April 30, 2014

When you said that they were bringing him home to die, I thought you meant that he still had a few weeks left, not hours. If possible, I would like to add to my previous statement in that book. I don't know if you want me to write in it myself when I get back, or if you want to write it in for me, but I want to add his phrase "you're a great man, there aren't very many of us left". That helped me understand what the expectation was for how I should grow up. I have to admit that it is a lot easier to handle his passing when I haven't seen him in over a year, and when I've been putting so much more effort into understanding/contemplating the Plan of Salvation. It really is a fascinating plan, it seems very simple, but can become so profound when we look into it more.

Transfers were today. Do you remember a certain Elder named Wang Shuai that I was companions with just before I went to Peekskill? Yep, it's him.

Elder Zander and Elder Blonquist go to the mission home tonight, they fly home tomorrow. 2 years have gone really fast for them, and now I'm looking at 5-6 transfers and then I'm the one kicking the bucket. I guess this along with Grandpa's passing is just a strange reminder of how quickly life really passes.

Currently, we don't have anyone on date for the May goal, and we don't really have any investigators who look like they will be able to make it, so it's time to start looking at the lists of former investigators a bit harder, because they have to come to church at least so many times before they can get baptized. That or we can contact a ton and hope to find someone who was taking the lessons before, then moved here from wherever they were before (that was how Elder Cook and Elder Blonquist found Xxx Xxxxx last September.)

We ran to 102nd street on Monday. 11 miles, and thanks to the extremely poor decision to eat a bean burrito for lunch the day before, 2 arguments with my stomach and a toilet later, I was a very tired individual. Also, it is pretty much impossible to find an open bathroom on first avenue between 50th street and 96th.

We are running super behind schedule right now, so I'm probably going to have to go, but if I still have time or if I realize there was something I really needed to say, I'll let you know.

Love, your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen

陳少駒

April 23, 2014

Well, I guess I'm 20 years old now. We had a nice dinner outside of the sisters' apartment on the 6th floor of East Broadway because we can't actually go into the same apartment with them anymore now that the Blairs are gone, and the chapel was closed early due to it being Saturday. My special birthday gift was I got to go do baptisms for the dead for the first time in almost 2 years. I didn't get in the water at all, but we helped with being witnesses and doing confirmations (the confirmation prayer is shorter in Chinese). No mom, I still haven't gotten a cheesecake from that deli yet, I think I might just save that for next year in the summer when we come out here either before or after pageant (it's happening, plan on it).

Elder Zander kicks the bucket a week from today, so he is in the temple with Elder Blonquist and all the other missionaries going home. President takes them there and then out to lunch on their last P-day, so I am currently with Elder Murray for the day. Due to Elder Zander going home soon, a number of meal appointments seem to have materialized out of nowhere. I don't think we have had to provide any of our own lunches or dinners since Saturday. We went to the Larson's for Easter dinner. They live across the street from the Freedom Tower and the Memorial Pools. It was really weird to have a home made meal that wasn't Chinese food (ham, deviled eggs, rolls...)

We opted out of a long run this last Saturday because we didn't really have anywhere we felt like going, so we did a speed work instead. I will admit that it is nice to be able to run for quite some time while playing Frisbee and not get out of breath, but I definitely won't do it every day after Elder Zander leaves, because we never work anything else. We had our first stay-in day last week in probably 3 weeks, and I could only do 10 pull-ups (this compared with the 55 I did one day at the very beginning of my companionship with Zander). If I had to chose, I would run 2 days a week, one being a light speed workout, plus Frisbee on Wednesdays, and then the other 3 days we stay inside to work out.

I would be fine with just an email if Grandpa dies before I get back. What kind of time frame are they giving him?

I guarantee there are other words that I mess up here and there, but since if I knew about them, I wouldn't be doing them, hence I can't tell you what they are. I do know one Elder once accidentally gave a priesthood blessing "by the authority of the Holy Melchizedek Uppercut". That was a really funny one.

Our mission president set a goal that the mission will have 100 baptisms between the 20th of April and the last day of May. They highest number we have gotten before was 57 baptisms as a mission in September 2013, the last time we had more than that was over 9 years ago now. We will see just how much we can push ourselves.

I have a roughly 1 in 3 chance of getting a training call tonight. We shall see what happens.

