December 15, 2009

The e-mail from this week came on Tuesday, because of transfers being this week. Here's the transfer news:

"Last night was transfer call night. The tension was in the air. The anxiousness was palpable. The air was thick with suspense... and then it came...So president called last night and called Elder Kacher to be his next assistant. That was pretty intense. That means that I will be staying in Leeds and I will be getting a new companion, Elder Rondo from California. So what's new, I'll stay in the same area and get my third companion here. I think president is set in making me serve in as few areas as possible."

About Elder Kacher serving as an Assistant to the President, he had this to say:

"I'm really excited for Elder Kacher, he will do great. If it were a calling I'd sustain him fo sho. It will be kind of weird having him as assistant. I told him last night that I will no longer be sharing anything personal with him in fears of it finding its way to the mission president."

In other transfer news:

"Elder Liu will be moving into our flat in Leeds 1 and will be companions with Elder Johnson. That's so exciting too. It will be weird how we split up Chinese people, we'll see how that goes."

It sounds like he's getting used to the idea of staying in Leeds another 6 weeks, especially with Elder Rondo as his companion:

"So when I heard I'd be staying in Leeds I have to admit that I was a bit disappointed, I kind of wanted to go somewhere else and see some other places and to be honest with you I was kind of hoping to get dropped as a zone leader. I just kind of want to go somewhere new and get a new challenge like opening up chinese work somewhere or training again or helping a younger missionary but I'm really excited to stay here. Elder Rondo is really a great missionary. You probably wonder if that's true because I say it about all of my companions but it is true! Elder Rondo is really good. He is a bit younger than me in mission age and zone leader experience but he is really good and he's done great where he is now. I can't believe how lucky I am to be with him. So work with him should be exciting."

Elder Hansen reported that they only had 2 investigators who came to church with them on Sunday, and he was disappointed by that. In typical Eric fashion, he was quite hard on himself, saying he feels like he has become complacent and needs to improve in many ways. They continue to teach Lillian and the Dindambe family, and are hopeful of seeing progress there in the next few weeks. Other than that, they aren't teaching very many people right now. Christopher (remember Christopher?) came to the First Presidency Devotional, and has been reading the Book of Mormon, but the missionaries aren't really teaching him much right now.

Because he has a companion who doesn't speak Chinese, we asked what he does when he teaches Chinese people:

"Usually I teach mostly in Chinese and mix in some English to help Elder Kacher know where we are in the lesson and then he can put in a few words and bear testimony. When I teach completely in Chinese he falls asleep 9 times out of 10 and that's no good lol. Awww I'm gonna miss Elder Kacher, what a flying star. We'll just have to be BYU buddies."

Interesting change of plans for their preparation day:

"As for other news, today we had a huge p-day planned for a big hike but Elder Kacher and President threw a wrench in that. Elder Kacher is in the mission office right now getting his AP training and President asked me to come in for an interview this afternoon. Not too sure what that's about but I'll tell you later...I'll probably tell you on Christmas Day!"

And finally, his pre-Christmas thoughts and feelings:

"So anyways I think over the past 24 hours I have had a lot of different emotions but I am very excited to get on with it and light it up with Elder Rondo! It is gonna be intense!... I'm really excited for Christmas in Leeds. It will be really good. I'll tell you next week when I will call. When you e-mail me next please tell me appropriate times to call and then I'll give you the final word. I'll try to webcam if possible."

Needless to say, we were hoping he would be able to webcam, but looking forward to hearing from him either way. Watch for an update in next week's e-mail.