March 27, 2011 - Senior Companion AND District Leader!

OK Family, I'm sorry I'm emailing so late. I moved to a new area and.... Whats this?

It seems that Elder Graham is evolving.......

Elder Graham is evolving!

Elder Graham has evolved into............... a Senior Companion!

Whoa!! Whats this??

Not only that, but Elder Graham evolved into District Leader Elder Graham!

OK sorry for that. You guys probably don't get the joke because you never played Pokemon on my old game boy.

Anyway. So yeah I moved into the mountains of yuan lin. And yes I have my own district that has three companionships in it. Both of the other companionships are training right now and so we have to be really good! It's really scary because I went from a little Junior who didn't have any responsibility to a District Leader and now I have to watch over 5 other people and make sure they know what they are doing. But I don't even know what I'm doing! haha It is really kind of weird. Anyway.

I want to tell you guys about last week. It was soooooooooo good. OK I don't have my miracle book because I packed it. But basically we got to go out to dinner with our recent convert chen zheng gong and his family. We had hot pot. It was really good. But it was so good because he wrote his testimony on a card and gave it to me. But what was even cooler is yesterday.

Yesterday was probably the best day of my mission. OK so what happened is the sisters baptized 5 people and the elders from Nan zi baptized one. It was so good because Chen zheng gong is our recent convert and his daughter and his daughter's friend and his daughters friends daughter all got baptized because he has a testimony and he stopped smoking and started spending time with his family and stuff again instead of gambling with his friends. It is so good. And now his daughter's friend's mom is also getting baptized in two weeks. And his wife's younger sister is getting baptized in Taibei in two weeks as well.
I am going to miss that place. I hope that someday we can all come back to Gaoxiong. I have lots of people who want me to write them letters. It is soooo good. So yeah. And the other cool thing is that Chen zheng gong got the priesthood last week so he did two of the baptisms. And our other recent convert chen zhong liang did some of them too. It was just really good. Awesome. All of our recent converts are doing awesome.

Yes kami they have donuts in Taiwan but they are just like fried bread with sugar on it. I'm getting much more comfortable with the language. I can pretty much communicate they way I want to for the most part. I just need to keep working on not sounding like a wai guo ren.

Oh yeah I just got a new companion and his name is Elder Galespie. I think that's how you spell it. I've only been with him for about an hour. He is really smart and I think his Chinese is better than mine. Our apartment only has one bathroom though... Ughh. But It is still pretty sweet. Right now I'm still just trying to figure out the area. He has been in this area for three move calls now.
I don't think there is anything I really need from home except for the prayers I know I already get.

Love Elder Graham

See ya in a year,
桂長老
桂俊杰
Elder Graham

March 20, 2011 - Focusing on our recent converts

Hello Family and other people!
Just so you guys know, if you go on my facebook and look at my friends, you can look at a lady's facebook and find the cutest asian baby pictures. Her name is Pinky. She is one of the sisters' recent converts, and her baby is soooo cute and at church yesterday, she kept on reaching her hands at me and wanted me to hold her, but its against the rules.... I don't like that rule. All of the other ones are good, but I really don't like the not holding babies rule.

To answer your e-mails:

Way to go Sisi for getting grounded! Now you can read scriptures and do your homework.
Sisi... Be careful with boys. When I get back I have to interview each date you have.
Yes Kami I played soccer. And I write in my journal most days. I will have to buy a new one soon. I've almost filled mine up.

ugg. xu wen hao said he didn't want to come to church anymore because it "makes him tired". 藉口!!!!!!!! So yes, smoking is a big problem.
Taiwanese pb tastes like reeses peanut butter.

Yes I have been out for a year. But!!!!! I haven't hit my halfway mark yet. so yeah.
xiao4fa3 效法 is just the scriptural way of saying follow/to follow an example.
I can testify that a study journal is awesome because I've kept one and wrote in it every day for the last 50 or 60 days and its really cool to look back and see what I've done. My list is in the back of my journal. Its just a small list right now.

It's time once again for MONDAY MADNESS!

Monday: Today was good because we found out that because chen di xiong got baptized at least 3 more people are investigating the church and want to be baptized. His daughter, his daughter's friend and his daughters friends daughter are all getting baptized in two weeks. They saw how he changed his life and quit smoking and now they will do anything to be baptized.
Tuesday: Change yesterday's number to 4. Chen di xiong's daughter's friend's mom wants to be baptized also. She went to the nearest chapel where she lives and just sat outside the church until someone came and said she wanted to be baptized. Sweet.
Wednesday: Today was CDTM and during the Presidents interview he hinted that I might go senior.
Thursday: Today I learned some sweet Taiwanese.
Friday: Sun said he wants to become a missionary. And Chen di xiong said he wants the priesthood so he can baptize his daughter.
Saturday: Chen di xiong told us that before he was baptized his hand would shake like an old man. But after he got baptized his hand stopped shaking as bad, which is good because his hobby is painting.
Sunday: We had a good 8 investigators at church, but even better we had 6 out of 11 recent converts at church. That's double the mission average. We also found out that our recent convert chen zhong liang will be baptizing the sisters investigator who will be baptized in 6 days.

