Transfers, Visas, Stolen Camera & COPS!!!

Hey Everyone,

Well this last week was pretty good. News for the week is Rathnayake is getting transferred to the Celementi Ward Elders in Singapore. He'll be covering three wards down there in another three some. OTHER BIGGER news is that Elder Thurman calls me Monday night and he said he had just decided to check his passport and notices that when we came back from Singapore he had only gotten a 2 week chop..... So he was 2 weeks illegal in the country..... So he called me and I told him to call the Carpenters in the mission office.  Their plan was to basically try to bus him down and see if they don't notice.... So then I called them and said no he should go to the American Embassy and talk to them before he does anything. So they finally agreed and he went down early the next morning. They told him he had to go to the main integration office and report it and then he'll just have to pay a fine and then leave the country and hopefully not get a red chop meaning he can't come back. So he paid the fine and they gave him 7 days to get out of the country and gave him a envelope which he can't open and he has to give it to the immigration officer so, hopefully he can get back into Malaysia.

Those 14 Indonesians that we are teaching are doing good.Three of them came to church this Sunday Dolly, Nurhayati, and Merba. They are cool and we went and taught them the next day. They are super cool and funny. As we left their home after teaching them one blurts out the only thing she really knows in English and it was I HATE YOU! Ha-ha she did it with a big smile on her face.

Also with some other news I thought the day would never come but, we now have to wear our suits to church on Sundays..... So that’s not so awesome... Devid and Aasis are getting baptized next week on Saturday they will be interviewed this Saturday. They are super awesome and super funny. We asked Aasis if he had ever been to jail and he said; yes, and then he said just for one day because he drove the wrong way on a one way street ha-ha.

We also are teaching a new Indonesian named Uli she is cool and is doing awesome. She is super funny and makes fun of Elder Lewis when he eats with his hands ha-ha same with Dewi and Yanti they make fun of him when he eats with his hand. He isn't so pandai (clever) with it yet.

We also went and saw Sister and Brother Siow and they are super awesome they fed us some good old Filipino food and it was awesome. Maybe you'll have to check and find us a Filipino restaurant in SLC.

Jhenny is also doing great and putting right along towards baptism and is awesome and super funny she is just like an 18year old ha-ha. Elder Rathnayake and I were sitting there after sacrament and she looked mad so we made faces at her and she came over and punched me ha-ha. But she is cool and loves to read the Book of Mormon. She also started to teach me a little bit of her Bahasa so now I can say little things like, don’t be mad and don’t be shy…ha-ha. 

Sister Yanti also went up to Melaka for her work for a 1 day vacation trip and she told me the morning of and I told her to keep an eye out for the missionaries up there. About 5 hours later I get a sms saying, Elder Watkins I just met the two elders here ha-ha. She even got a picture with them. She walked up to them and said; “aku anggota gereja Yesus Kristus dari orang orang suci zaman akhir” (I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). And they were like huh? Ha-ha so she was super happy. 

Sister Caroline also hooked me up with a shirt from Sarawak and a bead necklace from there it’s pretty cool so, I was a bit happier that day cause it was also the same day my camera got jacked. We were at a restaurant and someone walking by snagged it out of my backpack.  I lost all of my picture from June until now :( Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the money to help buy me a new camera. I will buy me a new camera today.

The Durian party sounded fun but, the Durian you got was a BAD Durian…it was way too yellow on the shell and it shouldn’t look like mush in the middle.  You’ll have to try it when I get back so I can pick a good one and then open it the right way and the “cool way” J You also have to try it three times before you can judge…the guys who didn’t try it are a bunch of babies ha-ha.  I had Durian ice cream yesterday, mmmm…delicious :P

That is super awesome about Nick but, sad that I won’t see him for like three years.

So things are still going good for now. We are just getting the work down and trying to find some new people. Like yesterday we were knocking some terrace housing and then all of a sudden Elder Rathnayake says, Elder Watkins there are some cops and I was like; what, and I turn around and the cops were flagging us over.... Just what we needed. Apparently someone called on us because and said we were bothering people. The cops didn’t really care and they didn't speak English so they couldn’t really say anything to us but, they basically said to carry around a thing that says the church sends us so, I just foto stated my copy of my ministerial certificate. They just told us to leave there for the day and we did. Then we went to Mentari Court near our home and they were shooting a movie and of all the places…Mentari Court ha-ha. They were shooting a scene with cops in it and low and behold it’s those 2 cops from before also being used in the movie and you could totally tell they couldn't act and they were just using them for the film and their car.

