August 10 2012 - New Missionaries & Transfers

New Missionaries arrive!  9 elders and 3 sisters from Provo.   Lots of excitement today anticipating their coming.  We got to the airport and thought we were plenty early because it was still not even their arrival time, and we knew it would take a while to get baggage, get through customs, etc.  We looked, didn’t see them coming out.  Then Elder Pearon looks over another direction and says—there’s a group of missionaries over there!   They had been out and waiting for us for 10 minutes!  We felt so terrible.  But to be fair they were very early to be there and already through customs and visas and baggage.  Anyway, it was fun to meet and greet them.  We took photo at airport, then loaded up one van with luggage, one van with elders and our car with sisters.  The AP’s took the elders to a market area and did contacting with them for about an hour.  The office elders and some other elders met them there.  We had felt really good about having them jump in and be able to do some real missionary work as soon as they got here.  They have not done that before in this mission, at least not recently.  But we tried it.  It was really good.  The AP’s said it was an amazing experience.  All the new missionaries were paired up with an experienced missionary and they did contacting, mostly letting the new missionaries do the talking.  They gave away Books of Mormon, got contacts to follow up on, and were able to try out their language skills.  The experienced elders say this group has very good language skills already.  We were at the mission home with the sisters preparing lunch and making ready for the orientation.  

We also loaded all the luggage out of the van into the foyer.  It was quite a sight with luggage for 12 elders filling the first floor.  The new missionaries all seemed to really like the opportunity to jump in quickly to do some missionary work.  Once they got back to the mission home we had a lunch of sandwiches and fruit with them.  Then we took some photos in front of the mission home with them and started an afternoon of orientation.  

We had four rotations.  The whole thing lasted about 3 hours.  I did interviews with each of them.  That was a wonderful experience.  I had been praying for inspiration as to which trainer to assign each of them to, and had made a list of the trainers so I could refer to it as I talked with the new elders, but I did not expect to have such clear and unmistakable impressions while I was interviewing the new elders as to who they should serve with.  It was just as if a voice was speaking to my mind very clearly and matter of factly.  “He should serve with Elder so-and-so”.  I have rarely felt such clear impressions.  It was a real testimony to me that Heavenly Father cares about these new missionaries, cares about who they serve with, and is really directing this work.  I felt a great deal of peace about the assignments we made.  While I was doing interviewing, other missionaries were having orientation with the office couple about money things, apartments, bikes, and others were meeting with the AP’s learning about our mission rules, schedules, things about doing missionary work here.  Others were with office elders having visa pictures taken, learning about our mission organization, and e-mailing their parents at home to tell them they got here safe.  Kathryn met with the ones I wasn’t interviewing in our rotation group and just talking tot hem and showing them some slides of missionary work in Cambodia that the elders had given her.  We finished about 5:30pm. 

We had a short devotional with them, we had planned on a testimony meeting but they were falling asleep and tired and we didn’t have time.  So we had dinner together with them upstairs in our family dining room, we had lasagna and fruit and bread.  Then we sent them all to bed.  

Friday was even quite a day—transfer day, new and departing missionaries.  We were up early and preparing for the orientation and training meetings.  Got breakfast out for the new missionaries—had the office elders buy some rice/pork stuff so they had some local food.  Then we had an orientation meeting with them for a couple of hours.  I spoke about missionary work and what our focus should be on here, used a slide show to help.  Kathryn talked about the 10 commandments of health and safety, went over a lot about cleaning food, staying sanitary and getting medical help.  Then I announced their assignments – companions and areas—to them and we excused them to do personal study and met with their trainers, who had all arrived by that time, for 1 and a half hours.  Went over the 12 week training program with them.  Then had lunch with all of them up on the outdoor deck, pizza we had ordered in and fruit, and then did a meeting with all the trainers and trainees together, again about the 12 week training program and some other general missionary things.  

It was about 1:00 by that time and all the missionaries from all over the mission were arriving at the mission home for transfers.  It was crazy, with the first floor completely filled with missionaries, very loud everyone excited to see people they hadn’t seen for a long time, meeting new companions, etc.  In the afternoon I interviewed our 3 departing missionaries and formally released Sister Loy since she lives in Siam Reap, part of our mission district, so I am also her stake (district) president.  By the time we got done the families of Sis. Loy and Elder Oleson were just arriving to pick them up—that was a tender moment to see their reunions.  Many members came to say their goodbyes to them as well.  Then we invited them all upstairs and had a dinner of Khmer “stew” & rice and fruit with them and their families.  As we started dinner we received a phone call that the sisters returning to HCMC in Vietnam were stuck at the border unable to leave the country.  Sis. Lam had an expired visa.  They did not have enough money to pay what was required to update it and continue.  The bus they were on was going to leave them—it had to continue.  They had no phone so were borrowing one from a stranger in the little town there.  We decided we had no choice but to send the AP’s in a car to go rescue them.  5 hours away.  But then they called back and had been able to withdraw enough money out of an ATM to pay the necessary fees for the expired visa and get on the bus… we hoped.  They didn’t have a phone and so couldn’t confirm they were on the bus.  The lady whose phone they had borrowed said had left.  So we had the elders turn around back home again and were able to confirm later that night that the sisters got through ok and to HCMC.  Thankfully.  The Lord was watching out for them and opening up doors for them.  We had a testimony meeting with the departing elders and their families—it went much longer than we had anticipated, but the parents shared very heart felt testimonies.  And hearing the testimonies of the departing missionaries was such a spiritual treat.  We took Elder Mickelson to the airport and said goodbye -- we decided we like the part about welcoming new missionaries better than the part about saying goodbye to departing missionaries!