Your mission, should you choose to accept it . . .

The Last Word From Korea

2010-08-25T21:29:00.000-07:00

Well, this blog's been sitting unfinished for a decent while, bothering me to no end. And to finish it, I'm just going to put up here the most direct account of the events as they transpired: the last few pages of my mission journal.

10 July 2010

It's quarter past five in the morning, the day I go home from my mission.

It feels frantic and lively--I can't sleep, my shoulders are killing me (gosh-blamed mattress for the first time in a year).

LATER . . .

So here's what happened.

We made it to Seoul Station only to be greeted by the indomitable Pak twins--Pak Sera and Pak Sung Hee, both dressed in knee-length skirts and normal clothes. Much squealing was indulged in--big news is that Pak Sung Hee is coming to America in September and staying until January to help out and babysit during her older sister's pregnancy. Yaaaay! She called us a van taxi, which transported all the bags, all the elders, and Pak Sera, and we four chameis took a separate taxi to the temple.

Even the taxi driver was blown away when he saw it. You're on a big street in Seoul, right past Hyundai department store, and you take a typical little side street up a hill behind a big, square, more-ominous-than-uplifting Presbyterian church, then veer up a steep little driveway, and the temple just unfolds in front of you like a flower, white and gold and clean and bright. The Seoul temple.

President Ii of the Pusan stake, and his daughter Long-Haired-Sister-Ii's-Little-Sister, were there. As we'd arrived with not enough time to make the 1:30 session, President Ii took us to lunch at a member's bulgogi restaurant around the corner. (Good bulgogi. I ate a lot of kimchi. I was craving it.)

The meal left us with enough time to not quite make the 2:30 session, so we hustled in there like blazes (long pause for checking cameras), got our clothes, changed, dashed into the endowment room, then Sister Kim the temple matron brought it to my attention that my dress was, in fact, on backwards. Shuffle out, switch the dress, shuffle back in. Then I realized we had to pick up translators, so I did the whole thing again. And then there weren't enough translators, so I surrendered mine to Sis. Linford and watched the mea culpa late-starting session in Korean.

Oops, we're almost to the airport. More later.

LATER . . .

In airport. To continue.

So after the session, we were all standing 'round in the celestial room when we were asked to be daughters in some proxy sealings. That was pretty cool. Elder Anderson was witness, and I got to do my batch of names with Pres. Yang Yong Suk and his wife. None of the names we did were names. The father was always XXX, the mother (with one exception) was XXX's Wife, and the daughter was Miss X. Centuries upon centuries, thousands upon thousands of women whose names have vanished into the void so that only their relationships tether them to our reality. And, one by one, they are being wholly and completely saved in the Seoul Korea Temple.

So we didn't get out of our session 'till about five, after which photos and debating were indulged in. I really wanted to have some time to just relax, so I opted to wait at the temple with Sis. Musser, whose brother Woody (really) was coming to meet her. That was a big help, that break time. Kim Yoon Ha, Musser's trainer, turned up while we were waiting (all the returned sisters know the door code for the sisters' dormitory . . . they lived there while at the KMTC) and together we ventured out into the insanity of Seoul. Just to make my travels in Korea complete, we ran for a subway train whose doors were closing, the doors popped back open for us, Kim Yoon Ha stopped dead in the doorway and I got stuck in the door. Awkward, but not painful. And at least I didn't get dragged to death like almost happened to that kid on the bus that one time.

So we made it to a tourists-only market, where we met up with Woody and battle-buddy Josh and all grabbed dinner. Real Korean food, thank you very much. Nengmyeon for me.

We made it back to the temple a smidge after our 9:30 mark--I as afraid we'd miss Sister Copeland, but her stuff was still there and she herself was not yet there. However, there was short-haired Sister Ii (Ii Kyeong Un) from the MTC! Whoa, blast from the past. So we chatted with her until the one and only Sis. Copeland herself showed up, exhausted as usual, her voice a half-octave higher than I remember, like she'd been sucking on a helium balloon.

I managed a decent chunk of sleep until five, when hey! up and no hope of going back to sleep. I padded across to the bathroom, pajamaed and barefoot . . . only to run into most of the sisters of Bangeojin, AND Ii Yeong Hwa, getting ready for the 6 a.m. session. Nothin' like a good impression. :-/ So exercise, shower, dressed and braided, all by 6:30. Sis. Musser and I foraged breakfast at the GS25 around the corner, I got a big (heavy) box from the temple prez to take to his son in Salt Lake, I fretted a bit over whether Jin Mok Hwan were coming or what, and then Sis. Musser and I participated in the 8:00 session. It was so much more sedate, spiritual, uplifting and enjoyable than yesterday's. I had a translation doohickey this time, so I listened to some in English, some in Korean, and some in French. And in the Celestial room, I meditated upon the inlay of a table and thought of something new. Before the mission, I was a table. Over the mission, I got a lot of gauges cut into me. They HURT. But they've been filled with mother-of-pearl--little streaks of divinity, of perfection, swirled into my otherwise-unremarkable self. Not wholly perfect; that would be ostentatious. Just little bits of perfection are perfectly appropriate right now. Really just a plain white table still . . . but worthy to stand in the temple of our God.

When we finished the session, I looked around for Jin Mok Hwan . . . nothin'. Sis. Pak Sung Hee's temple clothes were still in the locker, so I guessed they weren't in a session. We headed back to the chapel and the res, but instead of going straight into the res I just felt like making an appearance around the wooden screen, where lots of people were waiting around in the lobby . . . and there on the sofa were Pak Sung Hee, Jin Mok Hwan, and Jang Shin Yeong (Bishop Pyeon Jang Gi's wife), all there waiting for me.

Sister Jin Mok Hwan received her endowment today. And as I sat with her, she said, "You know I'm here because of you, right? I t was because of what you said. I was so worried I wouldn't get to see you; I kept calling Sister Pak Sung Hee and asking 'What day will she be there? What time?' You made me want to make it here." Or something to that effect. And I just thought, this is a fairy tale. This is a bit from a movie. These things don't happen where I, personally, can watch them. But it did. And after hugs, and laughs, and showering with presents, and pictures, and debates about whether 'heppi en ding' is a Korean or an English expression, Jang Shin Yeong led Jin Mok Hwan into the temple so they could start getting ready for initiatories, and they went behind the wooden screen and I saw them no more.

Sister Jin Mok Hwan is safe inside the temple. And my service was one of the things that helped her get there.

That they be not wasted . . . the people we teach, the months that we give. Gather them to the temple. There can be no sweeter reward for a missionary than to spend Saturday morning outside the temple, watching the saints come in. Sister Han Mal Suk is attending again; we met her. We also met a sister who was a Pusan mission mom back in the day. And to everyone we saw, the tag was a badge of honor. This is a returning missionary, a servant of the Lord, who has worked and wept these eighteen months to bring people here. From every corner, I heard the sweetest of all praise: "You worked hard, Sister Missionary. You worked hard. You took many pains."

Being a returning missionary hanging around the Seoul temple of a Saturday morning is the closest thing to heaven I've ever experienced.

And on the last day of my mission. Heavenly Father can't be beat for dramatic timing.

The time, as it always does, grew short. Elder Anderson having rendezvoused with his parents and Elder Oxborrow departed alone for an earlier flight, we were down to five. Some helpful youth assisted in the lugging of the bags to the Hyundai department store bus stop. And a bus ride later, we're back on old familiar turf: airports. Incheon International Airport. Where you have to reply in Korean to English questions to get people to speak to you in Korean . . . where your one precious skill is nice and quite impressive, but certainly not necessary to your survival like it was this morning.

And now I'm on an airplane, wearing little paper slippers, my stomach full of bibimbap (Korean Air gochujang is 100% un-spicy), four hours left to go in our rather bumpy trans-Pacific flight to Los Angeles.

Oh, and I let my passport slip out of my hand at the ticket counter, and if the gentleman at the next counter hadn't called my attention to it, I would've had a real short trip.

*

Last Email From The Field

2010-07-04T19:57:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Holy cow. It finally came. This is finally it. This is the last e-mail I'll send you from Korea. And a lot of computer time is getting taken up with business stuff, like copying files onto/off of Liz* (she's being passed on to my daughter Sis. Culver, who needs the dictionary more than she needs her American cash, whereas I am in the opposite position), e-mailing our less-active record to Elder Jeong, and generally tying up loose ends.

Oh, speaking of Elder Jeong. Friday night transfer calls were insane. When the APs called, I actually had the audacity to flippantly tell Elder Kim, "Yeah, I know where I'm going . . . not much you could say that's gonna shock me, really." Oh, did I eat those words. 'Cuz here's what happened. Sis. Culver is moving to Jungni ward in Taegu. Just Jungni ward. Just one ward, with one missionary team. Just sisters. Sister Alcazar is staying in her area, but only Hogae, not Bangeojin. So she's moving up to the abandoned Hogae elders' house, which means that our apartment has to be closed up for long-term abandonment. Poor apartment. So the time I have left that isn't writing down important information to pass to Elder Jeong (Elder Jeong's staying in Shinjeong, but his companion, Elder Wells, is moving to Suseong in Taegu) or eating one long string of shiksas** is going to be taken up with cleaning, cleaning, and more cleaning. Really. I scrubbed the laundry room floor last night.

So it's one team per ward now. The training curriculum is getting rehauled, as is scheduling (everything's now running on 'quarters' or 'months' . . . once-a-transfer anything is now a thing of the past). The leadership are going to be subjected to bi-monthly three-day-long leadership training meetings (so long, suckers! Have fun!) which I'm sure Sis. Jennings is thrilled to death to have to cater for. (Not.)

Oh, and Sis. Culver, scissor expert that she is, cut my hair. Since I've been on a mission and am now an adventurous, exciting, fearless person, I told her to go ahead and cut it pretty much exactly the same way it's been since sixth grade. She took this in good humor, and cut in some cool layers that give me a whole bunch of effortless curlyness. Sis. Linford and Alcazar got trimmed, too, so we're all set for the trip home. Well, not Sis. Alcazar. But you know what I mean.

Gaah I can't even remember what we did this week at all! Oh, ward activity. Yup, we played water balloon volleyball in the parking lot with a bunch of the ward kids and parents. It was a ton of fun, and everybody got really wet, but fortunately the rain held off until we were quite done. Sis. Culver had told me that Elder Wells had told her that it was somebody's birthday (not sure who . . . maybe The Kid Who Looks Like Spock) and that I needed to make a cake. Hey, no problem. I like making cakes. So I made a cake. And after the activity it turned out that the cake was for my surprise going-away party. Yep. Elder Wells had me make my own farewell cake AND I WAS STILL SURPRISED. Sis. Culver played it really well. And my going home present was a plain white t-shirt, signed by all the folks. Which is SO awesome. I always wanted something like that. So I'm lugging it around and making people sign it, and I am well pleased. Sister Shin Jeong In drew a swoosh on it, so now it's a knockoff Nike t-shirt. Yaay!

Let's see . . . I had my first pat bing soo*** that I actually liked, at Paris Baguette with Sis. Go Gyeong Ah (the Branch President's wife). And this week we're being taken out for shabu shabu# (my favorite interactive meal concept) and boshimtang (dog soup--Branch prez said I could have samgeitang#* instead. I said he'd better believe I was getting sameitang instead. He's just really proud of his rep as 'The Boshimtang Branch President') (Now I think of it, it kind of blows my mind how much Pres. Pak and Sis. Go are like you two. Really a lot). And dinner tonight at Matt & Charlotte's, assuming that Charlotte doesn't go into labor (she's fairly well at the 'any-minute-now' stage, and is astonishing everyone by how little her very large pregnant belly impedes her from doing anything she dang well feels like doing).

The bags are being packed; last goodbyes are being said. The Seoul temple president, who used to be a couple missionary in Yeonsan ward when I was serving there, asked Prez if he could coerce one of the missionaries going home to Salt Lake to take a couple of books to his son, who's living in Utah. So Elder Kim the AP hesitantly called me to ask if I might possibly by chance be able to sqeeze these books in and still make weight limit . . . and I, being my parents' daughter, said, "Oh, yeah. I'm travelling light, so I've got plenty of space. Not a problem." and Elder Kim was happy.

So . . . we've got to run to a shiksa pretty quick here, and close my Korean bank account, and pick up last useful things like boric acid (we don't seem to have roaches, but nothing like being careful when you're leaving a house abandoned for an unknown stretch of time), and generally say my goodbyes to Korea. We are one hundred percent jangshim opda## (ask Helena), which pleases me, because the less time I have to think about this the better I'm going to take it. Which has always kind of been my style, I realized. This is why I've never attended my own graduation and dislike big weddings. I like to plow through life changes, not wallow in them. Maybe this isn't giving enough reverence to the occasion, but it keeps me moving forward and having fun, which is good.

So we going to Aaron's wedding reception on Saturday?

Love you guys. And, um . . . gosh sakes. See you this weekend.

RoseE"

*translator thingy

**shiksa --"meal." The missionaries use this to refer to dinner appointments.

***pat bing soo pat bing soo-- red beans on shaved ice, with various other things done up fancy like a sundae. Pics here: http://www.google.com/images?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=6FK&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&q=%ED%8C%A5%EB%B9%99%EC%88%98&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi

#* sameitang--maybe samgyetang? Chicken soup, but with a whole chicken. http://www.google.com/images?q=%EC%82%BC%EA%B3%84%ED%83%95&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi

# shabu shabu --this is actually a Japanese thing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shabu-shabu

## jangshim opda --I'm guessing this is jeongshin opda, basically losing your mind. Like you're so busy you can't think straight.

Many thanks to Helena for the translations and links to images!

Dialogue

2010-06-28T12:00:00.000-07:00

Todd wrote:

"From what I can tell, this is your last P-day. Next week will be a P-week. Yesterday Rose and I received from President Jennings a letter announcing your completion of your mission. Both President Reusch and the Bishop got letters saying the same thing, so you are done. Take a week off. "

RoseE wrote:

"Yaaay! Actually, not that much goofing off planned for this week. Next week is only four days long (Mon-Thurs) and two of those days are P-Days (Mon and Thurs), so goofing off will be heavily indulged in then."

Todd: I remember my last week. I had no fear, I could speak with power to members and investigators alike. Calling to repentance and changelings all I spoke to. You get to do that when you are about to leave this mortal coil. Take advantage of it.

RoseE: Yeah, I'm noticing this . . . last week of your mission, you've got nothing to lose, so stuff just flies out of your mouth without fear of the consequences. It happened at Kim Yoon Eh's house this last week. I think it might make her come to church next week, for the first time in ten years. And even if it's not next week . . . some things are inevitable.

Todd: Friday passed without my feared outcome. I knew that North Korea would lose in the World Cup, but they didn't take their failure out on Seoul, so I think you will survive your mission.

RoseE: Folks around here are worried for the NK soccer team, actually . . . thinking Beloved Leader or whatever we call him might take out his frustration (and humiliation -- from what we hear, he made sure that lots of people in his country were watching as his poor team got their butts whooped 0-7) on the players and that if they do not find themselves a quiet corner of South Africa to live out their lives, they might be living them out in a labor camp.

Todd: Since you will be coming back, what do you have planned?

RoseE: Monday morning, I'm planning a trip to LDS Distribution to beg for my job back. If they give it to me, I will be planning on going to work every day. If not, I have no plans, really. Other than sewing dresses, going to the library, cleaning out e-mail inboxes, and exploring the boxes and boxes of clothes I think I've still got over there.

Todd: Will you stay in the ward or go to a singles ward?

RoseE: Staying in the ward, at least for the time being. I've missed the ward a lot, and until I figure out what the next few months are going to be like (staying in Rose Park/moving elsewhere to chase employment, staying living with all y'all/finding my own place, eventually back to BYU for grad school as soon as those student loans are killed . . . ) I'm gonna stick pretty close to home base.

Todd: Do you want a calling?

RoseE: Yes, please.

Todd: The Bishop has asked for you to speak on the 25th will you be ready?

RoseE: Can do.

Todd: What to you want to do when you get back? I know you are going to Boston, but do you have any locals that you are going to spend all your time with? Do you want to be left alone? Should I find stuff to do?

