Dongdaemun!

Dongdaemun is awesome! It's SO hot. But awesome. I miss Sokcho, but I feel like it was time for me to move on to a new place. First off - The ward is huge. We had 85 people yesterday. Guess I won't have to be first councilor anymore! The people are super awesome. They're all really nice and friendly. There's 3 meetings, like usual, instead of the 2 we have in Sokcho, so church is longer than I'm used to now. But I love it. More time to listen to Korean and feel the spirit! We live in a 4 man house with two Koreans, and they serve in the area next to ours, in a different ward. But we have a lot of fun together. It's so nice having your house on church grounds, because you can go play ping pong with the Koreans for your morning exercise^^

Elder Gardner is great, he's in his 3rd transfer, and I'm in my 5th (not including the MTC). He's REALLY good at Korean, and even a better teacher. It's wonderful. We really work well together, and we really get along. We have a lot of similar interests and such. He's from Oregon, and will turn 20 right before my year mark on the mission, so I'm almost a whole year older than him. We haven't taken many pictures, we've been too busy working! But we hurried and took one picture this morning for you guys.

Being new in a HUGE ward has some benefits - they all want to meet you so they invite you over for dinner, and they want to help teach! Lessons with a member make a HUGE difference. One being that they can actually speak Korean.

Our investigators are doing well, we have one guy from Nepal that we teach in English, and he's really prepared. I'm excited for him. The others are doing well, some progressing faster than others. The ward has really high expectations for the missionaries here, so we'll work super hard, like always! We're also trying to work with a few less-actives; they're all really nice.

I love it here! There's still one street that has fish, so I can get that good ole' whiff of Sokcho sometimes, and there's a few universities, including a foreign university, so there's a TON of foreigners. But since foreigners aren't rare, they're not too excited to see another white person. But oh well. There's PLENTY of people to talk to!!

I love my new area, even though it's SUPER hot, and I know we'll do some good work here.

Well, that's about all I have for the week.

Until next Monday,

Elder Franchina

Father's Day & A Transfer!

Father's Day Package!

By the way, Happy Father's day. I'm sorry I can't be there to say it in person, but I know you'd rather me be out here than home. You know how valuable this experience is. I know you miss Grandpa, and I'm not sure why I wrote those words, but now I do. Never worry, Dad, this is only a brief blip in the span of eternities. And Christ, according to the scriptures, suffered not only for our sins, but also for our sicknesses, sorrows, infirmities, etc. This is why the pain was too much to bear. Every sorrow you and I feel, along with the rest of the world, was felt before we experienced it. That's why we can receive so much help through Christ. He knows us, our sorrows, etc, because he experienced them already. Because he knows how we feel, he knows what kind of help and comfort we need, so he can run to 'succor us'. In any time of discomfort - sickness, sadness, grief - turn to Christ. He knows how you feel. 

The Korean word for grandpa is 'haraboji- 할아버지', but that's not what I wrote (on the piece of wood pictured) I wrote '영원' which means 'eternity, or eternal'. This word has been echoing in my mind for a while. Even though our most loved people will pass from our sight for a time, keep an eternal perspective. We'll see them again soon.

WHY in the world were you specifically looking for a bobble-head on the internet? You're too weird. I guess that's where I get it from, as soon as I saw that, in a game machine, I might add, I had to win it. You know me. Super pro at claw games and such, I soon had that bobble head in my hands. And I knew this would go well on your desk :) (Gangnam style bobblehead on gray horse in picture)

So, on to transfers. I will transfer to 동대문, Dong Dae Moon (you'll actually be able to pronounce this right^^), tomorrow. Tuesday night we'll go sleep in Seoul and meet with all of the missionaries for transfers Wednesday morning. Giving my parting words in sacrament yesterday was hard. I love the ward so much. But I know that DongDaeMoon is a really good place, and there are people waiting there for me. It's right in the middle of Seoul. I'm not sure exactly where, we don't have a map, I just know it's right by the subway stop 제기동 Jaegidong. It's a 4 man house, and the other two missionaries are Koreans. My new companion will be Elder Gardner, he's just finishing up training in DongDaeMoon, so he's a little younger than me. It should be really fun! When I come back (when, not if), I need to go back to Sokcho. These people here are wonderful.

