Letter #25

Hello everyone!

 This week was amazing... the best week that I had on my mission I think so far... our investigators started to progress and a few of them set bap dates!! I cannot explain to you how much of a miracle this is..

I will start off by telling you what happened yesterday! So my companion went on a split with our zone leader, so that meant that I was on a split with an English elder…. In china town! He did not speak any Chinese and it is safe to say that I don't either! So I was so nervous! I was thinking that we probably would not have any lessons that day though so I would be ok.. The only possibilities that we had were the phone numbers that I had gotten from the day before, which usually never work. But I called; one answered, and wanted to meet with us the next day! The day I was on the split!! I was a little nervous because I had never taught a lesson alone in Chinese! But It was not to bad because I assumed that he probably would not come anyways like everyone else does. So the next day me and Elder Navarez (the English missionary) decided to start off the day by contacting.. Not something that we will usually do because there are not a lot of people in the mornings out and about. I taught Elder Navarez how to say, “have you been to church before?” And “free English class”. But when we started contacting, the man I contacted the night before walked up to us and said “hello!” I was very surprised! (You never run into anyone twice in china town!) He said that he was just at our church and no one was there. I was confused because I thought I told him at two O’ Clock. But it was ok!!! I asked him to go with us right that second to our church! And we went! I think he is the nicest kid that I have ever met! He is in high school still and just came here from northern china! He is so humble and kind! I taught him the plan of salvation and it was a spiritual lesson. I said things in Chinese that I did not even know that I knew how to say. Words were brought to my remembrance that I studied soooo long ago! I actually felt like I could speak a little Chinese! After the lesson, I invited him to be baptized! And I have no idea where that came from either, it just kind of came out!! At first he was a little nervous about it and did not really understand why or what it was. Normal…considering he just came from China! He really did not know much about church at all. But once he understood, he said of course!! He also explained that he felt soo happy talking about it and about the plan of salvation! I really think that this proves to us that the spirit teaches lessons! If two missionaries (that do not speak Chinese) can get through a lesson… Well, just WOW!! I was so happy I felt like I was on fire! Also that same day I met a really cool guy in the park! (Besides having a huge chunk of seaweed in his mouth the whole time that I was talking to him!) But I walked up to him and started to talk to him about God and if he knew that God really existed. He said, “no”, but seemed excited about the idea. As I talked to him, I had the feeling that he was very lonely and that he really needed someone to talk to. I taught him about prayer! I told him that he could talk to God whenever he needs anything and God will listen to him. After I taught him, I left him with a prayer. After the prayer, his eyes were extremely wide! He was so excited and told me he wants to try praying! He did not have a cell phone so we are going to meet him in the same spot on Thursday to teach him again!! Ha that one is smaller but still it was so great!! We contacted a lot and I had some other great conversations with people and got some promising numbers! Great day! The rest of the week was awesome as well. China town rocked it this week! I was so proud of my district! We set some new records for china town I think. We all worked so hard and it was amazing! Our usual small sacrament meeting of 20 people was almost doubled! We had people sitting outside in the foyer! Wang jie Mei is doing great! Elder Near and I surprised her with a box of colored pencils the other day and she got so excited! She had been looking for them and couldn't find the ones that she likes. She is really into drawing for fashion and design. I think I told you that? It was great to see her get so excited! Our investigators are all doing so awesome right now and I am so happy! I have been feeling like I am floating lately from being so happy!

