I have a miracle Baby! (It's not what you think !!)

dear mom and dad,

good week this week. first off, sister lim is a miracle baby. do you remember when a car rolled over her hand and nothing happened? this week, we were riding down this neighborhood like road, she was going pretty slow because we were going to turn, and a car came and drove pretty fast around her, and as he came around her, his bumper hit the front wheel of her bike. it was loud, too. but she didn't even fall or anything, and nothing happened to her bike! the guy stopped up the road, and got out, all mad, we were just standing in the road, no way were we going over there, he checked his car and drove off. crazytown. haha, and then the next day we were going up a hill, and sister lim ran into a parked car! sister lim's balance isn't that great, and I've taken to riding behind her on the bike, just to watch her, and sometimes its kind of scary, maybe I'm just paranoid, but i feel like i notice a lot of close calls. not that much, but sometimes. but the other day we were coming back from an apartment complex that is kind of far. before we left we prayed for our next appointment, and as an after thought, i prayed that we would be safe. and then one minute later, we were waiting to turn onto this road, a car is coming, pretty fast, and sister lim starts going, aah! sister lim! I'm yelling, there is a car! she got across okay, she said he was in the other lane, but he wasn't, and it was way scary. I'm glad she's still here. sister lim is definitely a miracle baby, but lets not push our luck.

one cool thing about missionary work, is that you get to see people from the start, and see how they change, and sometimes you can detect the thing that really opened them up, that made them excited about the gospel, and its different for every person. sometimes at the beginning of teaching people, they have the attitude of, okay, sure, I'll listen. but then something clicks and then they are all in, and eating up what you say and at church every week, its really cool. for simbut, she didn't even like listening, and only listened because her husband wanted to, but after she came to church for the first time, she loved it, and it was her answering the questions, and sharing the gospel with her friends. we are teaching this other lady, Emba, and she listened at first because she didn't have any other religion. but one day we brought a member over who shared her testimony and experience, and all emba needed was a friend with her. before she never would commit to come to church, but after she met sister Mellon and sister Ida, she really wanted to learn, and church was no problem. its very cool. we had a lesson last night, that was really cool. it was our first time meeting this family, a dad, a mom, and an 18 month old. they were so friendly. we asked them if they had ever heard of the bible, and she said yes, and got up to get it, and lo and behold she brings back a book of Mormon. missionaries had taught them a little a long time ago. we just shared a little about prophets and Joseph Smith, and about heavenly father, but what we said really touched Jenny, the wife. i think that was the opening point for her. we asked if we could come back and Sasok, the husband said maybe after Chinese new year (nooooo...!!! Chinese new year is two weeks long, ps) but then i asked them if we could meet once before Chinese new year, 'can we come next Tuesday?' i said, and jenny said, 'boleh, boleh boleh!' (can, can, can!) but I'm so excited for that family, they were so easy to talk to, like we had been friends for a long time already. and we just found them knocking, i think we only knocked like doors that day, we just had a little extra time, and i like them so much now, even after meeting only one time.

but changes are coming, me and sister lim can feel it, we've already been companions for five months now, can you believe that? it is seriously crazytown. i love the mission! and its going by in a flash. i love you family!

sister Harrison

PS i love sister lim so much. sometimes i get stressed out about numbers, and its bad, because that isn't really the important part. but we were singing 'let us all press on' (an awesome missionary song, PS) and she pointed out a good line for me, 'we will not retreat, though our numbers maybe be few....' haha! she's awesome

Singapore, it's still there!

hi mom and dad!

parents, things are going so good here in kuching. i just barely got back from visa run in Singapore, that is why i am late emailing you. there were three other sisters there, and it was really fun. we got to go out to lunch with sister lim's mom, and we got to see the 'merlion' which is like Singapore's mascot, and i got yelled at for drinking water at the metro station. apparently there is no eating or drinking on the metro, and i found out, hard, that it includes water, too. sheesh. Singapore put me on a little high because everyone thought i was so funny there. recently, i feel like I've been losing my sense of humor, but its back, baby!

oh here's a funny little story for you. of course, here, everyone tries to guess the transfers and who is going where and who is training who, blah blah blah. me and sister lim basically worked it out that i have to be training next time, two new sisters come at the beginning of February. I'm almost 100 percent sure one will come here, but we will see. so i was talking to sister hite, we were getting our bags out of the car, and i was saying something about how i was sad i never got to be her companion, because we get along really well (she thinks I'm funny, and so i like her). and so i say," when i get my new trainee, she'd better be fun" forgetting the whole while that my mission president is waiting just outside the car, and that i really have no idea if i am going to train or not. oops. i hope he didn't hear me. i tried to backpedal a bit, 'uhh, i mean, if, uhh, thats just what me and sister lim think..' oh gosh.

also while we were in Singapore, they had us sing songs from the children's songbook in Malay, so they could record them, make cds, and give them out to members. oh yeah. just one person singing their heart out. i sang four songs, a child's prayer, he sent his son, when i am baptized, and stars were gleaming. it was pretty scary, and he played your voice right back out to you, yikes. but we got through it, and i stopped worrying about how my voice sounded, because i was mostly stressed out about the pronunciation and stuff, and whoever laid down the music track had an odd sense of timing, there were definitely a few rouge formattas in there. I'll save a CD so you can hear my voice. lovely.