RoseE: Awwww, dang, I didn't bring my Forbidden List. The Forbidden List has all the stuff I want to do, but I can't remember much of what's on it because I haven't read it because it's Forbidden. (That's why it's called the Forbidden List.) Yes, there are a lot of local folks that I want to spend time with, predominantely the old roommate gang (Serena/Felicia/Laura/Holly/Sarai, the ones who were around a lot just before I left) and my dear friend Cara, who may or may not still be alive (information's thin on the ground over there). But I want to DO stuff, with my family, from whom I have been troublesomely separated for quite some time now. I want to go hiking and see the Church Art Museum again and do fairs and random shopping and movies and Conference downtown and eating American food and eating Korean food and anything else I can get my hands on. I don't want to be left alone. I've been quite alone in my head for a very, very long time, and I've had quite enough of it, thank you kindly.

Though you might wake up the morning of the 11th to find me not in the house . . . I have a vague plan to wake up at like 3:15 a.m., jet lag being as it is and all, and take Isis and go jogging in the park. Just thought I'd warn you, as I know this is not normal behavior for pre-mission me and you might be scared I'd run away or something. Nope--just getting some exercise and hesitantly testing out what being alone feels like. I'm sure I'll find time to organize my thoughts and process this whole experience while those of you who still have real lives are occupied with work and stuff . . . but I don't want to be at loose ends. That's about the worst thing I can imagine now.

Todd: Hugh Nibley* spend a month in Zion National Park when he finished his mission to recoup.

RoseE: I don't like recoup time. I get bored. But I do like Zion National Park. I think. Have I ever been there?

Todd: We have Phoebe with us for the month, and she and Teancum want to hike and camp and we would love to have you along too.

RoseE: Count me in!

Todd: Keep up the pace. Remember: there are only 50,000,000 Koreans left to convert!

RoseE: Ugh . . . don't remind me.

*Hugh Nibley: LDS scholar and friend of the Hadden family; fluent in about 8 languages including some ancient ones that nobody speaks anymore. Here are some links:

http://hughnibley.org/

http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=effa8949f2f6b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD

In Which RoseE Goes Spelunking--Sort of--And Makes Last-Minute Visits

2010-06-28T02:25:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

Awww, you guys put in hardwood? That's so fantastic! Really, I'm so used to/comfortable with hardwood (well, fake hardwood) floors now that I was wondering how carpet and I were going to get along.

25 July. Got it marked. I'll try to be coherent by then.

And being Meredith's VT companion is going to ROCK! Thank you! I like having people pull strings for me in the RS presidency . . .

How was the futon lacking? What's wrong with the futon*?

So, this week. This week's P-Day was a trip to an old amythest mine outside the city that's been revamped into a tourist trap. I held myself rather aloof, knowing better than this, but everybody in general had a good time, and we got to watch some quite talented Filipino acrobats. (Yes, there's an acrobatics show that goes on in the cave. Told you it was a tourist trap.)

Tourist Cave video

LAST week was awesome, though. Many buses and much hiking took us to the top of this mountain south of Kyeongju, where we all got to finally Seokkuram Grotto, this Buddhist stone temple-cave from back in Unified Shilla. We weren't allowed to take pictures of it, which is fair, and you can probably find some online, but anyway seeing it is much cooler than seeing a picture. Just a beautiful, eerie little cavern built into the top of the mountain. Very neat.

And yes, Elder Ringwood came and spoke, once to the missionaries at Zone Conference, once to everybody yesterday at District Conference (it was packed, too . . . we almost couldn't find seats, as we got there late with Sis. Charlotte and I can't give driving directions). It was fun to meet him--he and his wife are excellent speakers. And though it's cool that they, too, presided over a mission, I still like Prez and Sis. Jennings better. They're MINE.

All of Zone conference was about going home. I cried a lot. Sigh . . .

Oh, but also, our whole zone performed an arrangement of 'Our Savior's Love' that I have sitting around in a folder somewhere, and despite my being in charge of conducting this impromptu choir, we actually sounded quite good. I was very pleased. But don't tell Bishop, or he'll make me be choir director.

And I went on my last comp split . . . my last day in Daegu. I begin to realize that I had a really, really hard time in Daegu, all things considered, and that I'm very proud of myself for getting through it. I didn't get to last-visit with anybody . . . we had last-visit appointments but they all got punked . . . but still had a good time anyway, talking to Sister Chon and eating choco bing su, which is good stuff.

So here's how next week is working. Monday is p-day, but not transfer day. Transfers are all going to happen on Thursday, a regular workday. So you'll get an e-mail next week, this same time, and then, um . . . well, then I'm home.

Love ya

RoseE"

*futon: having noticed a dearth of beds, we got RoseE a futon to help ease the transition from Korean life to US life. Aunt Lenore slept on it, and declared that the bars of the frame were very evident during the night. So . . . Plan B. Whatever that is.

Homecoming Talk

2010-06-27T17:19:00.000-07:00

Mark your calendars!

25 July 2010

11:00 am

Sunday attire

Email me for the address, if you don't know it already.

From President Kenneth W. Jennings, Jr, Busan Mission President

2010-06-27T16:22:00.000-07:00

President Jennings writes:

"June 17, 2010

Dear Brother and Sister Hadden,

We are pleased to inform you that Sister Hadden has filled an honorable mission and will return home on 10 Jul 2010. Please know that she has served with great faith and a dedicated heart in this missionary effort. She has been an influence for good and has touched many lives with this glorious message. She has been instrumental in bringing many souls into the church because of her strong testimony and outstanding missionary spirit. She is loved by both missionaries and members with whom she has served. She has done much to further the work of the Lord in this beautiful land of Korea.

Sister Jennings and I have been honored to work with your daughter and have grown to love her very much. You have good reason to be proud of Sister Hadden who has conducted herself nobly and diligently as a representative of the Savior. She has finished well the work and service she undertook many months ago.

It is our hope and prayer that as she returns home she will continue to find joy and fulfillment in service; and that as a result of her mission experience, she might be more prepared for even greater opportunities.

Sister Jennings and I are extremely grateful to you for sharing her with us and with the Korea Busan Mission. She will be greatly missed.

May the Lord continue to bless you and keep you in his watchful care.

Faithfully yours,

Kenneth W. Jennings, Jr.
Busan Mission President"

2010-06-21T12:15:00.000-07:00

Later, I got a forwarded email from Todd (because it's Father's Day) with the rest of the news from Ulsan this week. RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

http://www.lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=709a230bac7f0210VgnVCM100000176f620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD
I think it's technically still Father's Day over there; at least, I hope so.

So Mom sent me fifty billion pictures of the family reunion. On the one hand, I was really sad I couldn't be there when EVERYBODY else was hanging out together, but on the other hand . . . well, I'm one of the oldest cousins, aren't I? Still too young to hang out with the aunts'n'uncles, too old to play with the younger kids who're all the same age or thereabouts. Ah cham. Oh well. At least Will, and not I, gets the stigma of being tallest. It looks like it was an awesome time, though, and I'm glad you had a good time biking up there. You've got to tell me more about this stealth camping thing. It sounds almost as good as sleeping in airports. (see sleepinginairports.com; fun website.)

I FINALLY FINALLY got to do some cool living history stuff this week! It was the Soiburi Festival (Ironworks?) up at Buk Gu Cheong, and we missionaries volunteered at it. I really don't know what they thought they needed us for--they just told us to wander around and be enthusiastic, probably to make it look like there were more weigukins coming to the festival than actually came. We were nominally there as translators, but nobody seemed to need translation. So we just made clay pots, learned to make ddeok with a big old wooden mallet, wove reed circles to put on your head so it doesn't hurt as much to carry heavy stuff up there and it's easier to balance, watched some cool dancing and cooler drumming, dressed up in Choson-dynasty armor (plastic--my medieval sensibilities are appalled), and watched the Hyeahsa, praying to ancestors in general for a successful festival. (Apparently ancestors will do anything for a pig's head.) We also watched lots of blacksmiths doing their stuff, and watched students powering a foot-powered bellows like in Princess Mononoke. Very cool. AND on Sunday Sis. Go Kyeong Ah, the branch president's wife, finally relented and let us hear her play her very awesome Korean traditional lap-harp thing. She has two: a more traditional-style twelve-string one and a modernized 25-string. I took videos on my camera, but they'll have to come home with me 'cuz I didn't have Isobel there to take sendable videos with.

So yep. Seventeen months of searching in vain for a good Korean-history activity space, and my last month one jumps out at me and I get to spend two days hanging out there! And I got a free t-shirt. Except it isn't a t-shirt, it's a senghwal hanbok shirt, nice and cool with frogs to fasten it at the neck. So comfy. Sis. Alcazar is sleeping in hers. I'm wearing mine today to go up and see Seoknam Grotto. Hot as Hades and mosquitoes galore. I don't mind the skeeters, 'cuz I just don't react to the bites anymore, but poor Sis. Alcazar swells up like a balloon at every bite, so we've been experimenting with makeshift screens and netting tents, and taping up the vent in the bathroom 'cuz a lot of them seem to be getting in that way. Better last night.

We had President's interviews on Tues and Sis. Alcazar spent the whole time cutting elders' hair so they'd look spiffy for the mission tour. I got my Death Letter: the "This is when your exit interview is and this is how much money you'll need to get to Seoul and this is what you can do with the time you have after your temple session" letter. Death Letter. That whole last week's still kind of up in the air, since transfers are on Monday but exit interviews aren't 'till Thursday. It's looking now like Sis. Linford and I will just be companions and sleep in the living room for a couple days, and Elders Bocchino and Oxborrow will do something similar and have free run of Bangeojin to Kyeongju to say last goodbyes to everybody.

Sis. Kim Min Kyeong, the investigator who talks really fast, got matched up with Sister Go Kyeong Ah, who also talks really fast, and we had a lesson with a member and the two of them really hit it off and it was fantastic awesome.

We're having a ward activity in two weeks: Water balloon volleyball in the Daehwa River Park. Sis. Culver made a mad-cool collage poster for the occasion, with which everyone is very impressed. Now to get our investigators to come. . .

Sis. Wang Ga Jeong, of whom we had such high hopes, is in a pickle . . . her Buddhist mother-in-law, living in the States, has forbidden her to participate in a Christian church. She reeeeealy wants to come to church, but we're in Korea and Confucius reigns supreme and . . . we're stuck. Dang this woman, whoever she is.

This coming week: splits to Daegu, Zone Conference with Elder Ringwood, District Conference. It's going to go by really fast. It would even if it were a week in the middle of my mission and not my second-to-last week of regular missionary time. Chaos reins. We scramble to get stuff done. Even right now: gotta catch a bus to Kyeonju like NOW. So I love you! Happy Father's Day! See you in gosh-sakes-three-weeks!

Love

RoseE"

Get 'Em While They're Hot

2010-06-21T00:33:00.000-07:00

At a request from a family member for a 'chop'--a little round rubber stamp that sort of signs your name in the way that a signet ring stamped in wax used to, once upon a time--RoseE replied:

"In Korea they're called Dochangs. I'll get him one. If anyone else wants one, let me know. I can get 'em done up with just about anything written in Korean, Chinese, or English. I'll just do his in English, just his name, unless he'd like some characters on there or something in Hangul. So I'll wait a week to see if there are more specific instructions/further orders, and then do 'em all at once. I wanted to get a new one cut for myself anyway.

Really, anybody who wants one. Just tell me what you want written, in what alphabet, arranged how. By next week. I'll get 'em cut.

Love ya

RoseE"

. . . and since this is all she wrote this week, this is all you are going to get.

So get your requests in today, folks!

In Which RoseE Is Kissed By A Drunk and Gets A Prank Phone Call

2010-06-13T21:12:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

So we discovered this morning that Monday P-Day means the library, the youth center, and all the other amazingly useful places for e-mailing are now closed to us again. So we're back to Digital Plaza,

The Electronics Store, with dancing girls

the electronics store, trying not to get kicked out. Ah, cham.

Anyway, this has been kind of a drag-on week, 'cuz Sister Culver's been wiped out with this cold and so we've been trying to get her as much sleep as possible, to just kill it and be done. This morning she managed to get her own self out of bed, so that's a good sign. Hoping things will pick up hereafter. But highlights of the week include:

We found the doncas restoraunt run by the most awesome Jeong Hyeah Shim, and ate doncas there while chatting with her and her brother and sister. Sis Jeong (aka The Cake Lady) is about the most awsesome person I know. We love her whole family. After English class this week she took us out for jajjangmyeon (except it had octopus in it . . . I didn't know you could get jajjang with octopus. It was SO GOOD) and we bullied her into letting us pay 'cuz she's fed us like three times now. We are excited to start teaching her, but right now isn't good 'cuz she's trying to cram through her cake-baking course and is studying every waking minute except the minutes that she's taking us out to eat. So we're encouraging her through that, and in the meantime are trying to get ward activities happening again so she can come out and meet some ward folks.

Sister Jeong Hyeah Shim aka the Cake Lady

We went to the Daegongwon Rose Festival . . . big feature of this is concerts, too late at night for us to go to them, but we did get to go see the rose gardens for free, which was nice.

RoseE at the Rose Festival

We also hit the Daehwa River Water Festival, which was MUCH bigger and featured a lot of things I'm glad I got too see before I left Korea, like Korean traditional wrestling matches and the dragon boat race finals. (Hyundai won.) And just walking around in the sunshine talking to people is so very pleasant. I love Daehwa River.

Dragon Boat Races

World Cup: Korea vs. Greece. I didn't get to watch it, but BOY HOWDY did I hear it. We're in our apartment, quietly minding our own business after a hard day's work, and all of a sudden this ROAR resounds from outside, like every person in Ulsan just started screaming at the top of their lungs. Korea scored. We've also been kindly informed by everybody that America tied with Britain, so they're not doing too badly, really, for Americans.

Getting kissed by a drunk guy. An American from North Dakota. He'd been up all night and well into the following day watching US vs UK, and we met him on the street, where he kept us in conversation for a very, very long time, and finished it up by kissing both of us on the hand and cheek. I hope he doesn't remember this later. Elder Bocchino, when he heard of this (and also learned that the drunk guy in question was married; he'd told us so) labeled us both 'homewreckers.' I need that on a t-shirt.

OH, speaking of t-shirts, at the river festival we saw the Mother of All Korean T-Shirts, the Untoppable Wonder. It was being worn by a mom, out with her young family to see the festival. Printed on the t-shirt, in big black letters, was a neat list of every radically offensive epithet you can think of, one for each cultural or social group, just lined up neat as you please. She obviously had NO idea what it said. We almost worked up the nerve to ask her for a picture, but chickened out. Dang it.

Missionary work in general has not been much fun -- a lot of dead-ends and very, very awkward lessons. So no fun peppy news on that front, really, though Song Yeong Ok and Yoon Mi Hyeah are still coming to church, as did a lot of less-active families this week 'cuz it was branch conference. I spent too long gossiping with Sister Jennings. I always do.

Since last e-mailing, I had my last Zone Meeting. Ah, good old Shilla zone. Good folks all, from Shinjeong to Pohang. Zone meeting is presided over by the Zone leaders -- neither Prez nor the APs nor anybody high-ranking or official comes, so it sometimes decends into chaos. Highlights are 'Shilla time', the talent show portion, and the after-meeting game of werewolf while waiting for pizza to arrive. Good times have been had at zone meetings. And then I made the elders sing for a long while, prepping for Elder Ringwood's mission tour in two weeks. Nah, it's not intimidating . . . why would you think that? Silly.

And my photos are now all safely backed up on a flash drive, but I'm just going to keep it here with me and you can see 'em when I get home, though by then you probably won't want to, mission pictures being what they are and all. I'll send a few this week, though, while you're still interested.

And Guess Who called me this week.

Unlisted number registered in my phone. I picked up.

"Hello?"

"Yes . . . Who is this?" said a throaty female voice.

"Um . . . I'm Sister Hadden missionary."

"Yes. You served with me."

"Huh? You say I served with you?"

"Yes. Served last year."

"Last year? Did I meet you in Busan?"

"No . . . you were serving with a Maori person ."

"Oh, yes, yes. Sister Matthews. Do you know her?"

"Yes . . . "

"Wait . . ." *blink blink* "MATTHEWS?!?"

*uproarious laughter from the other end of the line* (translation thanks to Helena)

Yep . . . Sister Matthews called me and scared me to blessed death, me thinking she was some crazy Korean ajumoni stalker from a previous area. There is no rule against dead missionaries calling the mission phones, but that's only because there's no way Prez can enforce rules on those already dead . . . and even so, I'm sure there'll be one soon. But while there's still not, I had a great 15-min chat with my favoritest old companion, who is wigging out that I'm four weeks from the end of my service. Yeah, I know, it's bizarre, we're all shocked . . . It was great to hear from her. Just the surprise and smile I needed after kind of a long and blah week.

