February 15, 2015

I really like serving with Sis Erickson, she's super fun and we get along well. :P SO yay!
This week was pretty good, though most of our appointments got cancelled. heh. But we did meet with this one less active member 2 times this week and she is doing suuuuper well. We study the Book of Mormon together, and she always has these really good questions and understands really well and such. Man, if we only had an investigator like her :P haha.

 

Today was SUPER cool! We planned a special P-Day because the previous ones have been mostly chilling around. So we have an Ulsan tour book thing, and decided to go to this Buddhist Temple complex about 1 hour away, and even though it was raining a bit, it was SOOO COOOL!!! For the first time on my mission, I really felt like I was in Asia. I loved it, and took lots of pictures. It was so colorful and pretty :) Totally worth it.

 

On Wednesday, we had a Zone Conference which lasted from 10:00-4:00, but it was reallllly good. We talked a lot about how to feel and follow the Spirit, as well as prayer and scripture study, and gratitude. One thing I liked was the mission president was giving a talk and saying how the Lord knows our needs and desires of our hearts better than we do, and so he posed the question, "so what should our desire be?" Thinking about that, I was thinking that it is important to desire to do the Lord's will, because if we are willing to follow, He will lead us to the BEST thing, which is a lot better than anything I could wish for myself :P haha. 

 

After the Zone Conference, we went on exchanges. I stayed in Shinjeong with Sister Koyle, who is a transfer newer than I am. It was really fun, and we had a cool experience on the bus. We were talking with this lady who is Presbyterian, and she was really interested in us, so she asked US for our phone number :P haha, that usually doesn't happen :P So we were pretty excited about that, and hopefully we'll be able to meet her later. This coming week is going to be aweful for appointments, because it is Solar (aka. the Lunar New Year, Chinese New Year), so everyone will be very busy... It's a huge holiday, probably about as big as Christmas to Americans. So we have a lot of little projects that we will work on because there is nothing else we can do :P 

 

Anyways. We met with that one investigator (KimSunHwa) who has interesting views about spirits and ghosts and used to be an exorcist, and with a member. And it was interesting... haha. The member ended up showing her a picture of the temple, and Kimsunhwa went off on WHY there is an angel Moroni on top of the temple. Haha, it was so funny. But that sidetracked her for a long time and she wouldn't let it go :P 

 

This weekend at church was District Conference at church, so that was pretty fun.

Weird story for this week: we handed some fliers out for our English class, and yesterday a guy contacted us back about it, saying he was interested in coming to class. Which was cool. Until he called us EIGHT TIMES from the time of 10:30-11:00pm. We can't answer the phone after 10:20, but seriously, calling anyone that late at night is no bueno.  He apparently called the Elders too, but just once. Whatevs.

 

 

 

February 9, 2015

I was really sad to learn this week that our family cat of 17 years, Meg, died :'( I will miss her, and it'll be strange to not have her at home anymore, but I'm sure the new cat, who they SO cleverly named Purrseus... will get along fine with Hershey eventually. :P sad.

Meg

Hershey

Purrseus

 Anyways. Things this week have been interesting.We were pretty busy. On Tuesday we had a LOT going on. For lunch, we ate with a ward member who is American, and she was soooo nice, I love her. So that was fun, but directly when that ended we had to rush to get a bus, because it comes infrequently and we had to ride for a really long time to get to our next appointment with a less active member who we have been working with. We were late to meeting her, which was stressful, but next time we will know where it is, so we won't get lost again :P It was out in the middle of nowhere, so it was hard to find. But meeting with her went really well, and she wants to study the Book of Mormon with us every week in English, so that'll be fun :) We then had to hurry to our next appointment... but because of the infrequency of buses and we perhaps started to go in the wrong direction, we were 30 minutes late. Dang it! But it was still a fairly good lesson.

Sister Erickson at the end of a long week :P Hahahahaa.

