I'm Back!

God Be with You Til We Meet Again

Wow. 

So what happened lately: MIRACLES GALORE!

Pdays:

     Last week, we went hiking, then a member bought me and my companion dinner at an all you can eat buffet (hot pot). I ate there a while ago and ate some shark, it was ok. I have definitely eaten crazy things here. 

Today:

     We went to the  GRAND HOTEL in Taipei! It is THE fanciest hotel in Taiwan, the one where we went to on my very first morning in Taiwan to the site where general authorities said a prayer about 80 years ago or so to dedicate Taiwan to spread the gospel. 

   

      A sister from another ward named Wendy who got baptized recently who is kinda rich bought us all missionaries (8 missionaries, about  US $30 each) lunch at the buffet at the Grand Hotel. Let me tell you, it was fancy! So nice of her! The hotel is so cool, it's like an ancient Chinese palace. Reminded me of the palace at the Forbidden City in Beijing, but newer. Such an awesome experience. I ate some frog leg, it was pretty good! I definitely need to take you all there sometime, it is a must stop experience. My companion said it was even more Chinese than Taiwanese.

     Great way to spend my last pday-end it where I started my mission. 

Investigators:

     Cindy Zhang- we met her and her friend outside of a 7/11 (they are like gas stations here, but just the stores only, and they are cleaner than the ones in America). We started meeting with her. Turns out she is one of our member's classmates! She is 15 and starts high school soon. So cute and so smart! We met with her on the third time and her prayer has definitely improved! It was amazing to see! She said ever since she started praying, she could feel God more at her side. She came to church for the first time yesterday! So we went with her and another 15-year-old investigator named Olivia. We read 1 Ne 1 together and asked what she liked, she said she admired how Nephi really respected and honored God, it blew my mind. She will get baptized probably next month, she is awesome!

     Our other ones are Olivia, who is 15, very mature for her age, has some problems, but Christ and His gospel can fix them. 

Events:

     Jenny Oaks Baker concert- it was good, but she and her family seemed kinda exhausted. They were in Europe earlier that summer and they just did about a two-week tour of

Taiwan with about seven concerts. We were the last stop. Tons of people came, even investigators invited their non-member friends. It was overall a great concert, she is such an amazing person, so grateful for her and her family's sacrifice to do missionary work.

Last Testimony:

     Shared my last testimony in sacrament meeting, I told stories about how past apostles have seen Christ. I've written them in past emails before. It was great! In it, I said that even though I didn't want to leave Taiwan, I must do the Lord's will. I am at peace right now going home, I just keep on doing missionary work. 

     One elder said that where you serve becomes a holy place, and the Taiwan, Taipei mission has definitely become a holy place for me. I love the people, the food, the members, the language, and everything about it. I definitely want to come here later this year or next summer (or be like Elder Welker, who returned a month later). 

     Lately I've been thinking of Christ's last week here on earth, what it must've been like for Him to serve. He served all His life,  even after Gethsemane and even on the Cross. Even after His Resurrection, and right now and in the eternities. Like Christ, I strive to serve everyday like it's my last day.

     The Mission has been the best 18 months of my life. I have learned, grown, and changed so much. God really takes advantage of this time and transforms his missionaries to become His disciples. I am so grateful to be a part of this church, and I know it's true. I like in 1 Ne 11:21-23: the thing that gives us the most joy to the soul is God's love. 

     I love you all, and I love Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.  God be with you til we meet again, Taiwan. 

-Sister Annie Brinkerhoff, Bei Jie Mei

Third and Fourth of July/Mangoes: Taiwan's Manna from Heaven

Wed- Birthday Miracles

     It has been a good, normal birthday. We were on exchanges with the sister training leaders. all four of us ran up a hill for exercise. (It was literally like a jungle, super cool.) 

Miracle 1. When getting breakfast (soybean milk and two rolls), I realized that I ran out of money and needed to run to the atm to get some more. The lady was nice and just let me have the food. I paid her back later, it was so nice of her to do that for me. 

