Week 35

Yep. My eight month mark is this week. Kind of a pretty unimportant mark, but the next time I celebrate a fraction of my mission, it will be my year mark. I don't remember much of what I said last week, but Kapit was awesome and well worth the crazy day. It's kind of the Borneo I expected Borneo to be. Very scenic and tribal. The preparation day before that, we got to go way out to a huge Buddhist temple. That was awesome. I'll try to send pictures. Anyway, this past week has been a good one. Here is the gist of it: *Singapore- We spent three days for Zone Conference in Singapore. It's, as usual, an awesome place. Our first day there, we saw the aquarium, which is the largest in the world (by water volume). It was really fun, but also very expensive. The next night, after Zone Conference, we saw the laser show at Marina Bay. I may have told you before that Elder Hanks and I watched it his first full day there, but we didn't understand where to watch it from, so all we saw was lasers coming from a building, and lots of people. It was lame. But this last time, we watched it from right next to it, and it's actually a kind of movie projected onto a screen of water they shoot into the air, with fire, music, and lasers. It was very cool. After that, we watched a light/music show at the gardens by the bay. The next day, we went to the coolest airport in the world, and went to the sunflower, orchid, and butterfly gardens contained inside. The airport also has free gaming rooms, movies, and sporting even showings. It's way cool. *Zone Conference- Is the best! I feel bad for missions that only travel a few hours by road to get to their Zone Conferences, because ours is so fun. Elder Wilson, of the Asia Area Presidency, came this time. He emphasized having investigators experiencing true conversion by reading the Book of Mormon. Not just reading a bit every day, but feasting upon it, preferably finishing it before baptism. He also described our area (East Malaysia) of the mission by saying "someone has to serve in paradise". Indeed, I am very blessed to be serving in such an exotic and beautiful land. *New investigators- Referrals from less actives, curious friends who have popped into lessons, and random people contacting the other elders have all given us new people to teach. So it's been fun. We may be to the point soon where we will have to cut those who aren't progressing, which will be sad. But it's awesome to see the Lord providing and preparing people for us to teach. *One especially interesting lesson- one investigator we have who has known elders for several years spent about an hour telling us how we were horrible missionaries. It was very interesting, but we already knew we are weak without the Lord. We know our message is true, and we will continue to share it to the best of our limited ability. The Lord will do the rest. *Miracle- Elder Hanks jumped into an MRT after accidentally getting off at the wrong station and seeing me inside. He jumped right as the doors were closing, and it was miraculous he wasn't crushed. :) Well, that is the week. This next week looks like it will be awesome as well. Wo ai ni men! Love, Elder Andrew Earl

Week 34

Well, this email is being sent much later than usual, but that is because we just had an excellent preparation day activity in the town of Kapit, a good three-hour boat ride upstream from here closer to the Indonesian border. And I must tell you in advance, there will be no pictures included as I do not have my cord with me right now. :) I don't have a lot of time, since on the way back, I had a flat tire, but here is the week in summary: *KL: We went to KL this week! It was Elder Hanks's New Missionary Training. It was very good. I got to see Elders Cranford and Sutherland, and take night pictures at the Petronas towers. Unfortunately for the Kuching elders, they came late and left early from the 4 hour training in order to make their flights. We had it better, and spent the night there. *Kapit: We left at 4:45am, and pumped four elders to the boat place. People must have been very confused as to what was going on. It was a long boat ride, but while there, we looked around town, visited a long house, and saw a lot of the interior Borneo jungle. It was REALLY cool. The members we visited are really cool. *Floods: This week has had tons of water, that has flooded much of Sibu. It's awesome, because we get pictures, and once we were even in someone's car as we drove through like 2 feet deep water. It was fun. *Miracle #1: We visited the house of one of the members we work closely with, with the purpose of teaching his mother. She was there, along with a crowd of unexpected people, and during the Restoration DVD, we felt like it was a completely un-spiritual environment. However, at the end, she told us that she wanted to join our church. She has seen what a blessing it has been in her child's life, and she says that our members are willing to welcome others more readily. It was awesome! We are very happy to help her in joining our church. *Miracle #2: It was a torrential downpour, and Elder Hanks, who was outside, handed me an umbrella I had to take from him quickly. In order to take it, I had to throw an important piece of paper I had in my hands, and the entire ground was covered in dirt and water. However, the paper landed perfectly on a chair several feet away. Miracle. *Miracle #3: While in KL, our taxi driver asked which airport we were flying out of, which is weird, because KLIA is by far the biggest in KL, but it just so happens that because he asked us, we were able to determine we were going to a different airport. If he hadn't asked us that random question, we would have been very confused. He, a Hindu, also told us of a couple experiences where he felt Jesus Christ had blessed him. We got his information, and hopefully the other elders follow up with him! *Investigator work: is on the rise. We picked up a few this week. There were a couple frustrating lessons, but as a whole, it is a very good thing. *Less active work: is going down. Mostly because they are becoming active, but also because some feel they are too busy to meet. *Switched church times: Now we are at 2pm, which is super late, and makes it hard to have many appointments. Our attendance also went waaay down. But the other two branches had the highest they have had in months. Maybe ever. *I'm a missionary: It's the best! And you can all be missionaries, too. I would encourage you to read the talk from last conference called "Hastening the Lord's Game Plan" and doing those three things. :) That's all for the week! Wo ai ni men! -Elder Earl

