WHAT A YEAR/WEEK////EXCITING NEWS

WHAT A YEAR/WEEK////EXCITING NEWS
Sister Marlowe...Week #21
May 1, 2017

WOW! What a week. I am exhausted. 

We started off the week by meeting with a younger couple in our ward, (the husband is a Returned missionary) and we were able to roleplay teaching the first lesson with them. It was so cool!!!! It was great to be able to practice working together, and Sister Ete is awesome!! It is so fun to be able to share with everyone, members and nonmembers, about the gospel in its simplicity. What a wonderful thing to be reminded of always!

On wednesday we got to go visit quite a few awesome people! We found this cute girl named Honey whose brother was actually investigating the church a few years ago, and she is so kind and wonderful! It is amazing to see the people here who are religious (especially the Burmese). They are SO strong and convicted in their faith. All of their children are so mature and even in talking to a 13 year old can seem like I'm having a serious conversation with a person my own age! They LOVE God. I love one thing Honey said, in response to my asking her how her faith in God has helped her:

"It's simple. When good things happen, I can thank God. When bad things happen, I know it's okay because I've got God to rely on." Yes this came from a 13 year old girl!!!!! Wow I just love her and we've only been able to meet with her once. So far. :)

Thursday morning, we took a nice (VERY early) train ride into the city to work on Sister Ete's Visa! She had an interview at the US Consulate, andddddd she will be leaving me in a few weeks to come to Salt Lake! 

[Side note: If any of yous are ever visiting Temple Square, take a look for my favorite Samoan Soa Sister ETE!!!! She is the best. She's probably going to be the one with the biggest, brightest happiest smile of all of them. :) Love her love her love her]

WHICH LEADS ME TO SAY! I wouldn't be much of a missionary if I didn't have a companion! Sooooo..... We will be in a trio for a few weeks, seeing as this week is the beginning of a new transfer! hehehhehe and I'll take a minute of suspense before I reveal all the transfer news.

Friday, we got to go on splits, and I went with Natasha who is a YSA in our ward and I LOVE HER SO MUCH SHE IS THE BEST!!!!!!!!!! Ah. Natasha is the coolest. She wanted to go tracting so bad, so we totally went tracting and found two more people to be able to go back and teach more!! God answers prayers. After that, we headed down to my birthplace, Braeside, and had a mini MTC with our youth who would be serving as our mini missionaries :) They played a video about the age change of missionaries a few years ago, and a huge compilation of missionaries opening their mission calls..... WOW! I cried like a baby. I still remember that day like it was yesterday! I sat in the front window for hours and hours just waiting and praying and hoping and wishing with all my might that the mailman would be bringing me a special envelope. 

Ah I'm getting a bit teary-eyed as I'm typing this, but I just realized that exactly one year ago today, May 1, is the day that I sat down with my wonderful, fantastic, outstanding bishop, Bishop Murri, and we started my mission application papers.

What a year it has been. 

I graduated high school, attended a semester at BYU-Idaho, worked 3 different jobs, and last but surely not least, I am now currently doing my favorite thing I've ever done, in the best place I could have ever dreamed to be.

WOW!!!!!! A very big, quick thank you to all of you who have helped me get to where I am today!!!

Now back to Saturday :) Saturday, Sis. Ete and I got to work with two laurels from one of the other wards in Braeside and we got to work in my old stomping grounds, Moorabbin, for the day! It was AWESOME!! It was so funny to see how completely terrified they were to talk to people hahahaha. They were scared that people might say "No" to them. [can you imagine the horror???] Ahhhhh hahahah the number of times people say no to me in a day is ridiculously way too high. I actually really want to try this week to count the number of people we talk to in the week. I'm going to try my best! More to satisfy my own curiosity than anything else, but we will see!

Aaaaaaaaaanddddddddddd of course of course I have to now share transfer news. On saturday while we were GQing with our little mini baby missionaries, I GOT A CALL FROM PRESIDENT.

SISTER ETE AND I WILL BE STAYING IN MOOROOLBARK (until she goes to Utah in approx. 1.5 weeks) aaaaaaaaaaaaandddd I WILL BE TRAINING A GOLDEN!

I'm gonna be a mom, folks. (Just the fake missionary kind, don't worry)(And yes I already have step-daughter, but I will be double-momming! Scary.)

