It's snowing a lot. You know what's better than snow?

Melted snow. Melted snow is good. Oh right, that's water. What's better than water? Water in a font. Huh. Baptisms. Oh baptisms are good. Huh? What's that? Oh right. WE HAVE A BAPTISM THIS SATURDAY. WAPPAH.

Her name is Guo Yixin and she is a superstar! The same one I was talking about earlier (maybe two weeks ago?)-- the pediatrician from China. Oh, she just got her green card the other day! So very exciting :) Exciting indeed. We wrapped up all of the planning and everything at church yesterday! I got to skip out on priesthood (more like missionaryhood because the six of us make up a whopping 70% of the attendance rate to that class) for the baptism scheduling... that's always a good trade off. I could get used to that! :D

Oh yeah, there was almost nobody at church yesterday! I counted 23 people excluding the six missionaries-- and two of them were white guests from the stake presidency! Ahaha I haven't seen it like that in a long time. Wowzers. Es okay, the numbers will be better next week :)

It has been a slow week this week-- we spent it mostly visiting people that were already down in the book of people we contacted previously. It wasn't too effective because it consisted of driving more than contacting.

Oh, here is something sad that happened-- we got dropped by a person with a ton of promise. His name is Rodger, and he is in his mid twenties. He is the only Christian in his whole family. That was my third meeting thus far with him and things were going really great. He was finally considered a progressing investigator. He would read and when we asked him about what he read he was ablet to tell us exactly what happened in his reading. I would love to run into more people like that.
He ended up having a long talk with his family after meeting with us last time we met. His parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles (all whom live close) apparently really scorned him and chastised him about turning his back on their culture. He doesn't want to have to face the disapproval of his family. He's taking a lot of pressure from them right now (it doesn't help he lives in the same house with many of them).

We won't forget him, that's for sure. Hopefully after giving them a little time we can come back. I sure am going to miss him.

He likes anime-- I love anime too. That's where we hit it off in our first meeting.

Oh, by the way, my knowledge of the geek ways truly has paid off in my mission-- really, no kidding. Growing up, I was so into the asian super- nerd tv shows and video games. The people I teach are alllllll into that stuff. I am really able to connect and talk to them about this stuff like no other missionary in our program.

Go team! :D

Okay, so I would love to include all the funny things that happen in this email home, BUT being with Elder Beck has given me too many funny experiences to include in emails.... hey, I think it is safe to say that that is a good problem :) Right?

SO I thought you would all like to hear that...... AN INVESTIGATOR WE ARE TEACHING HAS THE MOVIE FROZEN. It's so funny though... he got it in a china market so it's hilarious.... the dvd itself has the words "Coming to theaters soon" on it and on the bottom of the back of the cover, the credits from "High School Musical" are on it. Chinese people don't read english, so the people selling it underground just wanted to make it look legitimate. Hey, it is still the real movie frozen and it still works. The only thing is, it is in English with Chinese subtitles...

I called president and asked him for permission to watch "a disney movie in chinese with an investigator" and he gave me permission! Thing is, the real frozen in chinese doesn't come out until april or may.... Oh yeah, only ten (now twenty) American movies are allowed to be sold in China. Frozen made the list, so Disney is rushing through chinese audio right now in order to get it on the market asap (due to all the frauds in China).

We are kind of snowed in right now, so we will have to do our shopping later this week when the storm clears up a bit... everything is shut down. No fun :( (And no food, which is even less fun. Blahhhhh :( )

OH I SAW JOHNNY LINGO FOR THE FIRST TIME YESTERDAY! It's in the LDS library! Crazy, right??

Oh another thing that happened recently! Maryann (erm, I mean Sister Shipp) finally got to Brazil! Yay! :) I am so happy for her! After 6 months of being on a mission, she finally goes somewhere where she can actually use her language. I can't imagine being somewhere not able to use Chinese for six months...

Oh, and she is back in the MTC (Sao Paulo--- not Provo haha ). They have program in the Brazil MTC for people who have been out for mor than two months. It is only a two week program, so it isn't as long as the normal program.... PLUS I am not there this time so she probably won't get any hardships from her Branch President or Zone leader this time around hahahahahahah ;) Man, that MTC was tough. Oof.

Anyway, I hope you all have a grand week wherever you are, whether it be lovely California, snowy Utah, or tropical Brazil! :)

OH before I head out... If you have a book of mormon... open up to Nephi 1:1... check out the footnote next to affliction... it says "blessing, gift from god."

There is some food for thought for all of you ;)

Don't forget that our afflictions and trials are really things that are given to us in order to help us grow and develop as individuals!

