Toto, I Don't Think We're In the US Anymore!

You heard it here first folks, guess who is in fact no longer in the United States, but the great island of Taiwan?! THIS ONE. Which means that I am also in quarantine haha which makes things a little anticlimactic but it's all good. To fill you in on the rest of the week:

Monday was pretty wild, I had to figure out a whole bunch of stuff for Taiwan, but everything was closed for the fourth of July, so we were kind of running around like crazy people. But we did get to have a district P-day and Elder Vang's dad came and made us Hmong food which was super fun!

Tuesday was good, I got to sing and share my testimony at district council which was fun! Afterward we got to eat lunch at a Hmong Grandma's house, and I ate another Thai chili pepper. We also got to go to a baptism for someone the Elders were teaching which was awesome!

Wednesday was pretty chaotic haha but it was an adventure! Wednesday morning, we got a call from the lead STL's asking if Sister Carter would be willing to train! Super exciting! They also let us know that we would be spending the night in the cities that night, so I packed up everything and we went to Woodbury for a covid test, Bloomington to pick some stuff, went to a bank, hurried and grabbed dinner, and did our finding time at a park and then went to Plymouth to stay with the Sisters there. It was a lot of fun actually! Crazy but good day! 

This past week the days got progressively more chaotic. Thursday was a big one! That morning we had to hurry and go to a library so I could fill out a health declaration form, Sister Carter was very patient with me (I was just slightly freaking out haha) which was super helpful, and then we headed out to Bloomington! We got there a little early and got to stop at a park and walk around for a few minutes, which was really nice honestly. The last few days had been super chaotic, but I really enjoyed spending that time with my companion. I went and said goodbye to President and Sister Richardson which was really sad, and said goodbye to Sister Carter, which was really sad, and said goodbye to the Minnesota Minneapolis Mission. As I'm writing this, I'm re-experiencing all of those emotions that I had just a few days ago. The MMM will forever hold a piece of my heart, and although I will miss it a lot, I guess Heavenly Father has a new plan for me now. 

After that everything was kind of a blur with a 5-hour flight, 8 hour layover, and 12 hour flight to Taiwan. I got to meet up with some MTC pals, Elder Pyne and Sister Kirton! Then we had to go through customs and all that jazz, and eventually made it to our quarantine hotel. My mission President is super funny and I'm excited to be a part of the work here! 

Spiritual thought for the week: Yesterday I was studying chapter 4 in PMG, and something that stuck out to me was how it talks about being "careful" in recognizing the Spirit. Why do you think God made the Holy Ghost sometimes difficult to recognize? How does that promote our growth? I have also been relating it to the talk Careful Verses Casual. There is a range of how careful we can be in keeping the commandments. Something Sister Richardson was saying to the new missionaries right before I left was that we shouldn't try to be the exception to the rules. Look for reasons to follow the counsel of the gospel, rather than reasons not to. Our level of carefulness in keeping the commandments is directly correlated to our level of recognizing the spirit. What actions might we be justifying that are keeping us from being able to recognize the spirit carefully?