Yeah, yeah . . . if THIS is a blah week, what do the exciting ones look like?

So Sis. Linford and I are not sure what's hapening to us our last week, if transfers are happening Monday the 5th. That would leave us still in-field until Thursday the 8th with no official area to be working in and nothing to be doing. Sis. Jennings suggested that we (and all 8 other missionaries dying with us) could just come down to Pusan and street contact for three days. I said How About NO. So we may end up sleeping in the living room of our apartment in Ulsan for those three days and just doing last-minute visits to people, but it would sure beat three days of street jeundo. Gaah. What a way to end your service. Please no, Prez. Have mercy.

Okay, gotta go look up an e-mail address for Sis. Linford and send y'all some pictures of stuff, so until next week!

Love ya

RoseE"

RoseE, Sis. Linford, Sis. Culver, Sis. Alcazar, Elder Moore (the smaller, fairer one), and Elder Bocchino at the Whale Museum

Branch President on a scooter.

*Sorry, blogspot does not do Korean characters. You'll have to imagine this conversation.

In Which We Learn What Exactly Was Said In RoseE's Three-Minute Farewell

2010-06-11T14:46:00.000-07:00

RoseE said:

"While serving in Daegu, I lived in an apartment overlooking the KTX rail line. And every morning, at 6:47, the train rattled past on its way to Seoul. And every morning, at 6:47, I thought, I could be riding that. I could be on my way home right now. All I have to do is give up.

Elders and sisters, all we have to do is quit, and we can go home any seond that we choose. We all know it. We all think about it at some point during our missions, when frustration and disappointment weigh heavy on our shoulders. So why are we still here?

The Lord faced the same decision every morning of his mortal ministry. He had the power to quit any time he chose. No one could have stopped him. Said he, "Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father." Even the nails that affixed him to the cross could not have held him there unless he chose to let them. At any point, he could have changed his mind, hopped down, and gone home, back to his family, and friends, and carpentry business, and good, decent, unremarkable life. He could have left the salvation of mankind to be somebody else's problem. He could have. But he didn't.

We all have the power to lay down our lives--our jobs, educations, friends, families, ambitions, plans, boyfriends, girlfriends, pets, cars, home culture, home language, independence. No man taketh these things from us; we lay them down of ourselves. We have the power to take them again. But every day that we choose to leave them laid aside, we become a little bit more like Him who made the same decision on a much grander scale. And we learn, a little bit, why he made that choice . . . because as we love our companions, investigators, members and friends, so he first loved us, and laid down his life for us.

We lay down our lives that we may, in due course, take them up again.But they are not the same lives we left. They are changed beyond recognition, enriched beyond measure--with greater love, stronger faith, truer freedom, deeper understanding, loftier goals, and a much, much bigger family . . . the people we've taught, and the ones who've taught us.

As I prepare to finally take that long ride on the KTX, I do so with a heart full of gratitude for our Savior, Jesus Christ, through whom we receive this and every opportunity for learning and growth. I'm grateful to have served with all of you in representing the Lord in the Korea Busan Mission. I know the Book of Mormon to be God's OwnTruth. I know this work to be his work--striving to bring all souls, including our own, unto him. I offer this, my testimony, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

RoseE Hadden"

2010-06-11T14:34:00.000-07:00

I'll give you news on Missionary work and stuff on Monday, when I have some proper e-mail time. Our P-Day's trunkated this week. *sulks* *but not as much as Elder Bocchino sulked . . . he really sulked a lot* Suffice to say: still alive, still hangin' on, still no North Korean invasions, been coerced into conducting a choir, got a day off (Sis. Culver wiped out with a cold bug; didn't stir out of doors all day), got a month left, gonna make it or it's gonna kill me, one of the two. Not too many other options, right?

Love ya!

RoseE

In Which RoseE Wishes Her Mom A Happy Birthday

2010-06-07T19:00:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum,

It striketh me as it has never before that Mother's Day and your birthday are fairly close together . . . as are Father's Day and Dad's birthday, come to think of it. Not AS close, but still.

So hoping this gets to you in time, Happy Birthday! Your last letter sounded ticked about the new glasses you've been forced into, like needing them made you feel old. Well, I'm younger but I'm certainly catching up--in the course of my mission I've developed bunions and bone spurs, started to go gray at an increasing rate, and aged from 23 to 26 in less than 18 months. My eyes are okay but my feet are in real bad shape. But hey, that's kind of the point, right? If you've got anything left at the end of the race, you didn't run it right. Thus saith Elder Holland (thus roareth Elder Holland, actually, if I know Elder Holland--I've never heard that talk, but you can tell in print when he's raising the rafters and it still makes you want to either run to join Helaman's Army or hide under the bed.) Well-worn things, whether shoes or glasses, are signs of a life well lived. Speaking of which, I've got to take my brown shoes to the cobbler's sometime this week, to be glued back together so they'll survive another two months' work. They're real gosh darn missionary shoes now. Fortunately there's a cobbler's booth right outside our church, so it shouldn't be too much trouble. (Cobbler's shops in Korea are, really and truly, called kudupyeongwon--shoe hospitals.) (I probably already told you that. I forget what I've told you and what I haven't.)

Oh, we saw a Honda outside our apartment today. A Honda! What is a Honda doing in Korea?

Dad's probably double miffed now that you've got two letters and a phone call while he's got nothin'. Tell him to hold his horses; June is coming. I'm really tempted to call stateside again and leave a message on his work voicemail to wish him a happy Father's Day, but I won't. Obedient missionary and all that. I'll think of SOME kind of mischief to do in his name on that day, though; don't worry.

I love you. And don't worry. Thora* wears reading glasses and her husband isn't even out of college yet.

Bisoux**

RoseE"

*Thora: RoseE's good friend

**Bisoux: kisses (fr)

In Which RoseE Gives Her Samang Marsum in Under Three Minutes

2010-06-03T01:11:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom & Dad,

myldsmail's being obstinate again, and the computer won't read gmail either, so we're back to option 3 so I at least get an e-mail out. Tiresome machine.

So . . . gaaah. What on earth happened this week? Well, we had ZLCM (hamburgers and baked beans . . . joy itself. I nearly killed myself with two pieces of fudge cake a la mode) and then right smack after that Zone Conference (yesterday). It was odd, because your last Zone Conference is supposed to be this big deal, because you give your Samang Marsum (Death Speech) and then everybody sings 'Each Life That Touches Ours For Good' just to make sure you cry, if you didn't cry while giving the actual talk, and you say goodbye to everyone and it's very sad and tragic. Except we're having another zone conference later this transfer, because Elder Ringwood's coming, so although I did give my talk and get sung at and cried, I didn't say goodbye to anyone, 'cuz we're all doing this again in four weeks anyway. So, uh . . . bye, y'all. I'm very lucky things worked out this way . . . as you may know, I heartily dislike dramatic goodbyes. I'd rather have goodbyes done with before I know what's happening.

You may recall that when I gave my farewell talk, though I was well prepared, I had some issues filling the time allotted. Well, that problem's a thing of the past. The trick with Samang Marsums is squeezing them into three minutes, lest you get eaten by the APs for over-extending their meeting. Whatever else I may have done, I'm proud of myself for not going over three minutes. HA.

This week Sunday was the big in-the-middle-of-church event of all watching the Joseph Smith movie together. Though none of our investigators came (gggaaaaah! The big standardized English test was on that Sunday, so at least two people couldn't come because of that [one of them Son Yoo Jin, who answered my call and talked to me again! Yaaaay!] and others were busy or not answering or dang it all), our awesome friend Kim Kyeong Bin's less-active dad came, as did a lot of other less- and semi-active members we weren't expecting to see. Kim Kyeong Bin was just beaming the whole entire time. She was SO excited her dad came to church.

Big discovery this week was a little cafe called Tesoro. We met a woman who works there a few weeks ago, and she gave us her business card, and we've been meaning to find the place for weeks and weeks . . . well, this week we finally managed it, and met her again. Nicest person in the world. We sat at the bar drinking hot chocolate and eating brownies and just chatting for a good hour or so, and I was able to give her a Book of Mormon and a cookie. The name on her business card was Son Hyon Seo, which is what I've been thinking of her as, but now that I reflect, that might be the name of her aunt who owns the new cafe.

We had our first power outage this week. Fortunately it didn't cause too much trouble . . . it was the middle of the morning, and although I was in the middle of a baking project, the oven was already lit and it's gas-powered so there was no problem. Lucky sods, us.

Sis. Culver got to pull out her old skills again and give a haircut to our member friend Charlotte, wife of Matt and mother of Lincoln and as-yet-unnamed. AYU is due at the beginning of July, so it's anybody's guess if I'll get to see him before I go. We're all hoping so. Charlotte's friend Wynne, from Scotland, also came and got a trim, and we got to talk a lot with her (she was very impressed that I was a piper's daughter) and eat tacos. Lots of weigukin food got et this week.

*checks the blog* Wait, you lost the second picture disc? Lost it? AAAAHH, freak. Now I have to make another one, and this one that's supposed to be copying right now is taking for blinking ever; I'll probably have to cancel the job. I may just have to buy a bigger flash drive and back everything up to that, because the CDs are turning into a real headache.

President Pak Yeong Chol, Branch Prez, is threatening us with Boshimtang again. Fortunately, his wife, Go Gyeong Ah, is about my best friend in the whole world now (I taught her Sunday school class for her this week and now she loves me) and has promised to protect me from any bizarre substances her husband might try to make me eat. Yep. I'm all for new experiences, but there are some lines I just do not cross.

It's been another week of bizarre freezing coldness, but sun's finally out (about blessed time -- it's JUNE already, people!) and we're doing another run to the whale museum today, as I am the only Chamei who has yet seen it. I'm wearing a sweater I dug out of the church's random leftover clothes pile with a zipper for a neckline (it's weird . . . show ya later) and am all set to have a great day and a great week, including a possible split to Taegu so save Sister Chon, who's going insane. So . . . I love you! Mom, Happy Birthday! I'm still trying to see what you e-mailed . . . I might have luck and I might not. Rrrgh.

Stay out of trouble

Love,

RoseE"

In Which RoseE Goes Gaily Into Her Last Transfer

2010-05-27T01:30:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Well, big news is TRANSFER CALLS. Friday night. I had my mission map out and pencil ready to keep track of all the moves. Sis. Yoon got the deadly call: they've sent her out to Taegu, my old apartment but not my old area, co-senior with Sister Crowther. It was rough for her, but I knew it was gonna happen. First transfer's always the hardest. Sis. Linford got the call from Prez--she's training. Sis. Ogelvie called me with news of how everybody else was shuffling around and who was training the other two new greenie sisters (Jeong Min Hee, 2nd trainee, and Sis. Musser, 3rd trainee). And the transfers were settled. A slot for everybody and everybody in her slot.

Then our phone rang.

Sis. Culver sat paralyzed in her chair as I answered it.

It was Prez. What the freak? thought I. Who could he possibly make me train? There's no one to train! They're all trained!

False alarm--he's installing me back as Chamei Dep. I've never heard of anyone going two rounds as Chamei dep, and am surprised it wasn't sister Ogelvie instead of me. . . but I think the crux of the matter was the Chamei Dep training binder I wrote at Prez's request a few months ago. Because now he wants me to write a training binder for sister trainers. I must have done a good job. I'm quite flattered. And hey, ZLCM LUNCH TOMORROW!

So that was it. My last transfer call. Well, the last one where my head's on the chopping block. No new companions, areas, district- or zone-mates, or roommates (now that we've met Sis. Linford's greenie, Sis. Alcazar . . . also from California. I'm in an all-weigukin house for the first time in my mission, and they're ALL Californians. Save me). And today begins my last transfer. Today Sis. Pak Sung Hee and Sis. Pak Seh Ra go into That Good Night. And for me, there is no Next Transfer. My new planner covers more time than the rest of my mission covers. I keep swinging back and forth between being excited to go home and forgetting that there IS a home . . . that there's something besides black oblivion outside mission boundaries. I'm confused, and nervous. And wondering if my Korean is as good as it's gonna get . . . I hope not. I'm going to try to speak Korean straight through every working day for the rest of the mission, because living in a house with three other Americans is NOT going to be good for my language skills otherwise. I mean, I'm looking forward to being home, and of course hey, I love airplane rides, and pre-airplane there's the temple and a couple hours to explore Seoul, and a ride on the KTX which is always fun . . . I think it's just getting on the train, that last goodbye to Prez and Mom Jennings, that I'm recoiling from. I think that's going to hurt like death. But hey, before that is Dinner at the Bu, and P-Day in Pusan, and all manner of fun craziness . . . Just that one painful kick and then it will all be over and everything will be okay.

So in other news, this week Sis. Culver and I discovered the wonders of Ulsan Grand Park (seriously, Dad, you have GOT to come to Ulsan Grand Park. You would flip. It's fantastic) and played with a bunch of butterflies and went to the bug museum. I think we're the only foreigners in Ulsan that know about the Grand Park . . . one gentleman we talked to said that he came to the park every other day, all day, for years, and we were the first weigukins he'd ever seen.

Also, politics proceeds apace. There's an election or something going on, and on nearly every major corner there are people in matching shirts doing dance routines to jingles in favor of one candidate or the other. The candatates themselves are riding around in big trucks with their faces plastered all over them, waving and doing nintey-degree bows to everyone they see. For once, we're not the weirdest thing on the streets of Ulsan.

And we got to have dinner this week with a lady who comes to our English class--a divorcee who runs a donkkas restaurant with her brother and handicapped older sister, while raising two teenage kids. She is teaching herself to decorate cakes, and wants to open a bakery next year. She fed us excellently, and happily accepted the brief spiritual message and Liahona we offered in return. I'm excited about her. I hope we can teach her.

This week, instead of the third hour of church, we're watching Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration, which the Bu bootlegged some subtitles onto. So everybody's inviting everybody, and hopefully it will be a good intro to the church for a lot of people. Awesome Katrina and her Also Awesome Friend Renee are coming (we've been doing FHE with them on Monday nights . . . we share a scripture story and they teach us how to play spades. Sis. Culver is winning), as are a lot of less-actives and sort-of investigators. We're excited. I love movies.

And Wednesday Elder/Dr Gibson and Elder/Dr Brown, the missionary health gwallying people, are coming and doing a mission tour, so we're having Zone Conference. AND some time after that, Elder Rockwood (Rookwood? Ravenwood? One's a Seventy, one's a Death Eater, and one's in Indiana Jones, or maybe somebody uses the same name twice somewhere) is coming, so we get two Zone Conferences in my last transfer. Good times.

AND I'm copying all my photos since, um, the last time I copied them (coughNovembercough)* and sending them home, so they'll all be safe and y'all get to see everything while biting your nails to the quick or freaking out over MASH or whatever you're doing to keep yourselves occupied in the remaining time. I'm reading Livre de Mormon, breaking the chewing-on-my-fingers habit, and making boxes for all my scriptures, to keep my fingers busy.

Oh, somebody please pass stuff on to Emily, and hopefully relay stuff back from her, 'cuz e-mail is quicker than letters even if it is only once a week:

How about the week right after Cat's wedding? That's what, 14th of August, right? So 15 or 16 August-ish? And it's still well before my dad's birthday. Sound good? Sound like a plan? Any objections?

Mom, can I still fly? Are there restrictions on my flying? Do I have to buy tickets now? Does JetBlue go to Boston or just to JFK? Is that week impossible to fly on for some reason? Maybe you should just talk to Emily . . . I'm just out here in Korea; I don't know what I'm doing. I am seriously not qualified to plan a week in Boston with my best friend right now, but planning is required, so . . . yeah, just tell her to pick a week, as long as it's not the wedding or Dad's birthday, and I'll be there. I'll figure out the details later.

Okay, gonna make a backup CD quick . . .

love you!

RoseE"

*coughwelosthemcough

to Bethe 5/20/10

2010-05-20T18:51:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bit,

Thank you so much for the drawing! The Enterprise looks great--you're really good at getting the proportions all just right. If you wanted to do another drawing, my companion Sister Culver really likes dogs and puppies--could you draw her a picture of Kotah, if you have time?

Everything there is to know about Star Trek? Jeesh. I think I used to know everything about Star Trek, but it's been a long time, so I've probably forgotten a lot. Dad knows a lot, though, and so does Emily, so I think we'll probably be able to figure out whatever you want to know. What do you mean, Doctor Who is running loco? Did the show get really weird? Weirder? Aww, dang it, that's no fun.