Miracle 2. Since it was the end of the month, a lot of the missionaries don't have much money. I thought I had at least 500 kuai (about 15 us dollars left) and that i would be ok. Turns out it was God's blessing - I had 1,100 kuai left (about 33 dollars). Out of gratitude, I paid for Sister Jensen's lunch since she didn't have much money left, and in return she bought me a notebook for a bday gift.  (15 kuai, about  50 cents. Taiwan is cheap.) 

     My comp with Sister Armstrong got home before us. We got home, and the sister training leader and I were on exchanges. Sister Jensen was knocking on the door for like five min; we thought she and my comp were showering. Her comp just opened up the door to the apartment, and we walked in. I was surprised when Sister Jensen and Sister Armstrong dove to the floor where my companion was with a sign they just made that morning that said, "Happy Birthday bei!" It was so nice and cute of them. 

     Since we had a zone conference the day before, our district meeting was moved to Wed, so my last two birthdays have been on district meetings. We taught English class that night about transportation. Let me tell you, after teaching kids English for 2/3 of my mission, my respect for primary, Sunday school, and for teachers in general have shot up. I am so grateful to have had a Taiwanese companion to help me, they are able to explain instructions more clearly, makes things easier.  

Investigators

     One guy my comp Huang JM and I found on the street through the Spirit after visiting a LA is getting baptized this Saturday. We had to give him to the elders since he is a single guy (mission rule), and honestly it was the best thing for him. It was funny, I remember one Sunday after passing him off to the elders, they were trying to get him to church. They called him, and he pretty much said he had stuff to do. They told him it was my last companion Huang JM's last sacrament meeting before she left for England, then he said he would be there. And he has been coming to church ever since! 

     We are teaching a Jian family who have two daughters, 11 and 8. The eight-year-old has autism. please pray they will come to church and be baptized. 

     I gotta go, love you all and I know the gospel is true! Love Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

-Sister Brinkerhoff

Forever 21

Hey everyone!

     

     I will be turning 21 this Wednesday; I am so old! I am not even kidding. I graduated high school in 2014, most of the missionaries now have either graduated in 2015 or 2016. They are all 18-20, and I will be 21. Mission experience wise I am the oldest sister in the mission, which is insane. I am an old person, let me tell you. 

     I am so grateful and blessed to have two birthdays on my mission, 20 has been a good age fully dedicated to serving the Lord, and I am so grateful that I will spend my 21st birthday just serving Him; it's the best birthday thing to do.  All I want for my birthday is a baptism (which right now is not yet), so we will go for the next best thing which is being busy, which is probably gonna happen.

     Happy Father's Day (last week)!  I am so grateful to have an amazing dad! I can't tell you how grateful I am to have him. What I Iike about him is that he likes to travel, likes to have fun, values education, works hard, and is always there for me. But what I love about him the most is that he loves the Lord, my family, and people. 

     On my mission, I have meet many families who do and don't have the blessing of an active priesthood holder in the home, and let me tell you, it makes a whole world of a difference. They are getting harder and harder to find, and it makes me so grateful for my faithful dad. I just love how he is humble, obedient, faithful and willing to serve the Lord, despite the challenges he has had in life. His faith and actions have really blessed us as a family and so many others.  He also really loves his family. He would takes on trips so that we can experience the world. He as well as my mom encourages me and my siblings to pursue an education. 

     My dad has really blessed so many lives. I can't tell you the number of times people have come up to me to say that my dad is a great man, how he just loves and serves people. I really see that in my life, especially when he serves the members  of the church, helps Brazilian members get into school in the US and find stable jobs, as well as serving my brother Jace's friend Javier and his family. He really has a tender, soft spot and great love for South Americans, since he served a mission in Ecuador. 

