I've eaten Chicken Feet

hello family, time for a little update from your favorite person in Malaysia, (that's a broad claim to make, but I'll stand by it)

the other day sister Petty and i were thinking of things that would never be the same after Malaysia. I will never scoff at chicken with bones again. (last night i even ate a fried fishhead, eyes and all!) i miss crosswalks a lot, and will never take them for granted. also umbrellas. before the mish, i never thought about them, they are just not very common in Utah. but here, man or woman, rain or shine, everyone carries an umbrella. and yes, family, i have become an umbrella carrier. it is kind of nice whenever it starts to rain (it rains at least once a day) to just pop it open and have a little bubble of transportable dryness. even in the sun, it is really nice to carry around. i scoffed at people with umbrellas in the sun, -until i tried it, and it is nice.
anything else? oh, here they eat with a spoon in their right hand and a fork in their left hand. when i first got here i thought it was a little primitive, but really it is ingenious. for one thing, you never have to put down your fork and pick of a knife, because you can just cut with the edge of your spoon, and for another, (Kim would love this) every bite is a perfect bite. you arrange the food on your spoon with your fork, a little of this, a little of that, perfect bite every time. who would've thought Malaysia would come up with a better way.

so, missionary work. its good. really good. everything seems to be coming together. for the past few weeks it was pretty hard, we had no one good, no one was coming to church. and then, last week, five people at church. i seriously don't know why it changed so fast, we found these people by coincidence, and they were super good. for instance, we went to see some people with a member, but they weren't home. so David, who goes out with missionaries a lot, said the elders were teaching this other lady before, we could go visit her, because she apparently has an awesome view of the city. so we went to see her, and she was awesome! it was a Friday, and even though we had never taught her before, she came to church, loved it, said it really touched her heart. our first meeting with her was so good, she had good questions, and she started crying when she gave the closing prayer. i was blown away. who knows why the elders stopped teaching her, but she is definitely ready now.

we are teaching this other guy, his name is rioh, and he is from the Philippines. i might have told you about him already, i met him while sister petty was in Singapore, i was at sister Alice's house, and he just passed by and started asking us about church. he is so funny. he is a model for a living; he is sort of an unlikely candidate for an investigator, but he has a lot of questions and is really open, he said he will read and pray (he actually said if he wanted to he could read the book of Mormon in one day) but i think if he got a testimony of the book of Mormon, he would be unstoppable. maybe right now he is just curious, but he could be really good.

we have other people that are really good too, but there is no time to talk about them. things are going great, i feel like the time is just slipping away..

oh yeah, PS, i hardly even notice the tag, it didn't take very long. now the most annoying thing is when people read your name as you pass them on the street, oh well..

the gospel is true, the people here are great. (haha, I'm such a missionary, and i don't even care. i have plenty of time to normal up once i am home)

your favorite,
sister 'I've eaten chicken feet' Harrison

A Day late, but not a Dollar short.

hi family!
i know, the email is very late this week, the last few days have been pretty crazy. sister petty went to Singapore. there were no girl members who don't work during the day, so i hung out for three days at sister Alice's house, she has three little boys, 6, 4, and one. so i hung out with her during the day, and when the members my age got off of work, we did a little missionary work and then slept back at our house. its weird how it worked out, visa runs are good if you are the one going, but if you are the one staying, you don't get a lot done. it felt really good for sister petty to get back and start missionary work back up. I thought it would be nice, to have a little break, hang out at her house, just have time to study and relax a little bit. but i didn't like it, i felt uneasy like there was something i had to get done all the time. sound like a missionary? so three days of that was plenty for me. but because i was there i met Alice's neighbor, rioh. he's cool and an elder who was here before gave him a book of Mormon, but he has never learned. he just happened to walk by their door, and started asking them questions about the book of Mormon. we are meeting him tonight, i hope he is good.

