Dear family and friends,
This past week has been pretty interesting. And sadly, I switched planners today, so everything is escaping my mind! But from what I do remember:
Tuesday we had a great DTM on finding. And more specifically on effective ways to find in our area. I think that'll be really great to help us focus on what we can do out here to find those prepared souls. That afternoon we biked out to a college in one of our secondary areas. It was a golden place! We started talking to this one guy and it turns out he's from Malaysia and speaks English! So we got to sit down with him and share about God's plan for us. It was really great. So many people in college that still have no idea what they're going to after they graduate. They just say they'll wait until they graduate to find that out. Afterwards we went to a less active's house. We've been trying to work with the ward to get people together to fix his engine. He showed it to us and the task became impossible. He wants us to take it out of his car. Seeing all the different wire and tubes just made me realize that I have no idea about cars. So we're still trying to help him out a bit.
Wednesday we had a really great miracle at English Class! There have been a few new students every week, but it's super hard to talk to them afterwards because two of them are brother and sister and the rest are friends of the brother, and they all get picked up by the mom right after class. The brother has been coming for a while and doesn't have too much interest in the church. But his little sister started coming a few weeks ago. I could see that she has a bit of curiosity. I had planned a spiritual share out, but that night I had this feeling to switch it to the Book of Mormon. During the English meeting before class, the other Elders brought up and investigator in my class that just started reading the Book of Mormon, but is a little confused. I knew I had to share about the Book of Mormon! When it came time for the spiritual share, I let the new girl flip through the Book of Mormon as I shared about it. She looked so amazed. Once class was over, I asked her if she wanted to keep the book. With a huge glow in her eyes, she asked "can I?!" We have also set up to meet with her really quickly after class this Wednesday! Such a huge miracle.
Thursday it was raining pretty hard, so we got a little nervous for our plans. We headed out to the college again, but there was no one in sight. Every populated place dies out here once there's a little rain. It made the day pretty rough. Then that night we were heading to the Chen family's house to see how the mom is doing. We had confirmed with the dad and the daughter the night before. And when we got there, we were just talking with them for a few minutes. We finally asked if the mom was in the shower or something and they both said she was asleep. That caught us off guard. We were a little confused because we set up to follow up on how she feels about the goal we discussed the week before. So that didn't get to happen.
Friday after weekly planning we had a very interesting experience. We were trying to decide if we should cook inside or go out to eat. We suddenly got a call from the Xihu police. They said there's some foreigner at the station that can't get home and they need our help translating. Looks like we're eating out. We got there and there was an American that wasn't quite aware of where he was or who he was sitting with a bunch of police. He had gotten a hold of his wife, who lives in Taibei! He somehow got on a bus or something and ended up in Xihu. He didn't know how he got there. So I talked to his wife on the phone and she told me I HAD to convince him to stay there and wait for her to come get him. It took some time because he wanted to just get in a taxi, but it worked out and he stayed with the police. We ate hotpot for lunch.
We then biked out to Erlin. We had come across a bike path halfway there last time and then found where the path starts in Xihu. So we took the path all the way and it was way beautiful. Once we got there, we just did some hardcore looking. We found a sweet kid that was very willing. We got to pray with him before he left. We then found a guy at a 7-11 and started sharing with him. Then out of nowhere, the first kid came up and sat down with us. After we prayed with the second kid, the first kid started bearing testimony of prayer that he gained 20 minutes before! It was so cool. On the way home, we got way lost. It was dark, we were on the trail, and the only thing out here is rice. We were beyond lost. And there were so many bugs. We got back to the church for a lesson and my pocket had probably over 100 dead bugs inside. Super gross.
Saturday we had to head out to Erlin again for a lesson. But before we headed out, I got surgery on my LEFT toe. There will be no more problems from now on. Nothing like a 5 minute surgery. But you were right mom. It's like they're injecting fire into you. A shot in the toe hurts so much. It hurt way more this time too. Our plans fell through in Erlin, but we came across a family that owns this food cart thing in front of a school. Elder Greer found them before I moved here, but we could never find them since. We just happened to take a road we had never taken before and it let to that school with them. They're a super sweet family. Hopes for the future!
Sunday we got to pick up this cool little kid that's an RC and ride bikes to church together. Halfway there, we met up with a few other people that had been baptized in the past few years riding together. It was just a party to church! It was a really good fast Sunday too. It made a good end to the week.
Well I love you all! I'm super excited to skype this week! Thank you for all the support! Keep those letters coming! I miss you all! NEVER forget to pray. It helps your day so much.
Love, Elder Anthony Kai Buckwalter
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