So things that have happened:

     

     Got permission from my mission president to visit Cousin Brett last week, since it's against mission rules to see family and friends on a mission. I told my mission president that my cousin was LA and I was his closest family. He understood, and allowed me to go. My comp and I, and two other sisters went (can't have two sisters with one guy, mission rule) and had lunch at a deli. The guy who owns it used to live in America so his English was really good. I asked him if he was from New York and he was like, "How did you know?" The accent. It was so funny to hear a Taiwanese man with a New York accent. Brett and I caught up a bit with life (haven't seen him in eight years or so). He's lived in Taiwan for four years, has a three-year-old son and another born last March. He teaches at the Taipei American school. We just talked about our families and Grandpa and Grandma Barrus. I gave him a picture of them that my mom sent me, he loved it. He goes to California for a month next week and won't be back until two days before I go home, hopefully, I can invite him to church or something next week. 

     After, we went ice skating! It was fun, haven't been ice skating since high school. A ton of missionaries went, I got to see my junior high school and Chinese class buddy, Tiffany Chao, now Sister Chao. It was fun to catch up a bit. 

     Got to go back to my first area Ba De for my companion's investigator's baptism! Sister Zhong was in Ba De last transfer, but closed the area for sisters. It was weird but nice to go back really quick to see her investigator get baptized. I remember leaving Ba De last year and having a strange feeling I would be back. Gift of prophecy, anyone?

     Miracles like crazy! We have been doing this thing called two-day prayer, where we we would sit down with members and have them write over a list of people they know, family and friends they want or tried to share the gospel with. There is a promise from an apostle that as we do it, people will get baptized. It's so true! I heard missionaries did it in a nearby area and they saw two baptisms from it. It has really been awesome for us and lots  of miracles came from it. 

Facts about my mission:

     **Using a Nokia cell phone, I can text in Chinese characters, yay! God's blessing of gift of interpretation of tongues.

     **We get around everywhere by bikes. If I want to go somewhere far like Taipei, I would either take a bus or the train. In Taipei, I would take the MRT, which is like a Subway but newer and cleaner. If i really need to, I would take a Taxi if a place is far from the MRT or train station. 

     **People recycle a ton here, and even have places to throw away leftover food. 

Miracles

     My RC Sister Ding texted me and asked when I was going home. I called her for the first time in a few weeks, because she and I have been so busy. She has always been busy with work. She called and said that she was going back to church (she was too tired before because of work), and that she has been reading her scriptures and praying. I was so happy! She then said that before I leave, she wanted to visit me! That was super special, Hualian is super far away from Taoyuan (four-hour train ride). I can't wait to see her! Hope she and I can go to the temple together before she leaves.

Spiritual Share

     I was reading in the June 2017 Liahona and read Elder Oaks's article about how religion benefits the world. In it he talked about two different morals, resume morals or eulogy morals. Resume morals are the more worldly morals, ones you would put on the job application. The other morals are eulogy morals, the morals that will be stated at your funeral, the kind of person you are.  He then tells a story of an experience that changed his life. When he graduated law school, he met some other lawyers. At one point, he attended funerals of two different men a few days apart. One had resume morals, the other had eulogy morals. Elder Oaks calls them Rich and Faithful. Rich and Faithful have served honorable missions. When Rich got home, he married a woman, who became less active and then he became less active as well. Over time, he earned a lot of money, was Rich, had a big home and such, but he and his wife didn't raise their kids in the gospel. The kids never served missions, married outside the temple to nonmembers, and a lot of them at one point or another got divorced. At Rich's funeral, it was held at a regular mortuary or so instead of a chapel, nobody under the age of 50 other than Elder Oaks and Rich's kids and grandkids attended. The service was somber, and little was said about Christ. 

     Faithful, on the other hand, was completely different. After his mission, he married a member. They had a small business, which caught on fire, and other financial problems in life. However, he was a faithful priesthood holder, raised a family in the gospel, he and his wife served missions, and a ton of other stuff. His funeral was at an LDS chapel, it was centered around Christ, people of all ages were there, and it was a happy and joyous occasion.

     I liked this story, because right now I see a ton of people choosing world success over being faithful to God, and they aren't happy. The happy ones, even though not successful in the world's eyes, are truly happy because they were faithful to God and endured to the end. It was a good reminder about choosing God over the world, and how the gospel really teaches us about that. 

