Food, Food, and an Adventure in the Metro this Morning

Well, it's me again, coming to you live from the Great White North.

It's been an exciting week, and not just because of Christmas. Last week we were busy going to Christmas activities and preparing for the big day. On Saturday, we spent the morning singing Chistmas carols for really, REALLY old (some of them were over 100!) Cantonese people in the Montreal Mandarin Hospital. They didn't speak Mandarin, but the writing system is the same, so at least we could give them cards that said Merry Christmas, or 圣诞快乐. 

That evening we had the opportunity to go to a fireside from Brother and Sister Chen, the branch mission leader and his wife, about their mission in China. They're from Taiwan and, at least as far as the Chinese government is concerned, Taiwan is China so they could actually serve there. It was really cool to hear that the Church actually does exist in China, even if it's small and spread out. A lot of the members there were baptized outside and then returned to China. It's really cool to think that I'm helping to build the church in China.

Christmas was good. We called home in the morning and then went to lunch in China Town with Alice. After lunch, she bought a riduculous amount of food and we went back to her apartment for dinner. I was still full from lunch, but she just kept making food. I ate as much as I could before I was almost sick and then had to stop. She gave us the left-overs. I don't ever want to eat Chinese food ever again.

This morning was really exciting. As Elder Tsai and I were hurrying to get on the Metro, I slipped and dropped my wallet. Being in a rush, I didn't notice until we were two stations away. We went back to look, but someone had taken it. So much for Canadian manners, eh? 

Anyway, I got to call home again to make sure that my account was frozen (I dropped my wallet basically in a mall on a day that's the Canadian equivalent of Black Friday), and then went to the mission office to figure everything else out. Everything is fine. I'll be good. Elder Tsai still has enough mission money to feed us until I get a new card and besides that, we have enough food in our 'fridge to live comfortably for at least a month. 

That's the news from me this week. Hope you all have a good week.

Elder Hadden

Montreal subway

Christmas Call 2017

At about 10:15 on Christmas morning, Elder Hadden skyped his family, who was anxiously awaiting his call. 

LtoR: Mom, Caitlyn Rogers, RoseE, Caiti

He and his companion, Elder Tsai, were enjoying Christmas festivities at the home of an investigator named Alice from near Beijing, who gets baptized next Saturday.

Elder Hadden seems to be doing well.  He's not cold or hungry, and has his own bed in a tiny apartment in downtown (almost) Montreal.  He reported that Elder Tsai makes good stir fry.  They are two of six Mandarin missionaries in the immediate vicinity, and there are six more scattered elsewhere in the mission.  The branch council is more missionaries than members. They are in one of the few no-car areas of the mission.

They went caroling at the Chinese hospital during the Christmas season, but everyone they sang for spoke Cantonese.  They sang in Mandarin anyway. 

He has worn out his first pair of boots, so will be hitting the Boxing Day sales in Montreal on Tuesday for a new pair.  He also requested some "tracting pants" for his birthday in February. Other than that, he is keeping warm.  

Distinguishing the tones of the Mandarin language is still a struggle, especially if the subject of the conversation or the accent of the speaker is new to him, but he said some things in Mandarin during the call which sounded very impressive to us non-Mandarin speakers. The local Mandarin accent throws extra rrr sounds everywhere, which is also confusing. He said it's like a pirate speaking Mandarin.  So it's getting better, little by little.  

His bucket list for P-Day includes the aquarium/aviary Aquarium Récifal Raging Reef - Montreal. 

 

The Carbs Never Stop

大家好 Bonjour tout le monde! Hey everybody,

(whichever language you prefer)

I figured out how to type in Chinese this week, so now I don't have to think of interesting subjects anymore. Life gets easier every week.

It's been an interesting week. Friday was the Branch Christmas party. It was essentially the same as any other ward/branch Christmas party, except that everything was in Chinese and we got Asian Santa to come instead of White Santa. It was a ton of fun. We talked to a lot of less-actives, investigators and non-members. I talked to a Romanian(?) guy who I think is dating one of the recent converts in the Branch. He doesn't speak Chinese, but he came anyway. You never know who you're gonna talk to here.

Alice, our bread investigator, finished her unit on baking this week, so we stopped getting bread. I think we've finally managed to eat our way through it all. To compensate for our lack of bread, we got at least a half gallon of mashed potatoes from the Christmas party. I'll probably be a healthy 250 lbs when I get back if this keeps up. 

