Elder Lindberg - 75 Baker St Apt #2 Johnson City, NY 13790

   Another week come and gone. This week was one I'd have been alright skipping, for various reasons. But hey, I did turn 19, and had a cake handmade and delivered by some cousins that live nearby. So that was awesome. Thank you to everyone who sent cards or emails, you guys rock!      Anyways,  Tuesday  was District Meeting. One of my last in the Binghamton Ward. And the ZL's were there, we had a great discussion on revelations, prayers of faith, and recognizing the Spirit.  On Wednesday , we did service at the Feitsma's. I'm not sure if I've ever mentioned this in detail. But Frank Feitsma has severe MS, and can't move and can barely talk, his wife also has MS, and while it's not as severe, she still appreciates us helping her with Frank, and around the house. So we go over every  Tuesday  and do many service activities of various natures. So this week Elder Chan was able to operate a lawn mower for the first time in his life, I hun...

Well I don't have a ton of time this week, as I'm currently in the hospital. But I'll try to keep this interesting.      First of all, concerning the hospital visit. Not nearly as exciting as one would hope. I texted Sister Rogers to ask what allergy medicine she recommended, because my allergies have been crazy now that spring is here. New York has about a billion more trees than Utah, so allergies are a billion times worse. All I was expecting from Sister Rogers was a text that said, idk, "Claritin is best" or something. But instead, I was called by two doctors and so today we've driving an hour and a half to Oneonta to see Dr. Jones, the mission doctor. So, sadly, there's no exciting story involving a stab wound or anything, not yet at least.      The rest of the week, with the exception of Sunday, was kinda bleh. It's been slow, and we got dropped by the two investigators we were so excited about a few weeks ago... So that's just dandy. ...

  Alright to start, before too many of you guys get to thinking I'm being far to harsh and rude to Elder Chan, just know that I literally do EVERYTHING I CAN to be nice and helpful, and I really am going out of my way to be helpful, and teach, and serve. It's just that after so long, and seeing minimal results, it begins to test one's patience. And as crazy as it may sound, I am not exaggerating or making stuff up, I'm simply telling it how it is. And I guess the only people that will understand my current situation, are the people who have served as a missionary with someone who does not share the language or the desire to work... Despite those differences, I am trying, and it's clear I ain't doing it perfectly, but that's bc I AM A HUMAN.       Anyways, this week was longggg. We had our interviews last Monday, and I learned that I will be leaving JC at the end of this transfer. I'll have been here for 6 months. And within the next transfer, I will be...

 Alright here's the low down. My patience has been stretched thinner than the worn out lycra bibs I wore in my last Lotoja... Some days are just fine, but then there's the other days. These "other days" are becoming more and more regular, and I don't quite understand why. I'm constantly being asked questions that can very easily be answered by some quick detective work. When you've got a watch and a smartphone, you should be able to reasonably determine what time it is, at least that's my opinion... And every morning, when he wakes up, he walks to the front window, opens it, looks out, then asks me what the weather is... It's a struggle. But it's goin.       I guess I should provide you guys with a little detail on the language barrier, and language status. Elder Chan does not need help with English vocabulary. When I first found out I would be training him and teaching English, I was worried that was the case. Luckily, it is not. The problem...

 Alright, last night I had a realization. I am a parrot. There has not been a time where I'll explain something, without having to repeat myself. It's quite the experience. The good news is, we saw some success that week, and that lifts one's spirit immensely. We had a service opportunity finally pop up. A lady called us and asked if we'd be able to come help at a community meal thing on Saturday. We were pumped for that, so Saturday morning we walked to this Church, and put on our hairnets and gloves, and started taking orders. Before it started, I explained to Elder Chan what we were going to do. There were 2 options to choose from, we just had to ask the people which one they wanted, then go get it from the kitchen. These choices were soup, or ziti. After reviewing this process 4 times, I just told Elder Chan to follow me and see what I do, then try it at another table. He eventually caught on. We successfully took orders for about 67 people, and got them fed and hap...