     Love my mission, and am so blessed to be a part of this work. I am so grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ! I am so grateful for Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost. I know this gospel is true and it will give us a happiness, in this life and the next.

     Love you all! Have an awesome week!

-Sister Brinkerhoff 

General Authority, Cousin, Bone Organizer

    Sorry, I am going in about 10 or 15 minutes. I will try to email later today. Right now I am in Taipei. In about 30 minutes I will be having lunch with my long lost cousin, Brett. He's working at the  Taipei American School. I was able to get a hold of him and we are eating lunch together with another sister companionship (mission rules- can't have a sister companionship eating or being alone with another guy). Haven't seen cousin Brett in eight years or so, so excited to see how it goes. 

Things that happened this week:

     Transfers - FINALLY after three weeks of being in a trio, I finally have a companion! so my new companion is Sister Zhong, she is Taiwanese. She is one of the Ba De sisters, my first area. The area has been struggling for a while so President took out the sisters and will close it for a while, since not a lot of baptisms are going on there. I have to be honest, it was a hard area for me as well. It probably needs a break so God can prepare more people for the sisters to teach in the future. I will finish my mission here in the promised land of Taoyuan, yay!

     Yesterday, Elder Peter F. Meurs of the 70 visited us at church. He spoke in Oct. 2016 conference about the sacrament. Our building has four wards, so he attended and spoke at every one of them. He is so cool! He is from Australia, so it was harder for a brother in our ward to translate since he is used to American accents. 

     Before he spoke, the new stake president (i think) spoke and had us missionaries stand up for our ward to see. It was so cool, he encouraged the members to work more with us.  Elder Meurs pretty much spoke about having hope and happiness, because God wants us to succeed. We just need to ask his help. It was so cool, he pretty much addressed the needs of the ward. He didn't prepare a talk, just went along with the Spirit, and it was exactly what the ward and I needed to hear.         

     After sacrament, we sat down with the bishop's wife and talked about friends and family to share the gospel with. She is a cute younger mom, two kids 12 and 9. After talking about them, writing down their names, we encouraged her to do what we are doing called a 21-day prayer miracles - write down names of people and pray that they would receive the gospel.

     Sorry gotta go, love you all!

-Sister Brinkerhoff   

On Death Row/Savior, Redeemer of My Soul

     Just got the notification to start the online course My Plan, which is for missionaries getting ready to go home.  I'm now on "death row," I can't accept it, I don't want it to end. It really has been the best 18 months of my life. I learned God really takes advantage of the time He has with His missionaries. He pretty much crammed in life-long lessons for me in 18 months, which is pretty remarkable. I go home July 29th. 

     It's been a week of miracles, from baptisms to eating Doritos with chopsticks and coming up with anti-flirting combats. We are going to start off the week with reorganizing bones (yay).

     I have been with the Sisters, and they have the FUNNIEST anti-flirting comebacks.  For example, there was this Vietnamese guy we tried to offer to share the gospel. He wasn't interested, but tried to practice English by saying, "I love you." My comp then said, "You speak great English!" So we joked at BYU whenever a guy would say, "I love you," we would hit it down hard with, "You speak good English." 

     Another example, "Do you want to come on a hike with us?" Sorry, I'm getting my bones reorganized (we are heading for a kind of chiropractor; in Chinese it translates to "bone reorganizer"). We should really hold an anti-flirting class when we get back.

     Elder Jensen, who is going home this week was the joke of Ward Council. He is totally anti-trunky, which was super amazing. The members and his companion Elder Heaton kept saying he's gonna get married in June, he's gonna find a wife, all that good stuff. The best part was when they were talking about the activity they held two weeks ago showing 17 miracles and how we will show it for pioneer day, and Elder Heaton said,"If he get's married, that will be the 18th miracle." Hahaha, Jolly good show, everyone laughed and thought it was pretty funny. 

