3-9-2015

3-9-2015

Date: Mon, 9 Mar 2015 11:43:16 +0800
Subject: A week of power in the city!
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello everyone!!

This week was actually really fun, a little bit stressful and just kind of crazy as I was trying to get used to my new area/companion, while working on what we call power week this week which is just a bunch of crazy goals that we wanted to try to accomplish like passing out 13 Book of Mormon's in one day while also trading contact info with them, adding 20 people in a day or other things.  It was pretty crazy but also really fun!

The week started off with me coming to the big city of Kaohsiung to meet with my new companion Elder Dayley, He is actually someone that was in the same MTC District as me and so we knew each other a little bit before now, however after the MTC I had not really had much contact with him due to the fact that most of my time on the mission I have been in the southern parts of the island where most of his mission has been spent in the northern parts of the island.  But now we get to work together woo!! I'll try to get a picture of me and him in dropbox this week, but if I forget or run out of time, sorry!

Other than that this week was power week, which also meant that study time was pretty much cut in half, there was 30 min's of personal study and 30 mins of companionship study, then we were out the door and just going to town trying to talk to everybody, its lots of fun, however I felt a little bad because I still had no idea where anything was because I was in a new area, and so the entire load of trying to do everything was on Elder Dayley's shoulders, but he did a good job and we were able to find quite a lot of awesome prepared people to talk to.

Another cool thing about the area is that when I got here they had 3 really prepared baptismal goals that we are working with, two of them are a couple of really awesome kids whose mother was less active for a while but is coming back to activity.  They are both really funny and they make me laugh every time that I see them.  They sometimes bicker a little bit but its always in kind of a funny way.  Then the other baptismal goal was part of a family that we are working with.  The mother is really interested in how the gospel can help her 3 daughters and has been studying the doctrine pretty in depth, then her oldest daughter is the one with the baptismal goal, she is a really prepared soul that enjoys being at church and just wants to improve her life.  then the other two are really hyper and like to cause a lot of mischief.  All it all its pretty fun working with them.

Finally I think that the biggest difference that has come from the transfer here is just the amount of people that you see.  Back in Dong gang you would be able to travel for a good 20 minutes without having much of a chance to talk to anyone, however here, the distance between our house and the chapel is about 20 minutes, but that can easily become 2 hours if you really try to talk to everyone that is on the road and everyone that you see.  Its really kind of crazy, but its something to get used to haha.

Well I hope that you all have a great week and that everything is going awesome!!!

Love you all!

3-2-2015

3-2-2015

Date: Mon, 2 Mar 2015 10:27:58 +0800
Subject: The end of the harbor
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the family!

Well after a long time spent in the wonderful land of Dong gang I am moving out of here, I have to say I will be really sad to leave however I am also excited to get a little bit of a change of scenery.  With that note however lets talk about the rest of the week.

The week turned out pretty well and we were able to keep in contact with some of the new investigators that we were able to find some time ago but were starting to lose contact with.  One of them is a pretty silly kid, his biggest interest is just playing on the computer and watching random cartoons.  It was kind of funny because we were really trying to get him to look toward the future, have him set goals and make plans as well as to consider the after life, so one of the questions I asked him was first if he had the opportunity to meet with God, how would he react.  Now because he doesn't really have much of a belief in God he didn't really think much of the question and said something like this "I would probably be pretty relaxed, sit down with him, drink a cup of tea and ask him how the universe is going, as well as let him ask me anything" haha, I kind of wanted to laugh but it that was pretty much how the lesson went.

