Blown to Listerine

Today, I want to share with you, the "The Parable of 'Listerine'"

This week before district meeting, we had district language study. We practiced our Cantonese with Hong Kong RMs. Most all of them go to America so their English is perfect, and Cantonese is their native language. Their the perfect people to help us learn more Cantonese. They're awesome. But after the Cantonese language study, we asked them if they had any English questions. One person had one - 

What is 'listerine'

Oh, that's a brand of mouthwash, do you know what mouthwash is?

I know it's a kind of mouthwash, but does it have any other meanings?

No......I don't think so.....what context did you hear it in

let me think...oh! They said 'blown to listerine'

...are you sure?

Maybe it just sounded like listerine. 

Sisterine. Lisherine. limerine. Mitherine

OH! Did they say 'blown to smithereens'!?

The cool thing, is that this RM is about 40, and is still learning! But I would like to point a difference between him and me. His English is perfect 99/999% of the time, where as I am almost always walking around saying things like "blown to listerine". But who thought after only 5 months learning CHINESE that I would be 2/3 understandable! Life is good. 

Last week on P-Day we hiked up SijiSaan, or Lions Rock. It's a mountain in Kowloon Tong that is a stereotypical P-Day, hike because it's so good! The pictures were AMAZING!! But you have to wait till next week to see them, because we're emailing at the library and you have to be careful to not get viruses. Next week, you'll also get temple pictures!! Because the temple is so close, we normally get to go once a transfer (which for us is 9 weeks), but last transfer it was closed for cleaning. But I get to go this week! I'm soo excited. After going once a week for 2 months in the MTC, 3 months without going to the temple is TOO LONG! So if you're able to go to the temple, DO IT! It's literally a safe haven. A paradise. Heaven. I love it.

Also, I've always wondered why all the pictures of the Hong Kong temple are from the same angle. It's because, that basically the only place to take pictures from. It's in the middle of the city and there are no grounds. So in trying to get all of the temple in the picture without you yourself running into a building, you need to take it from a very particular spot. And the sidewalk there does a weird thing that lets you take you take it from EXACTLY there. As far as I can tell, the sidewalk does that thing just so that everyone can take pictures. So next week you'll get pictures of a hike, the temple. and this weird sidewalk thing! 

Don't have time for much else, but I love you all! Our investigators are amazing. I'm so proud of each and every one of them. Until next week, gaa yauh!!

-- 

Love

Sister Hugo

Yiu Ji Muih

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Done with Training!

I'm officially done with training! Which is weird. I know I've improved so much over the past 12 weeks,
but I still have no idea what I'm doing. Which is why the spirit is so important. If I have the spirit with
me, the message turns into a guided missile. I can be WAY off, but the spirit will still carry it to the
hearts of my investigators. I fully expect for my dad to tell me that that's actually not how guided
missiles work, but I still think it's a cool metaphor. #ComeAtMeDad #ILoveYou #ArmyBratProblems
#HashtagsAreAddictive

I'm sorry that my emails are basically just stream of consciousness. I hope that at least it feels like I'm
really talking with you. That's one of the cool parts of the conversion process I think. We have to
become like Christ, but we don't need to become Christ. We just need to find that version of us. I still
have my sense of humor, my likes, my dislikes, and my pet peeves. But I'm also becoming more like
Christ.  

This week in English class we were talking about things you can do at a lake or ocean. We tried to
explain Cliff Jumping like this "It's kind of like sky diving, except you don't have a parachute, and
instead of jumping out a plane you jump off a mountain" then a student said "Oh, are you saying
...oh what's the word....suicide?" NOOOOOO!! We VERY quickly explained that you jump into WATER
and so it's really really (mostly) safe. That was a close one though.

The Cantonese in our mission is lacking, so we're all revising our language study plans and getting
pumped about learning Cantonese! I'm excited because now that I'm done with training, i'll probably
actually get my hour of language study a day! I joke sometimes that my Cantonese sucks (because,
it does) but I'm still amazed at how much I have been able to learn. It's only been about 5 months,
and I'm able to talk with people on the street about life, and teach people about the gospel. There
are still plenty of times where I'm confused, but the Gift of Tongues is REAL!!

No one in Hong Kong has ovens. Or is it stoves? I always forget which is which. We can make
scrambled eggs, but we can't make brownies. Anyway. This week we tried to make Banana Bread in
the rice cooker and it turned out surprisingly well. We're going to be experimenting more, because
I miss baking gash dang it!