The weather this week has been cold. I think the lowest it got downtown was -17 C (1 F) with -25-ish C (-13-ish F) wind chill. Needless to say, we contacted in the Metro as much as possible instead of on the street. The weather forecast has the high at 4 C (39 F) with freezing rain. It's not raining yet, but I'm not really looking forward for it to start.

In other news, we have some big plans next week. On Christmas, Alice wants to make even more food for us, so we're gonna spend most of the day with her eating lots and lots and lots of food. In addition to Christmas, next Saturday we have three baptisms scheduled.  Next week might be the most interesting week of my mission for a long time. I'm looking forward to it.

I can't think of anything else to write, so I'm gonna move on to pictures:

Here's a really awkward picture of me with my first poutine in Quebec.

Last P-day we went and got poutine. 

Here's another picture for good measure.

More pictures of the city from the top of Alice's student residence

This is a chapel on the McGill University Campus. We taught a lesson here yesterday because it was quiet. McGill is an anglophone school, so the campus looks a lot more British than French. 

That's all from me. I hope you all have a good week. Love you all.

Elder Hadden

韩长老

470 rue Gilford

Here is where your letters and packages to Elder Hadden go, and where he goes to pick them up.

470 rue Gilford, Montreal, QC H2J 1N3

It Got Cold



Elder Tsai and Elder Hadden @ the Montreal Temple

Bonjour Hi (that's how everyone greets each other here. It's kind of funny. You never know which language to speak)

Well the days of balmy 0 C temperatures are over. It's currently dumping snow outside, holding steady at about -11 C (12 F), 87% humidity, and -17 C (1 F) wind chill. It's exciting.I did get a coat, so you all can stop worrying about that. I spent a total of 100 USD on a down coat and jacket from a liquidation sale at Sears. They're plenty warm and should hopefully last 2 years. I'll keep you all posted.

Transfers were this week, so Elder Tsai and I are alone now. Elder Leung is now in the Mandarin West area, basically covering the west side of the island. The best part of all of this is that I actually got to unpack my bags this week and I have a real bed now. I'm moving up in the world.

Saturday morning, the branch had temple baptism trip, so we all got to go to help out (there're not enough priesthood holders in the branch to actually run temple baptisms). The temple is really, really small, but just as wonderful as Salt Lake. It was a nice way to spend a morning.

Saturday evening was the Mount Royal stake (the non-French-speaking stake) Christmas concert. I was in the missionary choir and the Mandarin choir. We met some new non-members, including a couple of girls from Korea who are friends with one of our investigators. 

To answer some questions:

Elder Tsai is very nice. He's a pretty funny and very down-to-earth guy. We're getting along really well, even though I'm horrible at being a real missionary and don't speak Chinese.

The biggest issue I'm facing speaking the language is tones. I sound super white whenever I try to talk. The biggest issue with understanding is just vocabulary. 

The main part of our diet is bread. One of our investigators, Alice, is studying cooking and baking, and she gives us all the bread she makes that she can't eat. We have a lot of bread.

Oh yeah! I have good news for you all. So, all mail needs to be sent to the mission office, but guess where I am right now and go at least once a week? The mission office! So feel free to send anything you want here, and I'll pick it up at least weekly for as long as I'm in Mandarin Central. Also, in the spring, the mission is becoming a smart phone mission so I'll be able to check my email everyday like the MTC. Probably.

Cool. That's pretty much it for me this week. More people, more Chinese, more bread, more snow. Adventures every day. 

Love you all. Have a good week,

The doorway to the Montreal Temple

Elder Hadden's apartment building at night.

Elder Hadden


An example of Montreal architecture

Chapel where the Mandarin Branch and Montreal ward meet (in summer, 2 years later)

A Note and Pictures from Sister Phillips CMM

"Thank you for sharing Elder Hadden with us!  This is the group that came in the week after him and they had met him in the MTC. We enjoy having him here and are excited for all that he will be able to accomplish on his mission. Elder Hadden has a tough language to learn, but he is in an excellent environment to be able to learn it. He also has a great attitude.  We truly appreciate having him here. Enjoy the pictures!

Love, Sister Phillips"

Pres Phillips, Elder Hadden, Sister Phillips

Sis and Pres Phillips, Elder Hadden, Elder Tsai

CMM: Canada Montreal Mission

Bienvenue à Montréal

Dear all,

Well, I made it out here. Forgive my typing and spelling; the keyboard I`m using is convinced I`m spelling everything wrong because it is not French.

Anyway, its all good.

I've learned a lot this week. One of the most important things is that I do not speak Chinese, and I don't speak French very well. Communication is a little awkward, but everyone speaks English, anyway, so its not too bad.

