The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away… and in my case, I’m glad He took people out of my life who only cause problems, and has instead given me blessings beyond what I deserve.
We didn’t meet with Cherie and PJ this week, but PJ got a calling as a Sunday school teacher, so he came on Sunday! But Cherie didn’t, so now I’m gonna hafta start pushing more for her to start coming to church with PJ, and getting her more involved there. The time is just so short…I know I’ll be getting moved soon (possibly after Singapore in March, is my guess), and I want Cherie and PJ in a solid situation before I leave!We met with Chern last week, and had possibly the best discussion yet. It was about Christ’s life, and she really seems to understand things pretty well. I was all hyped up and excited to meet with her this week, but when I called me to make sure that we still had an appointment, I found out that we had had a miscommunication, so we weren’t able to meet…and I was SOOOO mad at myself for that. People…this is why you don’t text. Cuz things are never as clear over text as they are when you talk on the phone. So we weren’t able to meet one more time before she leaves for Malaysia to visit her parents, but she’ll be getting back just in time for Elder Nelson, and we HAVE to meet before that meeting. I’m also worried about leaving Chern anytime soon…she’s SOOO close, it’s only a matter of time. But I’m going to leave her strong if it’s the last thing I do!
We’ve met with this one lady, Ibu Visinsia, a few times, and…well, it’s an interesting situation, but she basically only likes to meet with Sis and me cuz we’re Bules, and her grandson and daughter come to our English class. But we’ve been taking turns going to their house, and I told Sis Lie last week that if we went and all they wanted to do was feed us and talk about who knows what like they always do, we weren’t going back again, cuz it was a waste of time. However, when we went last week, it was Ibu Visinsia, her husband, and her daughter that all sat in with us, and all listened to the Plan of Salvation and seemed to understand it pretty well. I don’t think the other two are reading the BofM, but Ibu Visinsia had read bits and pieces of it, and so she had some fun and interesting questions that we got to try and answer. It ended up being a really good appointment, and hopefully they’ll just get more and more interested (although I have a feeling they might fall into the “Eternigator” category, cuz their church is at the same time as ours, so they basically refuse to come to our church…even tho their church has like 5 times to choose from…) and keep following thru with the commitments. We’ll see!
I think I mentioned last week that we were going to start teaching a girl named Israel that we randomly met (or I should say the Elders did), and we’ve taught her twice since then. We taught her the restoration lesson on Tuesday night, and then today we did the Plan of Salvation. She is GOLD. She has questions, but it’s more or less about who people are, and how it correlates with the Bible, but their still questions that I love! After we taught the Restoration lesson, she wanted to read the full account from Joseph Smith, so we gave her the pamphlet that we have with that in it, and so then today she was asking who Moroni was, and how he fit into the picture, and then a bit about Oliver Cowdery as well…she’s sharp, and she likes it when we explain things to her so it’s more clear. It’s been great teaching her, and we’ll be teaching her again on Monday at the Millecam’s, so I’m excited to see where she goes!
Haha, I almost forgot…so I got my hair cut the other day at a beauty school, and MAN! The haircut isn’t bad, no worries, but the girl that cut my hair looked/acted like she wanted to kill herself the whole time! I felt so bad…here I was, this bule getting my hair cut by a poor little lady from Medan who has probably never cut a bule’s hair before, which can only add more stress…but it turned out fine, and hopefully she’s still alive, haha. It really was funny tho… we walked in, and when Sis Lie told the lady at the front desk that we wanted hair cuts, the lady looked at me, then turned back to Sis Lie and said, “You know this is a SCHOOL, right? These AREN’T professionals.” Haha. I think she was worried about having a bule there. Man alive. It’s crazy being in a country where skin color can mean so much!
So for FHE, we met with Sister Suhendro, a cute little old lady in the branch who reminds me SOOO much of you, Grandma! She is adorable. She joined the church with her husband and kids in the early 70’s, and all are still in the church, and most (if not all…I’m not sure) have served missions when they’re old enough. She also served a senior mission about 10 years ago (after her husband died), and she told me she did that to set the example for her grandkids. She has such the funniest sense of humor…I only wish I could understand her better so I could laugh harder, but everyone else always laughs whenever she says anything, cuz she’s just funny, just like you Grandma. Always loving and ready to help with anything she can. She actually even had her next door neighbor over with her 2 kids on Monday, and afterwards we found out the they’re Muslim, so that was REALLY cool, and she said she’s gonna keep trying to share about the Gospel with them. SO COOL! Just goes to show, you’re never too old to share the Gospel…I believe she’s 78. She told me, but I forgot. All I remember is that she’s a few years younger than Grandma, so 78 is my best guess. So cool!
Well, that’s basically my last week in a nutshell. We’re hopefully going to be meeting with a few of our contacts this week… FINALLY! We haven’t had too much success with our contacts, but I’m gonna try to focus more getting those appointments, cuz we NEED them.
Oh…I thought of one other thing. Sis and Sis Mongan will get an addition in the next few days (or weeks…we’re not quite sure when). One of the missionaries from Bandung is being transferred to Jakarta, so that’ll be an interesting experience. I dunno how they feel about that, since they get along REALLY well, and have a lot of good things going for them, and this other missionary is said to be one of the tougher sisters to be comps with, but I’m sure if anyone can still have success, it’s Sis and Sis Mongan. We’ll see how it goes! But I’m not gonna lie…I’m just glad she’s not joining me and Sis Lie, cuz we’re just starting to get used to each other, and having a third person would only throw things off even more. Phew!