but it feels really good to be back to normal. sister petty came back from Singapore with all this enthusiasm and ideas and so we have a renewed effort to do really well. sometimes i think i don't work as hard as i could and should, so I'm going to change that right now. and guess what? we are now going to start wearing our tags full time. and let me tell you, it feels so weird. i have only worn it from the house to the email place so far, and it was weird. i feel like a brand new missionary. (also i sort of feel like part of the FBI, taking kk by storm with our tags and our bags and our skirts.) is this how most missionaries feel? so I'm really feeling the tag right now, but i'm sure I'll get so used to it that i don't even think about it.

what else? Malay feels good, my hair is growing out of the slight butchering it received (don't tell sister Goodwin i said that) about the skirts, I'll send you a letter with more of a run down, but don't worry too much, just if you happen to come across what i am looking for, then you can send it to me. i am also looking for new sandals, and maybe could you send me some money for them? ten or twenty dollars would go really far here, and then i could get some that would really last, so just let me know what you think of that.

anywho, i think that is all for today, i love it out here, and i have a feeling things are just going to get better. i love you all, so much, so so much!

love, sister 'who's wearing the tag now' Harrison

Whoa, I just talked to you guys !!

hi family,
it was really cool to talk to everyone i did on mother's day, (well, technically it was Monday for me..) it is weird to think that you are halfway around the world, and that it was night time there. and it was weird, because everyone sounds the same, just my same, good old family back home, it was really cool.

yesterday, for some reason, was such a good day. at the start of the day we had some extra time before our appointment, even though it isn't the funnest thing to do, we decided to go knocking. sometimes (sorry, tangent here) i am so sad that we can't teach Muslims. there are some really nice ones out there. once i even talked to one who had read some of the book of Mormon, had really good questions about prophets and everything, but we couldn't do anything, it was so sad, he wanted to learn so bad. here in Malaysia, they say they have religious freedom for everyone except the Muslims. if you marry a Muslim, you have to join. what an oppressive religion. and someone was telling me if you want to go high up in your field or do anything with the government, you have to convert. you just can't go anywhere if you aren't a Muslim. hooray for America. anywho, we were knocking on doors, and found a really cool lady who says she and her husband want to learn, and is friends with someone we are teaching right now. that was just the beginning of a really good day. we had some great lessons, and found some more great people. it was like things finally started to come together. we even talked to this lady who has a lot of friends who want to learn, and she even called us this morning to confirm that we are coming over tomorrow. i have never heard of an investigator calling to confirm an appointment, awesome.
so really quick, do you want to hear something funny? so this lady, she is SDA, seventh day adventist. the funny thing about Malaysia is that they number the days of the week, and day one (hari satu) is monday. so the kicker? all these seventh day adventists are going to church on the sixth day, hari enam, and everyone else worships on the seventh day.

things are going well, me and sister petty are getting along great and time is screaming by. also, i have had very strange dreams lately, the best of which entailed me training my pet hawk, it was a very cool dream. i love you family, and hope everything goes well, you are the best!

sister 'boleh bah kalau kau' harrison

ps i have one last story that i forgot to tell.
anywho, whenever we walk down the street, people always yell out to us. sometimes its 'orang putih' which means white person, sometimes it is good morning (at all hours of the day) frequently it is i love you (i can't count the number of men who have professed there love to me, i wonder if they say it to the elders, too..) so we were walking down the street and someone yelled out hello, ususally i would say hello back and keep on walking, but before i could, he followed with 'is it me your looking for? i can see it in your eyes' it was so funny, i could see Marc with his hand on the window singing it.. that is definitely the best thing anyone has ever yelled/sung to me.

