July 23rd

Last Monday we were invited to join the Young Women play soccer (side note: I've never played so many sports in my life as I have on my mission, but I'm getting the hang of it) and gathered in a circle afterwards to hear from: the missionaries. We weren't given a heads-up, so the other sisters went first and Sister Walker and I just spoke briefly about why we came out on a mission and what we've learned from it so far. It was a really fun experience being able to address the youth and something I hope to do again as that was something I would have loved if I'd had sister missionaries in my ward growing up. 

The following Sunday the father of one of the girls at soccer pulled us aside and said his daughter asked him if it was too early to start preparing for a mission. He said it was the first time she'd ever mentioned it, and he just wanted to thank us for being a good example and encouraged that we continue working more with the youth. They have the English sisters for that, but we'll see if we can pop in every so often as well.

The other day after we taught a yiay (the word for grandma), Sister Loy began fishing around her bag for a nickel while yiay took off her shirt. We asked Sister Loy what was going on and she said she was going to coin her. So there's this thing in Cambodia, where if you take a coin and scratch lines into the persons back - not so that it bleeds, but until it turns very red - it releases "bad air" and makes the person feel better. We'd heard of it before and had heard stories of it from our fellow missionaries in the mother country, but had never seen it done ourselves. At first we had Sister Loy do it, but seeing it would take awhile, we pitched in to help. It looks painful, and it lasts several days, but apparently it does hurt and afterwards yiay said she felt a lot better. It's a mystery!

Sunday we had our part-member family come to church, as well as the active Cambodian father and his son from another ward who speak Cambodian. It made Sister Loy and I very self-conscious as we translated/taught a bit of related doctrine to keep the flow because the topic was on pioneers, and everything they went through from crossing frozen rivers to the speaker's friend who had surgery on her eye. Neither Sis. Loy nor I knew any vocabulary for that. But it worked out well, and we had four people at our Sunday school class (excluding us) so it was exciting to have a bigger than tiny group. It's never the same week to week, but we're making progress!

It's crazy how time flies and every day presents its own challenges, but it's rewarding to see a little change in people or to see a little more growth from our efforts. It's all the Lord's work and we're only here to bring the Spirit into the people's lives and guide them back to their Savior, but it's a precious work I have the privilege to be a part of, and I love it.

Sister Dunster

 cleaning moss off a member's roof. It's a lot harder than it looks. 

1. Some service projects we did last week. This is raking up a woman's back yard of old grass, and cutting the new. Before when the bin was full ... and after when we made more space. (below)

                                                    Coining Yiay's back. It looks worse than it is!

                                    Helping scrape/paint primer on a nonmember's home. We had fun. :)

                                                        Eating a chili pepper together.... bad idea.

July 15

We've had abnormally dry and warm weather in Tacoma lately, and we did a lot of service projects, so surprisingly I got a tan! But we got to rake and cut tall grass in this woman's back yard, scrape moss off the roof of a member's house, and scrape/paint primer on a non-member's house which was the most fun because it brought back memories of painting with dad, and most of the ward was there so it was really fun getting to know them better.

We were able to get an eight-year old (whose dad's a member) and her mom on date for later this month on Sister Walker's birthday, so we're working especially hard to make sure we set solid appointments in order to teach them so hopefully everything will go well! The only draw-back is that's the day of transfers, and we have a dinner that day, so it's going to be a little packed.

Sunday was hectic as we had to make sure we had a ride for an investigator we've been teaching for the past like 8 months, who FINALLY came to church!! She's really old, and blind in one eye, so it's taken a lot to get her to come to our church and not go to the Buddhist temple, but she decided to come this week. We also wanted to make sure the family with the two on-date were able to make it, and although they weren't ready when we dropped by their house before church, they got ready and we were able to get them a ride to church! So here we had three investigators, and two recent converts at church, and we were a little late, but Sister Loy and I got the station set up for translating, and did that throughout the meeting. I translated for a speaker leaving on her mission, so it was super easy and made me feel really good about my translation although I know it was help from the Spirit, and I still said a lot of things wrong. Not everyone was able to stay for the rest of church, but after getting them rides, we still had three people attend our Khmer Sunday school!

