Paradigm Shift Part II

Oyata kohomada?

Just practicing my Sinhala. Sister Opatha's been teaching me. She's like Sri Lankan royalty. Well more like a Disney Princess. When I moved into the apartment, the same one I lived in before and the same one I stayed at for zone conference last week, I looked at my roommates, these gorgeous, spiritual giants, and thought to myself, "Maybe one day I can be a Disney princess too."

Dad and Cloe, sorry I forgot to say happy birthday last week. I hope it was a good one. I promise I thought of you during zone conference.

This transfer was nuts. I've lost count of how many times I've had to pack up my bags and go, and it just gets harder to say goodbye every time. Tuesday night, I got a call from the APs telling me my flight to Singapore was Wednesday morning. For some reason transfers were on Wednesday this time instead of Thursday. I guess I sounded pretty bummed on the phone, Elder Plazier kept apologizing over and over even though it wasn't his fault because he's sweet like that.

Sister Callor and I crunched. I calculated that we had about 14 hours to pass off our investigators to Elder Poppleton, say goodbye to all of our wonderful members, pack our bags, clean our apartment, and sleep if time allowed for it. We showed him the homes of all of the families we've been working with. I said goodbye to Dion and Anthonia and their kids. We mashed our bikes up to Waterfront and back, Nayau's family wasn't home but we slipped our notes and keychains into the mail slot in their door and called to tell them about transfers. We stopped by Josephine's and I cried a little when I hugged her goodbye, then it was Sudau's family. Sister Intang and President Changgai threw together a quick dinner and I choked up when I explained to them what D&C 130:2 means to me. Said goodbye to Carlos and nenek too.

Swung by the TBD house and I told all the kids when they're scared or sad or hurt to always remember that they're a child of God and nothing can change that. Some of the families were already asleep so Sister Callor and I slipped our letters and pictures under their doors as best we could. Veronica and her kids were last because they live close to us. When I told her I was leaving I teared up again and she hugged me and said "Sis, don't cry. Memang jumpa lagi!"

I hate goodbyes. I'm more of a "I'll see you soon" type of person.

We got home, said a prayer of gratitude for the time we had in Stampin branch, and got to work. In the middle of the night, Sister Callor said, "I wish they didn't book our flight for tomorrow morning. I wish they didn't do transfers this way this time. "

We recently had a good conversation about proactive thinking versus reactive thinking and I said obnoxiously, "That's reactive thinking!" She laughed and I asked, "Is it all gonna work out?"
"It's all gonna work out."
"Is God in the details?"
"God is in the details."

By some miracle we got everything packed and cleaned and had a couple hours to spare. We got to the airport, and Raymond, a kid who's starting his mission, was with his family and they were saying goodbye. I saw Josephine again, and she was crying, which made me almost cry, and then I said goodbye to Sister Callor and Sister Leavitt and Elder Hays (all going to KL) and got out of there. I hate goodbyes. I sat by Elder Capener on the plane, duduk maneh, and we had yet another good chat. It seems like I'm always next to him on planes. I love that kid. He's gonna rock JB. We got his bike from baggage claim and racked our brains on how he was going to get it (still in the bike box) across the city of Singapore and into JB. But as usual things just work out. We high-fived and said, "Yet another successful transfer."

I saw Sister Parcell walking towards me in the airport, so I dropped my stuff and ran to her. It was a glorious reunion. I jumped on her and she picked me up and spun me around and she said "You've gotten so skinny! What happened to you?!"
"It was the tapeworms! I went to hell and back!"

And we kept hugging and laughing and I'm just rocking my P-Day clothes and this is all happened as President and Sister Mains and the new missionaries just stared at us haha. Sister Parcell is my STL in Singapore and we're excited to bring this city to its knees.

I forgot to mention last week, when Arnold was about to be baptized, it was storming like crazy. Rain and wind and lightning everywhere. Then the power went off in the chapel. He told Sister Parcell, "Satan's trying to stop me from being baptized, and I won't let him." Then I imagine he, this cute little Dutch grandpa, shook his fist at the sky and got baptized anyway.

