plusses outweigh the minuses ‏ 9/05/10

Dear President Bishop-

I'm sorry that my letter last week was so whiny! It was kind of a hard move day but I am better now.

I really do like Taichung! Okay, here are some of the things I like about it.
- This internet cafe is the only non disgusting email place I've ever been to
- Wide streets and tall buildings
- Lots of people
- Lots of referrals
- Beautiful public parks
- Church is from 2-5 in the afternoon

Going from country to city is an adjustment, some difficult, some nice.

- I live about a half hour bikeride outside of my area!
+ Luckily the chapel is in our area - most missionaries don't have the chapel in their area.
+ We live in Taiping, which I am quickly finding a soft spot for. We only spend time here on Preparation day, but everything is close together and really pretty nice. This is the nicest internet cafe I've been to in Taiwan. Everything is also conveniently close to our appartment, instead of spread all across town like in Yuanlin.

- My bed is hard as a rock
+ We live with Sister Hampton and Sister Liu, which I decided I love. It's like having roommates again. It's nice to have Sister Liu back around again - my only bundi companion I've had! I love her.

+ The weather has been comfortable - it really isn't as hot this summer as it was last summer. That just makes everything easier to deal with

- I don't know anyone's name!
+ Church yesterday was hands down the best regular 3 hour block of church I've had since the MTC. I actually felt the spirit in all the talks and lessons. I learned things instead of just being stressed about about taking care of people. Not splitting work was great - we only cover one ward so I always have my companion. The ward is also really awesome. The ward here feels like a regular ward back home. It doesn't have the same feeling as some of the other wards I've served in where I felt like everyone is still a bit fragile in the gospel- (like in Yuanlin the RSP had never read the whole Book of Mormon). We didn't have as many investigators this week (eek) but it was nice to not want to just wish I were dead by the end of church.

+ The most amazing thing happened in church yesterday. President Bishop and his wife spoke in church, afterwhich and I was invited to do the routine introduce myself and share my testimony to the ward. I did, and as I finished, President Bishop got up and told the ward I was an amazing missionary and made me tell them how many people I baptised last movecall (6). I don't know if you know how many levels of awesome that is. First of all, complements from my mission president are really nice. Second of all, it was in the middle of sacrament meeting in my new ward. It increased my relationship with the ward tenfold. We got four member referrals yesterday alone. A sister came up and told me how special it was that my mission president did that - she had never seen it before. Then she referred me to her best friend - an apparently golden family.

So thank you President Bishop!

I think I am going to love it here.

+ My companion, Sister Brownell is great. She is a calming influence and pillar of strength as I am a bit melodramatic at times. I am not used to being in an area with so many people, so many referrals and so few progressing investigators. (The last part I am bound and determined to change). I don't know how I did missionary work before - we'd only have about twenty investigators but somehow baptise like crazy and here we have a ton of investigators but not a lot progressing. It's an adjustment. I guess it's only been a week.

Times about up. I love you all so much.
Love, Sister Johnson



Cami's email to Donna:

Dear Momma

Happy happy birthday from all of us to you, we wish it was our birthday so we could party too!
I'm sorry that there was not a pink convertible with a bow on it or a fluffy cake for you to make all your birthday wishes come true
But
I hope you know how much I love you and can't wait to see you in just a couple short months. It's coming up fast, eh?


HAPPY BIRTHDAY! I hope you know you mean so much to me. Yesterday during Relief Society they read The Giving Tree and I cried and thought of you. You are the most giving, loving tree I've ever met.

I love you.
FML
Your daughter,
Cami