Week 33

I need to keep coming up with different email subjects, or it attaches it to the first time I wrote "This week" or "the week" or the like. Anyway... One event that happened this week was Christmas! It was a good one, too. However, the vast majority of Chinese people here are much more excited for Chinese New Year than they were for Christmas. On Christmas day itself, we started with a Secret Santa, where we each gave one non-companion missionary in our house a gift. The person who gave to me, Elder Scott, who I've been living with nearly my entire mission. He sent me on a treasure hunt with six different clues, but I finally reached it and found the gift. For lunch on that day, we had some paos that had been sitting out for a few hours, then we visited five different houses! It was fun, but probably the #2 most biking day of my mission thus far. Unfortunately, it seems like the work kind of imploded this week. So many cancelled appointments. :( It's okay, because next week is going to be awesome! Grand experiences of the week: *Teaching a less active, and then going with the member who came with us to a tiger temple and a long house very briefly. When we got to the longhouse, random Ibans with good English asked if they could get our picture with them. Soon, it pretty much became a line, and we were standing on a wedding podium thing to be used the next day with assorted Ibans who wanted their picture with us. Fun! *Christmas carolling! We had no success, but it was fun spreading some Chrismas cheer. *While waiting for other elders briefly, I started contacting a massage chair seller. It ended up being a really good deal, because I talked about the gospel while sitting in a massage chair. Awesome! *I talked to the first two white people outside the church in Malaysia this week. The first was some Jehovah's Witness missionaries from Finland we found caroling, and then later some expats from Miri who we saw at "Food Fair" this week. *Institute at the Beuses- the senior couple wants to start a weekly activity for YSA, and last night it involved pizza and a spiritual movie. It was the third feast we had at their house this week, so it was extra awesome. *Making a badminton court with our branch president in the church parking lot! It was fun. This upcoming week should be way good! It's new year's soon, and we have badminton, pot-luck, and Singapore on the calendar pretty quick. In personal study, I've studied a lot about prayer recently, and found a lot of good reasons why it's important to pray as often as possible. When we pray, we bring our will into line with God's will, and we're generally pretty righteous and motivated to do good after a conversation with Heavenly Father. If we go too long between prayers, though, that's when we sometimes forget our desire to be better. The moral of the story is, pray always and do not faint! I love you all! Have a very happy New Year! Love, Elder Earl

