June 30 - Arrived in Korea

Man oh man. Just craziness. Um. FIRST OFF, I gotta say that I'm so excited to have a nephew!!! Little Camden McGlothin was born the day I flew to Korea.

So I guess the last time I emailed was at the MTC... Leaving there was great!! It was definitely time after 2 months :P Hahaha... I loved it, but seriously. We all got ants in our pants. So, unfortunately, Sister Stratton couldn't come, she still didn't have her passport or visa, so she was temporarily reassigned to Salt Lake City Central until then. I'm hoping she will really enjoy it. It was super hard to say goodbye though. We all got really close, we've all grown a lot together, so we had a huge crying fest the night before Sister Hill and I left. 

Anyways. Travelling was great! Though we did have to wake up at 3am (3 hours of sleep is not enough, by the way. just so you know). And our plane did get cancelled.... Hahha. But we were able to get rerouted though Seattle, and THANK GOODNESS, because otherwise they would have had to send us back to the MTC!!! Both of us were just like "plleeeeeaaase, noooooo". But yeah. Travelling went fine. The long flight to Tokyo was super not fun, to be honest. I wasn't feeling all that well, and I was SOOO tired and achy. Sitting for so long wasn't cool. But we landed, and LO AND BEHOLD there was a Japanese Delta agent waiting for us to help us get around. Which was extremely good, because the way she took us was INSANE. I would have had no idea that that was what I was supposed to do. Take a certain bus, go to this obscure desk, etc. And don't get me started about those spraying toilets without toilet paper! I don't remember the flight from Tokyo to Busan. I was sleeping. Haha. Once we got through customs, we were greeted by our mission president and his wife, the Gilberts. They are actually gone now, we only barely got to meet them before the new mission president and his wife came, the Barrows. 

So that next day we got our trainers! My trainer is Sister Sung; she is native Korean and super nice. She likes art and reading, which is great! She is suuuuuper good at English, which is very helpful. But also not. Because we end up speaking a lot of English. 

My PDay is Monday. I'm in 대구 (Daegu, I think) in the 수성 area. The language is okay. Honestly, for a beginner, I'm not all that bad, but what I really struggle with is understanding people. I want to go talk to people, and I'm not nervous about it because of my slow, broken Korean, but because I will probably have no idea what they are saying. Bah. I really want to be able to just talk with people! 

Our apartment is on the 12th floor of a kind of ghetto building, haha. It's not bad, just kind of funny. We sleep on the floor on mats. When I arrived, the AC was broken, but we have since had it fixed. Koreans don't really like AC that much though, and it's only in our bedroom, so I'm usually in some state of hot-ness. :P 

The bathroom is kind of interesting. Everything in it is tiled, and so there's no real designated "shower" place. It's kind of just the whole bathroom.; there's a drain in the floor. So you have to hide your towel in the cupboard.  

My first couple of days were actually pretty terrible. I was jet-lagged, and then I got a really bad cold. I was just so exhausted and felt so sick and achy, that I will admit, I started to cry. I just couldn't help it! I felt so miserable. But now I am much better. Just my first 4 days were not fun. I was basically a zombie, and Sis Sung was probably worried that she got an awful, boring, depressed, personality-void companion. Now I feel much better. It was just really good that we didn't have much going on by way of appointments during those first days. Though I did meet with a few members. In Daegu, there is an American military ward as well as a Korean ward, so we go to both! Super cool. 

So I had dinner with a Korean member one night, we sat on the floor, ate good Korean food (no idea what it was). I'm actually pretty good with chopsticks. The other dinner was with some Americans, and we (duh) had American food, which was nice. 

Being here has been great. It's definitely Asian. :P Hm. There are several things I have noticed, such as... roads. I think it was Sis. Sung who was telling me that roads are a means for people as well as cars to get around, so there is no sidewalk unless it is a major road, which you obviously can't walk on. But otherwise. Yeah. Sure. Walk in the middle of the street. I have to throw out my childhood of "be careful, don't go in the street! Look both ways!" Because you honestly don't look both ways. Haha. You just walk and play chicken with oncoming cars. I'm told that if you look at the car, it gives them the right of way. It's like you saying, "I see you, and you can go." Drivers here are also REALLY bad, so it's not exactly the most relaxing game ever :P Haha. 

Anyways. Another thing I have noticed about Koreans (my companion, members, even random old ladies on the street) is they are very touchy. I hold hands with my companion all the time, and when I talked with members on Sunday, they would grab my hands, touch my hair, pull me into a side hug, etc. It's super cute, I love it. The way Sis Sung explained it is that they see everyone as family, even strangers. One time, we stopped to talk to an old grandma on the street (in Korean, you literally call them grandma), and she was like "oooh foreigner" grabs my hands, etc. Super sweet. I really had no idea what she was saying to me because she had an accent and it was Korean. Sis Sung just tapped my shoulder or back every time I should just nod and say yes. Hahha. Though apparently she was saying I should find a Korean husband, bwuahahhaa. They are always so blunt. Speaking of grandmas. They are everywhere, and super funny. They have a particular fashion and look, you just KNOW a grandma when you see one. They basically run the country, haha (Sis Sung's words). They are so blunt and so tough.

There is so much I could tell you about, probably, but I think I got most everything of importance. Being here has been crazy. I can't wait until I have really progressed in the language and such and to teach! I think we actually have a teaching appointment tonight. Eep! I'm still getting used to this whole being-a-missionary-thing. But I'm really grateful to be here.
Every night, Sis. Sung asks me 3 questions: What miracles have you seen today? What was fun today? What Christlike quality/attribute have you seen in your companion today? And we talk about our answers and stuff. It's super cool. I particularly like that first question. Often we think miracles have to be huge experiences, but I have had a miracle every day. It could be little things like, I understood what someone said to me, or I spoke a little Korean accurately, or I was able to share my testimony with a member, or I spoke to a stranger, even if it lasted 2 seconds and they gave me a weird look. Seriously though, there are so many instances in which we receive help from God, which is a miracle. I haven't even been here a week, but I know God is helping us, because I've seen how He has helped me these past few days.