I hope this letter gets to you before the trek. I want to hear all about it--where you went and what you did. I never got to go on a trek when I was in Young Women's . . . I was always at Lac du Bois. And I only did Girl's Camp a couple of times. You're really lucky.

I miss you so much! And I'll see you in not-even-two-months!

Love,

RoseE"

In Which It Rains on Buddha's Lanterns and Sister Kim Yoon Ai Decides to Read the Book of Mormon Again

2010-05-20T16:26:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Well, another week in Ulsan with not very much that's very exciting happening. Tomorrow is Buchonim Oshin Nar, or 'The Day that Bhudda Came,' Buddha's birthday. There are lanterns up all over the place, which is very pretty. We're hoping to catch a parade or something, if we guess right where it's going to be and when.

Tuesday was the monsoon season opener. It Poured. But Poured. All Day. Sis. Culver and I went slogging through the streets looking up old addresses and got ourselves just as drenched as drenched can be. I'm going to have to start switching off black and brown shoes, giving each pair a chance to dry before I use it again. I might also have to start walking a little bit less . . . I've been proving myself to be My Father's Daughter and have been walking fairly well everywhere, spending in impulse-buy ice cream bars what I save in bus fare. Grr.

Oh, and this week I sent home a box of randomness. Most of it isn't very interesting randomness--clothes I like but can't use through the end of my mission, coming-home presents (but you don't know which one's for who yet, so don't touch), books and notebooks and such. I slow-boated it, though, so I may beat it home. There is a box of cookies on the top of everything that y'all can eat.

I sucessfully made kimchi chigae this week. It was spicy as blazes, but it tasted good.

I accidentally told Elder Bocchino over the phone last night that I really dislike the song 'Hey There, Delilah,' having listened to it about 300 times too many. He promptly started singing it to me. I hung up on him. He called back ten minutes later and immediately started singing it again. I hung up again. Then I got a call from Elder Wells. "Hey, Elder Bocchino says I'm supposed to sing you a song." "Is it 'Hey There, Delilah'?" "Um . . . yeah. He said you'd hang up on me." "Let's tell him that you sang it and that I hung up on you, okay?" "Okay. Deal." I love our elders.

Investigators . . . no strong progressors this week. Working and hoping, false starts and fresh attempts. I'll keep you posted if anything interesting happens. Oh, but Kim Kyeong Bin got a job at the district president's new robot academy so she's no longer unemployed and doesn't have to work on Sunday, and Yoon Mi Hyeah is getting her father's, grandfather's, and great-grandfather's records ready to be taken to the temple. Sister Ii Jeong Im, a slightly nutty member sister who always comes to English class and thinks that Buddha is the devil (ummm . . .), painted four of my fingernails yellow. Just four. VERY yellow. OH, and Sister Kim Yoon Ai, a lovely less-active sister who is 100% not progressing towards coming back to church but loves having the sisters visit and teach lessons, told us yesterday, "So I was thinking I want to start reading the Book of Mormon over again. I don't remember it very well from back when I got baptized, and I read it fast so I didn't much understand it because it is so difficult." Sis. Culver and I tried to not explode with excitement. Reading the Book of Mormon! She wants to read the Book of Mormon again! This is SUCH a big deal, particularly for her. She seemed surprised by our suggestion that this desire to read had come to her through the Holy Ghost. "The Holy Ghost is a . . . like a warm feeling, right? It wasn't that, it was just a thought." But it was a really, really good thought, one that I absolutely know she wouldn't be thinking on her own at this point. "The Holy Ghost comes as thoughts too, Chamenim. Any thought that encourages us to do something good comes from God. That's revelation."

Oh, another revelation: today I ate a Monte Cristo* and it was SOOOO good.

Sis. Culver is a sport, and we're getting along swimmingly. Transfer calls are tomorrow; crossing our fingers that we all get to stay (though I think the only person in real danger is Sis. Yoon).

Love you all so much! Talk to you next week!

RoseE"

*no idea. Post anything that you know.

In Which RoseE Admits To Being Trunkie*

2010-05-13T02:49:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom & Dad,

Wow, it was good to talk to you on Sunday. It's a lot nicer to call home two months before your fly day than it is to call six or fourteen months before it, as I can now state from plain experience. 'Cuz you hang up and take a deep breath and say, "Okay, two months. I can do this." And then it's okay.

Just workin' on hanging on that long. It's been an up and down week, but some good ups and no downs too drastic, really. The biggest, coolest thing is that on Sunday a woman named Oang Ga Jeong, her mother, and her 3-year-old son Dorian came to the 2nd and 3rd hours of church. Sis. Oang's uncle and younger brother are both members, one in America and one in Taiwan (their whole family is Taiwanese, by the bye). She and her husband & little boy are back in Korea after the dad lost his job, recession and all. We met her on Monday and taught her about prayer . . . she's kind of excited to get into this whole 'religion' thing, but was annoyed/frustrated that there was never anybody around to explain to her who this Jesus person is and why he is important. When we told her that, um, that's our job, she was all like, "Really? Oh, cool!" We thought it was pretty cool, too. We also thought it was cool that Charlotte, our token American member sister, served her mission in Taiwan and speaks Mandarin, and is very excited to help us teach. She speaks only English/Mandarin, us only English/Korean, and Sis. Oang only Mandarin/Korean, so this is going to be a language party, right here in a little bit.

And today for P-Day we all went to a reptile museum. Really. It's a museum full of snakes, lizards, iguanas, tortises, turtles, and more snakes, in what used to be an elementary school but got remodeled into an interactive museum/zoo. Since nobody else was there that day and the workers were bored and they wanted to be nice to missionaries, they let us in for free and let us pick up and play with just about everything. It was SO cool. My favorite was a little gray-and-yellow king snake. He and I were buds. I'll try to send some video in a bit here.

Elders Moore and Murray and a Really Big Snake

Shilla Zone Chases an Iguana

(still having problems loading these videos, but working on it.)

Inteviews were this week . . . Prez seems to have implied that Sis. Yoon is leaving (and possibly going senior . . . have fun!) so that Sis. Linford can train on her last transfer. The rest of the time was spent by all of us hanging on Sis. Jennings' every word as she talked about children's literature . . . she was a librarian in her former life, and we haven't had new stories in forEVER. She also bought us a block of cheese from Costco (yaaay!) and vitamin pills to see me through to the end of this adventure.

Oh, got news from Sis. Pak Sung Hee (who, like Sis. Pak Min Jeong, is from Kyeongi province, which donated the peace park thing) that Sis. Jin Mok Hwan, who I'd been mistakenly informed about, is in fact going to the temple this week. She's going to the temple. Oh, gosh. Have you even the slightest idea how deeply, abidingly happy that makes me? SHE'S GOING TO THE TEMPLE!

So this is all good news stuff . . . the hard bit is that we've kind of been at loose ends for a while 'cuz I've kind of forgotten what missionaries do all day when they're not madly riding busses back and forth all over the entire city. I have a lot of time that used to be eaten by transportation and not much idea of what to do with it. The Elders are trying to organize an "Okay, which people on the list of members ACTUALLY live in this city" project, which sounded like a great idea to me, and then they took the project book and hid it in their apartment, so I am annoyed. I don't deal well with being at loose ends. It freaks me out. Sis. Culver is being very even-keeled, bless her.

Trying to be trunkie in only healthy, productive ways. Not sure I'm succeding, but I'm trying. When Sis. Jennings was divvying out the vitamin pills, I let slip "I only need sixty," and was met with condemning stares. Yes, I know the number of days left, all right? Quit judging, y'all. I didn't come on this adventure to be SuperMissionary, just to be A Missionary. I've already far exceeded my own expectations. I'll know the number of days left if I want to. Any time I feel defensive about this I can just snap at Sis. Culver, who has to take it 'cuz she's my greenie. And she's even-keeled so she doesn't care.

Love ya! And not to be trunkie, but we're in the single digits of 'number of e-mails I have left to send'. Weird.

Stay out of trouble. If I didn't specifically forbid strokes, surgery mishaps, or broken tailbones**, I'm forbidding them now.

RoseE"

*trunkie: eager to pack your trunk and go home.

**strokes, surgery mishaps, and broken tailbones: All three of these things happened to the (extended) family this last week.

To Bethe 5/10/10

2010-05-10T18:42:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bit,

Thank you so much for the dragon! I really like that it's a Korean dragon, so I know you drew it just for me. It makes me feel special and loved. It's now on my bedroom wall, along with the painting of the Tardis*, which is a little battered from four moves now but is still in pretty good shape. It's been with me through almost my whole mission now. Cool, huh?

Mom says that y'all are hiking a lot now. Fun! I'm so jealous. I wish I could come, too. I get to walk a lot, but it's all streets and sidewalks and traffic, not cool hikes up in the mountains. I'd like to get out a bit, especially now, because all the big temples are decorated with hundreds of colored lanterns for Buddha's birthday. It looks really cool. And it's FINALLY gotten warm enough to where being outside is fun. Mostly. Today is really gray and stormy . . . I guess monsoon season is coming again.

I'm so excited to see you in two months! It's coming up really fast . . . one of these weeks I'm going to make it home before my letters. I love you! Have fun with the end of the school year--wow, you're almost a junior already, huh? Crazy!

RoseE"

*tardis: time machine used by Dr. Who shaped like a blue British police box.

In Which Plans Are Made to Call On Mother's Day

2010-05-06T01:39:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum & Dad,

Just got my e-mail et so this is going to be brief.

Calls: I'm shooting for 7 or 8 a.m. here, which is 4 or 5 pm Saturday for you, I think. If that doesn't work, tell me . . . I can check e-mail once quick tomorrow, just to get the calling thing worked out. Prez is nice this way.

E-mailing from Prez's tv, by the way. He's got internet on his playstation. It's a touch unwieldly, but with 18 sisters e-mailing we're really doing quite well, all things considered. Half the sisters the mission are reading this over my shoulder. They say hi.

Yesterday was childeren's day here in Korea . . . designated legal holiday for parents to spend time with their kids. Because without a legal holiday, it just doesn't get done. Just school from morning to midnight. But yesterday everybody was out in the parks, which was great. The branch was going camping . . . we were supposed to go with them . . . so we got up at quarter to six to go out and meet them for the day, and at 6:08 as we're going out the door (Sis. Culver had her shoes on) the elders called to tell us that the outing was cancelled. I was back in bed before the call was over. Turned out later the outing wasn't actually cancelled and everybody wanted to know where we were. Ugh.

We DID get to go hiking this week with one of our investigators. That was lovely. To be away from all the incessant traffic and pavement and city-ness, in pants, with my hair braided and no stockings or makeup or any gosh darn sister missionary paraphenalia beyond my tag and my testimony. We drank from a natural spring way up the mountain, and bought ice cream from a guy who hikes up there with a backpack full of the stuff every morning. It was fun. I felt a little bit like me again. . . me who could wear pants, and spend time in woods, and get dirty,and light fires and steer canoes and all that stuff I used to be able to do. Good feeling.

And Sis Jin Mok Kwan, the less-active hairstylist from Taegu, is going to the temple to receive her endowments THIS WEEK! Isn't that AWESOME?

This e-mail has now been eaten twice, so I'm going to send it before any more disasters hit. I'll call you! And that will be lovely! And I'll e-mail quick tomorrow to double-check the call times, so if there's a problem, tell me soon.

I love you!

RoseE"

In Which Sister Son Yoo Jin Comes Back From the Ether, and A Toilet is Conquered

2010-04-29T02:53:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Don't you jinx me with your snow! It's finally sunny here. We'll be lucky to get a week of sunshine before monsoon hits at the rate this has been going.

All the hiking* sounds fun. I hope it's still going to be going on come July . . . I want in on this action.

Space camp**? we have space camp in Utah? Is it a day camp or an overnight camp or what? I thought you had to go to Florida or someplace to do Space Camp.

LOL Mom, you are trunkie. This is funny. I haven't got any flight information yet through official channels, but it would seem to be not long in coming. As traumatic as it's all going to be, hey, I love airplane rides. And I've got Wall-E ready for the trip, just hangin' out in some back folder of the iPod. Freak, home at four in the afternoon. I can't go to sleep right away; I'll be whacked for a week. I was thinking going down to the temple would be a good plan--live session would keep me on my feet, so I'd at least only sleep for short stretches at a time. Or just walking downtown . . . I've got a friend in the T2 mission I want to try to find. Or maybe I should just go to bed. I don't know. Now is not the time to think about this.

So . . . camping. The ward is going camping outside Pusan next tues/wed, for Children's Day, and they laid it down with the missionaries that We Are Coming Too, Period. Get Permission. Arrange With Sisters in Pusan to Stay With Them Overnight. So, um . . . guess I'm going camping next week. And THEN this week, at Zone Conference, I get news that Sisters Conference *ahem* the Meeting to Watch the YW Broadcast (Helena will appreciate this: I've decided that in Korean, this meeting is named 자매 않대회) is Thursday, so . . . yep, looks like we'll be spending a lot of time in Pusan next week.

This was a week of Me Being In Charge, which is never a good plan, really, but fortunately some good experiences popped up that kept us out of trouble and chaos. The elders got a call from a woman named Kim Min Yeong, who's actively searching for a religion and has bumped into the missionaries a few times. We got to meet with her this week and it went GREAT. She was genuinely interested in what we were offering, and asked us straight-out if what she'd heard from other churches about Mormons was true. (Like, that we don't let our members eat for a month at a time. Um, no, that's not what you'd call fact.) And she fairly well invited herself to church . . . she's interested in and impressed by how our members live. I'm tentatively hopeful.

Also we went on a great old wild goose chase with the elders for this less-active member who doesn't show up on any records . . . I found his number in an old handwritten list . . . and while the meeting with him himself was extremely weird and in no way useful, it put us in the right spot to meet a young twentysomething man who has been pondering the purpose of life. The elders taught him a LOT, and invited him to all kinds of stuff and gave him a Book of Mormon and got his number and the whole jazz. It was really exciting how you could kind of see his face light up as we talked to him.

AND Son Yoo Jin texted me back! I got y'all's Easter package this week (the sugar eggs are adoreable . . . where in the world did you find a Glinda card?) and all the sympathy kind of set me crying again, and in my cry-y mess I texted Sis Son one more time, just to say that we loved her, and she ANSWERED! She's not blocking our number, not stonewalling us. She's not lost entirely. There's still hope. For this tiny miracle I am immesureably thankful.

We threw Elder Wells a 1-week-late birthday party with a Baskin-Robbins Ice Cream Cake. That was two days ago. I've barely been able to eat anything since. Just 100% not hungry at all, despite my having eaten next to nothing since then. Bizarre.

Oh, and I won a fierce and hour-long battle with our apartment's toilet, armed only with an utterly useless pump-style plastic plunger that spews water everywhere. And after I won, I was conveniently already in the bathroom to take a long, hot, and much-needed shower. The roommates hail me as a hero. My arm hurts. But that toilet now knows who is boss. Called to serve Him, Heav'nly King of Glory . . .

Today we're up at the Kyeongju Museum again, having a proper look-through. None of the elders came . . . one member of each team in the zone had already been a lot . . . so they're hanging out in Hogae doing nothing again. Heh. But Zone Conference was fun. There were tacos. Oh, and apparently Church Headquarters has been assigning missionaries on a map on which our mission is not marked, which would expain why there have been no incoming elders for so blessed long. They're fixing the map.

We saw a heavily pregant young woman this week, wearing a t-shirt that read, in big block letters:

STOUT
STOUT
STOUT

*chokes laughing*

Sis. Culver continues to be a great junior companion and a lot of fun to be around. We both like Pete's Dragon and Ghana chocolate pies. She is scared of spicy things but getting braver, and eats will at shiksas, which is all we ask.

When's Cat getting married***? Do we know?

Hey, if Marjie# hasn't found a boarder by the time I get back, what would you think about me taking that room? It would be a more permanent living arrangement, but still in the ward and just 'round the corner. I hadn't much thought about moving out so quickly, but that would be convenient, possibly. Just bouncing the idea off y'all. I just thought of it today.

Love ya!

Oh, and e-mail me your schedule for next week Sat/Sun so next e-mail I can work out when I should call for Mother's Day##. Hey, it's Mother's Day already!

RoseE"

*hiking: we've been spending Sunday afternoons doing hikes to get Bethe in shape for a Pioneer Trek, wherein she hikes for 3 days pulling a loaded handcart, to give her an idea what her ancestors did to get to the Salt Lake valley.

