said yes. then he goes, "you LOOK so NORMAL... but on the inside.....(and he twirled his finger around his ear)" I laughed and said, "why do you say that?" and he asked if we went to normal school, and studied normal subjects like chemistry and physics to which I replied in the affirmative. Then he said, "and you STILL believe that God created the earth 6,000 years ago?" I told him I did and he went off on how big of idiots we were. Hahaha I laugh about it now, but I was steaming at the time and if he had kept following us to the appointment I don't know what would have happened, but he let us go with a few choice words and we told him to have a nice day. hahaha but it got me thinking. I guess it's part of living in the world but not of the world. We LOOK normal, but it's what's on the inside that sets us apart. Some people may count it as foolishness, but to me, it's knowledge that others don't understand. We are a peculiar people, but we've got it right. and that's what matters to me. The way I see it, is if he is right, and God doesn't exist, then when we all die that will be the end of it and I will have been wrong my whole life, but he gets no more benefit than I do for being right, but if I'm right, and The plan of salvation is a real thing, then when we die, I'm the one who gets to do the "I told you so" dance. (which of course I won't do:)) hahaha but that's just how I feel about atheism. #gothope?

Love you all! Cant wait for mothers day! we're allowed to Skype and I think i'll do it on Monday for me which will be sunday for Yous. If church ends at 4:00 then i'll  do it after that sometime. Probably around 6 or 7 or 8? it all depends on where I do it and how many missionaries are doing it on Monday. remember, we have 11 missionaries in our ward so we have to find a few people to help us out with computers. Plan on that and i'll try to figure it out solid by next week and let you know. Lov eyou all heaps and heaps! Thank you for letting me be out here! It's the best thing ive ever done, and that includes all the frustration and stress! hahaha I really love it.

Love,

Elder 田

ps. special s/o to my boy John Hanks. Congrats on the calling! You're gonna smash it! love you pal, someday i'll get a letter from you.... hahahaha