Finding Joy in All Things

So another week, not enough time to describe everything that happened.

So this past week we received a call from a Sri Lankan man. There seem to be more foreigners or 외극인's interested in the gospel than Koreans. But that is ok. Anyways, he is a member who needed some help and knew that missionaries can help people. He is really interesting and super cool. He is in a rock band and he is also 54. He had some pretty cool pictures of him in the 80's. After we helped him with what we could, we said good bye. It was a weird experience, but he is super cool. 

This week, I met three Canadians too. One of them is a translator. I think he has a really cool job because he gets to travel the world. Then I also bumped into a Canadian couple here on vacation. They are really awesome. 

Also, I started playing a game while we are out street contacting. So, the streets are always full of police officers here in Seoul. Every time I pass one I say hello. But the funny thing is no one every says hello to the police officers so they look at me funny if I have never said it before to them. The cool part though is their response when I have spoken to them before. Sometimes, a police officer will even greet me before I can greet him. Kind of a lame game, but it makes me smile and it makes them smile too. 

We also had a crazy lesson this week. The person was 20 minutes late, but we talked with him as we walked to the church from the train station. We then gave him a tour of the church and then we tried to teach him a lesson. He was really interested, but he told us right off the bat that he didn't believe in feelings from the Holy Ghost. It was a really hard lesson, but it went ok. 

We also had exchanges this past week. Our district leader, Elder Mac, has two companions. I went with them and it is really interesting how they go about helping others come unto Christ, but I really learned a lot. I feel like I have been doing a lot of that. We also stopped and got Ice cream because it was super hot and humid (more so than in Missouri). That same day, we taught English and the Assistants to the President had a baptism. I think we ended up spending the whole day at the Church. 

So after English class, when we were setting up for the baptism, we noticed there were a lot of mosquitoes. Turns out someone had left the windows open in the women's bathroom. After closed the window, we looked out side and saw this massive ball of mosquitoes. It was gross. 30 minutes before the baptism, we (the missionaries) were told we were doing a musical number. In Korea, the do things a little differently... after we finished the musical number (singing during the baptismal service) the congregation started clapping for us. It was a little different. But the baptismal service went well. That's pretty much it for the Week... oh monsoon season is about to go into full swing, don't worry about me, with all your prayers, I probably wont get too wet :)

Elder Brown

Fun Fact: Our church building (the one to which I am assigned) has 3 floors and a basement, all owned by the church. The church was built in like 1983 and it has not been remodled since the constuction... I think. But the roof belongs to the city of Seoul. There is a really nice city park on the roof. I found this out this week.

When You Don't Understand, Testify of Christ

So last Monday, we went and toured one of the many palaces here in Seoul. I will have to send pictures later but it was huge! We walked around for 2.5 hours and we didn't see everything. It was so much fun, but we didn't have enough time to go shopping... We ended up going to a little market and paying rediculous prices for everything. Can of spagetti sauce 3300won or $3.30. Yep, we are not going back there again, ever!

 On Tuesday, we do service at a retirement home of sorts. The old people are so awesome! We made crafts with them and did puzzles, it was so much fun, I only which I could have helped by grandma with her puzzle better. Basically, when she got confussed and asked for help I said, 'maybe here?' becaus ethat is all I know when it comes to puzzles. After service they gave us a bunch of bread from a bakery that is all over Seoul. Paris Bargutte. We ate at this sandwhich place that I guess we are supposed to go to every week. The sandwiches are very cheap and the owner is super nice, she gave us free drinks to go with our sandwiches. Then we taught English which is supprisingly fun. I also gave the spritual message at the end...in korean...which was fun. 

Wednesday, my companion was called a ginger, which is funny because he is. We also handed out flyers for  the free English class that we teach. It was really weird because I was talking to girls. 

-SIDENOTE- in korean culture, if a man approaches a woman it is generally excepted that the man is flittering with the woman. In order to prevent that, the past mission president said 'no talking with girls'. This however does not apply to handing out fliers for English class.- 

Thursday we meet President Sonkson. He is super cool and is going to be a great mission president. But the highlight of the week was that night. We were eating dinner, wishing we had something to drink besides water...big mistake. 

For all of you preparing to go on missions, save yourself the trouble and do not have this thought. So we leave the apartment and Elder Bishop gets a phone call, not thinking, he turns down the wrong road. He ends the call and keeps going. As we are walking, we see two old men struggling to move this big wooden chest. We ask if we can help and a women walking down the hill told us to go help them. We run and help them, but one of them disappears. When we finish, we are told that we can not leave because the other man went to get us drinks. At this point we are hot and sweaty and would just like a glass of water, but the man comes back with soda and expensive milk. The old men, at least in their late 60's then tell us to drink. Now in Korea, if an old person tells you to do something, you do it, but we really have to go. 

So we end up drinking a bottle of super carbonated( Korean Soda is more carbonated than American) Orange Fanta and some other kind that tastes like Sprite in about 30 secs. Not smart, but the old men are almost in tears because they are so happy that we helped them and even more so for accepting their token of appriciation. We got away with not drinking the milk in front of them, but only under the condition that we take it with us. After asking them to meet the missionaries in the area that they are moving to, we headed down the road we wanted to go down originally. But this was up a super steep hill. By the time we made it up, we felt a little sick, but we keep going. While helping the old men, we missed a phone call, so Elder Bishop returned it. While he is on the phone, we pass two women, but in the fading light, it looks like one of them is a man. I say hello and the woman that I thought was a man responds. Then turns around real fast and starts talking to me. I still understand nothing but I act like I do because that is what I was told to do. You act like you understand them and then you testify about Christ and then they understand that you don't speak Korean. Well, she knows that we are missionaries. 

