Christmas!!!

Hey Everyone!

Wow, what a week! Christmas, caroling, dinners, I don't even know where to begin! Lots of stuff happened, and we're still trying to find solid people to teach!  Lots of finding is still happening, but not many people have been wanting to learn more for the past week. I'm not really sure why. But it was still a fun week!

Monday, we went to Keke and Nicholas' house in the evening and had a nice little family home evening. That was a lot of fun! Keke is so funny, because she always takes pictures of the food before we eat it.   For some reason, she loves pictures of food she cooks. I’m not really sure why. Every single time she cooks, she takes a million pictures of it before she lets us eat. She's so funny.

Tuesday, we had zone meeting first thing in the morning, so we snagged a taxi down to KL. After a good training on obedience, we ate a quick lunch, and had to hurry back so the Chinese elders could make it to an appointment. We didn't want to pay for 2 separate taxis, so we all went back together. Fun fact, taxi in Malay is ‘teksi’. Once we were back, we went contacting for 5 hours. We went to look at the national squash center, because I wanted to know what it was. It was closed though, so we just talked with a bunch of people to and from there. We visited Sister Saffron at work, and grabbed some ice cream called PI's. The usual. It's always easier to contact for 5 hours when you have destinations to walk to while you talk with everyone.

Later that night, we met with a referral from other missionaries named Anna. It turns out, Anna is from Bangladesh, and she's engaged to this guy named Ayaz from Saudi Arabia. Pretty diverse huh? They have a little bit of potential. We'll see what happens with them. They ended up not coming to church, so we might never teach them again if they keep not answering their phones. We'll see!

Wednesday was pretty fun! We had to finish our Christmas cards for an orphanage that Sister Saffron volunteered us to make the cards for. We all got together and drew random pictures on all the cards and a ton of huge English words. They only speak Chinese, so they wouldn't even be able to understand simple English.  They got cards that didn't even make sense, but they all ended up loving them. We went over to the Snellson's for dinner too, so that was awesome.

Thursday... Hmmm. We contacted all day, then went to the church to give the cards out to the orphans. They were all so funny, because they'd just touch our white skin. They were so fascinated with us! So that was fun! We had to leave the party early to go to Sister Stephanie's to teach Kok Cin. Kok Cin is a super sincere guy, and he's honestly looking for the truth. He really likes sister Stephanie. She's like a mom to us AND to him.  She's great. He's Taoist, and she used to be. They get along really well. We had an awesome lesson on the Plan of Salvation, mainly focused on the Atonement, and he decided he really did need to come to church every week to receive an answer. That was great!

Friday we had exchanges! I went with Elder Tennant (the guy I got famous with) and dominated the Chinese area. All the lessons were in Chinese, so I can't tell you how they went. We had a ton of fun going around to different stores talking with people, and an owner of a store even gave us free soda because he liked us so much!  That was awesome. They love seeing white people that can speak Chinese. I taught English Class, and it was actually a lot of fun!

Saturday, we had English class, then we taught Shena, then Joyse, then a new person named Yeun, then Erica. That took forever. Then we went caroling for the rest of the night!  It was a ton of fun to teach four lessons in a row! None of the lessons seemed to really stick out, but they were all good! We went caroling at two hotels. At the first one, a Japanese lady was standing about 5 feet away and dancing really funny. It was awesome. She was eating up the Christmas music. At the next hotel, there was another lady that did the same exact thing!  I was happy to make them happy! One of them came up to us after and told us it was the best Christmas of her entire life! Haha!

Sunday was awesome. We had church, then taught Kok Cin (which went really well by the way. I can't really remember what was said, but the Spirit was really strong), then we had a huge lunch, went to an American's house down in KL and had another huge lunch, then went straight to the Lim's after to have a huge dinner. I was absolutely stuffed. I'm still full. It was mega good though.

This morning, we Skyped our families! It was awesome! I loved it! Best skype I've done in my entire life. Can't wait to do it again in 5 months! It'll come faster than you think! Thanks for supporting me! You're all awesome! Have a great week! And have a Happy New Year!

Love,

Elder Ben Mullins

Sorry the letter was a little short today. We didn't have much time since we Skyped!

Kristoforus

Elder Forsyth and Mullins

Cool fountain

Train

I got presents!

I opened presents!  Thanks everyone!

Building Up That Teaching Pool

Hey Everyone!

This week went by really fast, and we didn't even teach a ton of lessons!  That was pretty crazy! We ended up dropping everyone we were teaching, so we have a fresh slate, and we're finding some really good people now! Malaysia is great, I'm still famous here, and it's always fun to go out and do missionary work!

Monday, we took some pictures for P Day for a Christmas card to send to everyone in the branch! It's pretty awesome. It was actually a lot of fun to think of a bunch of ideas, but we finally settled on one. I'll send the picture once my family gets the picture in the mail. Other than that, we didn't do a ton on Monday. We just talked with people mostly.

