Dear Missionary Moms,
My name is A.J. Rich and I am a photographer from Mapleton, Utah working in Hong Kong for Getty Images. My photographer friend and I were at the Apple store and ran into your sons. I noticed the Real Salt Lake soccer jersey and then saw the name tag and they didn't look particularly Chinese...
I am a member myself, and find it uplifting to see the Elders and Sisters in parts of the world that I travel to. I took this picture and hope it finds you in good spirits. Your sons looked great, were happy. I thought you might want to see this picture. I hope their missions will change their lives like mine changed my life. It has been 18 years since I got back from Denmark, and I don't even think it was possible to take a digital picture back then, let alone send it over the internet. Anyway, happy Mother's Day and you must be great moms to have done such great work to have sons serving in the field.
Kindest Regards,
A.J. Rich
www.richvintage.com
p.s. I actually have a photoshoot tomorrow on the island they live on (Ap Lei Chau). Small world.
So, I don't have a lot of time, sorry, but we had a lot of changes this week. Our ward split, and I got a new companion because of some problems we had with all the deaf members/investigators and boundaries and stuff. Apparently, we've been making some waves with our deaf work, and now it's getting up to the mission president, the stake presidents and some seventies. Every stake is probably going to have to have a designated ward to accommodate deaf investigators because we were pulling from, not only all over the island, but all over Kowloon... which is not only across ward boundaries but stake boundaries. They said they weren't too happy that we were teaching people from that far, but there was no where else for them to go, so they understood, and hopefully, it will get all worked out. They said they are going to meet next Sunday to discuss what to do. But because of the ward split, we ended up in the wrong ward (the side with none of the deaf members or translators), so we asked President if we could switch, and after a lot of discussion, thinking and pondering, he decided that it would be better if he sent my companion (who I taught sign language) and keep me in the original ward. So, we just swapped companions. I was kicked out of deaf work... which I can't lie, I was pretty hurt. President said it was because I will probably move soon, and they don't want the ward just depending on me to translate. Anyway he put it, it still hurt. We also lost all of our investigators. We turned them over to the other ward because of boundary, so we are back to square one, but I'm with Elder Walter who is awesome. We'll just continue to do what we do... find. I learned a lesson in humbling myself. I got kicked out of the club that I started, but I shouldn't feel like that. It was the Lord. I love you guys. I heard Alec is baptizing a family already!! That is awesome!
Elder Mikesell
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