And she's off! Destination....台灣台中!

This is Sister Peng's final email from the MTC!  She departs for Taiwan tomorrow.  If you wish to write her, her address in Taiwan is:

Sister Nicholle Peng

#498 -11 Wu Chuan Rd

Taichung 404-46

Taiwan ROC

Glow stick greeting

Dear Mom and All the Wonderful People Who Read These:

Oh my! Has the last week of my MTC stay already passed?  Where has time gone?  I leave tomorrow to Taiwan! I can hardly believe it!  In less than 48 hours I'll be in another country! It hasn't quite sunken in yet.  I'm pretty much all packed and ready to go, but I don't feel like I'm really going to Taiwan.  Not sure when it'll actually hit me.  I'll get back to ya'll on that. :)  Anyways, this week has been pretty good, all things considered.  We did a few things that changed up our schedules just a bit; enough to make it seem less monotonous.  Though, there were still a few days where I couldn't wait to be able to leave our classroom.  It gets pretty tiresome just spending hours on end sitting in the same room.  We try to spend as much time outside as possible, no matter how hot it is.  We have our own favorite spot by the back fence, where they have a few tables and it's shaded by trees.  I'm so thankful for the nice cool weather we've been having.  It's been perfect! I'll really miss it when I get to Taiwan.  It's supposed to be in the 90s when we get there or something.

Anyways, on last Monday (Wow, it feels like it was just Monday and that I was emailing yesterday... Then again, Monday seems so far away that it's hard to remember all that happened.)  we did TRC over Skype.  That was a good experience, though I still like talking to people in person.  I miss our TRC visits with people in person.  You could get a better feel of their personality, as well as have more control on the amount of spirit in the room.  You know, it's so easy just to assume that you are just practicing teaching.  It's easy to just think that it's just the members who are doing you a service by being patient with you.  I never really thought about if we were actually making a difference for them.  I just felt like my Chinese wasn't good enough to teach about the gospel.  And then I got a short Dear Elder from someone we met at TRC.  It was the father from the visit that we taught him and his two daughters how to pray in Chinese.  It said something to the fact that, even though they were already members, we as missionaries still have the power to make a difference for them, and to help them strengthen their spirit.  It totally made my day to read that I actually did do something!  I'll need to send him a card today, to thank him.  :)

On Tuesday, we had a devotional.  Yup, I bet you would have never guessed!  I've been forgetting to mention choir, which we have been going to on and off.  On Tuesday we sang Praise to the Man for the devotional.  It was such a cool rendition! It was hard, but I loved it!  Anyways, the Choir conductor is AWESOME.  Brother Egget, that's his name, always has a lot of patience and tells a lot of funny and spiritual stories.  On Tuesday, he shared a thought that, for me, had more power than the whole devotional.  It was to the fact that, out of 10,000 or so souls, Heavenly Father only picked 1 to be sent to the latter days and to have the gospel in their lives.  It was inspiring to think that he chose me to go and serve him.  I keep thinking that I'm not good enough, that I won't be a good missionary because I'm too shy, and because I can’t teach well enough.  But then I realize, that's not the truth at all.  Through Heavenly Father, and having faith in him I know that I can be a good missionary.  He gives me courage, because I know I'm not alone.  He is always with me.  And I don't have to be a good teacher.  I just have to try my best.  Because, in fact, I'm not the real teacher.  The spirit is.  I just have to open my mouth, and the spirit will testify through me.  He knows me; just as he knows everyone else.  He just needs us to recognize the fact that he is there for us. And that he will always love us, no matter how many mistakes we make. 

On Wednesday, guess what!  We got to host! We didn't get invited to host, we just decided that we would go attend the meeting, and if they said that we couldn't host, we would leave.  When we went to the meeting, there were a ton of people there.  And a lot of them were missionaries who had been there for a shorter amount of time than we were.  And then, there were also some missionaries who had already hosted before!  We don't know how they decide who will be invited to host, but whatever they do, it's not quite as organized as it should be.  Anyways, when we were there, they said that it was okay for us to host.  It would just be us doing voluntary service, which we were fine with.  Anyways, long story short, I got to host one Sister, there was a shortage of new Sisters coming in this week.  She was from Florida, and she is serving in the Provo mission.  She has a lot of family here in Utah, which she's lucky for, because if she ever needs anything she can just ask them to send her things.  I'm a little bit jealous, considering the fact that it takes about $50 to send things to Taiwan.  But that's okay, I'll be able to buy most things there, if I need it.  I doubt I'll need a lot of things.  I pretty much packed everything. :P

