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. 

Transfer 2 - Week 6

Hey good people! 

I am now in a new city! I'm in Xinzhuang! Before I was in Zhubei, like midwest Taiwan. Now I'm in the suburbs of Taipei and it's a lot more city. Pretty big change! 

Another crazy thing is right when I got here, 2 days ago, they decided to change the area. Before there were 2 sets of Elders, splitting the area because it's pretty big. But they decided to just combine areas so the other Elders have both left and now my new companion, Elder Beck and I, are taking over a huge area! And we're also taking all of their investigators so we have SO many investigators! Before back in Xinfeng Elder K and I were really struggling to find people to teach but here it's the total opposite! We are going to be scrambling from place to place teaching. We have about 30 investigators. Crazy! 

Actually my first day in the area one of our investigators got baptized! So that was cool to see Brother Bao get baptized and get to know him a little bit. He seems like such a cool guy. I spoke a little Taiwanese to him and he was really impressed! (Taiwanese is like the native, aboriginal tongue here in Taiwan. Not Chinese. Spoken by all the old people haha) My new companion Elder Beck knows a good amount of Taiwanese so he's already taught me a bit! Elder Beck is awesome by the way. We're like the same person. We like the exact same music, we both play guitar and have one and both like basketball (going to play today) and we're just the same. We already love each other :) 

But anyways all the people I've met here so far are so nice and awesome! I met some other members who own a chicken shop and when we visited them at their shop they showed us they were selling some chicken butts! Hahaha they were so funny looking! There was just a huge tub of chicken butts right there on the street. Must have been like 300 butts or so. Ha man I thought that was pretty hilarious. 

Another funny thing is last night we were at a member's house eating dinner and the toilet was super complicated. I'd never seen one like it before, it had a whole bunch of buttons and stuff all over it. So when I was trying to flush it I had no idea how. One of the buttons had a picture of someone sitting, as if on the toilet, and then little dots coming out of the butt. I figured that meant in order to flush after going poo, you push that button so I did. After pressing the button, this little straw looking them appeared inside the toilet and then to my surprise and amazement, it started shooting water up in the air!! The water continued to shoot out of the little contraption and splatter on the floor as I stood there, probably with my mouth open and with a weird, confused look on my face. 

Realizing the water was spraying everywhere, I snapped out of it and put my hand in front of the stream of water to stop it and pushed the button again but nothing happened. I figured maybe I'd just wait it out, maybe it's on a timer. But after ten seconds it kept on spraying and I had no idea what button to push so I just kept standing there with my hand covering this little straw-like sprayer thing in the toilet not knowing which button to push to stop it because all the buttons are in characters or misleading pictures. Ah it was pretty funny. Eventually I got the thing to turn off but man that was a funny time.

I think I'm going to really like it here in Xinzhuang. It's SO pretty! Our part of the city is pretty epic. I'll take pictures for next week but I already love this place. I've met some amazing people. I just met an awesome guy yesterday at church, Ronnie, he's from Uganda and going to school here in Taiwan studying business. He speaks Swahili, English and a bit of Chinese. Anyway he came into church a bit late so I went and sat next to him to translate and got to know him a bit. He wasn't actually an investigator so we taught him after church and man he is a spiritual giant!! So humble and surprisingly poetic. He was talking about humanity and God and stuff and how God should be the same to everyone and how feeling peace and the Spirit is most important and he said something like, not a perfect quote but close,"When I look at the flowers and I see blue and red and white and green, or when I look at the beautiful high mountains or the great sea, I think of how wonderful God is. God loves us so much. He loves every single one of us! When the sun rises, it shines on everyone. And so it is with God." Man he is an amazingly humble guy. 

Well everyone basically I'm super happy to be here and I miss the people of my last area but I'm very excited to start fresh! 

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

My old district! Last P-day going on a hike. Elder Orchard being the awkward tall guy due to the slope. Ha oh man we were cracking up at that. Gonna miss that guy! He's now in Hualien(east Taiwan. Total country. Super beautiful) and I'm in Taipei.