Later we were able to meet with a less actives father, he is a super nice guy and when we first met with him he expressed to us that he really wanted to be able to quit drinking and smoking.  So we set some goals with him and were in constant contact with him throughout the week and we were really just trying to encourage him, then the next time we met with him really made me realize what kind of a difference God can make in someones life.  He mentioned that he didn't really want to keep meeting with us because he felt it was a waste of our time to try to help him, he told us how he had been smoking and drinking since he was in middle school and that its not something that he can change, then he goes on to talk about how he has never really had any faith in any of the religions here in Taiwan Buddhist or Christian or anything like it, doe didn't really believe in any sort of God or after life and his only source of comfort was just money... we kept talking and he said that it was really just in his nature to be drinking and to smoke and that it was not something that he could quit... he had no hope and felt like he couldn't change.  However that is a knowledge that I have gained form coming to know God, that we can change, that "Though your sins be as scarlet, they can be white as wool" no matter the situation we can overcome them through the atonement of Jesus Christ, but you first need to have faith, you need to have a hope that these things are possible and because this man did not have it at that point in time he was not able to receive the blessings from it...

Moving on to the end of the week, once again the members were pretty sure at lest one of us was going to move, and so they threw a small dinner for us to eat, it was pretty good, they made fried noodles (chao mian) and put a lot of clams in there, then cooked it up with onions and a bunch of other vegetables, it was actually super good, I loved it, but then they brought out the fateful dish, the 1000 year egg, it looks like a normal hard boiled egg, however the shell has a bunch of small spots all over it, then you take it out of the shell and the egg white is actually a dark brown color, as you cut the egg in half the Yolk is a dark green color, and they serve it with a lot of sauce and a block of tofu.  The result, well I thought it was pretty good haha.

Well that is pretty much it for the week, my new area is a place called Ling ya (苓雅) which is in Kaohsiung or Gaoxiong (高雄) right in the heart of the city, so it will be in total contrast to what I have gotten used to here. oh well, I'll send you some pictures of the big city next week!

Well that's about it, have a great week!!

2-23-2015

2-23-2015

Date: Mon, 23 Feb 2015 12:34:28 +0800
Subject: The Chinese New Year
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello Family!!

Well this week went by really quickly, but it was super tiring all at the same time so let me explain a little bit about what we did!

It really felt like the holiday started on Sunday as they passed around a small sheet for anyone that wanted to treat the missionaries to a New Years meal.  Naturally we were pleased that they were doing it and excited to be able to talk with a lot of members during the week.  After the list was passed around we take a look at it and... there was only one name on it.  Haha, but it was ok.

We then start the week on Tuesday where we decided that we wanted to head over to one of our secondary areas and do a little more missionary work there.  But as we walked out the door, we could just feel that there was something different about the whole city, the roads were a little more crowded and we could just tell that is was definitely a holiday season and what was usually a empty street quickly became a busy road and we had to work a little harder to be able to dodge all of the traffic that was going around.  But it was good fun because we realized that in Chinese new year people are constantly traveling to visit their grandparents and all of their relatives and its a big chance to be able to see your whole family!

Then on the following Wednesday the weirdest thing happened and they canceled the English class that we hold every Wednesday night because of the holiday, but that was OK with us because one of our investigators invited us to eat a dinner with her family, so we were able to introduce ourselves to them and it was a lot of fun.

The next day was when one of the members invited us to eat a lunch with them.  It was at a nice little seafood restaurant and we were able to eat the lunch with the members whole family on the fathers side, it was cool to be able to meet them, however I didn't really get to talk to them too much because anytime that we weren't saying anything they would switch to the other common language here called Taiwanese and I would get nothing out of it haha.  But the food was really good and I was able to stuff myself, afterwards we did a cool little spiritual share where you put a candle and water in a plate or bowl, light the candle then put a cup on top of it and watch as the water all gets sucked into the cup, but little example of faith and the power of God. haha

Then the next day we had another member treat us to another lunch, this time it was at the beach.  As we got there they already had a nice big fire burning on the sand and were starting to wrap up some sweet potatoes in newspaper, after the fire burned nice and big, they let it go out on its own, then threw the potatoes into the coals and buried the whole thing and waited for a little bit. During which we wasted no time is contacting anyone there that was not a member and were able to actually bring out a good message about Joseph Smith and receiving answers to prayers.  Then the potatoes were done and we had a nice little meal!