Sisters Peng, & Eliason with their Chinese Teacher

On Thursday we had In-Field orientation.  It's kind of funny, because it reminds me a bit of like EFY.  They do a lot of object lessons to try and get principles to stick in our minds.  I really learned a lot, well, I already knew a lot of the stuff but review never hurts anyone.  Here are a few points that really stood out to me:

• Never let anyone, including yourself, tell you that you aren't able to do something.  Always believe that you can.  And with that belief, you can do anything.
• Always rely on the Lord's guidance.  Pray before doing anything and listen to his council.  (This one is great.  At the MTC we take it to heart.  We even pray before gym! Hahaha!)
• Set goals first and then plan.   If you set goals first, you can then plan around them.  That way, you know that you will have opportunities to make those goals.  Also, remember, goals are there to make you stretch.  If your goals are making you feel guilty, then you need to take a step back and re evaluate.
• Never lower your expectations.  Keep your standards high!  But remember, sometimes you have to do things one step at a time.  You might  have to build yourself up before you can truly reach your goal.
• Talk to EVERYONE.  You never know whose life you can change. 
• (This one is more for Missionaries)  Members are your friends!  Use them in your teaching!  In fact, let them teach investigators!  Their testimonies can sometimes touch the lives of peoples that yours can't. 
• As to the members, pray for missionary experiences!

Anyways, Friday and Saturday are pretty much a blur.  I spent a lot of time evaluating myself and reflecting.  I also made some goals for my mission:

• Become fluent enough in Chinese that people think that I am a native of Taiwan.
• Become fluent enough in Chinese, and forget English enough to pass as an international student when I go back to school. (Okay, yeah, this one is a bit silly. :P)
• Read the Book of Mormon all the way through every month.

I'm still working on my goals.  But the last one, about the Book of Mormon, I think is very important for everyone.  I believe that it would benefit everyone in the world to read from the Book of Mormon every day.  I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God.  How do I know?  I've read it.  I've felt his love for me through it's words.  My relationship with him as been strengthened, and I know that he is my Heavenly Father.  If you are a member, I encourage you to read from the Book of Mormon every day.  No, don't just read it.  Study it!  Apply it to your lives.  Pray to gain knowledge.  It doesn't matter if you read for 10 minutes a day or an hour.  The Book of Mormon will bless you in your everyday lives.

If you aren't LDS you don't have to take my advice, I know.  But I invite you to get a Book of Mormon (Through the Missionaries, or members, or yeah... You can ask me even!) and read it for yourself.  Read and Pray.  The Book of Mormon can help anyone and everyone.  But it can't help you if you don't give it a chance.  I testify that through it, you will gain a stronger testimony of Jesus Christ.  You will feel more happiness and peace in your life.  You will feel God's love. 

Sunday was very good, as always.  For sacrament meeting, I gave a talk!  They do this thing where they just call you from the pulpit.  No warning beforehand.  They do give everyone the topic a few days before, so people can write talks.  But it's not guaranteed of whether or not you will be chosen to speak.  Well, I pretty much guessed that I would be chosen (They choose one sister and one elder) since I always get chosen.  I wasn't as nervous as I thought I would be.  And the topic was easy.  IT was about the Book of Mormon.  And I love the Book of Mormon, so It was not hard to write a talk.  We had several good speakers for the devotionals.  And we also went to two departure meetings/devotionals (one was for the branch, one was for the MTC) which gave advice and talked about protocol.  Yup...

Today has been pretty good.  Busy!  I've been packing and writing letters and packing and doing laundry and packing.  Haha! Yup that's about it!

Well, I'm about out of time!  This will be my last email from the MTC! I'll be going to Taiwan tomorrow!  I hope that everyone has a good week.  Wish me luck!

Love,

Sister Nicholle Peng

Glow stick writing - Pioneer Day

Ahhhhh! Only one more week left at the MTC!

Sister Peng will be leaving the MTC @ 5:00 AM on Tuesday morning (7/30/13).  If you write want to write to Nicholle - it would make her extremely happy, you can use Dear Elder.com to the MTC until Noon on Monday7/29/13. If you send her something via postal mail, the last day to send would probably be Friday 7/26/13 if you live in the Salt Lake City or Davis County area.  After that you need to write to her Taiwan Address posted at the right of the blog.  International postage is $1.10.  You can still use DearElder.com.  They will also charge you $1.10.  She would love to get mail!!! 

