Translating at Youth Conference

Well, I thought I'd go ahead and write what is on my mind. Last week, we had youth conference. I am currently a secretary in YW for our church's youth group. Our Presidency just changed last week, as we got a new president because our old president moved to UT.

In the middle of the switch things were going a little crazy. We were told not to plan for future activities; to just wait for the new presidency to come around. So we didn't plan for youth conference... we waited and waited and waited... and still no one was called.

So the question was, who can go to Youth conference? There is only one girl old enough to go to Youth Conference-- Bethany, who is 17.

The bishopric decided that since our president was in the process of moving she couldn't go. And the two counselors couldn't go because they are both pregnant and wouldn't handle the overnighter well. The bishopric also decided that I shouldn't go because I have a child at home..... why they decided this FOR ME, I don't know. And instead of asking another member of our ward to go, they were going to make Bethany go with her old ward (the ward she was in before the ward split last April). Any way, I felt like I really needed to go and I didn't think it was appropriate to have her go with a different ward and have her be an extra responsibility for the leaders in that ward. So I had to jump through hurdles with the bishopric and YW presidency to be able to go to youth conference.

When I finally got the "go ahead". Bethany's mom called, she didn't feel it was safe that I drove up to Youth Conference so we drove with the YM in the Bishop's car. Thank goodness that man is holy!--otherwise he would be a dead man. He scared the geebies out of me! He was such a horrible driver. I thought maybe he was tired, but he drove horribly to Youth Conference and back. Every time he tried to hear what the person in the passenger's seat was saying, he would lean over towards the passenger to hear him. And as he leaned over, he took the wheel with him! We almost swerved into cars every time the kid spoke to the bishop. I was hoping the boy would stop talking and just fall asleep to avoid any accidents. He was worse than a chinese taxi driver... in five minutes, he managed to almost crash 3 times, run a red light, go straight in a right turn only lane (side note: one of the YM mentioned this to the bishop, that he was in the wrong lane, and the bishop replied, "oh you're right! we'll have to merge!" The bishop's version of merging was pressing on the gas.... he barely made it past the car in the correct lane). And most of the time, he didn't even realize what he was doing-- like running through a red light! He also didn't use the round about correctly. ..... I think we would have been much safer if I were driving than bishop... anyway.

I went to youth conference. The friends that bethany was suppose to have I guess were more aquiantances than friends. And she ended up hanging around me most of the time instead of the other girls. We are only 4 years difference in age, so we got a long. I made her go to the dance and dance with me out on the dance floor. She's not a very big dancer but I am, however, I'm not a very appropriate dancer for church dances. So in order to save her embarrassement and me from being told to stop dancing inappropriately, we just hung out on the wall like wall flowers on wallpaper.

In so doing, we noticed a really odd couple dancing on the dance floor. It was a 14 year old boy with a narely beard that looked amish and a chinese girl that had not been in America long enough to have changed culturally. (AKA, she still wore her clothes like most Chinese kids do-- all those who've been to china, you know what i'm talking about. They were sports pants up past their belly button--which they can do because most chinese have flat butts-- and she had a red stringed necklace with a very yellow fake 20 k gold heart attached. Everything about her screamed Chinese). To me, I felt like I was back at home. To the kids around her, I don't think they understood. In fact, I KNOW they didn't understand.

Bethany and I watched the odd couple for a while and then realized that he was half stalking her and she had no friends. So I went up and asked if she spoke Chinese. She said yes and was so relieved that I could speak Chinese too.

Here's her story:

She grew up in Beijing (she's now 14). Her biological father left her and her mother when she was 1. She says that he's doesn't like her because he's had the chance to come back and see her and he's bluntly stated that he didn't want to see her. I wonder what that had to deal with, whether it was because she was female and he wanted a male which causes problems with the 1 child policy or what... I don't know. Anyway, and then not to long ago, her now step father was traveling through China and met her mother. They fell in love and he wanted to bring her back to America, so he did. A month ago, he and her mother got married in Beijing and moved back here to Phoenix. As far as I know, I could be wrong-- I haven't met her parents yet, but her mom doesn't speak English and her stepdad doesn't speak Chinese. Her now step dad, is LDS. And the Chinese girl (Her name is Yuge--- I think!? :S... this horrible but I never really caught her name because when she told me we were out on the dance floor and the music was really really loud) and her mother are taking missionary lessons from the missionaries with a RM translating.

So with that said, she was struggling through Youth Conference. Having no friends and not understanding the language. She looked lost and sad. So Bethany and I took her under our wing. I translated for her and we got the half amish/half stalker boy to stop bothering her. I unfortunately haven't had a chinese class in 3 years. It's been even longer since I lived in Beijing and it's been a year since I've actually literally spoken Chinese. I'm very sad to say that I struggled remembering my vocabulary. It felt like a knife stabbing my heart everytime I couldn't remember words that I remembered learning. Fortunately, I remembered enough, that when I couldn't remember a word, I could describe it in chinese, and then she could tell me what the word was. Unfortunately this made it very difficult and long to translate when I couldn't remember most words.

The other struggle I had, was the fact that I don't know ANY church lingo. NONE. And I was translating for church meetings. So... I was describing Satan to try and figure out what Satan's name is, in chinese. I was describing him as a very very bad man who does very very bad things... until she finally clued in on who I was talking about and would tell me. But any chinese was better than nothing. I felt horrible though that my chinese was sooo bad. I'm glad, however, that I was able to help her and that I had the feeling that I should go and do this because like the Stake Young Women's president said, this was no coincidence. And with that said, I know that Heavenly Father is mindful of each and every one of us. He loves us and wants us to be happy, and he will do whatever he can to help his lost sheep. And though I wasn't actually ment to be there to translate and befriend other YW, I know that that was Heavenly Father's intentions.

Apart from re-aquainting myself with chinese. I was mistaken for youth no one thought I was a leader because I talked and did things with Yuge and Bethany. And I got hit on by some football players. It was a great trip! Nothing like a little self esteem booster. :)