Chapter 52: My Worst Nightmare Becomes a Reality (But Also Dream Comes True So It's Okay)

大家好

To explain my title we must begin many years ago when my family was on vacation in Europe. This was the time in my life that I realized I was completely terrified of birds because they always seemed follow me and fly to close to me. Basically birds are the worst (but not clothes with birds on them. I'm all about that life lol). Anyways while there I realized that I would have a lifelong enmity with birds.

 Well, the saga continues. 
A couple months ago a member in Yilan told my companion and I that during the month of May there were certain birds that for some reason, only in Yilan county, birds would attack people. Especially if they were riding a motor scooter or a bike because it would attack their helmets. After this story was told, I promptly put it out of my mind and tried to forget about it because I was so scared and didn't want to ever think about it again. That was the wrong way to go.

So, May rolls around and the birds are ready, but Sister Larson is not. I completely forgot that there are crazy birds that attack people. But they were quickly brought back to my memory on Wednesday. Sister Elliott and I were biking back from Yilan to LuoDong and we were getting onto the bridge to cross the river when these two black things swoop down from the sky. My heart skipped a beat. Flashes of memories of the pigeons in Europe ran across my mind. Then, I remembered. The birds in Yilan that attack people in May. They're real!! Then a hot second later, something starts to hit my helmet. They were attacking for real! Sister Elliott and I screamed and biked faster, but to no avail. They kept following us! Then I remembered the advice given to me by the ward member who told me about the birds. Contrary to what we would normally do, which is get away as fast as we can, we are supposed to slow down and walk for a while until they stop following us. So I scream at Sister Elliott to stop running away, slow down, and get off our bikes. After we did this, they followed us for a solid 100 meters, but eventually they left. Let's just say it was one of THE MOST terrifying things that has ever happened to me. I decided I had to move so I never had to have the same experience ever again. So I did! To Taibei.

This is where the "dream comes true" part comes in. Transfer calls came on Wednesday, and much to my surprise, I got transferred from Yilan back to Taibei!! #bless

It's kind of funny that I moved back to Taibei because there are so many other areas in our mission on the west coast, but I came back to Taibei!! But I'm so stoked because I LOVE Taibei! It's literally my favorite place to serve, and I am SO EXCITED to be back! I got transferred to a place called MuZha, or 木柵。It's right by the Taipei Zoo and in south eastern Taibei. It's SO amazing! The ward here buys us Costco milk and cereal!!!!!!!!!!! Also the work here is LIT. Although I don't know much about everything yet, I can tell this new transfer is going to be so great! My new companion is Sister Wells, she just got out of training, so I'm her first new companion. She's so awesome! Her Chinese is incredible because she took it for like 6 or 7 years before her mission, so it's so much fun! We already get along great. I'm so excited for what's in store this transfer. 
Hope you all have a wonderful week this week! 

Love,
Sister Larson

Pics!

1. Starbucks has mango smoothies here and I literally died

2. Selfie with Sister Wells

3. Sister Elliott and I accidentally bought train tickets in different cars so we had to awkwardly sit on the floor in the middle section. What do you do? Impromptu photo shoot.

4. It's summer now and the giant cockroaches have started to come out. Killed my first one of the summer. Pls pray for me.

5. Our cute 9 year old investigator Sunny! She's adorable. 

6. Did our studies by a river and a bridge. So of course you take a picture

7. When you're on the MRT picking up your bike, holding your ticket in one hand, talking to an investigator on the phone with the other, your dinner on your handlebars, new language study material that weighs 59 pounds in your bike box, and you still are fabulous #taibeilife