 Ah. It's all I can think about. I'm so scared. I'm nervous. I know there must be a reason I'm being trusted for this, but I'm very very good at feeling inadequate. I know though that I'm not alone, and I've got a calling from God to do this work! I will be praying. HEAPS.

I LOVE YOU ALLLLLLLL!!!!!! Ou te alofa ia te oe! Mahal kita! Wo ai ni! Etc.

Maybe one day I can dream of being multilingual. And polynesian. 

Sister Marlowe, the woman, the myth, the legend, the soon-to-be MOM. Hehehe. Jokes Jokes.

mikayli.marlowe@myldsmail.net

76 Cathies Lane

Wantirna South, VIC

3152 Australia

PS. we totally had a miracle and got to go to Cape Schanck for the Braeside end of transfer sunrise devotional. 

PPS. My mission mommie sister Schaub, Scoop, Scrub, Shobbie Dobbie Doooooooo is going to TASMANIA!!! Tazzie Tazzie Tazzie. Banished from all of us mainlanders. I will miss her so much!!!!!! It was so so awesome to be able to work with her in the mini mission!

Our Neighborhood

My lovely lovely daughter/sister/cuzzie cuzzie Sis. Ete

Cape Schanck with da bestest

FIA AI

FIA AI
Sister Marlowe...Week #20
April 23, 2017

Talofa lava!

So yes. Barbecue Sauce. Barbecue Sauce all the time!!! Basically Sister Ete puts barbecue sauce on everything. It's fantastic. Like fried rice? Heck yeah, we'll mix in some smokey barbecue. Carbonara pasta with barbecue sauce? Been there, ate that. DE-LISH as.

It has been a great week!

I don't think I've ever gone a week without saying that honestly hahaha. We had an impromptu zone meeting with our tri-zone areas, Braeside, Maroondah, and Narre Warren, because the head of the church History department, Elder Steven Snow and his wife and a few others were "in town" hahah from SLC, so we had a Church history zone meeting! It was awesome.

We haven't had anything extremely earth-shatteringly awesome happen this week, but it has been good! We have been really working to experiment and see how we can best help this area! We finally were able to meet with our bishop yesterday and talk about a few things we can do to best help the ward. Man I have never been so excited to just get out and talk to people as I have been the past 3 days! Saturday was hard--we went to visit our golden investigator Mica who was supposed to be getting baptized in a few weeks.... and her sister told us to not come back because they aren't interested anymore. I think the aunt didnt' want us coming by anymore, but that was hard. We hardout tracted for a few hours and we were almost running to every house! This gospel is CRITICAL! Sometimes it takes a rejection to remember how urgent we've got to be in sharing this great message! 

I'm sorry this is the most poorly written letter evaaaa, but hopefully next week I will have plenty of wonderful stories to tell you!!!

I love you all!!!! Thank you for your prayers. They are both much needed, and much appreciated!!! 

Ou te alofa ia te oe!

Sister Marlowe

The most palangi samoan you'll ever meet, livin on Marlow Street.
(I should never be a poet)

mikayli.marlowe@myldsmail.net

76 Cathies Lane

Wantirna South, VIC

3152 Australia

Our huge as ward boundaries. Just for reference, we live within the pink boundaries. the yellow is what was added to our ward, and the town Healesville is almost an hour away from our flat. YAY FOR HUGE AS AREAS AY

Croydon Chapel tree photo shoot

MAAAALO AY

MAAAALO AY
Sister Marlowe....Week #19
April 18, 2017

CAN'T STOP THE WORK FROM PROGRESSING HEY

Talofalava

Crazy week!! We had a companion switch-up this week, and I am now with Sister Ete! She is a golden, been out for 3 weeks, and now I'm a trainer???? (Sometimes I feel like I still need to be a trainee hey) I stole her from being trained by my own mission momma, the fabulous Sister Schaub. Hehe. Sister Ete is the AWESOMEST! She's from Adelaide, visa-waiting here in the AMM until she can go to Temple Square! I'm in the process of trying to learn Samoan. So far, I've got how to say 'hello' and 'I'm hungry'.. The two most important things. :) Wednesday we went to the mission office for her Golden Review, then headed straight to Dandenong for a day of exchanges with the STL's! I always love exchanges, they are the best!

