I have actually made or attempted to make western food for the sisters in the apartment, let's just say taco salad doesn't work with out chips, cheese and salsa and we don't have sour cream so most of the other things don't work. But I am adapting to cooking with the ingredients here, I make a mean sweet n sour chicken now and can make chicken noodles really well. For my weekly mail update, sadly not much this week. But I was grateful to get a letter from Krystal from last week (the fair and rodeo sounded like great fun) and from Amanda Siler, yes I remember who you are :-). It is interesting hearing from home in real physical letters, sometimes I think this is all one big dream and I'm going to wake up and realized everything was just imagined in my own head, but then I receive a letter (which considering the letters that arrived for Chi Pham and Chi Hien took 3 months and 1 month respectively, wow, am I really that far away from home?) and I am reminded that my mind might be good at fiction, but not this good :-).
I am truly coming to love it here in this country. After getting over the initial shock you realize how beautiful the sunrises, the flowers, the rain-storms, the sun sets and everything in between is. There has been many nights when I have come home simply saying thank you to my Heavenly Father for sending me to this country. I love the people, even Anh Hoang who has disappeared on us and we can't seem to meet with him anymore. But that is okay, Co Kim Ly is doing so well, I am so excited her baptism is this Sunday. Her faith is amazing, she has received so many miracles since meeting with us and she knows right where they are coming from. I love my companion, Chi Pham is eternally patient with me and she laughs at all my jokes, which is a wonderful blessing. I have come to love a quote from Pres Monson in last conference:
I slept and dreamt
That life was joy
I awoke and saw
That life was duty
I acted and behold
Duty was joy. Now don't think that everything is
perfect, because my heart still aches over people we could help, but
they won't let us or all the ants that still give me a bit of the
willies or etc. etc, but with a grateful heart all of those things
really do fade away. Even on the hard days like Saturday morning when I
had a bit of a break down about the language ( our district leader had
called the night before telling Chi Pham she needed to help me with my
Vietnamese. I was devastated, yes I know I'm not perfect, yes I know my
use of the language has so far to go, but Friday I felt like I was
getting the hang of just opening my mouth and saying what I needed to
say. Also I was feeling discouraged about various other stuff, but the
two of us talked it out and I felt I could cope with the day. That
night was District Conference for the Vietnamese branches, Elder Wong
(of the Asia Area 70 I believe) came for the conference. And as a very
dear, wonderful friend of mine once said "Heavenly Father sent me a
special delivery Alison Fabricius", and indeed Heavenly Father did.
Elder Wong took a moment and had all the missionaries stand, he told us
we were individually called by an Apostle of the Lord and we were in
Cambodia for a reason. He told us we had already made the choice to be
on the path to eternity and we should make no other choices which would
divert us from that path. Finally after we sat down he told his own
conversion story and how even though he didn't understand what the
missionary was saying he knew because of the Spirit that the message was
true. The Spirit came into my heart and I knew the Lord was speaking
just to me in that moment "don't give up, don't get down, I know you, my
daughter and I love you and you are doing just the work I have called
you to do' that is the power of the Spirit, that is the power of asking
for help. In the New Mission President training seminar Pres. Eyring
told mission presidents to teach their missionaries that the only sure
source of true accolade comes from the Lord. I know I am not a perfect
missionary, I still have distractions or discouragements I am trying to
overcome (we all have them), but as we strive to do the Lord's will and
strive to become what he needs us to be, when we pray to him for
direction or just the knowledge we are doing the right things, the Lord
will always answer. On Saturday Heavenly Father gave me new vigor for
the work and helped me see the joy in the work.We are working with a family right now who is struggling to come back into full activity in the church. The father has the Aaronic Priesthood as does the sons, but they don't see the power of that priesthood or the blessings that come from the Melchezidek priesthood. We all have had blessings or helps from the priesthood, could some who feel so directed send me their testimony of the priesthood or some insight about the priesthood that they could share with me that I might understand it more fully and share with this family. They are so precious to the Lord, as are we all, and Chi Pham and I are trying to find the best way to help them.
As I ponder of my adventure here I have sometimes wondered, how did I get here? What strange twist of fate brought me here to a country where it rains A LOT, the families are starving, where they don't have an F in the alphabet and the church is so young ( apparently part of my calling is to help the branches here, I'm only 21) but the more I ponder the more I know what brought me here. The Spirit directed me to go on a mission and so I put in my papers. The Lord has a plan for us and has things that only we can do. I hope that we can all follow that Spirit (and gain strength from it) so that when we come to a bend in the road we look back and know we made the right choice, in fact we will know, we couldn't have made any other choice. The Lord loves us SO MUCH, he has so much for us to do and is delighted when we help Him in his work. Know the Spirit will always guide us if we will ask and obey.
I love you all so much and hope you are blessed beyond measure this week. Love Sister Fabricius
P.S I apologize if any of you feel I harp or dwell on letters too much, even with being so busy and having a good work to do, all missionaries need a link to home and country, if any of you have a missionary out there (me or someone else) write them, and tell them you know they are doing good work. I never realized how much missionaries love to hear from home.
P.PS You can always write to my companion, she is pretty awesome! Sister Loan Pham, Cambodia Phnom Pehn
I love you all!!!!!!!!
P.P.PS I forgot to mention Silent Sundays, well actually not so silent. Now every Sunday Sis Pham and I can only speak in Vietnamese, I have already seen the blessings!
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