Me!

A cool little stick bug! Ooooohhh

Pingu - One of my students! They all wanted pictures with me when I said I was leaving! They're so sweet.

New Companion - Elder Beck and I calling all our new investigators (the peeps) and loving it.

Gordon - Whoo! Student! 

Kevin - One of my English class students!

Sister Peng got baptized! Sister's investigator but we love her :)

Transfer 2 - Week 5

Good morning good morning good morning! 

Well another week has gone by and it was very similar to the last. It's so hard to meet with our investigators!! They simply won't pick up their phone! We've tried everything. We've written them cute little notes on post it note hearts putting in on their door, asked members to call them, visited their houses unexpectedly and pretty much everything it seems but alas, it cannot be. 

A few days ago we were visiting a part member family, the whole family members except the dad and so we set up a time with him to come and visit and teach. When we got there he was upstairs playing computer games. When we got there the wife told us he was too busy and we'd just have to come back another time. But we were expecting this because it has happened before. Right after she had told us this our member pulled up in his car! This was our plan. We thought that perhaps the dad would feel a bit more embarrassed and guilty if a member actually came and wanted to meet with him too. When the wife saw that we had a member she totally changed and went upstairs to ask if her husband wanted to come down now. 

A minute late she came back down and still said he's too busy... It seems that has been the case with most of our investigators. We can't meet with them! There is one little golden nugget. Brother Zeng. He's a high school senior, studying to be a composer who we met a couple weeks ago. The first time we met with him we invited him to be baptized and he accepted a date for May 25th! The only thing is we found out he has school on Sunday mornings so he can't come to church... There isn't much we can do but pray, pray and pray that he can come somehow! Anyways he's awesome and we love him. Our other investigators we can't meet with consistently so there isn't much to update on sadly. 

Funny story though, yesterday we were visiting a potential investigator that we had met a couple weeks ago. When we got there he invited us in and we saw that we was watching what seemed like a pretty sweet action film. We asked him what it was and he said it was OO7 Skyfall. Of course we're not allowed to watch movies so we asked him if he could turn it off real quick and he said there was only a few minutes left so we said ok. But about 15 minutes of struggling not to watch it by awkwardly appearing to be very interested in his centerpiece later it seemed that the movie still had a good amount of time left. We asked him if we could come back another time and rescheduled. That was pretty funny. It still rains most everyday and sometimes it's quite chilly but I like the rain so it's kind of fun! And when it's raining and cold and we're only wearing short sleeves everyone we ride by notices and says something about it so it's a good conversation starter. 

Well I miss all of you very much. Pray that I can meet with my investigators! Oh also another thing is the transfer meeting is this Friday so I might be moving. So that could be exciting! I've already been out on my mission for almost 6 months! It's crazy. Weird. Anyway I love you all. Muah.

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

Elder K wearing some poor members shoes.

"Picture Contacting" with the assistants! Went on splits with them and went out contacting! Basically we go around and ask someone to take a picture for us cause we're foreigners and so it makes sense. While asking them to take a picture we start talking to them and maybe even get another passerby to take a picture of all of us, as in this case. Picture contacting. Love it! And if they don't have interest, at least you walk away with a good picture! 

Transfer Week 2 - Week 4

Hello hello hello! 

So this last week just passed by and it's really weird! I'm not a "trainee" anymore! Crazy. I'm all grown up! Well to update you all, Brother Guo got baptized!!!!! Goodness I love this guy. He's such a scoundrel. Definitely going to be going to the single activities and stealing the hearts of women all over in Zhubei. And it was my first time actually baptizing someone! And it was in Chinese! So I was a bit nervous but it went all smoothly and it was a good experience for him. 

