Letter #12 Week of 30 Apr 2008 - 4 inch spider!

Hello family,

Thanks for the pictures of Tyler, Dan and Sharyll.

For mother's day, we figured the best time to call would be 7:00 A.M. here, which I am pretty sure is 4:00 PM in Colorado. I had planned on getting a phone card and calling you, but I suppose it is a better idea for you to call. I know we still have a week, but I'll just give you the number ahead of time. I'm not sure what the country code is, so you'll have to look that up for yourself, but our phone number is XXX-XXX-XXX. We will have an hour to talk. Maybe some time you could practice calling the orangutan sanctuary or somewhere else you could find the phone number to so that everything goes smoothly.

The call a couple of months ago wasn't a collect call. I was supposed to pay for it, and after asking both Elder Beczuk and Elder Dhillon about it several times, I just gave up. It cost about ten dollars, but I couldn't figure out who or how to pay.
That's good to hear that Carly is still winning everything. It's also good to hear that Ariel got selected to the Best and Brightest. Mom, if you ever see her could you congratulate her for me?

This week went very well. For the next month at least, we will be focusing on a new area in Sandakan. We started knocking at an apartment complex last week, and we have a lot of new people to teach. I've been talking for a couple of weeks now, but I had been feeling very scared and uncomfortable trying to speak malay until Thursday. I don't know exactly what changed, but I just started to really enjoy contacting. It finally clicked that I could share with others the Restored Gospel.

Stephen Chin didn't come to church on Sunday. He was travelling somewhere.

We will be having a baptism this Saturday. Misdi is a 22 year old young Kadazan man. Going to his house is always very hard for me. He lives with many other people in a small wooden house they doubtlessly built themselves. They lack running water and many other things I'd never given a second thought to. I think his most expensive possessions are the clothes he wears to church. He always shows up with an ironed collared shirt and polished shoes. Misdi is very humble and courageous. The elders have been teaching him for quite a long time. He has quit several jobs because his bosses have suddenly made him work on sundays. We're excited that he can finally get baptized this week.

I got my quad last week. I think it came to the post office last wednesday, so that would have been exactly 2 weeks.

A couple of weeks ago, between conference sessions on Saturday, Elder Dhillon and I went to eat lunch from a little Chinese food court near the church. I ordered some noodles with beef. When the food came, I noticed they didn't have any forks around, just chopsticks. So, I had to figure out how to use those. I'd never done it before. Elder Dhillon tried to explain it to me, but I couldn't use them as he described, and I just had to figure it out for myself. It was nice after I got the hang of it. I think it's way easier to eat noodles with chopsticks than with a fork.

I got scared this morning. While I was downstairs exercising, Elder Dhillon called me, saying "There's something you might want to see." He pointed toward the bedroom. I went inside, and there, a few feet from where I had been kneeling in prayer a few minutes before, was a 4 inch spider. So naturally, I ran to get my camera and a ruler. But when I set the ruler down on the floor so I would have a point of reference in the picture, the spider ran away. I suppose it's still in our room somewhere.

As I've said before, most of the time we travel by bus here. However, past 7:00, there's not much bus service, so we use taxis, normally just to drive us home. We have one very reliable, very good taxi driver that the elders have used for years. His name is Jad. We call Jad before we go out for the day and tell him where we are going to be that night, and he will come get us. Every now and then, though, Jad is busy and cannot pick us up, so Jad sends his best friend Ahmad. Well, Jad's taxi broke down last week, so we had to use Ahmad a lot. Both Jad and Ahmad are Muslims. Because we gave Ahmad very good business last week, he invited us over for dinner. That was a good experience, eating with a Muslim. He and his wife are such good people. His wife is very good at decorating. They have by far the most beautiful home I have seen in Malaysia. For dinner, we had curry fish, and some chicken and fried vegetables, and, of course, rice. We ate my favorite way- no utensils. Along with the other things, Ahmad's wife also brought out a very small dish with some sort of pink salsa. Elder Dhillon wouldn't tell me what it was, but just suggested that I sprinkle a few drops on my rice and try it. I did. Those few drops burnt my mouth. It was the spiciest thing I have ever tasted. It was very potent.

Alas, I have to go.
Sincerely,
Elder Muffler

Letter #11 Week of 23 April 2008 - DHL Driver and Wongs' Preacher

Hello family,

Sorry this is coming to you late. There was a problem yesterday with the email system, so our zone leaders gave us permission to come back today and do our emails. I am happy that it worked today, though.