And that’s all.

Elder Watkins

Stick with what you know...Valuable Lesson Learned!

Last Friday night I thought I would change our background to Fall. Well...I got into the new blogger Design and boy was that a mistake.  I messed up the whole blog and I thought well, I will just restore it back...I restored it back alright it restored it to the original template that we created two years ago :(  Yeah...I got physically sick to my stomach thinking, what have I done.  Everything I had done for the last two years to our template was gone. Jeff tried for a few hours trying to get it back  but, to no avail.  Of course I didn't sleep that night. Jeff called the guy that does all their computer work who is super smart.  He did a few things and got it back...we thought.  It wouldn't update and was like locked in time. I couldn't post etc. Anyway him and his wife have been figuring out how to fix everything for us.  They are truly amazing and I think with a few more tweaks we will soon be back up and running.  I am so grateful to them and for the incredible knowledge and all the time they have spent trying to fix my terrible mistake. As for me...I will stick with what I know and learn how to backup before I do any changes again with our background.

Thanks you two...you know who you are...you two are the best!!!

Durian Fruit...Is it Stinky???

I got a phone call a few weeks ago from our cute friends The Nielsen's...Cindy was giggling so hard that she could hardly talk so, I knew she was up to no good. She said that Andy had a present for us. If you remember Nathan's Durian stories from his emails then you know how his first Zone Conference he tried Durian and was not too impressed. He said it smells like a dumpster and said that they say you have to try it three or four times before you acquire a taste for it. Anyway they thought it would be fun to give us a "Durian". How thoughtful of them right? The Asian ladies at the Asian Market told them to keep it frozen so it won't smell and then leave it outside all day to thaw. So last night we had a little Durian party. Andy kept texting me asking if it was smelling yet. It really didn't smell. He suggested that I put it in the oven and get it "real ripe" ha-ha!!! When Andy cut it open half of it was still kind of frozen and it still didn't smell that bad. We let the youth and anyone that was brave enough to try it have as much as they would like. The majority ruled it tasted like green onions and the smell of propane. It was nasty!!! It wasn't so bad while you were eating it, it was after you finished chewing it, it left this nasty propane gas taste in your mouth. I had to swish with Hydrogen Peroxide to get the taste out of my mouth. We decided that because it was a cool day and still frozen that's what kept the smell not so offensive because when Cindy and I went in to wash our hands and put them under the warm water...boy it really smelled bad. I sure hope Nathan never quite acquires the taste for Durian...

Things are still putting along...

Me with two Pakistani Christians we met

Hey Everyone,

Well this last week was pretty good. We saw lots of new people and are starting to get a bigger teaching pool. I’ll start off with Jhenny who is super awesome. It’s Yanti's cousin and she is going to get baptized on October 24th if not sooner. She has only one concern and that is if she doesn't pass the medical for her work then she'll get sent back and won't be able to get baptized. But, she is super awesome and like a bright ray of sunshine ha-ha, she is always super happy and its funny cause she knows a bit of English so she throws it in once in a while and the Indonesian accents with English makes me laugh every time. She also loves the Book of Mormon so hopefully she can keep that up and hopefully finish it pretty quick.

Devid and Aasish are doing well and are working their way right along towards baptism. This Sunday they will be at church and they are pretty excited about baptism still. It’s super awesome because we follow up with them about commitments everyday because there our security guards and so we walk past them 2-3 times a day ha-ha and they are super funny. Devid is super awesome and speaks the most English and he is like a missionary. Then you’ve got Aasish the funny man who is alway making funny faces and then bobbing his head ha-ha. Aasish is sending a Book of Mormon and a Bible home to his wife in Nepal so that is also cool.