Also we were able to watch conference this last weekend and it was some good fun. I loved how Elder Christofferson talked about Les Miserables! Haha sometimes I miss stuff like that, my music, but how glorious the reunion will be when I get back and can listen to my Phantom of the Opera. So conference was great and it was definitely a new experience watching it here. It was a tough week (so basically a normal week) because it seems everyday we had at least 2 appointments fall through. One day we had 4 fall through! And our backup plans were to go contacting so we contacted a whole lot this last week. Usually I haven't liked contacting, partly in fact because a lot of the time I didn't understand what they were saying. But I've felt I've really started to like it and just talking to people is actually kind of fun! 

Also another thing I've started to like is calling potential investigators. People who missionaries have talked to in the past and their numbers are then written on a list for other missionaries to call because at the time of the first contact, they may not have had interest, couldn't set up or whatever the reason may be. I talked to one lady and the conversation suddenly got personal as she told me she's looking for a job and remembers past missionaries giving her a Book of Mormon, she asked if she should read it. I said definitely! I told her to read 1 Nephi chapter 3 and it turned out she lives in a different city so I sent her referral to the missionaries in that area telling them to be ready to discuss that chapter and her situation. 

I talked to another lady on the phone and she was hilarious! We both couldn't stop laughing! I'd never even met this woman but somehow we just made each other laugh. When I started turning the conversation towards church and stuff she stops laughing and she say, "Are you trying to persuade me right now?" and so I was like persuade? No no no of course not! I was thinking in my head oh shoot she's onto me. And then she starts laughing super hard again and says she's only kidding and would love to set up and meet with us. Turns out she also lives in another area so I sent that referral as well with the details of our conversation. It's strange, I feel this last week I've really started to love these people. Whoever it may be, I see them and just feel love for them. I'm definitely a sappy old missionary. We also met a new investigator the other day, Brother Zeng. He's in high school, about to graduate and he wants to be a composer. We've only met with him once and so we taught him about God and prayer, because his background is in Buddhism. We prayed at the end and after the prayer he said," I feel peace. More special than usual." We're meeting him tomorrow and we're so excited to help him feel the Spirit again. We were also able to meet with  the Liang family this week. Our families are all very busy so finally meeting with him was very nice. We taught them the Restoration and they had many questions. 

About prophets, about priesthood, about Joseph Smith, Jesus Christ and basically everything. They are very curious and sincere and inviting them to read the Book of Mormon, we feel they will come to know that everything we taught is true. Family and friends, I love you all. I know the work I'm doing is real. Hard, but real. 

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

Conference Sunday! The Elders of the district and Colt! A recent convert who has striking style. He just got a brand new suit, probably because of our influence... :)

Ward Mission Leader owns a bakery. Gives us bread every once in a while. LOVE bread!!!!!!!!!! So Happy!!!!!!!!!!

Brother Guo's baptism! 

Go out the door. It's raining. Get soaked. Get home. Sleep. Wake up. Put shoes in front of heater. Study. Hope they dry fast enough. Go out the door. Gotta love "typhoon season" :D

Oh ya! 

 Watching conference on Saturday! 

Transfer Week 2- Week 3

Hello everyone again! 

This past week hasn't been too shabby at all. Because of this last weekend being a holiday, where everyone goes back home to visit ancestors graves, all of our investigators were gone. It's called saomu, don't think there's a translation for it either cause we don't have this holiday but anyway everyone was gone. Literally every investigator. So that meant a whole lot of knocking doors! It also rained I think everyday this past week so it wasn't the best combination but it was good! We were able to teach a bunch of lessons in doorways and met one lady in particular who was awesome.So prepared. 

Every question we asked her she just went off about things that totally related to the Gospel. We found out that her husband passed away recently and though that's rather sad, we are so so so excited to teach her about the Plan of Salvation! We hope to meet with her this week! So the past few days have definitely been pretty tough. Riding bikes all day in the hard rain, actually fairly cold, and getting rejected by most everyone. BUT meeting one special lady made all those hours worth it! So sorry there isn't much news on any investigators because we didn't actually get to meet any of them... What else did we do? 