Oh, by the way, since I'm in DongDaeMoon, I'll stay in the North Mission, with President Christensen. I'm happy about that. That means I won't ever be able to visit Gangnam or SeoCho, the rich cities right below the river until after my mission, but that's okay, I like it up here. I am pretty excited to experience the city life though.

Not much happened this week, just a bunch of travel to our Zone leader's area and back, just for meetings and such. 

 

I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week!

P.S. dad- you look pretty good in Korean Ties  :)

Now for the week's events:

We moved P day to Wednesday and went to Seoul in the morning. We went to the biggest bookstore in Korea and I bought two books that teach Korean. While shopping, a Korean guy came up to us and in perfect English starting asking us where we're from. He served a mission in Australia, so he got along well with elder Ghergori. He liked us so much he wanted to grab some dinner with us. He was really nice.

We were running a little late for the temple so we ran back to the subway station, got to the temple to find that we missed our session by a few seconds. But they held one 15 minutes later, so that was fine. We slept at the temple, and the next day went to 화양, to a huge park with a church nearby for a big mission conference. There's so many missionaries here now! But I don't know any of them because I've been stuck in the boonies my whole mission. When I get transferred they'll all think I'm a greenie (brand new missionary) because no one knows who I am! But that's okay. I like Sokcho. (pronounced soak-cho, not sock-cho ;)  )

They talked about the mission split, and two transfers after the split, they're going to have 55 greenies coming in. And since the mission is splitting, there will only be 64 missionaries available to train, the others will be zone leaders, APs, ect. So basically everybody in the Seoul North mission will be training in 2 transfers' time. CRAZY!

Jordan, Eric and Friend

We played some games and went to the public zoo next door, and we saw Eric Boothe there! It was so good to see him. Also, he knew a few of the missionaries there! One Korean in my district in the MTC who's my good friend knows Eric well. He lived across the street from the missionaries in DaeJeon, and Eric served there for 10 months. They played basketball together a lot. COOL!

We then went to Costco, but it was pretty disappointing. I got delicious chocolate muffins and sharp cheddar CHEESE!! But I was also looking for cheap sunscreen and American toothpaste. But I can just get sunscreen here at the medicine stores. As for toothpaste? Korean toothpaste is grossly sweet. Ew.

Anyway. We had to go to WonJu, my MTC comp's area that night, because the next day they had a baptismal interview, and since it takes 3 hours to travel there from our city, we slept the night. Elder Ghergori is District Leader so he has to do the interviews. It went well! While we were waiting for the bus back to Sokcho, we were talking to people, and this guy comes up to us and speaks REALLY good English, and asks where our church is! Woah. He lived in the UK for 2 years and found Christianity, and wants to come to our church, because other churches in Korea seem like there's something missing. So we got his name and number and referred him to the WonJu elders! (He lives in WonJu). SWEET!

Saturday was just a normal day, and yesterday was a good fast Sunday at church.

Anyway, that's about it! Today we're going to the bath houses to relax for P day, that should be fun.

I love you all!

Elder Franchina

Transfers?

Oh my goodness, homemade cookies are so nice. We visited with a member and I brought a few over. She has a handicapped kid in his teens, and he really liked them too. But I hoarded the cookies to myself, mainly. :)

So English class is going good, we have a few new people attending, but still, it's a class full of girls. But they're all over 30, some reaching up to 60 or 70 years old. We have usually 6 or 7 people attend. It's really fun! And they enjoy the spiritual message at the end and usually end up asking questions and stuff.

We have picked up some more 30.30 investigators, which is a program we do: 30 minutes of English teaching, and 30 minutes of gospel. One lady is a member of the Unification church, with Reverend XXXXX. I've never heard much about them, but people say they're really weird. But she's pretty normal. She's Japanese, speaks really good English and perfect Korean; married a Korean, has a cute 3 year old daughter and one on the way! So we practice English with her, and teach her 3 year old English too. She's so cute.

Beware of Dog...Cute Bulldog?

The cookie guy is doing well, he really appreciates all we do for him, and he really loves us. He thinks a lot, and he really wants to believe, but he is always 'thinking about it'. But if he comes to church I know he'll find his answer. It's just hard, because he's trying to make enough money to scrape by and move back with his family down south, and if he closes his shop for even an hour on Sunday, he might not make any money that day. Not a lot of people buy cookies these days.. 