SIDENOTE- After the conversation, Elder Bishop infortms me that she is a buddist monk.- 

She says something about UTAH and BYU and I thought, "oh she is asking if I am going to go to BYU in Utah," luckily, I can respond to this. So we are talking and she motions up the hill and says something. I thought she said 'I am going this way, can you walk this way with me?' I agree, turns out she was asking if she could buy us something to drink... So we talk a little bit more and she stops at a convience store and I see her go to the drink section. I think to myself, I really hope she doesn't buy us something to drink. She ended up getting both of us orange juice and super expensive apple juice. Crazy right! well my companion was on the phone for this whole conversation and he tells me that the person he was on ther phone with wanted to take us out to dinner. It was a crazy night. 

I know that God is always looking out for us and wants us to always be happy. If He could answer a small desire of our hearts, He will answer your concerns. 

ON Friday we met a really cool kid, but as my companion was talking with him, a drunk man (there are a lot sometimes) stops me and wants to talk with me. Lets just say that it was really interesting to see him try to not fall over and he had a lot to say to me. The kid that we met though is super cool though. I really like him. He even tried to help me understand what he was saying. 

Saturday was uneventful, except for English class. 

On Sunday, I gave my welcome to the ward talk. But we also had a super awesome suprise. So we are greeting people at the door, all 8 missionaries in the ward, and this girl walks right up to the sisters and says 'I am looking for my God. I am from China. I want to be baptized today.' Yes that was rather exciting for the sisters, but it just tells me that there are many people ready and willing to come closer to God. 

That is all I have for this week.

Love

Elder Brown

KOREA!

WOW! this has been a crazy week. Sorry if I miss spell something. I am typing on a korea keyboard. And the pictures will be fun to work with. To start back in America... I have forgotten just about everything. Sorry. I can tell you that we had a lot of fun and that we studied hard, but other than that, I have nothing.

The flight: Well to begin, we went to bed around 12:30am and woke up around 3? maybe, I have forgotten, but it was really early in the morning. So we make it to our bus on time, We load the bus, get on the bus and it won't start. oops. So then all the missionaries ( I am traveling with at least 75 people to the airport) get off the bus. It starts, we get back on the bus. We barely make it to the train station and we hop on the train. Then we transffer trains. This is fun because one of the sisters in my district recently had surgery, she had to have her gall bladder removed. So as we move all her stuff, and ours, we catch the train. We make it to the airport and then we are going through security. We saw Stacy! the one from studio C. We didn't ㅗㅁㅍㄷ 샤ㅡㄷ 새 ㅅ맏 ㅗㅑㄴ ㅔㅑㅊ셕ㄷ, oops, have time to take his picture. We made it to our flight and it was a really nice flight. But then our landing was delayed due to the fog. This was a problem because our connection flight to korea was leaving soon. When we landed, we ran as fast as we could to our flight. We made it with 2 min to spare. Lets just say that Prayer works! I slept for most of the flight to Korea, could do a whole lot else. When we landed we were all super excited. We walked throught the airport, it was super empty and made it to customs. There were a bunch of health signs up too. But that is ok, as a missionary I have promised myself that I can not get sick. Plus the Mission ㅖㄱㄷ냥둣 ㅅ맏ㄴ ㄱㄷ미ㅣㅛ 해ㅐㅇ president takes really good care of us. We get of the plane after we go through customs and find our bags. Then we go out and meet our mission president and his wife. The Christensens are so nice, but they go home on thursday. Our new president gets here on Wednesday. It should be fun. They take our bags and we go and teach the gospel on the trains. That was... an experience. I think I have forgotten all Korean, either that or they taught me cantoneese in the MTC. On the train we met a man from Cambodia, he is studing here. He is super good at english which is good because I am too  Then we went and saw a 4-D historical film and then went to president's house. It was a lot of fun. I had my first taste of Kimchi... it was ok. and we had melona which is a  super awesome popcicle. After a quick personal introduction to president, we went to bed. The next morning after breackfast, we had a meeting all morning in which we found our trainers. Then we had Korean Pizza, which is way better than American. Then we had more classes and then we headed to our new homes. Public transportation and suit cases is not very fun... After hiking a small hill, we made it to our new home. It was a litttle messy, but that is ok because we cleaned it up later. Then we went to work. We were supposed to meet someone at the church, but he didn't show up. We had kimchi chige which is the hottest soup you will ever have, in boyh ways. The Koreans started laughing at us because our faces were turning red because of how hot the soup was. The next day we went out looking for people to teach. This is because my trainer and I are new to the area. As we were walking a man ran up to us and asked if we taught about God. After we confemind this he demanded, more like politly informed us that he really wanted to learn about God, us to teach him at his resturant later. We agreed, I mean that is our job, no? The rest of the day was super great as well. The nxt day we were lost and asked a man to help us. He couldn't help us, but he bought us ICecream, which is good enough right? We eventually found our way. Church was interesting... seeing how it was all in Korean. During Sunday school, I was asked to go with another Missionary to pick up a man from a mental Hospital. He is a convert and was fine until he was nearly choked to death by one of his customers. He was a taxi driver. They were driving over a river and he drove off the side into the river. He is the nicest person in the world though. I really like him. As we were walking back to the church, a man stopped us and asked if we taught about God. Before we could share a message with him, his caretakers dragged him away. After Church, which was ward conference and my mission presidents farewell. ( We had to do a special musical number in the middle of the meeting. It was a lot of fun) We had a 식사 ward lunch. I think I ate octapus or intestince, maybe a heart, liver?, chicken, chopcha, cucumber kimshi, super awful gross kimchi and aprocot jelly cubes. That is all That I have for now.

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Elder Brown