This has been a pretty happy week! We were able to watch all of General Conference, so that was pretty fabulous. I love conference so much. We watched it in English with all of the missionaries and it was super fun. Except for how like half of the talks were about marriage. Super important and I learned a lot--but I think I'm going to hold off thinking too deeply about it for another year. Basically, I loved how one of the themes of conference was the importance of families and how the gospel and families work together; one of the essential elements of the plan of redemption is the setting we were born into, with families to help us learn and grow. (See Elder Christofferson's awesome talk.) So true! Loved it. I super loved Elder Kevin W Pearson's talk about what we can learn from Lehi's dream, and Elder Uchtdorf's talk about grace, and Elder Bednar's talk about Godly vs worldly fear. Seriously, conference. Love it. If you don't know what I'm talking about you should go to https://www.lds.org/?lang=eng and do some spiritual feasting. Meanwhile, I'll be eating some potsticker things I got for like $1.50.
Lots of miracles this week. We met the epitome of the traditional American grandma making apple pie while we were contacting, except she was the Chinese version and she taught us how to perfectly fold dumplings. Although it turns out we have the handicap of genetically long thumbs that can't quite fold it just right, so our dumplings weren't super pretty. Or we just need to do it for another 50 years. Probably that too. But she was so sweet and actually super interested in the gospel; she is good friends with another lady from China in our ward (who, according to the first dumpling lady, "really does fold dumplings.") (that sentence sounds more impressive in Chinese.) and wanted to know about how to pray. So we are going back this week and she is totally going to get baptized.
I feel like something I have been focusing on this week is talking to everyone, and I've discovered that when I do I feel a lot more successful. The days when I'm kind of tired and it's super hot or mildly chilly and I'm hungry and don't feel like I can speak Chinese very well, as soon as I decide to perk up and talk to the next young 20-something girl getting off of her scooter at a store, everything just goes better. Except for when she walks away or gives you the silent treatment. But! Then you move on and go and talk to the next lady getting off of her scooter, and it turns out that she went to church when she was little and feels like it's time for her to try it again and you get her phone number and it's all really happy. Then you figure out that she doesn't live in your area. But! It is still a good day. Basically, when we are willing to work and keep going, the Lord blesses us with a happy countenance. Hey that's actually pretty good advice. I should figure out how to say that in Chinese.
Interesting things I've eaten recently:
loquats. They are little orange fruit things that are only in season for like 1 month of the year. Super delicious.
I forget that this is something different because we eat it all the time; a staple vegetable here is sweet potato leaves. Like, why stop at eating the thing that grew in the ground? Let's eat the leaves too.
One of my favorite fruits here is called a lianwu in Chinese, wax apple in English. It's way good; it kind of looks like a wax apple my mom would use to decorate, but you can actually eat this one. And it's way juicier than regular apples and super delicious.
There's a shop next to the church that makes these little meat roll things, and how they cook them is they have this big stone/metal pot thing that they heat with coals, then stick the rools on the sides of the oven thing so they are like hanging upside down. Oh! Kind of like how they make traditional naan in a tandoor oven in India. You can look it up. I don't know what the roll thing is called. But it's tasty!
Well, I need to get going on other computer things. I hope all of you have a great week!
Sister Cardon
Picture: You thought sister missionaries already looked fabulous... but you hadn't seen our awesome rain ponchos yet. Yes, we have matching ones.
NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.
No comments:
Post a Comment