Christmas all month long. :)

My Beloved Shizhong Girls (That's not everyone, just the most recent pics I took)

This week was another great week!  I love Christmas!  Christmas as a Missionary is great.  The whole entire month is just overflowing with thoughts about how to help the people here know and understand the true meaning of Christmas.  Great things are happening here in Shizhong!  But!  There has been some recent devastating news!  My beloved companion Sister Thao who has only been with me for 4 weeks will be moving this next move call on Friday!  Nooooo~!  But she will be going Senior and I do know that all the moves that President makes are after serious prayer and promptings from the Spirit.  I will really miss having her as a companion but I know she is off to bigger and better things. 

Super miracle!  Our other investigator passed her baptismal interview on Saturday!  She will be getting baptized on same day as the investigator I mentioned in my last letter.  MIRACLES!!  They are already friends and are both so excited be to getting baptized on the same day.  They really are both just so ready.  I have no doubt that even after baptism they will continue to grow and exercise their faith in the Savior and become strong disciples of Christ.

Let us all revel in the feelings of love peace and charity that come with the remembrance the the birth of our Savior and Redeemer and go and do the things that He would.

Sister Hsu

Random pictures.

It's Christmas! Well... Sort of. :)

Mission Christmas

This past week was so fun and amazing!  We not only saw a huge miracle, but we also had a ton of fun.  This past week was our Mission Christmas Party.  In other words our whole mission came down to GaoXiong!  It was the best thing to see some missionaries that I hadn't seen in a really long time.  I won't lie, there was definitely some squealing as we saw certain people come of the parade of buses.  We went and took a Mission picture in front of a giant sitting Buddha and then had time to take photos and be with friends.  Afterwards we all went to an All-You-Can-Eat restaurant.  So good.  There was all you can eat sushi and sashimi.  I love sashimi!  It really was a great time.  :)

I got to see people I love! :)

Other than that.  MIRACLE!!!  Our investigator who would never accept a baptismal goal has decided to be baptized on the 27th!  So awesome!  We had been feeling that she'd been ready for a few weeks now, but she just wasn't sure.   So we invited her to just have the Baptismal Interview so she could gauge for herself where she's at spiritually.  But!  It and the on the interview she told our District Leader that she wants to be baptized!  Amazing!  We are so happy for her!  And on top of that, we may have another investigator that could get baptized on the same day.  It really is just so great to see the changes that occur in people as they choose to live the teachings of Christ.  

The District

Merry Christmas!!!!!

Sister Hsu

Yay!

This past week has been another great one in the city of GaoXiong!  We had a wonderful Thanksgiving here!  I feel like we just had a week of preparing for different Thanksgiving dinners.  Haha.  But it really was a great week.  I love the people here and all the good friends I've made here on the mission.  I am just doing all I can to love every minute that I have as a representative of the Lord.  I love my new companion Sister Thao.  I need to get a picture with her sometime soon so I can let you see her.  :)  She really is quite amazing.  Well in honesty I'm not sure what to say other than I am truly having the greatest time of my life.  The only downfall is that I've been super exhausted recently,  I suppose this is just what comes after you've been out a little while.  But, outside of the physical exhaustion, I have been great.

I love you all!  Oh and if I have forgotten birthdays or special occasions... I apologize.  I'll try better next time.

Sister Hsu

Oh and  shout out to Richard from  Lingya Ward.  My memory card got a virus on it a few weeks ago and he was willing to take it and see if he could clean it out for me.  He not only fixed it but got me some stuff to make it just a bit safer for me to plug them into the internet cafe computers.  Thanks Richard!

So here are some pictures.

I climbed Monkey Mountain with Sister Wu and Jin Fang. There were definitely a lot of monkeys. (BTW I had a member companion while I was waiting for Sister Thao to arrive in GaoXiong)

We made it to the top! It was beautiful. :) The air was so fresh!

Look at what my adorable family sent me for Thanksgiving.

Another new move-call?

Well, surprise!  We found out on Tuesday night that Sister Olson would actually be moving and I'd be getting a new companion on Friday.  Due to the blessing of new missionaries finally arriving (albeit a bit late) We had another move-call on a Friday in the second week of a move-call.  (I hope that made sense)  So this means... I have a new companion!  She is super awesome.  Her name is Sister Thao.  She's Hmong and amazing.  We are gonna make miracles together here in Shizhong!  FIRE!  FAITH!  DILIGENCE!!!  HAHAHAH!!!  

Sister Thao and I at our Ward Thanksgiving Party

Okay, well other than move-call, another amazing thing happened this past week.  One of our investigators "not-so-good-influence-boyfriend" has moved.  Now she has more freedom like being able to out when she wants, and not having to stay up until 10am watching movies with him.  So!  She was able to come to her first activity with our amazing members!  Sophia through a rather large dinner party at her house because three of our missionaries were going to be moving on Friday.  Our investigator was able to come and have so good wholesome fun and taste a bit of freedom!  So good!

Okay, well I think that's about it for now.  I'm still trying to find a way to fix my memory card.  Wish me luck.

Sister Hsu

General Conference!!!

Note from Kat: Sorry, I found this hidden in my email, and I'm not sure if I actually posted it. But here it is! She sent this to me back in October.

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaay!  Loved Genreal Conference.  I think it may actually the first time in my life where after the 8 hours of conference were over I just wished it could keep going.  I literally could not get enough.  I loved literally every single talk.  Which ones spoke to your heart?