I got to see Raymond and Jesper as new missionaries, two kids from Kuching who are starting their missions here. I teared up because they looked AWESOME in their white shirts and ties wearing their nametags, and I thought to myself that the church in Malaysia is gonna be just fine because of people like them. I finally said goodbye to Elder Capener and told him not to get crow-barred in JB. Tears sprang to my eyes for the hundreth time that day. He said the biasa "Don't cry Sister Wynn, if you cry, then I'll cry." Just like he always does during transfers.

I feel kinda alien back in Singapore. I'm living in the same apartment, same bed, but I'm not myself. But then I heard the lyrics "I'm a phoenix in the water, a fish that's learned to fly," and it made me feel a little better. I can't fail.

 I had a good attitude coming into the area, but it was easier said than done when me and Sister Opatha filled out our calendar. I was daunted by all the empty hours. Ex-pats are hard to come by in Singapore. Well, they're not, but the ones who want to learn more about Jesus Christ are. I miss being in people's homes, especially with families. I miss teaching. I haven't taught an actual missionary lesson in a week. But it's okay because God trusts me to be here, so I'm doing my best to do things that show I can be trusted.

The noise and the lights and the advertisements and the sheer number of people I talk to in a day is exhausting though.

We have an awesome investigator (really, our only investigator) from England who's almost done with The Book of Mormon and she's been coming to church for six months. She's just waiting for an answer, so I asked her if she's down to let us help her have spiritual experiences (i.e. recognize and understand the Holy Ghost) and she said she's down.

It was weird going to church with almost all Americans yesterday. I felt like such a foreigner. Ironic, right? I miss my Ibans, but I'm not Iban at heart anymore. I have to think and live and breathe like an ex-pat now haha. I introduced myself to all the members before church started and they are all so kind. And incredible cooks. I think part of the plan is for these dinner appointments to fatten me up. Also, advice to future missionaries: the first thing you should do when you get to a new area is shake hands with and introduce yourself to ALL the members. It's a really good way to earn their trust and get to know them.

I've missed contacting people on the MRT and on the buses but I've forgotten how hard it can be sometimes. But when I see these people I think about how they need to know they're loved and that they have a Savior. I see them in all white and it makes me feel a little better. I picked up something interesting that Elder Wilson says in his prayers. He always says, "Please help us to see things as they really are." Then I came across Alma 19:6 and I think I'm finally figuring things out. I hope this email makes sense.

God is in the details my friends.

XO Sister Wynn

Paradigm Shift (Liew's Baptism and Arnold's Baptism) (TRANSFER NEWS)

Hey everyone,

I wish our card readers worked at this internet kedai because our pictures from this week pretty much capture the essence of how insane this week was. It was one of those weeks that built me because I was so weak and so underqualified but the best part about missionary work is none of that matters because the Lord qualifies us. Every. Single. Time.

Sister Callor was so sick on Tuesday and I said, "I'm sorry, but we HAVE to get out and see Liew, and then we can rest." She was a trooper and we did. Wednesday we hopped on a plane and went to Singapore. I got to see my friends from Sibu zone in Kuching's airport, and they're doing so well. Before our activity, Sister Hansen and I stopped by Brother Keith's work in Raffle's Place and got to see him. Elder Hunsaker was also telling me there were tons of people he and Elder Plazier called from my list of people I contacted in Singapore who are now learning from missionaries, including this one girl who was strong in a different church, but stopped going because she had lots of unanswered questions. Right when she was praying for help to find truth, the elders called her. Elder Hunsaker asked if I remembered her, and I said, "Psh, no! I contacted thousands of people when I was there! But are you saying things I did nine months ago that I thought didn't matter actually matter? It's like the church is true or something."

And when I thought about it, I did remember contacting this girl on the MRT. And I remember calling her back and her politely declining being taught by Sister Hansen and I. It was good for me to hear because sometimes as missionaries we forget that we do a lot of good. And it was humbling because missionary work is like a relay race. I'm just impatient I guess haha, and I want to find, teach, and baptize everyone. But for most people, they come into contact with dozens of missionaries before they think, "Hm, there's probably something to these young kids and what they're promising me."