Mother's Day - Hurray !!

hi family, lama tidak nampak!

yesterday marked six months into my mission, which i cannot believe. and i have almost been with sister petty for a month now, can you believe that? we are getting along really well, she is really cool. but she doesn't have that much longer left, either. I'm not sure if i will be transferred before she gets sent home or not, but it is looking like i will stay here. which means i will have killed off two companions in a row, and which means i will stay in KK for quite a while, which i am totally fine with. sister petty goes home in august, and three other sisters go home then too. right now there are only ten sisters, and going down from ten to six is quite a bit. so hopefully we will get some more sisters before that happens. six sisters is only three companionships, crazy.

anywho, the work here is good. i feel like we have turned a corner. before everything wasn't working out, and we couldn't even scrap together new investigators, from our own efforts and from the branch. it was super frustrating because before, it seemed new investigators would just come to us, from all sorts of places. but yesterday, we found some really cool people, and got nine new investigators in one day! so i will admit one was a family with seven kids, but even still, they seemed pretty cool. so i feel like things will start happening. and we are having a baptism this Saturday, farini is awesome, so i really can't complain, because even when we didn't have that many investigators, we were teaching perhaps the most golden person I've ever met, so it all works out.

sister Harrison

The Cereal Thief, JK!

as always, things are going pretty good. the last couple of weeks have been harder for me for some reason, but things are looking up. sister petty and i are getting along (even though she eats my cereal sometimes. i don't really mind, but it is like eight ringgit a box, i mean, come on, that is precious stuff) and we've started to go to the gym every morning, so i'm getting back into running. in the mtc i got really bad shin splints, so now i'm working myself up really slowly, it feels good. i miss running outside.

we had zone conference just this past week, and a member of the seventy came and talked to us, he is the area authority for asia, and he told us a lot of interesting things, that i think dad will especially like to hear. the asia mission area hold around half of the world's population, and there are more mulisms in our area than in the middle east and north africa. isn't that crazy? because malaysia and indonesia are huge muslim countries with big populations, and places like bangladesh, and even pakistan might be in our area. also he said that malaysia is the ninth fastest growing mission right now. cool huh? take that, all you south american missions!

i think we might be getting close to having a stake in malaysia, which would be so cool. it would not be in KK though, they are still too small. but there is going to be a temple here someday, and when that day comes, i will be so stoked. also when they finally print the book of mormon in malay will be a very good day.

anywho, just thought you would like to know that kind of stuff. they are making some changes in our mission, too. for visa runs we are supposed to go through in missionary clothes, and we might even start wearing our tags here. that would be crazy, i'm not sure if i like it. i bet other missionaries don't even think about there tags, but i think it is a lot easier without them. because we already look different, i mean, we are the only white people here, dressed up. and it is so much easier talking to people and bringing in the gospel, sort of slidding it in to the conversation. the other day i was talking to a girl, just about her, and what i was doing here. i said we just go around and teach people about our church. and then (like it had just occurred to me) i said hey, maybe we could come to your house, and teach you a little bit! and she said yes. but i feel with the tags our purpose would be staring people down. maybe not. maybe i'm just afraid of what i'm not used to. we will see if we will eventually have to wear them.

it is really good to talk about the gospel all day, about the thing that will help people the most. sometimes, when i walk into an apartment complex which is huge, i feel there is no way we could even have the time to knock this whole thing. and then only a few people would be willing to even listen, its like how much good can we really do, we can't even begin to make a dent. but then you work a little, and you carve out a little, and you find someone awesome that makes the whole thing worth it. so missionary work is hard and very good. i just need to get better at it, hehe. (listen to me, i have everything all figured out over here)

sister renee harrison

Maylay is Crazy !

wow. i seriously can't believe that tracy is graduating. i can still remember when we went shopping for books my first semester at byu, and when she showed us her little carol. and now, she is all done. what is her plan for this summer? how long are she and marc staying in utah? and tell me how spark is getting a long. i quit over a year ago, crazy.
anywho, this week was really good. i introduced sister petty to saturday's warrior. my new favorite song is the missionary one--big surprise. here are some choice lines:
'with our swords of truth we plunder,
slicing wicked men assunder,
we are something of a wonder, in our humble way

sometimes i feel like that. also:
'crooked generation,
will you scoff at ordination?
we are warriors by a right, so respect us if you please'

yeah.