I have a dictionary already, the problem is you often need to cross reference with either another dictionary or else someone who speaks the language to make sure that you understand the translation correctly (or that they translated correctly in the first place.) If you can't find a thesaurus, I'll just try and look for one when I get home, you probably need to be able to look through Chinese websites to find it.

陳少駒

April 16, 2014

It's that time of week again!

The weather here is still on the fritz. We had several days in the 60s which were awesome, and then we got up this morning and it was 34 degrees, the radiators weren't working, and there was snow on the ground in some spots. It has to warm up permanently at some point.

So Robert got his call to my Mission? Is he Spanish or English speaking? I'll definitely see him at his first transfer meeting here, beyond that is hard to say how much.

I found out that thanks to these wonderful things called tones in Chinese, there is a difference between how you say old (outdated) and "long ago". Unfortunately, the pronunciation for long ago is the same as for alcohol, so I've been passing out the last of our English class cards that had the old schedule on them and saying "sorry, this is alcoholic" when they ask about the schedule. I'm surprised we haven't had more of the drunk variety coming to our classes.

We had Stake Conference this last weekend, Elder Smith of the 6th quorum of the 70 was the presiding authority. He used to be a senator for Oregon State apparently. He also had a lot of cool stories, and told us that while we shouldn't get our hopes up too soon, he did confirm that there are actually senior couple missionaries serving in Iraq. How would that be for a crazy call?

I don't know what the fastest mile I could run right now currently is, but during our last speedwork yesterday I decided to try a pace for a 6:40 mile, I ran a half and I was on pace to the second. I think I probably could have done a 6:40-6:30, but I stopped after the half because I knew we were going to be playing frisbee today, as well as playing basketball with some of the members, so I didn't want to be very sore. I guess there are some side effects of running so much. Our long run this past saturday took us through West Village and along the Hudson River Park to the Intrepid (aircraft carrier). That ship is really big.

I don't know if I mentioned it or not last week, but one of our recent converts (Xxxxx) got a job. On Wall Street. Most of the ward is working in Chinese restaurants 6 or 7 days a week for 12 hours a day, he manages to find a 40 hour 9-5 on Wall Street. That counts as showing the blessings of keeping the commandments, along with deciding to get an education/use the employment services that the church provides.

Spiritual thought of the week comes from President Buckner who compared the gospel with economics. In economics, there is this constant view of Win-lose, but there are also instances of Win-win, when both parties get more out of the deal than if they had produced something on their own, wealth is created. Sharing the gospel is this kind of situation, we often think about "is now the right time to make the "pitch" for them to "buy" the gospel, but the fact is that we aren't trying to trick them into a deal where we will win and they lose something. Both parties win.

I need to get going soon, we're going for the annual spring trip to Central Park Frisbee and Chipotle today.

Love, Your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen

陳少駒

April 9,2014

Don't park under an overpass in NYC

General Conference was awesome. It's weird to think that I only have one left before I go home. Yes mom, I did see Matthew Buckner, but it was only for a little bit. We have stake conference this Sunday, so he can take the picture then. We have a tradition in Chinatown, since we have to go to the 65th street chapel (the Manhattan Temple) to watch conference and there isn't enough time to make it back to Chinatown between sessions, we go to Dallas BBQ (72nd street) between the Saturday sessions for lunch, then all the Elders go to Century 21 and buy a new tie before the priesthood session. To let you all know, we didn't really have any investigators come to conference, so we watched it in English. According to Elder Leung, the Mandarin translators were pretty bad this time, not sure why, but it just makes me more grateful that I was able to do it in English. Elder Holland's talk was awesome, as always, but I can't really say which one would count as my favorite overall. I think the best stories have to go to President Uchtdorf's "Dieter, don't even think about it" and the story about jumping from the truck. I'm just dying for when we get the talks on Gospel Library (First world missionary problems).

Speaking of first world missionary problems, I think I told you last week that they announced Delancey Street apartment is the most expensive in the mission (~4000$ a month). We did the math, the mission has spent 68,000$ In rent for the months that Elder Zander has lived in this apartment. This is one of the 3 most expensive missions in the world (shout out to London South Mission and Tokyo Japan mission), and Elder Zander has been living in the most expensive apartment that the mission has for 17 months, so there is a chance he is the single most expensive missionary for the church currently.