We are also teaching these 14 Indonesian girls we found in Mentor Court they all work at a factory called Freescale and are all from the same village, school, and church so they all know each other. Only problem is it is hard to find out the ones who really want out of the group. We have taught them twice now and they are pretty cool. Their names are Merba, Eva, Asnita, Elsi, Jojo, Relisma, Meny, Winro, Franicha, Lely Narcahaya, Isnawati, Leli Putri, Nurhayati, and Dolly. Ha-ha so many but, their super cool I’ll get a picture next time of us teaching them in this big circle and send it. We taught them the Plan of Salvation last time and I had to use 10 pieces of paper to make it and they hung it up on the wall there so it’s pretty sweet ha-ha.

Sister Lina is doing awesome and she just finished the Book of Mormon about a week ago and she was pretty excited. She understands the scriptures so well and it is easy for her to find those that relate to what we are teaching and it’s cool. I think one day she'll be a teacher in Sunday school or something.

Sister Christine is going back to Indonesia for 2 weeks. Her and her family are planning on going to the temple or she planning on doing baptism for the dead and her family is just going to walk around cause they aren't members.

Sorry I am missing capitalization but the key board is broken... Also something that is exciting Oscar the Nigerian that I found back a long time ago that we passed to Thurman and Carter when we split the area got baptized on Saturday and received the Holy Ghost and the Priesthood on Sunday. He was one happy man and it was sweet. We also got a new senior couple named the Brown’s they are cool and have got some intense culture shock ha-ha. But, they'll do good they were called as Family History specialists or something like that. Also on Sunday we went to the Felt’s place and had us some good old steaks, pork sausage, and good old Dr. Pepper ha-ha.

We’ve also found some new people we got a Filipino named Shree who is learning and pretty cool and also another Indonesian that was referred by a door contact by a Sri Lankan lady. Things are still putting along and that was pretty much our week in a nut shell. And I am running out of time on the meter so that’s all.

Elder Watkins

P.S. Thanks for the email Josh…I’ll get you an email next week since my time is short this week.

I also forgot to tell you about Ivy are other baptism date she is from Tawau in Sabah and she is awesome she flaked on us for church but, she is doing good. We are going to have to have the tattoo talk cause she already a has some and we ran into her sister and we said where is Ivy and she said getting another tattoo....

Aidilfitri...

Aidilfitri Party at the Fitza's

Food at the Party

Food at Ivy and Wanda's

I had to put this one in...it was too funny not to post it...this is what Nathan said about it... "this is a car we say driving down the road, Yeah I know... ha-ha!"

Salam Aidilfitri,

Hope everything is going good. Well I’ll start off with that I have now had 2 Dr. Peppers and awe man they tasted amazing I don't even know how to describe it other than awesomenya. So this last week was pretty awesome between teaching people and Aidilfitri. We got invited to a home for it and man was it some good food. It was the home of Fiza and her family, she works for Sister Mei and she invited us over for it. They basically just finished Ramadan and that is what Aidilfitri is… celebrating the end of it. So they give people food and money then ask everyone for forgiveness from everyone. Salam Aidilfitri minta maaf dan binat (apologize). So everywhere has been pretty vacant since everyone is balik kampong (behind the village).

So this last week we taught Ivy and Wanda from Sabah. They are super cool and they came to church and really hit it off with Sister Darleyn who is also from Sabah. So things are going great with them. We taught them the Plan of Salvation and they are super pumped to be learning so much and to be able to come to church. The bad thing is Eder wasn't at church this Sunday since he was at the Young Adults Convention…so low and behold I had to translate and of course it was all crazy topics about Zion etc, and I had no idea how to translate it… ayo so hard and I was having a heart attack the whole time just praying they understood me and that they were able to feel the spirit ha-ha. They also made us some way good food on Monday, they are super awesome and love to belajar (study) the bible as they say it ha-ha... They are super awesome and super funny. And the best part is that it is not too hard to check up on them cause their our neighbors ha-ha.

One awesome thing that happened this last week is finally Maria accepted a baptism date for October 3rd WOOHOO... yesterday I asked her if she knew if these things are true and went over the interview questions then said, will you get baptized... then she thought and thought some more then said, yes and We all cheered and gave out high fives and she said, I know I am not perfect but, I know after baptism I will have to continue to repent and so we talked about repentance and everything went well.

