Holidays are hard...

It randomly started raining on night so we went
to get umbrellas and came out with these

This week was really really slow. We had one appointment that followed through. The rest of the time we just spend proselyting and finding less actives. Which means a TON of walking. Good thing I have good shoes or else I would be dying.

Our appointment was with Amanda. It went well but we don’t think she is going to want to change religions anytime soon. We talked about the importance of keeping the Sabbath day holy. She takes her Toeic English tests on Sundays so we asked her how she could keep the Sabbath day holy after her test. The she went to English class after and really liked it. She said she wanted to go again this week.

This is a burger place at the university nearby.
Korea doesn't mess around with burgers

Then the other exciting thing that happened didn’t happen until Monday. Holidays are really slow here with regards to missionary work. People aren’t home and they don’t want to talk to you so it’s a bit discouraging. But on Monday morning when sister Stradling was in the shower Sister Marsden called us and told us a member of her ward had someone she wanted to refer to us and she wanted to talk to us immediately. So I called her and started talking to her in broken Korean then she asked me how long I had been here for and when I told her about 4 months she broke into perfect English. It was a huge relief. She was in Jeon Ju for the weekend because of the holiday and she wanted to meet us with her cousin and her family to refer her to us. We were SO excited. So we made an appointment for that night. We met them. They are a family of five. Mom, dad, two daughters and a son. The only one that seemed interested in the gospel message we shared was the second oldest daughter. The rest of the family just seemed interested in English but we are meeting with them again on Saturday so we’ll see what happens.

 

We ran out of oil so we tried to make a pancake
in the microwave. It worked!

That was pretty much the only exciting thing that happened this week. Holidays are really painfully slow. There are a TON more people and traffic is insane but people aren’t as willing to listen. I also got a nasty cold this week so we stayed inside one day so that I could relax. When Elder Smith found out I wasn’t feeling well he gave me a TON of natural medicine. It was hilarious. Shows what kinda dad he will be. I guess my body just doesn’t like Korea in the spring time. But I have been feeling better recently so were good :)

Here is the medication Elder Smith gave me.
I don’t know if I feel more loved or drugged

Anyways I hope you all have a great week! I’m excited to talk to you on Mother’s day!

--

- Sister Collyer 콜리여 자매 (kol-lee-yeo ja-mae)

I almost forgot! our relief society president went to America this week so we couldn’t meet with Sister Oh and didn’t come to church so we will most likely have to push back her baptismal date but we have an appointment with her on Friday so well know more then

Another Baptismal Date!

We found these wings as we were walking around so we took pictures.

We finally had a lesson with Sister Oh! (The one that was referred to us by our relief society president) and she has a baptismal date! We taught the plan of salvation and sister Sung (RSP) was there. And it was so good! The lesson went really well and it was hilarious because at one point sister Oh got up to get us strawberries and sister Sung leans over to us and asks where it talks about Christ’s baptism in the Book of Mormon so we gave her the reference then Sister Sung read it when sister Oh got back and asked her if she would get baptized. At first sister Oh said that she would have to think about it but Sister Sung pushed her so hard for May 18th because that is the date that sister Sung got baptized on. And sister Stradling said that we could set a date and if she didn’t feel ready we could push it back. And eventually Sister Oh agreed! So we have a baptismal date! She didn’t come to church on Sunday so to make that date she has to come the next three weeks in a row but we still have hope!

More Wings

We also got a new investigator this week! She is mainly English interest but we’ll see where it goes. Her name is Sister Park and she is planning on moving to LA wit her son so she wants to get better at English. She lived in Hawaii for a few months and apparently went to the Polynesian cultural Center where she met someone who told her about out 30/30 program (30 min English 30 min message) so she contacted us. We only met with her once and she seemed very much English interest. She kept asking us to speak in English instead of Korean during the gospel part which is something we are not supposed to be doing. So we’ll see where things go. One funny thing is we showed her a picture of Joseph Smith and she said she saw a huge picture of him in Hawaii and we got excited. Then she asked if he was single. Never thought I would have anyone ask me if Joseph Smith was single before. She was sad when we told her he wasn’t single and he was dead. We got a kick out of that.

We had a fruit party!
We don't get fruit enough so we had to document it

we got this candy from our stake president and it was kinda like skittles
but i thought you would like it mom because its called Beatles and its a band of fruit
and it reminded me of the Beatles! That's all :)

And Amanda wanted to meet with us again this week! So hopefully things get rolling with that. She had a lot of questions about why bad things happen to good people because of the boat accident so we comforted her as much as we could. We used the questions of the soul in preach my gospel and it went really well. She always talks to us about how she knows she needs to change things she does in her life but she just doesn’t want to. We’ll keep working with her and see where it goes.

kimbap

Also we called Stella on Thursday to see if there was any hope there and she told us that she didn’t want to meet with the Mormons anymore. Then Friday night the other sisters come into our room and tell us that Stella met with them. That was really hard on Sister Stradling. She took it pretty hard. She felt like she had failed as a missionary because Stella just didn’t want to meet with us anymore. As I was trying to comfort her she said something to me that took me by surprise. She asked me how I face my fears so boldly. (She was referring to proselyting because that’s the only thing I am afraid of) I didn’t even realize I was doing that. I feel like I don’t talk to enough people and that I’m not bold enough and that I’m not strong enough all that time and I kinda beat myself up about it. But when she said this to me it made me feel like maybe I am a good missionary maybe I’m not quite as slow progressing and I think I am. It gave me a little hope. And it also made me realize how much God has helped me these past few months. I know there’s no way that I would be able to open my mouth to random people without him and I am eternally grateful to him for that and other things he has given me.

