Merry Christmas from Taiwan!!!

We got to Skype with Silas on Christmas Eve. It was already Christmas Day there in Taiwan, or as it is known to most Taiwanese -- just another Sunday. He was Skyping at church, before church meetings started. He is still the same Silas we know and love. As always, he said a lot of funny things. We got to see what a Chinese computer keyboard looks like. It looks similar to ours, but it has Chinese characters on it. He told us some funny mission stories and, at our insistence, he spoke a little Chinese for us, and we had a big Q&A session about life in Taiwan. He eats a ton of seafood and rice. We got to meet his companion Elder Meanea. He seems like a good guy. We miss Silas, but we know he is where he is supposed to be right now.  Being able to Skype with him was a highlight of our Christmas!!

This afternoon, we got his usual P-day email. It was Monday in Taiwan. Here is his email:

Hello! ........Again.

Yeah Skyping was really fun yesterday! It was really hard to work after but... Worth it! Yeah that night we literally just rode around and explored our area. We went to the baseball stadium and it was really cool actually. Apparently previous elders have done "baseball game contacting." ....I might want to try that.

Sounds like Christmas was a good time! I can't wait to be home for that again. That'll be really fun.

Last night, we had to explain to our Bishop what Panda Express was. He was weirded out. Hahaha, we were laughing so hard. We were eating some Christmas Chinese dinner with him and they always ask us if we eat this stuff in America. And we always say not really. Then I explained to him what Panda Express entails. We told him it was super fake Chinese food. I think he was Googling pictures. He wasn't sure what the freak we were talking about. He thought it was super weird. I don't know, he was just weirded out that we called it "Chow Mein". It's actually pronounced "Chao Mi-en" I'm going to be so cringed out when I go back to America and try to order something in Chinese.....

I've come to terms with the Chinese language. I just take it one day at a time....I'm not sure if I'm going to learn how to write well, but I'm definitely going to be really good at reading. That's why I've been pushing so hard for reading. Because actually, Taiwanese people are forgetting how to write. So I said, "不用!" (no need to). Yeah, I'm going to learn how to read.

This is my friend Anthony eating ice cream in our pews at the church. He's like 68.  He loves learning English and he claims us as his grandsons. He says hilarious stuff. He likes to buy missionaries ice cream. He's not baptized, but he claims he's been baptized before, because he's been to a ton of baptisms, and he stood right next to the font and the water splashed him.  So, he counts it. Hahahaha!

This week was actually really good! Thanks for the Christmas packages!

Hello!

This week was actually really good! I've assured my dominance as the Fearless Leader Elder Burge. Everybody fears me. Yeah, I had my 1st District Training Meeting (DTM) and everybody said it was alright. I thought it was alright too. Just a regular DTM. I'm glad you got my letter informing you that I'm now the District Leader. Yeah, it's not that bad. DTM's aren't very fun...

This week we met A LOT of cool people. We met Douglas who has really good English and a good interest in the gospel. But, he doesn't live in our area so we had to give him away.... Then we met Johnny at a park. He's 18 and doesn't really have a life or direction. He's super awkward and talks really quiet and really fast. So I'll ask him, "Are you going to college?" He'll say "-No." Really fast. It's really hard to understand him but he seems accepting of most of what we teach him. He believes that God doesn't exist because science can't really prove it. So... He came to church for all 3 hours though and we're meeting with him in a couple of days.

We had a lot of stuff happen this week. We're preparing for the Zone Conference. So we have to do a musical number as a Zone. So we were all singing this hymn trying to get it figured out. Then all of the sudden my old companion ( now zone leader) says, "Hey Elder Burge plays guitar." Then all of the sisters were like, "WOW, YEAH, GET ELDER BURGE TO PLAY GUITAR YEAH!" I was like oh freak, I don't know how to play this freaking hymn. So they ran and got a guitar and brought it to me... Surprisingly I couldn't figure it out. So they told me to take it home and practice the hymn. I didn't have a case so I had to bike 20 minutes. Fortunately, I had brother Elder Randolph the secretary of our mission and former Army guy, help me create a bagging system for the guitar. Needless to say, a few bags and pins and tape and I got the guitar home in one piece. It was super ghetto. Then an Elder called and said he could swap me out and play violin instead. So I said OK. So now I have a guitar and I don't have to make a dang fool of myself in front of all of the Taizhong Zones. Score.

I also received both packages from Grandpa and Grandma Burge and yours as well. Thank you!! The candy is much needed. I love American candy hahah! Thank you for the pajamas it was SUPER cold this week. So all items of clothing were used. We also got these really cool flying monkey slingshot things from the Grandparents. We love them. We think it's really funny. They also gave us ping-pong paddles and stuff. Which is SUPER useful because we have a ping-pong table in our basement of our apartment ready to use. We just didn't have any paddles. So this week is going to be fun!