Ah funny story, so Wednesday morning, we woke up and NONE of our water would turn on in the whole flat. So we called about it, went to review and on exchanges and someone came and fixed it while we were gone. So then fast forward to Thursday night, we get back and our water's working, Friday morning, still working, then stopped working again Friday afternoon!!! Then we go out to do some finding, and we parked at this house to visit someone. No one was home, come back to our car, make some Peanut butter sandwiches because we're out in the woods so we obviously came prepared, and then voila. Our car wouldn't start. Kept trying, kept trying, nothing. SO. Obviously we knew it was a sign that we needed to stay on that street a little longer, soooo we started tracting! Not really anybody answering the door, then finally about 10 houses away from the car, this lady answers the door and she was deaf! Just in the last few years, so she started talking to us and telling us she met missionaries a while back, then she says "Wait I have you show you my favorite record I used to listen to before I lost my hearing" and she comes back with a record of a Christmas album of Mormon Tabernacle choir from 1963. Coolest ever! We wrote on a pass along card that we loved her, and shared 3 Nephi 11:10-11 with her. She loved it! Ah her name is Linda and I just love her. We gave her hugs, told her we loved her and left almost in tears hahaha. Long story short, our car didn't start again after that so we got a jump start and switched it in, but I know that our car broke down so we could tell that cute little deaf lady we loved her!! I also told Sister Ete that our water keeps shutting off and the car broke down because the adversary knows she's about to do some maaajor missionary work up in the hood of M'Bark hehehehe. HE CAN'T STOP US!

Sunday (HAPPY EASTER) was good as! I got asked super last minute to sing in sacrament with one of the other girls in our ward, so we just practiced before church but ah it was so fun! I miss singing. I'm hoping it sounded okay! Ay speaking of the adversary trying to stop us hahahaha besides the water and the car, I also started getting sick the day before I was supposed to sing in church! Dang Dang. Oh well can't stop us hey!

AND we taught relief society! What a day! Ah man nobody had signed up for a feed on Sunday, and the Relief Society and the Priesthood were hardout guilting people and it was sooooo awkward hahaha I felt so bad!!! I was like noooo don't guilt people hahaha I would have been fine eating some Samoan fried rice but hey. We finally got a feed hahaha. Man. Our ward is the best!!!!!

AND NOW! We are in the process of putting together a map of our GIANT AS area! We're not done yet, but at the rate this is going, it's going to be taller than me and I'm guessing about 6 feet wide hahaha. We've got some maaajor bushlands out here in M'Bark. Most of the edges of our ward boundaries are just where they stop making street maps.... because there are none..... It's awesome hahahaha.

MIRACLE OF THE WEEK! We popped by to visit our investigator Mica this week and she has read 20 chapters of the Book of Mormon since we last saw her last week! She is wonderful. Wow!! The Lord is preparing people to receive the gospel. She studies the Book of Mormon with her Bible every day and she is so keen! She wants this gospel to be true, she is just waiting to be able to receive an answer from God! She also really wants to be baptized, because she feels like when she was baptized before in Tazzie it didn't mean anything to her.. She committed to prepare for baptism on May 6!!!! Please remember Mica in your prayers!!!!

I hope you're all having a fantastic week and had a great EASTER!!!! Love yous!

Alofa atu,

Sister Marlowe

mikayli.marlowe@myldsmail.net

76 Cathies Lane

Wantirna South, VIC

3152 Australia

(JUST A LITTLE SIDENOTE...OCCASIONALLY SISTER MARLOWE RANDOMLY THROWS IN THE WORD  "AS" AFTER ADJECTIVES...WE WONDERED WHAT WAS WRONG WITH THIS GIRL(HA HA)...TOTAL AUSTRALIAN SLANG, USED TO EMPHASIZE THE WORD IT FOLLOWS.  SWEET AS!  ENJOY...)

WHAT A WEEK!!

WHAT A WEEK!
Sister Marlowe...Week #18
April 10, 2017

(I feel like I say this every week but)

WHAT A WEEK! It has been a dair finkum past few days my peach cobber dingoes! Including but not limited to: getting lost in the city on our way to a shrine, train rides, miracle tracting, climbing the temple (yes yes I said climbing the temple), GENERAL CONFERENCE AY, and hiking in a rainforest!