Korea takes morning to a whole new level. Like it is seriously looked down upon to do anything fun or be seen having fun right now. So our ward picnic got canceled which is sad... And i guess news recently came out that religion might be connected to the boat sinking so pres warned us that our job might be a little harder for a while so that will be fun. Hopefully everything works out though.

Anyways I hope everyone back home is doing well! I love and pray for you all!

--

- Sister Collyer 콜리여 자매 (kol-lee-yeo ja-mae)

Happy Easter!

All the lanterns for Buddhas birthday!

I hope everyone had a fantastic Easter! They don’t really celebrate Easter here. Like at all but I will talk about that at the end.

Still a really slow week. We had to drop another two of our investigators so we are down to three and they are all busy moms that can’t meet a lot so that’s hard. We only had one lesson this whole week and it wasn’t until Saturday. But we have been trying to find less actives so that has been an adventure.

 

Beautiful bridge!

We visited one family at the beginning of the week whose father is really active and is part of the ward council I’m not sure what his calling is but his wife is less active and so are his kids. We shared a short message with them and then just visited with them and the wife (Sister Moon) started commenting on my face and I had no idea what she was saying so I just thanked her because I was assuming it was good. Afterwards Sister Stradling told me that she was talking about how perfect my features are and how when she was in college she had to do an etching of the Venus De Milo and so she studied the face a lot and my nose reminded her of the Venus De Milo. So apparently my nose looks like the one on the Venus De Milo. Fun fact.

We had a combined Zone conference up in Daejeon this week. It was all about purifying ourselves with missionary work because we are doing a 40 day fast where we all promise to purify ourselves of everything that is distracting us and at least one companionship in the mission is fasting every day. President thought that it would be a good idea to prepare ourselves for when Elder D Todd Christofferson comes on May 31. So we pretty much talked about that the whole time. But I saw Sister Jensen from the MTC! The one that wasn’t my companion and she told me she looked up to me so much so that made me feel good about myself :)

We also found out as we were coming back to Jeon Ju that a ship off the coast of Korea had capsized with over 500 students on board mostly high school students. Last I heard 300 are still unaccounted for. Korea is DEVESTATED. Everyone is talking about it. It makes me sad the more I hear about it :) I am sure if you haven’t heard about it and are curious you can look it up on google. So they have all been in my prayers lately.

Anyways, on a happier note: we met with Sister No (our investigator in our apartment complex it’s easier to just call her that) on Saturday and it went so well! Her husband was there for the first time and we taught her little boy English then taught about fasting and tithing. It was the first time I have taught a whole family and it was amazing! There is just a different spirit there when it’s a whole family together. Sister Stradling shared an experience that her dad had with tithing and I shared about Jakobs spina bifida that we did that family fast for (I had to look up a lot of words for that one) and it was just so great! We asked if they would come to church and her husband told us that he used to go to church a lot when he was younger but he doesn’t anymore. They didn’t end up coming to church but we are hopeful :)

So things with them are going well and we are meeting with Debbie (the women whose mother invited the missionaries into her house when she was 10 and now she wants to know more) on Friday and Sister Oh (the one we meet with the Relief Society President) tomorrow so that will be good.

And now to Easter! So we went to church yesterday and no one even mentioned it was Easter (they call it resurrection day here) and it was really sad! But after Sunday school the bishop asked sister Stradling and I if we had plans after five. We told him no and he just walked away so we were really confused. So we get home from church and start our studies then at 4:30 the young women’s president (Sister Lee) calls and says she’s picking us up for a dinner. Then she takes us to the Relief Society Presidents house (sister sung) and the bishop and his family are there and we all ate together! All the men were cooking and waited until the women were done eating to eat so that was cool. Sister Sung lives in this authentic Korea house and she her husband showed us around some and taught us about it with Sister Lee translating it into English. So that was cool. We shared a message about the resurrection and sang Christ the Lord has Risen Today with everyone. No one in the ward even knew that is was Easter but I feel like we had a really successful Easter for no one here even celebrating it :)

 

Cherry Blossoms at Buddhas temple!

 

The guards at the Buddhist temple

Oh and yesterday after church we had a ward council meeting that lasted 2 hours where we pretty much just talked about where we wanted the ward activity (picnic) to be held on Buddha’s birthday. I think it’s funny that we talked amore about Buddha’s birthday on Easter than Easter.

Anyways I hope everyone is well and has a great Easter. I love you all!

--

- Sister Collyer 콜리여 자매 (kol-lee-yeo ja- mae)