Week 32

Was awesome! We had some interesting challenges, but we also had some great tender mercies and other experiences. One highlight of the week was going to Christmas Conference in Kuching. It only took one day of the week, but because of the early flights and club music playing all night, it took a large toll on our sleep. While in Kuching, we did some service, heard some talks, slept during some talks (on accident!), acted out the Nativity (we were the worst shepherds ever. We only had one job and we messed it up!), and talked with all of our missionary buddies. I got to be reunited with my MTC buddies, Elders Sutherland and Mitchell. So that was fun. I also got a large package and got to eat some delicious packaging peanuts. The best part about Kuching, however, was the miracle of the week. We decided we were going to talk to as many people as possible, and because of that goal, I started talking to a cool guy in a bookstore, who just happened to be from Sibu. He's Chinese and says he needs some more information before he can make an informed decision on God's existence. Well, we'll be happy to give them that information: the restored and everlasting gospel of Jesus Christ! Other fun things of the week: *Snapping turtles and bears *The power went off late at night, and we went outside to see what was up, and all the neighbors decided to light off tons of fireworks! We're excited for Chinese New Year for sure. *We went to pizza hut in Kuching, and one of the zone leaders and I noticed the best deal was delivery only. We walked outside the store and tried our very best to get them to deliver to us. In the end, we ate at another restaurant. *More biking in a single day than ever before. In pouring rain! Our struggles this week: *Getting stood up. In Chinese they say "fang gezi" which means "unleash pigeons" *Investigators not coming to church Our successes this week: *Less actives becoming active! *Home teaching begins *So many people committing to come to church next year! *Being a missionary is just awesome. Wo ai nimen! Love, Elder Earl

Week 31

This week was a good one. There are a few disappointments every week, it seems, but the miracles, the Spirit, and the good we are doing outweigh it all. The joy of being involved in missionary work is great, and luckily, it isn't limited to the full time missionaries. Everyone has a part in the work of salvation! One funny experience we had this week was early in the week, we had a few Chinese people randomly show up at the church, which was really awesome. We gave them a tour, and they stayed for FHE, which they seemed to really enjoy. However, we later really found out they were sent from another church, who every once in a while sends different people to kind of scout out what our church is doing. It's sad they didn't have genuine interest, but we welcome everyone to come and see, to join in worship, and to learn about the glorious message of Christ with us. Something that we are going to push this week is home teaching. It doesn't currently exist in the branch, but with the elders' quorum president, we decided it could really help our branch out. So more on that next week, hopefully. One of the major events of the week was Saturday's three-branch Christmas party. It was so much fun! It was more people than expected, and we ran out of food, but it was lots of fun. We had Nativity performances, songs, dances, and more. It was really fun, and many less actives and potential investigators came. Yesterday, we had a miracle of active members taking less active members to church. Our attendance was the highest it's been for many months! Next week, I get to teach Sunday school! That will be fun. We'll be in Kuching one day this week for Christmas conference., It will be awesome. Especially being reunited with my other two amigos in my generation. Love, Elder Earl

Week 30

It was once again an awesome week! Though overall we are an inexperienced companionship, we work and pray hard for the Lord's help to make up for our weakness. One awesome miracle of the week happened yesterday. We got home from our church meetings yesterday, and one companionship was still home and told us of all the cool people who had committed to come to their branch, including one very less active member. After they left to church, we got a call from a potential investigator we'd called a few times, but nothing had come of, that said she was at our church. She had apparently come with their less active member, and when she realized they were at the address we had given her, she called us. She enjoyed the meeting, and we have a return appointment! Another cool story of the week started a few days ago, when we had arranged to eat dinner with some other potential investigators. As we waited for them, we contacted two people. The second one was from Canada and really awesome, and we even had dinner with him two nights later. He's really friendly to us, and we hope the Book of Mormon we gave him will help him feel the Spirit and want to learn more. We went to a really awesome member's home this week, and watched "Finding Faith in Christ" with him and his non-member family. His mother thoroughly enjoyed it, and we plan on showing another movie next time: "The Restoration". :) This week we are going to plan and prepare a lot for a Christmas party on Saturday (mom's birthday!!). It should be a fun one, but we missionaries have a part that isn't ready, and I certainly hope I won't be doing too much singing and dancing. One crazy experience was we called a food stand last Monday to get some Ramly burgers ready, and as we went to pick them up, a huge rainstorm came. We literally waded through the rain to get them. And all this while I was on a temporary small, pink/orange, no gears/brakes bicycle. We also got 100% drenched the next day on a bike ride to a way cool less active member's house. Anyway, Sibu is still awesome, and my son is doing well. The senior couple remarked we were the first companionship they'd seen where the trainee talks a significant amount in lessons. So he's awesome. Love, Elder Earl