So last Monday was crazy and awesome! We went into the city to email before we met with all the sisters on the East Side (#eastside #represent), and got completely lost, mixed up, and turned around, trying to meet up with everybody, rode like 3 buses and a few trams and FINALLY were able to meet up with everyone at a huge shrine built right in Melbourne proper as a memorial to all the soldiers from Australia! It was cool as to see the shrine and climb on top to see the city, but it was even cooler as to see everybody!!! Ah we have the greatest sisters ever in this mission I'm convinced hahaha

I got to talk to a lady on the train this week, what an interesting experience. She just asked me all about why I'm here, and what I do, and isn't it completely crazy that I moved countries at 19 years old by myself to talk to strangers everyday?? YES! But it's worth it! Absolutely 110% worth it. 

We also visited a neighbor of the cute Burmese girls, Cerku  and Chin Chin that they mentioned we should go over and meet--AMAZING family!!!! The girl is 16, living with her auntie and cousins right now, all from Liberia, and her father is a pastor in Tazzie! She had sooooo many questions and wanted to know so much about the book of Mormon. We gave her a copy, showed her mormon.org, and talked to her about how we have general conference  every 6 months so that we can hear from the prophet and other leaders of the church... She thought that was so cool!! I am so excited too because we can totally invite her to read Elder Costa's talk that he gave specifically to the investigators and nonmembers of the church. What a wonderful talk and wonderful conference!!!!! 

The melbourne temple is closed this week for cleaning, and we were asked to spend a few hours helping clean! Friday, we got to go to the temple (in jeans, soo weird) and scrub the grout of the temple bathrooms :)  My favorite grout I've ever gotten/ever will get to scrub!!! It was great and all, but then some of the elders came and got us.. They had been power washing the roof. SO YES! We totally climbed onto the roof of the Melbourne temple and it was amazing!!! Hahahaha at all of you that thought it was cool to climb on the roof of the high school. You get to do crazy cool as things as a missionary ay! Hahahhaha the zone leaders even got to use a super long power washer sponge to scrub off the statue of Moroni. Coolest ever!!! Saturday and Sunday we watched conference. What can I say--AMAZING!!!!! Conference is just different as a missionary. I LOVED IT! A few running themes I caught-

Light of Christ

STUDY THE LIVING CHRIST

families

Peace that comes from Christ

Christ 

Jesus Christ

Having no fear

WHAT A GREAT CONFERENCE!!! It seemed to be everything I needed and more. Can't wait to be able to study even more!!!!

And yes last but not least, we got to hike through a rainforest in the middle of downpour this morningin the Dandenong mountains!!! Got drenched to the bone, but as our ward mission leader told us a few weeks ago, there's not a huge amount of time in your life that you get to hang out with missionaries--angels on this side of the veil. So true! And it makes it all worth it!! 

I hope you all have a wonderful Easter week. I am excited to be able to spend this week sharing about my Christ! I love love love all of you!!!

Sister Marlowe

Ps. It's totally a thing here that someone brings like 10 garbage sacks FULL of loaves of bread to the conference broadcast so everyone can eat something on Sunday. hahahha man people are just walking around everywhere with a whole loaf in their hand just eating it whole hahhaha. got a pic of the aftermath.

Also, Sister Chang's auntie sent a package with these aweeeesome matching overall gaucho pants?? From Taiwan hahahha. Best ever.

I will try to send my March video next week! It takes a long as time to load, but I will send it eventually, I promise!

mikayli.marlowe@myldsmail.net

76 Cathies Lane

Wantirna South, VIC

Australia 3152

(Mom Letter)

Heyyyyyy mommy! Okay the first thing I need: Please add Sister Chang to my email list! 

Chia Chi (Penny) Chang 

penny19970309@gmail.com

Also, just talked to president!! Sister Chang will be leaving tomorrow night to go back to Taiwan!! I will be staying in Mooroolbark. Sister Schaub has been in a trio, one of the sisters is a new missionary who is waiting for her visa to go to the temple square mission, and just started her training here! She will be moving to Mooroolbark and be with me! So I am killing a companion and becoming a step-mom. Crazy stuff :) I am so sad to see Sister Chang go but I am excited for her! I think it will be good for her and we will be able to work extra hard here now!! I'm terrified to be training but at least I'm taking her at the end of the transfer! Whatever happens, it'll be okay. Thank you for sending a package!! I was going to ask what it has in it.. But i'll let it be a surprise. I was going to ask.. not super urgent or anything, but  next package you send, can you send me my polaroid camera! I think the film here is pretty expensive but sometimes I just wiiiiish I had my polaroid because it is so beautiful here and it would just be fun to have! just an idea. :) and maybe a click counter, just the ones you hold in your hand to count. I heard in the Brisbane mission, they are supposed to carry them around to count how many people they come in contact with every day. I think that would be fun! Don't worry about it if it's not soon! Just an idea for next package.. Even if it's for Christmas :) I love you!!!! Have a great week!!!!!

