akhirnya...‏

well, it's certainly been a week! it started with us teaching Ibu Dina last week, and we read 2 Nephi 3 with her, and tried to help her recognize that the seer spoken of in there is Joseph Smith. She doesn't seem to have too hard of a time believing that the Book Of Mormon is scripture, but she still has a hard time with Joseph SMith. so we're trying to help her with that, and our goal when we meet this week is to find out ALL her concerns so we can help her overcome them...and basically to just make sure that she really is interested in the gospel. we passed by her warung (food stand...she makes THE BEST chicken) on tuesday, and so i ate, and then we offered to do the dishes (she won't let us pay), and she always fights us on it, but FINALLY she let us do them....and it was SUCH a personal victory for me! i know that if she can see that we WANT to serve her, we don't just want to come and eat her food and then be full of broken promises...but that we're sincere....oh, i just know if she can see and feel that, that she'll be able to feel Christ's love that comes thru this gospel! so one step down....hopefully we can help her with Joseph Smith now. she went to jakarta last weekend for a nephew's wedding, and i was totally bummed cuz i was hoping she'd stay and go to district conference, but she didn't. we'll see....

friday i got ANOTHER class at ENHAII to teach english to. the teacher who's coordinating everything is combining the other 2 classes (fridays no one comes cuz they all go home for the weekend) into one for fridays, and then after that i'll teach this other class that will be going away for their "training" in international hotels across the world. their english isn't as good as the younger kids i'm teaching, but hopefully we can see some improvement over the next few months.

saturday and sunday we were in jakarta, and man alive! i forgot how much i miss elders and bules! elders are nice to have around cuz they don't create too much drama and are just fun, and i miss REALLY talking to people in english. no need to translate or ask meanings of certain words....just talk, and let it all out. saturday night the choir sang, and they did so good! my piano skills weren't too shabby after 3 months of practicing the same 2 songs over and over again (altho i still messed up a few times, but nothing serious! :P). but i was shaking super bad. we had a lot of people come and tell us how good it was, and especially the bule members were impressed with "count your many blessings" where we did verses 1 &4 in indonesian, but 2&3 in english for them. i had a few tell me that it meant so much to hear a hymn in english sung by indonesians. so i was happy with it :) and yes, we looked TOTALLY awesome in our pink flower skirts and black shirts. i have pics i'll send eventually. it was so fun to see old friends, and catch up on everything! basically i just miss all the fun i had in jakarta, with missionaries coming in and out. but thats life. sis lie stayed at senopati, and is now in malang with the new american sister (she's a highland ram, dad, from sugarhouse....and DARN PROUD TO BE A RAM, in her own words :P haha i laughed. hopefully you get to meet her), and is pretty worried about them going there without knowing the area, the other's language, or anything. haha. sounds like us in jakarta, if you ask me.

tuesday we went to Prabowohadi's house again...and they are SOOO nice, but he was pretty straight forward (in a very indonesian/javanese way :P) that they weren't interested in learning more. as he was talking about how the mormon church seems to be just like the catholic church, i had the distinct feeling that i needed to share with them that our church may SEEM the same on the surface, but when you find out more about us, we're certainly not...and the one thing that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has to offer that no other church can even come close to offering is an ordinance that binds families together for eternity. then we got interrupted, which might've been best cuz the dad was getting a more and more defensive the more i talked, and so while he was getting his new aquarium situated in the front room, we talked to the mom about temples and marriage in the church, and then she asked about songs in our church, and i had just HAPPENED to think that i should bring my little mini hymn book in indo along with me for a different appointment, and so we were able to sit at her piano and sing the 2 songs that we sang at district conference....and then she was all impressed that i could read music, and i was all impressed cuz she plays by feeling, and so it all ended in smiles and all was well. but i'm not gonna lie...i'm pretty frustrated with this guy's little bro thats in america....first he didn't tell the family ANYTHING about his "new religion," and then he calls last week like i requested, but only to ask if we'd come by and then talk about how i live REALLY far from philadelphia, where he lives. ugh. it'd be SOOOOO much easier if he would testify himself, and ask his brother to learn, rather than putting all the weight on us missionaries. we can only do so much! but oh well....we might try again next month.

and thats as exciting as my week gets. sis simanjuntak left this afternoon for jakarta, and she'll be released next week....so right now it's just the 3 of us here in bandung, and sis mongan got a headache from us hiking yesterday, so we've been inside all day. hopefully this isn't my next week. sis hasibuan should be getting here sometime next week, i believe? me and jo'll still be together, while mongan and hasibuan get to figure out bandung together. we'll see how it all goes. yup. i'm still the only bule in bandung. i'm not gonna lie...it's pretty lonely, but i'll just appreciate other bules in my house that much more when i get transferred or someone comes here :)

what i've learned this week is how to repent. i realized that i criticize so many things that the other sisters do, but how much of the white handbook do i not follow? i actually read from the white handbook for my personal study on tuesday, and found A LOT of things in there that i'm not too great at following. so i have a lot progress before i'll become the type of missionary i want to become....but i'm working on it! one of those things was to call the other missionaries by their full name...as you can see, i'm still not perfect. but too lazy to read over this again and change all their names. plus my time is up. anywho...REPENT! become better every day! thats why we have days...so if we fail one day, we can sleep and then have the next day to succeed! i love you all, and have another great week! loves~

~Sister Sara