**space camp: yes, we have it here in Salt Lake. Our fifth grader spent a day pretending to be a First Officer on a Star Trek ship, the Oddessy, dealing with Romulans and the Neutral Zone.

***RoseE's sister Cat is marrying Jeff on 14 August. 2010.

# Marjie: Relief Society President; she has a room to rent.

## Missionaries get to call their families on Christmas and Mother's Day.

In Which Sister Song Gets Baptized But RoseE Is Still Worried, and P-Day Acitivities Are Discussed Heatedly

2010-04-22T06:39:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Gaaaaaah I want to go to the temple like CRAZY. I'm glad you went. It's good for you. I think it's okay to be trunkie for the temple. Maybe it isn't. I don't know.

I'm really glad I don't have a film crew following me around on my mission. I cannot imagine that they would have a good time. Most of missionary work does not end up being good movie material. Like, at all.

We were going to go to the whaling festival down in Jangsengpo today, but it's raining and we couldn't work up the motivation. This is after the elders spent half the night leaning on us (not even asking us straight-out; just leaning insistently) to go up to Hogae to play the piano for their musical number practice and play werewolf with them. These activites are all well and good, but it is what we did last week, and we have Sis. Culver who has still not seen much fun touristy stuff in Korea and needs to get out and look around. And, of course, Sis. Linford and I are running out of time to see stuff. So there was a squabble and lots of annoyance on both sides, and so even though we're not going to the festival we're still not going up to Hogae, which is sad, 'cuz there are elders from the far reaches of my zone coming with whom I have served and whom I'd like to see again. But that's the way it goes.

Last night, it being Elder Moore's birthday, we all did dinner at Outback Steakhouse. It was after Lunch Special time, which is not good, because Lunch Specials are just what missionaries do, period. But good times were had overall. There was food made with milk, which always makes me happy.

Um . . . looks like this letter is turning into the weekly report, so I'll just go with that and keep writing. So Sister Culver is an absolute champ. She hasn't cried once yet. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop--I'd cried half a dozen times by this point in-field; where's she getting all this composure from? We're swapping lots of stories and slowly getting her phased into Korean food, and doing lots of wandering around in parks, which I'd always wanted to do but never had a companion be enthused about. But yesterday we walked around a lake with this woman who turned out to be the head nurse of the postnatal care unit of ING hospital, and the day before that we met the SK director who manages Ulsan Grand Park, who showed us around a bit. Fun, huh?

Saturday, Sister Song Yeong Ok got baptized.

I'm amazed she gathered up the courage to do it . . . she's SO shy. I was in a tight-wound bundle of stress all day, mostly vicarious terror on her behalf, so I unfortunately did not have much fun at the baptismal service. But it all went fairly smoothly. Sister Kang Kyeong Jin, an old friend of Sister Song's daughter, gave a talk (this was the by-accident ask, but Sister Ii Kyeong Jin, whom I was supposed to ask, couldn't make it so that ended up okay), and so did President Jennings, who'd come up especially. Sis. Yoon and I did a musical number, but as we weren't able to practice or warm up it was not an unqualified success. That's okay, I hope. Nobody died. And Sister Yoon Mi Hyeah, Sis, Song's daughter, was just glowing with joy and tears the whole time. I'm so excited and happy for them both. But I'm worried, too . . . there are so many people in this world who've gotten baptized and then fallen away from the church, because of sin or neglect or boredom or whatever. So I've now got a head start on worrying if Sis Song's going to stay active, if she's going to keep learning the gospel and progressing and being blessed as she's been these past few months, or if I'm going to check in later and discover that nobody's heard from her family in ages. But that's how Heavenly Father feels, I guess. You never stop worrying about the people that you love. I hadn't expected this. I guess we just work and pray and wait and support one another and hold on. I guess that's what life in this church is all about.

I'm having a hard time hanging onto the morning and evening schedules with Sisters Linford and Culver in the house. I just want to talk to them all the time instead of studying. New challenge. Hold on.

And now we're back to the 'gathering' phase of missionary work, collecting up another load of people to teach in hopes that one or two of them will catch the fire of what we're trying to share with them and progess towards baptism and onwards. And we're back to tracking down less-active members that haven't been seen in ages, reminding them that they had something good in their lives once, even if they've forgotten about it. And we see what happens as the weeks go forward. It's still not pleasant and sunny and springtimey on anything like a regular basis. Just a rather gray, wet spring. They happen.

Oh, we got news yesterday that THERE'S GOING TO BE ANOTHER SISTERS CONFERENCE! Just a little one, to watch the YW General Broadcast. I'm SO excited. I had given up hope of any such thing ever happening again. But I'll get to see all the gang at least one more time, which is tremendously exciting.

Still working hard, I promise. Still practicing Korean and talking to people and doing all that stuff I'm supposed to do, as well as I can do it, which is still not well. But I'm waiting for that thing to hit . . . the thing where you suddenly don't want to go home. I'm not sure if it just hasn't hit yet, or if I'm just trunkie and aught to be ashamed of myself, or if I'm just a positive person and am facing the end of my mission with a good attitude. I suppose we'll see, in due course.

Love you. Stay out of trouble. Have fun hiking with the family and riding bikes and going to the temple and being in Hawaii (Cat) and stuff. This church is true, and I know it, and everything's so much easier and happier because I do.

RoseE"

To Dad, Early April 2010

2010-04-22T03:01:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

I'm sorry you haven't managed to see Brigham Young's grave yet. Might want to try a weekday.* If you can wait 'til July, I'll go with you. I like walking. I'm sort of discovering this now, 'cuz Sis. Yoon is not yet used to walking--at least, not in missionary quantities--and I'm suddenly noticing just how far I generally walk in a day. It's a long way.

We went up to Kyeongju again today and spend the afternoon in the Tombs--actually a very pleasant park full of odd-looking steep round hills. There's one excavated tomb sort of renovated into a museum space, so you can walk inside the hill and see how they're put together--one coffin and a box of burial goods in a decent-sized wooden chamber, covered by but tons of rocks and rubble, covered by a thick layer of dirt, covered by grass. I don't know if the other tombs were ever opened. When they opened the one, back in the seventies, they found tons of cool stuff, like a big antlered crown with jade pendants and horse gear with painted designs still intact, so you'd think they'd be curious about the others. I dunno. Knowing what I do of Korean history, I'd guess there's an inventory of all the burial goods stored in some temple somewhere, so no one sees any point in checking. I dunno. History education seems to be different around here. We saw lots of school groups (all in two straight lines, just like Madeline) being lead around by guides, who informed them through megaphones "This tomb is twenty meters tall. How tall is it?" "TWENTY METERS," chorused back the lines of children. Okay, think I, it's twenty meters tall. But who's inside it? Who built it? Why did they build it this way? What did they believe about death? What did they eat for breakfast? I'm sure all this information is somewhere--just nowhere that I, as a missionary, and a foreigner, can get at it. But at least I know now that the tomb is twenty meters tall.

So we played werewolf amongst the tombs--two rounds. I called them both. Elder Bocchino, our district leader, is a werewolf/mafia junkie, and it's hilarious to watch him play--he gets very intense. And it all brings back good ol' camp days,** rounds played around the fire on Aventure Nature campouts with the loons wailing hauntingly in the distance. This is the last P-Day of the transfer, so maybe no more werewolf for a while--but Elder Bacchino's my death d???, so betcha five bucks I'mgoing to be calling another round in the Seoul airport.

Holy cow. I've nearly made it through my first full-senior transfer. Friday's transfer calls, Sat-Sun is Conference, Monday's a working day, Tuesday we'll probably go spend the night in Pusan, Wednesday training day and thursday Transfer Day. I haven't madde it through very gracefully, and we're still baptism-free, but there haven't been too many major disasters, all told. We've hung on. I still can't cook, though.

I miss you. Let's go backpacking or something. I'm finding that my most restful activities on P-Days are either watching movies (rare) or being outside, in pants and sneakers, on pine needles or grass, a little bit dirty. It feels so different from my pavement-skyscrapers-and-stockings life--so much more like who I used to be, only more appreciative of the privilege.

Getting back to Ulsan. I love you--

RoseE"

*He did. The gate was still locked, so we could see the grave but couldn't go up to it.

**Werewolf: (also known as Mafia or Assassin) is a party game modeling a battle between an informed minority and an uninformed majority. See more here.

In Which Transfers, Conference, and Spring Happen Together

2010-04-15T03:41:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

I like e-mails about nothing. They make me happy.

I unfortunately have no nothing to report. It's been action-packed chaos fairly well every day.

Transfer calls came. I'm training again, as are Sisters Ogelvie, Musser, Beh In Yeong, Pak Sung Hee, and Jeong Min Hee . . . all MTC mates, roommates, or companions of former days. I'm staying in Suseong ward, and Sis. Yoon is covering Hogae/Bangeojin with . . . Sister Linford! Sister Linford, back on the mainland from Jejudo and back in my life after a YEAR of no contact.

Conference. Once again, no American sisters to watch conference with so I yelled at the APs (I didn't yell; I requested politely in a stressed fashion) and they let me go on splits with Elder Wells so I could watch it in English while eating too many snack foods. It was GREAT. I LOVE Conference. Was it always this short? I could have sworn it was about four times as long when I was twelve . . .

Sister Song Yeong Ok had her baptismal interview on Monday. We're all set to go.

That morning Sis. Ogelvie called in tears because the APs weren't going to let us come down to Pusan Tuesday to go with the new greenies to the bathhouse at the crack of dawn on Wednesday. She'd fought with them for ten minutes, to no avail. I called the APs and asked politely and earnestly, and we got the permission. YES!

So Tuesday we had a meal appointment miraculously move ahead an hour so we could still attend it while making it down to Pusan on time, which is good because it turned out in the course of the meal that I had asked the Wrong Person to give the talk at the baptism! Gaaaah! Well, hopefully that's not going to be a world-ending disaster. We'll see. And pray.

Tuesday night, down to Pusan. We all slept at the Gupo house with Musser/Beh and their greenies (not so green anymore), on the living room floor. And first thing in the morning we went to Hoshimchang for a lovely hot soak in twelve different kinds of water and jaw-flapping chatting with the six new sisters, all of whom are hyped and raring to go. Heck of a good bunch. Sis. O and I were so glad . . . we've been wanting to take new greenies to Hoshimchang ever since we were greenies, back a LONG time ago. We had awesome breakfast and a great training day . . . once again, lots of fun and hardly stressful at all. Watching newbies eat their first kimchi and pick up live squirming octopi at the Pusan fish market was an absolute riot. Bless 'em, good sports. More food than can possibly be described at dinner, and last of all my new companion is . . . Sister Lindsay Culver of Central California! That's right, my FIRST American Companion since Sister Montgomery, a year ago. She's awesome. She's an outdoorsy hairstylist who likes to read and who has four bison in her backyard. I think we're going to have a great transfer. And Sister Linford and I will probably be here in Pusan together until The End. I have friends again. So much of the stress is suddenly just GONE.

And today we played Werewolf for four hours with most of the elders in the Zone, including new faces/old friends Elders Murray and Oxborrow. Elder Matsuura transfered out to Daegu, but I'll see him on the way home so I'm not too fussed. And who doesn't want to go to Daegu?

I made pancakes this morning and people ate them.

My Korean is better than my companion's for the first time in my mission.

I don't really have a doorstep for somebody to leave a Korean baby girl* on, but if something of the kind happens, I'll keep you informed.

Still cold. That's no fun. Where's the gosh darn sunshine?

Okay, gonna try to send some videos. Sit tight. I love you.

RoseE"

April Fool's Day Bread

Cherry Blossom Time

*I, Blogmom, keep having dreams where somebody leaves a baby girl on RoseE's doorstep, or forces one into her arms on the street and disappears, leaving her stuck with this baby. I told her if that happens, get the baby a passport and bring her home and we'll adopt her.

In Which 7 Days Pass

2010-04-08T03:31:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum & Dad,

Read Cat's e-mail before yours, so I heard her account of the proposal* first. I approve, overall. But why am I always out of town when Cat gets proposed to? Gaah!

But I'm glad his whole family was involved--I like families, generally. And I don't know how much help I'm going to be from out here, but when I land you've got my help--particularly if I don't get My Job back, which is my major nightmare at this point.

So Dad and the dongsengs made it out to SC? Cool. (Bit and Bug used to be 'The Little Ones' . . . now they're 'the dongsengs,' because they are not little and 'dongseng' is more descriptive.) Lenore wrote and said that Nora might be out in Provo for late June/early July doing some Arabic thing. Heck, it's gonna be a party out here, ain't it? Good. I like parties. Drinks all around.

So this week . . . well, it was pretty good. Sunday was awful. The weather was gorgeous, so nobody . . . like NOBODY . . . was at church. Investigators, less-actives, actives, new members . . . nobody. We were about half our normal number. I just broke the heck down and cried in front of everybody, and hung like grim death onto Ii Kyeong Bin, the one faithful young single adult recently-reactivated member sister who showed up out of our whole teaching pool. And all the poor sweet Relief Society sisters were clustering around and squeezing my arms affectionately to assure me that it was okay, and one sister even promised to invite Sis Song Yeong Ok to dinner this week. So I guess crying does get you what you want, in certain circumstances. Who'da thunk.

And that evening there was an Easter party at Matt & Charlotte's . . . there was LAMB! How they got lamb in Korea I will never know. And lots and lots of deviled eggs, and mashed potatoes, and every good thing. So it was a quiet Easter, but ended fun and well. Very up-down, and without the big ol' surprise at the end of it, but a good Easter nonetheless.

We spent Pday up in Kyeongju playing werewolf amongst the tombs of the Silla kings (not as creepy as it sounds). Good times were had with all the zone from Shinjeong to Pohang, but we got back SO late so I have but NO time to e-mail, which is sad and sorry. But the weather's warmed up, the cherry blossoms are out, Conference** is Saturday and by the time I e-mail again it will be a new transfer and I will most likely have a new greenie trailing behind me. Gaaaah!

Oh, found a couple new less-active sisters we can hopefully teach and help--one we think is a little bit nuts, possibly . . . jury's still out. And we found and chatted with a very nice and funny old Korean war vet who was hanging out of his window, and invited us to come back and hear his stories. I don't think he's much interested in the church, but I want to go anyway . . . I love nice people, and old stories. And I ate a chicken foot and got a sore throat, and am SO excited for Conference (thank you for no spoilers). And sister Yoon Mi Hyeah and sister Song Yeong Ok are still speaking to us, though I'm thinking we'll have to postpone the baptism a bit. It's okay. It's okay. We'll make it through. It will be all right.

Love you so excessively much! Don't freak out about stuff! Book of Mormon's true!

RoseE"

*The Proposal: Younger Sister Cat got engaged on Easter. He invited her to his grandparent's house for Easter Dinner. His Whole Family was there. Grama passed out plastic eggs to the kids, then to the adults, and when Cat opened hers, it contained a diamond ring. He (Jeff) got down on one knee and popped the question, and she accepted. They are scheduled to tie the knot in mid-August.

**Conference: Annual General Conference of the LDS church is broadcast to all Stake Centers. It happens the first weekend of April, but I think it's delayed getting to Korea for translation or missionary work schedule issues or something. There is also a Semi-Annual Conference that happens the first weekend in October.

To Auntie Cat, 11 March 2010

2010-04-08T01:13:00.000-07:00

(Blogmom note: we did not get an email from RoseE today, so I am substituting this instead. Try not to worry. Just pray for her.)

RoseE writes:

"Dear Cat,

As a piece of random information, I had a dream two nights ago where we were all out visiting your family again. It was a lovely dream, very relaxed and pleasant. Your house had an automatic retractable sunshade over the back porch, and your father was showing me how to use it so I could sit in as much shade or sunshine as I pleased if I wanted to sit out there and read in the afternoon. He was speaking speaking Korean, so I couldn't understand him, but I still appreciated his kindness and courtesy. I think my subconscious has decided that Heaven must be just like a long vacation at your house. I'm sure your house is not always like heaven, inasmuch as real mortal life must go on there--but just so you know, it made a heavenly impression on me.

So that was fairly random. Sorry. My dreams are the only new fiction I get around here.

Today we got sunshine for the first time in what seems like forever--hope that summer may actually come again that there may be a day where I just feel like leaving my long, heavy green wool coat at home and enjoying an afternoon's work in just a jacket . . . or even just short sleeves. It's hard to believe there was a long, hot summer where even short sleeves seemed oppressively hot.