Oh so every Wednesday night we teach English, well I teach English because Elder K is out in the hall at the front desk taking care of newcomers. So there is one lady in particular in my class that causes some trouble, we'll call her Julie. She has a desk and everyone else doesn't because she will get very upset if she doesn't have one. And she is rather hard to work with when she's upset. Her English is actually pretty good though I wish it wasn't because I think she gets some secret thrill from going on tangents. At the end of every English lesson, after the first hour of class, we then have a 30 minute spiritual lesson to finish up. So as I was talking about family, love and great stuff she started talking about orphanages, parents abusing children and then decided to throw gangsters in as well. Needless to say, it was very hard to keep control of the situation because throughout all of class she'll just start talking very loud about completely off topic things and if I tell her that I can't answer her every question and that she needs to let other people talk, she'll get really upset. So it is a rather difficult situation, because trust me, she's a bit scary when she doesn't get when she wants. And kicking her out in the past hasn't done anything so we'll see how it goes this week. 

A lot of stuff happens in missionary work! But I'm learning how to work with all different kinds of people so it's good. Well basically this past week was riding bikes in the rain (funny story on that included with the pictures), knocking and contacting also in the rain and a crazy English class. 

Well I love you all! Stay classy.

Love,

Elder Hagedorn

Last P-day! Lunch with the district and a nice little burger joint "Feed Me" is it's name. Love it. 

LOVE me some Taiwanese bakeries. Eat at one pretty much about every day. Love bread and love Taiwan. Perfect combo. 

Went bowling last P-day after Feed Me! I'm Asian.

So the other night as we were knocking doors a certain "Good Samaritan" had compassion on us, or maybe it was pity and gave us an old umbrella because it was pouring outside and we were soaked. So as were riding back home, I, being in a very strange and dorky mood, was holding the umbrella while I was riding and propped it on my shoulder as a soldier would hold a gun. I started to swing/shrug my shoulders back and forth as if I was marching and was really exaggerating the motions. I was having fun. But, because I was very very exaggerated in my motions, and was riding with no hands, I made my bike swerve and I lost control and slammed into the side of a parked car... Ha ya. It knocked my back brakes off but other than that I was totally fine and the car had no scratches so we carried on. Riding in the rain, wearing my helmet, holding an umbrella, for some reason I just really felt like a soldier and so I continued to act like one "marching" on my bike and this time, holding the umbrella with both hands and swinging from the left to the right across my lap, how I imagine a soldier might do. Again I was very exaggerated with my motions and so my bike was kind of swerving left and right, this, coupled with the already slick roads from the rain, was destined for destruction. As my "marching" preceded to become more and more exaggerated, violent, I might even say, I lost control again though this time, having prior experience I was able to grab my handlebars and brake in time. But, because my back brakes had been knocked out earlier, only my front brakes worked and braking really hard on these caused me to do a front wheelie sort of thing. And so out of reaction I put my feet down and because of all the momentum I had, I didn't actually stop but kind of ran with my bike while it was only on its front wheel, if you can imagine that. So as I was running, out of control, with my bike on its front wheel, trying to slow down, I was headed towards the side of the road by this time and saw on the side of the road a cement trench type of thing. Basically, a huge gutter. I was heading straight for it and envisioned for a split second my head hitting the cement corner of the trench and tragically dying. This whole scene played out in my head as I was heading towards it. It really was slow-mo. So seeing this sharp corner of the trench I somehow leapt over it, letting go of my bike, the front handlebars and front wheel were able to go through my legs and I landed safely on the other side of the trench while the sound of my bike crashing to me, sounded like a huge explosion like in one of those movies where as they're walking away the explosion goes off in the background. It was crazy, basically.And I don't know how I walked away with no injuries, not even a bruise. And I even stayed on my feet the whole time! It was pretty whack. Hopefully that narration made sense. But I'm fine and I'm never doing dorky things on my bike in the rain again, though it was pretty fun... :)