My new companion is pretty cool. He was really into Theater and stuff before the mission. He was even in Civil Air Patrol so we did a little bit of some military talk. We get along just fine! His Chinese is already super good. Kind of makes me feel a little bad. When I was being broken I didn't know anything! Hahaha! He reminds me a lot of Elder Tatton. My Breaker.

Yeah, right now we're trying to build the area up. We've been seeing a lot of success and stuff! Hopefully things will continue to get better!.

I'm glad that there will be a massive sleepover for Christmas! We will try and Skype you at 5 pm on Christmas Eve.

My new companion is Elder Meanea!!!

Hello!

For starters this week was also pretty bad. Elder Wilkinson moved to BeiChu as our new Zone Leader. Now I'm senior companion AND district leader. My new companion is Elder Meanea from Cedar City, UT. He just got done out of training...

I'm still in Beitun and it's just burning down right now. We don't have any investigators or anything. It's just super bad. So, my numbers are probably going to be crap but whatever. I actually think it's kind of funny. Not much happened this week as me and Elder Wilkinson worked. Just lots of contacting busy business men and former prostitutes. Nothing much.

On Saturday we got to go to this place in NanTun. It was a lady's house because she wanted us to practice/perform a Christmas activity for the Young Women in our stake. So we went over to her apartment with all of these other elders and sisters. Her apartment is super fancy... Her husband works for freaking Google so it was SUPER fancy. We took the elevator to the 28th floor of their apartment building and it was this really beautiful area overlooking Taizhong City. You could see so much. It looked like New York City from up there. Then the sun was setting and it was super pretty, so I reached for my camera.... didn't have my camera... of course. We practiced and it was insanely pretty. Then we ate Costco pizza in her SUPER fancy apartment.

The next day we performed and President Teh gave a really good talk. It was really fun. We had an Elder who's been invited to go to Julliard for piano play for us. He was super good. I think it's rumored that someone recorded it and is sending it to our parents. I don't know when he's emailing that though. I assume really soon. Maybe he won't do it. I don't know. I thought it was really good.

Other than that.... That's basically my week. Not much to say... Just a lot of the same stuff. I got a package today, but I'm not sure who it's from. It hasn't been shipped to my apartment yet.

Glad to hear Kayleigh is trying to date lonely SLCC RM's.

Good luck Ale on driving!!

I love you all so very much. We will definitely be Skyping next week. I don't know when or how.

Probably one of the worst weeks of my mission

Hey!

Thanks for mailing the package! Also thank you Grandpa and Grandma Burge for mailing one too!

Christmas sounds crazy in the states as usual. I'm glad everything is also equatable to how many shotguns they could get. That's so funny.  I miss the Christmas shopping tradition. It's so fun.. Good times.... Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles!

Unfortunately, this week was probably one of the worst weeks of my mission. This week our numbers were pretty much straight zeros. We didn't teach any lessons this week. It started off with my bike tire exploding on Tuesday night and then we had 3 lessons set up and they all stood us up and then it was raining too so we had to look for a bike store in downtown Taizhong. Unsuccessfully, we had to leave my bike at the mission office and I had to take a spare home. The spare bike is much nicer than my regular bike hilariously enough. My bike is a piece of crap... The next day we got my bike tire fixed and I was riding around when my bike tire started to make some weird noises. So we took it to a bike shop and had to replace the axle in my bike. So I spent quite a bit of money on my bike this week.

We also had a weird random family come into the church bawling and crying about their dying Mom in the nearby hospital. So we sat down with them and talked to them. It was weird because they basically told us that they wanted us to heal their dying Mom... We told them that we couldn't heal their Mom and they just bawled even more and stormed out.. It was super depressing.

To make the week better we went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders again.. I actually had a decent time on exchanges. We were in the Zone Leaders' area of downtown Taizhong. I forgot how nice people are outside of Beitun. It was actually enjoyable to contact people. But when we got back to our area we received a rude reminder that no one in Beitun likes missionaries.

Transfers are coming up and next week I could possibly have a new companion. But, were guessing we might stay together another transfer. It's very possible. The President has made small hints that me and Elder Wilkinson will be together. He's a good missionary. It's hard to stay motivated in our area and about missionary work overall. We got wrecked super bad this week and we're both really discouraged. Yesterday I got to call a former investigator and he basically went off in English about how Joseph Smith is a liar and I'm part of a heretical church...just adding onto the already bad week...

I'm glad that everyone back home is doing well! I'm very grateful for the emails and packages! They keep me going.

Love you! I can't wait to talk to you on Skype sometime. Not sure when.