We also stopped by Baja Fresh because I was craving good old American mexican food, then I showed some elders the way to Chinatown because I like sherpa-ing the Malaysia missionaries around my old stomping grounds. I bought TONS of keychains for our members back here in Kuching. Love em.

Zone conference was so good. More than anything, I felt so much love from my mission friends, from President and Sister Mains, and from Heavenly Father. I've always been told I was a child of God, but it wasn't really anything that had meaning until I came out here. I got to see most of my MTC elders, and they've all grown so much. A lot of them are zone leaders right now, which freaks me out because I'll always remember them as 16 punk teenage boys with greenie fire. But every time I see them, my heart swells with love because of how much they've grown and how much they love their people. I also got to see a lot of old comps and roommates, and I thought about how much they influenced my life for good. Elder O'Bryant has probably changed the most. He, along with the rest of my friends, still make me laugh so hard I double over and start to cry, but he exudes so much more confidence now. He bore an incredible testimony about how he used to lack in desire to serve, and how he only came on a mission because it's a priesthood duty. But now his mission is the most important thing to him and he's lost in the work and we can all get lost in the work. And THEN, his low baritone voice got all shakey and tight and he teared up a little bit, and I was sitting in the front so I started to cry, and it was just a mess and I thought, "Dang it Elder White Lion!"

Sister Callor and I also played our duet of "I Am a Child of God" and we were so underprepared and nervous but by some miracle it sounded really good (again, Heavenly Father helping us out). I was only running on 9 hours of sleep for that whole three days because of my cold, but it was nice to know I can do hard things like being all over Singapore while feeling sick and still being happy about it. It's like a precursor to mother hood or something haha. My head hurt SO much on the flight back. Sinus pressure and high altitudes don't mix well haha, but it's okay.

The next day, we crunched for Liew's baptism, along with the elders' in our branch. Biking felt like hiking up Mount freaking Kilamanjaro, everything hurt so much and had we not had a baptism, I would have taken a sick day haha. The font was really dirty, so we rinsed it out with the fire hose, which made it dirtier, so I handed everyone a brush and I got in the mucky water and started scrubbing. My head started killing me, and I looked at the elders and said, "Please help me" and Elder Poppleton was a total sweetheart and kicked off his shoes, rolled up his slacks, and got to work. Everything went wrong with that day, which was okay because the night before, I said, "Gear up Sister Callor, there's a baptism tomorrow and Satan's gonna try and stop it!" But the baptism itself was wonderful and Liew even teared up a little because he was so happy. He is going to be instrumental in bringing his family and friends into the church.

All the while across the country in KL, Sister Parcell and all the missionaries and members were filling up their baptismal font bucket by bucket for Arnold's baptism. Remember him? The sweet little Dutchman I was teaching when I was there. He asked, "Why are you all doing this for me?"

"Because this is how much we want you to get baptized. This is going to change your life. We love you." Sister Parcell told him.

When I biked home that night, my head felt like it was going to explode, and my lungs burned with every push, and my muscles felt like jelly, but I didn't care because knew I was the luckiest girl in the world. Arnold and Liew were baptized. They have the Holy Ghost. Their lives are different for the better. I will spend and be spent (2 Corinthians 12:15).

C.S. Lewis said, "I believe in Christ like I believe in the sun, not because I can see it, but because by them I can see everything else."

XO Sister Wynn

P.S. Getting transferred to Singapore. 1st ward. Time to network with my Americans living in Singapore. I'm sad to leave but I'm trusting Heavenly Father.

The Parable of the Swell Window

Nama berita,

Well this past week was just crazy. We have a baptism this Saturday, and as per usual the powers of earth and hell are combining to keep it from happening. Come at me, Satan.

Come at me, Satan!