Someone we're teaching is really close to baptism. They went on vacation to China, but they get back today so we'll meet with him tomorrow. This is the person we've been looking for - someone searching for the truth. And I think he realizes he's found it. We'll extend a date for the end of June for him tomorrow.

The Simpsons are popular here.  Sign says to be quiet; baby is sleeping.

Transfers are on the 12th of June, so our calls will come the Saturday before that. I've been here for 4 transfers, so that usually means I'm outta here after this, but there's a missionary here that's been here for 5, and since the mission is splitting, I may stay. I don't know. But I'm super excited to find out what's going to happen!

Korean is the same, the accents and dialects vary on area, but the Seoul Mission is basically the same. Some people say that the area I'm in, is where people speak super fast, but it's not that different than Seoul. Down south in the other two missions is where they have the really funky speech that's really different.

The weather is good, but today it's pouring...No bikes.. Dang. Oh well, but I still love it out here!

Okay, now for my report on the week:

Tuesday was a funny day. We were walking down the street and saw some foreigners, and we decided to pretend not to speak much English, just for fun. Elder Ghergori suggested we do a German accent, so we walked up and just said a normal 'hello', but they replied in a nice, thick, German accent. Whoo. Glad we didn't follow through with our plan. All I know is Haagen Das, Voltswagen, Bratworst, and Saurkraut. That was funny. They were really nice people though.

Wednesday was fun. It was Elder Ghergori's first time teaching district meeting, and then I got to go home to Sokcho with my MTC COMPANION! He's so awesome. He's really good at Korean, but also a really, really good teacher. So I learned a lot from him. He's also really good at talking to people on the street. He'll give high fives to all of the high school kids, then just start talking. One of them is drinking a soda, and he just says, 'Oh, can I have some?' and it kind of breaks the ice or gets them laughing. I guess he calls it 'food proselyting'. He gets free licks of ice cream, chips, or drinks out of it, and the kids always think it's funny.

On Friday, we did our service thing at the Women's Center where we help a less-active teach his English class. They loved meeting with Elder Smith. He's so funny. They told us that they would take us to Ashley's, which is a really nice buffet, and so Elder Smith told them about his experiences with buffets. One day he had four meal appointments within 5 hours of each other, and two of them were buffets. And the missionary rule is at a buffet, you have to eat at least 5 plates, or else you're not grateful. So, naturally, Elder Smith threw up after. So they all started calling him 되지, which is pig. They were just joking around, we laughed the whole time. It was great. Then we went to Ashley's, ate well, and got pictures on the beach! I love it there. 

A kid in our branch, 정 문영 leaves for a mission next week, so he'll give his farewell next week. That'll be cool. Too bad he's going to Busan, if he was going to Seoul Nam, there's a possibility I could get put with him later on! He'll do great.

Well, aside from that, not much to report on last week. But this week is really exciting. On Wednesday we'll go to Seoul, grab some cheap ties, go look around, go to the temple, do a session, sleep at the temple, then have a big mission meeting on Thursday. It's at a huge park in Seoul, and we'll be playing games and have a nice spiritual meeting. I'm super excited!

Love you all and hope to hear from you soon!

-프렌치나 장로

Choku and Sunscreen

Jordan called last Sunday for Mother's Day.  It was so wonderful to hear his voice!  We put Zach and his family on Skype and brought Grandma & Grandpa Shell over to hear the conversation.  Jordan is enjoying everything about Sokcho, Korea:  the people, the food and sharing the Gospel!  He is really missing seeing his nephew, Oliver, grow up.

A friend of ours, her son (Eric) is doing an internship in Seoul, Korea, and offered to take a package to mail to Jordan while in Korea.  Of course, we thought of cookies!  We mailed some peanut butter cookies and some chocolate chip cookies.

Here is what Jordan had to say in his letter:

The package was wonderful! Thank you SO much for cookies. I celebrated and bought MILK. Oh my gosh it was so good.  Thank you! Elder Ghergori also loves the cookies.

I called Eric and when we go to Seoul, he'll drive over to meet us. That should be great, we talked for a few minutes. I'm really excited to see him!

Okay, now for my adventures this week!

