Farewell Gyeongsan and Hello Goomi

Hello! I have more time than I expected. I am currently on a train from Busan to Goomi. It is in the furthest northern district in our mission. My next companion is Elder Kim. He is 28 years old and only recently started his mission. I will probably only be with him for one transfer before he leaves as he has already been in that area for 3 transfers. I am really excited to serve there. I hear the work is going really well there. I will still be in the same zone. This transfer there were many changes and they will continue as the size of our mission continues to decrees. The last estimate I heard was 69 missionaries to be the plan. When I started we had about 110. Quite the change of things but we are coping.

This week was a pretty sad week. I have been in Gyeongsan for 7 months and it was sad to go. I almost couldn't believe the amount of friends that I had in members, investigators, and random people on the street. A neighbor lady tried for about 10 minutes to give me $100 because that is what Koreans do when they are sad to see people leave. Naturally I couldn't take it but I appreciated the effort. She kept praising my parents for raising me and told me to thank them so, thank you mom and dad. It was sad to go but I like change and I know I will like my next area and companion. Elder Kerrigan and I served together for 3 transfers which will be the most of any of my companions. it was really fun and he is an amazing missionary. I am glad I got that time with him and in that area. I hope that all goes well in America. Don't worry about what you hear on the news. Koreans don't worry about it. They have seen these types of things over and over again.

It is so crazy that Lauren is now in the MTC. I have been telling everyone and their dog. Its pretty cool. I am trying before I leave to have the signs on our churches say "Visitors Welcome." The campaign is going well I think. President told the whole mission that he mentioned it to the area authority and stake presidents but I'm not sure how it will go. It got a few people who knew that I have been pushing it to look at me and laugh. I hope it gets up someday.

Love you all!

Goals

Hello! We had a really good week this last week. We were able to complete nearly all of our goals which is a fairly rare thing. We met a few new people and hopefully we can continue meeting. We also had a few stop meeting with us, one is moving to the Philippines.

Our best investigator right now is a 79 year old grandma who has come to church for the last 2 weeks. She is the mother of an active member and is a really fun lady. We as teaching her but she is old so it is taking a little bit to get things across. Luckily the family is full force behind it so they are always willing to help out. She said she plans on going to church every week and has changed because of the example of her daughter and grandchildren. It is amazing what a simple good example will do. She was so proud that her children don't smoke, drink, or swear. Apparently see was very against her daughter joining our church but has only recently had a change of heart.

She will likely be baptized in the near future but I am probably transferring this week. This week I was able to go on splits with Elder Hamilton. It is so interesting to be with him. I thought Koreans were surprised to see me being a white boy but Elder Hamilton is black and Koreans just openly stare. It makes for a good conversation starter. ha. I hope everyone is doing well!

Korea loves my......

Hello! It has been a good week for me. I got plenty of great complements on how huge my noes is. It is pretty funny because I don't think I have ever been told my noes is big in a bad way. Usually they say it while giving me a thumbs up. Ha. I love Korea and Korea loves my nose, it's a good relationship. Summer is coming and I am not too excited for it. I find that I am more of a winter person. I really liked this winter. We had some pretty big news at Church. Our branch President is moving. We are pretty sad about it. Another family is moving away as well. That will be the branch president, relief society president, primary president, and all the primary moving. Plus our only young man is going to Canada on a mission. It will be quite the change of scenery to say the least. Hopefully we can keep our heads above 10 people at church. We were able to see a few small miracles this week which keeps the spirits up. It has been good. Unfortunately I don't have a ton of time so I will talk to some of you on the phone this weekend for my Mothers Day call.
Elder Anderson

The picture is of a kid that stole my helmet and wanted to fight for it. ha.

things are good in Korea

Hello! I hope everyone is doing well. Today is a pretty good looking day. Sun shining, light breeze, 65ish degrees. Korea is amazing this time of year. This week was really good as they usually are. We had 3 less actives show up to church which we were really excited about. 2 of them seemed like they liked it and participated in the lessons. We have been pretty busy lately.