     We had a stake choir concert, where everyone performed two songs. Some of my favorites: "Come Thou Fount" in Chinese, "You Raise Me Up in English "(they did great), a traditional Chinese song, The Prayer, and Be Still and Know that I Am God. Before the concert, one elder was being funny and said, "It's like pitch perfect, everyone is trash talking each other" but in reality it's not. Gotta love drama added by the elders.

     So two days ago, we attended the baptism of Harry, who my companion, Sister Huang, and I contacted. The story:

     When we first came to taoyuan one day, Sister Huang was like, "Let's go to this small park." It was really random and unexpected, but we went. We were there for a bit, no success, but finally we found a young dad who wasn't happy for some reason. We talked with him, said a prayer, and he felt the spirit. He then set up for a chapel tour. 

     A few days later, gave him and his two little boys a chapel tour. They were energetic and naughty, but i think they felt the Spirit and God's love, because at the end of the tour, the dad prayed in gratitude for direction in His life. He then was taking the boys to go, but they wouldn't leave. He kept dragging them out of the church but they kept running in, and finally he had to pick them up and march out of the chapel.

     He met with our elders, and found out it was his parents, not him that lived in our area. So we gave him to some nearby elders. Fast forward two months later to a few days ago, and I'm sitting at his baptism. Yay! :)  He got up to speak after he got baptized, and said that one day he was sitting at a park by his parents' house, being angry for some reason, and we came up. He wasn't interested in the message when missionaries approached him in the past, but for some reason, we were different. We prayed with him and He felt the Spirit. He then talked about the chapel tour, then the Elders teaching about faith, and now he is baptized. I am so grateful to be a part of his path to baptism. 

     One thing that blew my mind this week was the special training meeting the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders had for the district leaders. They taught them how to do member missionary work. They asked the Zone Leader's bishop's wife to do a demonstration with the Sister Training Leaders to show how it was done. The Sister Training Leaders started talking with her, and the bishop's wife gave them about 15 referrals, who live in three different districts in Taoyuan. It was amazing! Even after the roleplay, she just kept going on and on, giving more referrals. Afterwards, she came up to the Sister Training Leaders crying and said she has been waiting two years for missionaries to teach her how to do missionary work. She really wanted to do it, she just didn't know how. I was really grateful to be a part of the training and really wished every missionary was able to see what I saw in that demonstration. It was truly miraculous and got the district leaders really pumped about member missionary work. It was pointed out that information trickles down from the head to the body- what the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders get from MLC, by giving the same information to the District Leaders, they get their District Members excited. I thought it was a great training. The missionary leaders encouraged us to start working with the bishop and other church leaders. 

     Later in the meeting, we talked about working with members. Elder Welker quoted Pres. Jergensen, saying that If something doesn't work immediately, don't give up, just keep trying even if it takes weeks. We talked about that with member work and with green key indicators. It was pointed out in the meeting that we could have green key indicators all transfer and have no baptisms (Elder Shumway then bore his solid testimony that it was true). We figured that what was best overall is working with members. Even if it hurt our key indicators for now, the numbers will definitely skyrocket after a period of time. Our stake has a goal of getting 170 people baptized this year, since in 2015 we had about 89 baptisms and in 2016 about 92 baptisms, and we agreed most of them are from street contacting. If we all just got one referral from every stake member, we definitely will hit above 170, and those people will be solid RC's, because they have family and friends in the church. I noticed that all but one of my RC's are member referrals. I testify that the members are the best source of new investigators. 

     One elder pointed out that it will be hard to change this mission culture of doing member missionary work instead of street finding, but we are just going to have to be the pioneers that get it done. We are used to street contacting, because it doesn't require as much work or thinking. But overall it's not as effective as member missionary work, because those people don't have church connections, and it makes it a lot harder to be friends with the members, so they are a lot more likely to go less active . The Sister Training Leaders mentioned yesterday that members want to do missionary work, and we missionaries want to do member work, we just don't know how. Us missionaries in Taoyuan will start to change the culture and work with members more.