Oh and I got such a cool new nametag! I will send pictures home soon but it is half English and half Chinese! It is so cool! It is perfect for our mission because we still leave china town sometimes and people ask a lot of questions about it! But ya it is awesome… you are going to be blown away!!  Oh and I am sooo exited that Elder Bednar is coming this Friday! This is going to be one of the coolest experiences I am sure that I will have in my whole life! I have really been trying hard to prepare myself so I will be ready to receive the revelation that I need. One new thing that I have been doing that I really like is writing down miracles I see everyday! They don’t have to be big miracles; they can just be something that makes me happy personally. This was not my idea… it was President Darger (a counselor in our mission) told me that he does it on his mission and it was really cool. So I have been starting and I love it! You really start to realize how much heavenly father loves you as an individual. One funny thing that I want to share (I counted it as a miracle)…. So Elder Near and I were having a rough day of contacting! The wind was blowing so hard that we could barley walk foreword. Well, I couldn't because I am small ;) but anyways a huge burst of wind comes and the buttons on my jacket came undone and I started flying back! Because my jacket turned in to a large parachute!! I started to laugh sooooo hard! My mouth dried almost completely out! It was great! On another day, we had a lesson not show up so we went out to get contacting! We walked to a part of china town that we usually don't go, only to find two quidditch teams going at it in this intense game!! (The game on brooms seen in harry potter!) Two college teams! Grown men and women running around on a field with brooms between their legs! I was laughing so hard!! And they would hit so hard too it was hilarious! In my opinion these things are miracles! Both are ways that heavenly father wanted to make ME happy!! It was so awesome!!

Well I love you all so much!!! I hope that all is going well!!! Thanks for all of the letters! I love them! Sorry if it has been a while scene any of you have got a letter from me! I am a little behind right now! But they will come, just wait and see!

bao zhang lao!

Letter #24

Hey hey hey!

Well this was another great week in New York! My forty-day fast is still extremely hard, but the number of marks on my hand is still continuing to go down on my hand. Well it was.. until our zone had a meeting on language! They said that we need to stop using words like gay, stupid, dude, and man! For those of you that remember the way that I speak, I use these words quite a bit! It is going to be very hard to break the habits! I had quite a few marks the first day but I am slowly starting to get better.. Wow it is hard! The plus side is it is really teaching me to think before I make decisions and before I speak!

As far as investigators go, this week was great!!! We set a Bap date!!!! A BAP DATE!!! I am so happy! Her name is Wang Xiao jie and she will be baptized on 13 of March!! She was the one that I told you I contacted in a restaurant. She met with us finally, and oh my goodness she was so prepared! She left China a few months ago and did not really know why she wanted to. She kind of wanted to go to college here but she doesn’t really like it. When she saw us, she said that she was reminded of a teacher she had in China that would always talk about Christianity. She really wanted to learn about what it was. When we started to teach her she pulled out a note pad and started to take notes! She is so awesome! It was so obvious to me that heavenly father had prepared her to meet with us. At the end of our meeting with her we asked her to pray and ask god if what we had taught that day was true. The second that she asked the question the spirit became so strong!! I felt like my body was going to collapse!!! I am so happy that we met her what a blessing that she is!

We also met with wu di xiong. He was awesome! He is the one that I met at the new years party! He came to English class and met with us after! We had a great lesson about prayer and taught him how. At the end of the lesson, he said a beautiful prayer with us and wants to come meet with us on Saturday!! I am so happy!

Me and Elder Near played ruby and xia jie mei in ping pong again for a lesson, unfortunately this time it was not as good. I think they trained or some thing because they were doing very well! They beat us.. So we had to teach them English again!! Ha-ha! This week I told them the story of the 3 little pigs. This was a very funny moment! I made them say,” little pig little pig let me in.” "not by the hair on my chinny chin chin!!" I don't know if you can imagine this in a Chinese/Fuzhou accent but it was one of the funniest things that I have ever heard in my life!! We recorded it on our phone so they could hear and it is now our ring tone!!

Those two right now are probably our most solid investigators. I really feel like they are just prepared! I think the rest of our investigators are as well, it is just not as obvious yet! It has been so awesome to see how the harder you work and the more obedient you are, the more people you run into.. It is usually not even in times that you are expecting! Most of the time is not even when we are contacting! It is when we are in a restaurant or in the subway, something not planned at all! This is why we need to contact everyone that we see! Everyone!! Even though it is very hard and impossible sometimes! Especially in New York!

Ok I just found out that I am allowed to tell you guys the best news ever!!! I thought that I was not allowed until after but I can now! Last zone meeting, the zone leaders told us that they had a special surprise for us. On the board they drew a picture of New York City.. Then they passed out two talks by elder Bednar.. We were all extremely confused.. Then they told us to add the talks with the picture on the board! Elder Bednar is coming to New York just for our mission!!! He is going to give a talk to the missionaries and after we are going to have a question and answer with him! I cannot tell you what a miracle this is for me personally. I am so exited! Our mission president has also asked us to prepare so that we will be ready to receive the revelation that we need from him! We are really supposed to try to fix every small thing. I was happy that I had a head start! He is coming in two weeks, wow this is awesome!