Finally the last big event of the week was another meal appointment with a less active's father.  As we got there the less active was there, with another less active, her mother, and her father.  We started talking and having a good time while eating some foods, when the father brought up that he had a desire to quit drinking and smoking.  So we shared a message about how through Christ we can be cleaned from addictions and made plans to help him quit it.  It was a pretty spiritual lesson and at the end of the week he was able to make it to church which as awesome!!

Well that's pretty much all for what we did this week, it was lots of fun and I'm pretty sure that I gained a few pounds from it, but thats just the life of a missionary I guess haha

Until next week!!

Love you all

Elder Heaton

2-16-2015

2-16-2015

Date: Mon, 16 Feb 2015 11:42:19 +0800
Subject: Rushing through the week
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello family!

Well this week went by really well.  We were able to see quite a few miracles this week as we were working on seeing different parts of our area and we had a great time.

The week started off with some exchanges and I got to head out to Kaohsiung and once again experience the big city.  It was pretty fun up there as I got to go with an Elder Bak who came on island with me so we had a lot of fun talking about the MTC and about just mission life in general.

After that on Wednesday my companion and I decided that we wanted to play a board game with our English class, so from Monday to Wednesday we had worked hard to be able to get the board game set up and prepared so that we could play it on Wednesday, making all of the cards and thinking of some random rules, then when the day came, I thought that the game might not take the full time and during our English classes I prepared a short activity before hand to help them understand the cards a little better, however I underestimated the time the game would take (it was a matching game) and in the end neither I nor my companion were able to play the board game... how sad haha, but we decided that we could play it in two weeks so that should be good =)

As most of you know, Chinese New Year is pretty much upon us, which to most Americans doesn't really mean anything, but here in Taiwan its a really big thing, where people get a ton of time off (anywhere from 4 days to 2 months) and they go around and see their families and eat a ton of food.  its quite the celebration, so during this time where there's tons of people traveling, we have a potential investigator that lives in one of our secondary areas, nearing the boarder of our area, so we decide to travel out there and to get a good sit down with him.  He decided that he didn't really want us to come to his house because he said his dog is really loud, so we head over to a nearby park, as we get there we look at the benches.. and they are covered in bird poo... so we are thinking where do we want to sit when a woman walks toward us and yells "hi elders!" we are a little shocked but start talking to her.  As it turns out she was a member from Taipei and was down here visiting for the New Years, when she sees that we are meeting with an investigator she invites us to her families home for us to have the lesson.  It was quite the experience, and just kind of made me laugh in the end because of how crazy it felt at the time.

Well to end the week we had a small branch activity where we went to a members to bake a chicken.  As we get there, we start helping the member prepare two fire pits with piles of dirt clumps in it, then we build really big fires to heat up the dirt clumps.  After the dirt is nice and hot, what they do is they put the chicken that they want to cook in a bag, put out the fire, then throw the bag of chicken into the coals and bury the whole thing... once again totally throwing me off, but it was a lot of fun and me and my companion reeked of smoke afterwards. 

Well that's pretty much my week.  Hope that you are all having a great week!!

Love you!

2-9-2015

2-9-2015

From: Eric Heaton <eric.heaton@myldsmail.net>
Date: Mon, Feb 9, 2015 at 2:32 AM
Subject: Ripping up the roads of Dong gang
To: Judy Heaton <judyhe@provo.edu>

Hello family!

This week went by really well.  Our focus this week was on our investigator that was planning to get baptized this week, and so we were working hard on keeping in touch with her throughout the week.  Other than that though we have just been trying to keep the area going strong and to be able to bring the most people unto Christ.

The week started off pretty well.  One of the biggest things that we have been trying to do lately is to be able to meet with every active member here in Dong gang, its been a fun little activity and I get to hear a ton of different conversion stories and how people got to know missionaries (it's mostly that they were contacted at a red light and they gave the missionary their number) But during it one of the members decided that she wanted us to be able to meet with her less active father, so we head over to there house and just start talking to them.  It was a fun experience however the father had been living in a different city for awhile, and just went to the nearest christian church and was totally smitten by it, so we were just going to start on square one with him, but we will have to see how that goes haha.

