The "harolding" of December

The "harolding" of December.

My first Christmas away from home, and I"m dealing :) Much thanks to my mother and her wonderful fully stocked Christmas kit, complete with tree and decorations.

Its funny with Christmas here. I can ride my bike down a street packed side to side with shops and look in the windows and see Christmas items for sale. Some places have trees set up in the lobbies (like our apartment complex and many others) and giant blow up Santa's that wave, but its kind of empty. Its not in their culture, its something they have adapted from the westernization that is taking the world by storm. But they don't have the spirit that accompanies the season. Its just missing. In America, even with the mass marketing of Christmas, the very air is different, cheerful. People are kinder, they care, they are happier (for the most part), they are with family, and there is a glow in faces and smiles. Its because even with the mass material focus we still more or less remember why we have Christmas. Here people lack that, lack anything of an understanding for the most part, and so the holiday's presence almost seems like a mockery. I just want to tell them all. I wish they could really experience what IS Christmas.

Last night we had a dinner party with all the singles in the ward here. It was like a Christmas/thanksgiving party that they have been throwing for 5 years in a row now. It was pretty nice, there was a lot of food, including American dishes like a turkey (legit, with a wonderful herb rosemary seasoning) and mashed potatoes with bacon, then there were dishes with a Asian twist, like a casserole with sweet potatoes and curry. It was all delicious. Home made cinnamon roles and about 5 different cakes and Costco (yay!) ice cream for dessert. It was fun, but isolating. The more Chinese I learn (which is not a lot, it seems to be going slower now :( ) the more I become aware that the less I understand and the less I can communicate. The first couple of weeks here I was completely in a foreign atmosphere so it was easy to be ignorant and clueless. But I have adjusted enough and have enough understanding now that I am just frustrated because people try to speak to me, or I try to speak to them and there is no communication, no understanding. So I sit in the corner and watch a room full of people mingle and laugh, ostracized by that stupid language barrier. But there is nothing I can do, but do my best to slowly and painfully wade my way into this language... and hope that I can deal with the frustration.

This week we had temple tour training, and then temple tours. Next to the temple in Taipei there is a beautiful stake center, and the last mission presidents wife had the inspiration to set up the halls as something of a museum. They are lined with paintings of Christ, and of our churches history, and of gospel stories and topics. With the wonderful view of the temple to aid us, sisters give tours of the building and use the paintings and the temple to acquaint people with the gospel. Missionaries can bring in investigators, members can bring in friends, and the sisters tackle people off the street and drag them inside for a free tour. There are sisters assigned to the 'Temple Square' but also a couple of times a week other sisters in areas close enough take turns to give tours for a day, allowing the square sisters to go procilite. We had a workshop type training Wednesday, and then Thursday we spent all day in Taipei giving tours. Its really fun, I love the temple and I love dealing with such powerful visual media. I really wish my Chinese was up to par to really explain the paintings to these people. Someday I hope that I can be a temple square sister. The two that are there right now are amazing! A sister Hintzy and a sister Hsu. I have a special place in my heart for Sister Hintzy because the first day I was here in Taiwan she was the first missionary I did the work with.

And interesting story I would like to share. On Saturday we had an appointment with a woman we came in contact with (well Sister Li came in contact with, I was on exchanges) through a recent convert, that was very very excited to meet with us. We arrived at her house and she was pleasant enough, but after entering the doorway and the entry hall I almost ran into a GIANT Buddhist shrine, it had three different levels and literally took up most of her living room.

We sat and she gave us oranges and water, then she excused herself to go pray and change the incense, it took about 10 minutes, and I became pretty sure it was for our benefit. Shortly there after, before we really even got to talk to her, a man came over as if just to stop by briefly. Then he saw us and decided to sit down and engage us in conversation. Well engage sister Li in conversation, the atmosphere was thick with intense smoke and I was utterly confused. The lady kept praying and doing things around the alter, then looking to see if we were watching, then asking us to write out our names and buddhist prayers for her. Sister Li solidly told her we could not. She kept trying to get us to participate in 'activities', I had no idea what they would be but the longer we were there the more I felt the spirit ebb away. Especially when that man pulled out a picture of Christ healing the blind and told us (I later learned through sister Li) that Christ was actually doing this buddhist ritual and got very passionate then started quoting the Bible. Sister Li told him she didn't know the bible in Chinese because she was actually American and he whipped out a blown up picture of the American dollar bill and smacked it on the table before us and demanded if we knew the mysteries of God then, then told us that they were right there. In the dollar bill (translation later provided by sister Li). Then the lady we'd come to see came over very close to me and tried for the 6th or 7th time to get us to participate in this ritual. Sister Li refused but the woman was insistent and apparently wanted to show us because suddenly she was on top of me, stroking her finger down my nose and then covering my eyes and whispering in my ear. It took all my control not to break that woman over the coffee table in front of me. My skin crawled and I felt unclean. The spirit was gone. Then another woman entered the room and she more or less told the other two to back off. She'd come in contact with missionaries before (she named two sisters by name) and she told the other two that they must respect our religion and that we could not do the things they were trying their hardest to persuade us to do because we were missionaries. She had us pray for her, she had some kind of illness, then Sister Li was able to excuse us. As we were leaving the woman we came to see followed us to the door proclaiming on me blessings and prophesying (sister Li told me later that she'd told me to become a vegetarian and to spread my message with everyone I came in contact with among other things).

It was an interesting experience, but I don't think we are ever going back there.

We baptized three little boys on Saturday night, and another miracle occurred the next day. Their father came to sacrament meeting and all three boys got up and tried trembling and almost speechless to bear their testimonies for the first time in front of a congregation. Then we were informed later that day that a friend of the Bishop's daughter that we have been teaching had good news. She has been attending church secretly for months, she lives with her grandparents and her mother sometimes though not all the time (I'm not sure on the details...sometimes people don't translate these things for me), and all strongly oppose of any kind of religion change. In her mothers words "As long as I am alive, you will never be christian." We have all been praying and last week she accepted a baptismal date with trepidation for the first of the year. She was afraid to even bring up the fact that she had been attending a christian church much less that she wanted to be baptized. But slowly this week she had been approaching the subject "Oh, my friend taught me about prayer today" and the like. Then Friday night her Grandmother told her suddenly "You know, if you would like to go to church, you should go."

See. The Lord does care. :)

Well, I think this is long enough now. So I'll be off. Until next week my friends, I love you all.