This Was An Interesting One...

02/14/16

안녕하세요!

This week, we did not really do anything.  Well, we did a little bit, at least, as much as we could.  

Due to 설날 being this week, there were approximately 0 people on the streets.  No one could meet, except for our one investigator, 임상현.  We had another really great lesson with him this week about the Plan of Salvation and the Atonement.  I'm starting to see a marvelous change come about on him.  It will be pretty slow at first, but I believe it will accelerate soon, and he will be able to see the blessings of the gospel come into his life.  Other than that, we met with 박태호, a less-active member of our ward who lives in 일산.  He really really wants his daughter, 조연, to get baptized.  We taught a lesson to both of them, but his daughter is 8, so it was a little weird to teach quite that simply, but it was a good lesson, and he wants us to keep visiting in the future, so that's definitely a blessing.  

The rest of this week, we did not do a whole lot.  On Tuesday, Elder Eggleston and I had to go on exchanges because of a Music Night practice that the other two Elders had to go to, and there were no plans, so we tried to 전도, but when there are 0 people on the street, it's a little difficult.  On Wednesday, we did Deep Cleaning (again!).  It was my 4th time doing it in my 5 months in Korea.  That's as many as a missionary will usually do doing their whole missions.  I was also bored the whole day, so while I cleaned, I did some Arts & Crafts with a whole bunch of random stuff that I found.  I made a power outlet using an extension cord and some tape, and also a magnet board made out of razor blades (yes, I was very bored).  Then, on Thursday, it was P-day, and we just hung out around the house.  Nothing special.  Then, because Elder Bradshaw and the rest of the violins in the quartet received the same revelation, it was decided that the entire piece needed to be changed. So, that's what we spent the rest of the week doing.  

We were also able to have dinner with 이현규 and his family, who are members of our ward, last night.  They are super cool.  We had a nice long conversation about Aerospace, since that's my what I will major in, and they were really interested in knowing about how I chose that, and what it entails, and stuff like that.  It was pretty fun.  

That's all for this week!

Love,

Elder Tyler Conley

P.S.  I will be better at taking pictures, because I have been slacking off.

세해복많이받으세요! (again)!!

02/07/16

안녕하세요, 여러분!

That is right, it was New Year's again today!  Today was 설날, the lunar new year (which I think is kind of funny, because the word sounds very similar to "solar").  That is why I am emailing so late today.  We had a big conference at the mission home, where they trained us on various missionary subjects.  We also ate lunch there.   There were 9 members of my 동기 there (they came to Korea at the same time as I did), so during lunch, we all sat at our own table and exchanged missionary stories and it was really fun.  I can definitely call it a 설날 파티!  

This week was an awesome week!  We met with two different potential investigators, and they both became new.  One is named 문양준 (Moon yang june), who is 24.  He told us when we met on the street that he was not really interested in religion or anything dealing with that.   I have now decided that I am just not going to believe anyone that tells me that and then makes an appointment with us.  We had been meeting for maybe 5 minutes when he started asking us about our church, and the Book of Mormon.  We had to go to another appointment really quickly when he asked about Joseph Smith, so we set up another appointment right there so we could teach him again.  Our other new investigator is 유광석.  He is the chairman of the Buddhist Scout Council, and owns 4 companies, one of which is in Japan.  But, he is interested in learning our doctrine.  He has no desire to be converted or anything like that, he just wants us to teach the doctrine so he can know what our church believes.  He is a little hard to meet with, because he spends a lot of time in Japan, but we will continue to try to meet with him.  

We also had an awesome lesson with 임상현.  The Spirit was so powerful during that lesson.  I think that, after this lesson, he will progress quite rapidly.  We talked about faith a lot, and found out that he only has "half-faith".  He believes that God exists, and that's about it.  But, he knows what the Holy Ghost feels like, and has felt it before.  I think that, now, we will definitely be seeing miracles with him.  

Having church yesterday with it being 설날 was pretty fun.  During this holiday season, people get really, really happy when you say "세해 복 많이 받으세요!" to them.  So, I said that to a ward member, 백정화b, and he said "네, 장로님!" and gave me this huuuuuuuuge hug with his arms and his legs.  It was pretty funny.  He dressed his daughters up in 한복s too, which was suuuuuuuuuuuuper cute.  A 한복 is just the Korean traditional dress.  They were so cute!^^

That's what this week looked like!  세해 복 많이 받으세요!  ^^

Love,

Elder Tyler Conley

We Found Some People!