Later in the week me and my companion have been really working on our tracting, trying to do it every day and to be able to be as bold as possible while doing so.  I still am not much of a fan of it, but it some times works out pretty well,  however on Thursday night we were out tracting and ran into this lovely grandmother (in chinese you just call everybody that seems really old grandma or grandpa) and she invited us in.  After giving us a ton of fruit we discovered that she was christian and went to a nearby church, however there was one problem, she only spoke Taiwanese, so she was sitting there talking with us for a good long time and neither me or my companion had any idea what she was saying, int he end we just decided to ask to say a prayer with her, which she happily did, but she did it in Taiwanese and I still had no idea what just happened there, so we left, as very confused elders.

Finally to end the week me and my companion decided to make cookies for the baptism that we had planned for Sunday, and so at the end of the week or Saturday night we got some investigators and members together and taught them how to make some lovely American style cookies, we all had a good time and it came out pretty well.  However the sad thing was originally the cookies were for the baptism, but earlier that day we had learned that the sister that wanted to be baptized the next day couldn't because her husband was against it... sad day, but we can still go visit her and share the gospel with her, so we are working hard on making sure that her testimony is secure.

Well that's it for the week, sorry this e-mail was sent soo late, we went out to an island this week and decided to e-mail at the end of the day!

Love you all!! Have a great week!!

2-2-2015

2-2-2015

Date: Mon, 2 Feb 2015 11:57:14 +0800
Subject: Blazing through the transfers.
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the family!

Well this week went by really well.  We were working hard trying to stay diligent and as one of our big focuses right now we have been trying our best to be able to find new investigators every week.  It has been fun and we have been able to see miracles because of it.

Well this week was also kind of weird because we knew that transfers were coming at the end of the week, and one of the members here who likes to help the missionaries kept saying because I had been here in Dong gang for about 5 months now that I was going to be the one to move.  So of course me and my companion just kept saying that nothing was going to happen, mostly joking, and we just kind of went through the week, however the topic was brought up multiple times during the week.

Starting on Tuesday we were working hard to be able to find some good new investigators, we went out tracting, we tried to get on Facebook with little success and so to end the day we still hadn't found anybody, but we were able to meet with some investigators and had some good lessons.  Once again the topic that I might move was brought up...

Wednesday we of course had our English class and as it was the last week of transfers we had our English Party.  It was lots of fun and we had it as a Birthday Party theme.  We played some party games and had some snacks and cake with a little bit of a gift exchange and all in all it was a pretty good time.  it was really good to see everyone in the English class and we had an awesome spiritual share about forgiveness to end the party, but that member was there and once again brought up that I was probably the one that was going to move...

Then the really big thing that happened this week was that our investigator that lives in our furthest away area was finally able to pass her Baptismal interview!!! woohoo! we were super excited for her and we were able to really get a good lesson with her explaining once again the need for baptism and blessings that come from it and she was super excited for it.  She said that her son was going to come down for it and everything should be good!! Woo

Well the rest of the week was more of the same, just doing the missionary work waiting for Saturday night when we would finally know the results of transfers and see what was going to happen.  Finally Saturday rolled around and as we get in the door, we got ourselves some good ice cream and headed up to the roof to wait for the call... but before we were even out our door heading for the roof we get a text from our zoneleaders, saying that there were no changes in transfers for now because it was going to be extended to wait for some of the missionaries that were having problems with their visas.  haha, lots of suspense for nothing, but it really made me laugh. =)

Well I have some more time now to be in dong gang and to bring more miracles down here, so I'm excited to still be doing the work.  I know that this church is true and I know that Taiwan needs the Gospel, that is why I am here and that is what I am doing!!

Love you all!

1-26-2015

1-26-2015

Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 12:18:44 +0800
Subject: Miracles
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the family!!!