Oh today we are also starting a new cycle! China town only saw one small change. Two of the companionship's were switched around. So now elder Fan left our pad and elder Huang is coming in, I am going to miss elder Fan! He was a very funny elder. He was the same one that dropped the air conditioning out of the window! Ha He is a great guy! Elder Huang is also great though so it will still be great! He is the one I think I told my family about? The snoring one! We decided we want to open a Chinese talk show after the mission and announce ping-pong. It is fun to practice with him! It is so weird how fast time is going by! These cycles feel like weeks!

Oh I also taught gospel doctrine in Chinese on Sunday! That was a very funny experience!! The whole time they were correcting my tones and pronunciation! I also taught them how to say "puts the cherry on top." relating to baptism! Ha I am definitely not the best gospel doctrine teacher!

Well I sure do love you guys! Thanks for all of the love and support! Sorry this letter is not that long! I think I am just so pumped on the bap date and Elder Bednar, that I am having a hard time remembering the rest of the week! Well, I am still loving my mission, it is amazing how much I am learning really about myself! I know that sounds selfish but it really is true!

Love,

Bao zhang Lao

Letter #23

Hey Hey Hey!!

How is everybody doing?! I had a pretty awesome week not going to lie!! I am really starting to feel like there is going to be some big things happening in china town! All of the companionships in my district are working so hard, and as a result we are starting to see success!! This weekend the sister missionaries are having a baptism and the other elder companionship are having two!! I am so excited! I love going to baptisms they are so awesome!

I am still doing my 40-day fast, and oh my goodness it is SO hard! I have been marking my hand whenever I mess up! I still have not had one perfect day! Right when things are starting to go good, we will walk by a store playing the little mermaid song, and it will get stuck in my head. Then the whole day I have an urge to start singing! Then right when I am not paying attention the words will sneak out of my mouth! Or I will say some thing sarcastic to my companion! As for today though I am still perfect I really hope that I can keep it up! I have been getting so close the last few days! My companion is doing the same thing with me now too, and it is helping a lot! I just got to mark his hand because he called me Frodo. (The Hobbit from Lord of the Rings!) When we come to this place to write e-mails we have to hit a button that rings the inside. Eventually, someone will answer and ask who it is, then let us come inside. Well my companion said hey it is elder Near and Frodo Baggins! I made sure to press down on his hand really hard with the pen! haha!

As for this week, it was awesome! Elder Near and I worked our tails off. We were still really trying to focus on lessons because that is what all of our investigators need to progress! It is so hard to get lessons with these people though because they are always busy!! And I mean always! Some times they work every day of the week for 12-hour shifts! That was what mainly happened this week! A lot of them were working this week! We were very thankful that heavenly father still helped us to get in some good ones! And is still blessing us with finding new awesome people!

Fan Xiao jie came to church this last Sunday, and brought two of her boys!! I was so happy!! None of our investigators have been able to make it to church for like three weeks in a row now!! It was really cool because the night before, I prayed really hard that we would have 3 of our investigators at church, because I was really getting discouraged from not having any one come! We had one investigator come, and she brought her two boys who we had never met before!! Although this is a small miracle it meant the world to me!! Prayer is amazing we are so lucky that we are given the opportunity to do it whenever we want!! They seemed to like church! Now they just need to keep on coming! We are scheduled to play ping-pong and teach a lesson with them all this Saturday, so I will let you know how that goes! I ALSO had to translate this week for some one who decided to visit our ward! Oh my goodness that was very hard! I had such a headache after! There are so many words I don't know how to say in English any more!! But I think that he got the general gist of the meeting so I was happy about that!

