We Survived Two Days!

Downtown Gangnam.


Wow....so crazy week. Alright, it didn’t get crazy until saturday when we had transfers.

Sanbon members fed us a ton since i was leaving and i said goodbye to some good friends.  I would send pictures but this computer doesn’t have the right usb drive....its because today were using a ‘PC bang....’   which is pretty much like a room full of computers where teenage boys come and pay and then game for a couple of hours. I’ve heard a lot about PC bangs and pres discourages us using them, but i actually thinks its a pretty funny situation. We walk in here and the room is full of high-school boys going to town playing world of warcraft and such games.....yelling at their friends and eating food.... I wish i could send a pic. And then in walks us two sister missionaries....tall and blonde and American. Hahah and we don’t really know how tot use the pc bang either so we have a bunch of kids trying to explain to us in horrible konglish how to “rogin and whichee  ah-ee-dee”  to use....  hahaha  the guy at the front desk thinks we’re idiots....sorry i don’t understand weird computer vocab.

Thats pretty much has this last 2 days has been though. Sister Chestnut is the new comp from Payson Utah. And while she’s great, she speaks about as much Korean as Mom does spanish....so you can imagine how that is.hahah But its been a great self esteem builder for me haahha  seeing how far i’ve come because i was worse than her when i got here!   And, i’m pretty sure i’ve spoken more korean in the last 2 days than i did in my whole first 2 transfers....so i’m definitely going to learn alot faster now...its exciting.

The ward on sunday was awesome though!!! i heard a lot that gangnam area was hard because everyone is super rich and too busy for missionary work, but compared to where i just came from this ward is great! I had to introduce myself and do a short testimony...no notes again and it went alright i guess....Then that nice American from Utah asked if we’d like it if he called our parents.....that was super nice of him—we were standing right there mom when he called you!!  

We were told several times that the ward requested for sister missionaries to come here and so they’ve been waiting for us!  That’s a lot of pressure on us though to live up to what they expect. It will be a good learning experience though to finally learn to work with and through a ward to find and teach. I’ve never had the wards help much before.

And it’s true....the members here are all super rich. We got fed Pizza Hut and Papa Johns on saturday and sundday which is SUPER DUPER expensive here. And all the brothers are big business men and speak english and live in nice big apartments.  Its been a little overwhelming not having any idea where anything is though and trying to find our way around. ------ Especially since the phone they gave us doesn’t have a subway map OR  a dictionayr....which is pretty much all you need to survive around here.  We have neither but after a few detours we made an 11/2 subway trip today including three transfer points without a phonemap! i felt pretty good about it.

I do sorta feel like i’m starting my mission over again though. Because everything is new and unfamiliar and we have no foundation here—The days feel long again since we’re struggling all day to get where we need to be and figure out what we’re supposed to do....but i think time slows when you’re learning the most. When its easy like Sanbon became...the time flys—it’ll just take some adjusting time and then we’ll be fine again.

our house is like 1 minute away from the churhc....just downt the hill and once we get the place stocked and settled in it will be a good little place.

We met a man from sudan today he wrote our names in Arabic. He didn’t know ‘god’ or ‘Jesus’ or ‘church’ or ‘missionary’ in english or korean....so i finally tried ‘allah?’   and he finally got what our job was hahahah

Sister Chestnut loved Korea and the culture long before she got here so she’s always telling me the names of different bands and singers and movie stars...its fun.

K I’ll send pictures next week!


FAMILY:

mom—i got the card...i withdrew some money so that i can buy the things i need. thanks alot for sending that!  ......and....i reeaaaallly don’t need a package for christmas...really. i would rather have the money you would spend and i’ll spend it on something else. as always thouhg... You could though just print pictures from the last few months....the big family gatherings, halloween, hayride, thanksgiving, farewells....and just throw those in a paper envelope and send. I just like seeing people!!

Jill—thanks so much for the pictures...your kids are the cutest ever and their halloween costumes are the best!!  ellie is the best robin.

CHY—sounds like youre having some good times in rexburg..thats weird that you had a washburn cousin dinner!  hahah you just need to get troyboy up there and we’ll get aust and the twins then we can have a real party.  

Dad—the subways are getting easier. I’m learning a ton of things now because i don’t have a korean to lean on. I always thought that having a korean comp would make you the best at the language but i think they’re more of a crutch.

what is everyone doing for thanksgiving?/

TRAV— thanks for the picts and the note. what is your novel about?  glad to hear the temple is open again!  what are your plans for after december??  you going back to school?  you really should be a teacher. they have a super important job.