July 20, 2015 (Week 31)

July 20, 2015

Surprise Package from Home!

Ok, hmmm, time to recap.

Monday I spent a lot of money on Korean supplies. Four books (still waiting to get another), flash cards, and other things later.  I spent around 100-ish dollars.  Good thing Nokbeon was cheap on groceries, and I was smart with money, so I could get them all at once.  Should last me for a while too.  Elder Carpenter spent around 300-400 on books, which is nuts.  So I've been going pretty hard with the language now. If i have any free time,  I'm usually doing something Korean.  It's kinda sad though, missionaries don't really speak in Korean to each other... I guess it takes too long to say anything to each other, so nobody speaks Korean, unless its with an actual Korean.  That night we started our exchange with Elders Ridge and Saunders.


Tuesday I was with Elder Saunders.  He has been out for about a year (transfer below Elder Yetter). He is from Illinois and super cool. With him,  I had an 8 hour jundo day... so long to walk around. So we went to the edge of our area, kinda jundoed around there, then headed back into our home area. Since we were hot and starving, we figured why not go to a gogi (meat) buffet?  So we jundoed over there, finally got there after about 6 straight hours of walking around (Elder Saunders doesn't need 4 breaks in one day), so we ended up just walking 6 straight hours.... met some pretty cool people.  One guy we met was super drunk and half crazy... He called us over to him (which is a sign he needs help... nobody ever wants to talk with us).  He took a Book of Mormon and started reading it, and as Elder Saunders tried to explain, the guy looks up, and just says "shut up".  Since he was crazy, we just kinda laughed at it, and tried to keep talking... He took our card, ripped it up,and went back to himself...  The buffet was pretty good. It was going fine, until the grill acted up and starting shooting up flames, about half a foot high... so the whole place got smoky, and everybody was looking at the weird white people who can't cook meat haha.  The worker called her manager, had us move over, and then opened the door.... pretty funny actually.  Really fun exchange though...

Wednesday was a huge let down... Planning for our member meal that night was hard. The member said they were having a family over, and so we were deciding whether to teach the first lesson, just share a message, and whatnot.  Elder Roskelley was just like "I don't want to overwhelm them with the restoration right now" and I'm just wondering why? We have a family there, they are already listening, why not teach them? So just things like that just get to me.  Elder Roskelley takes things really slow.  District meeting was "eh".  I played piano, and he picked hymns that I have never played before, so that didn't help. (yes, I do play the piano out here. I'm our district unofficial pianist.  Yes, I know you were right mom, sorry I didn't practice more).   The member meal was alright. they sat there and talked the whole time, so we didn't do much. The family played some songs they were going to perform, so we didn't even share a message...

Thursday was another 8 hour jundo day, lots of walking around trying to contact people. Yeah, we still didn't have a sit down lesson this week... all we do is walk... We met some super drunk guy (hehe, Koreans to say a heavy drinker call people "alcohol whales" haha) who kept saying since he is 50 we need to obey him and eat with him... When we tried to walk away, he chased us down the street, and kept pulling us a certain way... so he finally just bought us a drink, said he was sorry, and then walked off... I felt kinda bad.  He was drunk out of his mind, but he was so nice afterward, I felt bad trying to walk away.  After planning that night, we got a text from some lady who brought a package from Sister Boud and parents!

Friday I listened to a great talk from 1974 by Elder Holland.  Pretty good,  I recommend that one. later,  we went and picked up the package from the lady.  We were talking with a guy when she came, so she literally handed us the bag, and then just walked off.  We didn't really get to talk to her. really nice though. Thanks for the package!  That was an awesome surprise!  If I would of known,  I would of told you to send some deodorant, and toothpaste.  Koreans don't believe in deodorant per se, and their toothpaste is awful... Hopefully I can last until September... but yeah, that package was awesome!  I was jundoing that night with some guy, when a delivery boy pulled up on the sidewalk (they ride motorcycles everywhere, and obey no laws haha) and listened for a moment, then said "wow, you're good at Korean (everyone says that) I thought you were speaking English at first."  Then just drove off, haha.  That was pretty funny to have happen.

Night Skyline Shot

Saturday was lame.  For exercise we went outside, so we ran up 18 floors to get to our apartment after... That was such a long run... either I'm really out of shape, or 18 is just too high, but we were both about to pass out, haha.  Later we just some jundo and a really awkward English class. I was with a sister Korean missionary and their investigator at a table, so they weren't very good at English, and really awkward about it... English class is always super weird...  Later was just some more jundo, except it actually rained!  It's been pretty cloudy this week, but no rain except Saturday.

Sunday was pretty regular, more jundo and church.

 Well, love you all, have fun

-Elder Mortensen