My comp and me started trying restaurant contacting! It seems to be working really well! You walk in grab a menu start talking to them about what their favorite thing is on the menu, and then you start to talk to them about church! It seems to be working pretty well! It works better when there is not a lot of people in the restaurant or no one.. We had one really cool experience doing that in this amazing Taiwanese soup place! It is seriously amazing! You can’t call it soup because it is so full of goods! There are more goods then there is broth if you get my gist! And at the and it is really fun to try to drink the broth because it is so hot! And we only had the medium hot sauce with it! But of course I got it all of it down because that is how I roll.. Any ways, I ordered what I wanted in Chinese and the girl looked like she saw a ghost!! And really wanted to know why I spoke Chinese!! She then saw my tag and really wanted to learn about the church, AND BE BAPTIZED!! It was crazy! But she is always working, and never really has time to meet with us!! She had just moved here from china too, which is really cool! I wrote my testimony inside of a book of Mormon and gave it to her though while she was at work yesterday!! She was so happy, and couldn't believe that we did that just for her! Definitely a miracle!

We also had our big Chinese new years celebration, which ended up being huge!! So many people came!! Not all of Chinese but still a few. Well two came... that was a little hard for us because us missionary's had been passing out cards for that thing for probably about a month! But I was still happy we had at least two come! One of them I think we are going to meet with soon! We are going to stop by his work I think tonight! But the performance went great! Elder Near and I did the voice over and it was really fun! People said that our performance was the best part! I personally thought the lion dance was awesome! It looks so cool! I was actually getting kind of scared when the lion jumped of the stage! (It is the costume thing that looks like a dragon, and a bunch of guys get inside!) They guys were very good! They did a lot of cool tricks with it! Chinese New Years is crazy! The celebration is still going on! We already went through the biggest day, but are supposed to continue for about 3 weeks!

Oh and another funny investigator story! Do you remember Ruby and Xia? The ones that Elder Near and I played in ping-pong for a lesson?! Well it happened again, but this time we lost.. I don't want to talk about that too much.. But as a result I had to tell them a story in English and they wanted to try translating it! I told the story of Goldy Locks and they loved it...They thought it was hilarious! When I said the word oatmeal, they thought I said old meal, and started explaining it to me as old food! It was really funny!

Well I think that pretty much wraps up the week here! I hope to have good news for you next week about our investigators! I love you all so much!

Love,

Elder Barton

Awesome Letter #22

Happy New Year! Chinese style! It is not today it is tomorrow but still! It is a huge holiday in china town! I have found the best way of contacting people has been asking what they will do to for Chinese New Year! They are so funny! Our stake is having a Chinese new years party mainly put on by the Chinese missionaries! We even hired people to do a lion dance! A lion dance is the thing with the big dragon! And all of the Chinese missionaries are putting on a little plaything to reenact, why they celebrate Chinese new years! It is going to be so funny! Elder Near and me are going to do all of the voices for the whole thing, and all of the actors are lip saying everything! It is pretty dang funny I really wish that you all could see it! I also might be the monster at the end but we still don't know!

I should probably tell you the story of why they celebrate Wow rude of me! So what happened was, long ago in china, a monster would attack a town every year and meet all of the people. The people decided that they would start leaving the town every year, on the day that the monster attacks! One day when all of the people are leaving an elderly man approaches the city, and starts setting up his things to stay the night he tells the town that he will get rid of the monster so that the people will never have to worry about it again! The next day the old man hangs red signs over every door, and sets up many explosives. He thinks that the red will hurt the monsters eyes, and the sounds will scare it away! The monster comes and fortunately he is terrified and never returns to the town again!

This is why Chinese people love the color red! Even their flag is red for this reason! They also hang a bunch of red signs over their doors every year so that the monster will not come and eat them! I have to say I really enjoy this story!