Not . . . it's gonna be okay. I am going to get through this winter. It will probably be gone and forgotten before the next transfer calls come. Just a few weeks. Not long. Right now, I feel like July can't come soon enough, but I know from talking to "older" sisters that when that Final Day really starts looming I'll panic and want to back-pedal, or do anything at the last minute to keep the mission from ending. (Sister Corrigan nearly turned around and came back when she reached the Seoul airport, although that might have had something to do with her plane ticket's accidentally being cancelled.) I can't extend my mission out to August, though, because Cat (younger-sister-Cat) would KILL me. And eat me. I'm both excited and afraid to see the changes that have slipped through the lines of the letters--I'm pretty sure Teancum is going to be bizarrely, disproportionately huge, seeing as I left when he was nine and now he's eleven . . . and he was always a tall kid anyway. And I'm starting to wonder about what I look like. My hair's still long, and I haven't changed the style much, and goodness only knows I'm wearing the same clothes I was when I left . . . but when Sister Yoon was looking at my book of pre-mission photographs, she exclaimed, "Chamenim, you look so different now!" She couldn't really articulate how, though. And I can't really see it. All I see is me paler from the long, sunless winter months. And my feet are warped and abused beyond all recognition, but that's not something you see in photographs, really.

Huh. Only four more months of relative normalcy in Korea before heading through the looking glass to that bizarre and fantastical placed called home, where houses don't have shoe pits or drains in the bathroom floor, and where every time I bow politely Cat's gonna hit me with a rolled-up newspaper or something. (Sister Cat again. I don't think you'd hit me with a rolled-up newspaper. Well, you might.) It all seems safely far-away now, but, y'know, so did Korea once. So did ninth transfer, and training. And look where I've up'n landed myself now.

Gosh--you got a really bizarre letter. I'm sorry. I like talking at you too much. I will try to make the next on a little saner.

Love always,

RoseE"

2010-04-01T03:06:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Which one's the 'back' bedroom? They're all kind of 'back'.

I just read about Callie*. Oh, gosh, poor Cat. This has to be a hard thing for her to go through. Callie's such a big, good, loving, wonderful dog. All I can share is my testimony--I know, of my own knowledge through the witness of the Holy Ghost, that dogs do in fact go to heaven. You can think it's a silly thing to know in such a solemn way, but I do know it. I've felt it. They wait for us there.

It's been another long, tough week out here in Ulsan. The sun refuseth to shine. Really. I used to want to live in Seattle someday, but I'm rethinking that now because the incessant cloud cover is taking more out of me than I thought was possible.

This is my one-year-in-Korea mark. This day last year . . . well, there wasn't a this day last year, really, not after about 10:00 a.m. The international dateline done ate it. I was on an airplane, eating bibimbap (and ordering some for the unconscious Elder Kerrigan) and discovering that there is no apple juice on Korean Air. I can't even think about how much has changed since then. It's too much. It simply cannot be absorbed. I really have no idea how much or how little I resemble the person that got on that airplane. I have no basis for comparison. But I worry that you might be in for a nasty shock of some kind or another -- like they switched me out some time during the mission and you're going to end up getting the wrong missionary back. It's gonna be weird. Hold onto your hats. I'm not sure if I'm going to lock myself in some small room just for the luxury of being alone, or if I'm going to follow Mom around all day, going through companion-withdrawl. Maybe I'll try to do both at the same time. I'm not going to be a very stable individual.

Mum, your Easter** sounds almost like mine. We're lucky enough to have received an invite to an Easter Party hosted by Matt and Charlotte, the Shinjeong Branch resident foreigners . . . if not for that, I don't think I'd be observing the holiday at all, except in personal study time by pondering the Atonement and Resurrection. Which are good things to do on Easter, of course. But it worries me that that need to observe all the traditions, of egg dyeing and chocolate and ham for dinner, is just not in my brain right now. It's kind of like novicane. I'm glad the phenomenon is here, so I'm not freaking out with pain, but at the same time I'm worried that it's not going to wear off properly. I mean, I'm sure it will. Novicane always does. I mean, for most of us. Emily might have had a different experience somewhere down the line, knowing her and dentists.

We've heard some talk about the destroyed ship***; the man who runs the corner store behind the apartment told us about it. General consensus among the Koreans seems to be that it was an accident of some kind. There's no angry uproar, just a kind of bitter sadness, in a why-do-bad-things-happen-to-good-people kind of way. And I don't much think the mood's going to change, whether it turns out that this actually was an accident or if it as the North trying to raise a little chaos.

I've kind of been comparing my e-mails lately with the kind I used to send, back in the beginning. My e-mails seem to be a lot less colorful. I'm surprised you're all still reading. I'm just too gosh darn used to the way everything looks and sounds and smells; I can't think what I aught to describe. Our apartment's clean again. We have a little houseplant in a tall white ceramic pot that sits on a round 'sang' (that's the short traditional folding-leg tables) by the porch window. Our floors are all linoleum with a 'hardwood floor' pattern printed on them. Where the two lineoleum panels meet, earlier missionaries have sealed the ratty edges together with packing tape. I'm currently sleeping under two smallish fleece blankets, one gray-green flannel, one purple with sequins on it, and my yo cover is scarlet with hanja embroidered into it. (It's a weird, weird feeling when you look down at your yo and realize that you can read the hanja . . . that your bed is talking to you.) The whole thing folds up neatly in the space between my desk and the far wall. As my number of books and such increases, shelving space is becoming more precious on my desk, so my family picture is now sitting ON my handkerchief press.

I think the biggest reason I'm so down this week is Sister Son Yoo Jin, the miraculous and wonderful investigator. She loves us missionaries. She has accepted every commitment, lived every principle, done everything we've taught her. She's been attending Sacrament meeting as regularly as her work schedule will allow. And she told me this week, laughing, that the talks she heard on Sunday moved her to tears with the witness of the Spirit. And in spite of all this, she doesn't want to get baptized. She doesn't want to meet with us during the week anymore--she's gotten too busy. And here I stand, a bewildered and dazed sister missionary who's been praying and working like she's never prayed and worked in her life, all so this good woman will make covenants with the Lord, enjoy the blessings of the temple and life in the gospel, and be happy now and forever, wondering in heartwrenching pain what it was that I did wrong.

PMG# admonishes me to 'not become discouraged' when people decide not to accept the gospel in their lives even when they've received a witness that it's true. I would like to know how the heck the writers of that book managed to not be discouraged after experiences like that. Whatever they did to stay peppy, they neglected to write it down in that worthy volume. I went to Baskin-Robbins, which was tasty but not particularly helpful. And I got a call from Sis. Ogelvie, funnily enough also in tears just then. She'd been visiting a less-active sister, and during the whole visit she'd been receiving (and fighting) a prompting that this woman needed to know that she was being prideful. Not even Sister Ogelvie would outright say that to a member. But then this sister announced that she PARTICULARLY didn't want to come to General Conference because the speakers always said that less-active members were prideful. And, turning to Sister Ogelvie, she asked, "Do you think I'm prideful?" And poor Sister Ogelvie, pushed now from both sides, opened her mouth and let it slip out that yes, actually, she did. And her reward for humbly and fearfully trying to follow a difficult prompting of the Spirit to help this woman whom she dearly, dearly loves: she and Sis. Pak got thrown out on their ears and told never to come back.

Man. Those sister missionaries who float through blissful missions with dozens of tearfully grateful converts trailing in their wake had better transfer out here to help us figure out what the heck we're doing wrong.

Sis. Song Yeong Ok's baptismal date still stands, but the way things have been rolling lately I'm suddenly scared to death. You know that saying 'the common factor in all your failed relationships is you'? Well, the common factor in all my mission disasters does seem, thus far, to be me. I'm really, really scared. And in interviews on Friday I cracked and told Prez that I was within a hairsbreath of cracking under the strain. That poor, good man. There's not a thing he can do to help me right now. He offered to let me train an American sister next round and have another sister come out to serve with Sister Yoon, bringing us back up to two teams out here, to which I responded with shaky, desperate gratitude. Any relief would be welcome. Sis. Jennings seems to think I'm going all to pieces (can't imagine why) and sent me a copy of the relaxation exercises the mental health team handed out last time they were out here.

Disclaimer: Sis. Yoon and I have been getting along just fine this week. No problems there. Life's good, thank goodness.

I baked bread this morning. It worked fairly well--not pretty, but tasty. I ate hot fresh bread for breakfast. That was a relief, too.

Hyeon Soo, the little 13-year-old investigator who lives just behind us, is still really cool and is warming up to us. We're still not sure about her mom--if she's an English spaz or if she's going to kick us out or what. But Hyeon Soo's cool, and keeps commitments that we give her and really enjoys our lessons. We tried to share 'Finding Faith in Christ' with her yesterday but couldn't get her family's DVD player to work. Oh, well.

Oh, the Joseph Smith movie (the one they play nowadays in the Legacy Theater) just got its Korean subtitling done, thanks to the mission office team, so we're planning to show it at a ward activity, as soon as we plan the ward activity. I'm voting for a pioneer-themed thing, like used to happen all the time when I was a kid. I remember stick pulling, making butter, and dancing the Virginia reel, and I'm sure there was more stuff to do but I'm drawing a blank. If anyone remembers anything from those old activites back in the day, let me know, will ya?

I still don't know anything more about when my flight will be getting in. I'll ask the Bagleys on Traning Day, probably. The Bagleys know everything. They'll probably think I'm trunkie, asking about this in April when the flight doesn't go until July, but if a bagpiping event is involved then the pre-planning is justified.

I found a copy of HP6## in Korean in a church cupboard, and I didn't even touch it. How's that for some self-discipline right there?

I love you. I miss you so much. One of the things I can't express well anymore is how much a mission teaches you about your parents and how important they are. I'm so grateful to both of you for being the wonderful, faithful Latter-Day Saints you are, each in your own distictive way, and for being so unfailingly supportive every week, unfailingly, through this whole insane adventure. Every time I see anything that reminds me of either of you, it makes me happy. I love you so, so much, and I miss you more than I can possibly begin to explain.

Stay out of trouble. Don't get cancer. You know what I told you about cancer.

RoseE"

*Callie: a Bernese Mountain Dog belonging to my dear friend Catherine, who had to be put down due to severe physical and health issues. We're talking quadrapalegic here. Bernese Mountain Dogs are in the 100 pound range. We will all miss her.

**Easter: Dad, Teancum and Bethe will be spending the holiday in South Carolina, leaving me, Blogmom, to hold down the fort. I will be having Easter dinner with Cat and Jeff and his family.

***destroyed ship: a South Korean naval ship was blown up last week. No one is sure if if hit a mine, or was torpedoed by the North Koreans.

#PMG: Preach My Gospel, the missionary handbook

##HP6: Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, the 6th book in the series

From President Jennings, 24 March 2010

2010-04-01T02:55:00.000-07:00

President Jennings writes:

"Dear Brother and Sister Hadden,

Sister Hadden has reached the last several months of missionary service in the Korea Busan Mission. Of course we want these months to be the happiest, and most productive months of her missionary experience. She is skilled as a teacher and has learned the Korean language. We urge you to make your letters in these last months encouraging and motivating, avoiding frequent references to "when you get home".

At the same time we are aware that there are plans to be made for school, employment, and family events. For this reason I am writing to inform you of her anticipated mission field release date. Tentatively, that date is 06 July 2010. Church Travel will mail an itinerary giving specific arrival time and flight one to two months before her release date.

As you know the policy of the Church is to discourage parents from traveling to a son or daughter's mission area to pick them up. However, the decision is yours.* If you plan to travel to Korea to accompany your missionary please notify us as soon as possible. Generally, you should contact Margaret Sales at Church Travel before you make any travel arrangements. She will help you coordinate your travel plans with your missionary. . . .

If you notify us of your intention to come here we will send you guidelines for the visit and a listing of available hotels and travel options with an estimation of prices.

We are very grateful for the service that your daughter has given to the Lord and the people of Korea. Thank you for making the sacrifices necessary to support this service. As we send Sister Hadden home to you we will have the feeling of loss you felt when she left!

. . .May the Lord bless you as a family,

Kenneth W. Jennings, Jr.
Korea Busan Mission President"

*Blogmom note: We have decided not to go to Korea for various reasons.

In Which RoseE Takes A Trainer/Chamei Dep's Eye View of the Rest of Her Mission

2010-03-27T09:18:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes**:

"Dear Dad,

I accidentally cut my finger open on a can of gochu tuna this morning. This is why tuna should not be eaten for breakfast.

News from the house seems to have quieted down these last few weeks. Understandable, I guess, since the Olympics are over and there aren't any holidays or birthdays in this stretch, so life's probably just kind of same-old, same-old for a while. There's Easter/Conference, but other than that nothing big until May. Kind of the same here. It's looking like I'm probably not going to serve with any of my close mission friends from here on out, and they already threw training at me so there's nothing more to dread. My Korean is serviceable, my Book of Mormon is read from cover to cover. As trainer/chamei dep, I'm the highest ranked sister in the mission. What else is there to be done? Just one more thing: I'd like to see one more investigator get baptized before I got. When Brother Cho got baptized, I scarcely knew what was going on. When Hyee Ji got baptized, I was full of dread, knowing that she was probably cruising straight for inactivity--she'd had all the lessons and kept all the commitments, but the feeling was still there that she wasn't ready. I'd like to go home with the photos from one baptism I could rejoice in and be proud of.

But I'm senior now, which means that making this marvelous thing happen is suddenly my job and not that of my Korean companion. And I haven't a clue. Not a clue. Over a year at this and I still have no idea how to be a missionary.

* * *

Ran out of P-Day just there. It's been a week, and I still don't have a clue, but now Sister Sung Yeong Ok has a baptismal date. In tears and joy. she decided to be baptized. Last week I was sure I'd never see it and then yesterday I did. Just --- babang! like that. I'm dazed, and bewildered, and overjoyed. You work for a year and nothing, nothing, nothing happens, and then suddenly from out of nowhere spring miracles that you had nothing whatsoever to do with.

Sister Yoon Jin Ah doesn't get it at all. She can't. She's coming from the MTC, with the grilled-in mindset that miracle baptisms are par for the course--an attitude that's reinforced by seeing a miracle in her second week. And I haven't the heart to correct her and explain how phenomenally rare this is. Maybe if no one tells her, she'll have a successful and bountiful mission--like how honeybees fly simply because no one's yet explained to them that they can't. Let's let her expectations stay high and see what happens.

I washed another tuna can this morning but didn't cut my finger. And we're hitting the whale museum, finally. And I discovered a secret room in our apartment. And I tried it the other day and discovered I can do push-ups now, thanks to the regular morning weight training I've been trying to make a habit of. And the tree behind our apartment is putting forth bright pink cherry blossom buds.

Being a missionary is the most drastically up/down roller coaster experience I can imagine. From paralyzed with misery to transported with joy in seconds flat. Is there a pattern of RMs* developing schitzophrenia? I wouldn't be surprised.

Love ya,

RoseE"

*RMs: Returned Missionaries

** letter received 3/26/2010

In Which RoseE Gets The Silent Treatment

2010-03-25T09:31:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

. . . At least all of your surrounding surgeries are relatively necessary. I'm just beginning to discover how many people I know . . . including Sister Pak Sung Hee . . . have had plastic surgery on their eyelids. On their eyelids! People get this surgery as casually as they get haircuts, chopping their eyelids up so they'll fold above the eyeball and not under the lashline when their eyes are open. Apparently having a crease in your eyelid is the most attractive feature you can have . . . because that's how foreigners' eyes look. Korea has a very complicated love/hate relationship going on with the rest of the world.

So, this week. Ups and downs again, even higher and lower than last week. The lowest down was that Sister Yoon decided to give me the silent treatment for a day and a half, from Thursday at the whale museum (which was fairly fun otherwise) to Friday morning, when she finally conceded to my begging and let me pry out of her what was wrong. She's having a stressful first transfer, as does everybody, but she doesn't really know how to cope with it or deal with a companion. These were things that I learned in the pressure-cooker of the MTC, but she didn't have that experience. This is her pressure-cooker and I'm her learn-through-trial-and-error companion. Friday was the worst day of my mission so far. Left everything else in the dust.

