Another week gone by! Still here in Taiwan. Still love it. Still have new interesting things happen every day.
Last week after we emailed we experienced one of those new and interesting things. We went to have our hair washed. Yes, that is a thing. No, it is not a simple shampoo and conditioner thing. For us it was a two hour process where the lady generously soaped and massaged my head for much much longer than she needed to, then rinsed and massaged for an additionally long duration of time, then blow dried it very thoroughly. Then she ran into a problem; she herself had grown up in Vietnam and lived in Taiwan for a number years, and this was the first time she had ever worked with my American hair which does not like to be blow dried in humidity. ("Your hair is so frizzy!") When she didn't know what to do with it I suggested a straightener, mostly meaning that I could straighten the front part myself and then go because what's the point it's just going to be wavy again tomorrow. But no, she insisted on giving my hair the most thorough straightening it has ever received, including separating it into at least 8 layers. And guess what? It was wavy again on Tuesday. But at least my head felt clean!
On Wednesday we had a pretty exciting day where we had 4 lessons with a member present! It was really wonderful. In the morning we met with Chen Li Zhu, who has already learned so much and the gospel is helping her so much. She is struggling with a few things in her family right now so most of the lesson was spent listening to and comforting her. Sometimes when that happens as a missionary it is hard to know what to do. I have limited life experience and don't know how to help her on one hand, and on the other hand we're not here to be counselors. But we are here to help people feel the love of Christ, and that's why I still felt like it was a good lesson; we were showing her that we love her and care about her, and we were able to share with her a Family Proclamation to help teach her some of the gospel principles that will help her family improve. I often think about how we are called to comfort the afflicted. It's a really wonderful role for me right now.
Then later on Wednesday we taught English class, where we are teaching the xiaopengyou class (literally "little friends", it's what they call kids). It's a little exhausting. And embarassing; it would be one thing to do the hokey pokey with just seven year olds, but it's another thing to do it with seven year olds and their parents. But I'll get over it. Then after English class we had 4 different investigators, two sets of friends, meet with us for lessons, so we split up and had two members be our companions for a lesson. It was cool for a little while to be the only missionary in the room where I knew that I was there to bear my testimony and help the investigator progress towards baptism. And I was grateful for the member who bore her testimony really well (and helped me understand what the investigator was said because I wasn't entirely sure if she said she thought she could get baptized when she was 18 or if her mom was opposed to it right now or what)(details like that are important). So overall it was a crazy day but was really wonderful.
AND the best part is that yesterday we had a lesson with one of the investigators Sister Grigg taught on Wednesday, Claire, and set a baptismal goal with her! It's been about a month since we've had anyone make a baptismal goal and I feel really good about Claire. All day Sunday I kept thinking about how we needed to set a goal with her in the evening, and even though our lesson was going late and we kept getting off subject we finally were able to talk to her about it and she is very willing to keep learning and pray about it. I know that God will answer her prayer and she will be baptized in February! And cool thing; she told us that she hadn't been sure if she wanted to come to dinner with us (we invited her to a dinner with a member that she hadn't met before) and she called us to tell us that she didn't feel comfortable coming. When she called us we were on our way out the door and the phone only rang once before it didn't pick up so we just decided to call her back in a little bit. When we didn't answer the phone she decided to pray to see if she should go to this stranger's house and had a really peaceful feeling that she should go. So she went and met us there and we didn't hear about this until later. What a miracle! God answered her prayer, we had a nice time with the member, and she now has a goal to be baptized. This is the kind of thing that makes being a missionary really worth it.
I did have a little bit of trouble eating the mini shrimp with their eyes still attached that the member gave us. And I'm not entirely sure what that fruity squishy plum-looking thing in the soup was that I ate, but I don't really intend on eating it again. The dumplings were good though!
And by the way, the answer to the question "Can both companions ride on the same bike at the same time?" is yes.
Love you all!
Sister Cardon
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