Transfer 3 - Week 4

Hey everybody this last week has been amazing! 

Highlight of the week was definitely going on a hike. Now that was something else! You'll all see in the pictures I send. Let's see Leo is still doing great! We taught him the whole Plan of Salvation as well as the Word of Wisdom this week and he accepted it all he's awesome! He is such a beast and these next two weeks we really got to buckle down to make his baptismal date on June 6th. 

Here's a cool story though. We have an investigator who's been an investigator for over a year, been meeting with missionaries and nothing has ever really happened. The first time we met him he didn't seem to have too much interest so we didn't think too much about him. Except recently he's been coming to church every week and has been loving it! We don't really know what happened because all we did was meet with him and teach a little about prayer, reading scriptures and coming to church, not too special of a lesson... But we think he's been coming to church more because he's been getting some good friends and enjoys church now. We took a look at his record and we noticed that he's never had a lesson where a member was there too to help teach him. All the lessons have always only been with missionaries. 

So we thought it might be helpful if we got a member to help teach so after church we met with him and had our ward's first counselor help teach. During the lesson we reviewed the Plan of Salvation and it turns out he had a lot of questions about it, regarding Buddhist beliefs like reincarnation and things that Elder Beck and I don't know too much about. But with our member there, he was able to answer all his questions, because he actually used to be a Buddhist. We had a lesson set up after so we had to go after about half an hour, but he wanted to stay after we left and keep talking to our member about it all. It was awesome! Members are great! We plan to invite him to be baptized next time we meet with him. I think he's just had a few questions while he's been meeting with missionaries but we just haven't been able to answer them because we know nothing about Buddhist beliefs haha. 

Also we started meeting with a new family! The Huang family! they've been coming to the free English class we do  for a good time and for some reason have never set up with missionaries. They've never really been interested. But when we talked to them after English class they were like,"Ya we'd love to meet! What time works?" So that was really strange because they've been coming to English class for over a year on a weekly basis and have never been interested but all of a sudden they are! Pretty cool. So we taught them in a restaurant a few days ago and they're pretty great! They have 3 daughters and a niece, Bobby, who is pretty much always with them. They are so stinking cute. Maybe I'll get a picture this next week. Didn't have time to go guitar contacting again this week... We just have a lot of other stuff going on we don't have time to go contacting! But things are pretty good! 

I love you all and miss you! Also shout out to Heather! Happy birthday! Love you :)

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

Me! On the way down. 

What a beautiful man. 

I was waiting forever for this lady to move so I could get a picture but she would not budge so this is good enough! 

If you stuck out your hand, they would just land on you! It sounds lame but it was probably one of the coolest things I've ever done. It was straight out of a Disney movie or something. 

Hike!

I look like a little kid. But cool little spot on the side of the trail.

Saw a stinking monkey! 

Lovely paved path hike. 

Waterfall at the end of the hike! 

Transfer 3 - week 2

This last week has been pretty amazing! 

On Wednesday nights we teach a free English class as one of our service activities and as a way to meet new people. So this last Wednesday we meet a Leo, or Brother Wu, and this guy is so so so awesome. We taught him Wednesday night after English class and then met him again yesterday at church. He came early before church started with his son and we gave them a tour of the church and then had a lesson with them teaching them about the Apostasy and the Restoration. (The 1st lesson.) We invited him to be baptized next month, June 28th and he said,"Yes, of course. But can't I be baptized sooner?" We told him he could but we have a lot to teach and would have to meet with him at least twice a week and he said no problem! He understands everything we teach and asks really really good questions. 

He's super smart and is already the Gospel principles book and he even got a copy of one of the church books,"Teachings of the prophet Lorenzo Snow" and was also very curious about Joseph Smith. He wants to go to the temple with us soon so he can buy more books as well paintings and things that he can use to decorate his house with so he can feel "the same spiritual feeling again". When we invited him to be baptized we read with him Mosiah 5:8-10, which is about baptism, and after reading it he said I have a strange feeling. A good feeling, it feels like electricity is on my skin." He is SO cool! So he said he wants to be baptized June 6th which is actually my grandma's birthday too! 

Also this Friday I think I'll be taking the test thing to pass off Phase 2! Whoo so recently I just started on Phase 3, which is all the chinese characters in the Book of Mormon! Man characters are hard! But they're so cool. Anyway so Chinese is still hard... But cool :) It's been raining pretty hard lately too. I put on my normal shirt and tie with slacks but then I put rain pants over that and a rain jacket on too. Plus on my backpack I have a little rain cover that comes out of it that covers my whole backpack making it waterproof.(very nifty) So basically we look like we're pretty hardcore and a lot of people ask us if we're going camping or something which I think is awesome cause I love camping! 

Anyway it's a good way to start talking to people too! I'll have to get a picture of us with all our gear on. And this week we want to go guitar contacting! We've put together a few hymns so that'll be awesome! Very excited! Loving pretty much everything about being a missionary! I love you all though! And miss you very much! Happy Mother's Day mom! But I'll skype you tonight :) I get to skype my family tonight! Whoo! Pretty excited! Peace!

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

My bike! My loyal steed :)

Mango ice cream! Condensed milk, ice cream, shaved ice, mangoes and pudding! SOOOO GOOOODDD

Transfer 3 - Week 1

This last week has been pretty great!

Brother Zhong got baptized! He's a total stud basically. Played basketball with him last P-Day and he's actually pretty good! You'll see him in the pictures he's so cute :) Let's see well I don't know if in my last email I mentioned how huge are area is. This transfer they combined 2 areas into 1 so we took over some other Elder's investigators and area as well as my companion's old area. So we have a bunch of investigators and we were trying to meet all of them this week but many of them have been unable to meet, sadly.

We have over 20 investigators so it's pretty crazy. And those are investigators that we can regularly meet with too. Elder Beck and I still adore each other, of course. Haha we get along really well and are almost the same person. Both love camping, like the same music, sports, same style, both play guitar, have a dream of playing the piano and we both are just pretty chill bros. This last week we've made delicious pancakes, ate stinky tofu, played guitar together and even volunteered at a hospital to do service! I pretty much love my new area and companion. It's great.

We have a new investigator, Brother Chen, whom we're meeting tonight and he's secretly like a millionaire or something. We first him and he was wearing some faded jeans with a t-shirt and a camouflage vest over that. But when we saw him drive away he got in a brand new Mercedes! He must be Batman or something. But this guy is awesome, only met him once so far at church but I've got a good feeling about this guy.

Today for P-day we're going to a guitar store in Taipei and it's going to be awesome! Also this week we want to go "guitar contacting"! We want to go to the local park, which is extremely beautiful by the way, and just whip out our guitars and play songs for people, mostly Chinese hymns, and then boom talk to people about the Gospel! It's going to be so awesome, we're super excited. I'll try and get some pictures of it next week. Well things are pretty great and I can't believe I've already been out for 6 months! Where does the time go? Sheesh. Love you all!

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

 

 

Brother Zhong just being cute and stuff. :D

 

Almost to the top of the stadium!

 

Xinzhuang -

VIEW of maybe... 1/6 of my area?

Went to ikea for lunch!! Love this place.

You can climb up on top of this stadium thing at the park and it's absolutely beautiful! 

Elder Beck eating some delicious pancakes... hehehe... MAN those things are good. We bought some german cereal stuff, like granola grain type of cereal, and we put that in our pancake mix, as well as cinnamon, and what came out was straight from heaven. Put some blueberry jam on top and we both about melted from tastiness.