  
Dear Mom and everyone else in the world,

How are you? I'm doing great! I am super excited that this is my last week at the MTC! Don't get me wrong, I've enjoyed my time here, but I am super excited to leave! We've already started sorting and packing to make sure that we don't have any overweight issues with our luggage. :)  Today has just been a lot of running around getting last minute things done.  I went to go get my books laminated, so now they are nice and shiny.  I've also been taping all of my books that can't be laminated so the humidity doesn't kill them off as bad... It's funny; I started out all OCD about taping the books so they wouldn't have bubbles.  And now, I couldn't care less.  As long as it's taped nice and tight, that's all that matters.

Last Monday seemed like so long ago! I have such a hard time remembering what's happened since then!  Thank goodness for journal writing!  I've never been big for journal writing, but as a missionary we are encouraged to do so.  I think when I come back I'll still write in my journal or at least blog, so I can keep a record of my doings.  I'll have to set apart time to do it though, so I don't forget.  Journals are a great way to remember things that happened.  I encourage everyone to write in journals! :)  Anyways, on Monday in the evening we had to teach our investigator.  Once Sister Eliason and I got back from our appointment, we were surprised with the news that we would be skyping with members of the Church in Taiwan.  We had no time to prepare!  We rushed to the computer lab to make it to our Skyping appointment, which no one knew about!  That's okay though, because our lesson turned out pretty well.  We skyped with a Sister L. in Taipei, who was super nice!  We only had a 20 minute lesson opposed to 40 because she had to go to classes for school.  But she was super encouraging to us. Skyping with her made us super excited to leave to Taiwan and teach people in Chinese! 

On Tuesday, a strange incident happened.  Sister Eliason and I were waiting for our turn to teach our investigator (mu2 dao4 you3), and we were just being quiet so we could gather our thoughts.  When suddenly, we both started humming "I believe in Christ" at the same time.  We hadn't even heard that song on that day, or even the day before!  It was just a coincidence that we started thinking of the same song at the same time! Haha!  Our lesson with our investigator was good.  We only got to teach for 5 minutes though, because everyone else went over time. Tisk Tisk!

We also had a devotional on Tuesday, like always.  It was actually broadcasted to all the MTCs in the world! Robert G Hinckley came and talked to us about how to be a good missionary.  I think a lot of what he said could apply to how to be a good member of the Church as well.  Unfortunately, I forgot my notebook, so I can't quite recall all that he said.  Sadness!  There were a lot of things about making sure that you do your best... I don't remember! Sorry! :(

On Wednesday through Thursday, I don't really recall much.  I was just exhausted.  I kept trying to not fall asleep during class... Yup... I've been going to bed on time. Of course, I don't quite fall asleep because the light is still on in our room because the other sisters are writing in their journals.  But yup, same old same old....  Oh, it's been getting hot lately!  I think this is good training for Taiwan! Except, there is not humidity right now, for which I am grateful!  But I only have one more week to enjoy it...

Name Tag!

Sad thing about Wednesday is that we didn't get to host. We've been signing up, but they don't ever assign us.. Which is very not fun, because we've been wanting to host for 8 weeks now... :(

Now Friday was a good day!  We got our Travel Plans and our new name tags with our names in characters! Yay!  There will be 28 of us who are leaving at the same time to go to Taiwan. We'll be stopping in San Francisco and Tokyo before we get to Taiwan.  We get to do a bit of time traveling too, since we'll be missing a day!  I'm going to try and sleep on the plane, but we'll see how that goes.... 

Saturday wasn't really that exciting, since we didn't have TRC.  I did get a card from Mom which I was very impressed with! She wrote it all in characters! I understood most of the characters, but there was a few here and there that I had to guess on.  I don't feel bad about that though, considering the fact that I haven't been learning characters at all (they expect you to do that on your own time, since it's not the most important thing for us to focus on) and the fact that Mom had to use Google translate to write it.  But I understood! :) Yay! 

