10,000 BUDDHAS - One Little Old Me.

{A letter that came in between emails}

Dear Family, friends and followers:

WOW DAD AND IAN look fabulous in their pictures! Thanks for the story about your fun bday party!!!

NO memory card yet but it's prob waiting at the mission home!(perfect timing, mine ran out of memory TODAY at 10,000 buddhas).

The weather IS cooling off! Slowly, but surely! The bugs are... ok, I think they're better. Actually, yesterday I got bittten on my hand --saw it happen, the little sucker (haaaa literally sucker)

(ok, my humor has disintegrated a LOT)

(...with my ENglish...)

it bit me right on the vein--and our fellowshipper said, "CHINESESOMETHINGOROTHER" and grabbed my hand, ran to the hose outside the church (we were waiting for the elders bc we still don't have dkeys--'member I lost them?)

and started hosing off my hand. I finally figured out (after about a minute of frantic hosing and shouting in chinese) that she thought that if you wash the poison out immediately, it won't be itchy later.

I shook my head (and wrung out my hair) and laughed, thanked her good naturedly and went in the church for the lesson. Chinese medicine? Haa!

2 hours later, however, I realized IT DIDN'T ITCH! There was no swelling! CHINESE MEDICINE (at least this one) WORKS! I'm seriously going to start doing this. I have high hopes for less-oozing and less-scarred calves and arms.

The language is TERRIFIC! I just finished my English fast AND this Monday is my last pass-off for "Language Giant" language level (the lowest one, but after this I get to start learning CHARACTERS!).

I'm happy to be able to speak English again, that week was rough. Good, FABULOUS, but hard. Sister Cheung is going to start trying to speak only English in the apartment which will basically be a major source of hilarity and stress release, I'm super excited :D she is so awesome.

The work is FANTASTIC! WOW so many miracles this week! One of which is named A. A. is so special--only 12 years old but looks and acts 17, minimum. Oh, I'll tell you more about her later in the real letter.

As for food, I ate the weirdest thing today (P-day morning is always intersting because we're all out of food)... chestnuts, but they were SOFT. And black. So... weird.

But yes! The food is fabulous. I think I only get poisoned (accidentally glutened) about once a week :P (SORRY Maum,) but I'm really being blessed with very few really bad stomach aches... really.

LOOooonnnnggggg Fat, drumroll please.... I BOUGHT A JUMP ROPE! I'm SO excited!!! I dragged Sister C out this morning (she's so good, she just sits on a bench and watches me run 100 feet this way, 100 feet back, 100 feet this way, 100 feet back, it's hilarious) to try it out and I'm pretty sure I finally got my heart rate about normal!

We're getting a Korean baby [newbie, greenie, new missionary] into our apartment (she'll serve Tai Wo/ Tai Po with Sister B.) and I'm hoping she likes running... praying she likes running...

Hugs, Happiness and Prosperity...

Love, Sister Dia

I FORGOT MOM'S BIRTHDAY--BUT GOD DIDN'T!

And the Lord Will Send Her My Birthday Song That I Sang In My Prayers!

Dear Family, I am so, so, rushed that I have time for a short letter, but I am sending this note too. It is representative

of my life.

This was my letter to the President this week...

Dear President Chan,

WOW, what a week, what a work, what a month, what a move, what an experience! God truly is at the head of His work--and intimately concerned with the details of every single one of his children's lives. God be praised for his wisdom and patience with ME as I slowly learn the lessons he provides.

I am so grateful to have had this move's learning experiences, this area with Sister C., our summer missionaries, our investigators, our ward members, our leaders, our fellow missionaries and especially with the Holy Spirit. What an eternal blessing.

This week Sister C and I did some soul-searching as we evaluated our work with ward members and decided that we really need to develop our relationship with our Sha Tin ward. Several factors have kept us from really getting to know and helping this ward, and many ward members still don't know ME, much less Sister C. We have set goals and plans and fasted for Sha Tin on Sunday--and the blessings are being poured out!

We finally (after months of missing phone calls and going through the wrong people and etc) set an appointment and met with Bishop Lee, who was really helpful and hopeful in helping us resolve concerns and define the sister missionaries' role in his ward better.

We, through pure chance, I mean blessing, were able to serve Sha Tin through an opportunity to help clean the church (our investigator cancelled last minute) with members and attend a senior citizen home presentation the same day.

We really worked hard to find (tracting) at Fo Tan and New Town Plaza/ Lion's bridge--the longest, hottest, hardest finding I've ever done (Sister C. is AMAZING and so resilient! She is such a hard worker!). We're also planning on putting together ward sister-to-sister activities to help the sisters to advance in scripture know-how and testimony and visiting a family every week to help the ward meet the sister missionaries.

I'm so excited for ST's growth and progress.

{Note to home folks: this was a big deal to tell Pres Chan, because Sha Tin is HIS home ward and they really have not welcomed sister missionaries at all. We've been struggling with them for... months before I even came into the area. They don't invite sister missionaries to bear testimony in sacrament, they don't include sister missionaries number with the elders; they don't tell us about activities so of course we don't show UP to activities, they give the elders their female referrals... but it's CHANGING now! We're so excited}.

President Chan, we have also been blessed in our unity as a companionship. It's been a beautiful, really deep experience to become unified with SIster C. Real teaching with power, authority and love comes through the Spirit, and inviting the Spirit starts in a unified companionship--which is formed through real prayer, study and hard work, and obedience!

One of the best experiences this week was when I brought up that we should really try as a companionship to get to bed and get up exactly on time every day. I've been nervous for weeks to talk about it, which is really a manifestation of pride. We decided as a companionship to work on this area of obedience and made plans for how on earth we were going to do it (especially at night, and with showering at the end of the day taking so much time, etc). It gave us a great goal to work on together and negated previous prideful/guilty feelings as we acknowledged our common need to improve.

I am most excited to report that we met a new friend named Alice! I'm so excited for her--she's only 12 but her desire to learn and come to Christ is HUGE. We found her finding at Hin Keng Estate in Tai Wai--this experience is already really building my faith in finding {tracting} because I actually started talking with her (then Sister C. took over because a slightly-crazy man started talking to me...) and then she set up a time to meet with us again.

Almost ALL my investigators so far on my mission have been member referrals, investigator referrals or previous investigators. She's so ready to learn [and yesterday (wed)--our second meeting--set a baptismal date for September 25. Wow!!!].

I feel so happy and excited about this area and finally really open and unified in my companionship. I will be sad to move if I do, but I will leave with peace about Tolo Harbor in my heart.

{YAY--FAMILY! I DON'T HAVE TO MOVE!!! WE'RE GONNA TEAR THIS PLACE APART THIS MOVE I'M SO PSYCHED!!!!}

Thank you for your prayers and service on our behalf!

{This goes doubly for folks at home!}

With Respect, Sister Diondra Darcey

______END OF President's Letter_______________

I love you people so much! Mom, if you could send cranberry and vitamin b pills in the next package it'd just be fabuloous. Love you!!

Dia Awesome Darcey Baaaahk Jan Hei Ji Muih