I've got another story about the Wongs I will share in a minute.

Elder Dhillon and I are the only missionaries in our district right now. I looked over the list of all the missionaries in our mission, and I realized a few things: all the other missionaries that came in with me are in districts where there are other young missionaries. Also, my whole zone only has 8 missionaries right now (all of our couples got kicked out), so there are some districts that have more missionaries than my zone has. So yes, it is lonely here. But it's all good. Elder Dhillon and I are becoming good friends, so we're having fun together here. Just us and the orangutans.

This last week, we baptized Tiga and Rosemarie. At the baptism, our package guy from our favorite shipping company, DHL, came. The Baczuks sent a ton of stuff through them and always talked to him about our church, so he decided to come to the baptism. He is a very busy man, but he was able to finish work just a few minutes before the baptism. When he came, we took him on a tour of the church. He is a very enthusiastic man, and he was amazed at the beautiful pictures of the temples. He speaks english very well, so I sat next to him throughout the baptism service and explained things to him. While we were having refreshments, one of the members was talking to him. After the baptism service, Steven enthusiastically told us about how much he felt loved in the church, about how friendly everyone was to him. He told Elder Baczuk a few days later that he could really see a change in the faces of Tiga and Rosemary after they were baptized.

I'm excited about Steven Chin. He is a very busy man, so we won't be able to teach him all the time, but he should be coming to church from now on, and I think he'll get baptized before long.

Rosemarie chose me to do her confirmation on Sunday. She understands some english, so I was able to do that. I think being able to perform priesthood blessings are the most special experiences I have had since I've come on my mission. I really find it amazing how when you are giving a blessing, the words flow so easily, and you can really feel as though you are speaking on the Lord's behalf. After sacrament meeting, I was also able to bless one of the young women in our branch, who is sick.

West Malaysia is drastically different than East Malaysia. Elder Dhillon said that even he got culture shock coming here. Even the capital of our state, Kota Kinabulu, is cleaner and nicer than Sandakan. I'm not sure whether or not I told you, but my zone leaders told me a few weeks ago that they were kind of scared for me when they knew I was coming here, because as a new missionary, I would be coming to an area that is the poorest in the mission, where I would have a native companion, where there would not likely be many investigators who spoke english, and where the closest other young missionaries would be 200 miles away. But I don't care now, I love it here. I'm kind of sad. Next week, I have to start using my 3rd planner, so that means I'm already 12 weeks into my mission. Time goes by much too quickly.
I can finally teach the Joseph Smith story and have people kind of understand me. I still haven't been able to get a return appointment with anyone from contacting, but I'm working on it.

I haven't yet gotten my scriptures, but that's just because I haven't been to the post office. Usually, the branch president checks the P.O. Box on Saturday, and he will bring the package to church on sunday.

Can you email me some pictures of Tyler? The only pictures I got to see were the ones of him at the hospital.

Congratulate Andrew and Christina on the soon to be baby boy. Actually, I guess you'll read this yourself, so Congratulations, Andrew! I don't know about Daily. What kind of name is that? Daily. Jackson. I guess you like cities, like Jackson and Boston, so why not try Sandakan?

So, the story about the Wongs. We went there later in the week we watched conference. When we drove up, we noticed that only one of the children was there. When she saw us, she walked upstairs, and out came 2 men dressed in collared shirts and slacks. They came down to greet us. One of them talked to Elder Dhillon in malay. I didn't understand all he said, but I understood he was the reverend from the church across the street. When I first realized this, I'll admit, I was a little scared. That quickly faded, though. From the time I was 8 years old, I had progressed further in the kingdom of God than that reverend may ever go. When I was 12 years old, I held infinitely more authority than he does as a reverend. And now, as a missionary, I enjoy my commission to preach the Restored Gospel, and a prophet of God has said of me "We invite all to heed his message." The reverend, on the other hand, has a piece of paper that says he studied the Bible. I noticed he was looking awfully skinny. Donations were probably hard to come by. He told us that we needed to stop teaching those children and telling them his church was wrong. He got their father, who is a bhuddist, to come out and reluctantly agree that we need to stop coming.

I have to get going.
Love,
Elder Muffler

Letter #10 Week of 16 Apr 2008 - 15 foot python!

Hello family,

This week went very well. It was also very, very fast. Time goes very fast when you're doing pretty much the same things all day every day.