Yay for monday madness. Well that's about all I got for today. This week went by really fast. We had lots of lessons but we didn't find very many new people to teach. We also have been focusing a lot on our recent converts. Oh yeah. Yesterday two of the 70 came to our ward and spoke and had some good things to say. One said that President Monson's "theme" is "rescue". And that it is everybody's responsibility to help bring those who have drifted away to come back into the fold.

See ya in a year,
桂長老
桂俊杰
Elder Graham

March 13, 2011 - 2 weeks of Monday Miracle Madness

Fam,
This week was pretty good. Our district has had at least one (if not four) baptism every week for 3 weeks now and we have a nice escalator effect for our investigators and so we will continue to have those.

This is our recent convert chen and his Taxi.

OK I'm going to quickly type Monday madness!

Monday the 28th: Nap. Costco. That's all I have to say. Oh yeah. and muffins.

Tue: Today I was senior comp with Elder Farr because Elder Summerhays went to lingya. For the first time in my mission, we hit all 8 of our key indicator goals. ALL of them. And I was senior. felt good. And some sweet stuff happened today. 1. I got a call from the assistants telling me a lady wanted to give some referrals. Yay for member referrals! Then we went to visit Chen dx's restaurant. We had planned on just meeting with his wife because yesterday he said he wouldn't be there today. Anyway, he happened to get back early from whatever he was doing. We had an awesome lesson. The coolest part is that he found his Jia1 Pu3. Family history. 940 years worth of it. All the way back to the first Chen to come to Taiwan from China. And he planning on going to the temple for them as soon as possible.

Wed: I was still acting as senior when the assistants called for Surprise Exchanges!!..... Chen DX passed his second interview and is set to go for his baptism on Sunday.

Thur: We saw chen dx family history book. Its huge.

Friday: Chen DX is excited for his baptism!

Sat: Sun got baptized. But we knew that would happen.

Sun: Chen dx got baptized. His wife was crying the whole time. His granddaughter is super cute. Shes only 2.

Monday the 7th: We walked up and ran down monkey mountain. and saw a dog eat monkey poo.
Tuesday: My legs still hurt from monkey mountain. Sweet.
Wednesday: We found an entire village made out of cement. Its way up in the mountains and we call it "New Taiwan"
Thur: Sun dx said he was planning on becoming a missionary. This was his 5th day of being a member. wow. Sat: Chen dx cannot even stand the smell of someone smoking anymore. He said that he starts coughing if someone is smoking around him.
Sun: We had 7 people at church and 4 of them were new. After the sister's investigators baptism, we sat down with Xu wen hao (guy who chooses smoking over God. Willingly). and our new member Sun dx helped us teach. He helped a ton and we actually set a goal for xu wen hao to be baptized in 3 weeks. we also found out that sun had a super big smoking problem before he was baptized but he came over it through "sincere prayer and reading the scriptures"

So yeah its been a pretty good last two weeks.

I have a spot in the back of my journal for places to go when we come back!

Yes pops I got the letter with the picture of greg. Its sweet.
women yinggai yao xiaofa yesujidu de bangyang qu jieshou xili
Yeah I am used to the food. Xiguan le. I really like it. And today we are going to buy a coffee can size thing of pure taiwanese peanut butter. yumm. My favorite food... I have a lot. Like.. well I don't know what they are called sometimes.. umm but chao fan is good. we also eat lots of mian4 and bian4dang1 (Lunchbox) its where you pick a meat and three veggies and you get rice. for about $1.50 USD. Then all of the night market food like zhua bing s and other fried things like that.
Shaved Ice! ------>

I have to go deng yi xia

桂俊杰Gui jun4 jie2

See ya in a year,
桂長老
桂俊杰
Elder Graham

March 6, 2011 - Chen and Sun Baptisms!

Dear Family and anybody else,

First off, tell Sarah happy birthday and sorry that I didn't get her anything.

And second off I'm sorry. I didn't bring my Monday madness stuff. But that isn't my fault. What happened is that we were waiting for the zone leaders at the jia le fu at 7 in the morning because they wanted to go to monkey mountain and it's in our area so we have to show them where it is. Anyway they called us at 7:02 and told us that they slept through their alarm. They told us to go email while they get ready to go to monkey mountain. So A. I don't have a lot of time. And B. I forgot my book so I'm sorry. And C. I emailed early so I didn't get an email from you guys so... I don't really have a chance to reply back.

But this week was really good. We had two baptisms. Sun 弟兄Brother Sun) and 陳弟兄 (Brother Chen).

Sun is just awesome. He was so good. -->

<--Chens baptism was yesterday. His baptism was a really good service. His wife shared her testimony and broke down crying. She literally fell to her knees at the pulpit as she was sharing how grateful she was that this day was finally there that her husband could be baptized. She stayed on her knees for about 15 seconds before she got up. It was really good. I cannot wait until they go to the temple. awwwwww man I wish I had my Monday madness book. There were some really good things in there that you guys will get to read next week. Sorry. I don't want to just wing it from memory though or else I will ruin it for when I can actually write it.

Did you guys like the cute Asian babies?

See ya in a year,
桂長老
桂俊杰
Elder Graham