Good Times were had by all

31 August 2015

Remember that time that my comp and I went to the HMONG branch with
our Thai investigator who speaks absolutely no Hmong? That was a good
time.

It's been a good time in the Alaska anchorage mission. We have had
loads of good times. We are lovingly cracking down on member
missionary work and we are receiving some loving good results and some
loving resistance. The great thing about working with active members,
is it is one of the most effective long term uses of your time. The
tough part is that in the moment you see very little positive effect
from is. But we have started hearing people talk more about missionary
work in church and we've had a few shout outs, so I am happy.

I had exchanges in soldotna this week, and the drive down is
incredibly gorgeous. Haha I don't know many missions that drive 3
hours for an exchange, but hey :) soldotna is a little fishing town
and it has the PRETTIEST river next to it, called the Kenai River. You
should probably look up "dip netting Kenai River" and check out the
mayhem that goes on here. Also check the color of the water. It's so
beautiful. Bright aquamarine. While in soldotna I was looking for some
food to eat in the morning  in the sisters apartment. Moldy Apple?
Nah.  Candy? No thanks. Toast? Maybe.... Then I reached into the back
of the fridge: "fresh salmon recently caught out of the Kenai River,
and home smoked for my personal enjoyment? Don't mind if I do!"  The
sisters didn't want any of the smoked salmon in their freezer so I
helped myself to all of it. Rough life I lead. Also I have had moose
burgers twice in the past little bit (which are approximate 10,000x as
delicious as cow) and have had salmon once or twice a week this whole
summer. I think we are having mountain goat with my bishop next and a
halibut fry with the elders quorum president. I am happily packing on
a little extra insulation for the winter. It's already down to the low
40's in the mornings, this morning 39 degrees.

As far as our investigators go, man they are giving me a run for their
money. They have struggle more complicated than any others I think I
have ever encountered so far. It's forced me to rely on the lord
because 80% of the time I have NO idea what to do.

Linda was seventh day Adventist, but had the lord Essentially tell her
that wasn't the correct religion. She has been just trying to follow
his guidance, and is VERY cautious about making a mistake. It's a good
and bad thing that seventh day Adventism and Mormonism is so similar
because she is ultra careful.

Jorene lives in a village out by bethel, and we communicate through
email. She wanted to get baptized at one point but now, she is just
comfortable going to the only church in their village. She also has a
lot of native cultural things that make switching churches difficult.

Jennifer is so great and would be totally golden escape that she is
way afraid of change of any type. Even good change. She is a romantic
who is dying to have a family. Too old for her singles ward but
doesn't like going to church because of all the families there.

Eve is Thai, and barely speaks English. Communication is tough and she
doesn't understand very much at church. But she can understand us
alright. Our perfect fellowshipper is now going to BYU and our other
translator commandeers our lessons. The other translator we have
doesn't really speak English. I never knew how much of a challenge
working without a Christian background would be, too. I have never
even thought of how I would answer questions like: "what is a sin?"
And "what if I can't pray?" It's been a trip. We feel like we just
left the MTC and are learning how to teach all over again.

What it comes down to truly is that we are starving for people to
teach. Our area is by far the smallest area I've ever served in and
sometimes I feel like I have met everyone in this fishbowl.

BUT.  It's so good. The zone is SO close. We're going to be best
friends for life, specially me and my companion. I am a lucky dog,
Alaska is so rad, I am obsessed with it and all the beauty and the
whackadoo people.
I love my ward, they are sweet, good people who are trying. They take
great care of us. Having not as much to do has taught me a lot about
patience and learning to rely on the lord and the infinite worth of a
souls.

You are precious, too :)

Dawww.

Sister Galli

Anchorage days

24 August 2015

Once upon a time we prayed about a street to tract. It was named "Tammy". We met a lady named Jennifer, who was terrified of us because she thought we were polygamist. But she was also too nice and awkward to shut the door on us. So we fast talked and kept on jabbering rapid fire until she understood that we were actually Christian. Then we taught her the restoration standing there. 