 Oh, and the fun thing of the day, when we took off our shoes for that lunch appointment, I broke my boot again :P Because I had glued it shut, I have been taking them off by placing my other foot on the heel of it and just pulling my foot out, but this time the heel ripped almost entirely off :P So as we ran around late all day it was just flopping around :P haha. ooops. And sooo, we bought super glue after all those appointments and before English class, but I apparently didn't learn my lesson last time :P I glued the heel back on just fine and so my boot is all good now (I think), but some dripped down the side, so I obviously decided to try to wipe it off with my fingers... So I accidentally glued my fingers together. Literally. Hahahaha. It was another face-palm moment. But I got them apart again, though I think some layers of skin from my forefinger got glued to my thumb. :P And I still have a little glue on my nail. Sigh. Hahahaha.

Sister Erickson and I

So anyways. We had an interesting Wednesday too. We had a district meeting, and right after it we had an appointment with an investigator I hadn't met with yet because she is really hard to get a hold of, because she just doesn't answer the phone, or doesn't show up to planned appointments. So we were really excited to meet her and catch up with her, so we went out to eat lunch together. In the past... she has apparently done weird things to avoid the "paying the bill" part of eating, like staying in the bathroom for 20 minutes. We were fine paying for her, but at the end of the meal, she asked to use our phone to call someone, deleted that number from our phone, and then said she had a friend who was outside that she wanted to talk to for 10 minutes, and told us to wait inside until then. .... I was suspicious at that point, but about 15 minutes later we just left and tried calling her, but she didn't answer. (insert much eye-rolling).

On Thursday we met with someone for my first and last time :P She was doing the 6 week 30/30 English program thing we do, and was on her last week, and she had absolutely NO interest in our message :P Haha. She asked if we could skip that part of the lesson :P Uhh... nooo. But she was interesting and I felt really bad for her though, because she is about 50 and didn't graduate from middle school, so she is trying to prepare for a test so she can graduate, and I could tell how uneducated she was. It was kind of sad. I hope she does well, and we told her she can come to English class for help if she needs. 

All the sisters in the Zone

On Sunday, we met with that woman whose husband died really recently, and we are trying to figure out how to help her. We asked her what she thinks about God, and she said basically "well, He created us, but he just lets us die. I don't like that" Soooo, we are trying to figure out what would be best for her. We had a nice little miracle getting to that appointment though. Before that appointment, we were at a member's house for dinner, and then left for our appointment, but there weren't many buses and the next one would come in 40 minutes... So we were kinda freaking out because we had to get to that appointment in about 20 minutes, so our only option was to find a taxi, but in that part of town there weren't many. So we were all internally praying (begging) for a taxi to show up, and it DID about 3 seconds later :P WOOO! Haha. That was such a blessing.

February 2, 2015

My first week in Ulsan has been good! I really like Sis Erickson, who kind of reminds me of Mikaila because she is really healthy and active and such. She's doing pretty good at leading the area, but we have gotten lost a number of times :P Haha. But it's okay, 'cuz I remember my 3rd transfer.. :P

This week has been pretty good. It started with Monday night, when we had a Family Home Evening thingy with the ward, so I got to meet some ward members. COOL THING: There's a member who married a Czech man and lives in Switzerland most of the time, but every year comes back for a few months to visit her parents and connect with friends, so she speaks German! Wooo! It was fun to refresh my German a little bit, but it has definitely gotten rusty. I can still communicate just fine though, but Korean words like to try to pop out. :P 

A weird picture from our District from last transfer

Anyways, Tuesday was really busy. We met an investigator who is really nice, but maybe not progressing much at the moment, because her husband died about 2 months ago and he didn't want her to get baptized, so we are trying to help her with that. We also met another investigator at her art studio, which was fun. She was really nice too. Then we had  English class, which is a lot more low key than Gwangan's was (Gwangan English = ridiculous).

We had District Meeting, and later that night we met with an American member who is in Korea teaching English. It was super weird to teach in English, 'cuz I'm so used to Korean.