01/31/16

오! 안녕하세요, 여러분!

This week was a pretty fun week.  This was pretty much the first week I have had in 원당 that we weren't super duper busy with everything.  I think that it might very well be the only one, too, because the practices for the Easter Music Night begin this week.  So, here we go again.  

Due to our lack of investigators (except we still have 임상현), we spent a whole lot of time finding this week.  It was actually pretty much the most exciting week that I've had in 원당 so far, I think.  And, our efforts have also produced fruits!  We are meeting somewhere around 3 new potential investigators this week, and our old investigator, 김종우, reappeared!  We thought he was gone!  He wasn't answering our phone calls or texts or anything, but during weekly planning this week, we called him and he answered, and we set up an appointment.  

This week was also 임상현's birthday!  A member in our ward invited us to make 만두 (potstickers) with her, so we invited 임상현, and he thought that sounded fun, but it turned out that it wasn't really fun.  I thought it was delicious, personally, but he was not having a wonderful time.  So, we took him out for chicken after.  He was very much happy after that.  We also taught him a very short lesson, about Lehi and the Tree of Life, and we asked him if he would read it himself this week, and he did it!  So, we will follow up on that this week and see how he understood it, and if he can figure out life's purpose, and stuff like that.  

I also went on exchanges this week. Since our district leader is in 일산, I went clear over there with him.  And, the other two people living in the 일산 house are two people in my 동기:  Elder Biesinger and... Elder Polley!  My MTC companion!  So, we had a fun time together on Wednesday night.  Elder Flora (the district leader) also taught me a lot that I can do to improve my missionary skills and be more humble and follow the Spirit and all that good stuff ^^  It was a great exchange.  

That's all the interesting stuff for this week!

사랑합니다!

Elder Tyler Conley

I Have Been Defeated...

01/24/16

안녕하세요, 여러분!

Don't worry to much over my subject line.  I am only referring to the weather this week.  It was so freezing!  My friends at home will be surprised to know that even I was freezing.  We went outside to hand out flyers for English class on Saturday, and the street that we did it on was relatively pretty narrow, so it also acted as a wind tunnel.  About halfway through this activity, our district pretty much decided that we would just try to make people happy, because absolutely nobody was talking to us, and I really don't blame them. 

This week, we had transfers.  Elder Sol left, and was replaced by Elder 이호현 (Lee Ho Hyeon), who is an extremely kind person, and a very diligent missionary.  He is a zone leader along with Elder Eggleston, and our district leader is clear out in the 일산 district, because we are combined now.  It's a little interesting not having our district leader actually in our district, so there is still a little bit of confusion around there right now.  It's pretty interesting.  

This week, Elder Bradshaw got drafted into playing for the Easter Music Nights, and then drafted again by President to actually arrange a piece of music for the violin quartet.  So, as you can imagine, we spent a lot of time with that this week, so we were actually not able to meet with our investigator this week, sadly, but we are meeting with him tomorrow, so hopefully that goes well.  

On Tuesday, we had English Class.  Our district has recently started a children's class, so I take the intermediate class on Tuesdays now.  It was pretty fun.  There are some cool people in the intermediate class, that are definitely prepared.  We will be making sure to ask them about taking lessons pretty soon here.  We also taught English at a community center on Wednesday.  Bob came.  I don't believe I have talked about Bob yet.  He is pretty much the entire English class.  The missionaries found him about 3 or 4 years ago, and he has been with them ever since.  He has not received baptism yet, because he was not quite ready for it when asked.  He is best friends with the missionaries.  He knows all about districts, and transfers, and exchanges, and pretty much everything about how we run.  He wasn't able to come for the English Class on Saturday, until the very end.  It was pretty bad, because the Advanced class was literally empty without him there.  

This Friday, we were able to hear from the General Authorities in a worldwide missionary training meeting.  They haven't done one of these for over 10 years, probably about when PMG first came out.  It was very cool to see, they taught a lot.  They taught us about they way that we should be doing missionary work, and it was a little pressuring at times, but it was a wonderful experience.  

사랑합니다!

Elder Tyler Conley^^

Tyler's district before Elder Sol left.