This week has gone by really well, we were able to enjoy seeing tons of miracles this week as we decided to be as diligent as possible and to really try to hit all of our goals this week, so we went out and the lords hand really guided us into a ton of really cool experiences this week.

The first thing that really brought the spirit into the work was that we were able to have some interviews with the mission president, which is always a good fun time, and he was able to share some cool scriptures as well as some insights that really got me pumped to go out and do missionary work. So we decided after our interviews that we were going to hit all of our mission standards this week and to bring tons of people unto Christ.

So the next day we didn't have anything set up... so we decided to go tracting in an area that was near our house.  So we were out just knocking on doors and trying to talk to people, but nobody was home, until we came to a house that didn't have an outside door, so we could see inside it, and there was a man inside carving idols for a Taoist temple... I don't normally knock on those doors because everytime that I have they just point at the idols and say that that's their religion and just kind of walk away, so we were walking past the house when he yells from inside, come on in and sit down!  Well I wasn't going to turn it down so we go in and talk to him and he tells us a bit on how he doesn't really believe in any religion and just wanted to talk to us, so we were able to share a message with him and set up another time with him next week, it was pretty cool.

Later in the week we had just gone into a store to eat our dinner, we were standing at the entrance looking at their menu and deciding on weather or not we wanted to eat there, when a man walks up to us and just says to us I want to know where your church is... I was a little in shock as nobody ever really asks about that stuff here, but we were more than happy to tell him and to invite him to come to church in the coming Sunday and he told us that he would try, but it was a really interesting experience.

Finally to end the week were traveling over to a less active members house just to see if he would be home, and when we got there... he wasn't home, BUT as we were heading back to our chapel we notice a small pond on the side of the road and decide to pull over, because there was a little house in the middle of the pond and what was all around the house but a bunch of little turtles! super funny, so we decided to look at them for a minute or two and took a picture, and headed home.  All in all it was a pretty fun week!

Well thats it for what I did.  Hope that you are all having a great week and that you can get everything accomplished that you need to!

Love you all!!

Elder Heaton

何長老

1-19-2015

1-19-2015

Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 10:45:29 +0800
Subject: Blasting through the week
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello family!!!

Well this week was really good, we were able to meet with some really cool investigators, as well as to meet with more of the members, to really get to know them and to see why they joined the church.  Recently our mission president has been inviting us to get to know the full names of all of the members in the ward of branch where ever we are serving and to really get to know what they are doing, so that you will be able to greet most of the people as they come to church.  It's been a fun process and I have been lucky because the branch that I am serving in is pretty small

Other than that this week one of our investigators said that she wanted to be baptized and told us the date that it will happen, we had been working with her for a long time and we were super happy to hear it.  so now we have set our plans to make sure that she is able to get baptized on the date that she wants.

Finally I have to say one of my favorite things about Taiwanese Culture, it is something that I have really noticed recently and really makes itself manifest when you get into the more countryside of Taiwan.  So as me and my companion were traveling to one of our lessons, we decided to talk to one of the many fishermen that are usually fishing on one of the bridges in our area.  As we were talking he was being nice, however we could tell that he didn't really have that much interest.  we were about to leave when suddenly a man on his motor scooter yells hello to us, asks if we are from america, then gives us some fruit, and drives off... neither of us had ever met the man before and we were a little confused, but we just moved onto our next appointment.  Next we were just talking to people at a red light.  I turn around and there is only one person at the light, a nice old lady.  So I yell hello to her, and we figure out that she can't speak Chinese or English so there was no real way for us to talk to her, however she reaches into one of her bags and just hands us some bananas and insists that we take them.... yeah.  it really has shown me the true love that Taiwanese people have for eachother and for other people and I have been encouraged to bring more people unto Christ because of it.

Well thats pretty much it for this week.  I hope that you are all having a great time in all of your various circumstances and that you will be able to accomplish all of your goals.  The new year is started and it is a time to look onward and upward.

I know that this gospel is true and that it has been given to us by a loving heavenly father who just wants the best for us.  Hope that we can all feel that in our lives this week!!