I had to talk to an investigator about this concept earlier.

In order to help him better understand that trials and hardships really do help us, I pulled out a study I learned about in college.

I asked him and his family to guess which nation out of all the nations in the world had the lowest rates of suicide.

"America!" "Switzerland!" "Australia?"

Are you all ready for this?

.....

Haiti.

I asked them why. It doesn't really make sense when you first look at it-- they have just experienced some pretty insane natural disasters and they are one of the poorest countries on earth.

They all sat for a second in silence until their son said "Maybe their hardships help them grow closer and help them work together to overcome things like that? Maybe they have become stronger through these difficulties?"

:)

A lovely talk Sister Shipp sent me (Thank you so much, by the way!! :) ) addressed this a little bit.

What was the underlying answer behind trials and stife?

They are "For thy good."

Remember that, everyone :) Have a wonderful week!

Love,

Fang Zhang Lao

 Party in Maryland at the Washington DC north mission branch! :) They have like 148 members. Crazy. Triple our size... (BUT WE ARE HAVING MORE BAPTISMS :)!)

Frozen cd hhahaha

 

 

The Stuff

Bad news and good news:

Let's start with the good news:
It was a fun and fast week!

Bad news: I don't have much time to throw y'all a long email today -_-

Even worse news: I FORGOT MY JOURNAL AT HOME. BLARGH.

 

Elder Beck and I are having a blast. He's kind of my clone. I have never laughed so hard in my life.

This transfer is going to go by way too fast.

We have a baptism on the 8th! WOOHOO! :) Her name is Guo Yixin. She is a STUD MCMUFFIN.

Let me tell you why.

 

So she is a doctor. A wickedly smart woman. She had a concern about tea (due to health/ science-- that sort of thing).

When it came down to it, she told us she was willing to step forward in complete faith and just trust that the prophet's know what they are doing.

Wow.

Hey, this isn't the best thing yet either....

A relative of hers presented her with some Anti-Mormon material and encouraged her to read before she commits to baptism...

Her response?

"It can't be true because it isn't in the book of Mormon, therefore why should I bother reading it?"

MAN OH MAN THESE ARE THE INVESTIGATORS I DREAM OF!

It's so beautiful it just makes a grown man want to cry :')

Haha. Hey, Ill throw you people some pictures next week. I know I stink at sending pictures; I am sorry, I am sorry :(((

Love you all! :)

 

Love,

Fang Zhanglao

Short email! Sorry friends :(

Well, yesterday Elder Beck, my new district leader, some other missionary who spotted me five dollars to buy an American flag tie, and I went on an adventure to DC! SO NO TIME TO EMAIL!

Worst thing is, I have a lesson in 7 minutes that is a 2 minute drive, and a couple minutes walk way sooo...

Yeup. This will be a shortie!

I will send pictures next week! No worries people.

Hey, all I have to say to you fine folks is I love the book of Enos. It is awesome. I am teaching about it in this upcoming lesson to Rodger, a 20ish year old Christian in a huge family of buddhists (in other words, I respect him).

Enos is the perfect example for developing faith-- this guy uses words such as "wrestle" and "struggle" to depict the challenges he has to overcome in order to develop faith of Jesus Christ.

Alright , I will talk more next week!

LOVE YOU ALL!

PS. 6 people died due to heart attacks they received while shoveling the enormous amounts of snow.

Elder Beck and I totally stopped lifting and laughed when we heard that on the news.

I dont know how good that is haha....

LOVE YOU!! :)

Fun fun fuuuuuuuun!

Okay this week.

Guess who was at the gym lifting weights the day before transfer meetings?
NOT ME AND ELDER JOHNSON!

"I was ruuuuuunniiiiin!" -Forrest Gump

yeah we went on a little few mile adventure around the foresty area.

So my new companion... Elder Beck. The first official chinese called missionary to this mission (I was the second ;) )

Holy mackerel, we are having fun.

SO we had a little hair adventure the next morning... I was cutting my hair... looked fine... then I wanted to try something I see barbers do.. WHUMP.

Bald spot.

I had to pull out the super short ones and cut my hair.

I am now known as Sergeant Valentine. I tried to do the back myself, but Elder Beck just started dying so I knew something was up hahaha. He took pictures then did the back for me..

Anyway, this is pretty much the most fun transfer ever. We are both loud, crazy, and outgoing.

Oh yeah, he makes me clean now. So I clean. Thought you all might like to hear that.

We ran into a couple of deer.... Haha. Literally. Ill send you all the stuff...

So there is a movie in theaters right now-- it is called the Saratov Approach. It is about the missionaries who were kidnapped in russia.