So on Monday, Sister Callor totally wrecked and hit her face on the pavement, HARD. I heard this horrible sound of metal on pavement, so I turned around and saw her crash on the ground. She hit a ditch on the side of the road as we were turning. I slammed on my brakes and spun my bike around, and ended up tumbling off my bike too (got a little bruised but I'm fine guys). I ran over to her and got her talking to me. I checked the side of her face she landed on, expecting to see tons of blood, but she was just a little bruised. She landed right on her maxilla and I was sure it had to be broken and that she had a concussion. I made sure nothing else was broken and me and this Chinese man dragged her off the road to the grass, and made sure she kept talking and kept her eyes open.

We said a little prayer together, and I didn't let anyone touch her or call an ambulance because I didn't want them to take us to some sketchy hospital and make it hard for the Pryzbylas to find us. They finally came, and we got to the hospital in Matang. By then she was feeling better.

No breaks.
No concussion.

This is one of the biggest miracles from my mission. I know God protected us that night.

I begged the Pryz's to take us to McDonalds afterwards, I was starving, and they humored me at like 1 am, haha. By the time we got to district meeting we were both running on 3 hours of sleep. Embrace those crazy days, right? We took it easy and sat in the house until Friday, so I was bored out of my mind. Cabin fever is real you guys!

Cabin fever?

On Saturday, I went on splits with Sister Tai, and it was fun. I did the usual Stampin-rite-of-passage day and took her all the way to Bintawa, then to the church. Hujung kawasan kami, why not? It was nice to catch up with her and remember all the fun times it was being roommates with her in Singapore. In an impromptu lesson, we showed pictures of Christ's life and tears came to my eyes as I testified of His love for this family (and some neighbors who sat in on the lesson). I'm not one to cry in lessons, because, gross, but that lesson was as much for me as it was for them. I'm grateful for Him, on those hard days, His life is what keeps me going. Gotta tell the world, right?

As you all can probably guess, the mission has been hard for me lately. THANK YOU so much for the outpouring of sweet emails. I should be getting my letters this week too. I love you all. Thank you, thank you, thank you for the thoughts, prayers, and love. I've been really depressed lately, but in one of my recent prayers, I just asked, "Heavenly Father, are things good between us?"

And they are. So I have nothing to worry about.

Anyway, little moments this week that made me smile:

(In a lesson with a less active and recent convert):
Me: So we have a baptism this weekend, can you guys come and show your love and support of  Liew?
LA: Uh tengok-lah, we might be busy or still feeling kinda--
RC: We'll be there.

(Before going to Liew's house to teach him the rest of the commandments. ALL of the Tabuan Dayak kids wanted to follow and fellowship):
Laren (11 year old boy): Sampit dulu. Let's pray first.

(Introducing myself to non-members at church):
Shirley (11 year old girl): These are my next door neighbors. They were learning from the missionaries before. This one smokes!
Me: Do you want us to help you stop smoking?
Potential Investigator: Yes. Please help me.

(Praying with Sister Callor about if we can teach 5 lessons in 2 weeks to Liew and see him to baptism):
Me: Heavenly Father, CAN we do this?
Me: I have a good feeling. Do you have a good feeling?
Sister Callor: This is happening.

Good things are happening in our area. It's like catching a wave. Best feeling ever, and you can feel the swells coming if you know what to look for. One of the most important things I learned in surfing is to be in the right place. If you're not, you look over and your friends are catching all the good waves. I guess you could liken that to obedience/following the spirit and having those miraculous right-place-right-time moments. And sometimes you fall off your board and get a little cut up on the reef (or your comp falls off her bike) but you need to keep going for it.

There's a swell coming in Stampin branch. Double-overhead. We've met so many incredible people who are willing to let us in. So visa renewals and injuries aside, this is going to be a good week.

Sayau ke dik.

Sister Wynn

P.S. Check out "Swell Window" by Zee Avi

The distance between heaven and hell

Hey guys,

Well this week was good. Hard, but good. I would be lying if I said there weren't days this week where I wanted to go home. And life wouldn't be bad if I went home. But the mission is good too, I promise. I'm happy that I made it to another P-Day and I don't have to worry about anything for 6 more hours. If anyone wants to talk me down, a nice email or letter would really do me good. How did you guys do it? How did you get through those months where you wanted to go home?