1-12-2015

1-12-2015

Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2015 12:04:54 +0800
Subject: The week of miracles!
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

This week has gone by really well, we were able to meet with a good amount of people this week and were able to really develop our relationship with our ward and were able to also go on some exchanges with our zone leaders, so all in all it was a pretty good week.

Well the week started off with the Zone leader exchanges, and I was able to go back to the big city of Kaohsiung (gaoxiong) to serve in the zone leaders area for a day.  It was pretty fun, I was starting to really forget what a big city feels like, and as I stepped out of the subway station the first sight I got to see was a 4 lane road totally packed to the brim with motor scooters, and people just going to their various places, with the roar of motors.  It totally threw me off, but made me laugh all at the same time.

After the exchange my and my companion were pumped and ready to get our area up and running, and so the next day we set some goals and made plans to really try to keep in contact with all of our investigators every day, so for the next day we had a fun time going to the nearby investigator houses and just leaving them a small note with a scripture on it and inviting them all to read and just to keep going.  After that we headed out to our beach area to meet with an investigator and had a great time teaching her.

Finally at the end of the week we were able to meet with a cool new family where the husband smokes and the wife doesn't really like it, so they wanted us to share a message about getting over that, so we are excited to be able to keep working on that!

Well that's pretty much it for this week.  Hope that you are all having a great time and a great week, know that I haven't even needed to put on a jacket so far this winter and I'm just loving it!!

Until next week

1-5-2015

1-5-2015

Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2015 11:54:24 +0800
Subject: The new year comes with a BANG!!
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello Everybody!!

This week went really well, we were really enjoying ourselves and were able to have a great time.  On Tuesday we were thinking that we had a good plan set up to meet with one of our investigators that lived a little further away, however as it turns out she canceled which left us with a lot of spare time to use, and so we decided to go out and do a little bit of tracting to see what we could find.  As we were going around there was a man and his mother sitting on their porch just talking and we just started talking with them, the man invited us to sit down with him and we had a great conversation with him about a lot of things, which we eventually got turned to the gospel.  As we were asking him about his experience with Christians and churches he mentioned to us how he had heard of Christ... from Jail!  haha it really threw me off a bit but we kept talking with him and learned that he was still really into Christian churches and said that we could come back.  It was pretty fun.

The next day during our English class I was really curious about what people do for new years here, as, when your a missionary you don't really have a chance to really see what they do, so I asked everybody what their plans were, and I realized its pretty much the exact same thing as America. There's big parties everywhere and sometimes people go to hang out with their families, but a lot of people also don't really care about it, which I felt was a little sad... But it was OK

The last thing that happened this week was we had a member invite us to dinner on Saturday, so we get there, and one of the things that he was serving was a little red, rectangular box thing, which the member kept insisting that we eat. So I took one and it tasted like I was just eating a block of salt.  Not my favorite thing, but the member mentioned to me that it is one of his favorite foods, after asking what it was he told us that it was some sort of fish eggs made into a cake... so that was the interesting thing that I got to eat this week..

Well that's all that I really got for this week.  Hope that everyone is having a great time and is just loving life!!  Have a great New Year!!

12-29-2014

12-29-2014

Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 12:07:40 +0800
Subject: The crazy Christmas and going until next year!!!
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the Family!!

Well this week went by really well, and we were able to accomplish a ton, I really enjoyed being able to see all of you on Skype this last Friday (Thursday for all of you) and just be able to have a ton of fun.  The Christmas season really pumped me up this week and we were able to have a ton of fun so lets get started!!

Well the week started really well, we decided that we wanted to share a ton of Christmas joy, and so what do we do?  We get a picture of my companion dressed in a Santa suit and start writing messages to all of the members as well as some of our investigators, it was a ton of fun and we were just having a blast sending those off.