Tuesday morning, we got a call from Winson, an inactive in the branch, and he was SOBBING. We couldn't understand anything he was saying, so we told him we'd run over to his work and talk with him there.  We got ready as fast as we could, and ran to a hotel nearby. We got there, called him, and he says, "Nevermind, it solved itself. We're good."  We just went back home and started our studies. We thought he was dying or something, and then it turned out nothing really happened.  When we got home, we made up a story to tell to the Chinese Elders. We told a horror story, and the Chinese Elders totally believed it until I started laughing. They were freaking out saying, "NO WAY! THAT DID NOT HAPPEN!", but then we kept going on and they'd keep believing it. It was hilarious.

Later in the day, we painted a member's house white. It was a ton of fun to paint for a few hours, and the house looked good. We just had to put a few more coats of paint on the next day and it'd be finished. After we finished painting, we taught a funny little family; Ann, Vincent, and their boy, Vanness. They're such a funny family. Ann and Vincent want their son to grow up to be like the missionaries, and they decided they'd meet with us and learn why we are the way we are. My favorite question they asked was: "So you guys don't worship any statues of Jesus or anything?" They were super surprised that we don't worship statues of Jesus... Roman Catholics... Anyway, they miiiiight have potential. They came for the wrong reasons, but they might stay because they realize that they need the gospel!

Wednesday, we finished painting the house in about an hour, had some Malaysian pizza (not even close to as good as American pizza), then went contacting until our lesson with Keke and Nicholas. We had an awesome lesson on how they can continue to learn and grow, and we ended up setting up family home evening with them for the next year!  Every single Monday, including tonight, we're going to go to Keke and Nicholas's house for family night! It'll be great! I'm excited! They're awesome members. Members that Elder Forsyth and I BAPTIZED!!!

Thursday was a great day. Everything with contacting kind of clicked on Thursday. I finally get it. Before, I had a hard time genuinely caring about everyone I talked to, but somehow, I found a way to really care about everyone we talk to. And it has made my contacting really effective. It's been great! We had a ton of success on Thursday with contacting, and we met a lot of people that I really connected with.  Throughout the week, we've had the same success!  Our teaching pool should be bigger by next week!

Friday, we met with George, one of our recent converts. It turns out, he sells gems and otherfor a living. So that's really cool! I thought he was just in school right now, but he does that on the side.  We had a cool lesson on the priesthood, and he's pumped to get the priesthood now. He goes to Liberia later this week, so he'll get it after he gets back.

We had English class Friday, and 27 people showed up! It was awesome!  We got a few new investigators out of it too! Most of them only speak Chinese. Well, all but one actually, so we got a new investigator named Joyse, and the Chinese Elders got a lot of new investigators.

Saturday, we had English class again, and got another new investigator! Her name is Yeun! She's awesome. After English class, she asked if we needed help with anything, and we told her we were just going to make Christmas cards, and she helped us make all of the cards! Then she asked if we needed anymore help, and we said we didn't, but the Chinese Elders said she could go contacting with them if she wanted. So guess what?  She did! She went contacting with the Chinese Elders. She's Buddhist, but talked to everyone they walked past about Christianity and why it's something they should learn about. She's going be an awesome missionary once we get her baptized! She just hung out with the missionaries all day until our Christmas party at night! We had a great Christmas party, and we had a lot of investigators from our area and the Chinese area show up!  It was a lot of fun too!

Sunday... Let's see. Oh, we just talked with people all day after church. At night, Sister Saffron had us over for dinner, and brought an investigator, Joyse, along with her! So that was awesome! Saffron is an awesome member missionary. We taught the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and it was a really good lesson! Other than that, Sunday was pretty uneventful!

This week flew by! And I've already been out for over 5 months! That's INSANE! I can't believe it! I love you all, and I hope you have an awesome week!  Merry Christmas!

Love,

Elder Ben Mullins

Saffron's presents to each of us Elders

Painting Brother Perumal's house

Kok Cin

Branch Christmas Party

I'm Famous!

Hey Everyone!

This week was CRAZY. So many things happened that I could hardly believe, and the days went by super fast! First off, Elder Forsyth is staying for a 6th transfer in Puchong! Which is pretty much unheard of! 6 transfers is 9 months! That's a REALLY long time to stay in one area. And I'm staying in Puchong too, so hopefully we can find even more stuff to do!

Monday... Let's see. I got a haircut, then we went shopping for everything that we didn't get over the last five million weeks. So it was pretty much just a long day in the mall, plus a nap at the end. It was fun though! I don't mind naps! After that, we just went out and contacted for a couple hours, then went home and set up appointments for the week!

Tuesday, we visited a referral that lived a million miles away. It took us like 45 minutes to walk to their house, then they ended up not being interested. But it was a really fun walk, because we had never been over there before. So we saw lots of fun, new stuff! We found a huge gutter that was nearly empty, and took some pictures in it. I'll send those.

At night, we taught Wei Xuan. We separated her from Harshaa so we could get her to talk more. When we have lessons with both of them, Wei Xuan tends to just sit back and watch, so we couldn't really tell if she had a desire to learn or not. But we split them up, and went out to dinner with Sister Saffron and Wei Xuan and Bryant. She opened up a ton, so it worked perfectly! After dinner, we went to choir practice since we had Christmas caroling on Friday later in the week.