Anyways, now that the brief history of china is over I will start my email! I really had another great week. As far as numbers go it was not like the previous weeks that we have had, but I really learned allot! And why we are still on the bad news note... we lost Peter i was very sad! I think I told you all about the challenge I gave him last week. He was saying he did not want to meet with us and I gave him the plan of salvation pamphlet, and told him to read it, and we would meet the following week and discuss. I told him if he really didn't like it then I would not keep asking him to meet with us. Any ways so we had our meeting. We taught him the plan of salvation and he understood every thing. The spirit was so strong in that room. The love that heavenly father has for him was so easy to feel. At the end of the lesson I asked him if he wanted to continue meeting with us based on what he had leaned. He looked up at me, and you could see that there was a change in his eyes. It was like he just realized something. He said quietly no... I was extremely surprised! I knew that he had felt the spirit! I really wanted to know his reason for not wanting to meet with us! I asked him how he felt and he said happy, in a quiet voice! I testified of the spirit. I told him that we should kneel down right that second, and he could ask heavenly father what he thinks that he should do. He said a great prayer but did not ask heavenly father the question; it was like he was scared to receive an answer!

I don't think I have ever had such an overwhelming desire before to help someone, and have him or her not accept. It was really hard on me! I prayed so hard for him to continue to meet with us. He still comes to English class and is still one of my great friends! Yesterday he ordered a pizza to the church for us. He is really a great guy. I need to trust that heavenly father has other plans for him! And maybe it is just not the right time!

On the plus side we still have some great investigators! And a lot of them still seem to be progressing great! Popeye wants to take Elder Near and I to a parade! I love all of the great people I am meeting so much! I really hope that I can continue to see them progress!

I read two great talks this week! The first one is called the forth missionary! It is about types of missionaries that people will end up being! The first type of missionary comes out unworthy and does things that he wants to do, goes home early. Second, unworthy does what he wants to do but finishes his mission. The good that he could have done goes undone. The third in my opinion is the most common. The missionary that is worthy and works hard. He still does so much great good! He works with his might and strength, but not his heart or mind. His mind is focused on other things. Such as home, sports, or self-pride. He measures his growth from comparison. The fourth missionary is the one that we all need to be! He leaves his personal thoughts, and concerns at home. He gives himself completely to the lord, not holding anything back. He measures his success from the feeling that he gets from with in; when he asks heavenly father " have I done all I can?"

This is the missionary that I want desperately to become! The best way to describe in my opinion is a servant! Not only a servant of the lord but of his fellow man! It was really an amazing talk!

The next talk that I read was about a forty day fast! Not a forty-day fast from food but from our personal concerns and worries. This missionary once asked a general authority how he could have the spirit with us more powerfully. The general authority began to ask him a bunch of questions. What time did you wake up this morning 6 31 6 35? Do you love your companion? Do you avoid all distractions from your calling? He told the missionary to go forty days being as perfect as he can be, and getting rid of distractions! And he said the first day he needs to start with a fast to know what the distractions might be! As the missionary fasted, he could not stop thinking about golf, something he would do every p day. I told him self it was not a distraction, but he had the biggest urge to play golf as he fasted! He got rid of it! He did not play on p day any more! I have decided to start doing this same thing, and started on Monday! I thought that this talk and the one about the fourth missionary went hand in hand really well.

I have developed a big testimony of perfect obedience! That is really where the blessings come from! Well sorry I just preached a small sermon! But that was really what I learned this week! I am so exited to start improving! Giving every bit of my self to the lord! The best missionary's are the ones that let go!

Well I sure do love all of you! I hope everything is going great! I am loving my mission, when you come out on a mission, you can really see our prophet wants us to go so bad. Not only because more people because our church needs more members, but because of what it does for a missionary.

Love,

Bao Zhang Lao

Letter #21

AMAZING WEEK!

Well this week was just amazing!! I was so happy! The mission president gave our mission a goal to find four new investigators for every companionship! This goal may not seem very high but for china town missionaries who are lucky to find one investigator in a week, this is huge! BUT me and elder Near decided that we really wanted to do it! and we worked our tails off! we work hard every week but this week, we decided to push it even more! Every night we would usually crash after doing our planning for the next day because we were so tired from all of the contacting and tracting and even some TEACHING!