We didn't have many, except on Friday, we went to Kangnang for a sports meeting! There were 12 missionaries, the ones from our zone, some members, and investigators that the missionaries brought. In all, maybe about 50 people came. We played soccer, chok-u, which is soccer and volleyball combined. You play with a shorter net, and you can only kick or head the ball. It can bounce a few times, but only once between hits. Koreans get pretty crazy with their kicks! They jump up and spin to 'spike' the soccer ball down to the opposite court. It's definitely a sport designed for Asians and kung-fu masters. It's super fun.

The only downside to a really fun day was that we were super tired after, and...I got burned. Everyone did. We didn't know it would be that hot, but it's not too bad. There's '약 국's every 30 feet in Korea (Medicine stores). They're everywhere. So we got some aloe-copycat, and when I go to Costco next week, I'll pick up some good sunscreen and aloe.

Yesterday we had two visitors in our ward, both missionaries that served here! One was an American that served here 6 years ago, and he brought his wife and baby, and the other is a Korean, who's trainer was trained by the American, funnily enough. They were super awesome to meet, and both got up and gave a short testimony. I wish it was longer, because...I had to speak. So the topic was 승영. 

What the heck is that? It's not in the dictionary. Turns out the Korean language doesn't have the word 'exaltation'. So the church made it up. Just like the words "tracting" and temple "sealings." So it was hard to find what it actually meant, not to mention talk about it for 10 minutes. Then our branch president comes up to me the day before and says, 'oh, by the way, just make it 20 minutes, we only have one other speaker tomorrow.'......crap.

On Sunday, the other speaker comes up to me and says she wasn't well prepared, and leaves me with almost 30 minutes to speak, even with the other return missionaries. So I spoke...and spoke... and spoke. After an eternity of rambling, I sat down, but it only took about 15-17 minutes. But the branch president said it was really good. So at least I didn't end after 5 minutes or something. That was a... frightening experience. But when I got up and told the congregation of 20 that I didn't even know what the topic meant in English 3 days ago, that made them laugh. Once I learned what it meant, it was easier to talk about it.

Jordan and a friend from his high school days

Other than that, not too much happened up here in Sokcho, but my MTC companion is in our district, and it's time for exchanges, so I'll be back up with good ole' Elder Smith this week!!! I'm super excited. He's awesome.

Until next week,

-Elder Franchina

뿅!

Investigators & Ping Pong

Well hello, it's another beautiful day in Sokcho.

This week has been great! Sokcho is great, I know you wish you had the weather we do up here :)

We have been talking, me and Elder Ghergori, and it seems like a lot of the investigators we have aren't progressing. Do they even want to learn about this gospel? So the past few people we have met with has been what, admittedly, we should have been doing all along, but we really tried to find out if they really want to learn about this gospel or not. It seems a few don't have interest, just English, and a few are merely curious, not willing to act. Dropping people is hard, but we might have to drop a few people. But these meetings have been good, because it's where we invited to act a lot, and bore strong testimony of this gospel.

Also, we have been focusing on reading the book of Mormon, so I feel like a lot more of our investigators will start reading more. And even if they don't have gospel interest yet, we can still continue serving them and showing our love for them. You don't have to stop being someone's friend just because they go to a different church! That's crazy!

One investigator is doing good, she admits she doesn't have a strong belief in her church, and she seems sad, because she thinks God won't hear her prayers. We taught well and bore our testimony, and she seems to like what we tell her and what she finds in the Book of Mormon. The cookie guy is doing alright, he said if he didn't have to work, the first thing he would do is come to church. He's trying to find someone to cover his store so he can go to church on Sundays, so that's really good! The rest of our investigators have been invited to read and pray, and we're praying hard they follow through!

We have also been trying to work more with less actives, as I may have mentioned last time. We are going to spend an hour or two once a week visiting less actives with Elder 안 경일, our branch president, and bring them cookies or something with a spiritual message and an invitation to come back to church. We meet with a less-active about once a week, and he REALLY likes us, and I think that will help him come back to church. We gave him a present, an excerpt from the Liahona (church magazine) about coming back to church, and we both wrote a little note on it, and colored it to make it look nice. He loved it. After we left, he sent us a text message: '영원히 사랑할거에요.' "I'll love you forever!" Awh. What a nice guy. Hopefully at church, he'll realize what he's been missing, particularly the presence of the spirit and the friends he has there, and will continue to come after both Elder Ghergori and I are gone.