Sister Marlowe

WHAT A WEEK!

WHAT A WEEK!
Sister Marlowe...Week #17
April 3, 2017

What a week!!! 

So normally I like to end off with the best parts, but I want to switch it up and start with my little miracle this week!

So earlier last week we were tracting and found this 12 year old Burmese girl named Cerku (there are heeeeeaps of refugees from Burma and Myanmar in our area), and anyways, Thursday we popped by the house to see her again and she is just the cutest thing ever! She's 12 years old, but so mature and very serious about her beliefs, I feel like I'm talking to someone my own age! We kind of tried to get to know her a little better and her religious background, (super religious Christian family) and for some reason we just started talking to her about prayer! She kept telling us she just loves praying and she always prays for her family and her friends and her church and it was so amazing! Her cute little sister Chin Chin came out a little while after we got there and was just listening intently to all the conversation about prayer! Cerku all of a sudden started asking about our families and why we're here together and so we told her we left our families in the states and in Taiwan and we miss them so much, but we came here because Jesus Christ brings us so much joy in our lives. So fast forward a few more minutes, and we invited her to pray. She kind of hesitated for a second, and then agreed. I was just thinking we'd stand for the prayer, but she just immediately started to kneel on the little cobblestone driveway, so we joined her and then she got super shy and I think she was really nervous to try and pray in English, so we told her to just pray in Burmese! They were still both a little nervous and unsure, so I said a short prayer and invited them to pray how I did, addressing Heavenly Father, telling him different things I was feeling, and ending in the name of Jesus Christ. Somehow, the little 8 year old, Chin Chin, decided to pray first! She said the cutest little prayer in Burmese, and then Cerku took a turn to pray as well... Wow!!! Once she finished, Sister Chang asked what they had prayed for.. Little Chin Chin looked right at us and said "I prayed for  you and your families!!" I just didn't even know what to say! I was so shocked hahaha. We just thanked her and told her she had done a wonderful job, and proceeded to ask the older sister what she had prayed for; she goes "I prayed for you and your families too! And I also prayed that the people you talk to will believe you and believe in Jesus."

WOW.

So I just want to let my family know that I'm not the only one praying for them here in Australia! there are two very cute girls here that probably have heaps of wants and things they could pray for, but they wanted to kneel down on their rocky driveway to pray for my own family, and for the work I'm doing here!

It's been a good week though! We've been doing lots of driving.. Our area is HUGE!!! So we drove out alllll the way in the bush the other day and preeeetty much just went offroading in the mountain forests of Australia in our little Corolla hahahaha. There was seriously one part where we were just driving up dirt switchbacks that were almost too narrow for the car to fit hahaha sooo dodgy as. But THE WORK OF THE LORD ROLLS FORTH REGARDLESS.

I feel like this is the least exciting email ever, Ah I'm sorry!!!! We had a lot of people say no to us this week. #lifeofamissionary But I got to share my testimony in church yesterday so that was sweet as! We had a man get up in sacrament who was visiting on a holiday from somewhere in the states, and he just kind of talked about how the gospel is true no matter where you are! It was such a great reminder for me! Here I am, a 19 year old girl from Idaho, in Australia, with a Taiwanese companion, working with missionaries from the States, Asia, the Phillipines, Samoa, to share the gospel with Aussie, Kiwi, Filipino, Chinese, Burmese, (etc.) people! No matter what background, age, language, walk of life, the GOSPEL IS TRUE AND IT CAN/WILL CHANGE OUR LIVES. If we allow it to do so. I spent a lot of time this week studying a talk by Elder Russell M Nelson from last conference! I wish I could remember the exact name, but I don't have my ensign with me... Read it!!! He talks a lot about how we can have joy in our lives, EVEN WHEN we have troubles! "We can be joyful, even when we're having a bad day, a bad week, or even a bad year!" That just really hit home for me this week I think. What a wonderful reminder though, that we can always have the joy of Christ in our lives, whether or not our lives are going as we're hoping they will! 

I hope you all have the best week, and enjoyed General Conference! We'll be watching that this weekend. We're in the future and we still have to live behind the times ay? ;) Love you all!!!!!