Guess who got to watch it at transfer meetings (which got turned into a mission conference)?

WE DID. It was a total surprise! The movie was AWESOME. I recommend you all watch it!

Alright soo I learned something recently.

I learned that the mission pushes you. Okay, duh I bet you all knew that.

No, just wait a second here.

During the mission, you become reacquainted with your weaknesses.

Some of them are ones you were fully aware of before,

whereas others are ones you never knew.

I know my work ethic is terrible, and I know I am a terribly unclean person.
That wasn't knew.

I found out I am headstrong, proud, and am severely lacking humility (again, to some of you, this may be no surprise!).

I talked to my president recently, and those are things I am now working hard to correct. It is funny how this all works though. It is when you are striving hard to follow Christ, you continue to find more and more small things about yourself that you need to change.

It's a never ending process, I guess.

Anyway, the point I was making is that the mission really really changes a person. I don't know if any people who are contemplating on going on a mission will read this.

If you are one of those people, just know that the mission is hard. It is tough. It is humbling

BUT

It is all worth it and will change your life.

Alright everyone, I am off! I wish you all the best.

Love ya!

Elder Valentine

 

 

Better weather=happy missionary

Alright so I have a freakishly busy Pday ahead of me, meaning this email will not be as big as the usual one...

Highlights and opposite of highlights of the week:
Cai Xiansheng: Awesome guy, mid twenties. PRAYS NOW. Said he feels peaceful. Yeah, okay that might not sound like a huge win to some of you south, central american missionaries, but that is HUGE to us and I will TAKE IT.

LinLin: Frustrating :( Very frustrating. I think she might have a learning disability, because whenever we ask her basic questions we went over last time, or a few minutes earlier, she completely misses it :/ I guess I just need to be more patient. We did get a baptism date for her! That is a week from this saturday. We already covered all of the lessons. We mayneed to review everything again... Oi. Oh well.That's how it goes, I guess.

Our GPS decided to just NOT work one day. That was fun. Oh so fun. Not really. We are probably the most GPS reliant set of missionaries in the mission because we cover all the way from China to Korea (figuratively) in the mission.
So we busted out the ole' map and tried doing some good scouting stuff.

Long story short, I am glad you can't get your Eagle Scout revoked due to map-reading failure.
(We were out all night. hahahaha. It was really funny seeing Elder Johnson get flabbergasted and frustrated due to him being accustomed to the Utah grid system)

MMMM. AHHHH. What else? We visited an old Chinese man who was chillin in bed. I was yelling at him in bed because his caretaker said he was almost deaf. This is how it went. (I'll translate it into English for the sake of time.)

Me: Are you chinese?
Him: Mehehhhh
Me: Are you a chinese person?
Him: Blahhhhhh
Me: ARE YOU A CHINESE PERSON?
Him: MMRRRRRRRRRRRRREJOFEJ
(I felt like I was Dory trying to speak to the whale in finding nemo)
I then grab a peice of paper and write it out in chinese...
ME: ARE. YOU. CHI. NEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESE.
HIM: (In an extremely loud voice) YES.

We then gave him a book of mormon in chinese and headed out because he wanted to sleep haha...

It was fun!

Oh here is some big news. I made a bet with elder johnson.
I am saying he is leaving the area and I am staying, while he is betting the opposite.
The bet?
I have to run a 10k with him Wednesday morning if I lose "and not bellyache" while he has to "lift seriously" with me if he loses hahah.
I am going to win, juuust saying :)

We know he won't stay as my companion, that's for sure.
It's been six months now! Wow it is going to be so weird.
(transfers are thursday)
Well, I love you all, and I hope you all are doing well! See ya next week!

Love, Elder Valentine

BLAAAAH! Not much time left :(

ALRIGHT

So we had mission conference this past Saturday!

Guess who came?

Exclamation point guy.

You know, the one who spoke at conference.

Well, his real name is "Elder Nielson," but I prefer to call him Exclamation Point Guy.

Boy, did he live up to that name.

It was a really really good series of talks, presented by my mission president (Wow, talk about a guy who makes you fee loved. He was so sincere during our interview, I started crying! Holy mackerel, I am turning into quite the softy.), the mission mom, and Mr. Exclamation Point.

Boy, did he use those exclamation points. Killed them, in fact.

It was pretty good, otherwise! (President's section was better!)

This week Elder Johnson and I scored a couple new investigators... We met with the Ward Mission Leader. All four of us Chinese missionaries were there last night.

I found out what was required to turn our branch into a stake.... Well, heres what we have currently....