     First of all, my parents are currently in New York City. This is the first and probably last time we will be in the same state until July of next year. They're 180 miles away, I've biked further than that in less than a day. So that's interesting.      Second, this week was the big week. The one we've been waiting for since November. We finally got smartphones. And wow, after all the hype, all the District Meetings, all the waiting, the Zone Conferences, we got them set up. And if we're honest, they aren't as much "smartphones" as they are glow in the dark scriptures. Yes they do a lot of awesome things, and help with Facebook to contact people, the "Phone Tiwi" makes it so we can't even get LDS.org to load. They area book planner app is actually way cool, but we've it ourselves quite a project to get all of our paper records inputted into the system. So that will be a process. And with Elder Chan's smartphone abilities now...

    Alright bros, it's been rough. There ain't no way around it. I'm not saying I had much experience  living away from home when I got out here. But like, I knew how to do things like shop, unlock doors, make a bed, light a stove, scrape car windows, use a doorbell, etc. Just basic everyday things, so I thought. But as I now have the opportunity to see, there are in fact many people people who do not have the luxury of having experienced these things. So now, as a trainer, am I having to focus the majority of my time, energy, and patience, teaching these things  before  I can get a chance to have a good "12 Week" discussion or practice lesson. Don't get me wrong, Elder Chan is very sincere and nice, but the poor kid is 5'9" 108 lbs of curious, lost, confused, and silent missionary. This is a rather stark contrast to my 6'2" 200 lbs of nonstop talking and just doing things. So this whole training thing has been a struggle. I'm learning a ...

    Well, the subject line pretty much tells you what we focused on this week. In no particular order, but all were very good. I guess General Conference will come first, because as a missionary, General Conference weekend is kind of our only "weekend off." Don't take that the wrong way, we still try to get people there and set stuff up and stay focused, but it is a rather relaxing few days. We watched the Saturday Morning session at the Church, which is nice because you can really focus. After the morning session, we ran home to check the mail, and I had a wonderful package from (soon to be) Sister Nielsen, and one from my Grandparents. Both contained candy, which was perfect because the home where we would be watching the afternoon session has 3 of the coolest kids in the Ward. We went to the Leiter's house, and they've got 3 kids, Hannah (2), Trevor (4), and Kieran (6). The kids are awesome, however this did mean that I was unable to hear most of the session. A...

  First of all, it's been round about 9 months, and I'm sure that some, if not all of you, are sick of getting my weekly email. So if you want to get off my list, simply send me $20 cash (or equivalent in Taco Bell gift cards) and a handwritten note about why you'd like to be removed, and I'll have my secretary process your request within 1 transfer of receiving it.      Ok, now for the missionary life report. Training is HARD. Every single day has some new challenge or some surprise. And when your trainee is still rather unfamiliar with the language and has never lived on his own, the missionary term for trainer, "dad", takes on a literal meaning... I don't know what kind of light switches Elder Chan had at his house, but he lived in Orem for 3 years, so I would have assumed they were a rather traditional, American style. But we have a daily seminar on what switch does what. I also spend a lot of time going over what tracting is, and I have trouble get...

243 Days. 8 Months. That's how long it's been, but it feels like round about 12 minutes or so. And it's still shocking to me that I'm training. I was talking to DD from Massena on the phone the other night, and I told him I was surprised that I was training already, and he said "Elder I think the Lord is surprised you're training!" This is exactly what Elder Chan needs to hear in order to increase his confidence in me. But, despite all that, training is going great. 12 Week is a drag, as it always is, but I think we're both learning things. The only struggle is Language Study... I'm not entirely sure, but I'm afraid my attempts to help him  learn  English are actually only making him worse, while I learn random Cantonese words. I'm just hoping that the Spirit jumps in and is helping me out while I have Elder Chan write random words in English such as "calendar" and "water bottle."       This week has been rather slow, ...

  Well this week was transfers, and since I'm training, we had the lovely opportunity of hitting the road at  6 am , to make it to Utica for my  9:30  training meeting. I was hoping this meeting would consist of tons of instruction and advice. It was pretty much the AP's just reminding us we need to do 12 week, and then we looked at pictures. Soooooo that was super useful. Then we had a meeting with President Rogers and his wife, where he told us he loved us all, then told me that it was probably time for a haircut, then said "alright let's do this companion match up so we can start slammin this pizza." We went into the room full of trainees, fresh outta Utah, and President began announcing companions. He had me stand up and say my name and my area, and he says "Elder Lindberg you will be joined by Elder Chan, and he speaks great English!" At this point I started to stress a little. I knew we were going to be getting a missionary that had just learned En...