but i love you, mom and dad, there are a lot more stories, but they will have to wait. say hi to everyone for me!

sister Harrison

Happy and Sad, work goes on.

dear mom and dad,
i liked your email, and what you did for family night. this week we did a family night with three families from the branch, and it was so cool, just to kind of sit back and watch them laugh and have fun together, one was our recent converts, sulin and simbut, i like them so much, i hope they always do good.

yesterday, we had a zone meeting, and our zone leaders were telling us what the mission goals were for this year, and how they were broken down to our specific goals, and what we can do to help our mission. its kind of crazy, because they are pretty big goals, and we will have to change a lot of things about our work, but at the same time, we know that we can be doing a lot better, and all we really have to do is believe that heavenly father will show us and help us and tell us what to do, and then work like crazy. our mission is sort of a high baptizing mission, its doing really good right now. our goal for baptisms this year, I'll tell you just for curiosity's sake, is 1200. last year i think we had 1024. but i think it will be really good, to keep me on my toes until the very end. so that has really been on my mind a lot lately, because i think i will have to keep focused to the max, because they broke it down for us, and eventually, they want us to get around ten new investigators a week, and nine at church every Sunday. i hate to bore you with numbers, but it is what is on my mind, so whatever. its pretty high, but i want to do it so bad, to have the faith, and put the work in and see some results. so that is the goal, mom and dad. there is a really good scripture in Romans, about how experience worketh our hope. sometimes i used to think, 'what if it doesn't? what if you have a lot of experience, but all your experience is that you tried and you failed? what then?' but in the gospel, experience always worketh hope. you just can't tell now when you are working and trying and not seeing any results, but later, you will. that is where the faith comes in.

anyway, how about one sad piece of news and one happy piece of news? sad first. we've been teaching this family for four and a half months now. they almost got baptized in December, their interview was the next day. but he drank on Christmas. so we had to push it back, and push it back again because of this stupid conference thing, and two weeks, maybe three now, they haven't come to church, and last night, they ditched out on their appointment. so sad! we have to start dropping them, and it is so sad family, i like them so much. but then last week, a family, a mother and a daughter, came to church for the first time, i kind of thought that they wouldn't ever come, but they came, and they loved it, and they are really into the gospel now. they are excited to get baptized, and it is really cool to see. even though sometimes we're not that great of teachers or whatever, the gospel can overcome all of that and shine through. its good.

sister Harrison

Chinese New Year, Hurray !!

dear mom and dad,

Christmas and new years are over now, and Chinese new year is in full swing! it doesn't technically start until February third, but that doesn't prevent every store and business from loudly playing Chinese new year music, fast paced, high pitched, sounds like the same three songs over and over, oh yeah. but that is the only down side to Chinese new year, and I'm hoping against hope that i will still be here with sister lim until then, it will be my best Chinese new year ever! go year of the rabbit!

anyway, I'm glad the holidays are over. the work was a little bit slower, and it was hard to find new people, and i think I've gotten distracted or something lately, i don't know, but i want to start doing better. it always surprises me that even if you are thinking and teaching about the gospel every day you still can lose touch a little bit. but now we know, and knowing is half the battle, and i want to stay focused on what is important until the very end.

in other news, we met the coolest person this last week. he was a friend of the first counselor, he came to the branch party on Saturday, and then to church on Sunday. you know people are good when you actually meet them in church. His name is Palima, and on Sunday night we got the chance to teach him the first lesson. we asked him how he liked church, and he loved class so much. we taught him a little about Joseph smith and the priesthood, and i taught the apostasy differently than i have ever taught it, and that was cool. He was so into the lesson, basically eating up everything that we were saying. we asked him what he thought about everything so far, and he thanked us for teaching him, and he said, 'now i know, that this is the way for me.' ! me and sister lim were so happy, we didn't know what to say. then he asked us if there were things that weren't allowed in our church, (a lot of people think that we can't eat pork.) oh great, the word of wisdom on the first lesson. so i said, yeah, Joseph smith, when he became the prophet, received revelation, a law of health, and there are five things that the lord told us are not good for our bodies. bam bam bam bam bam. and guess what? he said, now i know that there are two special things about this church, class and the word of wisdom. haha, he is awesome. the saddest thing? he lives so far away! he is moving here, but not until later this year, and he only come every once in awhile. but he will get baptized, and I'm glad i got the opportunity to teach him once. what a great guy.

isn't heavenly father the best? even though i still have a long way to go, he still lets us be a part of really cool things. that's sort of how i feel about my whole mission, so happy that i got to be a part of it, just for a little while.

i love you family, I'll let you know next week about my release date. is it just mom and dad who are coming? any sibs coming along? just wondering. love you, have fun in the snow, suckers. and I'll have fun being sweaty all the time, haha

sister Harrison