Happy Valentine’s on Sunday! It’s always a good chance to tell the ones you love that you love them…so I want to tell you all how much I love and appreciate all of you and the support, prayers, and letters. I really am blessed beyond what I should have, and I’m immensely grateful for that. I hope you all have a good week, and remember that I love and miss you tons! However, this is the Lord’s work, and I’m beyond happy to do my part in helping move that along. It truly is a great and marvelous work, and although it’s NOT easy, it IS important, and it IS what I’m supposed to be doing right now. I have no doubt in my mind about that, and I’m grateful for the trust that God has put in me to do this for Him…hopefully I don’t let Him down! Loves~
~Sister Sara
Friday, February 12, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Beruntung :)
Whew…where to start this week, huh? Well, zone conference is good. As usual, it was inspiring, and actually EXACTLY what I needed. Pres had Elder & Sister Paul from Honk Kong come and talk to us…a psychiatrist and nurse. They talked about stress and anxiety, and it’s effects on a mission, basically telling us that what we’re feeling is normal (I think maybe cuz pres was sick of telling so many missionaries the same thing, but no one believes him cuz he doesn’t have the PH.d). they talked a lot about how to bring down the stress level…which was basically to just remember that everyone has their agency, and as long as we do our very best, that’s good enough. Which…I think was good, but I also thought they should’ve pointed out that we’re supposed to always STRIVE to become perfect, even tho actually becoming perfect is obviously not possible. But whatevs…it was good. Pres talked about death, cuz his 91 yr old mom died the week before (sorry dad…he already had a pre-need plan for her at another mortuary…but I tried :P). it was good, and definitely gave me a good boost for the last week… cuz I NEEDED it.
The sad news for the week is that Indri’s baptism is off. Hopefully just postponed, but most likely off. I’m not gonna go into details, but we’re not quite sure how much of her story is true, and we’ve spent the last week chasing after her. So now we’re done chasing, and ready to get back to work… which means contacting because we don’t have ANYBODY. I’ve been REALLY frustrated lately because we can’t seem to get ANY appointments with any of our contacts, while Sis and Sis Mongan have at least 2 or 3 every day. I know we’re not supposed to compare ourselves…but it’s kinda hard when we go thru our entire contact list and not a single person will meet with us, and they try 5 people, and get appointments with 4 of them. Ugh. Ya…I’ve been frustrated the last few days, and possibly a little depressed. But I’m trying to push thru that and just keep talking to people, and keep worrking to try and find those people who WILL listen to us. Actually… I have a testimony that that will happen, just from our experience yesterday…here’s the story.
Yesterday we had nothing, so we went to a big mall out by Chern’s house where Sister Mongan said there are a lot of Christians. But, we found that there aren’t any good central places to sit and find people to contact (other malls have fountains in the middle of them or some place that you can just sit and wait for people to sit next to you to start a conversation), altho sis lie did contact one person, which was totally awesome. I think I just hate shopping without a purpose too much to be good at it..but anywho, we left there and were sitting the bus station for about an hour, and I had one Muslim lady who invited me to her house just so she could have a bule there, and another Christian lady who I think I scared somehow (luckily sis lie contacted her later…ugh), which got me thinking about how I’ve been here for 3 months…and I’m totally sick of people who either hate me because I’m a bule, or are just overly excited to be talking to a bule in Indonesian…where all they want is pictures and to touch my skin (yes, skin DOES feel the same, no matter what color it is, people :P). it’s fine if that happens and I get a good contact out of it every once in a while, but…ugh, I was just really frustrated. So I prayed and asked Heavenly Father to help me to find some good contacts, and find someone who could help bring my spirits up. On the way back to our usual proselyting areas, I had the thought that we were passing by Ibu Agnus’ house, one of the 2 lessons we’ve taught with our contacts, and it’d been over a month since we’d been able to meet with them cuz they’re always busy. So I told Sis Lie we should go there and just drop in. she didn’t like the idea at first, but she finally gave in, and we went…and it was AWESOME. We just followed up with them and shared a scipture, but they had a lot of questions, and the father has been praying about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, and he’d read almost all of 3rd Nephi… not to mention that I understood FAR more this time than the last time. So we tried to answer all his questions, and even Ibu Agnus was more involved in this lesson than she had been in the last (she was REALLY quiet in the last one, but this time she read scriptures and asked a few of her own questions, so that was really good!). so then I was able to go home feeling FAR better about things. Thank goodness I have a Heavenly Father who hears and listens to my prayers, especially when I need them the most!
Another funny story…while at this mall, I was looking at movies, and I found CHURCHBALL! And then I freaked out. Lol. Who would’ve thought? Churchball in Indonesia? I was gonna buy it for Sis Lie, but it was a bad copy so I didn’t…but I just thought that was a funny, random thing to find here.Today we went to the national museum for pday, and that was fun. Remember that picture that steve found on the internet right after I got my call, mom? I now know that that is a tribe in Papua, and the reason behind their “dressings.” Haha, I told sis about that, and she just laughed.
I met with Chern last week, and I had Bro Hunter come as well, since I wanted to hear about their trip, and plus I think it’s good for him to be there every once in a while. We had a good discussion on our eternal families. But now we’re going to focus on her testimony of Christ. She comes from a Bhuddist background, so I don’t know that she has a true understanding of Christ and His Atonement…and without that…ya, why would you get baptized? So we’re really gonna be working on that the next few weeks, and hopefully that helps with her. Bro Hunter is such an awesome guy…and I know what her getting baptized would mean to him, so I want to help them as much as I possibly can to become the eternal family that they both want! I’m meeting with both Chern and Cherie this weekend, so hopefully those will keep being regular weekly appointments, and I can help both the families become eternal. I feel like that’s a lot of the reason that I’m still here in Jakarta…to work with these two families, and I’m so grateful for that opportunity. Sis lie is always really nervous to talk in them, but she does a good job, and she understands most of what’s going on.