I'll start from the beginning. I left the MTC bright and early Wednesday morning, hopped on the train, and went to the airport. I had a wonderful conversation with a Québecois couple while waiting for my flight to Toronto, which made me feel pretty confident. I was scheduled to have a one hour layover in Toronto before catching my flight to Montréal. However, when I landed, I got funneled into Customs for about 50 minutes. When I finally got my visa, I frantically ran around trying to figure out how to even get where I needed to go, all the while praying that somehow I would make my flight. I didn't even make it through security again until half an hour after my flight had already left. So, I was alone in the airport of a foreign country surrounded by people speaking French and all kinds of other crazy languages, and I was stuck. Luckily, a super nice lady working in a café let me use her cell phone to call the travel department to figure out what to do. After a short conversation with Salt Lake, I talked to the airline and had them arrange for me to be put on the next flight to Montréal without any problems. Everyday miracles.

I finally made it to Montréal about 3 or 4 hours later than I had been scheduled to. I was luckily able to find President and Sister Phillips without any problems. Salt Lake had told them that I was going to be later than scheduled, but they told them that my new arrival time was an hour before my flight actually landed. They had been waiting for about an hour and a half in the airport for me to arrive, terrified that I wasn't going to make it. We all had a good laugh about it. They took me to Tim Horton's to get some dinner, and then to my apartment.

At my apartment, I met my trainer, Elder Tsai from Taiwan, and his current companion, Elder Leung from Hong Kong. I arrived a week before the transfer, so I'm in a trio for the first little while. Elder Tsai is a native speaker, but he has lived in Vancouver for the past few years. Elder Leung is a native Cantonese speaker, but his Mandarin is just as good. I understand next to nothing they talk about.

My mission district LtoR: Elders Chih, Kim, Leinhard, Saunders, Leung, Tsai, and me

My apartment is right next to downtown. Mount Royal Park is just a few blocks up the road. Our area is downtown Montréal. We spend most of our time teaching college students from China, and contacting around college campuses, in the métro, or on the street in downtown.

Montréal is an insane place. Everything is in French.  About half of the people speak English, and a lot speak something totally different. On Thursday, I went on an hour and a half exchange with Elder Gauthier, an AP from France, also called to Chinese-speaking, and I spoke English, French, and Chinese. Sometimes all three at the same time. It's crazy.

Friday, we did exchanges with the district leader, so I spent a day with Elder Kim, from Korea, instead of my trainer. We went and visited a less active member with a member of the high Council named Cédric. Cédric is a crazy little man from Vietnam, but he has lived in Québec for about 25 years. His English is really good, but his French is better, so I talked with him in French mostly. He shared a message with the less active in French, while showing her  a video in English, as Elder Kim and I added stuff In Chinese.

The rest of the weekend was pretty normal. I've gotten into the rhythm of things a lot more now. I bore my testimony in Chinese in the Chinese branch yesterday, and met the Branch president, a very old Canadian white man.

Yesterday we taught a lesson to one of our investigators. We invited her to be baptized and she agreed. I think.

It's been a crazy week, one full of speaking lots of different languages and being really confused, but I am all right so far. I'll be sure to keep you all posted.

I love you all. Thank you for your love and support.

Sorry again for my spelling. [corrected by Mom so you won't see it]

A la prochaine

Elder Hadden

French

A la prochaine - Until next time

Landed!

Late last night, 29NOV17, I received this email from the Mission President's wife's email:



"It's your son

Hey Mom! I'm not dead. I'm in Montreal with the Phillipses.  I love you!"



A few minutes later came another email from the same source:


"Oh yeah

Can you transfer $700 into my account? I need to buy a coat. Thanks."


From this we can assume that Elder Hadden has arrived safely at his destination, with the appropriately-dated visa attached to his passport, and a heightened awareness of his need for a warmer coat.

Next Stop: Montreal

Dear All,

I hope you appreciate my catchy subject line this week. I spent a long time coming up with it.

This is it. I'm leaving in less than 48 hours. Half of my district has already left and I'm the next to leave. I'm super excited.

It's been a pretty interesting week. We had in-field orientation every day except Thursday. In-field was a wonderful hour and a half every day telling us how to be a missionary. It was essentially the same as what we've been doing for the past nine weeks, except it was in English instead of Chinese. Pretty fun.

