Crazy, stupid faith

Nama berita guys,

Here are some reasons why I love Sister Bourgeois:
1. She's left handed too!
2. Scar Tissue is also her favorite Red Hot Chili Peppers song
3. She's way patient with me
4. She's obsessed with Grey's Anatomy

and I call her my little xiphoid process because we remember random vocabulary from anatomy. Or we high-five each other when Sister Parcell's boogers are black because her mascara runs and I tell her it's because her make up went into her lacrimal duct and into her nose. Everyone I live with is gorgeous and brilliant, and I'm just over here getting chubby off of all this good food.

Food...

Today is my 8 month mark. I turned to Elder Strathearn (he's emailing somewhere behind me) and said, "Happy 8 months to us!"

He said, "Today? Wow...that--that's a long time."

This week was so good. I'm really, really, really tired of rice (please no one make it for me when I get back) and I'm pretty sure Sister Bourgeois and I ate pork that wasn't cooked all the way last night...but honestly I'm surprised I haven't gotten sick from the food here before. I've eaten gutter catfish before and that didn't even get me [that] sick.

Last P-Day was one of my favorite yet. After not being able to find an open field for the longest time, we decided to play in the street by this park (if you can even call it that) and these little Iban kids joined in. It was so much fun! The girls played with my hair afterwards and kept punching Elder Gualtier and calling him a booger. Precious little ones, haha. The parks and fields here are a little more worn down than they are in Singapore...and I'm really grateful for tetanus shots.

For some reason this week, I decided I wanted to redouble my efforts and we went and saw even more people than we thought we could. I can't decide if I'm exhausted because I'm sick, or exhausted because I'm a missionary and this is what missionaries are supposed to feel like, haha. Don't worry though, Sister Bourgeois doesn't let me out of the house if I'm sick, and it's nice that she's working hard right there next to me.

We've been praying to find more people to teach who have cars, especially men because we need more priesthood, kan? If we get enough people who can drive to church, our branch can split, and then we can have a branch closer to our area and all 300 of our less actives who would go to church but can't because they don't punya a car can come to church a lot more easily. At least that's our game plan for now, and it's cool to see how Heavenly Father helps us carry out our game plans.

Elder Bester, the inspired little Canadian that he is, said something that struck me in District Meeting last week:"If we labor, God will do the work."

He and Elder Reynolds are such a good example to me of hard working, smart missionaries. Except Elder Bester was sick this week too, but won't admit it so Elder Reynolds made him stay inside for a couple days. Elder Reynolds had a tough week a couple weeks ago, he finally had that realization (that all greenies have) that he's not gonna baptize all of Malaysia this month. But I told him never to lose his faith. "Always keep that faith you have from when you're a new missionary. Just have crazy, stupid faith all the time, and even when you're let down, keep having faith that things will work out."

I also told him what Elder Spence-man from Scotland wrote to me, "I not only believe that Heavenly Father will provide a way when I cannot, I expect Him to."

It was nice to see Elder Wayment this week, he was on splits with Elder Reynolds and we had a meeting with our branch president. His Malay and Iban are off the charts. And he's still so funny. I also got to see Elder Mitchell because they were passing off an investigator to us. I love that so many of my Miri friends are here in Kuching.

As we were riding back from the airport, we saw the most brilliant sunset, and planes were landing, and it smelled like smoke and jungle and I thought to myself, "This is nice."

I love being a missionary, I love being in Malaysia. I love my Ibans, and Bidayus, and Filipinos. I'm grateful for every day I have here.

Senang hati saya. See you soon.

-Sister Wynn

What  sight...

Where Sister Wynn gets humbled (what's new?)

Anei abar mu, my friends?

That's "Apa khabar" in Bidayuh, a really sweet sister was teaching me some phrases after church.

Well, little Tracy, the sweetest girl ever got baptized, and her family is reactivated. Like all baptisms, it was VERY humbling for me because like all the baptisms I've ever been in charge of, I forgot a lot of things. I didn't forget to fill up the font (like I did with Keith's baptism) but I did forget about baptismal clothes until 10 minutes before the baptism started. By some miracle, it all worked out. I forgot to take one of the extra jumpsuits home so I got a call from a church member the next day asking about it, to which I apologized profusely (I gave our baptizer, Brother Christopher an extra one because the first one didn't fit him and I only took one home to wash). I also knocked a huge stack of towels over in the clerk's office and forgot to pick them back up, so I called Batu Kawa's clerk and apologized to him. And our speaker who was supposed to give a talk on the gift of the Holy Ghost couldn't make it to the baptism so I just kind of wing-ed a talk on it.