Week 29

We've had an excellent week! I really love Elder Hanks, he is a great companion. He is succeeding in the language and in missionary work, and he's getting used to the area very quickly. We taught a really awesome guy who came to church and FHE last week, and he expressed his sincere desire to know which church is true and right for him. We're excited for him to find out. We were also able to do a couple different service projects this week, which were really awesome. The people in our branch are very friendly and supportive. For Thanksgiving, we taught two lessons, and then ate some Kampua Mee (I think that's how it's spelled), with a Sibu-missionary favorite fruitbowl. My companion also tried his first durian this week. We visited a couple families last night of less actives members we have never met, with the district president. Together, we think we can really help make a difference in their lives, and the way we want to help them is specifically through family history. It's weird doing the extra hour of studies every morning, but it's fun. We practice teaching the lessons mostly. Transfers are happening this week, and most the natives who speak Chinese are all being switched to Chinese elders. So it's exciting to see that the Chinese people are a real focus now. I've also had a chance to read some conference talks recently, which is good, since I didn't understand much of the last conference. Anyway, I'll send some pictures of the week. I love you all! -Elder Earl

Week 28

This weekly update doesn't have much, because of all the time I spent travelling this week, but we still had time to have awesome experiences and witness some miracles. Firstly, after we figured out about transfer news, we went downtown to run errands, and a group of Iban girls came up to us to request to have a picture taken with them. It was funny. Then we got haircuts, and the person styled my hair into a fohawk. On Tuesday, we had a lesson with the miracle contact from the week before, and he's awesome. He says if he had a way to, he'd drive all of his friends every week to our church. Because he is married into an Iban family, though, he is now the Malay elders' investigator. We had an awesome bowling activity this week. One miracle is that I didn't get last place! Between Thursday and Saturday, however, I was gone in Singapore. President Mains (probably for the first time ever), immediately revealed who was training who, and we had fun for three days in Singapore! My new companion is Elder Hanks, who did, in fact, meet my family in New York at Hill Cumorah. Just another little witness the Lord knows what He is doing. In Singapore, outside of our meetings, we visited Marina Bay (twice), went to Chinatown, and contacted. My trainee is already very good at Chinese and extremely willing to work. So he's awesome. Since we've been back home in Sibu, we've mostly just done weekly planning. But at church, we had yet another person walk into our church randomly. We already have an appointment scheduled for this week. I also gave a talk on Sunday, which I had very little time to prepare for. So it probably wasn't too great. :) We're excited for our new companionship, and with the Lord's help to overcome our lack of language ability and experience, we know we will do great things. I love you all! Love, Elder Earl

Week 27

There isn't as much to report on this week, since I was a Chinese elder for pretty much only two days, due to district leader companion exchanges. But I had lots of fun and interesting experiences. First and foremost, transfers happen this week. We just barely got the news, and Elder Cranford is going to Kuala Lumpur! I'm staying and getting a new companion fresh from the MTC. So that will be fun. I was a Chinese elder for a bit, and got to witness some awesome things. For example, the two who walked into the church building on Sunday also came to FHE, and they're super awesome! And cool people coming to church again for the first time this week! And best of all, one great investigator is making awesome progress. She understands if she gets an answer, it will mean big changes for her life, but she said she's not afraid of that. She also applies scriptures to herself! She's awesome. I was a Malay elder this week, pretty much. So I learned some Malay phrases, and I exchanged with four different Malay elders. I saw monkeys as pets, jungle houses, kampung fish, and more. I ate cool foods, witnessed amazing lessons, and more. I even got to exchange with Elder Scott, who I lived with in Kuala Lumpur. And because I have a way of taking pictures now, the rest of my message will be sent in 1000-word equivalents. I love you all!

