Monday was great. We had a great morning at the 金華 chapel practicing for our Christmas program. I will miss those practices! I am a performer after all ;) but after practice, we met up with the Sisters in our District and another companionship of Elders plus one of my Taiwanese friends and we all grabbed lunch together before heading to our chapel to do tie-dye! I had really been looking forward to this so I am happy we got to do it. We left it to settle and dry so we will get it tomorrow at District Council and bring it back. I hope it all turns out good. Once preparation day ended we had a lesson and then dinner with our Bishop. That was pretty much the night because we got talking with our Bishop a lot about future plans for this area and what we want to accomplish. There is a lot of potential for this area. I can't wait to see the future growth of it. I am so excited to go to 竹北. My new companion is a stud and seems like a lot of fun. And our District is awesome so it's going to be great for sure.
Tuesday was a great day. Had the normal schedule including our last District Council of the transfer! I'm really gonna miss the Sisters and our District. It was a great time being here but all good things must come to an end at some point. It was also a special day because one of the sisters asked me for a priesthood blessing last night and I was able to give it. It was a great spiritual experience for me. I spent a lot of time pondering and thinking about what she needed and then I let the Spirit take the lead and I feel like I did the best I could. I hope all is well going forward. I was also able to check on my tie-dye projects and they turned out awesome!! I can't wait to wear them soon. Especially the socks. They turned out way good. A member fed us a barbecue dinner and that was basically the day! Pretty busy and fun too.
Wednesday was a pretty good day. I spent the whole day getting ready to leave and get all my stuff packed. I accumulated too many things in this area so I had to declutter a bit and make it all fit and it all worked out! Aside from that I also went to the dermatologist because Sister Peterson told me I should go get my legs checked out so I did and they said I have Eczema. I got some medicine and cream for that and hopefully, that works and it goes away. That was a fun time I guess and the best thing from the day was our English group!! My students are so cool they brought me some gifts! One brought me big oreo brownie and 4 others all got me a cool ceramic mug with an awesome design on it! I'm so glad for my students and the progress they have made and what they will continue to do! I will miss them a lot. It was a sentimental day. Lots of memories and things in this area. It's bittersweet to leave. I'm excited about my new adventure.
Thursday was such a tiring day, transfer days always are. Started out by getting all my luggage out of the house and downstairs so a member could help take me to the train station! I had a little bit of a wait before I took my train to my new area, but when I got on the train 2 people helped me with my bags, which was a big answer to a prayer I had said only 30 seconds prior. What a turnaround answer. The train ride was smooth and when I got to 新竹 a lady helped me with my bags getting off too. Taiwanese people are so nice! I felt so blessed and lucky to be surrounded by such amazing people. When I arrived I met up with my new companion, Elder Seamons, and he is a total legend! I love him a lot and he's such a fun Elder. We made our way back to our area and got my stuff dropped off and a little unpacked before we headed out for a lesson and then a District Dinner. This area is so great we are always doing things as a District, which I really enjoy. At night we were just out finding and whatnot. We talk to a lot of people here! A great change from how we did things in 三峽. Longer entry but it was a big day, I'm excited to serve here and can't wait for the new adventures!
Friday was great. A pretty normal day. We had a great morning exercise playing frisbee with a bunch of missionaries! It felt good to get out and run again. I definitely have missed doing that. Today we just had our studies and our weekly planning with finding to fill the gaps. I'm still finding my groove in this new place, but I really do enjoy it here! It's not as big as 台北 but it's not as remote as 鳳林. It's a perfect balance and has everything I need. Elder Seamons is a great guy also. We will get along great. We still talk to a lot of people and even though we don't see much fruit right now the harvest is coming soon. There are always prepared people ready.
Saturday was a good day. We had a good day doing some studies and talking with people on the streets. We did see a cool experience when we started talking to a guy sitting on a public bench and then when we asked if he had time to meet with us he said he had time right then so we taught him lesson 1 on the street! Super cool and he didn't really have an interest in learning more but it was a cool experience for us to have. We also had Stake Conference tonight! It was just the adult session but it was pretty sweet. President and Sister Peterson were there and so that was cool too. We have been walking around these past few days because my exchange bike broke really bad. So we have to wait until my bike gets here and then the real work can get started. This area is awesome and I'm loving it more every day!
Sunday was super good! It was Stake Conference round 2 and it was the general session so all the other missionaries were there too so it was nice to see other missionaries around and also hear some good messages! After church, we met with an investigator that came and the lesson wasn't the best in my opinion. It just seemed a little scattered and he asked some complicated questions too. It was all good and after all that we did some studies and then made our way back to the chapel to get stood up by a guy. Then we had some miracles! We had an hour to walk home and we promised God we would talk with every man we saw and in return we asked for at least 6 gospel conversations and 2 setups. Then we went to work and ended up getting 8 conversations and 2 setups! Such a great experience and Elder Seamons even went all preacher mode and talked to 17 kids at once about English group! So legendary. Then I was able to pick up my bike and we biked around a bit. Super good day in a super good area!
Elder Heber Chase Ciminski
謝希伯長老