Transfer 10: Week 1

oh no. i am such an old missionary. i am the oldest missionary (in real age and mission age) in the area. weird.

move calls came... i'm still in jiayi! sister hornberger moved to gaoxiong first ward, the same ward that president hsu lives in. nerveracking. my new companion is sister pickering. she's on her fourth move, and this is her fourth area. if president keeps moving her around then i'll die in jiayi, and i'll die happy. sister pickering (pan jiemei) is from northern california. she grew up on the beach, surrounded by redwoods. she's really happy. i'm grateful- this move i'm working on optimism and having faith in others. i recently read two talks that made me realize how much i need to work on this. one mentioned that every doorstep is santified at the time that we're standing on it. the other talked about how we need to treat every home as if the family inside is waiting for the gospel and ready to accept. i'm going to work this move to treat others as they ought to be, even if that is not how they really are. i think this will change a lot about my missionary methods, and my relationships with others. i'm sure that this move will be good. sister pickering likes to eat organic food and already told me about a drink her mom told her to make that balances hormones, gives energy and detoxinates. it consists of apple cider vinegar, cranberry juice, lemon juice and water. i have grown to love drinking vinegar which is supposed to change the ph of your body so that mosquitoes leave you alone, and help with your digestion, so i can't wait to try sister p's concoction. also, she wants to have dreadlocks when she goes home. cool! i like her a lot already.

the last days of last move were up and down, kind of like the whole move. looking at our investigator board saturday night was depressing. we're going to be working on finding souls this move. on the bright side, hong yunling and wang sirong (kitty, haha) are great and i think/hope that they will be able to be baptized this move! "make it a goal, make it happen." that motto seemed to work well through my first few years of college. i'm sure it will not let me down here.

on friday my testimony of heavenly father's willingness to answer prayers was strengthened. it was a day of miracles. at correlation meeting that night we told the elders and they laughed (at us, with us i'm not sure.). don't laugh. this is true. and it's proof of god's love...
so, friday was a white day. WHITE. we had nothing going on until the evening, so we decided to bike to a part of shuishang that we hadn't been to before. on our way out there we stopped at a police station to ask for  directions because the neighborhood we were looking for was not on the map (sister h thought it was weird that i did that. and i guess considering the fact i would never go to a police station in america for anything, it is kind of strange. but i feel that police officers have an obligation to help people, i help them do that.). the officer told us where to go. we followed his directions to the T but rather than coming to a large intersection, as he said we would, we came to a crooked crossroads with three turn choices, all involving backtracking in some way or another. two men passed on scooters. we did not flag them down. the only men we talk to are ones in uniform. we decided to pray before anything else. sister hornberger asked heavenly father to send someone that would be able to guide us to zhongzhuang. the next person to ride past was a woman. at first we thought she was a man. i thought to myself, "only in rural taiwan would you see a man wearing a leopard print shirt." then we realized she was in fact a woman and quickly waved her down. we asked her where the neighborhood was, and showed her the address. it quickly became apparent that she did not speak a lick of mandrin. she apologized for being uneducated and unable to read then motioned for us to follow her. we did. she took us to some steel working shop, pretty creepy. we waited while she had a 10 minute conversation in taiwanese with the man there. i could understand some. the were conflicted between two opposite directions. in the end it was decided that we would follow the woman to zhongzhuang.  we ended up taking the same road we had been on, and went back to where we started. we followed her for close to a half an hour and finally made it to the right neighborhood. she was an angel, i'm sure of it. we then, miraculously, found the home we were searching for. it was kind of in the middle of no where. we knocked about 10 doors (it was an old tradition home. horseshoe shaped with no "front door". we were grateful to know people still lived there. we could tell by the well kept alter in the main room.) we left a note and rode to the next area. the address said it was in shuishang, another policeman (i love policemen here!) directed us to zhongpu, an area i had never ridden to. we rode forever, feeling somewhat discouraged and worried that we were getting lost. we kept remembering our angel. suddenly another police station popped out of nowhere. it seemed to have literally fallen out of the sky. we asked the man inside where #676 was. he told us we were on the right path and directed us to keep riding. we found another home in the middle of nowhere. after some time there we headed back to jiayi. as we rode into the city, my bike became hard to ride. i looked down to see a flat front tire. we stopped and started looking for a bike shop. literally right next to us was a little bike store!! right next to us! the man inside was amazing. he replaced my inner-tire, fixed my alignment, secured my basket, filled my back tire and sister h's tires, and tightened her brakes. all within 10 minutes. all for about 7 dollars (american)! we made it home with time to eat and prepare for correlation meeting! do you see the miracles! one after another. small ones, but miracles nonetheless.

oh no. time is almost up. i'm sorry. ether 6 next week. i love love love you all. miracles are all around, every day. watch for them. they are there. we get to watch conference this weekend! i am so excited. and in a few weeks i get to call you! horray!

love,
sister jade