Week 26

Our week was super awesome! We got to go to Singapore, which is always a fun place, and Zone Conference helps us learn a ton, but nothing compares with doing the Lord's work in Sibu! Zone Conference was super good. Because of weird situations, we ended up having all of East Malaysia together, and so we had by far the largest of the three zone conferences. It was good to finally be reunited with my MTC buddies, Elders Mitchell and Sutherland. And when we had a few extra hours, we went to the zoo. I rode my first elephant! It was really fun. The Singapore zoo is awesome. The only downside of Singapore was that we left for the airport before 4am, so we've had to get adjusted. As far as the work goes, we have had lots of success with our investigators. One of our super awesome investigators came to church, and made friends with some of our awesome members. We also had two really cool people walk into our church, and they were also fellowshipped well. We've gotten great referrals, and found lots of people through contacting, and we're excited to see who will choose to accept the restored gospel. We met with an investigator with a member this week that is super awesome, and she accepted a baptismal date. We just pray that she'll be able to recognize the Lord's answers to her prayers. Less active work has also been going well. We had many less actives come to church this week, and we helped teach one family about the temple, and now they are preparing to go there sometime in the future. We're really excited for the progress our investigators and members are making, and we pray it will continue. The Lord has blessed us so much! Have an amazing week, everyone! Wo ai nimen! Love, Elder Andrew Earl

Week 25

This week has been an awesome one. I really love Sibu, and I'm extremely happy here. It's crazy to think this transfer is already over half over, but I should be in Sibu for a while. This week, we had a few awesome miracle experiences. Yesterday, we had some less active members we really love come to church, and our attendance was higher than it has been for a while. Our branch members have awesome testimonies. We also had miracles that led us to new investigators. A referral from a couple weeks ago became an investigator this week. We also had another investigator give us a referral, so that's a good sign that he knows how amazing our message is. The lady we found while knocking has accepted a couple follow up visits, and we're really excited for what might happen there. We tried three main finding methods this week. The first was knocking, and we didn't find success there, but we met some interesting people. The second was calling potential investigators, and a few of them even agreed to meet. The third was walking around (in Malay it's called jalan jalan) and talking to people. The first person we even opened our mouths to was willing to meet with us and everything. We also ran into two Indians, who don't speak Malay or Chinese, but I spoke some Hindi with them, and they were so happy and impressed, they wanted to take pictures with us. We gave them copies of the Book of Mormon and suggested we meet again. I'm excited for them. We did exchanges with one of the Assistants (the Chinese elder, Elder Harper), and we got to learn from him. He's an awesome guy, and he helped us a lot. Overall, it was an awesome week. My Chinese is improving, and I'm starting to know the members really well. I'm super happy here, and that's what the gospel can do for everyone. I'm so glad I can share that same message of happiness with Sibu. Have a great week! Love, Elder Earl

Week 24

This week has been super good! Transfers did come on Monday after email time, and, surprise to everyone here, no one left our zone. But we did get six new elders, four who now live with us (one is Elder Scott, who I lived with in KL), and two in Sibu Jaya (which is really small, so it's funny it was split). I guess Sibu just needs the gospel really badly right now! Elder Cranford is now the new district leader here. One fun experience we had this week was eating dinner with the senior couple and some people in the branch. The waitresses were really funny and absolutely loved my companion. So as white people, we got a lot of attention and took many pictures with them, one of which the restaurant people said was going in their magazine. We spent some time this week considering different housing options, since six elders in one house is not optimal (the president compared six elders together to a fraternity house). So we may be moved this time next week. We brought an awesome member to an awesome part-member family's home, and put the mother on baptismal date there this week. She is super awesome and already interacts with other branch members like she's a part. We also got some good contacting time this week, which was really awesome. The first time, we walked around downtown, giving a few copies of the Book of Mormon out and even running into a former investigator from a while ago. The second time, we decided to go knocking, and the very first house that answered had a cool girl let us in. We taught a lesson and got a return appointment. She's actually been taught a few years ago, too. We had a Halloween party on Saturday, that was really fun. Tons of awesome food, and some cool games. We were in charge of the fishing game, where you put candy on the end of the hooks. Today for p-day, the whole zone got together and we played football. It was fun! And I ate my recent favorite meal: a MegaMac. It's like a really big BigMac. And I don't know how many calories are in it. We also had a really awesome weekly planning this week, where we set some goals for our area, and decided how to better plan for upcoming weeks. So hopefully the work can move even faster along! Love, Elder Earl