Wednesday, we met with Harshaa, and she's totally gonna be baptized. I'm super excited about that. She told us that she feels like she's ready to be baptized, but doesn't know if she knows everything she needs to yet. So we just have to teach her a few more times, and BOOM. Baptized! I'm way excited.

After we taught Harshaa, we went and advertised for our free English class. Little did we realize what would happen. So Elder Tennant and I were walking down the road like we normally do when we advertise, and there was a lady filming us advertising. People film us and take pictures of us all the time, so we didn't even think anything of it. We finished advertising, went to our appointments, and two hours later, we get a call from the Chinese Elders. They said someone showed them a video of us advertising English and wanted to know if it was us. So someone recognized them from a video that some lady took of us advertising. Not really a big deal. So we hung up the phone, get on the train, and someone we tried talking to showed us the same video the other Elders saw, and asked if it was us, and we said yes. So we were pretty excited that two people had seen the video! Once we got off the train, we got a call from a branch member asking us if we knew about a video that was going around of us advertising, and we told him that we had just met someone that had seen it. We asked him how many views it had, and he said, "Four hundred... Thousand." We were pretty surprised, and got really excited! We went home that night and talked with the other Elders. Their phone literally rang nonstop from 8 to 12. They just gave up on answering calls and responding to texts. That first night, they probably got 400 texts and 500 calls. It was insane. The video had 400,000 views by that night.

Thursday, we called President Simmons in the morning. He had scheduled a Christmas Devotional for all of the missionaries in the KL zone for Friday, but we teach English Fridays. So we talked with him, and said we had something really important come up and we were wondering if the meeting was mandatory. He said it was mandatory, and he expected us to be there. Right before we hung up, he asked us what could possibly be so important that we thought he would let us not come to a meeting he scheduled a month in advance. So we told him about the video and that English Class was exploding. There was silence on the phone for a minute, then he said, "You know, I think you better actually go to English class." We thanked him, told him we were sorry for not being able to go to the devotional tomorrow, and that we were still planning on coming over to KL for interviews on Friday. We went through the day pretty normal, except people were constantly asking if they could take pictures with us. We decided it'd be RUDE if we didn't take pictures with them, so we had a blast taking pictures with them! Then we'd talk about the gospel with them. Not many were interested, but it was still a lot of fun! We were at Ariz's fruit shop just talking with him, when a lady walked in and asked if we could take a picture with her, so we did. She told us she had seen our video and wanted to show her friends she met us. Ariz got really excited and laughed a lot that someone wanted a picture with us. 3 minutes later, two other people walked in, started staring at us and whispering to each other, then walked up to us and showed us their phones and asked if it was really us in the video. So we said yes, took pictures, and then they left. At this point, Ariz is freaking out, and keeps yelling, "You're FAMOUS! I'm so lucky to know you because you're FAMOUS!" It was hilarious. We just had a blast on Thursday. By 5, it had hit 1,000,000 views, and pretty much everyone wanted a picture with us.

Friday, we went to our interviews with President Simmons, and started talking about the English class video. Some things came up, and he had decided it would be best to not hold English class this week. One of the reasons was that our church can't hold more than 150 people. Anyway, we ended up having to go to the Christmas devotional, and President told us we weren't allowed to go outside of the house unless we were traveling to an appointment, and we weren't allowed to go contacting if we did leave the house! Haha! He just wanted us to lie low so that the video stopped spreading as much. So we just hung out in the house until night, and went to the Christmas Devotional, which was super good! I loved it. We had a white elephant gift exchange, and I got some poptarts! Which don't exist in Malaysia! So that was great! Elder Forsyth got a pokemon go wallet. We hit 2,600,000 views at the end of the day, and articles were being published about us advertising English class. The Chinese Elder's phone was still ringing nonstop.

Saturday, President Simmons approved us to go caroling with the branch in the mall across the street. It was a lot of fun, and tons of people listened to us carol. After, a million people took pictures with us, which was a lot of fun! Malaysians really like the missionaries right now! Haha! The rest of the day, we were stuck inside! But we played some Scrabble and had fun!

Sunday, we had church! I was glad to get out and have some human interaction! We also went caroling again! Lots of people took pictures with us again too! I actually really enjoy being famous here. It makes it SO easy to talk with people! And President Simmons decided we could go outside again, so we went contacting after we finished caroling! It was nice to be doing some missionary work again!

This week went by super fast! I can't believe it's Monday again! Already into week 2 of the transfer! And tomorrow, I've been a missionary for 5 months! I can't believe it has been that long already! It goes by SO FAST! I love you all! Hope you have a great week! I'm sending some pictures from last week AND this week, so there'll be a few more emails!

Love,

Elder Mullins

Famous Ones

Awesome car

A lightbulb moment

Happy Science Building

Like kids at the mall

Epic scrolls

Exchanges with Elder Stratton

Harshaa and Wei Xuan

Amanda and Sister Saffron

Baptism of Keke and Nicholas

A cool gutter we found