So here it is, the end of my time here in Cupertino. I have officially ended here starting today. I will move on to other areas of the Lord's vineyard here in this fine mission. This week has been an amazing week for sure, and I am grateful that I was able to end in such a way to make it the best week ever.
I think this week has been really awesome, we worked hard and it paid off, and I had a feeling I was going to be getting transferred all week, so I started preparing mentally for this change.
I am grateful for the time I spent here, I love the Branch President, President Law, he is just the best, and I love the Branch Mission Leader, Brother Davis and his family. They are also just awesome. It's been a good week, of ups and downs.
The biggest thing this week really was working towards new investigators, and so we tried hard, but it didn't seem to pay off just yet. Just when we thought things weren't doing well, on Sunday we had a gal that has been coming to church every week get invited by a member to take the lessons and she said yes. Super cool. Her name is Angela, and she just graduated from grad school, and so right now she is job hunting here in the South Bay Area.
Ellie and Rittas lesson this week also went pretty awesome, we planned on teaching the law of chastity and also go over the baptismal interview questions with them. The Law of Chastity was easy for them no problems, and going over the baptismal interview questions was not that bad either, they had a lot of questions about the interview questions and all of that but it ended up being really good. Up to this point Ritta has not prayed at all with us, and we were pretty determined to help her pray. So we were going to pray to end, and it was brought up about baptism again by Sister Davis, and Ellie said she was going to be baptized for sure, she said "I really like December 7th, but that's tomorrow, so how about next December 7th?" she was being serious and probably not serious at the same time, but we are pretty sure that she will be baptized very soon. They were both worried a bit that I wasn't going to be there since I was probably being transferred, but I assured them I was going be to able to come back and be there. We wanted to end, and I asked Ritta to pray, and she was communicating to me with her expressions saying "I don't even know what to say!" But we all just told her that it was okay, and she prayed, and it was really good. She said "I want to join the church once I know more" and so it was an awesome prayer.
Christina! I will miss her so much, she has become like a little sister to me, she is just a funny gal. Sunday was her 14th birthday, and so now she is 14 years old, and she is doing so well with everything. We met with her on Wednesday night instead of Sunday because of scheduling stuff, but I was on exchanges with Elder Baldwin, and it was a good lesson helping her understand more on baptism and the atonement, and she seems to understand those basics really well. She is learning English rather quickly, but according to her mom, not as quick as all of the other friends of hers that were adopted, but she is getting there for sure. I will truly miss her!
Another person that hasn't had a very good time lately is Wu Tao, he was going to be baptized a few months ago, well now his visa has been denied twice, and his current visa will expire on Dec 23. He is currently appealing, and so if he doesn't win the appeal, he will have to be forced out of the US sometime in the next couple of weeks. Pretty sad, he made dinner for us on Thursday night, and it was really good. Too many bones though, little fishy bones and pretty annoying. I will miss Wu Tao as well quite a lot.
Sunday was a pretty bittersweet day going to church for the last time here, everyone was very surprised that I was going, and I was able to talk to nearly everyone and able to share my testimony and my thanks during Sacrament meeting. Pres. Law isn't too happy that I am leaving the area, he called last night and asked if we had dinner, and we said yes, so he asked how he could get me to come to his house instead, so I told him we could go on splits, and then that would enable me to go visit a few last people before I left for good on Tuesday. So Tonight we are going to split up and i'm going to Pres Laws house and Elder Fisher is going to Ren Feiyan's house to help her son with math stuff. That worked out really well.
The Christmas Party was another fun part of the week, we had it on Saturday night (it was 40º here in Silicon Valley that night, a blistering cold for the people out this way) so we all came and had a great party in the church, with all sorts of Chinese food, from every scope of the Chinese world, Northeast China, South China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singaporean. All there, it was delicious and there was nearly 20 non-members there that night. It was awesome, we had a skit about a normal day in missionary life that we did, with Elder Pekipaki as Santa Clause and it was really funny. It was a real crowd-pleaser.
Well that was just about my week here, I am pretty sad to leave, but so ready for a new start. Pray for me this week that i'll be able to do well in my new area. I am going English speaking for 2 transfers for sure, by the way.
Love you all,
Have a great week!
Elder Sanchez
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