Sunday was good as well, though they are always good.  We got to listen to music and the spoken word, which always is nice to start your day off with.  For relief society, we had Sister Rosemary Thackery come and talk to us.  She talked about having faith to always keep moving forward, and the importance of knowing that God is in every detail of your life.  She also shared the importance of having enough faith to not have God answer your prayers in the way that you want.  I really liked that point.  This week, I read in the Bible Dictionary about prayer.  In it, it says that Prayer is a method in which we can talk to our Father in Heaven.  When we ask for things and it is given to us, it is because what we ask for aligns with the Lord's will.  But if we do not receive that which we ask, it's because Heavenly Father has something else in mind for us.  It's our responsibility to align our wills, as the Children of God, to His will.  It is then, when we will see miracles in our lives.  For Sunday devotional, we listened to Jolene Allphine who writes pioneers stories for a collection called "Write my Story too".  In the stories she told of the pioneers, she emphasized the importance of enduring to the end.  We must have enough faith to keep moving.  We must have enough faith to give God a chance to show us miracles.  And we must keep a cheerful and brave attitude in all of our trials.  After devotional, we watched a talk by Elder Bednar that he gave at the MTC.  It's called the Character of Christ.  He emphasized that it is importance to not only learn about Christ, but to learn of him.  He says to search the scriptures for evidences of the Character of Christ.  What he meant by Character of Christ, is the fact that even when Christ was suffering, when he was going through trials in his life, he didn't pity himself.  He didn't turn inward, but outward.  When he was suffering, he helped others who were suffering.  When he was weakened by his afflictions, he went to the aid of others who were being afflicted.  He was selfless.  Elder Bednar emphasized the fact that everyone can develop the Character of Christ within themselves.  It starts with not only having a testimony, but being truly converted unto the Lord.  Because when we are converted to the Lord, we become more like him.  We become more loving and selfless.

Anyways, Today has been pretty good, though not very relaxing since there is so much stuff to get done!  Oh, but one very very very good thing happened today.  I saw one of my best friends from USU!  Elder Blake Johnson!  That silly boy/elder didn't even tell me that he had got his call! That's okay, I forgive him!  He's going to Arizona?  I think... I don't know... I was just so excited to see him!  It was so hard not to give him a hug, because as some other people know *cough*Audrey*cough* he gives extremely good hugs!  It was so good seeing him! I was so sad I didn't have my camera with me, since we were getting out of breakfast.  And to make things sadder, he's living at the West Campus, so I probably won't see him again!  Sad!  But I know he'll make a great missionary, and I hope that I'll have the chance to bump into him again!

This is where we are headed!

Okay, well, time is running out... Sadness...  I hope everyone is having a good week! I love you all! 

Love, Sister Nicholle Peng

7/15/13 Sister Peng's testimony continues to grow

Hello Mom and everyone else!

How is life?  It's just been the same old at the MTC.  I honestly can't believe it's been a week since I last emailed.  And I can’t believe I only have 2 weeks left! We are supposed to get our travel plans this week! And our Chinese name tags (with character names)!  It's so exciting!  It feels like forever ago since I last saw everyone.  I miss everyone and I hope you are all doing well!!!

Anyways, I fear that this email might be short since I'm short on time. These computers are the WORST!.... anyways.... Last Monday was good; I hardly remember it well though.  After I did laundry and ate dinner we went back to class where we had  to teach a lesson.  We didn't have that long to prepare our lesson, since it's hard to motivate ourselves to work on p days..., so we decided that we were going to teach the Joseph Smith story to our investigator who is having a hard time having enough faith to be baptized.  Poor Sister E…. doesn't really have a lot of vocab to teach with, so I normally end up teaching most of the lesson.  Anyways, I started quoting the Joseph Smith story and I started tearing up.  The Holy Ghost was so strong! It was testified to me that what I was saying was true.  That Joseph Smith did see God and Christ in the grove.  He is a prophet!  It's amazing the spirit you can have when teaching a lesson.  I can't tell you how many times before I had recited the Joseph Smith story before (probably hundreds!) and never before had I cried.  But then again, I was just practicing it before.  I didn't really need the witness of the Holy Ghost when memorizing Joseph Smith's words.  But I needed it's witness when bearing testimony of it to my investigator.  I pray to have similar experiences in Taiwan.  Because, ultimately, I am not the teacher, and neither is my companion.  The Holy Ghost is!