     This next transfer I will dedicate the time to working with members, and whatever free time I have I will dedicate it for finding. It's interesting, what I learned from being away from my area is that green key indicators don't matter as long as our actions will result in baptisms. I think if we changed that mission culture from wanting to get green numbers to working with members for baptisms despite temporary bad numbers (but keeping in mind our actions will result in baptisms and future green numbers), our baptismal numbers will skyrocket.

     So the elders showed the movie, "17 miracles." I haven't seen it since last year. I wasn't able to see it with them, but lately I've been thinking of the song from that movie because it sums up my mission:

1.  Savior, Redeemer of my soul 

     Whose mighty hand hath made me whole,

     Whose wondrous pow'r hath raised me up

     And filled with sweet my bitter cup!

     What tongue my gratitude can tell,

     Oh gracious God of Israel.

2.  Never can I repay thee, Lord

     But I can love thee.  

     Thy pure word, 

     Hath it not been my one delight,

     My joy by day, my dream by night?

     Then let my lips proclaim it still,

     And all my life reflect thy will.

3.  O'er rule mine acts to serve thine ends.

     Change frowning foes to smiling friends.

     Chasten my soul till I shall be

     In perfect harmony with thee.

     Make me more worthy of they love,

     And fit me for the life above.

     It's interesting, the beginning of the movie the main character leaves for his mission to Thailand, and at the end, he comes home from his mission in Thailand and helping the pioneers in the handcart company. I liked one part after they sang this song, where he stated his only two desires were to be with his son and do God's will.

     I am so grateful to serve my mission. I love it with all my heart. I love the people in Taiwan, and will enjoy every second of it. It is indeed an island of miracles. 

     I love Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, and I grow closer to them every day. Please pray that my last transfer I can be a pioneer and start establishing a culture of member missionary work. 

     I love my mission in Taiwan!

     Love you all, have a great week!

-Sister Brinkerhoff

Companion in England, The 3 Peach Sisters, Storm troopers, Tale of two areas

Howdy cowpokes!

     I just asked my two awesome companions Sister Bernhardt and Sister Weaver if anything crazy went on this week while I was gone. They just stopped, looked and me and started laughing. Guess my mission has been so crazy, this week has been a tamer one compared to the other weeks I've had.  So here's an outline of what happened:

- Dragon boat festival: camping in paradise/sand sculptures

- Companion left for England  

- Interviews with President 

- Trio party for 3 weeks! :)-taking care of 2 areas

  exchanges in a trio

- Stormtroopers and a hot air balloon

- lots of rain, lots of cancels

- dinner with members-crazy stories

- more rain

- teaching kids class in the other church

- rained a lot

- painting the other sister's apartment

- Did i mentioned it rained?

- church- all by myself... and bishop's wife :)

     Crazy things on my mission-adventures galore: 

- me and comp who just got done with training being companions (me: senior comp for life)

- companion being sick-endless trips to hospitals, even one to taipei (3hr train ride away)

- a week with a member as a companion (got off her mission from washington dc a few months before)

- comp going home-served in Taipei with temple tour sisters for six days on Christmas week

- training a comp who is visa waiting to go to England.  Has been bapt for only two years and has not been at the mtc yet. Thankfully, she is from Taiwan and her English is great.

- ambulance ride with her (she's ok)

- being the first missionary (other than the seniors) to leave our mission to go to Gaoxiong to get her suitcase 

- comp in England, trio with sisters for three weeks

     Yep, it's been a pretty crazy week, to the point where other's crazy weeks are a normal for me 

   

      Monday, I got up early, emailed, got on a train with all of Taiwan and went from the west to the east coast. It's Dragon Boat Festival weekend, so everyone has the weekend off. Our and the Guishan (Turtle Mountain) wards went camping in beautiful area that was kind of foresty and open. It also was near a beach. And it was also, unfortunately, where all of Taiwan was as well. Super crowded when all of Taiwan is in a tiny, sleepy beach town. So we went to the beach and saw the International Sand Sculpture Festival. They had some pretty amazing ones. We went there, played in the water for a bit (below knee height of course), then went back and played ultimate frisbee. Talked to members and the Elder's Investigators, then went home. On the train, met a cool Filipino who is now the Zone Leader's investigator.