I had a really good heart-to-heart with Elder Trudo yesterday. He's a dear friend from the MTC and now he's my district leader. When he transferred here, he told us "I'm not some robot you report numbers to every week, if you ever need to hash things out, I'll listen." I just told him about our area, it's good but no obvious progression, which is okay, I feel stuck, and all these petty little things are getting to me. He said something along the lines of God doesn't expect us to be happy all the time, He doesn't expect everything to be perfect all the time, but He does expect us to trust Him.

Some way crappy stuff has been happening to some of our members, and I've been crying a little about it lately which is weird because I haven't cried that much since being on a mission. I think a lot of missionaries can relate, we teach a lot of people who don't realize they don't have to be stuck in their circumstances, but I also understand because I've been there. Thank goodness for the Atonement. It allows us to change. But people don't always understand, or don't know that they can get out, and I understand that too. Aduh. There's a kid in our branch who has been having a hard time, and we've found him wandering around every once in a while, so we invite him to follow us to our lessons, which cheers him up. We were sharing Mosiah 24:14 with a family, and I turned to him and told him "I want you to know and I promise you that He visits you in your afflictions." And then I almost started crying but I was able to stop myself, which is good because that probably would have freaked him out. Ha.

We were in another lesson and a girl in our branch took me aside and asked if she and this other kid could ride our bikes for a little bit because he's been having a hard time, and originally I said no because my bike is sketchy (um my brakes may have been failing me lately but anang erau it's in the bike shop now). But she poked her head in the door during our lesson again, and I gave her our lock combination with my hands as discreetly as I could so their parents wouldn't get mad, and then I turned to Sister Callor and said, "We need to stall. Find another scripture!"

So yeah those two kids are probably childhood sweethearts or something, and they don't even know it.

Sister Callor and I have been focusing on finding more people to teach lately because a lot of our investigators haven't been progressing as much as we want, so we're going to give them a little time to process what we've taught. So in the mean time, we've been knocking doors, mana2pun, praying specifically to find families. We've been pretty successful at getting into doors, which is nice. There was a day where all of our plans fell through, and it started raining pretty hard, so I biked up a hill into a secret kampung and saw this sweet old man sitting under his porch. I biked up to him and asked if we could wait under his roof because I didn't want to get kena hujan-ed. I saw that he was blind so I grabbed his hand and introduced myself. His wife came outside and invited us in, and I thought, "Sweet, this is going to be one of those miracle stories." But then I saw the jawi script above their door and thought "Hmm maybe not." This family was so sweet. We met all the daughters and granddaughters and they were all beautiful. The dad was so cool. He said, "I know you can't legally teach me, but it's not about my religion versus your religion, it's about friendship. You have friends here anytime." It was nice to sip hot Milo and not have to worry about anything for a bit, and now if I ever come back to Malaysia I have a place to stay. Luckily, they pointed us to their neighboring kampung which has a lot of Christians, and they said, "Go talk to them, we'll put in a good word for you!"

I almost killed Elders Stowell and Poppleton the other night, but I couldn't because they're so sweet and genuine. They asked us to go see a less active family in their area, in Bintawa, the industrial section of Kuching that's jauh from civilization. They weren't able to go because they had a really important lesson in Sungai Apong, and because we love them, we said we would go. We cancelled a couple of our investigator appointments and organized everything so they could receive a blessing, and biked in the pouring rain in the middle of the night to get out there. We planned to meet the senior couple at the entrance of Bintawa, so we biked over there, took shelter under an isolated building, and waited. They weren't able to find us for a while, so after the third call, I heard Elder Stowell's voice in the background. I hung up and said, "Sister Callor, the Elders are with the senior couple. There's no reason for us to be here. I'm going to kill them."

