Transfer 8 - Week 3

This transfer is flying by! It's the start of week 4 and I still feel like I just got here! I guess being in my last area for 5 transfers makes a few weeks seem really short. 

This last week I was with another companion for most of the time because my companion, Elder Nasman, was living at the mission office with a sick missionary, in order to give the sick missionary's companion time outside. So it was an interesting week exchanging back and forth from Taipei, about 2 hours to travel by bus and train. I would like to report some miracles but I think this week passed rather normally. 

At church, like 3 members gave us boxes of cake to take home if that counts as a miracle! It's definitely the little things. Having cake for dinner last night was pretty great. Right now we've got 3 main investigators. Little Bro Xu, who will be getting baptized Christmas. And then there's Bruce and Allen who are both pretty cool guys, though progress slower but Elder Nasman and I both feel that they already believe it's true, just a little hesitant to make the change. I'll keep you updated. Other highlights of the week... An old member in our ward thought I was Philippino! The way he said it made me unsure whether it was a compliment or an insult. (There's a little bad blood between Taiwan and the Philippines lately apparently) I told him I was half Taiwanese and that made him happy so we're good there. 

Taiwan is great. We've knocked as many doors as ever and there's as many stray, possibly rabid, dogs as ever. It's great. I love you all and hope your Christmas season is going wonderfully!

Met a cool guy who builds stuff right out of his garage! He also had a license plate from Utah on his wall!

Transfer 8 - Week 2

This week was pretty... "the usual". 

We found a new investigator who's really cool though. His name is Allen and he lives in YingGe. He works selling jewelry and is easy on the eyes so he probably does really well selling jewelry haha. We met with him at a little sushi store and talked to him about the Bible over some super tasty and super cheap sushi. He brought along with him his Bible and he had highlighted Hebrews 11:6 so we talked about that and how important it is to develop a relationship with God. It was a really good lesson and we're pretty excited about him! 

There is another companionship that live with us and one of them has been sick the past 2 weeks about, so this next week we're going to switch off babysitting him so his companion can get outside. Should be fun. We have an investigator who will be getting baptized on Christmas so that should be awesome! His dad is a less active and his whole family just started coming back to church! It's amazing! We're very happy about them and excited the son will be getting baptized on Christmas. 

Looking forward to the next week! We have a couple of missionary conference meetings so it should be fun! 

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

Yep. Biking down a windy road and both sides look like this

Knocking some doors down an alleyway. 

will learn how to play by the end of my mission! Thanks Mom! It works really well! 

YingGe

Transfer 8 - Week 1

Hello! This last week was my first full week in Bade, my new area with my new companion, Elder Nasman. It was wonderful! We visited many members and many were gracious enough to feed us! We even got fed on Thanksgiving! Though at the time I didn't realize it was Thanksgiving, the dumplings were just as good! 

Currently, we have only 1 progressing investigator so we have some work to do. We have many members willing to help us, but the main problem is not having any investigators to be helped out with. We want to go down to another city called YingGe, which is about a 20 minute bike ride east of our area and this city is actually famous for pottery so there are many tourists. We went there last night to contact and familiarize ourselves with the area and it's actually a beautiful little town. The road with all of the pottery shops lined on it is very charming, I'll have to get some pictures for you all next week. We want to focus on YingGe because no one ever goes there, because it's kind of out of the way and riding back is uphill. Also our area has 2 sets of Elders so one of us can unofficially be "YingGe Elders" and the other set can stick with Bade. But we figure we're kind of building up our area right now so why not go there and see what hidden treasures lie in wait! The weather has gotten surprisingly cold lately and biking at night will become a memorable experience. 

Thinking of investing in a thicker jacket, but also not wanting to take away from the memorability of my future memories. I'll probably go with the thicker jacket. Things are going well and I'm quite content with everything right now. Excited to get things going around here. Met someone in a park a few days ago playing basketball. Asked him if I made a 3 pointer, he would listen to us. I then shot and airballed big time. Or as my dad would say "Air Monster". Realized my basketball skills have become rather offensive. Asked if he would listen anyway and he said yes. Taught him about the Book of Mormon and he said he would check it out. We'll see if we can't get in touch with him. 

Thank you for all of the prayers! Have a wonderful Christmas season! 

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

Me and a couple of my other investigators before I left! Lyndon on the left and a new investigator, Brother Lu on the right. (New investigator, second time meeting him. Gospel hasn't quite changed him yet thus the no smile haha) 

Cleaning our apartment and Elder Lackey found an old rain jacket's hood. I was wearing a cowboy hat while taking this picture. 

Went to the temple Saturday for a tour with an investigator and JJ came with us! She's an RC and she's awesome. Super hipster.