One of the elders told me that our Singapore “trip” has been moved to March…so I should still be here for both the zone trip AND Elder Nelson! Woohoo! I’m so excited! I especially excited for Elder Nelson. I read a talk by him that I’m going to have Chern read about Christ and His Atonement, and…holy cow. Definitely the words of a man called of God. It’s gonna be a great experience to be here when he comes and visits Indonesia, and I’m grateful I get to be here for that.Well…time is running short. But time is also going by fast. I’m almost at 5 months now…almost 1/3 done! Craziness. But I’m grateful for this experience, and especially for family and friends who support me so much. I know your prayers truly are answered when it comes to me…cuz I’m still here, still kicking, still working hard. There’s no way I would be able to do any of this without the support of all of you. So thank you so much…I love you all so much! Have a good week, loves~
~Sister Sara
The sad news for the week is that Indri’s baptism is off. Hopefully just postponed, but most likely off. I’m not gonna go into details, but we’re not quite sure how much of her story is true, and we’ve spent the last week chasing after her. So now we’re done chasing, and ready to get back to work… which means contacting because we don’t have ANYBODY. I’ve been REALLY frustrated lately because we can’t seem to get ANY appointments with any of our contacts, while Sis and Sis Mongan have at least 2 or 3 every day. I know we’re not supposed to compare ourselves…but it’s kinda hard when we go thru our entire contact list and not a single person will meet with us, and they try 5 people, and get appointments with 4 of them. Ugh. Ya…I’ve been frustrated the last few days, and possibly a little depressed. But I’m trying to push thru that and just keep talking to people, and keep worrking to try and find those people who WILL listen to us. Actually… I have a testimony that that will happen, just from our experience yesterday…here’s the story.
Yesterday we had nothing, so we went to a big mall out by Chern’s house where Sister Mongan said there are a lot of Christians. But, we found that there aren’t any good central places to sit and find people to contact (other malls have fountains in the middle of them or some place that you can just sit and wait for people to sit next to you to start a conversation), altho sis lie did contact one person, which was totally awesome. I think I just hate shopping without a purpose too much to be good at it..but anywho, we left there and were sitting the bus station for about an hour, and I had one Muslim lady who invited me to her house just so she could have a bule there, and another Christian lady who I think I scared somehow (luckily sis lie contacted her later…ugh), which got me thinking about how I’ve been here for 3 months…and I’m totally sick of people who either hate me because I’m a bule, or are just overly excited to be talking to a bule in Indonesian…where all they want is pictures and to touch my skin (yes, skin DOES feel the same, no matter what color it is, people :P). it’s fine if that happens and I get a good contact out of it every once in a while, but…ugh, I was just really frustrated. So I prayed and asked Heavenly Father to help me to find some good contacts, and find someone who could help bring my spirits up. On the way back to our usual proselyting areas, I had the thought that we were passing by Ibu Agnus’ house, one of the 2 lessons we’ve taught with our contacts, and it’d been over a month since we’d been able to meet with them cuz they’re always busy. So I told Sis Lie we should go there and just drop in. she didn’t like the idea at first, but she finally gave in, and we went…and it was AWESOME. We just followed up with them and shared a scipture, but they had a lot of questions, and the father has been praying about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, and he’d read almost all of 3rd Nephi… not to mention that I understood FAR more this time than the last time. So we tried to answer all his questions, and even Ibu Agnus was more involved in this lesson than she had been in the last (she was REALLY quiet in the last one, but this time she read scriptures and asked a few of her own questions, so that was really good!). so then I was able to go home feeling FAR better about things. Thank goodness I have a Heavenly Father who hears and listens to my prayers, especially when I need them the most!
Another funny story…while at this mall, I was looking at movies, and I found CHURCHBALL! And then I freaked out. Lol. Who would’ve thought? Churchball in Indonesia? I was gonna buy it for Sis Lie, but it was a bad copy so I didn’t…but I just thought that was a funny, random thing to find here.Today we went to the national museum for pday, and that was fun. Remember that picture that steve found on the internet right after I got my call, mom? I now know that that is a tribe in Papua, and the reason behind their “dressings.” Haha, I told sis about that, and she just laughed.
I met with Chern last week, and I had Bro Hunter come as well, since I wanted to hear about their trip, and plus I think it’s good for him to be there every once in a while. We had a good discussion on our eternal families. But now we’re going to focus on her testimony of Christ. She comes from a Bhuddist background, so I don’t know that she has a true understanding of Christ and His Atonement…and without that…ya, why would you get baptized? So we’re really gonna be working on that the next few weeks, and hopefully that helps with her. Bro Hunter is such an awesome guy…and I know what her getting baptized would mean to him, so I want to help them as much as I possibly can to become the eternal family that they both want! I’m meeting with both Chern and Cherie this weekend, so hopefully those will keep being regular weekly appointments, and I can help both the families become eternal. I feel like that’s a lot of the reason that I’m still here in Jakarta…to work with these two families, and I’m so grateful for that opportunity. Sis lie is always really nervous to talk in them, but she does a good job, and she understands most of what’s going on.
One of the elders told me that our Singapore “trip” has been moved to March…so I should still be here for both the zone trip AND Elder Nelson! Woohoo! I’m so excited! I especially excited for Elder Nelson. I read a talk by him that I’m going to have Chern read about Christ and His Atonement, and…holy cow. Definitely the words of a man called of God. It’s gonna be a great experience to be here when he comes and visits Indonesia, and I’m grateful I get to be here for that.Well…time is running short. But time is also going by fast. I’m almost at 5 months now…almost 1/3 done! Craziness. But I’m grateful for this experience, and especially for family and friends who support me so much. I know your prayers truly are answered when it comes to me…cuz I’m still here, still kicking, still working hard. There’s no way I would be able to do any of this without the support of all of you. So thank you so much…I love you all so much! Have a good week, loves~
~Sister Sara
almost 5 months out...crazy!
