LAUREN'S OCTOBER 13, 2014 E-MAIL

ANOTHER WEEK IN PARADISE!!!

This was about a month ago at a zone activity next to the bay. So pretty!

Sister Wang and I! It was really windy as you can tell!

Giving Sister Housely a piggy back ride. She's super tall!

Me being weird! Also these are our zone t-shirts. :)

Sister Chen from Canada! She left this past transfer. She's the coolest!!

Me in front of the Moraga building! It's a pretty building :)

Greetings Mother!

You go girl! I'm glad you and Dad saw Meet the Mormons! Wasn't it good? Have they been advertising it on TV and stuff? You should invite a friend to go watch it with you!!

Something gross happened this morning! We went to the public laundry room at our apartment complex to do our laundry, and when we walked in something smelled rancid. Then I looked down on the floor and there were maggots all over the floor!! It was disgusting!! Sister Wang couldn't see them at first because she wasn't wearing her glasses but when she looked closely she freaked out because she hates bugs. It was so creepy. We think something might have died in there. We called the manager and he went and cleaned it up but when we went back to check it out again, there were more maggots! Luckily there are two laundry rooms so we used the other one. It was just nasty though. After that we were freaking out at everything we saw that resembled a maggot haha. It made for an interesting morning though. :)

Hmm let's see....well last week was good, but another slow week. We had two appointments scheduled with M****** but both of them fell through. Then we rescheduled for Saturday, but he didn't show up to that one either and since then hasn't been responding to our calls or texts! So that's been a big bummer. The only reason we have needed to meet him so often is to finish teaching him everything for his baptism which is next weekend. At this point though, if we can't meet with him this week, it doesn't look like it will be happening which is sad. We just need to find out what's been going on and how we can help him. He's been having a rough time at work because his boss is kind of a meany.  A couple of weeks ago on our p-day we were talking to him outside of where he works because he works doing landscaping stuff in that complex, and his boss drove by and yelled at us to "talk to him when he's done working!" Haha it was a little rude but funny because it was like something out of a movie.  Anyways, we have faith that his baptism will still happen on that day but first we need to make sure we're on the same page with him. A couple of weeks ago things were going great! But, when good things start to happen that's when Satan likes to jump in and be dumb.

Other than that, things are going good - Brother G****** is doing awesome! Everyone is so surprised and excited about his decision to get baptized. He is such a funny, nice, easy-going guy. During my time here I've seen a big change in him. He's a lot more enthusiastic and open. It is so neat to witness how hearts can be changed because of the Gospel. :) Oh also on Friday Sister Wang had to go to the eye doctor because she had a weird bubble-looking thing on her eye that had been there for a few days. It turned out to be nothing serious though, just an eye blister that can result from rubbing the eye too much or from contacts. So she got some eye drops and it's gone now. :)

Last week we also had some neat things happen at the Visitor's Center! Yesterday we got to the VC 30 minutes early to eat lunch, and when we got there there was a Chinese family that couldn't speak English. Sister Wang was the only Chinese speaker there at the time so she talked to them and asked if they wanted a tour. They said no because they had already looked around, but she had the brilliant idea of taking them to the Chinese branch which was still going on in the Inter-stake Center across from the VC! So we took them over there and quietly introduced them to the Elders. They were super sweet even though I couldn't communicate with them. And it's funny because Sister Wang said when they got there and the Elders starting talking to them, the dad turned to the elder and said, "Shh....I'm trying to listen." Haha. Anyways, so that was awesome. I think they go back to China soon (which is a bummer because they can't get baptized there) but, at least a seed was planted and they got to go to sacrament.

Well, that's it for this past week. I hope everyone has an awesome week this week! Halloween is coming soon! We get to do deep-cleaning on Halloween and I'm super excited. Haha. I love you all! Read your scriptures every single day and spread the Gospel!!!

Love,

Sister Johnson

Also a few tidbits from our back and forth e-mail from Monday:

What have you done today for your P-Day?
 

Today we got some groceries, went to the dollar store and I bought a kitten calendar!! I am going to write miracles that happen on each day (I wish I started this at the beginning of my mission!!), then we ate at burger king because we had some coupons hehe, then cleaned a little, then came to Oakland to wash our car but a lot of other missionaries were washing their car at the mission home so we came to email then we went to wash our car and then we came back but Sister Wang started talking to a Chinese guy and we showed him around the VC and now we're back emailing :)

Do you ever meet any really mean people?

Actually I haven't come across that many really really mean people, people have been rude but not any extreme ones yet. I talked to a lady on the phone and she was pretty rude though. The other day I talked to a lady who was just really upset off the bat and asked all these questions about what we believe and I was just calm and answered the best I could but she still wasn't happy at the end. But honestly I have no problem talking to rude people. It doesn't bother me at all haha. I'm just really nice and if they are rude back it ain't my problem! And they'll regret it a lot some day anyways which stinks for them and then I feel bad for them hehe.

Look for another post next week and a special post for her half way mark next month!  Bye for now!