Nothing Becomes Something...

 This week started out a bit slower than most. Transfers were happening and we were losing 3 of our 5 missionaries, so we didn't go anywhere for p-day. Instead, they wanted to come eat lunch at our apartment and play games. So we did! Uno was the game of choice...

Despite Allen picking on me, which he obviously did, we had a lot of fun. I think this will be on the list of things to do more often.

And lunch was nem nuong: you take rice paper, add lettuce and veggies and noodles and meat and crunchy stuff, roll it all up and dip it in an orange sauce, and there you have some fun Vietnamese food to eat. 

After the missionaries all left, Allen and I went walking because that's what we do!

I love to take pictures of the things we see on our walks; they are usually very typical of life in Vietnam. There are so many shops that spill out onto the sidewalk...

You don't need to go INSIDE any store; you can see it all from the outside.

You also don't need to go inside the "restaurants"; You can see the food cooking on the street, being served on the street, washed up on the street--it's all a part of what Vietnam is like.

Many of the coffee shops have indoor seating, but most people seem to like to come out to the street, where life happens.

And we always look for the tall, skinny homes!   

                                                                             

This day, we ended up walking to a very nice, large park near a lake. It was a very pretty setting; we'll be going back there. It's about 3 miles from home, and when we got our Grab car to go back home, it was rush hour; it took an hour and 15 minutes to make it home that night!

Tuesday turned into an adventuring day. Our task for the day was to get a reference book printed for our mission. We took a car to the print shop, only to find it closed. So we used our time wisely and walked a couple of miles to a very impressive pagoda: Chua Tu Ky.

This pagoda had the most amazing bonsai trees all around the grounds; some were growing around rocks, some around bricks, and many were fashioned to look like scenes from temple life. Oh, and all were decorated for Tet.

There was also a garden area with interesting statuary...

It was just a beautiful place, and decorated for Tet, which is January 29. 

We left this pagoda, started walking toward home and passed another pagoda: Chua Phap Van. It was being renovated but we were still able to walk around for some pictures. It was evening, so the lighting gave us some very nice pictures.

This was just the first 2 days of our week! You may think we do nothing but sight-see around Vietnam, but our weeks get busier as the days go by. As senior missionaries, we have the opportunity to see more of the city than our younger counterparts, but by the end of the week our assignments keep us very busy. 

Thursday was the day a few new missionaries arrived, and it had been the plan that Allen and I would help welcome them to Vietnam, but plane flights didn't cooperate, and we didn't get to greet them after all. Instead, we walked again down the streets of Hanoi...

Birds are being sold on the street; shops of flowers fill their air with their fragrance; plants are available for planting and also for celebrating Tet; even fish are sold on the street in honor of Kitchen God Day, when the fish are released into ponds and lakes to help the kitchen god on his way back to heaven.

We had a busy Thursday with our English activity, and we spent a great deal of time on Thursday preparing for our branch Family Home Evening on Friday night.

The Friday night activity showed us how difficult it is to teach in Vietnam when we don't know the language. We gave a presentation on The Family Proclamation, which was great, but the language barrier makes it hard to ask questions and understand answers. We want to figure out how to make these more interactive and interesting without us doing all the talking, which then has to be interpreted to the members. But rather than get discouraged, I will try to focus on the positive aspects and just look for ways to improve.

One really great thing at this activity--and others--is how many "friends" come to them who want to learn more! Allen and I have the opportunity to sit in with the missionaries as they teach these new investigators. We are asked to share our experiences with prayer, the Book of Mormon, faith, and other topics, and it's wonderful to have that chance to share our testimonies.

Today I got to sit in with the Sister missionaries who were having an online meeting with some Sisters in New Zealand who had found a Vietnamese woman who wanted to learn about the Church. Our Sisters were helping those Sisters explain and testify to the Vietnamese woman, and it was an amazing experiencer to hear how this Vietnamese woman had felt guided to the Church.

Another lesson I helped with was with 2 young men, brothers, who are very interested in learning about prayer and missions and have also felt blessed in unexplainable ways as they've begun to learn about the gospel.

These experiences make us very happy to be able to say that we are serving as missionaries and helping the Vietnamese people to feel the love of their Father in Heaven.

And THAT is how our week that began as "nothing" turned into a lot of "something" that was delightful and tiring and humbling and a great blessing.

We will leave you with a view of our apartment building in its new holiday attire and wish you all a wonderful week!