I'm out of time, and on the way to an exchange, but the church is true, and the work is moving forward!

-Sister Dunster

July 8th

I had a ton of emails today, so here's some of what went on this past week:

We met with the new mission president and his wife, had personal interviews with each of them, and I really like them. 

Three weeks into being the only sister missionaries in the ward, some sisters were transferred in so we're back to having 7 sisters in the zone! That's nice for weekly P-day activities, which we can only have with sisters except for twice a transfer.

For the 4th the Blatters had the nearby missionaries come to a BBQ at the mission home, so we went there for dinner before going home by 8pm. We heard a lot of fireworks beyond the trees and houses, and saw a few scattered behind leaves. Other than that is was a pretty laid-back Fourth.

The first few days of the week were very slow due to potentials and news dropping appointments. One of the worst things to hear from a great investigator is that they will call you when they have time. So we'll be making a lot of calls and drop-by visits to see if we can catch them and continue teaching them, otherwise most of them are still open to us coming - they just don't want to set an exact appointment.

Sunday we had two eligible priesthood men at our Sunday school!!! It was only two, and one can only speak a little bit of Cambodian (some other missionaries' recent Cambodian convert), but it was good to see more people together. We had a total of seven of us there (three of us missionaries), and even though the recent convert will probably not come for a little bit, it was encouraging to get a better picture of what it could be like soon!

Other than that, we finally got things moved around the apartment so we're settled into the trio arrangement now and are excited to have an official study room. We took Sis. Loy shopping at her three favorite Asian stores so we got a good look at the dried shrimp, fresh squid, chicken feet and pig legs. Went through withdrawals when we ran out of rice two days ago, so we were happy to get some more. Yep, we're going Asian.

Love,

Sister Dunster

July 1st

We checked a referral last week that we are really excited about. It's a young mother with an 8 yr old child and a husband, she works at home part time so she has time for us to come over and teach, and she's interested to be learning!! Our first lesson with her was amazing, and we're hoping the second she'll continue to be interested, but she's super sweet, and we're glad to have found someone that's interested that's Cambodian! It's truly amazing how God puts those people in our path because they move around so much, and one complex that doesn't have one Cambodian in it will be full of them three months later. And the majority of the time, if they're not less-actives, they're not interested, so we're really excited to be teaching her.

Last Tuesday after Sis. Loy I dropped off Sister Walker and Noun off to go check some referrals, Walker found out we were going into Tacoma West zone and said "You've been wanting to check where this one less-active is we visited with once months ago. I think she lives here." And found an intersection in the GPS. We checked our referrals in that area then went to go find this less-active I'd been thinking about for awhile and had wanted to check, but the address I'd had was wrong. So finally we go..... and I can't find her house. 

We stopped to say a prayer that if God wanted us to visit her that night that we would be able to, and at the risk of wasting miles I drove around the area in search of her house, searching the GPS for addresses or streets she might be on. Knowing Sis. Walker didn't know where else to look, I started to drive away when the farther away I drove, the more dragged down I felt. Finally I pulled over to call Walker to see if she had any more advice and she suggested trying a different, parallel street. We did, and to my relief we found her!! 

Her daughter answered the door and when we asked if Lay was there she said "Yes, she just walked through the back door from shopping." Lay was very tired, had a night shift, and wasn't sure when she'd have time to meet us, so I asked if we could say a prayer with her before we left. She said yes, and invited us in. We sat down, chatted for a bit, then Sister Loy offered the prayer. I couldn't understand most of what she was saying, but I felt the Spirit in the room, and after she finished Lay confessed they were about to move (outside the mission boundaries) in couple days. I asked if we could help them pack, but she said they were pretty much done and asked for our number, so I told her we could leave the mission upon appointment if she ever wanted us to visit or needed our service. There is no such things as a coincidence!

This week's been super busy as we now have President and Sister Blatter at the head of the mission now (whom we've now met a couple times now and really like), and Sister Noun left for California to visit her mom before returning to Cambodia yesterday, so we're now back to a trio. There's always so much more to say, and so much less time to say it, so, until next week!

IT'S MY HALFWAY MARK TODAY!!! Can you believe it?? I'm officially half-way through my mission! It's crazy how fast it goes!