I was more nervous because I didn't want the other missionaries to think I'm bad at Malay, and not so much the locals. But everyone said I did a good job and know more Malay than I think I do. I wasn't really that nervous, I just said a quick prayer and talked about the Holy Ghost like I do in all my lessons.

Thank goodness this work is not my work, it's God's work. I would fail if I had to do this on my own, but because He loves all of His kids over here in Kuching (and loves me even though I'm a dork), He makes it so I can speak, so people can get baptized, and so on. In theory, it should make the work easier (and it does), but I'm still exhausted all the time and always pretty humbled. I need those humbling experiences, haha.

Bowling

Last week we went bowling, and even though I rolled my eyes at the idea, I loved spending time with the people I love. It doesn't matter what we do, we still have lots of laughs. Today we're playing frisbee because Sister Parcell and I got addicted in Singapore and memaksa-ed the whole zone to play today. So even though I'm still really bad at bowling, I got lots of spares and a strike. I'm really proud of myself, if you can't tell. Elder Jensen commented that I must have gone on a lot of bowling dates when I was at BYU...which isn't untrue...haha. Afterwards, we biked to the airport because there's a McDonald's there, and Elder Gualtier talked me into eating a Megamac, and Sister Bourgeois and Sister Parcell and I had a kind of "Do it if you're real" conversation. So I ate the entire Megamac, a large fry, and two cokes just because Elder Gualtier thought I couldn't do it.

Megamac & Fries

Fun fact about him: whenever I call the Stampin Elders and he answers the phone, I think I called the wrong number because he sounds like a native speaker. He has the most BEAUTIFUL Malay because he spent some time in KK. I met him my first night in Kuching on the road. He's Elder Strathearn's comp, and Elder Strathearn had this huge grass stain on his shirt because he's not pandai bicycle and always falls off. I've missed him. He asked about everyone from our MTC group and said "I just hope they're happy and that they're being good missionaries."

Elder Strathearn also shared an experience during zone meeting, where he had a pass off lesson with the Chinese Elders. The lesson was being taught in Chinese, so he didn't understand what was going on, so he just sat there. Then he decided to pray for Elder Sutherland anytime he was teaching, and after the lesson, Elder Sutherland said, "Wow, that was the best Chinese I've ever had in a lesson." I hope that conveys what kind of a person Elder Strathearn is, he's forever my little brother in the mission. I wonder if he ever prayed for me in the MTC as I taught with him, because I always had words come to mind that I hadn't studied in a while.

Sister Bourgeois and I found out we had a chunk of a neighborhood over by the airport. It hadn't been visited in so long that no one was sure whose area it actually was, so we were like, "What's the catch?" The catch was that it was all terrace houses with gates, and as we were trekking through the jungle to go towards the airport, we got attacked by these super mosquitos! There were literally 20 on each of my legs, sucking my blood. We screamed and biked away, and it felt like my legs were on fire! We went to the airport to get McDonald's ice cream cones, cried about our problems for a little bit, regrouped, and went back to our familiar kampungs.

We saw a lot of miracles though, we followed a prompting to visit one of our members because we felt like she needed support (and this was over visiting a less active). I explained to Sister Bourgeois that sometimes it's better to just do good even if it doesn't count as a key indicator. On the way, we ran into our former investigator who was at kampung all month, who invited us over the next day. Then we ended up teaching her friend who was really interested.

What else...oh that day we taught Regimah, Sister Bourgeois was internally freaking out the whole time haha. I asked, "What, you've never just waltzed into someone's house, sat down, and proclaimed the restored Gospel before?"

To which she said, "No, that was awesome!"

If I had to describe missionary work in one word, I'd say it's fun. I'm still loving every day.

Sayang kau,
Sister Wynn

[No Subject] - No seriously, she didn't write anything on the subject line!

Selamat tengah hari everyone,

Sorry my email's gonna be lame because Sista B and I were confined to our apartment literally all week. We were so sick, ugh. Jangan risau, we're completely sihat again and ready to work work work to make up for last week.