During weekly planning this week, I took a step back and really looked at all of the people that
Heavenly Father has put in my path to help. It's crazy, because they are real people who have real
problems. Really serious problems. And the Lord trusts ME to point them back to him. *gulp*
Sometimes I think he trusts me too much, ya' know? But that's what this gospel is for! Fixing
problems! And it's not just some small bandaid. It's not just for people who have small trivial issues.
It's for EVERYONE! ESPECIALLY  people who have ENORMOUS problems! But that's the awesome
thing about it. When you feel like you have nothing. No money. No family. No love. No friends. No
purpose. Nothing to live for. All you have to do is turn to the Lord, and you will have everything that
matters. You will have peace. Knowing that 

I attached a picture of the Sheung Shui missionaries at dinner at a member's house, because I always
forget to include pictures of me.

This week while we were waiting at language passoffs, we invented Vocab Jenga. Every time you miss
 a word you have to pull out a block, and it got REALLY intense. It was really effective at helping us
learn vocab actually, because the adrenaline was so high.

​

As always, I love you all. Thanks for the support and prayers you send my way. I feel it every day. Y'all
are awesome!

The church is true

The book is blue

--

Love

Sister Hugo

Yiu Ji Muih

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Happy Birthday to Mom!

This week is gonna be a short email, cause I need to spend time writing my mom to wish her HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

 

Want to know something terrifying? Last transfer is already over. And it flew by. And things just keep getting faster. And at the end of the transfer I'm in, I'll have been a missionary for 6 months. Where is the time turner when you need it?! Although now that I think about it, I'm already exhausted all the time...and if Hermione couldn't handle it, there's no way I could. I guess I'll just have to do things the good ole fashion way and live in the moment.

 

This week our Sister Training Leaders and Zone Leaders are prepping for Zone Training. Which means that Sister Thomson and I went on splits! Pretty much every day this week. Which....is kinda terrifying. We were in the same MTC district, so neither of our Cantonese is really that good. And we were teaching real lessons, to real people, with real baptismal dates. It was a big week of learning. And really humbling. Sister Kessen says that the best part of being a missionary is how often you get to fall on your face. Which means that this was probably my best week ever!! Seriously though it was awesome. It helped me realize that for a while I've been stagnating as a missionary and just making excuses for myself. Well, it stops now! I'm so blessed to be a missionary at this time. The Lord has trusted me with so many amazing people who need His love. I love the Lord. I love this work. I love Hong Kong. It feels like that moment in the Grinch when "his heart grew 3 sizes that day" It's almost time to go, but just know that I'm doing a-MAZE-ING. Life is good. The Lord is better. I'm just astounded at how much love is in my heart right now, especially considering I'm just emailing in an Apple Store in the middle of China. Who would've though?!

PS. They took forever, but these are some pictures from a couple weeks ago when I went bike riding

--

Love

Sister Hugo

Yiu Ji Muih

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Hong Kongers

Found out this week that my MTC teacher lied to me. No one calls the people who live in Hong Kong "Hong Kongers." Except for me now.

Also, topic lines are getting harder and harder to think of! Maybe I'll just a mad libs title

I plan to cut my hair soon and I need your votes. Trim or chop? I don't know what to do, but it is too dang hot so something is going to have to change and fast 

(This is the point in the letter where my mother will get nervous because she think's I'll have already cut my hair. Not yet mom :) Don't worry)

Makeup time again! Susan is really stressed about finding a job to support her family. So we took our P-Day off to be models so she can graduate her makeup school faster. She is A-MAZE-ING!! She made me look like Co-Co Chanel. It was a little bit scary how much I looked like the picture of Co-Co actually.  Susan is such an amazing person and mother. She's really busy and it's hard to meet with her because she has so much stuff to do and she has to do it all herself. But this gospel is exactly what she needs. The moment she realizes that will change her life. I love her so much! She's such an example to me of hard work, diligence, and taking life one step at a time.

We've been meeting with Ada, Peggy, and Yoyo for about a month now. Ada is a single mom working hard to take care of her two daughters. Her English is amazing considering she teaches herself, mostly by copying her daughters homework. They've been going to church with us for about 3 weeks, but this week they went to mainland to spend time with family.  We didn't mind (family is important!) and then we got a call from them right before we went to bed. They were on their way home and had food to give us! We met them at the train station 10 minutes and Ada gave us a GIGANTIC bag of lychee fruits. Then she brought out a giant bag of "spicy stuff." Looks like marinated vegetables. She started pouring the food into our tupperware when Peggy said "Stop! Don't give them so much! I want some too!" To which Ada replied "Stop complaining! We like them!" I love them so much, they're so adorable. 

We had a water fight church activity this week. We had 3 investigators attend and they all LOVED IT! Which we loved. The only part we didn't love is that we weren't allowed to play with them. It was so hard to sit in the chapel and watch the amazing water fight going on outside. No worries though, it just means I'll have to have an even bigger water fight when I get home. I didn't bring my camera on that day, but just imagine 40 youth soaked to the bone and smiling all the while.