Well, another week. I wish I had a lot of good news, but this is week has been a bit of bummer week, and we haven’t been too busy with anybody except Indri. We’ve tried going to her house 3 times in the last week (which is FAR away, so we don’t make any other appointments), and 2 of the times she cancelled…while we were waiting to meet her. So 2 of the days we just went and proselyted, but the 3rd day was just a bit weird… we went with her, but then she didn’t have the keys, so we waited for a friend, but the friend never came…so we basically wasted a whole day there. But, the one good thing is that our contact list has gotten a ton bigger! So hopefully we’ll be able to make some good appointments for next week. That’s my hope! However…we still hafta go to Indri’s house, so we’ll be doing that on Friday. Yup…another day of traveling. Hopefully this time it works out. However, since we haven’t seen her living conditions/situation, she can’t be baptized until after that, so we had to postpone her baptism until next week… again. She asked Elder Millecam to baptize her, tho, and I think he was pretty relieved to hear that he had another week to try to memorize the prayer in Indonesian… haha, he’s pretty worried about messing up on it, but I’m sure he’ll do great!
SOOO…I did get some big news this week. I finally figured out why Sis and I are still here in Jakarta together…pres told me after district meeting last Friday that all four of us that came together will be going to Singapore sometime mid-late February because of some sort of problem with out visas. He said we could be there 5-7 days. Can you believe that? I was REALLY excited at first (I get to go to ANOTHER Asian country to experience things there!), but now I’m just bummed. Just watch…at that point, we’ll have investigators, and I won’t be able to teach Chern or Cherie. AND we could be gone when they’re having the zone trip to Taman Safari! Where, in case you’re wondering why this is so awful, I would get to ride an elephant! It’s like the funnest place! Everyone tells me that I HAVE to go there, and I’ll love getting to hold all the different animals and (tear) ride an elephant! I’m a total baby about this, I know, but I REALLY AWANNA GO! Then, if we hafta go later in the month, we might miss Elder Nelson coming! So…seriously. January has almost NOTHING in it, and neither does March, but February is full of stuff that we’ll prob hafta miss! Sadness… but I’m expecting to get moved after that to one of the other areas. So I’m kinda excited to get ready for that :)
Well…I really don’t have much else to say. We have zone conference tomorrow, so that should be fun. I haven’t taught Chern or Cherie since they got home, but I have an appointment with Chern, and hopefully I’ll have one with Cherie by tonight. We gotta follow up and see how both their trips were, and just keep on teaching. I have a lot of ideas go thru my mind about what to teach them each to help them gain a better testimony of the church, and hopefully that’ll help. I’m so grateful for this opportunity to share the gospel with the people of Indonesia! It’s certainly not easy, but I am grateful for it. For anyone willing to listen, I will tell them of my firm belief and knowledge that Jesus is the Christ, I know God loves me, and this church is Christ’s church…there is no other way that we can return to God than through this Gospel. Everyone will find that out at one time or another, whether in this life or the next. I’m grateful to be a soldier in His army, and pray everyday that I help His work move forward. I love you all so much, and pray for you everyday! Thanks for all the support and love and prayers for me from you…I know that’s what keeps me moving forward (and especially opening my mouth to find people!) everyday day here in Indonesia. Loves!
~Sister Sara
SOOO…I did get some big news this week. I finally figured out why Sis and I are still here in Jakarta together…pres told me after district meeting last Friday that all four of us that came together will be going to Singapore sometime mid-late February because of some sort of problem with out visas. He said we could be there 5-7 days. Can you believe that? I was REALLY excited at first (I get to go to ANOTHER Asian country to experience things there!), but now I’m just bummed. Just watch…at that point, we’ll have investigators, and I won’t be able to teach Chern or Cherie. AND we could be gone when they’re having the zone trip to Taman Safari! Where, in case you’re wondering why this is so awful, I would get to ride an elephant! It’s like the funnest place! Everyone tells me that I HAVE to go there, and I’ll love getting to hold all the different animals and (tear) ride an elephant! I’m a total baby about this, I know, but I REALLY AWANNA GO! Then, if we hafta go later in the month, we might miss Elder Nelson coming! So…seriously. January has almost NOTHING in it, and neither does March, but February is full of stuff that we’ll prob hafta miss! Sadness… but I’m expecting to get moved after that to one of the other areas. So I’m kinda excited to get ready for that :)
Well…I really don’t have much else to say. We have zone conference tomorrow, so that should be fun. I haven’t taught Chern or Cherie since they got home, but I have an appointment with Chern, and hopefully I’ll have one with Cherie by tonight. We gotta follow up and see how both their trips were, and just keep on teaching. I have a lot of ideas go thru my mind about what to teach them each to help them gain a better testimony of the church, and hopefully that’ll help. I’m so grateful for this opportunity to share the gospel with the people of Indonesia! It’s certainly not easy, but I am grateful for it. For anyone willing to listen, I will tell them of my firm belief and knowledge that Jesus is the Christ, I know God loves me, and this church is Christ’s church…there is no other way that we can return to God than through this Gospel. Everyone will find that out at one time or another, whether in this life or the next. I’m grateful to be a soldier in His army, and pray everyday that I help His work move forward. I love you all so much, and pray for you everyday! Thanks for all the support and love and prayers for me from you…I know that’s what keeps me moving forward (and especially opening my mouth to find people!) everyday day here in Indonesia. Loves!
~Sister Sara
:)
Another week has come and gone…man, time is really starting to go by fast. I’m still mad last week’s email didn’t work, but now I’ll be writing my emails in Word before I send, and just pasting and copying…so hopefully there aren’t any more problems with that. This week has been a little bit hard, just cuz I have a head cold now. Saturday it hit me pretty hard, so we came home early, but Sunday we were out ALL day, so I only really had Monday to try to recover…but even that didn’t last long cuz we had an appointment pretty far away, so we had to leave earlier in the day and were gone all night. Yesterday I only got an extra hour to try to get some extra sleep, and then again we were out all day…so it’s good, cuz we’ve been busy, but I might be sick a bit longer than I’d like cuz of it.
