11-11-2013

11-11-2013

Date: Mon, 11 Nov 2013 13:14:34 +0800
Subject: Meetings and interviews
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the family and the people

This week has been a little different of a week, as we have had the chance to do a few extra meetings which means a little less proselyting but a little more time with other missionaries.  Its nice to have a change sometimes.

So this week was interviews with the mission president, which meant that most of our Tuesday was taken up trying to fit in the interview schedule, and that took up most of the day but it was nice and we got to go to Chiayi city for it which is a cool place.  Then because we had interviews on Tuesday we has our ZTM on Wednesday which took up a lot of that time, but also on Wednesday's we have a free English class so with ZTM and English there was just nothing going on for the first half of the week. =/

But as far as food goes I think that the most interesting thing that I have eaten this week is probably just Sushi.  Not really exciting but I dont think I ever really ate sushi while I was in America.  But its not really the most amazing stuff, kinda boring really.

Also today I had the chance to go to Costco, which is apparently a really big thing here for the missionaries because you can buy a lot of things in bulk and they have a lot of american food, so that was kinda fun, but its pretty much exactly the same thing as Sams Club so that just reminded me of all the fun times that I had going shopping with my mom on Saturdays (at least the times that I went with her =) )

Well thats just about all the news for this week, there really wasn't much that happened this week, My Chinese is slowly picking up and I can slowly understand more and more of what people are saying.  Here for language learning they have a language study plan that they just call Phase 1, 2, and 3.  Phase 1 is just preach my gospel chapter 3 and key words and phrases that are useful in teaching the missionary lessons.  After you finish that your free to do what ever language study you like but they also offer the phase 2 and 3.  Phase 2 is just a ton of flash cards with random vocabulary words on them with an example sentence which is nice.  And finally Phase 3 is a bunch of flash cards with every single character that they use in the Book of Mormon... which is a lot, and so I got the phase 3 because they were out of phase 2 when I had the chance to get them, so my language is slowly picking up.

Well thats just about it, Taiwan is going good, its still really hot here with little to no signs of cooling off yet, the food is still good, the people are nice and we are meeting with some nice people.

Until Next week

Elder Heaton 

何長老

11-4-2013

11-4-2013

Date: Mon, 4 Nov 2013 16:26:18 +0800
Subject: Contacting till the earth shakes
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello family how are you!!!!

So this week has been going well, full of traveling to not too far but far enough that it still takes a little bit to get there, kind of an interesting mix but it happens... But enough about that, onto the news

So this week I had the chance to eat at a... breakfast shop ( that's what their really called) like 5 times this week, and a lot of the time it wasn't even for breakfast.  So breakfast in Taiwan is very similar to breakfast in America... if your not eating cereal, or drinking milk.  its actually an interesting thing about Taiwan is that nobody here drinks cow milk, its all soy milk or bust.   So that makes buying normal milk really expensive ( I think a 1.5 liter bottle is about 3.50 compared to soymilk which would be about 1.50) But the things they eat for breakfast in a breakfast shop is normally a crepe like thing with egg and bacon in it or something like that or a Dan bao which is like a hamburger with ham instead of a patty... interesting.

 Well as far as the whole subject goes there's a cool story to go with that, so we were on our way to meet with Brother Chen (the one I was talking about in the last e-mail I think) and we contacted this guy who was waiting outside a hospital for his wife and kid or something like that.  We got to talking with him and introduced the church and he had heard of Mormons before but he was wondering why we were called that.  So we brought out a Book of Mormon and was going to have him read the introduction to it and from that we were going to talk about it with him.  But right before he read the first character... an earthquake hit!!  I was totally excited because I have never felt one before, it was a really small one, just a little shaking but it totally happened, however after that, he had closed the book, the contact was kinda ruined and we just left with his number... so that was kinda interesting.

Well beyond that things are going well, I am enjoying my time here and the work is moving along, The people we are working with are all really cool and we are working on trying to find at least 2 new people that set up a time to meet with us in the next day or two, really fun.

Well I hope everybody is doing well back at home.  Its still hot as ever here in Taiwan and I'm happily sporting my short-sleeve shirts still, life is going good and Taiwanese people are all really cool.  Hope that you are all enjoying to cool weather and just finding enjoyment in school, work, play and other what ever that may be.  I know that the work I'm doing here is good, and that this church really has blessed my life in ways that I probably don't even realize yet, but also in many ways that become more apparent every day.  Hope you are all doing well =)

Until next week

Elder Heaton

何長老

10-28-2013

10-28-2013

Date: Mon, 28 Oct 2013 11:36:00 +0800
Subject: Leading the area and move call madness
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello family and friends!

This week has been a good one, full of fun things, meeting new people and preparing for transfers and seeing who might be going where.