We've also been teaching Jhenny which is Yanti's cousin’s sister’s daughter or something like that. She came to church last week and she is awesome. We’ve taught her twice now and challenged her to baptism. She said she is thinking about it and would like to do it but, her wants to discuss it with Yanti before, which is good because Yanti is awesome. So she is set for October 24 but, it’s just a soft date for now but, this Saturday she'll tell us for sure.

We also have Devid and Aasis they are also super cool our security guards at our building from Nepal. They are cool and are working towards baptism now on October 10th, as long as all goes to plan with coming to church since they work 2 weeks morning sift and 2 weeks night. But, they are awesome and it’s also easy to see how they’re doing cause we seem them every day and they say HEY BROTHER!!! Ha-ha they are sweet. They even tell people about church, like in this story. We went to go to church and Devid asked us if an Indonesian guy called and I said; no, he said hmm maybe he forgot but, he gave our number to a guy who wanted to come to church. About 10 minutes later low and behold the man called, I told him how to get to church and he and his whole family came to church. They are here on vacation from Jakarta, Indonesia :) so it was super awesome.

Other than that everyone is doing awesome and we keep finding awesome people every day, like yesterday I found a Catholic man from Iraq and he was awesome and of course first thing he asked me is how many wives I can have ha-ha. But, funny story Indonesian don't like Dr. Pepper btw and they are way fun to play Jenna Blocks with ha-ha… we had a family home evening with them and Eder and it was awesome ha-ha. Today we are going ice skating so I’ll let you know how it goes next week.
Elder Watkins

A bunch of ground chilies spread on a hot dog...

Hey to all you out there from the far off and exotic land of Klang West Malaysia,

This last week we have been doing lots of finding and it was ok. This last week we set two guys on a date from Nepal. Devid and Aasis for October 10th, they are pretty cool the best part is they are guards for our condominium ha-ha. They are doing good and they have some pretty good testimonies so far. One said he always feels so awesome and he wants to share that happy feeling with all his friends and family.

We also have a referral from Yanti, it is her sister’s daughter or something like that who is Jhenny and she is awesome. She came to the talent show last week and she said it was alright but, we taught her just last Sunday and it went really well. We were just talking and came to find out her dad passed away when she was 5. So then we switched topics to the plan of salvation and asked her if she thought she would be able to see her dad again. She said she didn't think she could so, we explained that she could and bore testimony, it was a great lesson. Yanti is super awesome she always hooks us up with people to teach. Speaking of which we taught them yesterday about the prophets and fasting and it went well.

Yanti and Dewi are super awesome and super funny. We wanted to teach them how to play slap jack or go fish or something so we brought some playing cards. But, then we had to quickly put them away cause they started to freak out apparently in Malaysia playing cards are only used for gambling and nothing else and if cops see you with them it causes trouble.... so that went down the drain ha-ha. So then we had some dinner together it was called Pecal Ayam which is basically a spicy sauce and chicken with rice and this stuff that looks like sweet potato leaves. It’s pretty good and I like it and have had it many times but, this was Elder Lewis first time having it. In my opinion it’s not spicy at all. But, he ate a couple of bites. his eyes started to tear up and his face started to turn red so, Yanti and Dewi gave him a tissue and started to giggle a bit, then they looked and me and asked me if it was spicy and I said; na tak ada lah (na, nothing is). So they said; Wah kuatnya (Wow strong)! Ha-ha so they were impressed with my ability to handle spicy food ha-ha and its just come with time I guess. I have only had two spicy things here and one was a tai spicy hot dog thing and wow it was just pretty much a bunch of ground chilies spread on a hot dog... not a good idea ha-ha and some Indonesia spicy sauce which is good but, seriously spicy, more spicy than the Thai food I have had. But, Yanti and Dewi are super awesome and super funny you'll just have to meet them. They should still be here in a year. We referred her family to the Indonesia Mission again so hopefully we will get a response for her she really wants them to learn.

We also have a new investigator from Sabah named Ivy she is really cool and she asked some really good questions, like how to know which churches are true and how to understand the Bible. The best part is she is living next to us as our neighbor ha-ha so it’s easy to follow up.

