Hello
Everyone!
Happy
Valentine's Day! I hope you all had a good week with your lovers!
This
is a picture of Sister Duggar and I last night. She's about as close
to a spouse as I get these days, (although because we ate so much
this week due to Chinese New Year we opted not to celebrate
Valentine's day this week, and on some other day will venture to a
mall across the city to treat ourselves to Cold Stone ice cream to
honor our companionship.) Anyway, last night we went to our ward
mission leader's house for dinner and next door to his house was this
really fancy, sparkly show car. It had jewels studded all over it. If
the budget the mission gives us were just a little bigger, we would
be considering upgrading from our rickety, rusty bikes. (Mine is the
yellow one.) The car is just a bit more family friendly, we are
thinking.
This
week was fairly different from most weeks, here. We. ate. so. much.
food. The members fed us really well. I ate a lot of fish sausage,
strange vegetables with salty flavors you never taste in America,
delicious shrimp, rice, spicy curry, pork, fried mochi-type stuff,
and pizza. Pizza hut and Domino's are actually very popular here, and
I really love the special Asian flavors they have--Japanese seafood,
sweet and sour fish ball, Korean kimchi, seafood, etc. I think I am
accustomed to Taiwanese food, for the most part. Remember when I
wrote to you all, being really impressed with myself when I ate
squid? That is so weird I thought that was email-worthy info. Picking
up the little chewy tentacles with my chopsticks seems like such a
natural thing now. Haha.
Other
fun things of the week: At Buddhist service this week, we had a new
chore. Instead of pulling leaves out of guava wrappers, we were given
a stack of discarded school textbooks and were supposed to tear out
every single page for recycling, sorting the pages according to
whether they were colored or black and white. It was so strange,
getting glances at headings like, "Statistical Analysis"
and "Business stategies" and feeling that old world of
school calling back to me. I miss burying myself in the quiet dark
corners of the BYU library and thinking about life, quite a bit.
But
you know what? Getting to experience life so fully and vividly that
you barely have time to think about it is pretty cool, too. This week
we had a lot of empty time to Qiaomen, (lit: knock doors, but in
reality it means ring apartment buzzers). You meet so many new,
interesting people every day. Sometimes when someone lets us up into
their apartment it feels like we are climbing the stairs into a
still, quiet part of the universe that perhaps no one is aware of
except us, and God. This week, for example, we rang a buzzer and an
accented voice came down on the intercom, asking who we were. We said
our normal thing, we're church missionaries, blah blah blah. She said
she ting-bu-donged (didn't understand), but then the door
clicked--she had let us up. When we made our way up to her floor, we
found the door open and two pairs of house slippers set up for us. We
weren't sure if they were really for us or not, but apparently they
were. A young Indonesian girl (about in her 20's) came around
the corner and invited us in, and to sit down. It was the most
spotless house I have ever seen in Taiwan. Usually Taiwanese people's
houses are so cluttered, life crammed into small spaces.
(Quick
Background/Cultural info: it is really common for women from
the Philippines and Indonesia to come to Taiwan to work for
a few years taking care of old people, because jobs are so hard to
get in their countries. Young girls, but also sometimes mothers and
grandmothers, will leave their countries for a few years to work in
Taiwan. 99% of the time their jobs are really hard on them, requiring
them to be 24-hour caretakers of old people with barely any mind
left. We meet these people a lot, and it is always so heart-breaking
to think how lonely they must be, in this country with a language
they don't speak, away from their families (sometimes away from their
young kids), being a constant companion to someone who often can't be
a real companion to them. This house was probable so clean because
that girl is probably bored out of her mind and has nothing to do
every day but clean.)
Anyway,
this quiet but bright-faced Indonesian girl invited us to sit on
these fancy hard wood chairs, then disappeared around the corner for
several minutes. We had no clue what was going on, and I was starting
to get frustrated because I wanted to be out doing something more
productive, not trying to communicate ourselves out of this weird
situation. Sister Duggar seemed relieved to have a few minutes not to
be finding someone. It was one of those tense moments when you feel
like according to your plans and goals for the day you should really
be doing something else, but out of wanting to keep the peace decide
to stay silent. And, as a side note, this is such a daily
struggle--trying to figure out what I am supposed to be doing. Trying
to figure out if that means talking to people about the gospel or
just talking to them about their lives. If it means keep trying to
find people to teach or giving my companion a break. I wish I could
let you all catch a glimpse of all the conflicting pressures I feel
on my heart all the time!
But
we waited. (It was so silent, and clean!) and sure enough after a
while the Indonesian girl came out with a very old man clinging to
her. They sat down in front of us and started talking, and were so
sweet. The old man seemed delighted that two white girls had shown up
at his house and offered us tea a million times. The girl was so cute
and kept bowing and saying "xie xie" (thank you) to
everything we said. Communication was very broken, but there was such
a welcoming, embracing spirit there. We decided to say a prayer with
them, and that was a really cool experience. As soon as we started
talking to them about prayer, it just clicked in my mind what my
purpose was right then. No, these weren't going to be future
investigators--we weren't teaching them prayer so they could keep
doing it themselves, like we usually do. We were saying a prayer
because they were children of God, and even though they may feel
alone in this quiet little apartment in YongHe, Taiwan, they were not
forgotten by God. I believe that with all my heart. We blessed them
in the prayer that they would be able to feel his love for them and
that they and their families would be healthy, strong, have things to
smile about every day, Things like that. Things that were absolutely,
100% true. Do you know how good it feels to be able to do something
true?
Sometimes
I think I might be rotten, inside. But sometimes I can be good.
Something I hear or see clicks a lock in my soul and a door swings
open-- and I just get it.
Here
is a Mormon message that we have been sharing with a lot of people,
lately, (investigators, members, everyone needs it.) We have a DVD
full of Mormon messages with Chinese subtitles that have been able to
touch people and clarify spiritual truths in such a powerful way.
When
I get confused about what I am supposed to be doing, I love to
remember the message of this video. It is so healing! There is
something about opening myself up to the idea that I am already loved
completely that just washes away all my fears and resentments. It
makes all my petty companion issues seem so silly, all my concerns
over whether I am being a good missionary seem silly. I wonder
how many of our problems in the world wold melt away if we all could
really believe this message is true--that all of us, no matter who we
are or what we have done--are loved completely, are full of potential
and worth. I don't know what the areas are in your life that make it
hard for you to believe what Uchtdorf says, but I know you probably
have them. I hope you can think about what would change, in your
life, if you knew that what he says is true, with your whole heart.
Let yourself feel that and let it change you.
Have
a great week! Oh by the way Mom, thank you so much for the Birthday
package! I LOVED IT! The card was so sweet, it made me cry. And I
have no idea how I am going to eat so much granola, but I will enjoy
it!
Sister
Brown
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