You Have to Loose to Win

What a week!! Sister Chan is amazing, our area is incredible and life is just really great here in Hong Kong!

Dinner with a member! They have this sweet exercise machine that shakes you! It was great!

This week I truly fell in love with our area and the people that we're serving! I feel like last week I was trying to drink out of a fire hydrant (funny for anyone who knows my past history with fire hydrants. If not don't worry about it.) But this week I was able to process things a little better and I feel like I'm finally getting into the swing of things! We're crazy busy, working crazy hard and the Lord is blessing us like crazy!!

Central City of Tsuen Wan

So our area is super diverse! You've got the central city which is just busses and shops and people and people and lights and more people! It's crazy! And then you have a pier and some areas that are a lot more chill. They're our favorite to go finding in because people aren't in such a hurry and more willing to talk to us. (It reminds me a lot of Yamashita Park, by where we lived in Yokohama Japan.) We go there twice a week and pick up garbage along this strip of rocks. It's the best. Makes me feel like I'm at home, emptying those garbage cans around Dick's! It's great! Cool story about the Pier later! And then you've got the mountains! We went up there to visit a part less active family this week and I'll send pictures because it was awesome!! Super rural. Really poor. Many of the people up there live in shacks. Everybody has gardens. It's beautiful! There's a lot of wild dogs up there so we're not supposed to be up there after or around dark, so we don't die. Probably a good idea. But it's great!

Pier 

Service…Cleaning Rock Area Near the Pier

Mountain Area

But Tsuen Wan is the best!! I talked about it a little last week, but we're the first Sisters to be assigned to only this area since clear back when President Hawks was a missionary. There have been a few Sisters that have been assigned to cover like four areas, Tsuen Wan being one of them, but they haven't had their own set of Sisters for a really long time. The members seem to be pretty excited about it and they're great! They take really good care of us!! (As I'm sure are an answer to a mother's prayers.) So we're still trying to figure everything out! Word is that we'll be here a long time to get things going, which I'm perfectly happy about!

In Hong Kong everyone has their Chinese name, and then they also have "an English name." A lot of people have just really generic names but some people have crazy ones! There's a boy in our ward named Sparkle and a Sister named Rainbow.... So that's just like the coolest thing ever! There's also a guy that comes to our English class whose name is Dinosaur. It's the greatest! 

Editor's Note…She got the Kool-Aid Packs we sent

Editor's Note…Now it is time for her to send us packages!!!  This store sells the best cream puffs ever!!! There was one right by the check-out counter of my favorite grocery store in Japan.  We are so jealous!!!

We have a weekly English class that we have at the church for an hour on Tuesday evenings. It's great because often people aren't interested in the church, but they're down to come learn English and then they realize how cool we are and how awesome the gospel is and how happy it makes people and then they let us teach them. I'm sitting there listening to these people try to speak English and most of them just have awful pronunciation and it's really hard to understand them. But then I realized that that's gotta be exactly how I sound to them when I try to speak Cantonese, so I just had to laugh to myself. It's great though!

So back to the crazy blessings that have come from the Lord. WAY more people talk to us than I thought ever would! Cool story about the Pier: So we were picking up garbage like the champs that we are and this guy just walked up to us and was like "Hey, my wife is super sick and I want to bring her and start going to church. Can we come to yours?" And we're like, "Um.. YA!" So him and his wife have both met with the Elders and have come to church and they're awesome! They love it! 

Another time we were talking to this super cute girl and teaching her a street lesson and this guy in his 20's came up to us and was like "Hey, I want to come to your church. Can I come? Where is it? Do you have a flier?" It was sweet! He also was at church on Sunday! I figured stuff like that happens in Brazil or Mexico all the time, but I didn't think it would happen in Hong Kong!! There really are so many people that the Lord has prepared! We just have to find them!

We extended a baptismal invitation to our investigator Lily this week! She's the greatest! She was so excited and was very eager to accept our invitation. She even made me stop in the middle of the invitation so she could write down the date. She's very eager to learn anything and everything. She loves to read the Book of Mormon and marks and circles things she likes. We asked her why she keeps reading it and she says it makes her really happy and she feels very peaceful when she reads it. She's just the greatest! She came to church on Sunday. It was 5th Sunday so they had the meeting about the electronic banking accounts and tithing. She wanted to sit right up front and when they started talking about tithing she turned to us to ask about what it was because we hadn't taught her about it yet. Sister Chan explained it super briefly and right there and then she pulls out her wallet and said, "Oh I have money right now, can I pay it right now?" It was SO COOL! Here some of the members of the ward were complaining about transaction fees, and this investigator that has only been taught up through the restoration pulled out her wallet to pay tithing right there on the spot. It was just a huge lesson to me on the simple power of faith and a desire to do what's right.

Like I said, I feel like I'm starting to really settle in and get into the swing of things. A huge part of that was a talk that Sister Chan shared with me. It's called "The Fourth Missionary." Changed the whole way I look at a mission. It's super long but go read it!

My favorite part is where it says:

"Just give it up. Surrender your will to Him. Unconditionally. Withhold nothing. Turn it all over to Him' all of your desired, wishes, dreams and hopes. Be true and faithful in your head and in your heart, not just in your behavior. Trust in Him. Trust Him who knows all things. Trust Him who has all power. Trust Him whose love for you is perfect. Trust Him, who alone suffered, paid and atoned for your sins, and for your weaknesses as well. Trust Him that He will make of you immeasurably more, than you will ever, ever, in all eternity, make of yourself."

"The only way to win is to lose. Lose yourself in the Lord's work, and you will win beyond your wildest imaginations."

That's it. The only way to win is to lose. He knows everything. I was real homesick my first week. But when I decided to hand it all over to Him - my desires, my hopes, my heart and my will - I was content and happy. Things are still hard sometimes and I'm still really tired at the end of the day, but it all works out! 

Have a great week! I love you all more than you know! Don't forget to do the little things!

Love Sister Robinson