Well the Crocodile Farm was fun last week, I almost got my face ripped off by a monkey and Sister Bourgeois had a panic attack in the bird room because she has a crippling fear of birds. We almost cried because there were a couple otters and they were so cute. Ironically, the crocodiles are the most boring part of the farm, just like in Miri. They just kind of sit there and move sluggishly. Every once in a while they'll fight with each other but it's kind of lazy. But if you throw a chicken at them you realize how fast and deadly they are when they want to be.

Sea otters

Gator ridin'

That reminds me, we have a less active family who lives over a river, and they were telling us how a buaya (crocodile) came up to their back porch and ate their dog...and they thought it was the funniest thing ever. If you ever want to freak Ibans out, tell them you've eaten crocodile meat before because they believe if you eat a crocodile, its spirit will haunt you and lead other crocodiles to eat you. Something like that.

Sister Parcell is obsessed with her hot sauce that her mom sent her from America. She's really loving and giving, but she threatened us that if we ever use her hot sauce, we need to lick it off the plate because it's precious. Anyway, she was talking by me in the kitchen with it, and I was talking to Sister Bourgeois and telling a story, and I made a motion with my arms and knocked her hot sauce to the ground...it shattered everywhere. It looked like a crime scene... there was hot sauce all over the walls and ground. Sister Parcell put her hands to her head and didn't say anything for what seemed like an eternity. I apologized over and over while Sister Bourgeois and Sister Pettitt stood there laughing at us. Then Sister Parcell sat down and scooped up some hot sauce from the puddle on the ground. Then she got over it and said it was okay, and in that moment, we realized how Christlike Sister Parcell really is. I ruined the most precious thing in the world to her and she still loves me. But really, if anyone is sending me a package anytime soon, throw a bottle of Valentina's hot sauce in there too. I've been trying to make it up to her by buying her Dr. Pepper and Japanese mayonnaise at random intervals, but it's just not the same. We're still buds though. I love my roommates/comp, I don't know why I've been so blessed to have good friends on my mission but I'll take them. Even though we were stuck inside all week, we had some good laughs.

Anyway, love you all, see you soon.

-Sister Wynn

P.S. We're going bowling today because the elders in our zone really want to and we live on the other side of the world. It's one of those exotic things you just can't do in America ;)

Proselyting turtles

Aku Anak Kampung

Kamu tahu kamu cantik.

Those are the words to my new favorite song, "Aku Anak Kampung." Ini maksud "I am a kampung child," and that's what I am! I live for the sweet kampungs. The most humble, kind people live there.

It's true what they say about missions, you get 50 years worth of stories in 2 years...and man we had a lot of crazy cool stuff happen to us this week. But let me start from last Monday:

We just had a nice lunch at a buffet with our zone, and the best part is Kuching is pretty much a Miri reunion. That's right, I get to serve with Sister LeBaron, Elder Snyder, Elder Wayment, and Elder "Sammich" Mitchell" again! They're all doing so great, and they're all still the same wonderful people they were in Miri, except more proficient in Malay (or in Elder Mitchell's case, Chinese). And I also get to serve with Elder Strathearn, who is still the epitome of Christ-like charity. And I'm making even more mission friends. We have a good little zone. We went to Waterfront afterwards, and we jammed with some of the locals and just took in how beautiful Kuching is. There's a huge sign that says "VMY 2014" (Visit Malaysia Year 2014) and I highly recommend all of you do it. Sister Parcell, who I think is just gonna be in my mission forever, said, "I totally get why you're so obsessed with East Malaysia now."

VMY 2014

That night, we went to Brother Martin's house for the most epic Malam Keluarga (FHE) ever. There was dancing on tables (by toddlers) and very bad karaoke (sung by yours truly). And Sister Bourgeois and I fell in love with the song "Aku Anak Kampung." They played it for us like 3 times because we were so in love with it.

Karaoke; let's hope they didn't quit their day jobs!

The next day, 6 of us missionaries went to the bike shop (one of my tubes definitely had a slow leak) and while we were waiting, this guy named John started talking to us. He is a photographer for the Associated Press, lives in KL, and is from Seattle. He kacaued us a little but said he had good mormon friends in college and his boss is LDS. He gave us RM100 for no reason other than he is a good man. Then he looked at our tires and said, "Do you even have treads on your tires?" to which we replied no...and he said, "That's dangerous." He went back into the bike shop and bought us ALL brand new bike tires. Elder Reynolds, whom I call Elder Hijou (Elder Greenie) tried to give him a Book of Mormon by going up to him and saying, "Can I give you a Book of Mormon?"

