New York!!!

Mom,

So I'm in New York and loving it!!!!!! My companion is beyond perfect! I couldn't have asked for a better one! Her name is Sister Johnson, the Mangelsons told me about her. Jennifer Mangelson and Sister Johnson's mom are friends. Small world. Anyway she is pretty cool and chill, she is an amazing missionary and a great example for me to look up too. When I arrived there was a group cheering for me. 5 sisters, 2 elders, and President Calderwood. Yes I met Sister Lee. She is pretty cool. Unfortunately  Sister Lee had a phone call Thursday and is being transferred to Brooklyn. Now I will be the only white girl in the district. There are only 6 Chinese sisters in the whole mission including me and only two white sisters, me and sister Lee. Sister Lee and I were lucky to be able to Skype with Miranda Norman last night and we just chatted and then it led to the gospel discussion. Miranda is doing fantastic I am super proud of her. The ward is fantastic! My Chinese has improved a lot. Now that I'm here I am really glad that I had tough and great experiences at the MTC. I don't really feel like I'm in New York because I see Chinese people everywhere so I felt like I was In Taiwan. I pretty much see one or two Americans at day.

My companion is the one taking the selfies

First day in the mission we had to do street sweep and say: mian fei ying wen ban. (Free English class) at the most popular area in Flushing. Street Sweep is like talking to a bunch of strangers about free English class and the gospel. I was super scared at first. My companion told me that we weren't leaving till I passed out a card. I tried to give one out and was rejected and my heart felt like it was stabbed. An elder from my district talked to someone, invited me over, and gave a card to that person and we were able to go home. My second time I give out 6 cards. My third time I gave out 5 cards and received 2 phone numbers and was able to carry a conversation. If someone rejected me or the gospel, my heart didn't hurt anymore for myself. It only hurt when others doesn't want to accept the gospel. The point to this story is..... Don't be afraid be be out of your comfort zone. As long we are improving everyday, we will be the best missionaries ever! The Lord is with us everywhere we go. He wants to help us. At first I was more thinking about myself and how I would think about others and how scary they can be. Later I started to realize that this mission is not about myself. It's about helping others to come unto Christ. I started seeing them as children of God. I started seeing how The Lord would see them. It's amazing how quickly the perspective and attitude can change for the better. My love for them increases. 

We are pretty much low on numbers. Right now we are working on bringing the less active to the church . People only come to church because of green card or they liked the elder missionaries and got baptized for the elder and when the elders leave the people stop coming to church. President Calderwood changed the rule of elders that they cannot teach females unless they are married. So they have to give all the girl investigators to us.  We go and visit a lot of the less actives and it's hard because they can't keep one simple commitment and we know it will bless their lives. They all pretty much love Sister Johnson. Sister Johnson is such a caring missionary but also very bold. We went to church yesterday and there were probably about 50 people. Not a lot. Since we met a lot of people at street sweep and guess how many people showed up? Pretty much 10 people who were searching for a church and interested in the church. Few were Mexican or American who like the Chinese branch and Sister Johnson translates everything for them.  So we have a really really small branch. When we arrived at church, Sister Johnson challenged me to talk to people in the branch. For some reason I didn't feel scared and went up and talked with people. My Chinese went up and I know that The Lord was helping me so much to hear, understand, and speak it. Few people here speak English and they helped me a whole bunch. They all were surprised when they found out I was deaf and then they wanted to learn sign language. Sister Johnson informed me that we are all spread apart as missionaries and are suppose to sit with others. I sat with a family, they are pretty cool. As I was sitting there, our newest district leader who sat a few rows in front of me turns around and tried to convince me to bear my testimony, that evil boy hahaha. I went up and bore my testimony. Again people said I was one fast learner. Again, this is the Lord's work.

One of the craziest stories I have ever heard was about a man. He is a convert of a year I guess, his girlfriend just got baptized a month ago. He is 23 and his girlfriend is 25. She overheard him thinking about going on a mission and freaked out. So Sister Johnson and I met with them and decided to talk about missionary work and it led to a Priesthood blessing. Background on him: his father told him that he will let him experience everything for himself to know if it was right or wrong. So he did a lot of bad things in the past.  One day the bishop pulled him aside and said something that made him change. He is now a young men president, worthy priesthood holder, and he is such an amazing guy. He is one of the best guys I have met. He was able to baptize his girlfriend as well. They go to the temple a lot.  He is now considering having  priesthood blessings to help him overcome some of his struggles.  She is such a sweetheart. She was shy around me at first but the warmed up to me and just loved me and I adore her. She is super cute and excited when she comes out of her shell

We met with another couple  last Thursday . Sister Johnson informed me that he doesn't like missionaries, he would say things and glare at the missionaries. She loves missionaries. We prayed that she would be home. She was home! He asked a lot about the church. He has problem with Word of Wisdom. It was so cool because I was able to understand like 70% of what they were saying. They both joined the church but went inactive. He was a little upset because in Taiwan the church never told him about word of wisdom and people here do. She kept saying it was a different church he was talking about in Taiwan. So we will be talking about the word of wisdom with them. It was a little intense but good talk. Afterward, Sister Johnson was surprised and said he had never asked questions about the church before and never talked to us before so that was an improvement.

Women's Conference was amazing!! We sat in the back back back of the room. Guess what? I was able to hear every word the speakers were saying! How awesome was that?!? The Lord is helping me a lot in this work! I love Women's Conference! The temple is super important, it's true that it does make you forget about the world and help you feel peace. We need to be like the 5 wise Virgins preparing ourselves. We might be going to the temple next month so I'm excited!

So we teach English class Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. A deaf girl teaching English class??? Really?!? Now my teaching skills are getting better because I now know what to do and say. My hearing is getting better for me to understand what they are saying in English is correct.

I won't get on Facebook till 5 weeks. The President wants all the new missionaries to experience missionary life for 6 weeks before having a Facebook so I'll be online in 5 weeks. They haven't had a new sister missionary for 4 months. Looking at the future missionaries coming in, looks like we won't have a sister missionary coming in for a long time.

New York is insane! People are crazy, police everywhere, always have sirens going on, we are right next to the airport so we hear planes everyday, we only speak Chinese at night because the Latinos hit on girls, once they hear you speak Chinese, they won't mess with you. We have been hit on a few times and we scare them away with our awesome Chinese. I still love New York, it's awesome, it's crazy, but it's where I'm meant to be. I'm super happy here.

Today we will be going to Coney Island and chill at the beach and play some sports all day. So I'm excited. It's a two hour ride but I can't wait.

There is really no pictures because I was in the learning/settling in process but that's no excuse, I promise you will have pictures next week.

Love you mamasita,

Love ,

Sister Moore

Ps wow Heather?!? That's crazy! I love that girl so much!!!! Miss her!

Wedding?!? Wow great story there! Miss Sister Price!! Love her so much!