Next on the awesome week happened right on Christmas day.  We wanted to have a good Christmas day, full of lessons, and so we made tons of plans, we were looking forward to it and we had a good afternoon and night planned, however we didn't really have anything planned for the morning.  We were sitting around in companion study and thinking how best to spend the morning when we have a random person call us, a member from another ward, saying that he has a referral for us, and that we should come right away.  So we hop onto our bikes and get out there for a good lesson in the morning, followed by the member that was going to help us skype call us up to be able to get that all ready.  After that we took the long bike ride out to one of our further away areas to meet with Sister Wang, an awesome investigator who we invited to be baptized, she accepted and is probably going to be baptized in January!! after that we headed home and were able to finish the day off with another lesson with a cool guy who wanted to hear a little bit about the Plan of Salvation.  Christmas was awesome!!

However as expected the best part of the week was being able to see the whole family and to be able to just chat with all of you!!  Your all looking really good!  I loved being able to just talk with all of you and to be able to just hear your voices,. just makes me think of how important families are and why I'm out here in the first place!!

Well to end the week we had a really great time at church.  I was able to get the Christmas package the day after I skyped everyone, and there was one thing that I was really looking forward to going.  In Taiwan they have one really weird thing about them, which is that they don't really eat really sweet things that often, they have sweets but nothing that really compares to American sweets.  So I decided that I wanted to share a little bit of the divinity with a couple of people just to see their reactions.  It was hilarious to just watch them kind of squirm around while eating it, they enjoyed it, but after they finished half a ball of divinity they just said it was too sweet then gave it to another person, who did the same thing!  Thanks family for the awesome treats!!

Well that's pretty much it for my week, the new year is coming along and I'm working on setting some goals for the new year, hope that you are all doing the same!!

Love you a ll!!

12-22-2014

12-22-2014

Date: Mon, 22 Dec 2014 12:01:11 +0800
Subject: The winds of change.
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the family!!

Well this week has gone by really well, super fast, but also pretty weird all at the same time.  But our spirits are high and we are happily doing the lords work here in Dong gang.

To start off the week we had a wonderful Monday, however this Monday was a little different from other Mondays because it wasn't really P-day, as they had changed it due to some visa problems with the new missionaries.  This Monday we were really able to get a little bit of good proselyting, and were able to have a good time teaching the gospel.

I think the biggest things that happened this week however happened on Wednesday night and throughout most of Sunday.  First off Wednesday night as you might know by now is our English class, and usually the week before transfers we would have an English Party, so that if you think you are going to leave you can take a picture with the people that you like, or just get a good last invitation out to them.  This month we decided that we (of course) wanted to have a Christmas party, and just celebrate Christmas because people here don't really do that, so we had a fun time having a paper snowball fight, we made paper snowflakes, had a gift exchange, sang some songs and finally had the nativity acted out.  It was lots of fun =)

Then on Sunday the other big thing happened, our branch also had an awesome Christmas party, the initial plan was that there would be a potluck, so everyone could come and just bring a dish, which should be enough for everyone and as missionaries we did our part in inviting everyone that we talked to to come to it as well.  It was lots of fun, with a lot of good Taiwanese food, then after that we were able to all go out and do some crazy Christmas caroling.  That was lots of fun, we were able to see a ton of people, and my companion dressed up as Santa Clause so everybody wanted to take a picture with him.  =)

Finally this week we were able to meet with a cool new person who runs a drink stand, we are looking forward to working more with her, but for now I still don't know much about her situation, all I really know is that she used to be part of the Presbyterian Church, but was starting to go a little less active there, so a member invited her to meet with us, and she accepted, so we will be meeting with her in the coming week.

Well I'm totally looking forward to skyping you all this Christmas (Friday for me) Hope that you all have a great week and some happy holidays.  Remember that Christ is the reason for the season and to just have a great time giving to all.

Love you all! 

-- 

Elder Heaton

何長老

P.S. Have you gotten my Christmas Package yet?  I sent it off 2 weeks ago so it should be arriving soon, keep an eye out for it.  I'm still waiting for my package, but there have been transfers and so they usually don't forward mail from the office during the week of transfers to prevent it from going to the wrong place.

Merry Christmas!!