So there's not much talk about on the food front.  I went to a night market for dinner once this week and got a steak, the cool thing about the night market stake though it that it comes with noodles, an egg and a lot of some mystery sauce that I don't really know what it is but it tastes good, the cool thing though it that when they bring you your plate, the sauce and all the food is still boiling hot and so when they hand it to you its still bubbling, steaming and just has a great presentation. yum

Well beyond that, this week I went on exchanges with the Douliu elders this week and had the chance to lead the area in Huwei, which actually kinda stressed me out for the first little bit because I for the most part am still totally lost when i'm wandering the streets here, but it turned out ok, I was able to find the people I needed to find, and we had a lot of fun going around talking to people.

Later in the week the sisters in our district had a baptism, her name was Sister Wang, she had investigated the church for a LONG time and had wanted to be baptized for a while but her parents opposed it and so she couldn't, but this Saturday was her birthday and she told her parents that all she wanted for her birthday was to get baptized... an amazing story and in the end they allowed her to do that.  It was a great story to hear.  And we got one of our investigators to go to the baptism so we were able to attend it, lots of fun.

Now for a little bit of a funny story.  So we are meeting with this less active member, his name is Brother Chen, hes a really cool guy, really smart but has a few mental problems, anyway we had decided to reteach him the missionary lessons because he had forgotten a lot of the basics, so in this lesson we taught him the plan of salvation.  While we were teaching it we would ask him some question or maybe make a comment like "So this is the plan of salvation..." and whenever he wanted to say something or make a comment he would start with "Bu shi" or like that's incorrect, or thats not right.  It happened so much that by the end of the lesson it was hard not to laugh when he said it.  we would say something like "So that's what the atonement can do for us." then he would say "No the atonement is..."  it was actually really fun, I love that guy.

And finally the part that you have all been waiting for, This was the last week of tansfers so we got movecall this last Saturday night, it was really suspenseful because after training you are almost guaranteed to be split up from your trainer, so we were waiting to get the call, and all of last week Elder Raley was practically convinced that he was moving so he told everybody that this was his last week here and that they should come to church to hear his farewell talk.  So we got the call and learned that neither of us are leaving Huwei right now!  We both get to stay here for at least one more move call!  So that's the exciting news for the month, I haven't moved yet.

Well that's all the news that I have this week, I hope that you all have a great week, learn something from the scriptures and are able to liken the scriptures to yourselves, this church really has brought a lot of happiness to my life and I hope that I can share that with a lot of people here in Taiwan

This is Elder Heaton, until next week, Later!

  何長老

10-21-2013

10-21-2013

Date: Mon, 21 Oct 2013 12:27:21 +0800
Subject: Halloween Party and Gaoxiong
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello everybody!!

This week has been one that really flew by and I'm actually surprised that its Monday once again.  But I'll try to remember things that we did this week and anything cool that happened.

As far as the whole food thing goes there are two stories that go to the same food so i'll have to tell you about that.  The first story goes like this, our ward (its actually a branch but ward sounds better) this last Saturday set up a Halloween party that we were able to attend and enjoy, we spent most of the day just trying to invite a ton of investigators to it and just to have some fun with it but in the end almost nobody we invited came, but that was alright because it was more of a little kids party than anything.  But while we were there they had a table spread out with some random foods that I got to try and one of them was this thing, its like a crunchy Churro, just like covered with brown sugar and was ok.  But the other story was we went tracting for awhile and the last house we visited had a couple kids just hanging around outside it and as it turns out one of them lived there.  But the people that answered had no interest, but were really nice and so they gave us this bag of these churro things and told us that they were really cheap and were just like a little kids snack so that was kinda cool.

So more info on the Halloween party, there wasn't much to it, but one of the families that are in this branch are American and because Taiwan doesn't celebrate Halloween, she wanted her kids to have a halloween so she, with the help from the branch, set this up and the people really like it, but all that it really was was a bunch of little games that you could go to like put the head on the skeleton, fishing and stuff like that, but I think that the highlight of the night was probably our bishop dressed up as Mickey Mouse for it, really cool and some of the kids were totally freaking out about it, awesome.

Next is that this week we had the chance to go to Gaoxiong (Kaohsiung) for a "specialized training" which just talked about stress management and things like that, but the problem is Gaoxiong is about a 2 hour train ride from where we get on the train station, and the train station is a 20 minute bike ride from our house, then the Gaoxiong chapel is a 15 minute walk from the train station, and the training meeting turned out to be about 4 hours long. so in the end... it actually took the whole day for that conference, which was kinda sad, but the I guess thats really just the interesting story for the day.

Well before I go I just want to tell you that next Monday is move day and so I will probably have a new companion, maybe a new area, so if anything weird happens just know its probably because of that.

Well the work is going well and things are starting to pick up here.  The members are getting really into the missionary work and we have been getting a lot of referrals lately, which is really cool, its kinda weird the difference in the church culture here because just about everyone here is a convert and so everyone is very familiar with what exactly it is that the missionaries teach and do where as back home I feel like before you actually go and do it, you really dont have a clear understanding as to what they do. But that's just something to think about.

