Elder Baird's Something About Socks: WEEK 78 TAIPEI/TIANMU: The ATM ate my credit card.... Yum Yum Yum!

Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello, We welcome you today, Hello, Hello Hello

What the hello is wrong with that song? In 12 words 8 of them are Hello. That is so crazy. They really should extend their vocabulary. Like throw in some sesquipedalian words or something. I mean seriously.

I'll probably use that again sometime.

Anyways, let's start out real quick with Monday where I did a huuuuuge hike and it was huuuuuge. Like so uge. 'uge'

The top was all cloudy and super fun. It was a tall hike. Not a long one, but steep! Loved it so much.

Then a member took us out for lunch and we made sure that we got all of our preparation done for the week. Except for buying bananas, I bought bananas on Friday.

Sue me.

Then we moved on to Tuesday like most days do after Monday. I say most because I've gone from Monday to Monday before. Plane rides mate. But anyways Tuesday started out right by getting a text saying our lessons weren't going to show up. Sadness. But then we met with a lady from Salt Lake who talked to us about our Facebook page and she was all like, "Yall are doing really good in the Asia area" And I was like, 'dope, that totally didn't go straight to my head', and then she found out that we was just two lone missionaries in the facebook world and she was lie 'WOWOWOWOWO' and that was crazy.

I think that we may be the only mission in the entire world that doesn't do facebook finding. Like the only one in the entire world.

That's weird... I mean we also have the only open temple in the entire world so *mic drop*

Anyways, then we ran around the office like we were doing important things and then we left to go to District Council. I trained on teaching with your companion in unity, and it went really really well! We all learned a lot and the spirit was there and that is about all I could ask for in my trainings!

Then we had a lesson with a really really smart guy. And sadly I think he may be too smart for the gospel... But we are going to try to help him! So yeet. I couldn't understand like half of his Chinese it was so advanced. But that is okay.

Anyways, on Wednesday I learned something cool "Good things come to those who do the right things for th right reasons" Like I feel like I already knew that, but I heard it in a talk and it really resonated with me!

I know that as a missionary I am doing the right things. I'm obedient and I talk to people, but sometimes I realize that my reason might not be 100% right. Sometimes I'm just doing the work to do it. I'm really focusing on making sure that every time I do the work I am doing it because of my love for God. It's hard to always feel the crazy strong love that I have for God. Like there are times where I am just like " I LOVE GOD SO MUCH!!!!!" And I just feel it in my soul and it's consuming.

But a lot of the time I'm just living my life trying to do my best. I don't have those strong emotions all the time. No one does. And so it's hard to make sure that everything I do in my mission is because of my love for God. And I've realized that I'm going to be working on this for the rest of my life. Living life because I love God, not just living because I'm already on this earth so why not.

These are hard things I think. But I think the only way to do it is to make sure that we are constantly having experiences with God. We are always thinking about him in every thought which is hard!

Recently I have had an alarm on my phone that goes off every hour that reminds me to pray. And honestly sometimes I'm like "Nope, too busy doing missionary work to pray right now" and I keep going.

Guys,

HOW STOOOOOPID IS THAT? How do I not have time to pray while I'm literally doing the work of the person that I'm praying to?

It's like you at work and your Boss is like, "Hey, come have a seat, I can see your stressed let me help." and you respond "nope boss, sorry I'm too busy doing all the stuff you told me to do to talk to you."

Silly silly humans we are. But yah I'm working on it.

Anyways, back to Wednesday.

Then began the longest drive of my mission. Which isn't that hard because I don't drive a lot in my mission. But I'm going to try to explain this in Utah terms so that people understand.

Imagine you're in Lehi. And you're going to drive to Mapleton. Okay. Except the freeway is only 50MPH and the roads are tiny and there's motorcycles everywhere.

So we drove to Mapleton (Spanish Fork) and picked up some ond missionaries bikes that they had left there. Then we drove down to American fork (on the 50mPh freeway) and had English group.

Then we drove up to Provo to pick up some more bikes.

And then finally home to Lehi.

And while that doesn't sound that bad. Doing that in Taiwan and a foreigner in the rain is terrifying. Let it be said. Let it be written.

On Thursday I burnt my cheese melt. Like the cheese turned black it was that bad... Oh well.

Then we got an order of calendars that we had ordered (as most calendars are ordered) and we opened up 4000 of them and every single one was on the wrong type of paper.

So we had a conversation with our printer guy.

Luckily he's getting us new one. So crisis averted.

Then I worked on a script with a Sister that we are going to film an interview of for our Facebook page so that I can give it to President so that President can give me money to go and buy fun equipment like lights and microphones! Yay!

Then we drove up to our area and did missionary things (I forgot)

On Friday I bought bananas. And I bought ink for my fountain pen. That made me happy.

Friday was kind of rough. Felt like nothing was going right in our area and that I hadn't done a ton on my mission. We basically spent the whole day in the office which just is always hard. Makes you feel off. But I also realized that I hadn't been super focused on my purpose that day. And when you aren't focused on your purpose, you feel like you don't have a purpose.

Imagine that!!!

Whoever writes these emails is a genius or something.

Yah we made a cool video for President's birthday though, and it made him happy so that's all I care about!

Then on Saturday I tried to take money out of my card. And it wouldn't work. So I went to a different ATM and it was like "bro this is the wrong password" and I was like "you atm machine dude, this is the password I've used my whole life don't tell me that it's wrong"

So I tried a couple more times and then gave up. Figured my card was frozen or something.

So my companion spotted me change for dinner like a nice guy. So nice guy. He's a nice guy.

Then we had a crazy mountain drive. It wasn't as long as the drive on Wednesday. But it was way crazier. We were drivnign all over the mountains in Taiwan and then hiking around in the dark and it was kind of crazy. We were visiting some Less Actives and they lived so up in the mountains.

And guys it's the jungle out there. So we in the dark walking up to dark house with dark dogs everywhere and oh it ws soooo fun! But terrifying. But fun!!!!

We didn't fall off any of the tiny roads, so that's a win in my book.

Then Sunday we went to church like most good missionaries. Then partook of the sacrament like most good missionaries. And then we talked to a bunch of families and they didn't care which was kinda sad. Oh well

Then the finance guy told me to try my card again. So I did. And the machine ate it.

And that's when I realized I'd been using the code for my at home credit card. Not my mission one. I felt pretty stoopid.

Then had our fireside and we had a crazy miracle!

So I'm in charge of the tech for the firesides, mics, cameras, go pros, phones, Facebook lives. And so we were using Presidents phone to do some recording, and he had forgotten to charge it. And so in the middle of the Facebook live it pops up with the 'low battery' now this is no good because we have no way to charge it cause Apple is idiotic and things that if you put the aux and charging female end in the same place then you're fine. So yah. That's whatever.

But we had no way of charging and 20% battery to last the rest of the time. So I started to get really really nervous. So I said a prayer and was like "Heavenly Father, we need the battery to last for the rest of the fireside. Please make this work"

And for those of you who know Apple phones. When they hit low battery they go FAST. So after I preyed I was jus tlike, well nothing to do know but have faith.

And guys. They said the closing prayer, I go to turn off the camera and the phone shuts off. The phone lasted to the very last second!!!! Crazy miracle. God is real. And that is that!

Love you all! Send me an email!

Elder Baird