When they finally found us, we were soaked, and of course, the elders were perfectly dry. Elder Stowell gave me this sheepish look, and I couldn't be mad at him anymore. I love those two. They're amazing missionaries, and the appointment itself was really fun. But man are boys stupid sometimes, haha. Welcome to rainy season, I've never been so cold while biking in the rain.

Anyway, Sister Fonbuena once told me the distance between heaven and hell is the distance between our head and our heart. We go to church, we understand why the gospel is important, but are we always living it? Have we internalized it? While I'm preaching repentance to the people here, am I turning around and speaking guile? Am I forgiving? Am I striving to be like the Savior in every aspect of my life? If I think about it too much, I get overwhelmed and a little sad, but it's a good visual.

All last month, I was telling Elder Capener "I don't know if I can do this for another six months. I don't know if I can make it." But the time does pass, and as I was busy whining about my problems, it suddenly hit me that I have less than five months left here. I don't know if I can give another six months, but I can give the Lord five.

Cheehoo.

-Sister Wynn

Zzzzz.....

Be Here Now

Hey guys,

Wow I can't believe it's already September. August 2013 will forever be the month I spent in a two mile radius at the MTC, stressing out wondering if I'd ever be a good little missionary or be able to speak this language, and August 2014, biasa sahaja. Tapi masih seranok. Dan anang erau, saya pandai sikit-sikit saja dan aku namuh jakuh bahasa lain mimit mimit. Also, August 31st was Malaysia's independence day, so selamat hari kemerdekaan to all my Malaysians out there. I love you so much. Thanks for being so good to me.

Well I was expecting this email to be melancholy, but I worked things out and I found my sparkle again. It took some honest introspection, reevaluating why I came out on a mission, prayer, LOTS of prayer, haha, and getting up and seeing tons of people and bringing them closer to Christ, even though I wasn't a hundred percent at the start of the week. I came out here because the Atonement is real. And people need to know that.

While I was biking a few days ago, I randomly started singing "Be Here Now," one of my favorite songs back home. Leave it to Mason Jennings to pick me up. Be here now/ no other place to be/ or just sit there dreaming of how life could be/ if we were somewhere better, somewhere far.

I forget most of the lyrics but it reminded me of how for most of my life, I've always worried about the future, or dwelt too much on the things I did before. I've spent a lot of my mission reflecting back on my life, and lately I've been missing my family a lot, and it's kind of a bummer. So I decided to focus on now. What am I gonna do today? What am I gonna do this next hour? It's been good for me.

Sun comes up and we start again.

Sister Callor and I had a really good week. I can't really remember what we did because I'm sunburned and tired, but we have some incredible investigators and we've been trying to help them have personal spiritual experiences. There's this one guy in a part member family who's met with missionaries for a long time, so we gave him a break but visited him last night and asked if we could help him develop a personal relationship with the Savior. We emphasized that he needs to read and pray to understand everything and to be truly converted, and he's down to change. Then there's a 16 year old boy who I think originally came to church because he's friends with all the cute Remaja Puteri haha, but as we've met with him, he's introduced us to his family and wept in front of us because he just wants to be a good kid and follow Christ.

Also, I got punched in the face by a mentally handicapped girl during a lesson. She nailed me right in the eye and then proceeded to tackle me. Then she decked Sister Callor and I was pretty sakit but then I couldn't stop laughing during the lesson because of it. We're terrified to go back, but we have tons of investigators who live there who we need to teach. Day in the life.

I went to Bako today with my homies. Google image "Bako National Park" and it will take your breath away. We met up with the elders after a really indah hike through the jungle and played some good old capture the flag right there on the beach. My claim to fame is tagging Elder Yang, who's super speedy, and by not getting tagged by Elder Pierce. And he played basketball at MIT so you know he's quick. Sister Hansen tackled me though but it was all good. It reminded me of our ultimate frisbee days in Singapore. It was fun to goof off and be kids for a day (while still being dignified of course). This place is beautiful.

Life has been very kind to me indeed.

Aku nyalau kinde simua (that means "I love you all" in Bidayu).

-Sister Wynn