so anywho, i discovered something new about missionary work this week. it is a freaking roller coaster ride of emotions. i think i felt like this at the beginning, too. but this week, it seemed every day had really high highs, and pretty low lows, too. it is exhausting. I think missionary work is pretty stressful because important things are riding on your everyday activities, and your skills, too. so sometimes i would feel like i couldn't do missionary work, i didn't know how to help people, i can't speak. but then other times, i would feel like this is the most awesome thing i could be doing, and i don't ever need to worry as long as i'm trying hard. and sometimes my malay is spot on, and lets face it, the members are awesome here, you can't help but have a good time when you are around them. last week it seemed like i went up and down and up and down. but i really think it will even itself out. i think because i have a new companion right now things are harder, but they will smooth out. i think me and sister petty could do pretty good here, she is a really good missionary, and she wants to work hard. she only has three months left. i wonder if i will kill her off here in sabah, which would be awesome because i would be here for a heckalong time. or i might get transferred before she leaves, which means i only have one or two months left here. transfers are crazy because right now there are only ten sisters, and so you can sort of guess what might happen. but you can also drive yourself crazy too. the good thing is, all of the sisters here right now are pretty cool, i think i could get along with any of them.

hmm, what else? we have two awesome investigators right now. one, farini, is the most golden i have yet seen. she is eighteen, and super cool, and in our second lesson, she told us she already had a testimony of the book of mormon! so some things are hard, but you can't really complain when you have people to teach like her. she is a blessing to teach, who knows why we were the ones who got to meet her.

ok gear shift, no pun intended, do you want to know another reason why malaysia is so awesome? dvds are dirt cheap here. there are no copyright laws. they have had avatar on dvd for weeks now, it costs less than three dollars for a really good copy. thats less than seeing it in the theater! so, if you want any dvds, i bet i could get them to you before they were out of the theater in america. just let me know. what good is having a daughter in malaysia if she can't send you really cheap movies? no good, thats what.

well, sorry this email is all over the place, but malaysia is doing really good. its always summer here.

love, sister 'sounds like a sabahan' harrison

Renee' has a new companion !!

So transfers happened last week, and now i am with Sister Petty, i knew you would be stoked, mom and dad! the only sad thing is that i was pretty sad sister richey left. she was so fun and we really got along, her last week in KK was so fun! for example, for some reason, she had tons of money left in her account, so we had lots of eating out, lots of mango lassies (at five ringgit a pop-but it is worth it) and even mcdonalds take out, when sister richey had her very first big mac. (mcdonalds delivers here, its awesome, and a little hard to resist. but don't ever order the breakfast, no mcgriddle and no syrup for pancakes. we learned the hard way.) also i will miss dance parties to church music, and watching saturdays warrior (as well as the SW karaoke-i love dvd special features)

its hard to go from all that to someone you don't know at all, but i really think sister petty and i will get along too. Missionary work seems completely turned on its head though, because now that i am the one that knows everyone, and is showing sister petty around, i have to lead a lot more than i had been doing. and things like talk on the phone in malay and everything! its only really been one day, but i already feel like my malay has gotten a little more solid, its easier to understand and to get things out. one cool thing is that sometimes i know some words that sister petty hasn't learned yet, because she has spent her whole mission in sarawak, the words i know are sabah specific. its kind of cool to look back and see that i've actually learned a lot. but enough about malay.

this week is going to be a hard one i think, just as we are transferring everything over and getting used to each other. but we have some really good investigators now. One girl is so good, she had a dream about the book of mormon last night! and last week we just happened to meet this guy that had learned everything up to the baptism interview, he had some problems, and stopped learning, but now he wants to get baptized again, awesome! and one sad thing, do you remember the deaf guy, simon? he is so good (he even payed fast offerings on sunday) but he can't get baptized for six more months, so i probably won't get to see it, which is so sad..

hey did you know that Kuala Lumpur means something like 'muddy river end'? crazy.