Apr 22 - Apr 28

It's actually Monday here and it has been a crazy day.  Wayne had to go get his Foreigner card, so we traveled by subway to the Busan Immigration office and sat and waited for our turn.

Just waiting

Our number is 47.  Almost there.  They just called 41.

It was raining too.  Just hanging out.

We waited for 40 minutes and it took about 5 minutes to get the application for the card completed.  Now we have to wait for two weeks to get the actual card.

This week was slow.  President called me on Thursday to tell me that another missionary was going home early.  Some of them really surprise you!  But I had to get everything ready for him.  They tried to get him on the same flight as the other missionaries that are leaving on Tuesday, but couldn't get him on.  He will be going home Tuesday but later on in the day and by himself.

Two missionaries called us on Sunday night to tell us that they needed to go to the hospital.  One probably broke his finger and the other has chronic lower back and hip problems.  Probably from walking so much.  Anyway, I have to get a Letter of Authorization from Aetna so that the hospital won't charge them any money.  

That's all.  We are just waiting for the departing missionaries to come to the office and say goodbye.

Love you all.

Apr 15 - Apr 21

You can tell that everyone is getting excited for transfers and going home.  We have 6 missionaries going home and 7 coming in.
Our Korean Assistant Elder Kim left for military sign-in for three days.  All Korean males have to serve in the military.  They have to sign up be the time they are 22.  Elder Kim is 25 and his three days of military sign-in is required each year after they have done their active duty.  So Elder Soffe is off with the President driving him around so that he can do interviews.

During District meeting they had Elder Guthrie go out and get blind folded.  He was told to not listen to any ones voice but his companion, who would lead him to the prize.  When he left the room, we were told to say nothing at all, not even his companion.  He came back into the room and just waited to hear someone talk.  Of course no one did.  Then Elder Soffe whispered to him to listen to the spirit.
It probably didn't work out exactly how they wanted, but they were able to make the point of sometimes we listen and sometimes we don't.  We don't get anywhere when we don't listen.  And even after listening, sometimes we make the wrong turn.

He totally missed the table.

Ran right into his companion.

Rice Herb Cake

This was like eating a really thick glue.

Got my hair cut on Saturday morning.  The lady is so nice and she seems to understand my hand signals.  At least my hair looks nice when she gets done.  There were two other ladies in the shop and when I got done, they both said something to me in Korean and then put their thumbs up.👍 I guess they like what she did also.

So, they don't do anything here for Easter.  No eggs, no candy, no nothing.  Even in church, the talks were not about our Savior or the Resurrection.  Kind of sad.  It was the Sunday for a meal after church.  So we decided to stay.  They had rice and a curry ham stew.  It was very spicy and did not sit well in my stomach.  I had to eat some Tums all afternoon.  We watched the beginning of the Ten Commandments in the afternoon.  Also, I decided to make a small cake to take to the missionaries in the office when we went over for our Staff meeting.  But it decided to overflow the pan and we had so much smoke in the apartment, we had to get out the fan and open all the windows.  I'm sure the people that live next to us was wondering what was happening.  Anyway, we did get it all cleared out.  I guess the pans here aren't the same size I'm used to.  Live and learn.

So Happy Easter everyone.

We love you and miss you all. 

Apr 8 - Apr 14

It's been a quiet week.  Everyone had to recuperate from walking up the mountain.
President Jeong started interviews for this transfer and instead of them coming to the office, he and Sister Kim are going to their apartments to inspect and make sure that everything is okay.  Before they left on Tuesday, they brought us some rice cake? that Sister Kim had made for the missionaries.

Here is what it looked like:

Yep, it's green and the black spots are beans.  We did try it.  But there was just no taste to it at all. That's got to be why Koreans are skinny, because they eat no sugar.

On Friday, the Assistants and President left for Jeju Island for their Zone Conference.  There are only 4 elders and 2 sisters on the island.  We hear it is very beautiful over there.  Hopefully, the President will take us one of these times.  