Last week was crazy…we had 2 deaths last week (which I wrote about one of them in the other email...ugh). We found out Thursday that a lady from one of the other branches had died, but her daughter and son are in our ward, so everything was done here in Jakarta. It was interesting to see the differences between us and them when it comes to funerals…dad, you’ll be interested in this. They bring the body to the church straight from the hospital, and they have a ton of people come and watch as they prepare the body. I wanted to watch, but we had one of our investigators show up for English class (which was cancelled due to the circumstances), and we thought it was better for us to do some English stuff with them rather than go to the “showing” upstairs, so I missed it. But, here’s another interesting thing…the family stays with the body in the church until the funeral. So the family was at the church nonstop from Thursday until Saturday. The place was an absolute WRECK when we cleaned up after the funeral…it looked like a tornado had gone thru the place. But the funeral was basically the same as a normal mormon funeral, except that at the end they have a line where everyone goes and gives their condolences to the family (they do that at the beginning and end, but the end was the big one rather than a viewing like we have in America). So that was interesting to me.
I’m not the only one who’s been sick…Sis Lie got sick last week after district meeting…like, she was throwing up and had a huge headache, so we stayed in that whole day too. You should’ve seen her face when she woke up and saw all the letters I’d written while she’d been asleep…haha, it was awesome.
Sunday was a crazy day…I was SOOO sick, but Heavenly Father has a funny way of helping us when we think we can’t do something but we do what we know we have to anyways…we’d set up an appointment with Lena, an inactive member who Jackie Larson asked me to go see, and it was FAR, and apparently there’s a bit of drama there, so we HAD to have a member of the relief society presidency go with us, we left after church and were gone all day. But I got 3 contacts…more than I’ve had ever in one night, I’m pretty sure. The appointment went well (hopefully!), but the very last leg coming home, I knew my energy was gone…but it was in perfect timing.
So I’m finding that I have a much easier time contacting men than women… which is really odd. But here’s why…I was telling Sis this the other day… with the guys here, they see me, a Bule, and they’re just excited that I start talking to them, and I can basically force talk about the Gospel and everything that I wanna talk about on them… whereas with girls, they aren’t as open cuz I’m only a bule girl. If I ask for the guys’ numbers, they LOVE it, but the girls get all skeptical and stuff. So… I’ve been getting more contacts lately, but they’re all guys. And we can’t teach guys, so we have to give them to the elders. So it totally stinks, but at least it’s been getting my confidence up. AND….this is wonderful news… I’m FINALLY starting to understand most things that people say on the bus! I’m still not too good in following other people’s conversations (like with members or investigators about things not related to the gospel, their family, or anything that is cute or funny), because my vocab is still so limited, but I have come SOOO far in the last 2 months. Today I was talking to one of the new elders from the MTC, and he’s so frustrated right now…all I could say was, buddy, I know EXACTLY how you feel. But don’t worry…if you endure this, and keep working hard, it WILL get better. I’m not sure if he believed me or not…but it really is true. Hopefully I’m done with my “transition” period, and the language will continue to come!
So the bad news this week is that Indri’s baptism got pushed back another week… so it’s not until January 21 because she didn’t come to church on Sunday, because she worked an all-nighter, and on her way to church she fainted and was taken to a hospital. She came to the church right before we left to see Lena, and she was sad, but she understood why we had to push it back. But she’s still doing great with the lessons, and we’re almost done. Just baptism and confirmation is left, and then I think we’ll start on Lesson 5 with her. Man alive…I love her! We had a lesson yesterday with her, and afterwards she followed us to 2 other appointments with members, and she chimed into the conversation and bore her testimony and everything. She’s also been doing a lot with the other singles in the ward, and she’s really enjoyed having friends that can actually go out and do stuff with her (we’re a little tied up as missionaries…), and they’ve been great influences on her, so that’s been awesome.
Mom, you’ll be proud of this…we had FHE with the first counselor’s family on Monday, and I had inspiration from above to focus the lesson on the 2 little kids in the family. It was AWESOME. Haha, funny, too… we talked to President Parmen about the time and everything, and he said that’d be great, and then we showed up to the house, and his wife had NO IDEA we were coming! Not to mention that President Parmen wouldn’t be home until after we needed to leave to head home, cuz they live quite a ways away. I told sis Lie, he’s a typical man :P haha. Anyways…I had the ideas for the lesson but Sis Lie did an awesome job of carrying it out (she is our mouthpiece most of the time). We read about Ammon and King Lamoni from the kids Book of Mormon, with pics and stuff, and then I bought a coloring book at a Christian store here, and so we copied 2 pics from that for the kids to color while we talked to Sis Parmen and got to know her. As unexpected as it was, I think it went REALLY well. And their little girl is ADORABLE! She is seriously so cute…I need to get her on video. Here’s an example…on Sunday, the Primary sang during sacrament, and she went up (she’s 3 BTW), and she turns around with this huge smile on her face, and her dress is sticking almost completely vertical with the ground…but up instead of down. And she’s just smiling all the while, and after about 20 seconds, someone in the front row went and pulled down her dress for her, but it was ADORABLE. Haha, she makes me laugh.