Our Investigator also came and watched on session and said that she even wanted to go home and watch it again online.  Super great!

Miracle of the week:  An investigator that I taught from my second area (Beitun) is getting baptized!  But that's not the coolest part, the reason I we stopped teaching her in Beitun is because she moved to Huwei.  So we asked the Huwei Elders to get in contact with her, we would occasionally catch up a little on Facebook.  Then 3 months later she messages me and says she is getting baptized in Tainan.  (She just recently moved again. hahaha. )  So cool to see that she is going to be making sacred covenants with our Heavenly Father and receiving baptism.

Some fun stuff:  I was able to go to one of the other districts in our area.  It's an island.  QiJin.  Yea.  Had to take a ferry to get to a different part of our area.  It was really cool and weird to be on the water.  It is an exceptionally small island, but was a nice quaint place to ride around and find some people.  :)

Today: Went to Zhongs shop and got a haircut and re-permed my hair.  He saw me at some point after the first time he permed it and said he wanted to do it again in tighter curls.  What do yo think? Hahaha.  Ultimately, what Zhong says, goes.  It won't be as curly as it is in the picture when I do it on my own.  Sister Olson also got her hair cut.  Looks really good!  Zhong really knows his stuff.

I think that is 差不多。。。

Love ya'll!  

Sister Hsu

Oh man.

I was so excited to write and send pictures, only to find out that this internet cafe computer has given my memory card a virus that makes it so that I am unable to upload the photos.  (my stuff got this virus in my first area, it basically makes a bunch of fake folders and hides my real stuff, and there was a man there that helped all of us missionaries clean it out without deleting our stuff.  But I don;t know where to go to get that done here...)  So now I an just very sad and ever so slightly irritated.  I don't know when the next time I'll upload photos is.  We'll see.  

But, as for how this past week was pretty good.  The highlight would have to be that we were about to help out at a special event.  We were originally invited to push wheelchairs, but the number of volunteers exceeded the number of people needing to be pushed, so we ended up directing traffic hahaha, but that was great fun too.

We of course met with our amazing investigators, although it seems as though many of them will soon be moving within the next month or so.. :(  so sad!

Okay, I'm sorry, I'm still upset about my memory card.  I think that is all for now.  See you next week.

Sister Hsu

So many good things this week. :)

But for reals.  So many that I am probably going to forget to mention some of it.  But let's start with investigators...

This weeks lessons with our investigators were so full of miracles and the Spirit.  It's to the point where I don't even know how to describe the amazing things that happened.  But, it felt like with every single investigator we met with this week, the lesson was exactly what needed to be shared, the member present gave inspired testimony and the investigator felt the power of the gospel and decides to make changes that will allow them to more fully feel the Spirit and Heavenly Fathers love.  So good.

Thanksgiving Party!

This week we also had our English Class Party: Thanksgiving Theme!  It was good fun!  We make Pilgrim and Indian hats and played some games.  But, I think my favorite was the spiritual share.  We shared a Mormon Message about the Spirit of Thanksgiving, where they asked the people on the streets of New York what they were thankful for, then we invited everyone to write things that they were thankful for on paper feathers and add them to our Thanksgiving turkey.  :)  Yay!

Cutie Doggies. :)

This week we also had the chance to go and take a look at one of our investigators volunteer places.  I don't know if you know, but Taiwan has an absurd amount of stray dogs running around all over the place.  They are really sad and always super skinny, and if they get picked up by the pound the get humanely euthanized.  So, what our investigator does (she's a part of a volunteer group)  They go around and catch stray dogs and get them neutered and them put them back where they found them.  They worked out an agreement with the government, that if they are neutered them they can't pick em up and kill them.  (If they are neutered, they cut off the tip of one of their ears.)  So, there is a college campus that is literally built into the forest, so there are tons of strays.  She catches them and re-releases some of them, but the school also provides a place to keep a pack of them.  They were so cute!  And there really were so many...  It was cool to see where it is she goes every week and what she does.  They were all really good tempered doggies, albeit still a bit weary or people.  They wouldn't be aggressive to people, but they also won't get especially close.

Lian's Baptism (and how I get around with my bike on the metro)

Another awesome thing that happened this past week?  Lian, an investigator I taught in my last area got baptized!  I was happy to hear the news!  I still remember the first time we met with her to share the gospel (we already knew her from English class) she brought us red tea.  When we told her we don't drink tea, she said, "Well, then I don't think I can ever get baptized, I have to drink my tea."  Hahaha.  Love her!  

Teaching how to bike ride.

Oh! And last but not least, two of our wars members, Yoyo and Sophia are going to be short-term missionaries for a few days!  We are so excited for them!  But, Yoyo didn't know how to ride a bike, she we took some time to teach her.  She picked it up super fast!  Withing the hour.  :)  So Fun.  In case you don't know (because I had never heard of such a thing until I came out on a mission) A short term missionary is a member who goes and does missionary work and lives the missionary life with a full-time missionary.  Short-term missionaries to not get calls and are not set apart and don't need to first go through the temple.  Essentially the are volunteers who help out the mission when ever we are short a full-time missionary, or there are circumstances where short-term missionaries are needed.  I wonder if we have these kinds of opportunities in the states...  :)

Okay, well that's all. 

Love ya'll

Sister Hsu