"Go Baptize the Queen of England!"

     My companion, Sister Huang, then had to get ready for her trip to England on Tuesday night. I also had to pack, since I would be in a trio with sisters for three weeks until transfers came and I got a new companion. We just packed, ate dinner with the Zone Leader's English class student/investigator (who bought us missionaries a fancy dinner). Sister Huang finished packing, then the taxi driver picked her up and I was with the sisters. It was funny, in her bye-bye shu (bye bye book, where we write goodbye notes and pics) someone was like, "Go baptize the queen!" even though she is serving in Leeds.

I said goodbye to her, she got in the taxi and left. The other sisters were there ready to whisk me off on their exchanges.  I am in Tao (Peach) 1, and the Tao 2 and Tao 4 (Sister Training Leaders) are on comp exchanges, so I was with one Tao 2 and one Tao 4 Sister for the rest of the night and part of the next day. We taught some lessons, then went home. The sister training leaders moved again, finally in a nice apartment. It's actually fancy, sooo pretty. Stayed with them, then continued with the exchanges then, went with the Tao 2 sisters.

     Tuesday, we had interviews with President Jergensen. I went last, which I was happy about, because his wife does an amazing job. While President took us out one by one for interviews, his wife showed us a clip from this years Broadcast video for the Youth or Single Adults with Elder Kim B. Clark, former BYU-I president and now a member of the 70. He talked about Joseph Smith and faith, repentance, and the Book of Mormon. It was amazing, I invite you all to look it up.   Worldwide Devotional for YA's - Elder Kim B. Clark

     After watching the video and receiving training from his amazing wife, I was called in and sat down with Mr. President. The first thing he said was, "Wow, Sister Brinkerhoff, you are the first missionary ever to leave this mission! Even I haven't been to Gaoxiong!" We then talked about High speed rails (180 miles per hour), and other stuff.

     He's the world's best mission president, such love and high expectations, the best combination in any leader. Christ leads that way, with high expectations as well as a lot of love. There was a talk we read last year that took place at a mission president's conference. I really liked how it said that to be a great leader, you need high expectations but also love. By doing so, you achieve loyalty, respect, reverence and love in return. By any other way, people either (high expectations, low love = no respect for leader, high love, low expectations = buddy, buddy relationship, nothing gets done or progresses, low love and low expectations = rebellion). 

Wednesday, kids class was awesome. Let me tell you, the mission really prepares you for church callings, I have so much more respect for primary and sunday school teachers, and teachers in general. Other than Yuli, I have taught kids classes my whole mission. It's been great, with God's help, I'm getting the hang of it. Lots of visuals and games, prayers and preparation, then everything works out great!

     One day, we played ultimate frisbee at a park next to a big art museum like we usually do, except for that morning there was a hot air balloon on the edge of the park next to where we were playing frisbee. It wasn't flying, it was just parked while some lady on the microphone was yakking away. To top it off, there were people dressed up as storm troopers from Star Wars posing next to it.  Then in the next photo shoot, the photographers gave them leashes so each held an australian shepherd of different colors, all with tails (my family dog buddy is an australian shepherd without a tail).  It was so random. 

     We were eating Dinner with a Cai family one night. Both parents were converts and served missions. It's amazing, here in Taiwan, a ton of women now in their 40's or 50's have served missions before, I am amazed at the members here. Brother Cai was telling me how when he served a mission, he helped two 18-year-olds get baptized. Right now, those two 18 year olds are stake presidents. The church lately has been telling us missionaries to focus on the younger generation, about 16 or 18-25, since its the time when people are most ready to receive the gospel and making the most life changes. People in that group are making big life changes like starting school, getting an education, getting married, having families. It seems like most recent converts have been baptized in that age group. Plus it makes sense, the time in our lives when we have the most friends is when we are young and at school with lots of classmates. That's why the church has been telling us lately to go hard with the youth since we are young and relate to them as well.