But Monday I got to go on splits with Sister Ogelvie!! And it wasn't even 'cuz I abused my Chamei dep priviledges . . . Sis Pak Sung Hee wanted to split with Sis. Yoon, and I just let her go for it. So I got to serve with one of my best mission friends (certainly the only mission friend still alive) for the first time, for a whole day. It was way exciting. We got to kind of process with each other how we feel about suddenly being 'old' missionaries, about everything we've learned and all the ways we've changed and the challenges we still have left to face. It was deeply theraputic. And English became a toy instead of a burden . . . the two of us trying to remember at 6:45 a.m. the respective meanings of 'exhibition,' 'expidition,' and 'exposition.' This is not as easy as you would maybe think.

And we taught sister Song Yeong Ok again, who is progressing just fine. We shared the Word of Wisdom and invited her to cut down on her one-coffee-a-day habit . . . both her daughter and her live-in less-active son are supporting her in starting to live this commandment. The son, I think, is doing it mostly to be annoying, but it's good that he remembers the Word of Wisdom. This could be cool.

This week we went tearing up to Hogae ward AGAIN to catch our investigators . . .and they didn't show. And one is not answering our calls. And all the while Elder Bocchino and Bangeojin branch are wailing for us to come down to see them. Gaaah! When does the other team get here? Three weeks. Can we hold down the fort here in Ulsan for another three weeks?

It's also been mostly sunshine-free this week. I'm astonished at the effect the weather can have on my mood. Sunshine, and I'm as chipper as a sister missionary is expected to be. Clouds, and I want to curl up in a ball and wait for it to all be over.

And I've somehow managed to not excercise one single morning this week. Not sure how that happened. I think that might be part of the problem, too.

Don't worry about Teancum's gray hairs. His hair's almost gray-colored anyway.* And I get them all the time now--I think they're cool. It's just one of those weird genetic things, I think, when you go gray. Ask Cat, but that's what I remember from Ekberg's** biology. (Yeah, yeah, I'm not Em***, I don't remember much from that class.)

Um . . . I think that's it, news-of-the-week-wise. Another week done. Heading through Lent, and Easter's in sight. Maybe there will be sunshine. Maybe there won't be. But we hang on nevertheless.

And if I made a list of food things, would Dad go down to the Korean market some Saturday and see if he can find them, so I know what I should smuggle home through customs? Sis. Ogelvie is also interested in getting some info about the availability of imported Korean food products in the Salt Lake/Utah Valley area.

I love you! Stay out of trouble! Church is true, life's pretty good, peanut butter is a blessing and you can make really delicious and easy rice crispie treats out of it with the puffed rice you buy on the street.

RoseE"

*It has changed in the last year to dark brown, or perhaps RoseE's memory is faulty, because those gray hairs show up very well!

** notoriously difficult high school biology teacher

*** Emily. RoseE's best friend. (You know who you are.)

In Which the Power of Prayer is Made Manifest

2010-03-18T05:06:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Well, holy heck guess what.

The ups are getting upper and the lows are getting lower and I know that didn't make any sense gramatically but I don't really care. Yesterday was one of the nuttiest days of my whole life.

So Monday we had combined zone conference, which means trip to Taegu! and meetings all day with the Zone Leaders and the Bagleys and Prez and Sis. Mom and all. Plus Sis. Tollett showed up -- the ZLs had recruited her to pick up Costco pizzas for our lunch--Costco pizza being the easiest, cheapest, and best-loved meal of mission meetings 'round here. Bless Sis. Tollett. That woman's a superstar.

And when the meetings were over I took the wrong companion home, going on splits with Sis. Ahn Da Yeon for Tuesday. That was lovely. Sis. Ahn is a very low-key and restful person, and she's probably lonely and bored as heck. She and her trainer are not 100% best friends, which isn't a big problem for one or two transfers, but this is #4 for them. Sis. Ahn's never served in any other area or with any other companion. She had me and Sis. Pak Sung Hee as roommates for two and that was it. I don't think she's even met most of the other sisters still. So she was glad to get out and stretch her legs a bit, and eat meat (her comp can't, so they never do; we ordered in delivery chicken, which is still the best food in the entire world) and she and I in general had a very nice time.

When we un-split yesterday morning, all the stress came back. Back with Sis. Yoon, who is much more strong-willed than I, which would not be a problem if she were senior and I junior, but unfortunately that's not how it works. Back with all our apointments getting canceled with no warning whatsoever, leaving me with a list of things to do but no way to get them done. I don't think I've been so paralyzed with stress since freshman year of college.*

But thankfully our first appointment of the day pulled through. We're teaching a woman named Song Yeong Ok, whose daughter, Yoon Mi Hyeah, was baptized when she was a teenager but went inactive for ten years. But she just up'n re-activated herself--worked up the courage to come back to church, and of course lovely Shinjeong branch were all so excited to see her, with none of the "And where have YOU been for the last ten years, young lady?" that she was expecting. And so she asked us to share the lessons with her mother.

Her mom has been a wonderful investigator and a joy to teach, and has been trying to come to church for about three weeks now, but at the last minute (really the last: dressed, ready to walk out the door) she changed her mind and didn't come. So this last Sunday we were just praying our blinkin' brains out. And our ward mission leader (bless him!) had arranged with a member family who live in the area to pick her up and give her a ride to church, which worked out like clockwork. She came to church and had a wonderful experience.

So yesterday we met her and taught lesson 3, and asked her The Question . . . if she would prepare to be baptized.

She started to cry.

Apparently when Yoon Mi Hyeah joined the church, Sis. Song was strongly opposed and did everything she could to keep her daughter from attending church after her baptism. And she's been feeling desperately guilty about that ever since . . . more than ten years. She was afraid that God wouldn't forgive her for her opposition. And that fear was what kept stopping her at the doorway. But on Sunday, when she came, she told us that she felt suddenly light, and joyful, and that she knew it was because of our prayers. She told us about how desperately she wanted God's forgiveness. And her daughter, her wonderful daughter, shared such a beautiful testimony, insisting that she herself hardly remembered this conflict that was still eating at her mom and that she'd felt the same way when she'd started coming back to church, but was so glad that she'd come and that she could see her mother come, too.

And Sis. Song said she wanted to be baptized. And we all got out our calendar books and set a goal for the 17th of next month.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is what I came on my mission to be able to see. I still almost can't believe I really saw it.

Also, in the middle of this lesson, a young woman poked her head into the chapel. I excused myself to go talk with her . . . turns out she just got back from 4 months in England, where she found the church and was baptized. The Elders had gotten news of her through the inter-mission grapevine, but hadn't been able to get ahold of her. But she just wandered into the church, on a Wednesday afternoon, when against all odds we just happened to be there teaching a lesson so we could tell her what time church was and get her phone number. Her name is Ii Mi Ji.

And in explorations that afternoon, we discovered a new building right behind our apartment complex: a newly-opened public library. With public computers. No more walking all the way down to Digital Plaza, to e-mail while being glared at by the employees . . . we couldn't have gotten a more convenient e-mailing place if we'd planned it ourselves. We and the Shinjeong elders are there now, e-mailing and rejoicing and giving thanks unto God.

We also followed up on a woman we met on the street, who'd told us enthusiastically, "Come and teach my daughter about your church!" So we did . . . and when we met her very nice, very sweet thirteen-year-old daughter, we learned that her mom had told her we were coming to help her with her English homework. And, once again, I am prostituted for my language. Sigh. You'd think people would be getting tired of doing this by now.

There have been other miracles, and other frustrations, and other insanity, but we're on our way to the Whale museum to see some whales. I'm exited. I'll take lots of pictures and videos and stuff for Bethe.

So yeah. Bounced back! Thanks so much to everybody for all their prayers and support and everything . . . I never needed it more than I did last week. And with the way things have been going, who the heck knows what's just around the corner?

Love you so much

RoseE"

*Freshman year in college: the month before, RoseE had a horse fall on her, fracturing her hip socket. She had surgery to repair it, but was on crutches her first weeks at college. Not only did she not have a car, she could not ride the bike she did have and her apartment was on the third floor of a building with no elevator. Daily life was excruciatingly difficult.

In Which Some Progress Is Made, but The Mountain Is Still Very High

2010-03-11T10:02:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

Yeah, Sis. Mong was my trainer. And she was a good trainer. We never got really close 'cuz she was Best Friends with Sis. Hill and, well, that was that, but getting someone addicted to your stories gets you over a lot of rough spots. She was a good missionary. We miss her 'round here.

I am not, at all, Sister Montgomery. This first week of training was really hard. I spent pretty much all of the first three days frantically reading member records, map books, and teaching records, trying to figure out what the heck we're doing. Then I tried to do it, but I ended up getting us lost . . . multiple times a day . . . on the outer fringes of Ulsan . . . without any clue whatsoever, and also without church keys or pen . . . while we were supposed to be three other places all at the same time. And it's been gray and raining and/or snowing pretty well straight through. I'm still not feeling optimistic about much, although the desire to hide under my desk has receded a little bit and I can function again.

On the plus side, we got to go to ZLCM and see the Ogelvie/Pak Sung Hee team and eat tacos with lots of cheese and sour cream on them for lunch, and that was lovely. And next Monday is Zone Conference, so we get to go to Taegu and see all the old gang.

And my camera tried to make another break for it on the bus last night, which made me think that I should probably work on making another picture backup CD . . . but I can't remember where the last one left off. Can you tell me what the last picture was on that?

Um . . . gosh. This must really have been a lousy week. I can't think of anything I really want to tell you. We had a bunch of investigators coming to church in Shinjeong on Sunday, but none of them came, and the two investigators that we didn't think were coming, up in Hogae (hour's bus ride away) both came, so we skipped out on second hour to go chasing across the city to catch them, then came chasing back in the other direction to catch Missionary Correlation Meeting back in Shinjeong. And all the while, out in Bangeojin, Elder Bocchino is whimpering, "When are you coming out here?" We're never coming out there, Elder. We have no investigators there. So tough. Leave us alone.

I haven't said that to him, actually. I'm trying to retain some veneer of civility. Failing, but trying.

Started anew on my hanbok repairs; discovered that in my distraction I'd pinned it together backwards and had to start over a third time.

We had some lessons with some investigators this week, which was good . . . Katrina and Sis. Ii Yoon Hwa, who attended church in Idaho. Not a huge amount of progress with either of them, but we're still working.

The only sort of comforting thing, if you can call it that, is the assurance that the Jeju sisters are having a harder time than I am. Sis. Linford and I vented to and comiserated with one another a couple of nights ago. Oh, man, it's going to be hard to make it through to July.

And I didn't cry this week. That's good. Just struggled and panicked and spun my wheels. Not, perhaps, the hardest week of my mission, but hard in a whole new way. Before this, all I had to do when things got hard was shut up, suck it up, and wait it out; now I've got to actively plan and impliment every single activity of every single day, plowing through the hard times as opposed to just hunkering down and waiting for them to be over.

Oh, heck, I hope this is over soon. Sister Yoon is a very nice girl and speaks English perfectly competently, so one year's worth of slaving over language study is now worth exactly nothing whatsoever.

But hey, Conference is coming up. I can make it through to Conference. I like Conference.

Please, don't blow a gasket or anything. It was just a hard week, that's all. I'm not planning on coming home early or jumping in the river or doing anything drastic like that. I'm still sane. Just . . . stretched. And I'm working without an emotional safety net now. It's hard, but what the freak is new? Life's hard. And I am assured by everyone I know that it doesn't get any easier.

I'm gonna be okay. I'm gonna be okay. I'm gonna make it through this.

Pray for me, please.

I miss you.

RoseE"

A Letter from the Mission President

2010-03-09T10:21:00.000-08:00

2 March 2010

President Jennings writes:

"Dear Brother and Sister Hadden

It is my pleasure to inform you of Sister Hadden's outstanding service here in the Korea Busan Mission. It brings me great joy to work with such fine young missionaries as Sister Hadden. Through her work, she has contributed greatly to the success of this mission.

Sister Hadden has faithfully served in her previous assignment, and has now been called to serve as a New Trainer. In this calling, Sister Hadden still retains the opportunity and privilege to proselyte daily.

The challenge of being a New Trainer is great and demanding. In order for us to continually improve the success of this mission, we need the cooperation of all the missionaries, especially the leaders, to obtain that unified effort. I am sure your daughter will provide that leadership.

Sister Jennings and I want to express our gratitude to you for sharing your daughter with us and with the Lord*. Her faithful, obedient service reflects great credit upon you as parents. We are grateful to have the opportunity to work with her in this great work of our Heavenly Father.

Sincerely,

Kenneth W. Jennings, Jr.
Korea Busan Mission President"

*Blogmom: Since the Lord shared her with us to begin with, it only seems fair.
Besides, it was her decision.

In Which More Responsibilities Are Heaped On, and the Bank Cards Barely Work

2010-03-04T01:50:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

One bad thing about the new Thursday P-Day is that when the big news hits (last Friday of the transfer) it's all hit, processed, implemented and done before I can get any news to you at all.

So here's what happened. The universe kicked me in the head, basically. Prez called Friday night to tell me I was training the new incoming greenie sister. I don't think I've ever been so afraid and unhappy in the whole course of my life. I mean, there are five . . . FIVE! . . . Americans coming next transfer, and I couldn't train one of them? When we've only got four American sisters who could train, including me? Freak. First I was mad, then I was shocked, and then I started crying great horrible hacking sobs while curled up in a ball on the floor and didn't let up for an hour and a half. Not a good night, really. Freak.

So in the midst of my drama-queen moment, Sis. Pak Min Jeong was still trying to pack up the last year and a half of her life . . . now a day faster than planned 'cuz we'd have to go to Pusan on Wednesday for Training Day instead of Thursday, Transfer Day. She's dying alone . . . there are no other sisters going home this transfer, so it's just gonna be her and a bunch of elders on the train to Seoul, and then she gets pitched straight into a visa interview so she can go do a summer semester at UVU in April. Not fun times. Very stress-filled for both of us. To our credit, we are neither of us dead and we're still friends. But it's been close.

Oh, and plus March has rolled around and we're now switched to the new purchasing cards. I tried six ATMs before I found one . . . waaaaaay out in Bangeojin . . . that would give me any money. We're sticking to a cash-only plan as much as possible from here on out.

So Sis. Pak Min Jeong and I got on a bus Wednesday morning to meet the new Sister Pak . . . Sister Yoon Jin Ah, of Seoul. She's done two years at BYU, so her English is more passable than my Korean . . . but aaaaah crap I still don't know what's going on or where anything is and don't get me started on the Language and how am I supposed to be some kind of gosh darn example to a new missionary? I had to take deep breaths, in through my nose and out through my mouth, the whole dang bus ride. And then on the subway. And then into the office. Sister Yoon's fine . . . no problems there, nice girl. But AAAAAAAAHHHHHH!! And I had to relive training day, the worst day of my mission!

It wasn't that bad this time. Prez made the meeting run long, as always, so we didn't have too much time to go cold-prostelyting in Pusan, and we got to go up to Pusan tower, where I'd never been, and see great cityscapes and all. And nothin' beats dinner at the mission home. Poor Sis. Yoon, of course, is dead on her feet from jet lag. And the apartment wasn't very clean when she got here . . . Sis Pak was packing and I was freaking out, so nobody cleaned anything. Poor thing. That's so hard, seeing your dingy missionary apartment for the first time and realizing just how far your standard of living has dropped. I saw Ulsan house as a palace when I got here, but seeing it through her eyes, I was ashamed.

She's a nice girl, really. Today we spent most of our morning cleaning, re-arranging, and unpacking so the house is now a lot more liveable for both of us. And then we went out to see if we could make HER new card work. Four ATMs and two calls to Elder Matsuura later, we figured it out. You have to go to the GS25 corner store and do a credit card-based cash advance in English and only take out 100,000 won . . . while hopping on one foot and reciting the Declaration of Independence backwards.

So here we sprawl. We're now under the leadership of me, who has no idea what she's doing, in a city covered in rain and slush. I am comforted only in the knowledge that no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing . . . I've only got four months and change* left, how much can I possibly screw up? Don't answer that. And Monday is ZLCM so we get to go to Pusan again and have tacos for lunch and I'll see Sister Ogelvie and cry at her some more, probably. We cry at each other a lot. It passes the time.

If I do 5 pages a day in Le Livre de Mormon** I can finish it before I get home.
New plan of attack underway for the hanbok. Pretty much starting over, but I think it will end up working at long last.

I wanted to food shop today, 'cuz we've got nothing but tortillas and peanut butter at the house (and we're dang lucky to have those, really), and because our house really needs a new toilet seat. The previous sisters' decision to buy the cheapest toilet seat availabe has come back to bite us all in the butt, every day.