I think I told you last week about the Wong children. Maybe not. We were far from home and it was dark and we were waiting for a taxi for a few minutes, and the only other house around was a house across the street with red altars near the doors indicating buddhists, who we never had any sort of success with. I told Elder Dhillon that we might as well try it: it's better to do something and fail than just sit there and wait. So, when we went, there ended up being seven children from a couple families between the ages of 10 and 16 who had all been attending the Christian church across the street for years, and they invited us in and we got a return appointment.

Our third appointment with them was on Saturday. We were teaching the restoration again. The children understood very little malay or english, so we had the first counsellor in our branch presidency come to translate into chinese for us. Near the end of the lesson, the dog started barking, so a couple of the children went to the window to see who was coming. One of them ran downstairs (their living room was on the second floor), and came back up very excited. Elder Dhillon said "snake", then got the children settled down and finished the lesson. After the lesson, we all went downstairs to see the snake. Elder Dhillon had gone ahead of me while I tied my shoes, and when he could see around the corner where everyone was gathered, he told me "Hurry! Come see this now" I was thinking maybe a five foot snake. I took my time. I walked to the corner of the house. I looked up. The owners of the house had set up two poles with a crossbar. The poles were about the height of a basketball hoop. It took me a while to realize what I was seeing, because it seemed very unreal. Tied to the crossbar on top of the poles was the head of the snake. It still was opening and closing its mouth, and wriggling a little. The body of the python touched the ground with a few feet to spare. I figure it was 15 or 16 feet long. I watched three men working with the snake. One was dealing with the rope to raise and lower the snake. Another held a very bright light for the third, who was in the process of skinning the snake alive. Chinese people love snake meat. It was so cool to watch. After they had skinned the top half and chopped off the head, they seperated the bottom half, and started pulling stuff out of the stomach. They pulled a couple of chickens (I wonder if they'll eat the chickens too) and about thirty eggs out. It was gruesome. I'm sending pictures. I actually didn't have my camera, but the guy that came with us, Brother Voo, had his cell phone and printed some pictures for us.

I don't know if you remember, but after they took my braces , they put a permanent retainer across my bottom front teeth. About a year ago, not too long before I went to BYU, part of it came loose, and caused some pain, and I got it fixed. I told the nurse who fixed it that I would be leaving soon, and that I might be going to a place with absolutely no dental care, and asked if there was a possibility that it would break again. She said no. No way. It's permanent. It won't break again. It broke last Wednesday. I asked Sister Skelton, the mission president's wife, about it, and she told me I could have it fixed here if I could find someone to do it, or I could have it taken off. I went ahead and had it taken off. I don't think it will cause me any problems. Actually, the dentist I went to also did orthodontic work. I told him that I wanted it taken off. There were actually two things broken on it: one came off a long time ago. I told him about that, and he said that the thing that came off a long time ago already made those teeth go a little crooked, and that they have almost surely settled already, so taking it off completely probably won't do anything.

We got a fax from the mission office the other day. It seems there have been a lot of problems lately with getting visas. Actually, the senior couple here in sandakan only got a 7 day visa last time they came through, so they will have to finish their mission 3 months early in Singapore. The old procedure for visa runs in Sabah (the state I am in) is that I would take a flight at night to Brunei, stay the night at a hotel, and fly back in the morning. The missionaries in West Malaysia usually would walk through immigration, stay a few hours, then walk right back and get their visas. They have had problems with that, so from now on, all missionaries will have to fly to Singapore, stay at least two nights, then fly back. That will be kind of fun.

I got the letters from the youth this week. It looks like it only takes 7-10 days for letters to get to Singapore, then they get sent from Singapore every saturday, and arrive here on Thursday. To be honest, I thought they were primary letters until I started looking at the names. I appreciated Ben's depiction of UNLV and BYU.
Thanks for shipping my scriptures. That will be nice.

General conference this week was very enjoyable and uplifting. We got to watch all 5 sessions, and we watched them at the same times that we would watch them in the U.S., except that we watched the priesthood session on sunday instead of saturday.
Just remember what Elder Bednar said: missionaries are called to be full time teachers. Members are the full time finders. Everyone should always be looking for people who the missionaries could be teaching.

Sincerely,
Elder Muffler

Letter #9 Week of 9 April 2008 - ZL Exchanges and Chocolate Rain

Hello family of mine,

This week went very quickly.
On Thursday, one of our recent converts invited his friend, Joann, to his home so that we could teach her. I actually taught a few principles of the lesson. That was definitely the highlight of my week.