Week 23

I love working in Sibu, so this week was, of course, amazing! First of all, I'd just like to explain Sibu a bit. It's a city probably like as big as Orem/Provo (or a bit bigger), probably about half Chinese, but also lots of Ibans (the local tribe, generally Christian, that makes up most of the church here) and some Malays. We live in a really big house in a nice area. We bike usually, but we also go with a senior couple who is assigned over two branches here to many appointments. There is an evil bird that lives by us that for whatever reason likes to attack bikers. Good thing we have helmets. Dogs are also a little rude, but definitely manageable. The food is good here, but mostly we go to just one of a few places that missionaries have discovered to be delicious. One interesting thing that I have learned here is the solution to when a missionary's bike is broken. It's called "pumping" and it involves one person sitting on the handlebars and the other person riding as normal. It's fun. This week, we had many cool miracle stories. On Monday, we decided to do what we are supposed to do, which is buy batteries to replace in our carbon monoxide detectors. While we were in line, a random lady started reading our tags aloud, and she was interested in our church. Then on our way out, we ran into a lady who had been helped by Elders Cranford and Sutherland a few weeks before when her motorbike stopped working, but they didn't have time to contact her. We got an appointment with her right then. Later in the week, the miracles kept coming. We contacted a headquarters referral (someone who went on mormon.org) at a local Methodist preacher school. We were told she got out of class at 4:30, so we came back at 4:39, and the building was already locked up. Miraculously, we ran into her on the way out, and we talked with her and her friends about our church and gave them copies of the Book of Mormon. They, too, are willing to meet again. The people here are super awesome. Everyone we meet with seems to be making progress, and it's really exciting. Our investigator work has been a bit slow, but we are going to really do our best to have one new investigator a week. We also want to focus a bit more on giving out copies of the Book of Mormon, since our mission president has invited us to give at least one copy every day. Another fun experience I had this week was doing exchanges with the district leader's companion. I spent a day in Sibu Jaya, which is really small. Almost everyone knows the elders there. We taught lessons to Ibans, and we taught a man in English who had flagged down the missionaries to request a Book of Mormon just a couple days earlier. It was a really good day! We watched the Asia area broadcast for church yesterday, which was also really good. It was my first time at a real church meeting, and I love the branch here. There are many awesome members! I hope all is well with you, and know that I'm having a great time here and working hard. I love you all! -Elder Earl

Week 22

This week was super awesome! I started the week by preparing to leave and a couple appointments. It was sad leaving the area, because I really love KL, but I was also excited for my first transfer. I packed all my bags, had a celebratory dinner with the Zone Leaders at Chilis, of all places, and left. The transfer went smoothly. Sibu so far has been amazing. We focus a lot on less actives and building the branch, but we also have a goal of one new investigator a week that we have to work hard to achieve. The branch here is super cool. I love my companion, and our house is very large. We bike around everywhere, or go with the senior couple around to appointments in their car. The food is good, the areas we've worked in are very nice, and I'm excited. General conference was something we watched this past weekend, but I only watched one session in English, so hopefully later I can catch up. It was a good experience watching conference in Chinese, though. I'm really excited to work in this new area, where I will probably be a while. I love it here, and I am excited to get a lot of work done. Wo ai ni men! -Elder Earl