We all laughed at him (including John) and so I decided to teach Elder Reynolds how it's done. I talked to John about his family and promised him he'd see his parents again and also explained that we were grateful for the new tires because we had an Elder die in Kuching recently as he was riding his bike. I testified of the plan of happiness and how everything unfair in life is made fair because of Christ. He still wasn't interested but he took a picture with us and was so cool. We told him he was Christlike, to which he guffawed and rode away into the sunset with his photo crew.

The next day, Sister Bourgeois and I were sitting at the bike shop waiting for them to change our tires, and contacted everyone who walked into the bike shop. We met the coolest guy named Oscar, who was genuinely interested in learning more about our church, and someone named Steve from the UK who lives a couple hours from Sibu and teaches English in schools. He wasn't super interested, but was so kind and we chatted for a long time. As we were walking away, I had the thought (prompting) to give him our blog addresses, so we did because I hate delaying promptings and I want Heavenly Father to know He can trust me. So if you're reading this Steve, apa khabar kamu? Keep working on your Malay :)

We had another night were the Elders showed us the homes of a couple less active families, and at one point Elder Reynold's chain fell off his gears on a bridge so I stood kind of in the road and obnoxiously stood there with my foot in the road so cars could see us. Hence the attached picture. Then the Elders gave a couple blessings to sick church members and I was reminded how grateful I am for the Priesthood, and how in those moments, all the elders I've ever served with turn from boys to men.

Light of the world?

Sister Bourgeois and I (with the other sisters) got stuck in Batu Kawa last night, don't ask how, but let's just say disobedience was never happiness. And Batu Kawa is kind of JAUH from our area, like a 40 minute cab ride. It was getting later and later in the night and we hadn't seen any cabs, and Elder Robinson told us to get off the streets (he and Elder Toney were on splits in Kuching that night) but we prayed to find a cab. As we were looking, Sister Parcell and I spotted a white van with a nice looking couple in it, and we both felt like we should ask them where they were going...we did and they said, "Do you need a ride?" to which we said, "Yeah! We need to go to Kuching!" and they said, "Hop on in!" I chatted with them in Malay, and they said they were Melayu so I said I couldn't talk to them about my volunteer work with my church, but I kept thanking them for their kindness. Sister Parcell tried practicing her Malay, but I said, "Don't talk about church." and she said, "Aw man, that's all I know!"

But then she said, "Aku anak kampung!" to which the lady pointed to her collection of CDs and we said, "Play it!" So for about 40 mintues, we all jammed to "Aku Anak Kampung" until we got to Kuching, and then when they dropped us off at our apartment, they said it was free of charge, but to tell all of our friends about their van service. I said they were malaikat, angels.

And that's the story of how we hitch hiked from Batu Kawa to Kuching in a party van.

Aw man I'm out of time, so many more good things, like how we had 7 less actives from  4 different families come to church because reading The Book of Mormon with them works.

Aku anak kampung.

Aku anak Tuhan.

We're all anak Tuhan.

The church is true!

Kuching Boleh Baaah (email I meant to send last week, whoops)

Nama berita,

Or however you say it in Bedayu, because Kuching is full of Ibans and Bedayus.

First, I have the best big brother ever because he looked up a bunch of cool things to do here on P-Day and I plan on making every one count because this transfer is a wildcard. Who knows where I'll be for the rest of my mission, but I plan on working harder and smarter here than anywhere else so far on my mission.

I love Kuching. Kota Sentosa. It seems like so many people I know served in this branch, Sister Nielson, Elder Simon (back when he was Elder Simon and not the incredible MTC teacher Brother Simon), Elder Putnum, Elder Crosland. They are so sweet and so loving. I love my comp. Sister Bourgeois is perfect. The only thing wrong with her is she doesn't realize how amazing, capable, gorgeous, and pandai bahasa Melayu she is. We're already best friends and got matching "Elder Scott" watches #compunity. She has an incredible conversion story, where the powers of earth and hell combined against her to try and stop her from getting baptized 2 years ago. It's been fun trekking to kampungs again with her. Except Kuching is really clean and the kampungs have perfectly paved roads going through them. It's weird.