So on Tuesday we had devotional once again.  I've kind of forgotten who the speaker was, but I still remember the message that he brought.  He really shared with us the importance of prayer.  Every morning and every evening you should kneel in prayer.  Tell God about your day, and ask him for help.  He is our Heavenly Father and he wants to hear from us! He wants to help us! But we have to ask for that help.  He has given us our agency, and so he will not help us if we decided we don't need it.  I've really grown in testimony of how important prayer is.  As a missionary, I feel like I am always saying prayers.  I pray that God will help me in learning Chinese, and for helping me more understand his Gospel.  I pray to be guided in everything I do.  I pray for the people that I will be teaching in the future.  I pray that he will watch over my family and friends.  And I pray for his strength.  You know, I don't think I could have made it this far in the MTC without his help.  I don't think I could go through this work without knowing that I am doing what he wants me to do.  And I don't think I can go throughout the rest of my life without maintaining a strong relationship with him.  He is my Heavenly Father. He knows me. He loves me. And he will guide me.

Sister Ninjas

Anyways, I can't remember anything that really stood out during Wednesday through Friday.  I was just getting really antsy to leave!  I really miss Chinese food! I really think that I'll learn more Chinese in Taiwan than I can here.  And I just really want to go out to work!  But don't worry; I have maintained the perspective of knowing that every moment counts at the MTC.  I'm here to learn how to teach and how to be a missionary.  I'm so grateful to be here.  I just want to leave soon! Haha!  I still am having a good time here.  We've found ways of making everyday fun.  On Thursday I ran about 2 miles with Sister Anderson, which was fun but hard!  I don't know how I could keep up with her! She's fast!  And then on Friday, I taught the other Sisters to make ninja masks with t-shirts.  We then proceeded in scaring some other sisters who are learning Mandarin as well.  It was super funny!  :)  We did it on a day where we all felt like collapsing, so it really raised our spirits.

On Saturday we taught TRC again.  We taught Sister C..  who is the mother of a Mandarin teacher at TRC (also named Sister C... She is awesome!).  Sister C.., the mother, has 5 kids, four of which all served Mandarin speaking missions.  She has a daughter in our mission, who has only been out for 3 months.  We'll probably see her in the field! We had a very good lesson and the spirit was really felt.  I also was able to see the progress in my teaching ability.  I've been learning so much!  However, I really need to do better at speaking Chinese all the time.  It's really hard... And I sometimes find myself wishing that my companion knew more Chinese so I could practice with her. 

Sunday was good.  It's the last Sunday before the "older generation" leave.  So that was a bit sad.  The topic of this Sunday was Faith in the Atonement, which is very important.  Heavenly Father sent us to earth to be tested.  He wanted us to learn. And with learning comes mistakes; however, we must be perfect to be able to return back to our Heavenly Father's presence.  So he sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to perform the Atonement.  Christ paid for all of our sins, but he didn't take away our personal responsibility.  We must decide for ourselves if we want to repent so we can benefit from his Atonement.  He paid for our sins so we wouldn't have to. We just need to have faith in him.  And having faith in the Atonement means that you have faith that he will forgive you.  And you have faith that you can change and be better.   And you must have faith that he will help you.

Relief Society was good.  We had Sister Mikita- Idk how to spell her name...(She spelled it just fine) But she is the Religion reporter for KSL- speak to us.  She gave the story of her family’s conversion.  She also said something that reminded me of what Mom said to me before I left.  She said "You will plant seeds (of faith) and they will remember."  That is so true.  We may not baptize everyone we teach.  But hopefully we have brought them closer to their Savior.

The speaker for this Sunday night's devotional was Brother Heaton, who we've already heard from.  His talk was pretty much the same as the other time, but I did write a bit more insights.  He said that we must have faith to recognize the Lord's hand in our life.  And the more we learn to recognize his hand, the more faith we will be able to develop.

Anyways, today has also been good.  Since the temple is closed for cleaning, we got a temple cleaning assignment!  We sisters got to take apart a chandelier in a sealing room! It took all 3 1/2 hours to do it, but it was really cool to do! The chandeliers are always so ornate and beautiful!  And they are made out of real crystal!  It was so scary trying to take them apart without breaking anything.  But we did it! And it was definitely a great experience to do!

Sister Sallstrom & Sister Peng

Oh! And today I also was able to see Sister Mindy Sallstrom (I spelled her last name wrong....nope, she didn't) before she leaves tomorrow! She's going to Arizona I believe.  I am a bit envious since she only got here last week and she is already leaving before I am... But I was so happy to see her, and I wish her luck on her mission!

Anyways, only 3 more hours left of our p-day.  Time moves by so fast!!!   I should probably stop typing since I am almost out of time.  I said this would be short... but it's not... Ah well!  Have a great week! And feel free to write me – another indirect request for mail-!  I love hearing from everyone! Haha! :)

Sister Peng