On Tuesday I took a 4 hour train ride down to
the east coast as part of the “tsunami”! (they sent a bunch of extra
missionaries farther south to help them try to find more people to teach) The
train ride down was absolutely gorgeous! I kept getting distracted from my
studies by the beautiful scenery out the window! 28 missionaries were sent to
various areas- I was assigned to YuLi, which is between Hualien and Taidong,
with a super cute Taiwanese companion, sis Zhong.
There is not a single place
on the island of Taiwan that could be MORE DIFFERENT than Taibei!! YuLi is a
little town with maybe 2 taxis, no buildings taller than 3 stories, and 2000
people, max. There is no one out on the roads. The town is surrounded by
mountains and there are lots of open spaces with farms. People would just chat
with us, even if they weren't interested in our message. In Taibei you have
about 30 seconds to get in a message and let people feel the spirit.
We spent most of our time in another small town
called RuiSui (which is actually a 20 min train ride away from YuLi but still
part of the YuLi sisters' area) knocking doors. We never knock doors in Taibei
because it is just not productive: as soon as we say into the little doorbell
thing that we are missionaries, they say "bu yong, bu yong, xie xie"
(no use, no use, thank you) and hang up. In YuLi we would walk up to a house
and call in through the screen, "you ren zai jia ma? (anyone home?).
People would just let us in to their house before they even knew who we were
and would give us fruit and water. Completely opposite of what I am used to! We
spent all day finding and talking to people. President Day's goal for the whole
tsunami was to find a total of 110 new investigators of the Gospel. As a group
of 28 missionaries, we found 171!!! So cool! The whole 14 companionship group
contacted 3256 people, got 572 phone numbers, placed 144 copies of the Book of
Mormon, set up 217 appointments for the local missionaries, and taught 226
lessons! It was exhausting but it was really a great 4 days! I was actually
super popular there.......with the bugs! They have these little tiny dark
mosquitos that are vicious. One afternoon I forgot to put on bug spray and got
literally hundreds of bites! Hahaha! Luckily they have stopped itching, so I
have my sanity back. :D
When I got back on Fri night, Sis Roy told me
that we had been chosen to get two duanchuans (short term missionaries) for a
week starting the next day! The east stake is doing an activity where the youth
could sign up to be missionaries for a week. So, we have two 17 year old YW
staying with us this week and following us around.
One of our coolest investigators right now is C
DX. I met him a couple weeks ago on the street. We shared a little bit with him
and set up a time to meet. Honestly, I didn't think he would show up, but he's
met with us 3 times and is reading the Book of Mormon every day and writing
down what he learns! He is super humble and asks really great questions. I
taught him the Plan of Salvation on Saturday with my duanchuan. After teaching
that lesson, I always like to ask people. "how do you think knowing about
this will influence your life?" Usually they say they don't know or don't
think it will influence them. When I asked C DX, he said he thought it would
change his life's purpose- that up until now it had been mostly about him, but
know it would be more about God and other people. Yeah! He really just got it.
That was a neat moment. He has a baptismal goal of the 27th, and we are working
really hard with him to make it to that goal.
Love you! Thanks for all the prayers! I pray
for you every night!
From the other side of the world,
Sis Murri
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