I thought of a birthday present that would be awesome mom. A Chinese Thesaurus. You'd probably have to get one used, or else ask Mr. Ostler how to find one, because I haven't been able to find one in any of the bookstores around Chinatown, and it would be super helpful. If it is too late now, you can just put that down on the list of things that I would like after my mission. I should be getting the packages next Tuesday. I found out that the ward is planning a temple trip for baptisms on my birthday, and I'll get to go since we have a recent convert from our companionship going.

Running from Delancey street to 65th street and 9th ave takes a while. Especially when you had DimSum the night before that isn't sitting too well during the run. On the upside, I can now check "run to the Manhattan Temple and back while having diarrhea" off of my list of things I never thought I would do on my mission. We aren't sure what to set as our new long distance goal, there isn't anything as cool as the temple farther up the island. Maybe we will just set a goal to have our final long run be 10 miles or a half-marathon, depending on how we feel.

That's sad to hear about grandpa, but we'll see, brother Brems (president Monson's friend) lived to 105 in a nursing home, so he might make it till I get home. On the note of aging, how is Dottie holding up?

The weather here has been very good for the most part. It hasn't dropped into the lower 30s during the day for a while, and today is almost 60 and sunny, so the spring is finally here to stay I think. We've been contacting a lot more. The day's vary, sometimes they are really good days (more people stop to talk) and sometimes they are slower days (no-one talks to us except to say rude things that make me laugh because they say them in Cantonese) but I don't think there has ever been what I would describe as a "bad" contacting day. Just days where you have to do a bit more looking before you find the needle in the haystack.

We played Frisbee this morning again, and got in some basketball, with 2 of the members actually, as well. Only problem is that I can already feel I'm going to be super sore for the next few days after this.

Chinese soap operas are super cheesy, they are playing non-stop at the laundromat where we wash our clothes.

Love you all,
Your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen

陳少駒

April 2, 2014

We had our first game of the Frisbee season this morning. Pretty fun.

Our long run this last week took us up 5th avenue to Rockefeller Center. It turned out to be the exact distance as a 10k. We have been working a lot more on pacing now that I can run for an hour continuous, so the first half (going there) we ran a 10 or 10:30 pace, which felt pretty easy, so we did an 8 minute mile pace for the second half.

Yesterday was awesome! We went on splits so I was with Elder Murray. Oddly enough, in 15 days it will be the year mark of when we started our companionship. We taught some late night phone and FB lessons, so we didn't get to bed until 12:20 Monday night, and Tuesday was beautiful. I had my sleeves rolled up and was only a tiny bit nippy. I love spring! Plus, it had been forever since it was warm enough that we could stand to contact for hours on end without needing a break to warm up. We passed out about 150 English class cards for our companionship, plus Elder Zander and Elder Blonquist passed out around 200, and the sisters passed out about 100 as well I think, so hopefully we will see a few new people coming in over the next few weeks.

General Conference is just around the corner. We tried to get it set up so that we would be able to watch it at our building here in Chinatown, but it wound up being a no-go, so I'll be spending most of the weekend in the temple it looks like. I'll try to say hi to the Buckners and/or brother Done. Make sure you have questions as you go into conference. Having questions is the only way you are going to get answers.

The Blairs are officially gone, it was really sad to see them go.

They announced that Delancey Street apartment is officially the most expensive apartment in the mission, the rent is currently 3800 a month, but has gotten as high as 4000 before. They are terminating the contract in May, so it looks like I'll be moving back to East Broadway before summer fully kicks in. They also told us they might have people coming in during the day to take a look at our apartment, so we're spending the day cleaning.

We have a new baptismal date, his name is Xx Xxxx Xxx. He is a friend of a less active member. The sisters called to meet the less active member and the friend came along to see what the church was like. His date is for May 11 (Mother's day, which now that I think about it, we might want to change that). He really wanted to get baptized on Easter, but we kept it further back because he really wants to get baptized, which means he might have some green card issues. That said, he knew the story of Joshua carrying the Ark of the Covenant around the wall of Jericho 7 times, which shows that he's a lot more into the Bible than most of the GCIs are (Green Card Issues). In other news, I learned how to say the Ark of the Covenant in Chinese. I've also learned how to say schizophrenic, kidney, applicable, digress, and motive. Schizophrenic is really long.