Thursday we had an AWESOME day planned, but nothing went according to plan, except for doing a service activity in the morning. It was at a soup kitchen, and was pretty similar to what I did in Haeundae, but this time it was indoors. After that, our planned appointment cancelled because she thought it was at 11, not 1, and she didn't have time later. Then we planned to meet someone else at 4, but she just didn't show up, and texted us 25 minutes later saying she couldn't come, and then the last appointment was with the Korean/Swiss member and her parents, but she got sick... And also all of our back up plans didn't work out, because what we planned to do was closed. So... we did weekly planning. :P

Saturday we had an interesting appointment... It was this lady who they had met fairly recently, but because Sis Erickson is so new and doesn't understand all that is going on, she didn't know much about her. But this lady wanted to meet with a member too, but had a list of qualities that she wanted the member to have. Previously, the sisters had tried suggesting 2 members, but she had shot down those ideas without even meeting them, so we were really excited when she accepted to meet with the Korean/Swiss member, LeeDongSun (?). But the appointment was kind of weird. She wasn't very friendly and didn't talk to Sis Erickson and I very much, but just fired a lot of questions at Sis Lee about weird stuff, like when EXACTLY Jesus Christ will come again, and if Adam was really made from dust and Eve from his rib, what is the meaning of the 10 women with oil, etc. I didn't understand all that much, but I could tell she was asking these weird, hard questions. So I was grateful Sis Lee was there :P But no matter what we said, she didn't like our answers. She didn't even consider them and just shot them down, saying "no, that's not right. no, that doesn't seem right." So we did what we could to try to help her, tried testifying that the way to get the answers to her questions is to pray sincerely and aks God, but she wasn't buying any of it. She... wasn't open, and was expecting some sort of sign or something very specific that she has in mind for an answer. So, we decided to stop meeting her. I don't think she wanted to meet with us anymore anyways, but it was just kind of sad to see someone who has a lot of questions, but is unwilling to do what is necessary to find those answers.

Anyways. Sunday was good, I got to meet the members, and they were all really friendly and nice. Later that evening we met a really funny lady. She's so funny and so outgoing, and kind of eccentric. I was excited to meet her, because from what Sis Erickson said, she sounded really interesting. Hahaha. So. uh. If I understand correctly, she believes she has a ghost/spirit inside her? But that's okay because she believes in God. She actually is a sweet lady who, despite some eccentricities, has a really strong belief in and love for God. I really liked her and we spent most of our appointment just laughing, but she is also very sincere and agreed with the things we taught. 

This week I have felt a lot of gratitude, because this is my first time being the "senior" companion, meaning the one that has been on a mission longer. I was afraid that my Korean would not be up to the level it needs to be, because Sis Erickson is still really new and learning. So if I don't understand, she doesn't, so therefore, I HAVE to understand. But somehow this week, we've met with various people and I've understood most everything they have said. I don't know if that is because they have been speaking more simply for us because we are foreigners or what, but I feel like my understanding has suddenly jumped several levels. I feel really blessed and grateful that I have been able to have the knowledge necessary to do missionary work. I was worried :P

January 26, 2015

Things on this side of the world are good :P haha. So, today is the first day of the transfer, and I was right, I moved! I'm now in Ulsan city (Shinjeon? area) with Sister Erickson, who just finished training, so I'm doing "follow-up training" with her. Fun stuff! Sister KimYeonSeob is going to stay in Gwangan and Haeundae and is going to train! She's pretty nervous, but I'm sure she'll do great. I'm sure it'll be quite an experience for her, because if I have to describe her in 2 words, it is "Neville Longbottom". That is a Harry Potter referrence, you all. Haha. 