At church, the bishop's wife was so nice to come pick me and my companion up for church. My church is at a big stake center clear on the other side of town, and the Tao 2 sisters have their church nearby at the same time as me. It was weird being at church by myself with a member as my companion. We had relief society, then went to gospel principles, then went to sacrament meeting, where people shared their testimonies.  (Funny story: Elder Heaton, in my ward, was asked to introduce himself, so he told a story of how one day he was at a member's house and he told them he liked xiong mao. Because he got the tones wrong, instead of saying "pandas," he said "chest hair." He pretty much told the members he really likes chest hair, when in he meant pandas. Haha.)

     Thank you for your love and prayers! Please pray that I can work with the sisters to balance both areas as well as for our investigators and members! 

     I am so grateful for the Lord's hand in my life. Love you all!

-Sister Brinkerhoff

Hello from the other side...I mean MISSION.

Hello everybody, it has been an insane week filled with breaking mission records, amusement parks, leaving missions, seeing family friends, and getting a comp ready for her mission to England. 

     But first, just want to wish you a Happy Dragon Boat Festival. Since it's a four day weekend, we are going camping with the ward. We won't stay the night, just go up with them and have fun! :)

     Last week, we get a call from some members asking if we could eat breakfast with them, which was kind of unusual but we said yes. We ate with them and the elders after playing ultimate frisbee like we usually do. We found out later that night that Elder Olson, who is an elder who we share the ward with was called to be an office recorder and left a few hours after breakfast (the president asked him the day before).  He is pretty much the youngest recorder in history of the mission I think. His Chinese is sooo amazing, he has only been here for seven months. Office recorders are only for elders with amazing Chinese, which is usually later in the mission. They pretty much record baptism records, work with mission numbers and such. So Elder Olson left for Taipei with three weeks into the transfer, since it takes three weeks to train. His companion is Elder Jensen. 

     So now the new elder is none other than... ELDER HEATON! He's some distant relative from my Grandma Brinkerhoff's side, since her maiden name is Heaton. I swear, the Heaton's are taking over the church. I met him at last year's Christmas party, and he called me Relative ever since. Now he is the new elder here with us in Taoyuan.

Victoria Zhang/The fastest train in Taiwan

This is totally Gods hand in it all.  Last week, we got a call from the mission office that my companion, Sister Huang, will leave for England on Tuesday night instead of Wednesday, so we had to hurry and go to Kaoshiung, where she is from, to pack her suitcase (which means I will be the first young missionary ever to leave the mission boundaries! Needless to say, people in my district were jealous that I could go).  President wanted us to go there and back all in one day, but we were too late buying high speed train tickets on a Thursday (because it was a four-day holiday weekend). So we were able to get tickets, but it required us to leave on Friday afternoon and get back on Saturday night.

     Because we would be in Kaoshiung for two days, we were able to stop and visit Victoria Zhang, who lives in Kaoshiung. She was a friend to my Uncle Brent and Aunt Brenda. She is so cute, she gave me really nice gifts for Chinese New Year. Her family all passed away from sickness, so she's kind of lonely. She teaches English. It was

so great to see her for two hours, I love her and was glad to see her. She served a mission a long time ago when my current mission president was her assistant to the president in her mission in Taipei. She showed me a photo of him and of my Uncle Brent when they served missions. She told me she now lives in Uncle Brent's favorite area of the mission when he served in the Taichung mission many years ago. 

Staying at Huang Jm's house was really...different. Her parents are really nice. They took us to a nice restaurant, we got some shopping done for Huang jm then left the next day. We also met the Kaoshiung elders and ate shaved ice together.  Sis. Huang is leaving for England tomorrow night. The church released a new rule this year that members can't be companions with missionaries. The only exception is is there are too many appointments for a companionship to teach, then they can split with members. So I will be with the sister training Leaders for three weeks. It will be great learning from them, I am so excited. Definitely will be harder, since we will have to share area and have teaching appointments fit with our schedules, but we can do it. 

Love 

sorry, gotta go camping. love you all!

-Sister Brinkerhoff