So today was pday, and we went to the ZOO!!! Holy cow, SOOO much fun! However, sadness mom! We found out that they ride elephants there a few days ago, so I’ve been all excited to do that, but then we get there and they only do it on Sundays and Saturdays! I was so sad! But I took a pic of the “boarding station” area so I could imagine myself getting on an elephant…someday. It WILL happen. But ya, it was tons of fun, and I got some pretty sweet pics and videos that you’ll be getting in the next few weeks, I’m sure.Well my time’s up…which is good, cuz I dunno what else to say. But I love you all so much, and thanks for all the love and support, as always! I hope things are well at home…know that my prayers are with you always~
~Sister Sara
Last week was crazy…we had 2 deaths last week (which I wrote about one of them in the other email...ugh). We found out Thursday that a lady from one of the other branches had died, but her daughter and son are in our ward, so everything was done here in Jakarta. It was interesting to see the differences between us and them when it comes to funerals…dad, you’ll be interested in this. They bring the body to the church straight from the hospital, and they have a ton of people come and watch as they prepare the body. I wanted to watch, but we had one of our investigators show up for English class (which was cancelled due to the circumstances), and we thought it was better for us to do some English stuff with them rather than go to the “showing” upstairs, so I missed it. But, here’s another interesting thing…the family stays with the body in the church until the funeral. So the family was at the church nonstop from Thursday until Saturday. The place was an absolute WRECK when we cleaned up after the funeral…it looked like a tornado had gone thru the place. But the funeral was basically the same as a normal mormon funeral, except that at the end they have a line where everyone goes and gives their condolences to the family (they do that at the beginning and end, but the end was the big one rather than a viewing like we have in America). So that was interesting to me.
I’m not the only one who’s been sick…Sis Lie got sick last week after district meeting…like, she was throwing up and had a huge headache, so we stayed in that whole day too. You should’ve seen her face when she woke up and saw all the letters I’d written while she’d been asleep…haha, it was awesome.
Sunday was a crazy day…I was SOOO sick, but Heavenly Father has a funny way of helping us when we think we can’t do something but we do what we know we have to anyways…we’d set up an appointment with Lena, an inactive member who Jackie Larson asked me to go see, and it was FAR, and apparently there’s a bit of drama there, so we HAD to have a member of the relief society presidency go with us, we left after church and were gone all day. But I got 3 contacts…more than I’ve had ever in one night, I’m pretty sure. The appointment went well (hopefully!), but the very last leg coming home, I knew my energy was gone…but it was in perfect timing.
So I’m finding that I have a much easier time contacting men than women… which is really odd. But here’s why…I was telling Sis this the other day… with the guys here, they see me, a Bule, and they’re just excited that I start talking to them, and I can basically force talk about the Gospel and everything that I wanna talk about on them… whereas with girls, they aren’t as open cuz I’m only a bule girl. If I ask for the guys’ numbers, they LOVE it, but the girls get all skeptical and stuff. So… I’ve been getting more contacts lately, but they’re all guys. And we can’t teach guys, so we have to give them to the elders. So it totally stinks, but at least it’s been getting my confidence up. AND….this is wonderful news… I’m FINALLY starting to understand most things that people say on the bus! I’m still not too good in following other people’s conversations (like with members or investigators about things not related to the gospel, their family, or anything that is cute or funny), because my vocab is still so limited, but I have come SOOO far in the last 2 months. Today I was talking to one of the new elders from the MTC, and he’s so frustrated right now…all I could say was, buddy, I know EXACTLY how you feel. But don’t worry…if you endure this, and keep working hard, it WILL get better. I’m not sure if he believed me or not…but it really is true. Hopefully I’m done with my “transition” period, and the language will continue to come!
So the bad news this week is that Indri’s baptism got pushed back another week… so it’s not until January 21 because she didn’t come to church on Sunday, because she worked an all-nighter, and on her way to church she fainted and was taken to a hospital. She came to the church right before we left to see Lena, and she was sad, but she understood why we had to push it back. But she’s still doing great with the lessons, and we’re almost done. Just baptism and confirmation is left, and then I think we’ll start on Lesson 5 with her. Man alive…I love her! We had a lesson yesterday with her, and afterwards she followed us to 2 other appointments with members, and she chimed into the conversation and bore her testimony and everything. She’s also been doing a lot with the other singles in the ward, and she’s really enjoyed having friends that can actually go out and do stuff with her (we’re a little tied up as missionaries…), and they’ve been great influences on her, so that’s been awesome.
Mom, you’ll be proud of this…we had FHE with the first counselor’s family on Monday, and I had inspiration from above to focus the lesson on the 2 little kids in the family. It was AWESOME. Haha, funny, too… we talked to President Parmen about the time and everything, and he said that’d be great, and then we showed up to the house, and his wife had NO IDEA we were coming! Not to mention that President Parmen wouldn’t be home until after we needed to leave to head home, cuz they live quite a ways away. I told sis Lie, he’s a typical man :P haha. Anyways…I had the ideas for the lesson but Sis Lie did an awesome job of carrying it out (she is our mouthpiece most of the time). We read about Ammon and King Lamoni from the kids Book of Mormon, with pics and stuff, and then I bought a coloring book at a Christian store here, and so we copied 2 pics from that for the kids to color while we talked to Sis Parmen and got to know her. As unexpected as it was, I think it went REALLY well. And their little girl is ADORABLE! She is seriously so cute…I need to get her on video. Here’s an example…on Sunday, the Primary sang during sacrament, and she went up (she’s 3 BTW), and she turns around with this huge smile on her face, and her dress is sticking almost completely vertical with the ground…but up instead of down. And she’s just smiling all the while, and after about 20 seconds, someone in the front row went and pulled down her dress for her, but it was ADORABLE. Haha, she makes me laugh.