Left to Right: Elder Bradshaw, Tyler, Sister Lautaha and Sister Preisler, Elder Eggleston and Elder Sol

The little boy is해찬, the son of the first counselor in the bishopric.

I asked Tyler this week why he puts ^^ all over his letters.  He said it's a Korean smiley face.

Transfers

01/17/16

안녕하세요, 여러분!!!^^

This week was transfer calls, and then the transfers are on Wednesday... Scary.  It was also my 6 month mark as a missionary, which is really weird, because I still feel like I'm really new.  As far as transfers go, I am staying in 원당, and so is Elder Bradshaw!  Elder Sol is leaving, and Elder Eggleston is becoming a zone leader, rather than a district leader.  Elder Bradshaw really doesn't want to be district leader, and since our district has only four elders, it seemed as if he were going to be district leader.  He was soooooooo worried.  But, it turns out that our district is combining with the 일산 district now, so Elder Flora from 일산 will be our district leader.  Also, two elders from my 동기 (they came to Korea at the same time as me) are going to be companions in 일산, so I will get to see them at every district meeting.  How exciting!!

The first half of this week was spent finishing up moving apartments.  We are finally done!  We finished on Tuesday night.  Then, on Wednesday, I went on exchanges with Elder Eggleston.  We 전도ed for a little while, and then we had to shovel the church parking lot, because it snowed!  It finally snowed!  It was kind of funny, because while I was shoveling, I remembered that the last time I shoveled snow, there was 4 feet of it, and I was doing it in shorts, a t-shirt, and flip flops.  That was weird.  It actually snowed again today, so that was a nice surprise to wake up to.  When I say it snowed, I mean about half an inch of snow.  It's not really a lot of snow, but it's something.  Then, on Thursday, we didn't even get to do companionship study, because the AP's wanted Elder Eggleston to come in for a Korean pass off test at 10, and then they had a whole bunch of other appointments, so he pretty much didn't start until 1, and finished at about 3-3:30.  So, I spent the entire day at the office.  I got to see a lot of missionary friends, because President was also having interviews at the same time.  But, I have also decided that I never want to become an office elder.  Probably, now that I've said that, I'm going to become one now.  I guess we'll find out.  

On Friday, we had to go on exchanges again, because our team had two appointments at once, so I was with Elder Eggleston for about 2 days, instead of just the normal 1.  On Saturday, we handed out English Flyers to a bunch of people so they could come to our English class, which we did right after that.  Then, we had Family Home Evening.  We played "Do You Love Your Neighbor" for the game.  When we had to wrap up, I was the last one to lose, so Elder Eggleston made me sing a song in front of everyone there.  But, luckily, there is no video of me singing "I'm a Little Teapot" in front of a bunch of Koreans.  Close call.

That wraps up this week!  Thank you all so much!

사랑합니다!

Elder Tyler Conley

Too Soon!

01/10/16

오!  안녕하세요, 여러분!

Sorry I am emailing a little bit late today.  We had a 식사 with our ward mission leader, and they fed us 돈까스 (donkas), which is like a fried pork cutlet.  And, since they made it pretty much a buffet, and since it's rude not to eat a little bit, Elder Bradshaw and I competed to see who could eat the most.  We tied at 14.  

This week we did not end up doing a whole lot because we moved houses.  I literally just cleaned a house to be sold 4 weeks ago, and now I had to do it again.  Not terribly exciting.  And, our new house is much smaller than our old one.  As the other elders have said, it would make a wonderful two man house, but it is for four people, so it's not very great.  We started moving Thursday morning, and we are still not finished, because downsizing makes it really hard to get rid of everything, especially when you live in Korea, and their recycling laws would take my whole email time to describe.  

As far as other missionary work this week, we were only able to meet with 임상현 (I spelled his name wrong last time).  As of last time, he had thought that the Book of Mormon was a spellbook, and that Jesus was a wizard (and I really hope he was mostly just kidding about that, but I really don't know).  So, this time, we had to tell him how all of the basics were, and it was an okay lesson.  He's reading the Book of Mormon now, so we should see some progression here soon.  

I was also able to see a convert baptism this week.  His name is 류명석, and he is the other team's recent convert.  He is really cool, and watching his baptism was a wonderful experience.  

That's actually all we did this week, because we were moving for most of it.  Sorry!

사랑합니다!

Elder Tyler Conley