I've been blessed LIBERALLY by the spirit as I'm finishing her training (she came pre-trained #thedistrict2quotes). In lessons, words and phrases I haven't thought of or studied in months come into my mind. I was a little worried for about 2 seconds that my Malay wouldn't be good, because it got a little rusty in Singapore, but then I got over it because I trust Heavenly Father like crazy, shrugged, and hopped on my bike and got to work. There's no way I could speak as well as I can or understand everything (I really do understand everything now) that is said to me without the help of the spirit. There's no way anyone could learn a language like this if it weren't for the spirit. I got up and bore my testimony in church without really thinking about it yesterday, and talked to everyone and participated in lessons. I don't really know how it happened. I remember 6 months ago, as a greenie going to Miri, we were at Kuching's airport for our layover. I watched Elder Hays talk on the phone to someone in Sibu as he set up an appointment in perfect Malay and wondered if I'd ever be able to speak like that. I love my mission. So many cool experiences.

All of my areas in my mission have included the airport, but none have been as close as Kota Sentosa. There's one kampung where the planes fly SO low over it, and I love it. I'm currently working on getting a sweet picture, the last one I sent doesn't do it justice. I see a lot of AirAsia and Malaysia Airlines planes. It is a little obnoxious when I'm trying to teach a lesson and every 7 minutes I have to talk or pray over the roaring of a jet engine. Mikel would love it here. We also bike right in front of Kuching's airport to get to church. Church is in a shop lot on the other side of the airport, and the stairs to get to it are really ghetto, but when you reach the 5th floor, everything is so clean. No matter where you go, church smells the same haha. It really reminded me of being home even though our branch meets in a humble little shop lot.

She wasn't kidding about the proximity to the Kuching Airport....

I'm not as sore as I thought I'd be getting back on a bike. Singapore made me gemuk sedikit. I'm also no longer afraid of biking on busy highways and crossing 3 or 4 lanes, or going through roundabouts. I was always a little scared in Miri. It's pretty easy to get back into the swing of things in East Malaysia. Our elders are awesome. Elder Bestor talks a LOT and is such a character. He thinks Canada is cool, but he is so genuine. Elder Reynolds is his greenie and always looks tired, isn't afraid to make ALL the language mistakes (and I mean all of them) and talk to people. He also has an incredible voice.

After studies yesterday, Sister Bourgeois and I had flat tires on both of our bikes, it was the weirdest thing. We called them up and they dropped everything to help us, although by the time they showed up, I already had checked the tubes and was putting the tires back on my bike. Elder Bestor and I punctured both of the tubes on Sister Bourgeois' bike though...oops. But it was nice, I had a good heart-to-heart with both of them and Elder Reynolds sang to me and I decided he's kind of like a male Ingrid Michealson.

Fixin' bike tires

It's gonna be a good transfer.

Memong I miss Singapore. Our lift was being remodeled at our apartment, so for the last two weeks we had to hike up and down 8 flights of stairs. Kind of like The Big Bang Theory, except we complained more and would occasionally take a break on the 4th floor where the other sisters lived. Sister Hansen, the best comp ever, helped me lug my 60 lb suitcase down all those stairs. It was sad to say goodbye to her, but she's tearing it up in 3rd ward. Elder Toney and Elder Robinson stopped by the morning I left to say goodbye. I learned so much from them and I'm definitely going to miss their friendship, their example, and their charity towards me.

I contacted my cab driver on the way to the airport. He went by Jay and he is a sikh and we talked about our beliefs. He talked about how we just need to be good because God asks us to, and he was impressed by our church's organization and especially tithing. I explained tithing a little more, and fasting, and about the prophet and I gave him a bunch of church websites I thought he'd like. We talked about how we're not bodies, we're spirits, and he was really impressed with how young I was but how I decided to serve the Lord instead of going partying with my friends. He was really kind. At the airport, my cab fare was S$20 but he told me to just pay him S$15 and we took a selfie picture together. I asked if he'd be interested in learning more about Christ's restored gospel and he said yes! He taught me "Dakh daroo," which is Panjabi for

"Pain is medicine."

With Jay, the cab driver

Anyway, semoga berjaya to me (I'm gonna need it) and semoga berjaya to all of you. Love you. Pain is medicine, Christ is our physician.

-Sister Wynn