So today was pday, and we went to the ZOO!!! Holy cow, SOOO much fun! However, sadness mom! We found out that they ride elephants there a few days ago, so I’ve been all excited to do that, but then we get there and they only do it on Sundays and Saturdays! I was so sad! But I took a pic of the “boarding station” area so I could imagine myself getting on an elephant…someday. It WILL happen. But ya, it was tons of fun, and I got some pretty sweet pics and videos that you’ll be getting in the next few weeks, I’m sure.Well my time’s up…which is good, cuz I dunno what else to say. But I love you all so much, and thanks for all the love and support, as always! I hope things are well at home…know that my prayers are with you always~
~Sister Sara
January 7th
well, i just spent 45 minutes writing a huge email, and it didn't send. so i'm sorry...UGH. no real email this week. that's it...i'm using hotmail from now on. this is ridiculous. big news that i talked about are indri is getting baptized on the 17th, my language is still coming but never as fast as i want it to, and thanks for all the holiday letters everyone has sent. ugh...sorry, i'm really frustrated right now. happy new year.~Sister Hewlett
well, i just spent 45 minutes writing a huge email, and it didn't send. so i'm sorry...UGH. no real email this week. that's it...i'm using hotmail from now on. this is ridiculous. big news that i talked about are indri is getting baptized on the 17th, my language is still coming but never as fast as i want it to, and thanks for all the holiday letters everyone has sent. ugh...sorry, i'm really frustrated right now. happy new year.~Sister Hewlett
Monday, January 4, 2010
PICTURES!
Sorry I didn't have access to a scanner but after a few months of collecting these...here they are with Sara's excerpts she wrote on the back of them:
Sis Mongan and I in traffic-possibly one of the worst nights ever. Traffic was so bad, we didn't talk to anyone and I was just in an awful modd-and yet it was still somehow fun :)
Ulang Tahun! Me in a Bajai in Jakarta. They're like mini taxis and they feel GREAT at night with the cool air.
So Sis. Rhandeau saw this advertisement at the Grand Indonesia, and I FREAKED! And this pic just happened to turn out better than I ever would've thought--Don't you love it? I feel like nothing expresses my feelings more than this :)
Pday at Grand Indonesia--it's a huge mall with a level with NYC/Ching/India styled everything. The bathrooms are pretty cool and I have the water/light show on my camera. This the Inda-styled part.
Haha. I get hot sometimes. This was like my 2nd day here :)
This is at Bishop McMullin's fireside with Jean's friend.
Sis. Rhandeau and I with Indri--Love her!
Service project my first Saturday here-These are all the sisters when I frist got here but Sis. Sumarno and Atmi were transferred the next Tuesday. 11/7/09(L -->R)
Sisters Okamoto, Atmi, Sumarno, Rhondeau, Christiansen, Mongan, and me
Me with Pres and Sister Marchant--First full day in Indo (Nov 5, 2009)Saturday, January 2, 2010
SELAMAT NATAL DAN TAHUN BARU!
Well...I'd written half my e-mail, and then my computer died...so you're only getting a REALLY short email this week, maaf, ya?
So Christmas was good, i wrote all about it, but now you just get that we went bowling, ate dinner, watched "The Nativity Story" which I loved, and then Santa came while we did a white elephant. It was fun. I loved all my presents (Kel, I got your package yesterday...THANKS SO MUCH! I LOVED IT ALL!! you are too cute...the album is adorable, and everything was just awesome. But all the cards were opened, the package itself was basically left open, so PLEASE make sure you guys don't put anything valuable in these packages, cuz they even checked the cards to see if there was money. Also...Mom, for my June package, Kel sent me some foot nylons, and I know I'm gonna need some more good ones by then, so the ones at Ross are the ones I got and I LOVE them, so send those? Thanks!) Yes I cried when I opened the calendar, I loved it totally and completely! Pres. even said he was gonna take it away if it drew me away from the work when he heard I'd been bawling in his kitchen when I opened it...but I told him it would only push me to be better :P so that was fun.
Yesterday, Sis Lie and I taught our first REAL lesson by ourselves, anything and everything that could've gone wrong basically did... we forgot loads, we didn't answer all their questions prob in the way that missionaries more experienced would've, the first vision was AWFUL and ya...but somehow, the Spirit helped us to still get the message across about how important this work is, and the FAMILY (yes, FAMILY...a mom, dad, and 2 teenage girls all sat in on the lesson) loved Joseph Smith, loved the BofM, and just..oh man. they'd be GREAT members! Hopefully they come to church on Sunday, and hopefully things go well with them. But believe me when I say...I KNOW the Lord makes up for things we can't do when we do all we can with our abilities. Cuz that lesson should've been a totally wreck, but it somehow turned out in the end. It was awesome!
Monday, Sis and I went the day helping Florentina with her English books. They're AWFUL, so we were helping her make them more correct. She has this long story at the end absolutely NOTHINg. She said she got it off the internet, and I believe it...maybe it's a really good story in INdonesia, but in English it just doesn't make sense at all. But whatevs, anywho, while we did that, Sis Mongan and Lie went and visited her family outside of Jarkata. She Lie is trying to help her family have a desire to learn about the church, so I thought at was pretty cool. A good opportunity for her to bless her family a little bit more personally while she serves the Lord.
INDRI IS BACK! She's had a bit of a rough go. She was in S.C. for a month, said sh loved her ward, they accepted her and became her instant family (I love this church!), but something happened where the immigration office or whoever told her she needed to come back to Indo for 2 weeks, and then she'd be good for the rest of her schooling. So she was on her way to church on Sunday, and her wallet, with $300 in it, got stolen. And its just gone downhill from here. Its just such an awful situation. the guy basically just wants more money, and sho she's been tyring to get the police to take Care of him...Hopefully tomorrow that happens. I feel bad for her. We've already met twice this week, cuz she wants to learn, but we've been focusing on strengthening her thru this experience. Sulit sekali!