 

Ulsan

She's so cute. Anyways, I'm excited to be in Ulsan now! I knew I would transfer, because I could just feel that I was done with Gwangan and Haeundae. They are really good areas and I love them, but I felt that it was time to move on. Something funny that I have noticed is I have had SO MANY COMPANIONS! Hahaha. I was talking to an Elder who is going to go home around the same time I do, so he's been on his mission a lot longer than I have, and he has had 6 companions. I have been here just 7ish months, and have had 5. Wat. Hahah. I had Sis Bussio, Hingano, and KimYeonSeob for 1 transfer each, and I'll probably only be with Sis Erickson for 1... Sooooo. What's with that, haha.

Ulsan is about 25 miles north-northeast from Busan

Anyways, my last week in Haeundae and Gwangan was good. We were trying to start a Family Home Evening in Gwangan, but basically no one came. Sad :( We just did normal stuff, mostly. Service project (at the outdoor soup kitchen), various area missionary meetings, met some members, English class, etc.

After English class on Tuesday, a member invited us and some class members to their house for dinner, and we had homemade Shabu-Shabu, which I've never seen before. Usually you just get ShabuShabu at a restaurant, 'cuz it requires a lot of preparation. ShabuShabu is not Korean, though everyone disagrees on where its from (either Japan or Vietnam, I think?). Basically it's a pot of boiling broth that you put various vegetables and meats in. It was really good! 

Shabu-shabu

On Thursday we did deep cleaning of our apartment, and got the call saying I was transfering. So Friday was mostly packing and sending my luggage through the post office. I feel sorry for whoever had to lug that thing around. So heavy. I have no idea how I'm going to get back to America :P I don't know how this happened.. haha. So much stuff. But I blame books/papers. On Saturday and Sunday we met some of our investigators for the last time. Both are Chinese, which is funny 'cuz we are in Korea, but they are both really sweet and I'm going to miss them. They go back to China this week, so unfortunately Sis KimYeonSeob is being left with basically no investigators :/ Sorryz. But I'll try to keep in contact with them. :) 

Saying goodbye to sis KimYeonSeob. Don't judge how tired I look :P

I think my shoulder-angel is photobombing me again!

My last Sunday was in the Haeundae Ward, and it was really nice. I'll miss those members. I got to give a goodbye talk thingy (just really short), so I shared some thoughts on Jacob 4:7. 

"Nevertheless, the Lord God showeth us our weakness that we may know that it is by his grace, and his great condescensions unto the children of men, that we have power to do these things."

Frankly, sometimes I don't like seeing my weaknesses, because they are MANY, but. Because of those weaknesses, I have seen how God has helped and strengthened me. I know that I need His help, and I know that He gives it. Another scripture I had been thinking about was Mormon 9:21 

"Behold, I say unto you that whoso believeth in Christ, doubting nothing, whatsoever he shall ask the Father in the name of Christ it shall be granted him; and this promise is unto all, even unto the ends of the earth." 

We are PROMISED help and guidance and answers, so even if we don't understand now, we will later. Speaking of blessings coming later, I was told something really cool today during transfer meeting. An Elder came up to me and told me he had been serving in Suseong, my training area. While I was there, a random lady approached us at the subway, because a loong time ago she had met the missionaries and they had taught her English and such. So she asked us to do that with her children. While I was there, two of the kids got really interested in the church, and right when I left, they were considering getting baptized. Later, I texted her but didn't get a response, and then I heard from the Elders that were still there that they hadn't been able to meet them in over a month, so I was sad. I figured that was it. But today this Elder came up to me and told me that the daughter got baptized! He showed me a picture and everything. Oh man. I wish I could have gone, but I still can't say how happy I am that I got to be a part of that. I think this is the biggest miracle I've had on my mission so far. I'm really, really grateful.

This girl from my training area was baptized! Sister Sung sent me this picture of it.

Anyways. I'm excited to be here in Ulsan and I hope things go well here :) I'm excited to serve with Sis Erickson, she is really cool, and I can already tell that she is going to teach me a thing or two, haha. I need it. Haha.

A Chinese investigator in Gwangan