Stories

Dear Family,

 So school is back already? That happened fast.

 I can understand Mandarin pretty ok and hopefully by the end I'll also be able to speack quite a bit. Either that or I'll study it in college. Mandarin is super easy if you know cantonese. Hopefully school will be good for everyone this year.

The language is better, still not where I want it to be though. I'm working really hard on it, but feel like I should be progressing faster than I am right now. I can understand a lot better, but I still have trouble speaking. Not giving up by any means though. one of the characters in my full chinese name translates into "doesn't give up" I think it fits pretty well The other character means handsome. also fits well.

 Things are a lot better this week, Leo should be better. He was sick this week so he didn't come to church this week, but we'll meet this week and help him out. Keep praying for him.

My new companion and I are getting along really well. Elder Arrington is super cool, he's super good at soccer, and the ward loves him for it. I feel like we'll do some really good work together this move. We already are progressing really well on getting less actives back to church, which is really good as well.

 It's story time.

 Spiritual: We just barely found a less active who hasn't been to church in over 10 years! We just found his record in our apartment, called him, met with him once, and he came to church this week! You should have seen him, he's 65 and he's walking super fast to get back to church. Turns out he was so busy working that when the new church was built, he never learned where it was. He's retired now, so he's says he's coming back. I wish I were a better story teller. It was really cool. Bishop Choi was so happy to see him back.

 Funny: We find a lot of crazy people here. Cities attract crazy people, and so do missionaries. kind of a bad combination really. Anyway, me and my last comp were out finding in the Chinese boonies right by Mainland when we found this old guy. We said hello and he just kept saluting us. Then he comes up, takes our hands and slaps them, saying, "Ho yeh! Ho yeh!" which in Chinese means good stuff. Then he just walks away. There are a ton of other crazy stories that happen to other missionaries in HK, I just haven't been out long enough.

It feels weird almost not being 18 anymore. I still feel like I should be 18 for a while longer, but I guess not. Thanks so much for the package, hopefully I will get it soon:) also tell Grandma thanks for her package as well. I love you all so much and I hope everything at home is going great.

We're not doing much this pday. We have to help with efy stuff over here. I kinda just want to quietly turn 19 and not make too big of a deal about it. Thanks for the birthday wishes, it's awesome to have an awesome family that will send me stuff too.:) 

I love Winston Churchill quotes. My favorite right now is "it is not enough that we do our best, we must also do what is nessessary" I know that I can only do my best, but the Lord will help me do even better so I can do what is necessary. 

Love

Elder Osborne

New companion

Dear family,

This week was super weird, we had moves so I got a new companion, and all sorts of crazy stuff has been going on. My new comp's name is elder Arrington, he's from texas, I'll tell you more about him later.

Keep praying for Leo! He's been told a lot of anti stuff from one of his christian friends. There's been a lot of anti stuff going on lately. He got confirmed this week though, so that's good. Still need to answer some questions he has though.

Anyway, not much else is going on right now, there will be lots more next week.

I love you all and hope that everything is going well at home.

Love, Elder Osborne

First baptism

Leih ho everybody,

 

 This picture is of me and Leo. Leo is my first baptism! We found Leo through another set of Elders that first contacted him and got his number. At first he said he didn't have a lot of interest in religion, but look at him now! After the first couple lessons, he got a job that had him working on Sundays, which was a huge hurdle for him, but we had a super powerful lesson with him on commandments and keeping the Sabbath day holy with an amazing family in our ward. That week we called him to see if he was coming to church on Sunday and he said he was! He talked to his boss and found out it was totally ok to take Sundays off for church! I think this was his turning point. After that, everything went really smoothly for the next few weeks and now he's baptized! Later in his testimony, he talked about how he was looking for a job for along time, then right after he met us, he found a job, and because it was just a summer job and he finished it just barely, he got a huge bonus when he finished it! So cool! He's also a college student, studying graphic design. He's a bit of a nerd just like me and we both like a lot of the same stuff. I hope I can help him receive more blessings and help him stay active. Hong Kong is full of miracles, I'm so grateful be serving the Lord in this wonderful place!

Today for p-day, we don't have much going on. A 4:00, we will be involved in english EFY, teaching english to our wards youth and some of our younger investigators, so we got have as much time as we normally do. We've also been doing singing practice on monday for a concert thing we'll be opening for. I'll send a couple pics. One is of me and my roommates goofing off about it.

Tons of pictures

Dear Family,

 THAT is why I wanted to send pictures so bad last week, cause Hong Kong is AWESOME!!! So yeah, things are going great over here, another successful week gone by. It sounds like everything back home is also doing well. 

I don't really know what to write this week, it went by so fast! We are still doing really well, still working hard, and still playing hard. Moves calls are coming up soon and Elder Staheli is probably leaving the area cause he's been here so long, so I'll keep you updated on that. Elder Staheli is a great trainer, he's taught me exactly what I need to be an effective missionary. I had no idea how much goes in to keeping things running smoothly here, but he  is teaching me how to manage things. Sheung shui area is very special to both of us. there are so many amazing people here. I'm really grateful to be where I am now. Being a missionary is such an amazing experience. I hope this week I can redouble my efforts and give it my all! I love you all so much and hope you are all doing as great as I am!

Yeah I'm almost positive that I'm staying, President Hawks wants us to stay in our areas longer so we can get to know it and to better serve it. I'm just fine with that, cause Sheung Shui is the best!

Love, Elder Osborne:)

Most of these pics i'm sending today are of last weeks pday. We went down to the island and saw some cool stuff!

This is me and Elder Barker on Zone exchanges. We were in the MTC together. we were all by ourselves doing missionary work in HK for a whole day! 

This is Elder Woods. He's a mandarin elder from springville. He's awesome.