Last Thursday night, my zone leaders, Elder Jugant and Elder Simons flew in from Kota Kinabolu for exchanges. They stayed the night. We had exchanges the next day. I really learned a lot from Elder Jugant. I think he really wanted to test my language ability. In the morning, he told me "You really know more than you think", and he had me teach him each of the lessons to him using words that I knew. They were probably 30 seconds a piece, but it's all good. We spent essentially the whole day tracting. After about an hour, Elder Jugant realized that I know enough malay to introduce who we are, find out whether the person is Islam or not, and begin teaching, so he made me talk to everyone. It was very uncomfortable to do so, because I really can't tell whether people understand me or not, but I was glad that I could do it.











Thank you for the addresses. Could you do me another big favor? I checked, and it's all right to send packages to me. The mission president is completely fine with it, and the missionaries I've talked to have never had a problem with the postal service, so it should be all right. You'll have to send them directly to me, not to Singapore. So, could you send me my miniature scripture quad? I didn't bring it because I was so worried about having too much weight with me when I hop on airplanes, but I realize now that there are a lot of ways to get around it. I don't know exactly where it is, but it is red, and it's in a red case. I'd like both the quad and the case. My address right now is:
Adam Muffler
P.O. Box XXXX
XXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXX

I'll probably be withdrawing about $60 soon to buy a long sleeve white shirt (it's a mission rule to wear one on Sundays, I just have been slow in getting one) and a nicer backpack.

On Saturday, we baptized a ten year old boy named Raymond. His mother used to be an inactive member, but now she and her son are fully active. Raymond was the most excited kid I've ever seen regarding his baptism. He absolutely loved it.
I've really enjoyed seeing how our recent converts have become great friends. Raymond, Joseph Tiga, and another boy who was baptized in January, are always playing around together, and their parents talk to each other often. Imagine how awesome it would be if they all went on missions!

We weren't able to see any of conference last week. What usually happens is that they send us the DVD's through the mail, and we watch them (I'm not sure which session(s)) on the next Sunday. But we were able to find out who the new apostle is. After the branch is done with the DVD's, we can take them home and watch whatever we don't get to see at the Church.

I ate some bamboo shoots this week. Yum. Yesterday, the Beczuks took us out for lunch and dessert after our weekly district meeting. For dessert, we went to a place called "chocolate rain". It was a little ice cream and smoothie shop. My companion wanted to have the dish chocolate rain, because we weren't quite sure what it was. The menu said it served two, so I agreed to not order anything and share it with him. The waiter brought out a plate with 8 little scoops of ice cream, a plate of fruit, and a fondue pot with chocolate in it. Besides feeling a little strange for sharing a fondue with my companion, I was very curious as to the flavors of the ice cream. There were 4 colors: 1 vanilla-looking, 1 chocolate looking, 1 green and 1 purple. I tackled the green first. I can't tell what it was. My companion couldn't tell. It remains a mystery to me. I guess it was pistachio, but the flavor was very subtle. The purple one was next. There was nothing subtle about it. It was very strong. I asked my companion to confirm my suspicions, and he did: yam flavored ice cream.

Things are going well in Sandakan.

I'll finish with a scripture that has advice we could all use, Alma 41:14 "Therefore, my son, see that you are merciful unto your brethren; deal justly, judge righteously, and do good continually; and if ye do all these things then shall ye receive your reward; yea, ye shall have mercy restored unto you again; ye shall have justice restored unto you again; ye shall have a righteous judgment restored unto you again; and ye shall have good rewarded unto you again. "

Sincerely,
Elder Muffler

Letter #8 Week of 2 April 2008 - First Baptism!

Hello family,

Life continues to get better here in Sandakan.

On Saturday, we had the baptismal service for Johnathon and Joseph Tiga. It was very nice. Joseph asked me to baptize him. I actually said the baptism .. um... I don't think you would call it a prayer or a blessing. Whatever you call it, I said it in Malay. Really, in Indonesian, but Indonesian is just malay that has been changed. Anyway, earlier in the week I asked Elder Dhillon what language he usually did baptisms in, and he said they had always done both baptisms and confirmations (except for the blessing after the confirmation) in english. We decided to change that up. We just got a copy of the missionary handbook in Indonesian (I think it just got translated), so we looked up what to say (I don't know where to get a Doctrine and Covenants in Indonesian).

