11/28/10 Email

Hello dear family,

I love Jiayi. I don't know how else to say it, there is just a good feeling here and I love being here and working among these fabulous people. There still are some more country areas but I'm back in a place where most of the time there are people everywhere and there are stoplights. I'm re-learning how to schedule travel time around stop-lights, but I love the opportunity to talk to so many people. We keep meeting so many amazing people. People are so willing to hear the gospel and we have some great people investigating the church.

This week was a really good learning experience but we were also able to see a lot of miracles. We got home late most of the week but were able to have such good, event-filled days. We were able to get more sit-downs than this area has had in a while. And hit most of our goals for this week. We have a really awesome Week B lined up, we had a lesson about baptism and the spirit was there and her real concern came out. Orginally it seemed her husband might be an issue, but she is afraid about not being able to keep commandments after she gets baptized. She went to the sat baptism so hopefully that will help her, she seemed to like it. She is one of the most beautiful mom's I've ever seen. And she really loves coming to church, but I think reviewing and helping her recognize her testimony and that she is not alone will help her keep working towards her baptismal goal.

This week we also started meeting with this really awesome investigator, jing yi. She loves reading and prays every day, and loved church and then came with us to a member's house for dinner. She has work on Sunday but was really willing to get things arranged so she could come to church. She really likes meeting with us and keeps commitments. At first when we met her she seemed really overwhelmed and didn't seem like she understood all of what we were saying, but she is so willing to keep learning and she really liked church.

Our newest member has a class that prevents her from coming to church until Christmas but she will come to church every week after that, but we will take special care to make sure we keep in contact with her and visit her every week. And she also wants to be involved in helping prepare for the Christmas activity so that will help her stay rather active. But, with the recent converts I've met it's been a little scary to ask them questions about how they knew the church was true or why they joined the church and find out they feel they haven't received answers or don't feel like the church has changed their lives. One has never prayed about Joseph Smith or the church. I feel like we need to treat a lot of our new members like investigators and start from square one. And really review what we need to do to develop our testimony and what actions we need to take. They are really awesome women but I think it is important right now for them to know that they have a testimony because the first year is the hardest and easiest to get lost if you don't have a conviction of why church is important. This is such a fragile time and I always hate this part of moving to a new area and seeing the new member list and seeing that half of them are already inactive. Sometimes it is really hard. But these people are important and we will keep visiting them and inviting them to do the things that will help them develop their testimony and choose the right.

The wards are fantastic and I am very excited to work with them. The bishops are very willing to help and I am so thankful for them. There are some great members and even one who loves to give us referrals and loves Madeline's picture. Her son is 11. :)
Also, Jiayi has so many food options, I think I have finally found a companion who loves food like I do, and she loves taking me to new places which is my favorite. Sister Lai is so great, she loves talking and she can read english but doesn't really understand much so I am learning so many new words and phrases. She loves to explain words and is so helpful, I am so thankful for her and her help. Especially here in this new area.

I actually kind of forgot about Thanksgiving this weekend, but yesterday we went to a member's house to eat and had a good amount of chicken which probably counts. She is like Grandma Ko and loves to dish everyone up plenty of everything that she has cooked :) If you still have rice in your bowl you are not done eating and she will make sure you have more food :)

Wow, you guys are getting snow, it's weird to be living in a place where pretty much everyone has never seen snow before. I am planning to print a page of pictures to send for Christmas-time, and yes, will send some to my new members, but it just takes a while for me to write :) But i will write slowly and eventually get it done. I can do it, don't worry and I will send a copy soon so if you want you can add it to our family christmas newsletter.

-sister ko