Love you!

Sister Dunster

                                  My current zone after zone activity yesterday playing Ultimate Frisbee.

                                    #1 Sending Noun off with the President

                                                                  #2 At Zone Activity representing Cambodia!

June 24th

      The end of President and Sister Weavers' service in the WA-TAC is coming to an end this week and we're sad to see them go. By the time I email next week we'll have a new president, and it will be my half-way mark!! Technically it's the 4th of July, but according to transfer schedule I figured Sis. Walker and I leave April 1st (on my birthday!), so we'll be celebrating it then as well as the 4th, (which won't be hard to do).

Sister Loy is the best natural missionary I could ask for. This first week was hard as we walked miles with very little success. I didn't realize how much people rejected us here until she asked if everyone here was this disinterested as apparently in Cambodian people approach the missionaries to ask what they are up to. She's wasn't used to walking so much and we counted down the days before we'd have the car again, since after this week Sister Noun will leave and we'll be a trio, so our walking days are over!! (Well, until October when the new Cambodian sister will be coming. Oh, yeah, another sister's been called Cambodian speaking!) 

Thursday was Park Day, so no one could drive the car and we used the bus to get places. That was the closest we got to a new, was finding an older man who was interested, but was too busy to set an appointment so he said he'd call us. Also, the buses in our area stop going around after six so we accidentally ended up walking (I don't know how many miles yet) home which is in a different zone. Talk about fit!

 It wasn't until yesterday that we found practically three new investigators in a row when checking referrals and Sister Loy and I looked at each other in astonishment by the end. So this week is shaping up to be a good one and I'm excited to see what people will come out of the woodwork to help get this Cambodian group started! Already a Cambodian that was recently baptized... wants to get a hold of us so he can help us get this group started. (...Just so you know, "poaching" is where a missionary teaches an investigator outside his jurisdiction. 'Nuff said.) So we're hoping to see some good progress going soon!

Love you!

Sister Dunster

June 17th

Of all weeks, the week I'm too busy to email - EVERYTHING happens!! I don't even know where to start (if I had changed missions it would almost be as dramatic) and I've been waiting all week for this time to come because there's just so much but I'll try to be logical and start where I left off.....

Ok, so as you know, my trainer and companion for the past 9 months Sister McQuivey's been sick a lot and hasn't been able to get out of the house. Over the course of last week we kept in touch with President and even considered having her work English rather than Cambodian since it's less stressful, but in the end, gave her the option to go home. She was adamant about staying and didn't want to consider the idea, but after a long time of agonizing over the idea, she suddenly became at peace with it. As hard as it was to face the fact, (especially with her only having 4 months left) it felt right. We talked to President about it, and although we didn't know when he would send her home, we figured it might not be for a little bit, and weren't surprised when at transfer calls we would stay together and be training Sister Loy from Cambodia!!

I was fine with the idea of training with Sister McQuivey the first few weeks, that's not so stressful for a new trainer, until when walking into transfer meeting President says I will be the sole trainer...... so I would be a single "parent" a little sooner than I thought. We'd joked that Sister Loy would have abandonment issues with Sister McQuivey (one of her "parents") and Sister Noun (her "grandmother") leaving within the same transfer she just arrived, but I didn't anticipate be the sole trainer so soon! But it's been going well and Sister Loy is the cutest ever!! She speaks about as much English as I do Cambodian, only she can understand more than she speaks, so the majority of our communication is in English, although I try to speak Khmer often to make her more at home. At least she has Sis. Noun here to talk to before she leaves in 2 weeks. But I've getting ahead of myself.

The next day we had a baptism; Brenda's. This didn't happen for my first baptism in Lacey with Say because the ward mission leader there is phenomenal, the ward is very supportive, and we had the elders there helping out, but this time - EVERYTHING went wrong. I doubted whether or not the baptism would go through several times; 

1. The day before Brenda wanted to change the day because she had an important errand and didn't know if she'd have time, so we just changed the time to the evening. 

2. Next, her grandfather Tom decided he didn't want to baptize her, so three hours before the baptism we had to find someone to baptize her while graduation is going on in the ward at which everyone's attending. 