Right now we have about 45 members, give or take.
We have about 6 active Melchezidek Priesthood holders....

Ready for this?
In order to even be CONSIDERED to become a ward we need...

.....

300 MEMBERS
50 ACTIVE MEL. P HOLDERS.

Dang, that was discouraging. I went and presented these numbers to the WML and I said "Alright. Let's figure this out and hit this. I want this."

Our meeting was a touch disappointing, because he didn't really have becoming a ward as one of our focuses. We did agree on one thing and that was how we do need to increase our numbers due to transportation issues.

His focus was maintaining our branch as a nice community for people to come from china and hear the gospel and have it be a good opportunity for Chinese people to receive callings. He was hesitant to set number goals for baptisms and referrals.

Oh well. I think the branch president has a more assertive view on things. Maybe he and I will see more eye to eye.

What can I say? I am a numbers guy. Numbers= more people coming unto Christ.

It was still a productive meeting, and I am really, really glad it happened. I definitely learned that I need to be more concerned about our current members. I have been so focused on expansion that I have not been very attentive to our current members! (besides liu jiemei-- I got the reinstatement for medicare approved! YES! Now I have to file one more claim after she receives her document in the mail and then we are GOLD!)

Okay well, that's most of today's stuff! I hope you all have a great rest of the week :)

It's really cold here. The humidity really makes the air bite. It's weird because it will say it is only 20 or something degrees, but it feels waay colder. Elder Johnson says it matches the negatives in Utah.

Alright! I am off! I wish you all the best! :)

Much love,

Elder Valentine!

A Title, A Title, We've got no Title

I still think that is the funniest verse in the Moermenjing (BOM).
"A bible, a bible, we've got a bible."
Cracks me up everytime.

Okay so this week was kind of a drag....

Me and Elder Johnson's fault. This is where it started...

We walked into the District Meeting feeling like stud mcmuffins because we pulled about 15 lessons, accounting for about a fourth of the zone's 62 lessons.

People come up to us and say stuff like "WOW! Great week guys!"

AAAnd we are feeling pretty chipper.

We then find out (WE SHOULD HAVE KNOWN THIS ALL ALONG BUT WE DIDN'T BECAUSE WE ARE STINKERS) that a little under HALF OF THEM COUNTED because there was no specific return appointment on a good majority! BLAH.

So we go home feeling like crap. Well, I do.

So my motivation was shot and that week I tried to let Elder Johnson take the reins because I was kind of tired of initiating every street contact and holding up every conversation.

Well, I discovered that didn't work very well. By the time I felt like getting back into "take the lead mode", it was already Friday and our numbers were trash. I can't say I am going to like the district meeting tomorrow, putting up the numbers we have... BLAH!

Transfers are happing in about three weeks.

My guess? Elder Johnson will go with the other quiet companion. Elder Beck (the other loud and gung ho companion) and I talked a bit about what he said in his interview with the President and what I will say in the interview, and it sounds like that is what the President is planning on happening, too.

I know Elder Johnson hates me giving him speeches, so I gave him a quick 30 second speal about how his next companion will not push him to talk to everyone as I do, nor how he will force him to talk during lessons as I do. He didn't say much in response, but I hope he got the point.

One time this week, I locked him out of the car and forced him to do practice street contacts with me in the grocery store parking lot. I was pretty frustrated at that point.
Haha, he refused to get out of the car at first because he knew what was going to happen (I was going to make him do street contacts), so I turned on the car alarm and waited a good 20 feet away until he got out.
hahaha. hahaha. haha.
(Many thanks to Sister Shipp's dad for inspiration on that one. You are a gentleman and a scholar, my fine sir.)

Elder Johnson is getting better now. I know there certainly are things i can learn from him as well, such as cleanliness and being on time and not backing out unless there is a missionary to back me up hahaha.

Okay so moving on.... I had to do a fat 90 minute phone call to Humanacare health insurance for an old lady in our ward! ( Liu Jiemie). That was fun-- and the best part is next week WE GET TO DO IT AGAIN! hahahahaha.
She got her program pulled because she paid too late, so now we get to file a reinstating claim to medicare for her next week.

Man, I should go work at a retirement home or something like that after the mission because I am learning how to do all this old people care stuff!

haha.

Hey, at church this little girl completely knocked her brother out of her seat! It reminded me of the football video game scott and I used to play!

That was pretty exciting!

Alright well there is nothing else really I can think of... Hrm ... I kissed a fried fish at a restaraunt! Is that email worthy? Got a picture, too ;)

I hope you are all doing well! Love you all. Take care, folks!

love,

Elder Valentine