We shared a spiritual message about how the Book of Mormon helps us. It's not a fairytale. It's not a charlatan trick. It really does help us . To help us we had an awesome object lesson. Place your finger on the Book Mormon laying flat and sideways (so you can see half your fingernail) and raise a can high above your head. When trials try to bring us down (bring the can down hard on your finger) the Book of Mormon helps us stay strong. The can comes away dented and your finger is 100% fine. 

Something like this happened for me this week. I woke up....just....angry. At nothing. It wasn't anger towards anything. It wasn't allergies. I wasn't tired or hungry. I wasn't stressed about anything. I was just .... ANGRY. Which felt terrible. I spent some time trying different things (chocolate, cleaning, meditating, eating, doing pushups) but nothing made this giant ball of anger go away. Each thing placed a little dent in it while I was doing it. But once I was done the anger would come back in full force. That is, until I read the Book of Mormon. I said a prayer really just explaining the day to Heavenly Father and pleading that something in the Book of Mormon would heal me. I started reading the Book of Mormon, and 5 minutes later all the anger and stress had gone. It melted away slowly, without me even noticing. There was no "AHA" moment, no magical verse, and no-one fell over as if they were dead. But somehow, I was healed. I say somehow, but really it was through the Love of God, Christ's atonement, and the influence of the Holy Ghost. A lot of Hong Kongers think that our church, and God in general is just a fairy tale. Nothing better than a Disney Movie. But that just isn't true. The help of our Father in Heaven is REAL. We just need to turn to Him and let Him in.

I'm out of time, but I love you all. Keep up the hard work!!

-- 

Love

Sister Hugo

Yiu Ji Muih

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Another Day in Paradise

I feel like not much happened this week, but I also know that somehow I'll find things to talk about as soon as I start typing. 

Every time I see members, and investigators even, they without fail ask me if I'm tired and/or hot. I mean..... yes..... but is it that obvious? I keep telling myself they'll just be even more impressed with everything I do if they think I'm exhausted.

Also, every one is insisting that I've gotten skinnier. I haven't lost any weight though, so what must be happening is that I'm getting taller!!

This last P-Day we went on a Bicycle Ride in Dei Mai Dok. #Gorgeous #MyDad'sOverUseOfHashtagsIsContagious We were able to go with a lot of other sister missionaries and it was a blast! I rode in a 4 person (2 x 2) bicycle which looked stable, but is somehow harder to drive than the tandems. I got a lot of pictures on another Sister's camera, so maybe you'll get pictures next week too!

This week we met with the Lee family and brought one of my best friends Salad along with us as well. (Sorry, no pictures) The Lee's are AMAZING I love them so much. Two of their three children are English speaking RMs and so they helped me translate (who knew I would have needed the word helicopter so badly). Members don't feed us very often like I imagine happening in America, but when they do feed us they go ALL OUT! Amazing soup. Then chicken for days. Then Mango Pizza (actually amazing, but I was expecting Yellow Bell Pepper flavor so was confused for a bit), then melon, and then dessert.  The best part of the night though (apart from the amazing lesson where all of the Lee's for powerful testimony of Christ) was my language skills. One of the Lee's asked Salad where she met the missionaries. She said McDonalds. Ithought that what they meant "Where did you first meet the missionaries who baptized you?" but what they meant was "Where did you meet Sister Hugo and Sister Kessen to walk over to our house?". So when I said "Wow. God had a plan!" all of the Lees had to stifle giggles. But then when they told me what had happened I was the one who laughing the hardest. It was so FUNNY!!

This week I went on Splits with Sister Thomson while our companions did STL stuff. We taught 4 lessons together and they all went great. WE did get lost....but just a little bit! And thank heavens for members because in one of the lessons we had absolutely no clue what she was saying.....MEMBERS TO THE RESCUE!!

We had a meeting with the Bishop about working more with the Less actives in the ward and he gave us maybe 6 names. We contacted all of them in 24 hours and they're all amazing!!  

Ada and Peggy rode bikes to church in the 35 degree Celsius (95 F) weather. They're rockstars! 

Transfers are this week, and I'll probably stay in here with Sister Kessen, but we'll find out!

Life in Hong Kong is soooooOOOOO GOOD!!

P.S. Has anyone gotten any hard copy letters from me? I've sent about 3 every week and I'm worried that I'm sending them incorrectly somehow........but just know mom, that I've written you a letter very week, even if they aren't getting to you

--

Love

Sister Hugo

Yiu Ji Muih

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