3. Brenda's normal ride had work at that hour and couldn't drive her.

4. The suits weren't in the closet, but the other sisters were preparing for their baptism the coming Saturday, so we had to run back to our apartment to pick up a suit... 

5. Run the sisters to a dinner we couldn't attend and apologize profusely so we could... 

6. Make copies of our program because the copier in the building where the font was wasn't working. etc.

By the time we were in the car on the way to the font (with a headache), and we finally got all the wrinkles smoothed out we realized everyone going to the baptism was doing something... and we were one priesthood holder short. Knowing they'd asked if they could come, and needed anyone available in the next 15 minutes, we called the elders (on bike) and asked them if they could speed to the other building in time to witness Brenda get baptized. 15 minutes and a deep breath later as I sat behind the piano playing my beloved Jon Schmidt hymn music, when who should show up but Brenda's grandfather Tom! He wasn't willing to baptize, and everyone else in her family was to "busy" to watch her make this important commitment, but she had family there!

The baptism went well, Brenda was SO happy (her ride's work schedule was miraculously moved by one hour so it worked out in the end!) and in spite of the water being cold, she was baptized!

Two days later (Friday), it's about 10 am and we get a call from President saying Sis. McQuivey will be leaving in 3 hours. She hadn't even started packing. So we all pitched in in organizing things, and she'd already decided to leave most of her things behind, so it was just a matter of her choosing what to take and leave behind. Those were a stressful and sad three hours as we said our goodbyes, and just like that she left. In mission terms when someone leaves or finished their mission we call that dying. It seemed pretty applicable in this case as one moment, the person I've been with every day 24/7 was there, and then gone. Only in this case we just had to wait four days before we could communicate with her via one email, but it's still quite an adjustment. At least Sisters Walker and Noun are still here, and of course I have Sis. Loy who, poor thing, is going through a very abnormal first week of mission-life.

All that, and our mission President will change in 9 days. Like, I said, the whole mission's practically changed for me. But it's been going well - the sisters went through similar trauma as their investigator got baptized the following Saturday, but we saw them both confirmed on Sunday, and the work is still progressing. My daily diet now consists of rice at every meal with vegetables, and fruit for dessert - thanks to Sis. Loy who loves to cook. (Last night she fried 4 chili peppers with the veggies, but with tissues to my left and a glass of milk to my right, it was really good.) Life is good, and the work is progressing. I will now end the epistle of a mission life-time in one email.

Love you!
Sister Dunster

                 1 Me with Sister Loy, McQuivey and Nanto (Sis. Noun's trainer who trainer sis. McQuivey)

                                                                     2 At Brenda's baptism!

                                               3 Me and McQuivey together for the last time here!

                                                              4 The four of us for the last time

June 6th

Except for a few appointments here or there I go on exchanges with to meet, I haven't gotten out of the house much because Sister McQuivey's been sick. She's making some improvement now so we can leave the house for a few things, but it exhausts her, so we have to go home right after. But Brenda's making progress towards her baptismal date coming up next week, and she's excited. The other sisters have a Cambodian baptism this week too, so it's been cool to have two Cambodians on date at the same time! Both of our investigators have been coming to church, so they've been teaching school in Cambodian the past few weeks and that's the most progress we've made towards becoming a group until someone is called, but it's progress.

Last week I forgot to mention when the Jehovah's Witnesses came to our door. I was doing language study and had no desire to bash with them whatsoever, but when they opened the door they pointed to the picture of Christ we had on the door and said "I see you're a Christian?". I showed them my name tag and at their request explained the process of becoming a missionary, and why we're here. The two women glanced at each other at the mention of prophets, but they listened and shared their message about whether or not misery ends from a scripture in Revelations. I agreed that we do believe there is an end to misery, and took their pamphlet (to add to the vase we have stuffed with those we collect at doors). I thought about trading it with a mormon.org card, but I knew they wouldn't care for it and I didn't want to be pushy. Before they left one paused and said, "You have a sweet spirit." I was surprised, but thanked them. I can now attest that even though they might not be willing to listen, showing respect can still make a huge difference. I love this gospel and I want everyone to feel the power of the full gospel in their lives, but I know everyone will listen in their own time and way, so we might as well love them through the journey.

Sister Dunster