July 24th 2011

I have never walked so much in life, ridin a bike so much in my life, and sweated so much in my life. yuck. The humidity level here on Saturday was a level 2, I don't really know what that means except sticky, hot, unbearable, and gross. I was chugging water like no other. We had a ward activity on Saturday and all the members kept telling us about how to avoid be dehydrated and dying. Salt tablets, wearing a hat, and having president send us a car, were just some of the best suggestions. I like the whole sending us a car one myself :)
So let me tell you all about our investigators! You'll love them. I sure do. Gloria is amazing. She is so quiet, kinda shy, but after I threw a few sarcastic comments at her she finally threw one back. She's on date for baptism in September and I'm so excited for her. You can tell she really knows that it's true, it's exciting to see the gospel really change someone's life.
Jing and Chen are amazing. They are both from China and have been taught a lot. We're trying to get them to set a date for baptism...and hopefully marriage :) I love teaching foreigners, they are so blunt and straightforward. Jing was teaching me a phrase in chinese and she started to laugh, I asked her if she was laughing because my accent was bad and she straight up said, "yes." cool. I'm working on it! I had remembered chinese phrase that Matt had taught me that he learned on his mission "do you like cats." I thought I'd impress them with it, and after some time they finally figured out what I was saying and then taught me the correct way to say it. haha oh dear...I try to be cool but it sometimes doesn't work out.
We got 3 people on date for baptism my first week here: Jacob, from Lebanon, really cool, searching, when the sisters had met him he already had a Book of Mormon in Arabic. Affe, from China has super cute glasses, kinda like Maddie's but bigger, I tried them on and totally want some now. And Jerome. He's from the phillipines, really nice, really sincere. It's so fun to teach these people! I feel like every lesson I want to cry because the Spirit is so strong. The members that have been coming with us are so great. Whenever they bear their testimony I just feel so warm all over, I keep thinking, "I hope our investigator can feel that!"
Jamil and Christian are pretty cool as well. Jamil is from Africa and Christian is from Columbia. They are both friends and we sometimes teach them together. They are around our age so it's fun to joke with them. Actually most of the people we are teaching are our age. It's kinda cool. So good story: We're on our way to see a potential when we spot Christian and Jamil coming out of a store. We cross the street and start talking to them, trying to get an appointment. All the sudden this guy walks out of the store, he has shades on and it's totally not sunny, and I don't think he was acutally wearing a matrix coat but that's what I picture him in. Anyways he walks by and goes, "mormons?" I immediately turn thinking, "sweet! he's interested lets talk to this guy." I say to him, "ya you heard of us?" He replies with, "no but you guys really intrigue me....and your really hot." and then walks away. Can you say, AWKWARD?! I turn to face Jamil and Christian and just bust up laughing. I couldn't help it. It was ridiculous. Who are these crazies we keep running into? haha oh dear. Anyways Jamil and Christian are great. Jamil is super passionate in what he believes in. When he starts to talk about God he puts his heart to his chest trying to get the point across like he really means it. Christian has the best questions about the Book of Mormon and he's searching for the restored gospel, you can just tell with his sincereity and the questions he asks.
Church on Sunday was amazing. We're getting a new Bishop and the whole bishopric spoke and their talks were incredible! It was like they were speaking right to our investigators. So amazing. I love the gospel. It's so true, you can just see evidence of it everywhere. oh Oh OH! Exciting news! I get to go to a conference in Halifax next week and guess where I get to spend the night on my way to Halifax....you guessed it...TRURO! yahoo! I get to go back woop woop! The conference is for newer missionaries so while in Halifax, I drop off Sister Davis and get to work with Sister Hudson for 2 days! I'm so stolked! Sister Hudson was my MTC comp and we've always wanted to serve together. We beg president everytime we see him. He probably thinks putting us together for 2 days will get us off his case about it. we'll see about that....:)
Thank you for your prayers and love and support! Sometimes I feel strength coming from some other source than myself, and I know that it's through other's prayers that I can feel that strength. Have a great week!
Love,
Sister Crane