Also Lina is doing good giving us some friends to teach every time we talk to her. She has tried to share with another friend the only problem is they just go to the other churches out of convenience. We also have Rina an investigator from Sarawak she is doing good and she loves the Book of Mormon but, she says she feels like people are laughing at her when she reads it? Don’t know what that’s about but, we told her if she feels good when she reads it, then it’s from God. She is doing well but, she can't come to church right now.

We are also teaching or kind of teaching a girl named Veronika form Indonesia. She believes the Book of Mormon is true but, she just doesn't quite understand how it came about ,first because the introduction isn't in the Indon BOM and second we can't teach her really cause she is a maid and her boss won't let her have any time off. Also for church her boss takes her with her to a church which she doesn't like :/ but, she has read almost half of the Book of Mormon and she wrote some questions down and she totally had a Joseph Smith experience where she felt really awesome then like Satan bothered her, and she said it was dark, and then she felt really good as she keep praying. She is really awesome she wrote a cool letter with questions in it and I just wrote her one back but, we haven’t seen her again yet.

That pretty much all…
Elder Watkins

Back to work after training...

Singapore Mission Photo August 2010
This was taken at their training last week. This is probably the only time that all 80 missionaries will be together. Thanks Elder Blissett's Mom for sending us these pictures...they are priceless.

Is it just me or does Nathan look older???

Hey Everyone,

Well this last week we did a lot of things but, mainly it was the training from Pres. Clark in Singapore which, was great and should spice up the work. We have been doing lots of finding the last couple of days with not a whole lot of success of finding good new solid people. But, I guess you don't know how solid they are until you get a couple of lessons in and get them to church. But, not a whole lot of return appointments and new investigators. We found someone a couple of days before we went to Singapore named Joyce, she is from mainland China and the part she is from they have a couple of churches so she is actually already Christian. She is pretty knowledgeable and is pretty cool. But she stays up late doing homework and wakes up late in the afternoon ha-ha so it’s rough to get her to church. She and her 2 other friends. They all slept in and missed church. And the other ones we had to come all fell through.

All the recent converts are doing good they were all able to make it to church. Dewi and Yanti were blessed this month because they were pretty much able to come to church every Sunday this month and also to be able to come to the talent night yesterday. They are still doing amazing and Sister Yanti brought her sisters daughter to the talent night and she is down here to learn and really enjoyed the show. We have a ton of talent here in KL its crazy and the members just busted out all these great talents that you never knew they had and it was crazy awesome.

We also have been seeing sister Lina she is also really excited to share the gospel. She brought her boyfriend but, he said that he will listen and come to church but right now he won’t read or pray cause he doesn't want a Christian one and he is super stubborn. But, she has another Christian friend who is Nepal and is interested only problem is the friend didn't come cause it rained. But, she has a Filipino friend that comes back in a couple of weeks she wants to bring to church.

I am not sure if I told you this but, she comes from the same church as sister Christine and Ima and I guess all three of them were the greeters at the church and now they are all in our church. Well long story short there were 4 indonesian greeters and she is talking with the fourth one to try and bring her to church :) so hopefully we can get all 4 of them ha-ha. She is awesome. She already has read much of the Book of Mormon, it’s crazy and we taught her and she even gave me new scriptures to use in the lessons that I have never found before ha-ha. Yanti is the same way it’s crazy how dedicated they are to reading and praying about the scriptures. They always help me to remember what I must do. I hope I can be as diligent as them when I get back. It is just too sad cause they can rarely stay the whole time for church cause they would make great teachers but, maybe they'll open the branch up in Medan and be a great strength to it.

But, were just working on finding new people to teach because we handed over all the people on baptism dates and half of our investigators and they were the most progressing ha-ha. So right now I need to get some new people and it comes down to talking with everyone and I guess I need to have a little more faith and have some more serious talking with the Lord cause I just have no confidence in some of the people we found especially since they say yeah come back we confirm and then wow surprise no one is home... So I know there are people ready for us I guess we just got to find them and get the members to find them for us too.

So I am pretty happy because Yanti's cousin Jenny is looking to be pretty good especially since she lives nearer to the church were as the other cousin lived very far way. Well the only thing to do is to get my butt into gear and work hard and talk with everyone. Keep praying not just for me but, that the members here will have opportunities share the gospel and then refer them to us.

Till next week
Elder Watkins