Hello family and friends!
This has been a good week. We are still missionaries, lessons are goign smoother, and it feels like I can speak Chinese. I mean, if someone who A ctually Speaks Chinese starts talking to me I probably wouldn't understand them, but when other missionaries speak I totally get it! I even translated for our branch president's wife during sacrament meeting yesterday, which was really fun. I totally got most everything and it made sense to her, although I didn't know the word for "work" so that was confusing sometimes, and I might have just summarized instead of translating directly. But hey, cha bu duo. (Not much difference.) Also, one of the new girls may have said that she was really grateful that Joseph Smith loves us and God sent Joseph Smith to die for us. Not necessarily untrue statements, but I kind of think she meant to say "Christ." I don't blame her, Yesu Jidu and Yuese Simi are pretty similar names and easy to get mixed up.
Yesterday in class with our native Taiwanese teacher, Sister Wu, we had a section about Taiwanese culture. She told us things not to do (bouncing your knees while teaching a lesson: not cool. It looks like you are poor.) and that Taiwanese people don't really shake hands. It's kind of weird to them and you have to ask permission before you stick your hand out awkwardly. Then we were discussing table manners (always hold your bowl up to your face, not eat over your plate. Also, don't ask for someone to pass you a dish, just stand up and get it, or reach over.) and the subject of napkins came up. In America at a fancy restaurant, you shake out your napkin and put it on your lap. Do they have anything similar in Taiwan? Sister Wu looks at us really confused and says, "Why do you put the napkin on your lap?" Well, in case food spills, then your clothes don't get dirty. Then Sister Wu starts giggling. "I thought it was because you were cold!"
So we've had a whole week with our new teacher, Brother Woolsey. Also Wu Laoshi, so we call him Brother Wu. No relation between Brother Wu and Sister Wu, he's a tall gangly redhead. And he is a great teacher! He served in our mission, Taiwan Taizhong, and just got back in like April (we think so, at least. Sometimes when we ask him personal questions he says, "...hao." and moves on.) so it's really great to be able to ask him questions about the mission. And he is such a good missionary teacher as well, he did a teaching demonstration the other day of the first lesson and it was SO GOOD. We were all like, "Can we have a recording of that lesson?" and "Can you be our companion?" And he's like "No cause you're a sister." It was a little deflating.
Last week we got to try Skype TRC for the first time, that was fun! We got to a special computer lab and Skype with members actually in Taiwan which was way fun, except the sister we were Skyping with didn't have a camera so it was just like a phone call and it was really confusing and we can't really speak Chinese. But it was fun nevertheless, and we get to try again tonight, so hopefully that will go well. We should probably plan our lessons. That would be good.
Oh so I've mentioned the past few weeks that the Taiwan group ahead of us has been having visa issues: well now they are having official visa issues and are going to be reassigned stateside for six weeks. The Taiwan visa process is changing so they had to resubmit and now it's going to take another four weeks for them to get theirs, so they are all getting new mission calls this week for the first transfer. It's kind of sad, but they're all pretty excited to try a stateside mission for a little bit. Prayers that we won't be in the same boat would be much appreciated!
Sorry no pictures this week, the computer is freaking out. Also I don't really have any pictures you might want to see, yesterday we had a "who can take the creepiest picture" contest in our district and I don't think you want to see the random close-ups I have of complete strangers.
Love you all, I'm so glad to be here on a mission and learning so much about patience and faith and charity and the Spirit and all those good things. Life is good.
Love,
Sister Cardon the Younger
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