One thing we had to do was to go check up on the youngchun house which we are currently looking after while missionaries are not in that area. It is pretty out of the way but we have to go there once in a while and pay bills and what not. On the way back we had to take 2 different buses for a total of and hour and a half. On the bus we were able to teach 3 different people quite a bit because of the length so that was a blessing. We actually met a lady that I had talked to previously on the same bus line. I had showed her my picture book which she still remembered and talked about families. She especially remembered Franny's twins. That made it really easy to be able to continue to teach about the Book of Mormon and the restoration. Unfortunately she wasn't too interested and lives forever away. I think she will look into it more and if she has questions she has our phone number.

Yesterday we had a really good lesson with the lady and daughter that we taught last week. The lady understood a lot better than we could speak Korean. I don't know how we would survive without the spirit. She now needs to read and pray which she is hesitant to do. I really hope and pray that she does find out about the truth of the gospel for herself. It it amazing. Unfortunately as foreigners we make a few mistakes with the language. It is a lot easier to notice your companions mistakes and this week he had 2 which made us laugh pretty hard afterword. The first is where we were teaching about Adam and Eve and he was trying to explain that Adam was our first parent but rather he said that Adam was in fact the first Buddha. That could cause all sorts of confusion. The other was when he was asking about a certain table in the house. He thought that they respected their ancestors with it but when he asked about it he asked, "Do you commit suicide on this table?" Korean is awesome. We defiantly need the spirit to translate a few things still. The church is true!

It's just ringworm, no big deal.....

I am good, except for the ring worm growing on my leg. It looks pretty cool, I've never had it before but I am in the process of trying to destroy it with anti-fungal cream. Pretty sweet. Besides my little extra stuff on my leg the week was good.

We met with a Jehovah's witness and talked about our churches. It was actually amazing to me as to how much of what he had to say we already believed. For the most part I felt like he had truth and we were just adding on to what he already had. I think the thing that struck us the most was when we asked him to read the book of Mormon and pray about it he said that he would but that he could not receive revelation to tell him if it was true or not. It is interesting because that is exactly what we tell people they need to do. They don't need to trust our knowledge on gospel subjects but they can simply ask an all-knowing being and we believe that he will answer. Wow, I am so grateful for a church based on active revelation. Trust God.

This week we were also able to meet again with a mother and daughter. With them we talked a lot about Adam and Eve, a subject that is quite different in our church. We explained the fall and they accepted it and understood. Now they need to read the Book of Mormon, its hard when they don't, but this time they promised with interest rather than just told us they would. We have a few things that could quickly turn into good things. We had neighbors recently move in as well who are very friendly (bring us food). The mother is really nice and they have a JR High boy who thinks its awesome to have two American friends he can point out to his friends. Ha. We are living and growing. I hope I always feel that way. The Church is true!

Still here…

Hello from Gyeongsan! I am still here. It is transfer day and I am going on my 5th transfer here. That means I have been here 6 months and witllcontinue for 6 more weeks. Time keeps ticking. I am still with Elder Kerrigan which I am really grateful for. We have a lot of fun together and get a lot done. This will now be the longest companionship on my mission at 3 transfers. It is fun because we are "mission brothers" as we were trained by the same Elder Snyder. I still have the birthright. Wow, we are a strange group. Anyway. The biggest news of the week is that English class has been completely slashed (canceled) by our Branch President. I haven't ever had this happen so it will be quite the experience. We were told to come up with another program so we will now be studying the Bible and then the Book of Mormon on Tuesdays and Fridays. We had our first test yesterday and it went well. We had 5 members show up and 1 non member. Hopefully it will be a good way for the members to refer their friends to us easier and will be less pressure. I am excited for it. I don't have much time but I thank you for your prayers.

A day in the life of a missionary