Week 7

Gamyanjit Faailohk (Happy Thanksgiving)
Singdanjit Faailohk (Merry Christmas) My district sings Christmas Carols in Cantonese pretty much every day. It's white and snowy here.
Happy birthday to my mom.
I didn't know that Aunt Kim's email address is based on her Chinese name! That's neat.

General
For Thanksgiving we had lunch for our main meal so that the workers could eat with their family and friends. We had lots of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, green beans with bacon, sweet potatoes, pumpkin/apple pie with ice cream, rolls, and the fruit pudding/whipped cream/jello stuff. Oh and eggnog. It was very tasty. Then we packed a sack dinner and ate it later in the hallway with most of our zone (peanut butter and jelly sandwich, chips, apple, brownie)

The whole day was so great. Elder Oaks gave the morning devotional and some of his extended family (grandchildren etc.) gave really nice musical numbers. During the afternoon we had a humanitarian devotional. One of the two speakers was from Sanford, Florida. I talked to him afterwards. He was the leader of the "Feed the Children" organization. He told us to picture the cutest kid that we know praying at night to Heavenly Father for food to feed his family. With the meals we were about to prepare as a service project, we are giving them more than food, we are giving them faith. I gave the closing prayer in front of about 2,000 missionaries. Afterwards someone said that I am now famous since I prayed in front of so many people. I surprisingly wasn't nervous because I prayed to be calm and just say what I feel/my testimony about charity (sincere love of God's children), gratitude (the ability to recognize the many, many blessings around us) and service (joy in helping and preparation of our own hearts for serving and finding those in our mission areas). We ended up making more than 350,000 meals at the MTC to give to poor families (more than ever before). That is what we did after the devotional. They had us wear red head caps that made us look like the mushrooms from Mario. Then for the evening devotional there were videos about every aspect of gratitude for the gospel and this life and musical numbers. Then my companion recited the first vision in Cantonese in front of everyone. We also had someone in Japanese, German and ESL do it. It was an amazing evening, and afterwards everyone stood while singing "I believe in Christ." The spirit was indescribable. You should listen to the last verse of that song.

We Skyped a Cantonese speaking member on Monday. It was nice. We focus on getting to know and really enjoying our time with the individual/loving them. And then we teach them something applicable to their life and that helps them come unto Christ. Our teacher put each person on speaker phone when doing the evaluation. The member told our teacher that we were one of the best companionships in the last 6 months, that she could really tell that we cared, had good eye contact, companion unity, and that she could feel the spirit so strongly. We felt really nice but knew that the success was only by and through the spirit because of the Lord. I am so grateful for that. He is always on our side. We need to choose to be on His. As we prepare ourselves to be receptive to the Holy Ghost through diligent scripture study and prayer, we can rely on it for every aspect of our lives.

Sat heui = to lose, Saat hoih = to kill. I don't want to mix those two up. jeui = the most, jeuih = sin. Sik = to know, sihk = to eat. beimihn = avoid, boumihn=maintain. Apparently one of the missionaries said "Will you maintain pornography?" to an investigator. Mahn (down tone) means smell. Mahn means ask. "Smell heavenly Father and he will answer you." We're going to make lots of mistakes teaching the gospel until we get the tones and sounds right. We've been making pictures of animals and animal puns to motivate each other. For example, with a picture of a lion we wrote "If I said you weren't a good missionary, I'd be lion." We discovered that rhino in Cantonese is sai ngauh, which means amazing cow.

This week I met people going to Russia, Albania, Finland, and Denmark. It was interesting to hear their languages. We also talk to people from other countries here to learn English or another language, such as China, Australia, Samoa. I also sat on one of my nametags and broke it in half.

Spiritual
"Remember how you felt" by Elder Holland has been a focus of mine this week. It is important to remember the past experiences or feelings that you have had and act on the promptings that you do receive. Put your mind and heart into searching, learning, and studying the scriptures and words of the prophets. The answers are there. You just aren't looking for them. It is the same with everything. If you WANT to know that the scriptures are true, or gain a better testimony, or feel the Holy Ghost, then you will with patience and faith. Heavenly Father doesn't prove himself to us. We prove our beliefs to Heavenly Father and He confirms that what we are feeling or thinking is true. The Book of Mormon is so essential to our conversion to the Gospel. I challenge you to read it diligently, meaning really thinking about what you are reading and likening it to your own life. Make it personal, write in the margins your testimony and thoughts while reading. 1 Nephi 6:5-6 makes me think how every single thing in the Book of Mormon was kept for this very day out of necessity. It was kept in the pages for a reason. As we read we should think of why the passage is significant for us and how it applies on our lives today.

The Lion King scene where Simba talks with his father applies to us. "You have forgotten who you are and thus forgotten me."

Thanks for your love and support. The thing that would make me most happy is if you would share your testimony with someone you care about. Help someone come more unto Christ this week by letting His light shine through you. Strive to have more of his countenance and be an example of the gospel.

Love
Sister Wilcox

There are no pictures this week. I have others take lots of pictures but they forget to forward them to me. Sorry
Oh yes, when Santa says "Hou, hou, hou" he is saying "good, good, good," in Cantonese! That seems appropriate!