Learning a new language and living in a different culture has benefitted the lives of returned missionaries who served in foreign-speaking missions, according to four RMs who served in Hong Kong, Japan, Korea and Madagascar.
Fred Parker, assistant professor for business management, served his mission in the Hong Kong Mission from 1986 to 1988 and said, “Every mission is phenomenal.” He said his mission in Hong Kong gave him “the opportunity to know what it felt like to live as a minority.”
Parker said, “When we came to live here where there were mostly Polynesians, we took the time to express to our children our mission experiences. We helped them understand as long as they were loving and understanding, they would be welcomed.”
Parker said as a missionary he did not find it too difficult to learn the language. “You needed to learn things pretty quickly to buy food or find the restroom and other essential things. But I only became fluent at the end of my mission where I was dreaming and thinking in Cantonese,” said Parker.
Other than the language, Parker said he learned to love the Hong Kong culture and goes to a Chinatown everywhere they travel. “I try to have breakfast there and get the opportunity to speak to people there in Cantonese. Even if I am not as fluent as I used to be, it is still unusual for someone like me to speak Cantonese and it becomes a great missionary opportunity,” shared Parker.
He said he especially loves the food in Hong Kong and cooks Chinese food for his family. “Respect and family is very important there. I loved the way they interacted. Even if they didn’t have time for our message, they understood the importance of family. Their genealogy record keeps going back thousands of years,” said Parker.
Cathleen Parker, wife of Fred Parker, served her mission in the Japan Sendai Mission from 1991 to 1992. She said her mission was difficult and her only convert was herself. “I did not see any baptisms, but I learned a lot of things from my mission and the culture,” she said.
“Eight weeks in the MTC and I thought I was doing great in the language. But when I got off the plane, it was a completely different story. It was like they spoke a completely different language than what I was taught,” she recounted. She said her head hurt because Japanese was the opposite from English with regards to subject and verb. “After around five months, it clicked and I understood it better,” she said.
Cathleen Parker said she learned to embrace the culture and has adopted a few characteristics of the culture. “It was not a tradition in my home to not wear shoes in the house, but now I don’t like my children wearing shoes in the house,” said Parker. “We spend a lot of time eating Japanese food now.”
Parker shared how in the interview process to come to BYU-Hawaii, they were warned how they might experience culture shock. However, she said she was able to adapt to Hawaii because she was able to embrace a culture in Japan.
Keanu Lee Chip Sao, a sophomore studying computer science from Tahiti, served his mission in the Madagascar Antanarivo Mission from 2013-2015. He said although the Malagasy language and culture is not common, it had unexpectedly given him opportunities to help others.
“There is not a lot of material in learning the language. Although it was similar to Tahitian, it was really difficult to understand the language,” said Sao. He shared how he was assigned to the southern part of Madagascar that had a different dialect. “There was no written material on the dialect and no one has done studies on the language. So I did.
I researched by reading materials and conversations and made a whole dictionary and grammar book on the dialect. It is now being published by BYU Provo,” said Sao.
Writer: Danna Osumo