Well until next week

Keep smiling

Elder Heaton

何長老

10-14-2013

10-14-2013

Date: Mon, 14 Oct 2013 11:35:07 +0800
Subject: Assistant Exchanges and Conference
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello the family and everyone!

So another week has come and gone, and within that week there was a ton of things that happened that its actually kinda hard to remember a lot of it (that happens sometimes) but here's some of the highlights that came out if this week

As far as food goes the most interesting thing that I ate would probably be a giant... I think my companion called it a "Fish Ball" which is pretty much what it sounds like, but the weird thing about it was that the ball was about the size of a soft ball, and the ward members laughed when the bishop gave both me and my companion one each to eat, it was pretty good but it just had a lot of random little things in it (I mean just random food objects of fish and meat) so you can think about what that means =)

This week as the subject says I had the chance to go on assistant exchanges, which unlike normal exchanges where one missionary would switch with another missionary and they would just go through a day like that, one Assistant would just go with our companionship and the other would go with another one somewhere else.  So the assistant that went with us is named Elder Limpanastraphong, you can have fun trying to say that.  But it was really cool going with him as he really was a hard worker, if there was a person to talk to he would be talking to him, and so as we would go to any appointment it would take us like 5 times longer than normal because of it.  but the exchange was really awesome and I was able to learn a lot from him, and his chinese was super good as well.

Now I think the last big thing that happened here was that I finally had the chance to watch conference here (they show it a week later so they have time to translate it) and they actually have another TV going for all of us foreigners in English, so that was cool.  I think my favorite talk that I watched would probably be Uchtdorf's talk in the Priesthood Session where he talked about how he fell down and couldn't get up, it was a super powerful talk and I liked it a lot.  But I think this was probably the first time I stayed awake for the entirety of Conference and I think I got a lot more out of it because of that.

Well that's all that happened this week, the work is going well and the people here are awesome, the Chinese is slowly coming along and each day I can catch a little more of what these people are talking about it so that's exciting.

Until next week

Elder Heaton 

何長老

10-7-2013

10-7-2013

Date: Mon, 7 Oct 2013 16:19:31 +0800
Subject: A week of... things
From: eric.heaton@myldsmail.net
To: heatonjudy@hotmail.com

Hello Everybody

I realize that this e-mail is a little late and... I dont know what else but beyond that lets just get onto the things that happened this week... it wasn't really that much.

So as far as weeks go this one has probably been one of the more bland ones, where nothing really spectacular happened.  We talked to some people, we learned from some people, we stayed busy and we went places.  But we didn't really eat any interesting food, so if that was your favorite part... well sorry =/

So this week we had ZTM or Zone Training Meeting, where we went, got together as a zone and were trained... it was fun, but the biggest thing that happened there was the fact that President Blickenstaff decided that he wanted to implement some mission standards.  Which are just weekly numbers that you are encouraged to strive to reach.  The way that they presented them I really liked because they had been doing a lot of research on the numbers that a person needed to be able to get a baptism each month, and from that data they boiled it down to what you need to be able to reach each week in order to mathematically get a baptism each month.  So I liked it and I think it really gives you a bar that you can strive to reach.

Beyond that though I had the opportunity to once again go on exchanges.  Now the funny thing is, Elder Raley has really been shooting for me to lead the Huwei area for awhile now and I still chickened out of this one as well.  But it seems like every time we have transfers, something really fun is happening back in my area (ward bowling activity, BBQ's, cooking activity ect.) so this next time I will probably be leading the area myself, but I am totally lost when I am here and don't really know how to get around yet so we will have to see how that goes.

Also this Sunday President Blickenstaff actually came down to Huwei for a meeting with the ward counsel, and beforehand everyone thought that they were going to be talking about how they have been thinking of closing down the Huwei chapel lately and people have been worried about that, and so everyone thought that we were going to talk about that, but in the meeting all we talked about was how to best rescue the less actives that are in the ward.  It was kinda interesting but not what people were expecting for the meeting.

Now as for the reason that I am e-mailing so late, its that for this P-day we with the Douliu elders, went out to an amusement park called "Fancy World" which was kinda fun, we were able to ride a couple of rollercoasters and do some really fun stuff there.  It was really interesting being in an amusement park where everything was in Chinese, and so we all (except for the two natives that were with us) didn't totally understand everything that was going on, but it was a blast and we all had a good time.  They have 2 roller coasters there, one is really short but is just a straight down drop for a part of it, while the other one is a more traditional roller coaster.  so that was cool, I'll include a couple of pictures of that =)

Well that's really all that has happened this week.  Thank you for all the prayers and support that you all have given me, I hope that you are all able to be happy and enjoy your time wherever you might be at the moment.  But as for me and the awesome place of Taiwan.  We are doing GREAT!

Until next week.

Elder Heaton

何長老