June 14, 2010‏

Dear Friends and Family,

Hello from right smack in the center of the great sity of Taipei! Wow, where to even begin? What a great week it has been!

First off, I would like to thank you all for your prayers about my safety...traffic is a nightmare! Ah! We went out the other night and it was raining and it was hard to see and the traffic was so scary and we were riding our bikes in and out of cars and buses and scooters and it is just plain crazy! Seriously, I think Eric petting the Cheetah is safer that riding a bike in Taipei Traffic! Don't worry - I am an extremely cautious rider, and I know God protects His missionaries, so nothing bad will happen. Just thought I would let you know, it is a jungle out there! Sometimes I feel like I am a living Nintendo game - like Frogger or something. And my companion is FAST on her bicycle! I am sure I will get used to it, but it has certainly been an adventure so far!

This week was absolutely crazy for some strange reasons! First, last Monday we moved to a new apartment - the assistant's old apartment, in fact. It is super big and super nice and we have a life-size painting of Jesus on the wall of our bedroom, not to mention about six other really nice, really big paintings decorating the house. But moving has really been a pain! Then, on Wednesday we found out we were getting a third companion - Sister Lin! There is an odd number of Sisters in the mission right now, and there was a member that was willing to be a "duanchuan" (meaning a short term missionary) for the first week, but she had to go home ad they couldn't find another Duanchuan, so in moved Sister Lin on Saturday! On Sunday all of her stuff finally arrived, and then this morning, wouldn't you know it - they found another Duanchuan for the next five weeks, so out moved Sister Lin! So for a total of two and a half days I was in a tri-panionship. It was a great couple days. I love sister Lin! She is a native to Taiwan, so she helped my Chinese A LOT in those couple days! Ah! I will miss her.

Also, the other crazy thing I noticed this week - every companion I have had so far was in the MTC together, and this is their last transfer, so they are all going home! Yep! Sister Ackerson, Sister Mac Isaac and Sister Allen all only have five weeks left, and then I officially don't really know any of the other sisters in the mission! :) The good thing is that since Sister Allen is going home next transfer I will almost definitely stick around in the area for at least one more transfer, so I get to make myself right at home. It is nice to know that I will probably stay here longer than six weeks!

Things are completely different from my other two areas in so many ways! First of all, our Chapel is the one right next to the Temple and the Mission office, so we see so many missionaries all the time! Every day there is a different set of Sister Missionaries doing tours of the chapel, so I have met a lot of the sisters in the mission right now, and we really do have awesome sisters here! Also, this area is huge on finding people! In my last two areas we had a lot of people to teach so we did not spend hardly any time trying to find. I have really only been tracting three times before here, but now it is an almost daily thing! And you know what? I really like trying to find new people to teach! People here are really great. Most of them are completely uninterested, but they are still willing to listen and talk and give their information out to the missionaries. It has been a week full of meeting about a hundred new people a day! Wow!

Also, we do have a couple really great investigators. Eve is a Taiwanese Aborigine, and she is awesome! The last time we talked to her on the phone she was so excited to tell us the new things she learned from the Book of Mormon! Wow! and Sister Fan is so excited to join the church and get baptized! We are hoping both of them will be able to be baptized next month before Sister Allen has to leave. We will just have to wait and see how everything plays out! We have a few other investigators that I have high hopes for. Things are really looking good here!

Well, I love you all very much! I hope all is well! God bless you!

Love,

Sister Collyer

PS - I forgot my camera chord this week, so sorry there are no pictures! Look forward to next week!