100515 Fireworks, repentance and Korean

Hey President,  [Daniel writes to his president and us weekly.  He sends us what he sends the president to help us know even more about his experience.]

This week has been good. Elder Grossgebauer [Daniel’s companion] contacted some people he knew from when he served here before so we should be having more meetings and lessons. So that is exciting! We went to a few of the poorer areas in our area, and we met some cool people. I feel like it is often the poor people that are more humble and thus more willing to accept the gospel. 

Here are some cars in Korea--but not in the poorer areas

When my companion was talking with a religious guy a younger guy listened for a little and came over and started talking to me. He seemed genuinely interested. He asked why we are out and I explained that we don't get paid and are just here to help people to come to Christ. He seemed impressed and gave me his phone number. So I called him later and tried to set up an appointment. He seemed more hesitant than he was before. However after reassuring that we aren't forcing him into anything, he set an appointment and ultimately said he would go to church. However he didn't show up. I just figured he decided he wasn't interested, but this morning he texted us apologizing and said he still wants to meet. That just made me happy. My interpretation is that he was prompted to listen and ask about us, but as happens with all of us, he doubted and got busy with life. However, he apologized and will hopefully decide to meet with us. That process of recognizing, changing, etc. is the repentance process. Hopefully that made some sense. But it is joyful to see somebody repent, or at least show the beginnings of the repentance process.
Another thought is back to the mission conference. I was really impressed with how my companion was really loved by a lot of people. He seemed to have loved and helped lots of missionaries. I think the missionaries around us are people we can definitely impact for the better. Just by being positive and saying good things like Elder Grossgebauer does.  He builds trust and the ability to work well together.
Elder Sabey

Hello everybody!

This week was another good week. Teaching English is always a highlight of my week. I teach the intermediate class with one of the zone leaders. He asked about what they did that was fun that week. Anyway one of the ladies shared about her holiday and cooking with her children. She paused a lot between words and had to think a lot about what she was saying.  Anyway, as she was talking I was like that is what I sound like in Korean. Speaking slower than normal, having to think about what I am saying a lot, but they can understand me and it really isn't that annoying! However I think they understand more in English than I do in Korean. I am getting better though. Church wasn't as exhausting as is it was last week. I am getting more and more. I feel like I know a lot of the most common conjugations, and I know quite a few of the words they use at church since it is religious. But still they speak so fast that it feels like words are flying at me and I get every 3 to 10 words and have to try to put them together. Plus I miss a lot of words still. However we still don't speak a bunch of Korean, which I will try to do better at, just because English is so much easier, and I think it isn't super fun for my companion to have to explain all the words and things I don't know.

One funny thing about my area. We have a Costco. It is funny because the food court thing is SUPER popular. It is packed with huge lines. So when we met with a guy Elder Grossgebauer knew from a different area, he wanted to take us out to eat. He said he wanted something American and suggested Costco. Anyway fun stuff.

 So yeah missionaries say my area is kind of like a mini America. There is a little box where people can leave stuff for us. So when military people leave or people just want to be nice they leave us food. Not many people do it. But some of the members in the English ward each week or so gives us two boxes of American cereal, normally cinnamon toast crunch. So that is lovely. 

In Korea they always have new people do introductory remarks at the beginning of sacrament. So my first week here, I had to do that in sacrament. I kept it pretty simple, but people seemed relatively impressed. The bishop said something like “This is his first week in Korea so that was really good.” Then this week he asked me to say the opening prayer. It is funny how things like that, even though you are among the most loving and supportive people in the world, are still nerve racking. 

In Seoul they had a world firework thing. There were teams from America, Philippines, and Korea. It was on the river between the north and south side. We went with a new convert who is amazing and is trying to get into BYU. There were like millions of people so we were pretty far away, but it was still cool.

 Koreans claim they are super busy, which to some extent they are. However most weekends everybody seems to have time to go out with friends and get drunk or go to firework festivals. It is kind of funny, and sad. Drinking and smoking is a huge cultural thing. So is religion. There are a bunch of churches. Mainly all Christian. There are Jehovah’s Witnesses, God's church, and others that send out missionaries as well. We met one of the guys from God's Church. It was funny. He argued a bunch with us. They claim that Christ and Heavenly mother are on earth or something. Though I think one of them (the person that claimed to be Christ) died or something. So he tried to get us to come to his church, only then would he meet with us. Or there are people who hand out flyers and people who stand on street corners and cry repentance to the people. I think I get why most Korean's don't love missionaries. Most missionaries are really forceful and outspoken. We are the opposite. We really want to help people in any way possible. We are here full time to help. We don't get any benefit whatsoever if they chose to join or not. In fact we are paying to be here. My companion kind of jokingly suggested we make a pamphlet explaining that. I actually kind of like that idea. If we can clearly explain our purpose and why we actually want to meet with people, I think we would be different enough from other missionaries that we could get some people to listen to us. I don't know it is probably harder that I make it seem.

Anyway I love you all,

Elder Sabey