Thanksgiving was weird. We started off the morning with a "Continental breakfast" that was exactly the same as any un-continental breakfast we normally have. We then had a really cool Q and A devotional from Elder Bednar. That brings us up to four of the Twelve that we've seen here. Pretty cool. After the devotional we had a big Thanksgiving lunch that was surprisingly good for the MTC. After lunch, we watched a T C Christensen film called "Love, Kennedy," we had a sack dinner, and then bagged dry food into individual portions for a couple of hours. (Here's a link of more info and photos of the service project.  MTC Service Project)  After the service project, we had another devotional from the "Nashville Tribute Band," a country-style Mormon band that just sang a lot of country songs about the gospel and missions and stuff. It was it was fun, but nothing special. During one of the songs, some elders in the front of the hall decided it would be a great idea to stand up and start clapping along with the beat of the song. Pretty soon about half of the MTC joined in and the yells of a about a thousand 18-or-19-year-olds drowned out the actual song. Needless to say, the MTC presidency got really, really mad and we all got a passive-aggressive email about it the next day. It was pretty funny. I did not participate.

I got to talk to the head sound engineer for BYU as he was taking the sound system apart after the devotional. It was really nice to talk to someone from the outside world about something other than missionary work.

Janice Kapp Perry gave the Tuesday devotional last Tuesday. That was really, really cool.

That's about all the news from The MTC this week. Exciting times for everyone involved. Can't wait to get out of here.

The "by no means a role play," "real" investigator we've been teaching for the past three weeks turned out to be 100% a role play. Thanks MTC. In all seriousness though, he's a really cool guy. It turns out he served in Montreal speaking Mandarin, so we had a really long talk about the mission and the culture of the area. It was really cool. I'm stoked to get out.

Love you all. Hope your Thanksgivings were just as exciting as mine was. 

Elder Hadden

Hey! guess what! I actually remembered my camera this week.

Elder Chan and me with Daniel Black (our "by no means a role play" investigator)

Our District With 2 of our teachers (left to right: Elder Mitchell, Elder Stubbs, Elder McKean, Elder Chan, me, Tan Laoshi, Elder Airoso, Sister Rafie, Hong DiXiong, Sister Miller, Elder Turcotte, Elder Biehler)

Our district with Wen Laoshi, our other teacher

Elder Biehler and Elder Turcotte getting ready to head out to Australia this morning.

Mormonspeak

Elder Bednar:  Elder David A Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

Twelve:  The Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (which includes Elder Bednar)

Surprise Thanksgiving Visit to the MTC

Elder Hadden was the only one of our children that was not present for Thanksgiving this year, and we felt the loss.  So Caiti decided it would be a good idea to go to the MTC and take a picture of ourselves in front of the sign/gate and send it to Elder Hadden so he knew we were thinking of him and that we were close by.

Surprise visit to the MTC 23NOV17

So we did.

Elder Chan Gets His Christmas Present

If you noticed in the last blog post, Elder Hadden mentioned that his companion, Elder Chan from Birmingham, UK, was going to be at Temple Square  yesterday, along with other missionaries from outside the United States.  This was of interest to me, because I had a Christmas present for him, and wasn't sure where to send it.

So I went home and wrapped his present in two layers of wrapping paper (the interior one has a warning not to open until Christmas) and went downtown to Temple Square.  

The first thing I saw when I went in the gate of Temple Square was a large group of Elder and Sister missionaries.  I asked their leader if these people were from the MTC.  He said they were, but that they couldn't stop as they were on a tight schedule.  So I walked along with them and asked the group if Elder Chan was amongst them.

No answer.

Not deterred, I approached an Asian Elder and asked him if he was Elder Chan.  He replied that he was not, but pointed out another Asian Elder and said that was Elder Chan.  I approached this Elder, held out my hand, and introduced myself as Rose Hadden.  "You're my companion's Mum!" he exclaimed.  We shook hands.

I gave him is Christmas present (all the missionaries cheered!) and an orange, explaining that this was a family tradition for Christmas.  He thanked me profusely.  We talked about where he was going (Calgary) and some other things.  At the Visitor's Center, his companion-for-the-day took our picture, and I include it here:

Me and Elder Chan at Temple Square 20NOV17

He seemed embarrassed, so I wished him a Merry Christmas and left him to enjoy his tiny view of the United States.

MTC Week Eight

Hello all,

Well, this has been quite an eventful week. We had Christmas on Friday, meaning we all got our flight plans, so we celebrated with lots of candy and a secret Santa thing. Just about everyone in my district got a package that day (Elder McKean got 3!) in addition to our flight plans, so there was plenty to celebrate, and to celebrate with. It even snowed, sort of. 