We also did exchanges last week, and I learned so much from Elder Lee. He's a great missionary, and he taught me a lot about talking to people on the street and teaching. I'm trying to get to know them, even in just a 2 minute street-conversation on the street.

We played ping pong with our branch president last week, and I FINALLY WON!! We played three games and I won the last one. I could tell by the end he was really trying, but I finally beat him! He was really proud and said, 'Don't transfer!' Haha ~ he's hilarious. I really like him.

Speaking of which, we get our calls next Saturday so next week I'll let you know where I'm going, if I go! I hope I don't, but I know I'll like wherever I go. Sokcho, according to other missionaries, is one of the worst places to serve, because it's just so incredibly hard to serve out here, in every aspect of missionary work. I find it absolutely wonderful, and if that's the case, that it's hard, it can only get better from here!

I love the ward here, and I absolutely love Korean people. Missionary work is awesome and I wouldn't rather be anywhere else!

Love you all and hope you have a good week.

Elder Franchina

Soul Doctors

Oh boy, what a week.

First off, the news is I'M STAYING!!! I'll be here for at least another six weeks. The members here were happy to hear that. 

So on Tuesday we went with a less active to this old guy's house up in the mountains. He lives far away from everyone, and is a sculptor, so he has a huge, personal gallery. He actually has GRASS on his lawn! Woah. Super nice guy. He's really talented, and his property was REALLY peaceful. 

We have an investigator that randomly told us he's giving up drinking, and next, smoking. He thinks it's bad for you (duh), and we haven't even gotten to that part of the lessons yet! So that's great he's already making those choices. We're really happy for him. He likes meeting with us. He asked me what I want to be, and when I said doctor, he said, 'Good, you're a good doctor already. You two are soul doctors. You heal my soul.' He's really nice and funny. 

Wednesday through Friday I was in Wonju on exchanges! It was awesome. We met with an American lady, taught her some Korean, and on the way home from that, we met a guy who had a little too much to drink, but he was super nice. Gave us his number, and called us the next day and took us out for food. He also seems to have some gospel interest! He's a funny guy. Then we met a Jehova's witness on the street. He seemed like a normal Korean guy, walks up, says hi, them pulls out a well-used bible...uh oh...... Not that we try to avoid using the bible when we talk, we definitely use the bible to support what our church teaches, but they don't listen. He just kept telling us how there's no prophet that teaches about the BOM, and that we're wrong. It's all a lie. He asked me to show him something in the Bible that talks about the BOM, and when I did, he wouldn't listen, just no, no, no.. So we tried to leave, but then he turns to my temporary companion, and starts speaking Japanese so I couldn't understand (he was speaking English at first). My comp is a little shy, but talked with him a little, but the JW started talking to him so I couldn't participate. So we just said we had to go, and left. JWs are really brutal. The bible shouldn't be a battleground. It should be common ground. Something we can share and rejoice over. 

Anyway. Next we went through a little market, and I saw a tie pin I liked, so I bought it, and the lady selling it took interest in our church! Surprise lesson! And while we were talking to her, the guy across from her booth tapped us on the shoulders and told us to talk to him next! Woah. Miracle. But this next guy was strange. He spoke English, and recorded the conversation to "listen to later to practice English". But then he asked us really weird questions, proceeded to take pictures of my comp's family photos he had, and then video taped us, saying, 'if you met Jesus, what would you say? Say hi to Jesus!", things like that.. really weird. So we left. When he left, he asked us to bless him. Can't refuse to bless one of God's children, so we just sat down and said a prayer together. really strange sequence of events, but whatever. 

I love how Koreans are so honest!  Yep, pink for girls, blue for boys...

Saturday we got our transfer calls, and turns out my companion, e Ghergori is district leader now, and in the other city in our district, is my MTC companion, so we'll get to go on exchanges sometime! 

That will be awesome. 

Yesterday, the American family in our ward blessed their newborn, and we got to participate. That was a special experience. I love babies. We were the only ones that understood his English prayer, but the whole ward felt that precious spirit that surrounds a newborn baby. That was a neat experience.

A Close-up of the painting, above.

Anyway, that's it for this week, hope all is well back in good 'ol 'Merica!

Love you all,

Elder Franchina