Before them leaving, a missionary and his companion came to the office.  President pulled one of them into his office and they spoke for quite some time.  When the President left for the airport, the missionary was still in the office on the phone with his parents.  We assumed that he was struggling and wanted to go home.  This was a Korean Elder.  Anyway, he talked for almost three hours.  After all was said and done, he decided to stay at least until the end of this transfer.  So he is staying with the Office Elders here at the complex.  And his companion was moved to another apartment.  Hopefully, he stays.  He is a wonderful young man.

Wednesday at English class, I asked the question - what is your favorite movie and why?

One of them said Ben Hur - he liked the chariot race.  Most of them talked about Korean movies.  One of the ladies - Anna - told us of a movie about a young girl who wanted to learn how to play the piano.  Her mother couldn't afford one, but their next door neighbor had one and he said that she could come and play his piano.  So over a time, the neighbor asked her to start taking her clothes off.  I turned to Wayne and we both started wondering where this was heading.  So she stopped after she gave that little bit of information and then said that it was a beautiful movie because of the emotions this young girl discovered about herself.  Needless to say, we didn't really comment on the movie and moved on to the next person quickly.

On Saturday, we did our normal things at the apartment, went shopping and then went for a walk along the river.  We have noticed before that there are groups of people scattered along the walkway and you can tell that some of them are watching people play a game.  We thought is was checkers or chess.  But on Saturday, we got a little bit closer and took a picture.  We don't know what they call the game but it was interesting to watch.

Those are black and white stones on the board and it looks like they have to stop the progress of their opponent.  We will have to find out what the game is.

At church on Sunday, we listened to Conference.  The ward stayed down in the chapel listening to the Korean version and we came upstairs to listen to English.  Then of course, they had a luncheon and started again at 1:00 pm for the last session of conference.  

It is fun to be here and see these people sit on the edge of their chairs, literally, listening to every word that is spoken.  

Well, that's it for the week.

We love you and miss you all.

Apr 1 - Apr 7

Wayne did go to Tokyo.  He left Monday afternoon.  Here he is at the Office Building/Tokyo Temple site.  The temple is under reconstruction, so he couldn't go to a session.  But he said it was beautiful.

He returned on Thursday with a new Visa in hand.

Looking out over Tokyo from his hotel room.

Looking down from his room over the garden area.

Train station.  It goes on forever.

Zone conferences started this week.  Tuesday - Busan; Wednesday - Ulsan; Thursday - Daegu and Friday - Changwon

They took everyone on a little hike up to the top of the mountain in Geumgang Park, the park that Wayne and I went to earlier.  The President supplied lunch for them and this is what they got.  

Seaweed stuffed with things.  I tried to eat it.

Anyway they all had fun and along the way they stopped and had discussions about missionary work and how they can improve and become more Christ-like.  Wayne and I went with them on Friday.  And decided to hike up instead of taking the tram.  WOW!!!, what an adventure.  We have a pedometer on our phone and this is what it said at the end of the day. -  18,743 steps, 113 flights of stairs and 7.2 miles.  Needless to say, we were the ones that brought up the rear and I know the President was quite concerned.  But we made it to the top and this is what we saw.

Getting ready to go.

Starting the trek.

1st stop along the way.

2nd stop.  We got to eat a little.

Half way up.

Not only was it steep, but the steps were at least 2 ft. tall.

Here we all are at the top.  It was beautiful!

Thank goodness, we got to take the tram down!

Saturday, we just kind of died, but did go walking for a little ways.  Because they don't get conference on the same days that it occurs in SLC, we had Fast and Testimony meeting.  

Also, I have to tell you about the garbage system here. Talk about recycling!  We have 7 cans in our storage room.  This is how we have to divide our garbage up:

1. Soft plastic

2.  Paper goods

3. Cardboard - milk cartons, etc

4.  Hard Plastic - water bottles, etc

5.  Glass

6.  Cans

7. Wet garbage - no garbage disposals here

Then when our containers are full, we have to take them downstairs and put in the containers the apartment complex has for each of the items.  The wet garbage goes into a closed bin that you have to open with a electronic card.

It certainly is fun!

We love you and miss you all.