It seemed like Joseph was very scared to get baptized. I remember what that was like. Do you remember? Do you remember how we had to have the interview in our living room because I cried and didn't want to go to church, and had to practice at the swimming pool before I got baptized? So I knew what Joseph was going through. Joseph was also very scared to bear his testimony in front of people afterwards. He had figured out what he wanted to say, but when he went up, he absolutely froze. It was very touching to see his father, unprompted, go up behind him and start whispering things in his ear.

On Thursday or Friday night, we were in Bandar (the center of town), and we were passing by Tiga Dawi's house on the way to our next appointment, and we saw that Tiga and his wife were sitting on the porch reading the Book of Mormon together. Wow.
I had some adventures this week. On Saturday, we were walking along a paved road looking for some people to talk to, when we came to a little dirt path about 2 feet wide leading off into the jungle. My companion decided to take that, and we climbed down a valley and across a creek and swung on vines and jumped between trees and killed an 8 foot python (well, maybe not those last three- that's just what I was imagining as we were doing the other two).

I think I tasted the most strange thing I have ever tasted in my life. Rosemary (Tiga's wife) had a pitcher with a dark-red liquid in it. I thought it was some kind of fruit punch. I tasted it, and it was kind of sweet, but it also had about a thousand flavors I didn't recognize. It's what they call "rose water"- rose petal extract diluted and mixed with sugar and water.

I heard James Dobson's weekly program in the grocery store. Colorado Springs is the greatest.

I'm glad you got my pictures. I had some more for you, but I forgot my camera today. I bought a USB card reader for 8 ringgit today (about $2.50 USD). Actually, I was going to get one for 50 ringgit at the camera shop, but it wasn't the right kind, and then I saw a computer store on the way to our internet cafe, and they had the perfect one. So, starting next week, I will be able to send you pictures.
I'm still struggling with my malay. My sign language, on the other hand, is getting great. I've learned to say just about anything I want with hand gestures and pointing. No, really, I'm doing all right with my language.

Yesterday, on the bus, a muslim girl asked me in english who we were, and I was able to explain to her in malay who we are and what we do. I was proud of myself. She was shocked that I spoke malay.

My body is adjusting very well to the temperature. I enjoy the heat a lot more than my native companion. I think it feels kind of good to exercise in the morning and have sweat rain out of my pores. I actually feel kind of cold sometimes. We have air conditioners in our room, so I have to sleep with two blankets most nights. One thing that was completely unneccessary, though, was a bath towel. It doesn't matter how well you dry yourself off after your shower, you're going to be soaked again by the time you get dressed.

When we went to the Hiews again, Sister Hiew said the same thing to me "Elder Muffler, after your mission you should marry someone in Sandakan." But this time she capped it off. "Maybe my daughter." My companion told me afterwards that it is a very normal thing, that she tells that to all the American elders. But she's (the mother) still so funny. This week, she was obsessed with the fact that she thought I looked too skinny. "Elder Muffler, you are too thin." "You are losing weight." "You need to eat until you are as big as Elder Dhillon." Don't worry, I'll be careful around them.

In reality, I have been steadily gaining weight. Nearly everything we eat here is fried. Also, all the investigators who have money give us cookies to eat. The big problem is that they refuse to eat more than the elders do, so if they want to eat, they will make sure that we eat more.

Yesterday, we went to a water village. The houses were built on wooden pillars that were cemented to the ocean floor. That was fun. We actually went to a Muslim compound right next to a mosque. Those are always the easiest, because we just ask the Muslims, "are there any Christians around here?" And they'll tell you the exact house they're in. In 2 hours we taught 5 lessons and got 12 new investigators. It was a good day. Going to the water village was really fun, because the people were super friendly.

All the kids think it's the coolest thing when they speak english with the orang putih. They run up to me and say "Hello. What is your name? My name is... " Sometimes they'll tell their friends "Orang putih! Orang putih!" (white person) and I'll say "Mana?" (where?) or "Saya? Saya orang biru." (Me? I'm a blue person.)
If everything goes well, we will have a baptism for each of the next 5 Saturdays.

Can you do me a huge favor and get a few addresses for me? I forgot to bring the addresses of Brady Bearnson, and Caleb Frisby, and Brandon Caywood, and the Lebarons. The only two addresses I have (of people my age) are of James Allen (his mission home) and Tami, just because I remember that one. Also, could you get Spencer Van Wagenen's mission address?

D&C 28:16 described my week pretty well. "And thou must open thy mouth at all times, declaring my gospel with the sound of rejoicing. Amen." The sound of rejoicing. Amen.

With love,
Elder Muffler

Elder Muffler March 2008 Slide Show