Moment #648. Chinese Book declined, but DVD accepted. Sat, Jul 22, 2006.

07/22/2006. After leaving the Lafayette Stake Center I headed away from the Interstate to look for a book placement opportunity before going home.

As I came upon a typical shopping center, of the kind which usually has a Chinese restaurant, I felt drawn to it. I didn't know if I felt drawn to it because I recognized it as the type of shopping center that usually has a Chinese restaurant, or whether it was a spiritual motivation. Either way, pulling in was a good decision, because I found a Chinese restuarant that was open late. Usually they close at 9pm, but this still had a while to go until closing.

It had been several hours since I had supper at the singles dinner/game night, so I decided to get something. I took in my small case with 6 Books of Mormon (2 regular Chinese, 2 Simpflied Chinese, and 2 English). I probably should have just gotten an egg roll and something to drink, but I went for a full combination dinner to go.

After ordering and paying I asked the cashier where she was from and she said China, so I offered her the Simplified Chinese version. She flipped through it, but politely declined. I didn't go into explanation mode about reading it in parallel with the English. I probably should have because she was not fluent in English, and reading them in parallel as ESL material may have been a good thing for her. But it was late, and there were other customers in the dining room off to the side.

Thinking back, I feel like I probably should have gone into explanation mode. There are times when you don't want to waste an extra second of someone else's time, and there are times when the Spirit does want you to be bold and intrude just a little. Even if she had still declined after the ESL explanation, the other Chinese customers in the dining area, or the other employees may have asked her what I said just out of curiosity, and she would have relayed the factoid that the Book of Mormon is in both Chinese and English, and they may have "caught the vision" quickly and asked me for a pair before I left. That has happened other places before. Even when an offer is declined, the "chain reaction" can still turn out good.

While waiting I decided to try another approach, so I went back out to the car and retrieved a "Finding Happiness" DVD that is intended for Asian audiences, and I presented that to her. She opened it and looked at it, and graciously accepted it, not with enthusiasm, but not reluctantly either.

So the little side trip did have a good result, and I found two more Asian restaurants on the way to try in the future.