April 20, 2015 (Week 18)

April 20, 2015

Well, another week down...

Gogi (Meat) Buffet

After email last week we headed up to 연신내 Yeonshinne, which is the devil of the area. Super busy and super rude, but we headed up there for the gogi buffet. Gogi is just meat, so a wonderful meat buffet. you pick up all the raw meat you want from a bar, then proceed to cook it at your table. I tried a little octopus, Korean style bacon (super thick), duck meat, other plain meats, and delicious side vegetables. I also tried lychee, which is a little strange plant, and an awful flavor at lanis. You'll have to try it sometime.... the fruit wasn't bad though. So we had the buffet and stuffed ourselves, then just shopped and headed back for the day. For the rest of the night we found our appointments work (took forever to find) and had a strange lesson. He works at a veteran place, so he gave us books about the Korean war, and we could barely give him the Book of Mormon before he had to get back to work... We plan to meet him this week, and hopefully have a real lesson.   Kind of a quiet night besides that.

Octopus

Tuesday was exchanges with Elder Brantley, so Elders Herron and Whitlock could do dl stuff.  Since it was raining, we managed to walk just about everywhere it seemed in our area in less than like 4 hours. While up in gu pa bal we met this super old guy (can give Yzma from Emperors New Groove a run for her money). We said hi, then he started raging at us for being missionaries for Jesus. We kept trying to talk to him until he was practically screaming at us.  As we were halfway down the street, he was still shouting at us... kinda sad, kinda funny.   For dinner with Elder Brantley, I tried 순대국 Soon De Gook. It is pig intestine. basically imagine a ball of meatloaf with parts of bone in it wrapped in a thin layer of fat... not that good. I tried like 2 pieces then called it good.  The people by us were nice though. Koreans are hilarious. They saw we were white, so they kept telling us to go get the ice cream, go get the Kimchi, try this out, try this.... Koreans love their culture, you got to give them that.  If you are a foreigner not talking about religion, they will go the extra mile to make sure you understand Korea.

Wednesday was district meeting, where most of it was spent talking about street boarding ideas, how they are splitting the area to be more effective, etc. So after that, me and Elder Whitlock went up to the moon goo (imagine an Office Max and DI smashed into a little store called a Moon Goo 문구 ).  It's a wonderful place.  So we did that, worked on that project, then had a big family home evening with the ward.  They had like 6 families show up and we had dinner with them. Dinner was quite delicious, except they had pig foot......... meat jello is the best way to describe it.  You eat around the fat to get the little bit of meat.  I don't recommend it.   While there, we met some referrals from the sisters. A 31 year-old, no life, spends it in video games... One of the two had a job and a girlfriend, so he's got that going for him. The other ones name is 이 병길 which if you break down each block, translates to "this disease path", haha. Poor guy.  Some names here are hilarious how they break down.  We also got to deal with "umbrella guy".  He is a Nokbeon crazy that all the missionaries know.  He just shows up at the church looking for food.  So we (just missionaries) were celebrating a sisters one year mark with some cake when he just walks into the room and starts demanding food. We tried to tell him it was a private party thing,  but he kept walking towards the cake.  Elder Whitlock finally snapped at him to leave...

Not gonna lie, this week has been pretty mind taxing.  Every other day I wake up and think well, still in Nokbeon, nobody to teach, this kinda sucks... so I get quite depressed, then eventually grow out of it, and repeat the next day.  That also happened Friday after weekly planning.  I was trying to pass off lesson 4, and I got stuck trying to teach prayer. I know the vocab, the principle, everything, except I can't teach.  So I broke down again with that, and just gave up on it that day.   It's quite frustrating.

Saturday I was still depressed, and it didn't help that we were supposed to plan the Family Home Evening message for that night.  Elder Whitlock had me take lead, but I didn't feel like even doing it. We were role playing with the other elders, when I asked him where he was at, because I couldn't follow his Korean, and he just snaps and says not to use English... Sorry if I can't understand where we are at, so yeah... that didn't help my state of mind.  We later went to meet our 5 appointments on the day. Only met with one of them. His name is Ee G Sung 이 지 승 .  He is a 28 year -old strange man.  He hates the organ, and hates scriptures and prayer because he gave himself to the devil in order to feel confident. He says he drinks his own blood sometimes too, but now he wants to change. Really strange lesson, we really need to help him. It's kinda sad what state he is in. I hope we can help him overcome these issues.

Lawrence Baptism

Sunday we were supposed to meet 방 석 규 to transfer him the the elders where he lives, but he cancelled to due a light rain, so we kinda just dropped him.  He has cancelled like 3 times, due to rain and being to hard, and etc.  We had to drop him cause he never keeps commitments either... kinda sad.   Then went out to ui jung boo 의 정 부  for another baptism. A guy named Lawrence that Elder Whitlock taught before transferring. He used to live with a prostitute, then we he wanted to live separate so he could get baptized. She called the cops on him for being illegal, so he has been on the run for a month now.  He finally got that settled, and was baptized. Really cool baptism. I got to play the piano for it, which was cool.  African converts are super strong. It's awesome to hear their testimonies.  So we did that then headed down to Shin Dang 신 당 where the Piano Guys were performing. All the missionaries came, even ones that live an hour and a half away. Two of the Piano Guys, the cello player and producer, served in Korea, so they wanted to come back. They each gave a little message and then played a couple pieces.  Super cool experience.  You'll have to see if you can find their video in front of the Brazil Jesus statue.  Cool story for that.  So we did the Piano Guys, I got to see my MTC friends again, then headed back home. We got home at 10:25, so was fun haha.

So yeah, that's been my week, up and down, but looking better each day now.

Love you all,

Elder Mortensen