Believe it or not, I, Sister Katie Cutler, have gone 10 weeks without eating chocolate. Are you amazed? I am. And I can still honestly say that this time is the best of times.
Anyways, I'm still in Macau, but in two days I'll have yet another new companion! That's Macau for you, the place with the weirdest schedule and the fastest turnovers. Sister Fernelius is headed back to Hong Kong, so now Sister Lau is coming to serve with me! She has been serving in the Chinese branch here for the past four weeks, so we've gotten to know each other pretty well and I know we're going to have a blast! And she has perfect Cantonese (her parents are from Hong Kong) and perfect English (she grew up in England), so my Chinese is definitely going to survive, even though I'm serving in an English-speaking branch at the moment. WHEW!
Oh yeah, t-shirt of the week! Here's a cute one: "Be proof against all weathers." My new motto I think, except for the only weather we need to be 'proof against' at the moment is RAIN. We have had several light monsoons already, and although we haven't had "black rain" yet, we have definitely reached a dark grey, that's for sure.
So for our P-day, we four sisters went around and took some pictures, goofed off, and ATE DAIRY QUEEN! Yes, that's right ladies and gentlemen, after more than nine months, I was once again able to taste the sweet, creamy goodness of a DQ blizzard. They even handed it to me upside down! All is right in the world.
We've been struggling a lot to schedule people to teach recently, so we've been doing a lot (the computer editing software just put a scribbly line under 'a lot' and is telling me that it's actually supposed to be one word... I may not be fluent in English anymore, but I'm not dumb!) of finding in the rain. Put nicely, it's a miracle that I don't have the grout at the moment. Okay, now I'm doubting that 'grout' is the word I'm looking for. I might have just made it up. But you know what I'm talking about, right? You know, in World War I, how their feet got that gross disease because they were walking around in water-filled trenches all day? I remember seeing pictures in 6th grade history class; that day that scarred me. Anyways, finding in damp feet isn't too pleasant, but the people we talk to and the miracles we see more than make up for it. And Elder Holland once said, "Nothing is bad enough that whining about it won't make it worse." So no more whining! (And ten points to Gryffindor for whoever can tell me if grout is actually the word I'm looking for. Also, the computer is telling me that Gryffindor is not a word.)
The great thing about finding in Macau is that, unlike in Hong Kong, we're actually allowed to knock on doors here. So the other day, we went door-knocking and a young man answered the door. We explained who we were, and he immediately invited us in to teach him. Of course we didn't go in right then because we can't teach a man without at least one woman there, but we rescheduled him for the next day. We invited the elders and one of our members to come with us, and we had the most spiritual, amazing lesson. It was awesome. The man's name is Mac, and he has been here for a couple of months now. He actually met elders around Christmas time, and he really wanted to go to church with them on Sunday, but he didn't know how to get to the church and the elders never called him back. But the Lord knows what's going on, and so he sent missionaries to go find him at his house. It's amazing to hear stories like that, because it just shows that Heavenly Father is aware of everyone's needs, and he works through us to help meet the needs of others, even if we don't know it. Mac really wants to know if the gospel is true and when we gave him a Hindi Book of Mormon (he's from India), he opened it up and immediately started reading. He really wants to know, and that means he'll know. He'll find out, and I'm so excited for when he does! We turned him over to the elders, because we try to have the elders teach men, but we'll be keeping an eye on him. Mac is definitely the miracle of the week.
In other news, our Relief Society president's name is Sister Cheete Alayon. Get it? Say it out loud. Now do you get it? I guess her parents must have really liked wild cats or something... Anyways, she is awesome, so eager to help the work. And so sassy too, just like you'd expect from a sister named Cheetah Lion.
So in our district meeting last week, Elder Welling (one of the senior missionaries) was asking about some of the data that the mission collects, including the number of lessons we teach with a church member present every week. He said, "So member presents lessons? What does that mean? Do you count it by how many members are at a lesson? What if I had ten members help teach one person?" And I whispered to myself, "That still only counts as one!" And then I giggled uncontrollably for about 30 seconds because I knew that no one in that room would understand such a subtle Lord of the Rings reference. Oh how I miss you all, Bec, Rachel, Rowan. You'd understand me.
So I could say probably a billion more things, but I don't have time. And I could send you all the pictures we've taken so far, but I don't have time. Maybe I should worry more about content and less about trivial things like spelling and punctuation, but a cheetah can't change her spots. Maybe a Cheetah Lion can though? I just had an image of a cheetah with a giant mane pop into my mind, and it's pretty amusing.
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