Oh man, I feel like there have been so many changes. Okay, okay, it’s really only been like one–but it feels like everything is different!

This past week Sister Curtis officially left to go up to the New Territories with a new companion and Sister Martin and I of course stayed in West Point. It was really weird with her leaving and having to pack everything up to move, I’ll miss her! But my new companion and I have already hit if off really well. It feels like we’ve already been companions for months but it really hasn’t even been a month yet! Weird! I am also senior companion now since she has been in the mission less than me by about 2 months which means that we are both still pretty young and I have to be in charge of making sure that things go well! But I’ve already been in this area for a while and love it so much, so it shouldn’t be any problem 🙂

For P-day we went to Mong Kok which is super famous for all of its shopping. It’s just a street that has little shops set up where you can but anything and everything! Mostly just knick knacky things, but it’s a lot of stuff! The only thing that I don’t like is that you have to barter with the shop owners to get a good price and as it turns out I pretty much stink at doing it. I just feel too bad trying to get the price down that I can’t bring myself to do it! I also felt kind of like I was surrounded by vultures because the second I looked at something in one of their shops they would swoop in on me and attempt to engage me in one of their little bartering wars and I could see the hunger in their eyes. Whew, but I made it out alive!

We went to dinner with a member, Sister Leung, right before Sister Curtis left one last time and she asked her where she would like to go and she chose–Mexican food! Okay, I just have to let you know that Hong Kong island really is so different from the rest of the mission and really the only place that you can get different kinds of food so she had to get it one last time before she went to the middle of nowhere haha! It was so good and if you had asked me where I was, I probably would have said Mexico or something! Members also really love making missionaries eat a lot of food even though they themselves eat hardly anything. I still don’t quite understand it but can’t say that I’m complaining 😉 She also ordered some churro ice cream which was quite delectable! We have such a great ward, really!

I just have to let you know because I am so so excited, but we got two of our investigators back after about a 2 month hiatus! Do you remember Gary and Zoey, the 7 and 8 year olds that came to English class and we would teach every week and the girl was a week away from getting baptized before they stopped meeting with us? Apparently someone told them our church wasn’t good and they stopped meeting with us and coming to church and English class–everything–for about 2 months. We were so heartbroken to have them leave without really any explanation at all. But the Lord can and will work miracles because they have started coming to English class again and we got to teach them again this past Saturday and it actually went really well! We still have some issues that we’ll have to work out with them, but I really can’t tell you how happy I am to be able to be working with them again! I can’t wait to see how things go with them next week!

Our other investigator, Grace, is kind of a frustrating situation. She is willing to keep commitments that we give her and comes to church, but has absolutely zero desire to be baptized. We asked her why she was meeting with us and she told us it was because she didn’t have anything better to do. We try to do everything that we can, but we can’t force someone else to have desire to do something that they don’t want to. One of the speakers in general conference actually addressed that when he said that our Father in Heaven hears and answers our prayers, be he cannot and will not force someone to do something against their will. Of course we will try our best to help her not only open her eyes but also to open her heart to the Spirit and see if we can help her.

We got to see general conference this past weekend and oh man, it was so good! The second President Uchtodorf started speaking I was already pretty much crying and almost forgot to write notes because I felt like I had to listen to every word that they said. Really, every single talk was amazing, if you missed part of it, you should watch it! One of my favorite talks was actually by President Uchtdorf in the women’s session because he kind of talked about never giving up and giving it your all. We’ve all hit the point where we think that we can’t go any further and if we keep going it really won’t make any difference. But I cannot tell you how false that is! I cannot tell you how many times when we have been finding for what seems like hours and wanted to just head back home, but kept going for just a little longer we would meet someone within the last 5 minutes who was actually interested in our message. Maybe if I say it again then you’ll realize how serious I’m being- Don’t give up! Decide how far you can go, and then go just a little further, you can do it! You can’t even imagine the blessings that are waiting for you just steps beyond what you think to be the finish line. I promise you that you always have more strength than you think you do, I plead with you to keep going!

Please, don’t give up! Press forward!

Love,
Sister Crockett
Picture:
1) So apparently you can have a wedding at McDonald’s here…
2) The sisters together one last time before Sister Curtis left!
3) The churro ice cream 😀
4) Gorgeous!!!

5) Me and Sister Martin at General Conference
6) Us with Lai Yi–she’s turning 99 and comes to English class every week!