I already told you about one of the investigators that we found last week in my last email! The English class student that is really cool! I now call her purple boots because she came to English class wearing these awesome neon purple boots! But after we met with her, is really when the magic started to happen!  The second one was a call that we got from someone calling from our pass along card! YES, someone called from our card!!! She called us on the phone and said that we talked to her yesterday, and asked if i remembered her! I, of course said, "yes" but had no idea!! It is hard to remember so many faces from a day! She said she wanted us to come over to her house the next day! We were very excited! When i saw her face, i remembered who it was! AND... it is a really funny story how i met her! I contacted her on the street in Chinese! AND her husband who was a white man was behind me the whole time swearing at me! he was asking me what i was trying to sell his wife! The woman said "i like you, i am going to call you" and they walked away! It was very interesting! I didn't think much of it because people always say they will call you then don't! But she did! AND we met with her at her house! She is very wealthy! Her husband invented the clothes pin she said! Her husband was not there but i found out that he is Jewish and really does not like Mormons! So this is going to be interesting! She also had such a cute little girl! I was having so much fun playing with her! It has been so long since I have played with a little kid! Any ways, it was a lot of fun! They want to feed us dinner tonight so I am really excited!

The third one was a friend of Lillian jiang! This is our investigator that invented the thing for the i phone! We had a lesson scheduled with her and she brings along this awesome friend! She said that she used to go to church and always loved the feeling that she had when she went! AND described a peace!! She was also very amazed in us, very surprised we would just leave our homes for two years to teach people about our church. I really like her and we will be teaching her again this Saturday!

The forth one was a lady that just came in to our church! That is another complete miracle no one ever does that here in china town! I talked to her after sacrament meeting and got to know her. I thought that she was a church member that i hadn't met yet! She said it was her first time coming to church and she had never been to any before! She wanted to learn about what it is… MIRACLE… she is also awesome, she is a hair stylist in china town! I asked her if she could give me a cool style maybe with some light highlights and texture and she said yes! so right now i have a "really cool" hair style!! I will have to send pictures soon!

But wow we got exactly four! I was so surprised. AS you can tell from how many exclamation marks i have been using!!!! I am very happy! The next step is getting all of these people we are finding to progress! We had a really cool district meeting this week on baptism. The presidency of the church sent out mandatory district meetings that we all have to start doing! The first one was about baptism! I never really realized how important this ordinance really is. It talked about how we need to start being more bold with making invites! This is my next goal that I really want to work on!

Speaking of baptisms... me and elder Near got one this week and were very excited!! Her name was ling yao! I have never been so proud of someone my whole life! At the end of her baptism, she bore her testimony and it was so powerful. AS i looked at her talking, i became so happy and really realized why i came on my mission. My purpose has never been so clear to me! She talked about the book of Mormon and how grateful she is that we taught her about it! I am so grateful that heavenly father gave me the opportunity to meet her… the feeling is so hard to explain but it is amazing! I love my mission and i really can not say that enough…

OH and another really cool thing from the missionary world! I don't know if you all have seen the new Mormon.org but it is really cool! They have these profiles now of Mormon people with videos and what not and it is really cool to see all of the different members of our church. Our mission president now wants us to go on Mormon.org twice a week for an hour so we can become familiar with these people and relate them to people that we contact! a lot of them are going through the same situations. We also have these new really cool pass along cards! They have a bunch of pictures of people on them and on the inside you can write who you want the person to go look up! It is way cool! YOU should all make profiles! It would be awesome to use your testimony's to help other people!

WELL, i love you all so much! thank you so much for the continuous support that you have been giving me! It helps so much! I really had a great week and am still loving my mission! My testimony is continuing to grow every day that this is really gods church and he knows and loves each of us! I hope you all have a great week! THIS is Bao zhang lao signing off...

LETTER #20

Hello HELLO!

 

This week was another awesome week! I was very lucky! I met many more amazing people and had some great giggles! I will start by telling you about some of the new people that i met this week! OR should i say, taught! The first story was about two english class students that we taught together...they were a crack up! So to start off, i will tell you how we got them to meet with us! A PING PONG GAME! They beat us two games in a row and the last game we said, "if we win, they would have to listen to a lesson from us about Jesus christ"! The heat was on but after a very intense game we won! We decided to watch the movie "finding faith in Christ"! That is such a great movie! Then after, we started to talk to them about what they thought! Sha jie mei seemed interested but Ruby was not really! Ruby went off on some crazy story that i did not understand at all! it was crazy! it was very fast, i think that it was about her brother falling in a cave or something! My chinese is still horrible! But any ways, it was funny! They said if we beat them again this week they would be willing to meet with us again! What have i gotten myself into here!!?