Love you all,
Your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen

陳少駒

March 26, 2014

I had an epiphany (I'm surprised I remember that word) this last week about running. I was looking back over the course of my mission, and I realized that the 2 companionships I have had thus far where we went running on a close-to-0daily basis have been the companionships where I felt the LEAST healthy, and also gained weight, whereas in all other companionships I've either maintained or dropped slightly. This seemed exactly contradictory to what one would expect, until I thought about the mentality of running verses other forms of exercise. In weight lifting/resistance training, you are focusing on how many times you can do the exercise correctly, and while you feel sore afterwards, it is easy to forget that you can actually burn a decent amount of calories depending on what muscle groups you target. Running on the other hand, the whole point is to focus on how far/fast you went. It connects much closer (at least in my head) to energy burned than resistance/sports does, and so it is much easier to say that you can eat a little bit extra. The problem is that running 5 miles is only about 600-700 calories, which is actually a deficit that is very easy to fill if you allow yourself to eat more. In short, I have determined that running will not be my primary cardio exercise of choice after my mission. Sorry Mom. On the plus side, we ran to Madison Square Garden/Penn Station/the General Post Office on our morning run last Saturday.

We had a former Chinatown missionary come this last Sunday. His name was Albert (or Alfred, I forgot) Lee. He served his mission here in 1999-2000. He was the one that was called by the mission president to open the Chinatown Group one year into his mission (he already spoke Mandarin and Cantonese). He told us about that first Sunday where it was him, his companion (the second counselor in the mission presidency), sister Yan (now the relief society president), and 2 investigators. He hasn't been here during a weekend since he left his mission, so this was the first time he has been able to attend here since 2000. Talk about being able to see the fruits of your efforts. We also found out that he was the one who discovered the contacting spots (tree of life, grand street station) that we still use to this day.

Winter is fighting to make it's way into April. We had small snow flurries last night and this morning. It wasn't close to sticking, but it is a bit annoying when the weather keeps bouncing from 20-30 degrees to 50 degrees or so. Spring is going to get here at some point though.

The Blairs say goodbye this coming Monday, they will be driving back out to Sandy, Utah. Their support here has been wonderful, we're going to miss them a lot. Their Homecoming Talks will be on April 27th at 11am at 1295 East 11000 South in Sandy. They would love to see you come. They said take the 106 exit, then drive to 13th east, and hang a right for a few blocks. Or you could just look it up.

We've been making use of our privilege to stay up late teaching recently, but I don't know how much I like the sleeping in part. Sleeping until after 7 makes me feel like I'm being extremely lazy, even if we have permission to do it. It's also difficult when you get people from Hong Kong and Mainland in the online events events together, because Hong Kong uses traditional characters, but mainland uses simplified. End result, they can't read each other's comments sometimes. On the plus side, I get to learn both!

It just hit me that Robin is getting close to the end of her Junior Year of high school. That's weird.

After my mission I would like to have a phone that is enabled to type characters, probably an iPhone for facetiming purposes, some Chinese movies (Battle for Red Cliff is the Chinese version of Lord of the Rings from what I've heard), and a set of stackable bamboo steaming racks. I'm planning on finding out how to cook most of the stuff I've eaten here after my mission, at the very least I could make the Chinese food we always eat on Christmas Eve/New Years (I forget which).

Conducting district meetings is a strange feeling. I'll probably get used to it though, we don't have any new elders coming in until June it looks like, which means Elders Zander, Blonquist, and Murray will all be gone (Elder Murray and Elder Blonquist are the Zone Leaders). Elder Cook still needs to leave Chinatown, so there is a chance of me being a district leader or Zone Leader until the end of my mission, since there are 4 leadership slots that need to be filled (2 Zone Leaders and 2 District Leaders), and there will be me, Elder Cook, Elder Radford, Elder Leung, Elder Atkinson, Elder Wang maybe, he might stay in the English program for the rest of his mission, and the new elder, who won't be getting any leadership probably until late fall/winter at the earliest. I might train, but based on the family trend it's difficult to say. We'll see though, president likes to be a lose cannon with transfers.

I found peanut butter that needs to be refrigerated after opening. East Coast fads.

For future reference, I usually write my emails at the laundromat and immediately after, so it might be more effective if you could all write on Tuesday night, and then respond to anything in my letter on Wednesdays, because there is no guarantee that I will be available after about 1 here to respond to parts of your letters (11 am in Utah).

Love you,
Your son/sibling in service,
Elder Christensen

陳少駒