Sept. 1st, 1st Sunday in Vietnamese Branch

Sunday, Sept 1 2013

First Sunday here in San Jose.  We have been assigned to the Vietnamese Branch, which the Crawfords have been attending.  It is very small.  The Branch President is President Shelton.  He doesn’t speak Vietnamese either.  There is an interpreter named Sister Kim…..Kim is her first name.  I learned from Sister Janette that they all go by their first names, because a lot of their last names are similar!  Sister Kim sat up where the clerk usually would sit.  She had a regular microphone and also a headset.  When someone spoke in English, like the Branch Pres. when conducting, she would speak into her microphone and translate into Vietnamese.  When someone spoke in Viet, she would put the headset on and translate into English for those of us who only spoke English, and we had headsets on to listen.  Today was testimony meeting, and as it began, Pres. Shelton first spoke and explained that a testimony should be uplifting, and if it wasn’t, then you shouldn’t get up to speak.  We learned later that there has been a feud going on between a couple of families, and they use testimony meeting to get up and bad-mouth the other family, so very negative.  None of that happened today after Pres. Shelton’s remarks.  We learned that meetings don’t cover as much as a normal ward does, because of the time involved to translate.  That slows down the process.

In Sunday School, Elder Crawford gave the lesson, and Sister Kim stood up front and translated.  Again, not much covered because of the time translating.  Also, there was some back and forth in Viet as they debated the proper word to use in translation of the word Martyrdom.  Elder Crawford finally changed the word to Killed.

In Relief Society, there were several announcements….both in English and Viet.  One being that on Sept 15^th, that will be Elder Atkinson’s last day, so they want to hold a potluck farewell for him after church.  They passed around a sign-up sheet (couldn’t read it).  Sister Kim showed me where she had filled in something I couldn’t read and told me it was a dessert.  I also signed up for a dessert, since she had pointed out that column, and I put down Brownies…..don’t know if that was what was what I was supposed to write down or what!  Also announced…..a couple will be going to the temple on Sept. 14^th for the first time, and getting married.  They will have a reception on Sept. 21^st, put on by the ward because they have no family here and no money.  It was asked that anyone that can do so, to please  donate money for it.  They will purchase food with the money, and any left over will be given to the couple in a gift card, with a card signed by all in the ward.  And, we were told that if you couldn’t donate anything, sign the card anyway, as the gift was from all in the ward.

When the RS lesson was taught, it was by Sister Lan, who is the Relief Society President.  She speaks English too, so she did her own translating.  It was on Forgiveness.  We didn’t progress too far into the lesson.  One sister, don’t know who, made a comment in Viet, which I learned was that she was saying that she had forgiven a certain person all she was going to, and that she was sure that God didn’t expect her to keep forgiving that person!  Sister Lan said, in both English and Viet, that we needed to forgive all, as many times as needed.  She gave scripture examples….7 times 70…..I the Lord will forgive whom I will forgive, but you must forgive all.  She also said if you carry anger around, it becomes a burden to you, and doesn’t help you to have peace or to follow Jesus’ example.  The class ran over about 20 minutes!  Sister Crawford tried to suggest we needed to end (she had an investigator she needed to take care of……take him home.), but Sister Lan said that she needed to finish this discussion first.  Sister Janette was sitting by me, and said that Sister Lan wanted to make sure the point was understood by the sister who was disagreeing.  People want it understood that they shouldn’t be feuding, and they want her to understand why and take it to heart to be forgiving….that we all have faults.  That no argument is 100% one person’s fault. 

So, interesting Sunday meetings!

Started setting things out for tomorrow…..packing a lunch for both of us.  We plan on getting up early to go walking before we shower and get dressed. 

Oh, Elder Crawford gave us a San Jose map today….we looked it over after church to get a better idea of the main roads that connect us to places.  It helped to visualize the layout of the locations we need, so we don’t have to rely on the GPS so much…..too many times it wants to take us on 101.  Even when I check avoid Freeways.  Because 101 is listed as a hwy, though around here it is like a freeway!

Hope we get a good night’s sleep to be ready for tomorrow!  We were told on Friday when we stopped in at the mission office, that they are so busy that they don’t even break for lunch….they just eat as they work!  Oh, well, keeping busy helps the time pass quickly!

Sat., Aug. 31, 2013. Finishing at the MTC, then travel to San Jose, California

^{Thursday, last day of classes.}

We had Brother Foutin speak to us in the morning about vehicles. 

At lunch time, we started loading up the car.

Afternoon classes, we had a testimony meeting, and then we had like a practice or sort of like a test, on the things we learned. Several different tasks to complete.  We completed ours about 3:50, and then said good bye to all and went to our room, changed clothes, took the rest of the stuff to the car, stopped in the front of the MTC to turn in keys to the room and de-activate our cards, and then hit the road.  We drove as far as Elko, Nevada, stopping for the night about 8 or so local time (they are on Pacific time zone).    Then bed.

