Elder Brandon Wallace: Rain, Rain, Car Accidents, Rain, and Halloween

So this week most of our lessons fell through and most of our investigators dropped us. It's been an interesting week.

Monday was a slow P-day. Didn't really do anything, this P-day is going to be crazy busy because we have to move our whole house in Richmond over to our new house in Vancouver. That kid we found by a miracle and were going to meet up with didn't show up so that was a sad night.

Tuesday I kind of just broke down. Missions are really hard if you are wondering, plus there is a lot of stress from learning a new language. But I felt sorry for myself for about a half hour, then made myself a burrito and got over it and went to work! Because there is always work to be done and we just need to forget ourselves. We taught Joanne again. She is super awesome and we had Ning DiXiong be our member present again. He is an amazing member present. Just such an amazing member. I know I've talked about him a lot but he really is probably the coolest member of the church I have ever met. Then we had an appointment with a guy Elder Hay met on the street and right before he called and asked if he could bring 2 friends with him. So we got 3 new investigators which was awesome!

Wednesday we had District Meeting and I did my first Training. It went pretty well, I trained on our Mission President's weekly newsletter and about faith which went really well I think. Then we brought clothes for a few days and went over into our new apartment in Vancouver. I didn't take a picture but it is a REALLY nice apartment. Lots of space too. We taught a former investigator named Karrie and she seems pretty solid. Then I got to give my first Priesthood Blessing in Chinese which was a really cool experience.

So I'm in the YSA branch now and we had our Branch Mission Correlation meeting and it was AWESOME! It is just so much fun being in the YSA because all these people you are working with are the same age so it's really easy to make friends. It really is just a big family in that branch. I'm loving the YSA. Since we moved into a new apartment and didn't have any food, one of the girls at Correlation had some groceries in the fridge at the church that she gave us so we could eat the next day. Gotta say, I really love this branch.

Thursday we taught a recent convert named David who brought us Sushi which I loved. We got some more free food from an investigator who owns a butcher store. Also, do you remember Vicky? She was the girl who seemed really solid but found anti-mormon stuff? Well we met with her out of nowhere and she still isn't interested but we were able to answer her questions and I feel like later down the road she may get baptised. We taught another lesson with Emrys. She is an awesome girl.

Thursday night we were out finding and we saw a car accident which was pretty cool. It wasn't bad and nobody got hurt, just the cars were a dinged up kind of bad. They were both Chinese so we went over and helped them out and one of the guys is going to meet with us again! He is an old guy named Baldwin and is really funny!

Friday we taught a sweet new investigator named Sasuke. He seems really solid. He has been praying to come to church ever since he moved to Canada, but his Aunt that he lives with doesn't like church, so when he is meeting with us he tells her he is going to the library. The YSA just got a new Branch President a couple of weeks ago so him and his wife invited us over to dinner. They made us salmon and potatoes which were really good. He is a really awesome and spiritual man.

By Friday most of our investigators from Richmond dropped us which really sucked. A lot of them were SO solid and now none of them want to meet with missionaries anymore. Our most solid, Simon, hasn't been answering his phone but we are praying that he will still meet because his date was in 2 weeks.

Saturday we met with another former from the YSA named Yu Chen. She is really awesome. She even set her own baptismal date for December 5th. She really wants to get baptised so we are really excited for her. She is coming to Family Home Evening tonight at the YSA so we will teach her again tonight. Because it was Halloween we had to go back inside our apartments by 6:00 and start weekly planning so our Halloween was pretty uneventful.

Sunday was really good. It was daylight savings for the rest of the world (sorry Arizona, you aren't cool enough apparently) so we got to sleep in an extra hour! Buuuttt... we changed our phones before we went to bed, and then they changed on their own in the middle of the night so we actually slept in 2 extra hours. It felt awful to waste the Lord's time and we were kind of rushed in the morning but we did everything else on time which was good. The fast and testimony meeting in the YSA was really spiritual. Emrys was supposed to get confirmed but she showed up 2 1/2 hours late to church. Sacrament meeting is last in this branch so when she showed up halfway through the testimony meeting we stopped and then confirmed her and gave her the Holy Ghost. it was really cool, and she cried and said she really felt God's love. Afterwards they do a big "break the fast" dinner so the whole branch gets together and we ate a big dinner of pulled pork sandwiches which were really good and fun to bond with the branch.

Life is still good in Canada. Moving to a new area this week which is fun. We've been over there all week, but sleeping in both apartments on different days. As of today, we will be officially moved in! Hope you all have an amazing week, I know I'm planning on it! Love you all!!!!

Jia you!

王長老

Elder Wallace

This was a cool quote somebody said in Testimony meeting yesterday: "No matter how dark of a world you live in, Christ will always provide a light for you that can dispel ALL the darkness."