Week 13

This week was another good one. On Tuesday, we had a great lesson with an investigator that we had challenged to fast with us, where in the end, he agreed to move his baptismal date up a few weeks. He is super great.

I talked with the assistants about my travel to KL, and they instructed me to find a bus and take it to KL on Thursday. I was kind of scared, since those descriptions weren't too descriptive.

One funny thing that happened was my companion asked me to draft a text to remind everyone to come to a baptismal service on Wednesday, and I accidentally used the wrong characters, so instead of writing "Hello, everybody" I wrote "Hit with a fist". The next day, we taught two lessons on the Word of Wisdom, and then we filled the font, etc, for the baptismal service. It was the other companionship's baptism, but my companion, Elder Frey, baptized. Kind of weird, but before we got here he was in their companionship, so it makes sense. Anyway, that was a good one. Her parents flew in from China to come, which was extra cool. And luckily, after the baptism I ran into the KL Zone leaders who were in for a meeting, and they were also travelling to KL the next day. We agreed to meet the next morning, so I was very relieved.

The next day, I left and met them a few stations away, and we walked and took taxis all over Singapore looking for a bus, but it turns out we were leaving during Hari Raya, the end of Ramadan, so lots of people were travelling, and there were no tickets anywhere. Instead, we decided to take a taxi to the border. Once across (many hours later), we had a really good lunch, met up with a Chinese man from Singapore who wanted people to travel with, and took a bus to KL.

There was a Beyond 5 (pretty much a Utahn boy band) concert that we were going to go to, but we missed it by a while. We got to the house about 9:30, but I met up with companion before that and we even ran into an investigator. The Assistants also slept at our place that night, as well as another elder. Our new place is pretty nice, and has tons of locks (the Zone leaders describe it as a fortress). It's not too big, but it has a gym, and we have a great view of the Petronas towers.

Anyway, for the past few days, we've mostly just followed the sisters who are assigned to the same branch as us (apparently there haven't been elders here for years). Transportation has been expensive, because the place was closed where the other missionaries buy a pass for the holiday, and we've had to buy tokens every time. But we got the passes this morning, so everything is good.

The first day, we went with them to an appointment and then got the area book and discussed the people they are handing off to us. The next day, we went to two appointments. The first was with a young Chinese man, and he is very prepared. They had taught him some of the Plan of Salvation the time before, but we cleared that up in Chinese with him and Elder Chong told a story of how he had to tell his boss that he wouldn't work on Sundays, even if he had to quit. He quit, and got an even better job. Then, Elder Chong got him a baptismal date by simply asking "So when do you want to have your baptism?". He's really a great guy and I'm excited for him. Next we went to visit two people that aren't our investigators, but they are super great, and they fed us, which I feel bad about, since they weren't expecting four missionaries.

Sunday was also a good one. We followed the sisters to church. I love our branch. Our branch president is very willing to help. There are many Indians, many Malaysians, a few Americans, and a bunch of Chinese people. We have a senior couple in our branch, that is also really nice. There are several soon-to-leave missionaries here. I went to Sunday School in Malay, but my companion translated a lot of it. After, we went to a baptism of an 8 year old in our branch, but at the other chapel (near our place, actually. We live far from our area). There are so many cool people here.

Other things we've done this week has been: call a bunch of people, we have a few appointments set up for this week, grocery shopping, and weekly planning. Overall, I really love KL, but transportation is a bit slower, so sometimes I don't feel as productive. I'm so blessed to be companions with Elder Chong, so my Chinese can progress. Things have been crazy with studies, but I think my Chinese is definitely improving. KL food is all really good, and there are many cool buildings here, like the beautiful mosques, and of course, the Petronas towers. I also got to call in our weekly report to the district leader yesterday for the first time. Overall, I'm excited to be here, I could potentially be here a long time. Hopefully this week we can really start to get the work moving.

Anyway, have a great week!

Love, Ge Zhanglao