Fri., Aug. 30^th….got up at 6 a.m.  Got ready, picked up a breakfast burrito at McDonalds to eat as we drove, and were on the road by 7:30 a.m.  Lots of construction!  Arrived in San Jose at the mission office just before 5 p.m.  Met a few in the office, and got a quick tour.  Taken to the place we are staying for 2 weeks till we can get into the apartment on Sept. 13^th.  It is a members home that they rent out to the missionaries.  It is actually the home the Cattron’s will be staying in.  They arrive next week, Wed. I think.  When they get here, we share it with them till the 13^th, so 1 ½ weeks.  This house has 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and 1 small bedroom that they have set up as an office.  It has orange trees and grapefruit trees in the backyard!  We went to the first store we found when we went out for the evening to pick up a few grocery items for breakfast…..a Safeway store, and prices were crazy high!  So we just got a loaf of bread, a dozen eggs, a quart of milk, a couple of bananas, and a box of cereal.  We thought of getting some bacon, but it was about $9 for a pkg!  So we skipped it.  We will find Walmart tomorrow and get more groceries at hopefully a better price!  We were hungry, so found a KFC and got dinner, which was also expensive….nearly $20 for the 2 of us!  Guess we won’t be eating out much!!  Then bed.

Sat., Aug 31^st…..Got up at 7, went for a walk for a half hour, cleaned up, ate breakfast, dressed and went to find some things.  Located the branch we are assigned to….the Vietnamese Branch (now, this will be interesting!); located our apartment we will be moving into; located Walmart (the bacon was $3 + cheaper than Safeway!) and got a few items we will need the next couple of weeks.  We will be packing a lunch everyday, so got things for that.  Gary spoke to the mission president’s wife.  We had hoped to meet them today, but they are very busy, and had a lot of baptisms to attend.  So, we will have dinner with them next week when the Cattron’s arrive.  We will most likely meet them while we work in the office next week.  Work begins on Monday.  Driving has been interesting around here….we can’t believe the traffic!  And, the GPS isn’t always accurate, we have learned.  In fact, when we arrived, it got us mixed up as soon as we got off the freeway, and when we were on the corner, and could see the church to our right, it wanted us to turn left down a road.  So, we learned it can get us near, but not always to, our destination. 

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

One more night and day here, then we are on our way to San Jose!

Today went well.  In class today, we learned about Housing-opening and closing a house and setting up preset payments, Referral Manager, Finances-journal entries, duties of a Finance secretary, Bank of America things like PAT and WORK for the cards used in the mission.  And we had guest speakers today, Brother and Sister Hawkes (and they are related to Jean Anderson!!  Sis. Hawkes is Keith’s niece!)  They talked of other things we can do on our mission, such as making our apartment look homey, then inviting neighbors to dinner, being available to invite investigators to dinner, even the missionaries.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Today, I did the devotional talk in our morning class.  I talked about faith being the opposite of fear.  In class today, we did Finance, introduction to Mission Organization, Missionary Transfers, beginning of Housing, and we did Outlook—email, calendar, contacts, and something else, can’t remember right off.

After dinner tonight, we headed to the Marriott Center for the fireside/devotional.  We walked over…the weather was great.  They never tell ahead of time who the speaker is, so we don’t learn till we get there.  They have monitors that tell different things to the missionaries there, some are things about Preach My Gospel, and how they need to stay seated during the meeting, and last week they had the name of the person speaking.  This week, there was nothing said about who was speaking, so we were beginning to think it was someone high up (the lady next to me who was Sister Turner and I were talking together about this). 

It was Elder Neil L. Anderson and his wife.  It was a great meeting, about Love and Sacrifice.  Towards the end of the meeting, I noticed a security man quietly go up to someone on the podium, so I thought “something’s up”.  After the meeting concluded, then the person conducting got up and said it was a severe storm outside now, with not only rain but thunder and lightning, so we had to wait for awhile to leave till it was safer.  All the young missionaries walk over to the Marriott Center.  Seniors can take a shuttle bus, but we wanted to walk.  Well, we rode the bus home!  It was still pouring when they let us leave, but no more lightning.  We probably sat in the Center singing songs for 15 to 20 minutes while we waited for the all clear.

So, got here later than we had planned.  If we had walked we would have been faster.  The shuttle bus always takes the seniors to the Marriott Hotel first before coming back to the MTC.  Now time to get ready for bed!

Monday, August 26, 2013. Office training week.

Today began our Office Training!!!  Yes, I loved it all!  I just eat up computer stuff, so it was a great day!  We began the day at 8:00 a.m.  Song, prayer and spiritual thought (which we do twice a day, morning and after lunch too).  Then introductions, introduction to computers, which was very brief, as our group all had been on computers before.  If was very basic for those who needed it, but we didn’t.  Then an introduction to Microsoft Word 2010.  Lunch next, then devotional time again, then introduction to iMOS, which stands for Internet Mission Office System.  It is the program the church uses in the missions.  Next came introduction to Microsoft Excel 2010.  Even though there were lots on Word I knew, I learned a few new things, and I really didn’t know much about Excel, so that was fun to learn.  I knew nothing about iMOS, so that was good to learn, especially since we will be using it in the Mission Office.

Met some of the new Senior Couples who arrived today.  One couple, the Cattron’s …….we met at dinner.  They are with the new group sort of, but not really.  They arrived a month ago, but the husband had a heart attack 2 days after getting here, and has been in the hospital, and recuperating since.  He is finally cleared to come back to the MTC for training, and they hope to leave for the mission field the end of this week or the first of next.  They will be in our mission, serving a MLS mission.

Hope to have a good night’s rest tonight and a GREAT day tomorrow!