My flight plans tell me I'm leaving the MTC on the 29th at 4:50 AM. I'll catch a flight to Toronto at the SLC Airport at 10:00 AM to arrive in Toronto at 3:51 PM local time. I'll have an hour layover there and catch my flight to Montreal at 5:00 pm, to arrive in the mission field at 6:12 PM. I'm going to be totally alone for about 12 hours. It'll be a party.

Other than that, we had another member of the Seventy give a really good devotional on Tuesday. I'd tell you what he talked about, but it's 6:30 AM right now, so I forgot my notes. It was good though.

Oh yeah. I'm in the laundry room insanely early today because Elder Chan is going to be spending the whole day at Temple Square. He's leaving at 7:30 and won't get back until 5 PM, so this is the only time he has to do laundry today. It's early, but at least I'll have time to take a nap later. If any of you are in the Temple Square area and happen to see a large group of missionaries from outside the US, look out for an Asian one with a British accent. Be sure to give him a hard time.

This week we have in-field orientation every morning except Thursday. They're gonna orient us about how to work in the field, I guess. We'll see what that means.

For Thanksgiving, we have a small "continental breakfast," and a "sack dinner," but supposedly a proper Thanksgiving meal for lunch. We'll see how that goes. I hope it's better than the rest of the food. My bowels can't take this much longer.  We also have two General Authority devotionals and a service project. That should be fun.

This week I met three Elders from Francophone Countries and got to have French conversations with all three. One was from DR Congo, one from Haiti, and the other from Tahiti. It was awesome and it felt really good to speak a language I'm actually OK at. The Elder from Tahiti is here learning English in preparation to head to Montreal. 

Anyway, that's the news from me this week. I hope I lightened your day. I'm gonna go eat breakfast now.

Happy Thanksgiving all,

Elder Hadden

Mormonspeak:

Seventy - the Quorum of the Seventy:  Members of Quorums of the Seventy are often referred to simply as “Seventies.” Seventies are called to serve as special witnesses of Christ, proclaim the gospel, and build up the Church throughout the world. They work under the direction of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

Temple Square - A 10-acre complex in the center of Salt Lake City which includes, among other things, the Salt Lake Temple, the Tabernacle, two Visitor Centers, and an Assembly Hall.

MTC Week Seven

Mt. Timpanogos after snow

Hello all,

It's been a good week. Elder Chan and I started teaching our real (?) investigator. The MTC told us that this experience was "by no means a role play"; however, I know that the guy we're teaching has already been taught, and I honestly would not be surprised if he has already been baptized or has already committed to be. Sort of frustrating, but
hey, at least he's a cool guy and at least tries to act like a real investigator.  I can't help but feel like I'm in some weird LDS-themed Ender's Game knock off.

Last Tuesday President Nelson came to talk to us. He talked about becoming deeply converted to the gospel so that we can teach better and stay converted forever. It was quite the experience to have him come while we're here.

This Wednesday, we got 8 new elders and 2 new sisters in our zone. Only three of the elders are from Utah, the rest of the missionaries are from all over the country: Hong Kong, Korea, and one sister is from a town in Malaysia. They're a really diverse group and it's been great getting to know them as we introduced them to the MTC.

In a little over two weeks I'll be in Québec. It's getting more real every day. This Friday, we're supposed to get our flight plans, and then I'll know for sure exactly what day I'm leaving. This week I remembered that I also need to be able to speak French when out there, so I'm trying to spend what little free time I have watching Mormon messages and reading scriptures in French. Chinese and French are very, very different languages. I do not understand how people can keep them both in their head.

To answer some questions: no, I can't actually order pizza. I wish I could, but the only place Elder Chan and I can call on our 2001-era phone is the MTC front desk, which unfortunately does not deliver. If anyone wants to arrange a back fence pizza for me, I'm sure you will receive blessing enough to compensate for your sacrifice.

Anyway, that's the gospel according to me for this week. Let me know if you're ever confused about my sarcasm. (It doesn't really come through as well as I'd like in email). 

Love you all. Wish you were here.

Elder Hadden
韓長老

My cool Chinese name tags!

Elder Chan in his Halloween costume

Cool sunset at the MTC.

First snowfall at the MTC NOV 2017

Moses and the cure for snake bite

Mormonspeak

Ender's Game:  a book by Orson Scott Card about a boy who is trained to defend earth against an alien race.  Check out the summary here.

President Nelson:  Russell M. Nelson, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.  Here's a quick summary of his life so far:  President Russell M. Nelson

Moses and the cure for snakebite:  Holy Bible, Book of Numbers, Chapter 21, verses 4-9