Week 21

It's been a good one, but we have learned a few lessons about patience. One fun experience we had was having someone throw an egg at us before we started a lesson. It did explode everywhere, but we still taught the lesson (we moved so they wouldn't get us again), and our investigator wants to follow all the commandments. We also spent some time looking for missing members. Unfortunately, we didn't find any. So that was sad. But we got to see some cool areas we've never seen before in the process. We got to take a bus this week to visit a family in our branch that lives in a different state, in a place called Seremban. That was pretty fun. The most exciting part of the week was transfer news, which happened today. I am going to Sibu with an Elder that just trained my MTC companion. Elder Chong is going to be with Elder Broadhead, who I lived with in Singapore. I'm excited that all three of us from the MTC will be in East together! I can't imagine many missionaries have been able to serve in the three separate land masses of the mission so quickly as I will. I hope all goes well this week packing and leaving, and I hope the work in Cheras picks up very soon. Have a good week, everyone! Wo ai ni! -Ge Zhanglao

Week 20

The week was a super good one, and who knows? It could be one of my last in Cheras. This week we were able to contact a lot of people who may or may not have interest. So that's good. Hopefully some of them choose to start investigating the church. One of them I talked to on the LRT told me he was an 18 year old boy in Form 5 not sure if he wants to go to college. He took a Book of Mormon, and afterwards texted me saying he had really lied and he was 25 already in college, and just thought it was funny seeing if I believed him. I got to do my first district leader exchange this week, which was super fun. Elder Chong went to Puchong and loved it. He told me "If you go to Puchong, you will be happy all day every day no matter what!" People there apparently even say "hi" back. :D I stayed behind in Cheras, and we contacted several people who had some interest. One person from the night before even called me and requested to learn more about the Book of Mormon. The KL Elders have an appointment with him to do just that. Two people approached my district leader and talked to him in Chinese randomly (despite the fact he's totally blonde and had an English tag on), and I got to talk to both of them about the gospel. We also ran into a member who has been looking for the church, and she brought a non-member Chinese family member to church this week. At the end of the week, I looked at the training book and the "application in proselyting" for the week is that the new missionary takes the lead in all teaching and planning, and looking back, because we taught in English with Elder Chong and Chinese when I did the exchange (it was kind of weird, so I went out two days with different Malay Elders), I did without even thinking about it! We watched some of the Work of Salvation broadcast in church yesterday, which was cool. Hopefully it inspires the members to give us lots of referrals! ;) Last week for p-day we went to Batu caves, which was cool. This week we are going pretty far out to visit a member family, so yeah. Anyway, have a great week! I love you all! Elder Earl

Week 19

This week has been a good one! Last week on preparation day, we went with a couple cool members around. Both are planning on missions, one is only waiting on a visa. We first ate at a Tamil banana leaf place. It was super good! They gave us lots of food! After, we took some pictures at KLCC, then we went to a Relief Society activity. We ended by eating a great Iranian dinner. It was a good day for food. I had some cool meetings this week as well. The first was a zone meeting, where we learned about a district goal to find all the missing people on the branch lists. That will give us a great thing to keep us busy! We ate at a house of some Americans working here, and it was super nice. The coolest meeting though was I finally had my New Missionary Training! After that, the Mission President and wife came to our house to interview us and do a cleaning check. He has to be one of the most busy people in the world with such a spread-out mission, but they are both so wonderful. One cool thing he said, regarding our area, was "Not all the soil is good, but you need to plow it all." We had a couple cool miracles this week. #1 was we went to find a brother whose record was recently transferred from BYU, but hasn't been to church yet. The first time, no one was home, so we left a card. The next time, the card was still there, so we kind of figured no one was there, but right then, his father pulled up and we were able to talk to him on the phone. Also, yesterday we felt we should go to a mall after church to contact, which we have never done before, but it just so happened a giant Chinese checkers tournament was going on, keeping countless young Chinese people occupied. I have never contacted so many people before, and we were able to plant many seeds. We're excited to do the Lord's work here in Cheras another week! Hopefully we'll be able to find success, but if not, we at least know we are doing what He wants us to. I hope you all have a wonderful week, as well! Love, Elder Earl