She said she would come to church. 

And didn't.

For two weeks. 

She wouldn't give us her number and had just said she would "meet us at church". 

Yeah, yeah, yeah.... 

So we gave her some space for a couple weeks... 

And went back. 

She was much more open this time. And was also wearing bright turquoise eye shadow. I think that would make me more confident, too. 

She didn't want to meet at her house, but it was a beautiful day, so we walked about a block over and taught her a more detailed restoration lesson at a members house. 

She said she had read parts of the Book of Mormon and that it was a good time. 

She also said she would come to church. 

This time it seemed for reals. 

So we got the Ward council all hyped up and ready for her, 

And Sunday morning we waited 

and waited 

and waited 

and waited.

And finally got so antsy at about 18 after, that we got up and stood by the door... Cause that always works. Not. 

 

But this time it did. 

Everyone and their dog introduced themselves to her. Then we had a lesson after and she committed to be baptized, and she was invited to dinner with us that night, so we taught her again. 

So that made my week. 

I was just about to be quite frustrated. This area is just a little tougher than some, and they haven't had a baptism in probably a year and a half. I was beginning to think we weren't going to see one either. 

But now I think we will :) 

BELIEVE. those miracles though :) 

That's all for now, folks. 

Sister Galli 

So where did you serve YOUR mission?

17 August 2015

These were taken on the plane to and from Juneau, and in Juneau. :)

Transfers! I'm staying with dear sister Dall :) we went to Juneau this
week and I am a fan. We are currently with the new missionaries. Life
is crazy busy but I promise there will be more next week!

Sister Galli

The funnies of Alaska

10, 12 August 2015

I going to send you a grand ole picture of a very common occurrence in Alaska.
We were at Walmart last week, and my companion was printing pictures.
This little 4.5 foot tall native Alaskan women with a thick upick (I
have no idea how to spell that word, but it's one of the common
languages here) accent comes up to us and sits down next to us and
becomes instantly our best friend, smiling like crazy at us and
talking about her entire life's story, speaking in very slow
me.as.ur.ed. English. Haha we had a Book of Mormon on the table and
she picked it up and said: can I Look at your book? We told her of
course and she flipped through it.  I asked her if she would like one
and she said "oh. I have one." And I asked her where she got it and
she didn't really answer me. I asked her if she'd read it or would
read it.... And she didn't really answer me. I asked her if we could
come teach her sometime and she said: "come back and see me at
walmart!" Haha I asked her if I could have a picture of her and she
was delighted. So here you have it.

Well I didn't really mean to send that already. So here is more. 

This week we ran to the end of our things to do.  We have contacted all the investigators we have. We have contacted all the less actives that we can work with. We have pretty well tried all the former investigators, referrals, and potential investigators. We have called a bazillion people and are waiting for calls back. It's at that awkward point that we have tried so many people that if we call them again they will probably think we are professional stalkers. Which is true. 

It's all fine and dandy to be out of things to do with your companion, (especially when she is as exceptional as my companion is) but on exchanges it gets REAL awkward fast. One day this week we kept running into garage sales, and I was with a new missionary on her very first exchange and we ended up just going from garage sale to garage sale because that was the only way people would talk with us. I felt awful that we didn't teach a single lesson the whole day. We tried tracting the street until we found lots of JW material, so we figured they probably wouldn't be too interested. Then one elderly guy said that we had just been there a week earlier i tried to explain to him that it was someone different and he was pretty insistent that It was us. I laughed to my companion about it and she said "where did you tract?" And when I told her it was Innes street she died laughing cause... Well she had tracted there on exchanges a week before. We are even running out of places to tract haha. I guess we'll just have to continue finding creative ways of using our time cause it's getting a little interesting. 

