Week 5! Over Half Way There!

Ni hao!

 

How is everyone doing? Thanks for all your dearelders. i do get them. Sorry i cant respond to them individually. I just dont have any time. So this big family email is the only way i can communicate with you. I can now email friends and family. So Rachel or alma, can you post my email to my facebook page and cousin's FB page? valeria.chao@myldsmail.net. New mission changes. Love it!

 

So this week was kinda sad. My teacher Si Kong Lao Shi (Brother Raskey) is not our teacher anymore and stopped teaching at the MTC!!! We didn't even know it was his last day. He didnt tell us. We had a normal class and then he shared his testimony and volunteered to say the prayer (which was a REALLY good prayer) and then shook all of our hands. We didn't think twice about it and thought we would just see him again the next day. Then after dinner, we see his info on the board with his address and email. Our other teacher Xia Jie mei told us he will not be teaching here anymore. We never got to say goodbye to him either! He just left without really announcing his goodbye! So sad! We really got to know him and love him so much. He was so funny and weird and quirky in his own way. Brought much laughter to the class. Also he was our investigator named John Li. I didnt know Friday was my last day teaching him. He started to progress a lot too and was preparing for baptism on April 13th! Now he is gone and i really loved my investigator. You really learn how to love people here. You learn how to love people like Christ loves others and how Heavenly Father loves all his children. Every soul is important so it was sad to find out i wouldnt be teaching john li anymore. We all got teary eyed when we found out we wouldnt see him again. It put into perspective how it will be like in the field. How I might have an investigator that i really loved and then all of a sudden she wont want any more lessons or want to go to church anymore or meet with us. But guess who is my new teacher?!?!? Brother SEIBERT! Mom, dad, Meg....do you remember him??? We met him while he was on his mission in Taipei. We met him in Keely's ward (shiling) and he was our translator. he translated sacrament meeting into english for us! Do you remember now!? so crazy! he just got back 3 months ago. He told me that I looked familiar to him too. What a small world! His chinese is really good. He is half Chinese...i didnt know that. He doesnt look half chinese. anyways he is a good teacher. He is going to be our new investigator, so we have to start all over. We'll see how it goes. I teach him tomorrow for the first time. Okay, last sad part of the week. The older generation of missionaries left today. They all went to Taichung. We grew really close to them. They are such amazing missionaries. Hopefully we will be like them when we leave. It's sad because i dont think i will ever see them again. But it was fun seeing how excited they were to leave the Asian Fortress (basement of our building). The asians got stuck on the bottom floor. :) Now my district and 2 other districts are the oldest generation of the mandarin speaking missionaries. We only have 4 more weeks here!!!!!

 

Okay enough of the sad news. So we started getting creative with our lessons. We have to make them interesting to our investigators! That's why i need that puzzle. :) If any of you want to send me things to make my lessons more interesting, please do so. but make sure everything is in characters. no pinyin. Anyways we taught John Li about Christ's early ministry. We used the story in Matthew 14. So my comp and I got some goldfish out of the vending machine and we "took" 5 rolls from the cafeteria during dinner and a few slices of bread to rip up. We took a box and on the bottom we had a ton of ripped up bread and lots of goldfish. Then on top of that we laid a paper towel down to separate it and put the 5 rolls and 2 goldfish. It was supposed to represent the 5 loaves of bread and 2 fishes in the scriptures and how Christ was able to feed the 5,000. When we read that part, we lifted up the paper towel and he could see all the pieces of bread and lots of goldfish. haha. I dont know if any of that made any sense but he loved it and laughed. my companion kept saying "zheme gao!??!?!" but she didnt say it right and i was just laughing so hard and the investigator was too! haha. i dont know what she said actually. sooo funny. I love creative lessons. The investigators understand a lot more and actually remember things when we make it creative. I'm really love to teach now. It's so fun and i really love my investigators! I think about them all the time and pray for them. The planning part is just the hard part and it takes a long time. We have to make sure each lesson is planned around each investigator's needs. And we have to make sure we ask the right questions and make sure they have the desire to follow the commitments we give them. Our goal is to help them come closer to Christ and to have faith and repent so they can be baptized. I love it! Just difficult sometimes, but when it's all planned out, I'm ready to go! :)

 

So this next sunday is EASTER! I'm so lucky to be at the MTC on Easter! We get to hear from either the apostles or the prophet...we dont know who is coming yet, but there is going to be a huge devotional that morning. We are going to have an MTC wide sacrament meeting and 2 elders from my district were chosen to pass the sacrament in front of the general authorities!! So cool! They might even pass it TO them. They are lucky. I can't wait to here them speak. I think easter is the best holiday to be at the MTC. I'm so grateful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ because without it, we would not be here right now. Without it, we wouldn't be able to change and become better people. After reading past journal entries, i think i have changed a lot, especially spiritually. We really need to be in tune with the spirit. I definitely feel the spirit everyday here at the MTC. I think we pray at least 10 times a day. no joke. its great! I think my chinese is improving a little. i sure hope so. My teacher said it has, but i can't really tell yet. In our district meeting last week, Brother Frischknecht (1st counselor) talked about how there is a pattern in all things...I think he said it was from D&C, I can't remember which scripture exactly. but he said that when we receive a calling and are set apart here on earth, we must be called and set apart in the pre-existence life too. There are patterns in this life, and this life is to find those patterns. I thought that was cool. I love being able to serve the lord 24/7. It's been great and I know that all of you will be blessed for it. I pray for all of you every night. I hope things are going well. I love the work and I can't wait to get out into the field. I know that the challenges I experience here will only help me in the field. Love you all! Wo ai nimen!

 

Love

Sister chao

 

Dad- When are you going to Taiwan and China? Did you receive the check from the church????

Veronica- i dont know where my layover will be. it might be in SF or in LA. who knows. or some other state.

Aborn- i got your dear elder. Glad to hear mia is getting fatter! :) haha. if you can print pictures of you and the kids and keely that would be great. I dont have very many of you guys. Also, you can email me pics. I just want some printed ones too to take to taiwan. Can you email me some of mia recently? I want to see what she looks like now! but do send me some printed pictures.

Rachel- i dont think i can watch videos.

Mom- Wo ai ni!