I also met an awesome blind guy when i was tracting! When we said we were missionaries, he asked us to come in and sit down! He also grabbed his sister to come listen to our lesson! His family and his sister's family live in the same small apartment! It is so humbling to see some of these people's living conditions! At the end, we taught them to pray! AND it was very cool! The sister already went to another church "Ming" ( a very popular chinese church that steals all of the chinese people!) but she did not know how to pray the way that we do! We taught them both and then asked if they would be willing to try it! They said yes and both closed there eyes and started right away! Not out loud but in their heads! That was not really what we had in mind but it was awesome! The spirit was so strong and they prayed for a very long time! I could really tell they were feeling the spirit! Unfortunately, the girl did not want to meet with us again but the blind man really liked it! I was on exchanges with a new elder that day, so I gave that investigator to him and his real companion! But I am very exited to see what happens!

We also met a really cool lady that moved here from China twenty years ago! She was very cool! She was very giggly and had a great personality! She talked our ear off and talked very fast but i really liked her! She was also very hard for me to understand!!!!! She had a very strong accent! All of the accents are getting frustrating! Right when i get one down, i meet someone from another place that i have never heard of before and it is nuts! But, that lady was so awesome! She wants to continue to meet with us, and wants her daughter to come with her to attend church! I was very excited!

This is probably my favorite story so sit back and get ready for the ride.... we were out contacting and i met this awesome kid! He said that he was from New Jersey and was only staying for a couple months but he was very nice and said he would be willing to meet with us the following day! I continued to contact and then right as we were getting ready to return home, he comes up to me again literally out of no where! Like i was talking with my companion, look over and bam he is right there! But he started to tell me that when i ran into him he was walking back to his church where he had left his bag! He went back to his church and it was locked! I guess he wanted to go back up to New Jersey and really needed money to get on to the bus! He asked me if he could borrow 20 dollars for a bus ticket. I was a little skeptical because of what happened to Elder Faulkner, but i just had a feeling i needed to give him the money. So i gave him the money! As i was pulling money out of the bank, he told me that he has an English name too... Shart! NO, i did not spell that wrong "Shart"! OF course, being the mature man that i am, i started sweating and turning red from trying so hard to hold in my laughs! It was horrible! I asked him who gave him the name and he said it was given to him in Malaysia where he is from! It was way to funny! He said that he would meet with us the next day but did not show up! I have a feeling that i will be seeing him again very soon! I hope so!
I also forgot to tell you we are having a baptism this sunday! I am so excited! It is lin yao, the daughter of a recent convert! She is so awesome and prepared to be baptized! We spent a lot of time with her this week which was awesome! We took her up to Harlem to watch another baptism which was also a funny experience! It was this Dominican lady! She was extremely spunky! When we introduced her to lin yao, she gave her a huge kiss!! (The complete opposite of how most chinese people will act!) It was so funny! Luckily, lin yao took it well! But it was awesome! We also went to her house and listened to her play this really awesome instrument that i don't know how to say in english! It is this side ways guitar thing without any frets it is so cool!

  I also had an awesome experience and was able to go on a split with an english speaking missionary!! The english program is so different! We had a ton of appointments! AND contacting most people will actually give you a chance to speak! It was cool and I met some great people! AND then we have to remember we are still in New York so there were some people here that were not so nice! I got screamed at a few times, but it was not so bad! For the most part, it was awesome! We ended up tracting a lot of people that spoke spanish! Luckily, the elder that i was with, spoke a little spanish so he could still kind of talk to them! This one spanish lady invited us right in after he said we were the missionaries! It was very awkward to not speak chinese at that time! She said that her daughters were already baptized! The English speaking missionary and his real companion are going to return to teach her! ha! in Spanish! It is so amazing all of things the lord is willing to help us with out here!

Well, that is most of my coolest stories! Sorry this email was all over the place today! I hope that you understand everything! I love you all so much! Thank you so much for your great examples!! Until next time, this is Bao Zhang Lao signing out!