For pday today, we went to one of the elder's investigator's house and played basketball and soccer. It was AWESOME! First time I've really gotten to play since I got her. And May...I have a feeling my confidence in my ballin' skills is gonna be super high when I come home cuz I'lol have played against Indos for 16 months, and then I'm gonna get home and hafta start from ground zero. Ugh. But ya...thats my way of saying that bball isn't really a sport that the Indos hafe mastered over here. haha. But it was tons of fun, and I was lad we went. So I tried to talk to Pres. about somehow using bball as a way to meet new people, but he thinks we need to focus on English classes (getting into colleges and high schools to teach. Cuz..ya know, we're all SUCH experienced teachers in the english language). I dunno what else to do. I've actually started asking people fromt the English branch to let me know if they know of any service that we can help with, cuz there is NOTHING that I can find otherwise. Anywho..any ideas you have would be great!
Ah! I almost forgot! So I gave my first talk on Sunday, in Indonesian. lol. It was great. I read the entire thing, which I HATE when other people do, but I figured that was better than me having to figure out how to translate when I hadn't prepared before that. Hopefully it went ok. I had sis mongan help me with some of it, but I really did translate the whole thing myself...and there weren't too many mistakes when I Read it to the other sisters. So that made me feel good. The language is coming. SLOWLY. but it's coming.
Alright, well I best be off..my time is up. I love you all! Thanks again fort he love and support. I know I'm her for the best reasons possible, and I'm so grateful to have the support I have, cuz I dunno how I'd be able to do this without that. You're wonderful! The church truly is headed by Christ, and I'm SO grateful to help in the spreading of it to all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people! Loves!
-Sister Sara
So Christmas was good, i wrote all about it, but now you just get that we went bowling, ate dinner, watched "The Nativity Story" which I loved, and then Santa came while we did a white elephant. It was fun. I loved all my presents (Kel, I got your package yesterday...THANKS SO MUCH! I LOVED IT ALL!! you are too cute...the album is adorable, and everything was just awesome. But all the cards were opened, the package itself was basically left open, so PLEASE make sure you guys don't put anything valuable in these packages, cuz they even checked the cards to see if there was money. Also...Mom, for my June package, Kel sent me some foot nylons, and I know I'm gonna need some more good ones by then, so the ones at Ross are the ones I got and I LOVE them, so send those? Thanks!) Yes I cried when I opened the calendar, I loved it totally and completely! Pres. even said he was gonna take it away if it drew me away from the work when he heard I'd been bawling in his kitchen when I opened it...but I told him it would only push me to be better :P so that was fun.
Yesterday, Sis Lie and I taught our first REAL lesson by ourselves, anything and everything that could've gone wrong basically did... we forgot loads, we didn't answer all their questions prob in the way that missionaries more experienced would've, the first vision was AWFUL and ya...but somehow, the Spirit helped us to still get the message across about how important this work is, and the FAMILY (yes, FAMILY...a mom, dad, and 2 teenage girls all sat in on the lesson) loved Joseph Smith, loved the BofM, and just..oh man. they'd be GREAT members! Hopefully they come to church on Sunday, and hopefully things go well with them. But believe me when I say...I KNOW the Lord makes up for things we can't do when we do all we can with our abilities. Cuz that lesson should've been a totally wreck, but it somehow turned out in the end. It was awesome!
Monday, Sis and I went the day helping Florentina with her English books. They're AWFUL, so we were helping her make them more correct. She has this long story at the end absolutely NOTHINg. She said she got it off the internet, and I believe it...maybe it's a really good story in INdonesia, but in English it just doesn't make sense at all. But whatevs, anywho, while we did that, Sis Mongan and Lie went and visited her family outside of Jarkata. She Lie is trying to help her family have a desire to learn about the church, so I thought at was pretty cool. A good opportunity for her to bless her family a little bit more personally while she serves the Lord.
INDRI IS BACK! She's had a bit of a rough go. She was in S.C. for a month, said sh loved her ward, they accepted her and became her instant family (I love this church!), but something happened where the immigration office or whoever told her she needed to come back to Indo for 2 weeks, and then she'd be good for the rest of her schooling. So she was on her way to church on Sunday, and her wallet, with $300 in it, got stolen. And its just gone downhill from here. Its just such an awful situation. the guy basically just wants more money, and sho she's been tyring to get the police to take Care of him...Hopefully tomorrow that happens. I feel bad for her. We've already met twice this week, cuz she wants to learn, but we've been focusing on strengthening her thru this experience. Sulit sekali!
For pday today, we went to one of the elder's investigator's house and played basketball and soccer. It was AWESOME! First time I've really gotten to play since I got her. And May...I have a feeling my confidence in my ballin' skills is gonna be super high when I come home cuz I'lol have played against Indos for 16 months, and then I'm gonna get home and hafta start from ground zero. Ugh. But ya...thats my way of saying that bball isn't really a sport that the Indos hafe mastered over here. haha. But it was tons of fun, and I was lad we went. So I tried to talk to Pres. about somehow using bball as a way to meet new people, but he thinks we need to focus on English classes (getting into colleges and high schools to teach. Cuz..ya know, we're all SUCH experienced teachers in the english language). I dunno what else to do. I've actually started asking people fromt the English branch to let me know if they know of any service that we can help with, cuz there is NOTHING that I can find otherwise. Anywho..any ideas you have would be great!
Ah! I almost forgot! So I gave my first talk on Sunday, in Indonesian. lol. It was great. I read the entire thing, which I HATE when other people do, but I figured that was better than me having to figure out how to translate when I hadn't prepared before that. Hopefully it went ok. I had sis mongan help me with some of it, but I really did translate the whole thing myself...and there weren't too many mistakes when I Read it to the other sisters. So that made me feel good. The language is coming. SLOWLY. but it's coming.
Alright, well I best be off..my time is up. I love you all! Thanks again fort he love and support. I know I'm her for the best reasons possible, and I'm so grateful to have the support I have, cuz I dunno how I'd be able to do this without that. You're wonderful! The church truly is headed by Christ, and I'm SO grateful to help in the spreading of it to all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people! Loves!
-Sister Sara
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