Komo stapo my homeboys (and homegirls),
Just kidding, although I refer to all of my friends here who are Elders as my homeboys. Especially those from my MTC group. Gosh I'm getting weird.
This week was hard. But if you go through your whole mission without hard days and hard weeks, you are doing something terribly, terribly wrong. But yeah, when all of your investigators are in the Philippines for the holidays, and all of your other ones are working all the time because it's the holidays, and you get rejected over and over on the MRT, and you have another cold because you come into contact with so many people every day, and the city is loud and you're constantly bombarded by advertisements and lights and noise, it's a little discouraging at times. It really was one of those weeks where I thought, "I just need to make it to P-Day. If I make it to P-Day, I won't go postal (or go home)." Haha.
I think part of my problem too is I just have more time to think about home, and about if I'm a good enough missionary, and what I'm going to do with my life after the mission. Oh and also why are the Elders in this mission such wonderful men of God, so kind, and so dang cute? This is a problem! Main-main sahaja (just kdding) but I've definitely been working on not distracting myself. Back in East Malaysia, I legitimately did not have enough time to think about petty little things because it was appointment after appointment, and then we'd come home and crash because we were so tired from biking all day in the sun and speaking in Malay all day. I miss those days, and the nature of the work here in Singapore is a little different, but the work is still the same. There's just a lot more white noise here.
Some days we sit at home and call potential and former investigators, which was miraculously promising last night because Sister Hansen and I threw our hands up in the air and decided we were going to call EVERYBODY we could think of when our appointment fell through. But like I said, even though we called probably a hundred people, we got a handful of appointments this week and a couple people said, "Where have you been? I've been waiting for you to call!"
It's also hard to feel motivated when you're tired and sick and nothing is really happening in your area, but I've tried to combat it by first, just acting, for example, calling people, and talking with everyone I see, even when I really, really don't feel like being rejected again. I've also thought back on my purpose as a missionary, which is to bring people closer to Christ, and I've also thought about what His Atonement means personally to me, and why I wanted to share that with people in the first place. I've also thought about how I would want the missionaries serving in the areas where my loved ones are (like so much of my family, and so many friends) to work hard, and how I'm that missionary to someone else. So I should work hard. I've also thought about how much of a better missionary I am when for example, Elder Crosland and Elder Toney are around, like when we have the same dinner appointment at a church member's house, just because they're really good missionaries and I want to emulate that. And I've thought about how if I'm a better missionary when they're around, how much better would I be if I acted like the Savior was around? I've also thought back to Doctrine and Covenants 123 and wrote "Waste and Wear Out My Life" on my window. But really, none of it's helping with not feeling motivated. The only thing that helps is to act. Faith without action is dead.
But no matter what, I wouldn't trade my mission for anything. I still see miracles every day. After a day of nothing happening, I exclaimed, "Sister Hansen, we should say a prayer that we'll find someone to talk to." We walked onto one of those bridges that allows pedestrians to cross the street, stopped in the middle of it, and we prayed right there with cars zipping by under us. As we were walking off the bridge, we saw a compur couple walking, and the husband had an American flag shirt. I caught up with them and said, "Are you American? Because we are!" and he said no, he was from New Zealand, and his wife is from the Philippines, but we had a good conversation with them and I gave them a copy of The Book of Mormon. They were stopping by in Singapore from the Philippines back to New Zealand, so we'll never see them again, but it was cool to see how fast Heavenly Father is willing to answer our prayers.
And here are a couple funny things from a couple weeks ago: Elder Toney accidentally knocked my planner into a fountain on Christmas day, and he felt SO bad and tried to give me his new planner, which you could tell he worked really hard to decorate. Sister Hansen and I decorated new planners last week (I sent a picture because it was just so great) and we laughed way too hard at the picture of the little ginger kid she glued onto hers. I still use my water-logged planner, it's only a couple more weeks till transfers anyway. Also, last week at Keith's baptism, remember how I forgot to fill the font but it was miraculously filled? When we were talking to Elder Berger about who filled it, he described a tall Filipino with curly hair. Since we don't have anyone like that in our ward, Elder Crosland and I said at the same time, "It was one of the 3 Nephites!"
Speaking of Elder Crosland, the four of us had a dinner appointment with a couple from the ward and their friend from Korea. Elder Crosland was asking her how to say "Can" in Korean, and she thought he asked how to spell it, so she said, "C-A-N," and then he repeated "C-A-N?" because he thought she was saying the actual word. Sister Hansen and I lost it and couldn't stop laughing. Also, the Elders were super sweaty because we live on the equator and the food was really spicy. We also got lost in Singapore with the APs after our appointment, and totally got home on time...like we always do when we have appointments with the APs... but we had some good conversations. At the bus stop, Sister Hansen said, "Man, I swear the four most awkward missionaries serve in the 3rd ward." and Elder Crosland said, "Okay, let's have an area discussion on how not to be awkward." As I'm typing all of this, I realize it's not funny in writing, but it's funny to me because I'm a missionary and we're all just so dorky.
On New Years Eve, we went to Barbie's house, and her and Art are super stressed about their wedding but it'll be okay. By the way I'm going to their wedding this Saturday. Sister Hansen and I stayed up til midnight because we can kind of see Marina Bay from our apartment, and we watched the fireworks in the distance. Remember those pictures of me writing on the beach ball? Lots of people in Singapore wrote their New Years wishes on them, and they were put in the bay where the fireworks were. So hopefully mine comes true.
We also had New Missionary Training this week, it was weird being on the other side of it as a trainer. I still learned so much and it was nice seeing so many of the missionaries in Singapore, even though I see them at least once a week. I remember how happy I was at my own in Kuching and seeing all of my homeboys. Also, props to the APs for flying in from East Malaysia that day, doing the training, and flying out to KL that night. Their lives are crazy, Sister Hansen and I love and respect them so much and we're grateful we get to serve with them when they're actually in Singapore. Yesterday, they let us into the office so we could edit some forms, and they gave me great advice on how to feel more motivated. I told them, "This week, it felt like I was swimming in a vat of honey and everything hurts, and I wonder if I'll ever be a Preach My Gospel Missionary." They first said swimming in honey sounds awesome, but then they told me to remember my purpose and they were just so Christ-like and kind. That reminds me, Elder Toney is like a basketball star and Elder Crosland breaks horses (yes he wears a cowboy hat when he does it) and has raccoons named Meeko and Clyde.
And then there's Sister Hansen. I love her, there's never a dull moment with her. She is so funny and every day I almost fall to the ground laughing. We love when other missionaries tell us, "I love your companionship." Your companionship makes or breaks an area, and even though this week was hard, we're feeling pretty good and gung-ho about missionary work. It's a good thing we're best friends, because we're gonna DO WORK this week. Our motto this week is "Do it if you're real."
Love you all,
Sister Wynn
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