Speaking of interesting ways of using time.... Right after this we are going to go sing and read scripts and pray with a non member guy who's in a coma. His mom is a potential investigator and this will definitely be a first. 

We also had a lesson with Eve our Thai investigator this week. It was our first lesson with both her and with the Thai translator, Josh, who just served his mission in Thailand. It was the most stressful/amazing lesson of my life. Basically indescribable. It was super tough, because we had to be very very simple in everything we explained, because 1, she could barely understand us, and 2 she has 0 Christian background and so literally doesn't understand what we're talking about. It was great to have Josh there to be able to translate things and to explain things much better. I've just never taught someone who doesn't even understand the concept of prayer before, so it was really challenging. But it was so rewarding as well. Things started to click for Eve, and she talked about how she's felt the Holy Ghost before (after we talked about who the holy ghost is and what he does), but just thought she was crazy. Thai people are very superstitious apparently. But it was just so cool to watch how things would start to make sense for her, and how she would get so excited once she understood a principle. So we're pretty stoked to keep working with her!! Our next lesson with her will be tomorrow. Oh man, it'll be a trip explaining the plan of salvation to her! 

Also last p-day we had a zone car wash that was a blast! Our zone is one of the closest I have ever served in and that's been a huge miracle. 

Well it's been a mixed bag week, and on a mission, even those are the best! 

Sister Galli

P.s. Craziest thing of my life! Sister Dall and I are made to be besties. We discovered this week that her little sister and I both had the same violin teacher when we were children, and that means that sister Dall has watched me as a wee child play screechy violin songs! THEN we discovered that sister Dall and I were in the SAME group at Brighton girls camp (the likelihood of that is like 1/1000000.) and spend a week together doing ridiculous stuff! Craziness. 

  

Can't stomach any more pig intestine

Phew, this week was a, well a trip. 

Some highlights 

-tracting literally the nicest street on my mission. One person made a beelinetowards the door instead of away when she saw us in the window, many people thanked us for what we were doing, one sweet Methodist lady went upstairs and had a long conversation with her husband trying to find Us service opportunities, and when we were leaving she said: "we're the Normans by the way", another lady said she would take our card to a local plant nursery to see if they could use help, and another lady told us her life story, asked for a hug, cried, so we sang her a hymn, and while we were singing pulled us into each arm and said she would pray onto her rosary for us. I seriously thought I walked into a dream. None were interested in the gospel, but every last one was an amazing Christian, and it taught me so much about the power of kindness. 

-we had 3 exchanges, 2 back to back

-we picked up a Thai investigator, and introduced her to the idea of receiving answers to prayers

-one exchange was with sister mcgraws new companion, who is finally helping her truly enjoy her mission and said how well she is doing.... Makes a momma proud, 'yknow.

-made a new mission law: be ye not behemoth, but be thou svelte. 

-felt a 6.3 earthquake that lasted a good minute+ while we were in a Thai restaurant. That was funny

-ate dinner with a part member family (the curry's) that I worked with in FBX, that then worked with sister Dall, and one of the daughters had gotten baptized. :) 

-went to go have a lesson with some new move ins to our Ward, that the mom is from Myanmar. We walked in on her and her sister (who looks exactly identical to her) and their families eating Malaysian food. There was a Filipino man, a cute little lady from Indonesia, and the Burmese family. They said: do you want some food? And though I had eaten dinner a,ready and was STUFFED, said: yes? :) and proceeded to stuff myself with food. While what I thought was a mushroom was in my mouth, I had this really fun thought come to my head: "I really am enjoying what I am eating, but I am pretty sure it is not a mushroom.  I think it's a strange part of an animal" so I finished what was on my plate, and after asked what I had eaten. Pig intestines and tripe. And lemme tell you, they were good. 

-it was just an uplifting week. This week we have 2 exchanges, a zone meeting, mission leadership training, and trainer Trainee meeting, so it will be chalk full! I can't wait. :) 

I love the lord. He is so wonderful. 

Love, sister galli