Yeah, I'm in a sarcastic place this week. I'm not ready to be a trainer or even full senior. I'm scared to death. I want to hide under my bed, but there's no 'under' my bed to hide in. And Prez is threatening to make me do this training thing once more before all is said and done.

I never wanted to be a highly-ranked greatly-honored sister missionary. I wanted to stay out of trouble and go home. And now I'm simultaniously trainer and Chamei dep . . . every available Honor of Men that I wasn't supposed to aspire to and genuinely didn't much want, I got. I hope you're all very proud of me.

I, on the other hand, am very proud of Bug*** . . . I couldn't hear a note he played, but he looked great! Rrrrgh missionary communication is hard.

Getting kicked out. Gotta run. I love you

RoseE"

* The Book of Mormon in French.

**128 days, but who (else) is counting?

***Young brother. He played bagpipes in a recital last weekend.

In Which a Homecoming Date is Announced and a Message to the Bishop is Generated

2010-02-26T23:11:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"My plane flies Saturday the tenth* at** three in the afternoon. Tell bishop if he wants me to speak on the 11th I cannot promise anything, even that I will stay awake through the whole talk and not pass out on the stand.

RoseE"

*of July. 2010.

**I don't know if this is leaving at 3:00 or arriving at 3:00. Stay tuned for further information.

In Which RoseE is Struck by the Subtleties of English Pronounciation and Is Again Vertically Challenged

2010-02-26T23:03:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

I forgot to ask things on a couple of Scottish topics. First: is there any information forthcoming on the proposed Scotland foray? I know only "Scotland" and "August" and "Robin McKinley". That's the sum total of the information at my fingers. And Emily and I want to have tentative plans for me to go out east a week or so ahead and spend some time with her, which works out fine as near as I can tell, from what I know, which is, as mentioned above, "Scotland," "August," and "Robin McKinley."

Second: will Teancum greet me with bagpipes at the airport too?
I forgot to make a 'this is what happened this week' list, so here's what I remember . . .

We had interviews this week, in the which we were informed, by an annoyed-but-resigned President Jennings, that all the missions in the world are being switched from managing their finances locally to managing them through JP Morgan "Purchasing" cards, which:

Cannot be easily replaced if lost or stolen

Cannot be used at Korean ATMSCan only be used at SOME international ATMs

Take a 3000-won transaction fee

Don't let you check your balance from an ATM OR by calling the bank

Take 3-5 business days to process any transaction

Issue a once-weekly balance statement by e-mail, sent at 5:30 p.m. on Thursdays, the end of P-Day, so we can't see it until next week

Can only be used at the largest, most expensive stores

Hold their balance in dollars, so we're at the mercy of the exchange rate both when the office puts money on our cards and again when we take it off

Are kind of ugly

But other than that, they're very convenient.

We also learned that Seoul mission is eating Seoul west mission, giving a little chunk of it to Taejeon mission. Pusan remains untouched. Yaaay!

This week, I went on my very first "real" split (I can't much count the last one, as I spent most of it in bed). Sister Crowther, new greenie from Colorado, came up to Ulsan from her area in Pusan while Sister Pak explored her old area down there with Sister Musser. As I haven't spent a whole day with an English-speaker in some, what? two or three months, at least?, I fairly well talked her ear off the whole time, forgetting entirely the rules that say you have to speak to greenies in Korean until one in the afternoon. Sorry.

But we had a great time. We made pancakes and cookies and didn't even get lost on the buses really and did some actual work and learned how to play one-card and were called upon to do an emergency musical number at a hastily-planned baptism in Shinjeong ward (as the baptizee was a member's 8-year-old daughter, you'd think they would have seen it coming . . .). Sister Musser had particularly instructed Sister Crowther to make me tell her a story, so I got to tell a story, too. It was the first day of my mission where I was really actually in charge all by myself, and nobody died, so I count the day as a success. Sister Crowther's a lot of fun and I'm glad we have her, because we're going to need her positive attitude and even-keeledness in July when we all disappear. (Sister Musser's extending to July and coming home with S. Linford and me. Sis. Ogelvie still planning on August as far as I know, and when she goes Sisters Crowther and Chon, starting their fifth transfers, will be the oldest American sisters. Party on.)

Sunday was District Conference. As President Jennings is somehow in charge of districts or something, he and Sis. J. came and spoke. There was also a district choir for the occasion, in which Sis. Pak and I participated, despite my being made to sing soprano against my will. (There were like twelve sopranos and five altos! What the heck? I begged, but to no avail.) Anyway, the sister sitting next to me (a young single adult and particular friend of Sister Pak's; I can never remember her name but her nickname is 'the supermodel,' 'cuz she's got the proper proportions and complexion to be such) tried to tell me that I looked really pretty. She took a minute to search for the right word to tell me what I looked like . . . she knew it in English and seemed pretty proud of herself for that. When she remembered the word, she told me glowingly, "Sister, you look like . . . penis!"

I think I blinked a couple times, and I know I felt every drop of blood in my body go rushing to my heart and lungs and then come shooting back up into my face as I demanded, "Wait . . . WHAT?"

"You know . . . the goddess," said this sister helpfully, grabbing for her cell phone to look the proper spelling up on her Korean-to-English dictionary.
The sisters all around us were now in on the action, too. "Yes, it's a goddess's name. Roman? Or is it Greek? I don't know. That prononciation's really hard, huh? Yes, that V sound. But it's very important in English, huh? Yes, I can never do it. We just write it as ㅂ, but it's a different sound. What did she say, Chamenim? You're absolutely flaming red all over, so she must have said something good."

I explained, as well as I could in a chapel, not having studied the 'male anatomy' section of my vocabulary book (I'm kidding . . . there isn't one, really) and then you had half the soprano section and the accompanist absolutely gasping with laughter until the start of the meeting made them get ahold of themselves.
When I got my proper face color back, I thanked the sister (who was pretty red with laughter herself) for her kind compliment.

This morning I finished my hanbok alterations. The dress itself looks gorgeous. I tried it on with the chigori and the chigori is also too darn short. I don't think there's gonna be a quick fix for this one. Mmmmph. Frustrating. I dratted hate being six feet tall in Korea.

This is Sister Pak Min Jeong's last P-Day. In honor of the occasion, she went to a beauty salon and got semi-permanent false eyelashes glued to her eyelids. Interesting process. Stuck on one at a time with black glue. Handled with tweezers. I considered trying, too, but then thought better of it. I'll stick with my own eyelashes, thank you kindly.

In actual missionary-related news, a member sister asked us to come teach her mother. The member sister's not much older than we are, so her mom's not much older than my mom and though she speaks saturi (dialect) I can still understand a lot of what she says. She's really interested, and is planning to come to church on Sunday. We gave her a giant Book of Mormon, since she said the regular size was too small for her to read. And we also had an investigator and her friend come to district conference . . . as dist/stake conferences are about the most boring meetings in the church, if they survived that, they'll survive anything. And we have an appointment tonight with a woman whose husband just got baptized in Australia. AND we found a woman who had taken the missionary lessons in Idaho, but because there were no Korean-speaking elders she'd gone through them in English and not understood much. She whipped out her calendar right away and was like, "So when can we meet? When can you teach me?"

So missionary work is lovely. I like it when stuff happens.

And that, I think, is the news from Ulsan. It's raining. Life's pleasant. Our houseplant is still alive. Oh, and we have tortillas and peanut butter and are very happy indeed.

I love you so much, and miss you like crazy!

RoseE"

Letter to Dad, approx 2/17/2010

2010-02-25T12:23:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

So this week while Sister Pak was making photo backups, I snuck onto LDS.org and loaded the Gospel of John as mp3 onto Isobel--Isobel being the appointed name by which the purple iPod shall be known on the records of the church forever after. Worked like a charm, and I had something pleasant, engaging, and spiritually un-distracting to listen to while exercising or working on my hanbok. But I finished it today, so I'm gonna try to get more chunks of the New Testament whenever I have occasion to be on a computer. You can tell you've turned into a flippin' Sister missionary when your iPod is loaded with scripture mp3s and conference talks and you think that's really cool . . . so cool you're astonished you can get away with it. Yeeeeaaah, Cat's gonna be annoyed with me when I get back.

So Ulsan. It's a factory town. Hyundai is king. I actually see big trucks-- semis--on the street sometimes, which would have been quite the event in Pusan or Taegu. One of our chapels is right smack next to the Hyundai shipyards, so if I time it just right I can catch a glimpse of the big old freighters through the bus window. And another of our buses runs by the manufacturing plant (or one of them), with this huge parking lot full of row after row after row of identical brand-new cars. And woe betide you if you're trying to get through Hogae district at quittin' time.

Hyundai seems to pay well, though. Most of the homes I've been in so far are well-appointed, large, clean apartments, not the chaotic, unheated little post-war "jutek" houses I saw so much in Pusan, or the tiny and badly-maintained two-room apartments, like (just for example) the previous residence of yours truly, where the hot water got shut off for two weeks. And Hyundai brings in a lot of foreigners--we've got two newly-arrived member families, one from the States and one from Vancouver, for whom we're all learning to do simultaneous translation.

And I found a museum! It is a whale museum. I figure Bethe will want pictures, so I'm planning to go, but not this transfer 'cuz Sis Pak Min Jeong's already been. We were right by it today, as I had to re-do my Resident Alien registration at the Immigration Office down by the port, but we didn't detour over to see it, mostly 'cuz it's just pouring rain today. It is too wet to do whales. It's a good day for hot chocolate and banana bread. Well, how convenient that I happen to have both of these things waiting for me at the house.

I'm through Ether 5 in my now-more-than-a-year-long quest to read the Book of Mormon in Korean. I'm gonna finish it if it kills me. I wanted to finish by Cat's birthday, but the setbacks attendant to a bout of influenza fairly well killed that, so now I'm shooting for Sis. Jenning's birthday the following week. Ether's going pretty quickly, though, 'cuz once you get into the wars and contentions, the vocabulary doesn't vary much. So who knows?

Aaaah heck my feet got soaked while transferring buses and now my poor toes are burning-freezing cold. No fun. I hope wherever we're going has a heated floor.

We heard tell there was an explosion or something in Connecticut. And I picked up a Newsweek at the post office, and from what I could decipher from pictures and article titles President Obama is not doing very well, according to that publication's view. And I saw on LDS.org that a new temple's going up in Utah Valley. And that's everything I know about What's Going On in America. And my toes are still cold.

I love you and I'm trunkier* than heck but I'm trying hard not to let it show, 'cuz if you can keep it to yourself and do your work it's just homesickness and that's much more socially acceptable 'round here. So here's to hangin' on.

RoseE"

*trunky: the emotional state a missionary gets in for the last few months of his or her mission, wanting to pack his or her trunk and go home.

2010-02-18T03:22:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Flowers? Really? I never get flowers. I like flowers.*

Yaaay for French baptisms!** Elder Routson (of my dongi) had to do his first baptism in Korean about three weeks after he got in-country; he crammed for days to get that little prayer right, and then when he actually did it he went really, really slowly, but he got it right and I was proud of him. I will be proud of Dad, too.

I also felt very connected to Dad this week, 'cuz at a member's house we were all very sneaky and got to watch the men's 500-m speed skating, which was a lot of fun. I noticed that they kept pairing the skaters in such a way as to get old rivalries going . . . Korea and Japan, Korea and Russia, Germany and the Netherlands, Japan and China . . . and we all had a lot of fun watching Mo Tae Bom gloat over the Japanese silver- and bronze-medalists. Korea seems to be doing very well in medal counts; the whole country is going nuts about it.

So Monday was P-Day, but instead of e-mailing I got dragged out to Kyeongju for Zone P-Day, where our plans to watch Up! were foiled but then saved at the last minute and We Got To Watch It . . . with the APs' blessing. Yaaaaaay! So much fuuuuun! SQUIRREL!***
I'm such a movie junkie. I'm so pathetic.

So the long stretch of wasted time in Kyeongju I'm not happy about, but the movie was dratted awesome. And Sis. Pak Min Jeong got her hair cut and 'magic' permed this morning (a 'magic' perm is a dead-straight perm . . . I don't know that I ever encountered such a thing stateside) so she's set to face her family again. She got to call them on Sunday for Solar . . . and spent most of the time getting nagged by her mom about how she shouldn't switch majors like she wants to. I've had lots of opportunities to compare and I think my parents are among the best parents in the mission. Sis. Matthews's mom is pretty cool, too, but she's the only one I've encountered so far that might be in the same league.

And what else happened this week? Well, Solar was weird 'cuz the only people on the streets were nutcases and missionaries, and the traffic was INSANE, leaving us stranded in tiny towns in the pouring rain in the middle of the night and in one memorable instance not letting us reach our apartment until 10:34 p.m., which is a new record. But I ate deokguk again, so I might be . . . what, 27? . . . now. Or something. This age thing is strange.

I also finished a year-in-the-making project this week, reaching Moroni 10:34 and closing the book upon it. Whole Book of Mormon, in Korean. It nearly killed me, but I did it. I'm very pleased with myself, and pleased that I can actually now work on things like, say, speaking Korean or being a good missionary during my study time now.

I made a thunder cake yesterday, but lacking a tomato I used a beh, an asian pear. Or a quarter of one. It was darn good.

This has also been a week of lots of new investigators simply landing in our laps. Downright hilarious. We've been getting calls from everywhere . . . other teams, members, the mission office . . . just dumping names and phone numbers on us. I've never seen such an influx. But I'm glad of it. I like having people to teach. Teaching people is fun and it feels good and I like it.
Love y'all lots! Sorry this isn't more thorough . . . we're pushing our time here as it is. Stay out of trouble, and somebody please tell Helena 감사하고 자매님도 새해복많이 받으십시요. Which I'm fairly sure I've spelled wrong someplace.

RoseE"

*In response to my advising RoseE that we will not, unfortunately, be meeting her in Korea, but at the Salt Lake Airport with pipes and flowers.

**A woman and her daughter from Gabon will be baptized in our ward this Saturday. Since I (Blogmom) speak French and that is their only language so far, the whole service will be in French. Todd will be doing the baptisms (in French with my coaching) and I will be giving a talk.

***I recommend you watch the movie to understand this reference. An excellent movie.

The Rest of the Videos

2010-02-12T14:30:00.000-08:00

To feed your addiction to RoseE's . . . communication . . ., here are the links to the other three videos she sent:

Tour of the Ulsan Apartment

Elder Routsen Comments on the Kyongju National Museum

Anapji: Duck Pond of the Kings of Silla

A Letter To Emily 21 January 2010

2010-02-12T00:59:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes,

"Dearest Em,

Whatever this unsendable Christmas present* might be, to heck with it. Your letter about chasing down the missionaries on the corner was the best and most fantastic thing I ever saw and the best Christmas present in the history of mankind. Do you have any idea -- any idea at all -- what a miracle you were to those two elders? Can you imagine what they wrote in their journals that night, or what they said to their district leaders when they called in that evening to report on their day? "Hi, Elder Pendley. Yeah, yeah, it was great. Listen, you're not gonna BELIEVE what just happened to us. Just listen. This is amazing." They are never, ever going to forget the woman that God sent to comfort them on that cold and discouraging and boring winter evenings. You opened your mouth and turned into a miracle, Emily Ruth Deckenback. I don't know if you can really get how much something like that would mean unless you'd been out here, but take it from me: you were a much-needed miracle sent by God Himself. Thank you so much for following the promptings of the Holy Ghost to help those two elders. Thank you so much.**

In relation to other letters received at exactly the same time, the missionary postal system being what it is and all ~ ~ And missionary letter-writing being what it is and all, as I ran out of P-Day and thus a week has passed since penning the above ~

[Random gushing about our plans for a visit when she gets back.]

Man, Em, I've been so gosh-darn happy this whole gosh-darn week. It's been amazing. Like all the burdens I was carrying - all the stress, the resentment, the discouragement, the frustration - just up'n blew away. I'm as light as a feather. Even Korean suddenly got easy. The language barrier kind of melted. I hope I don't get complacent about this -- when you get complacent you stop studying and then the Lord stops blessing you and it all gets hard again -- but oh, gosh, it is such a RELIEF to be able to TALK, and to UNDERSTAND. It's such a relief to exist, be a part of society again. Like the girl in the story who couldn't speak until she'd made very prickly sweaters for her brothers, who'd been turned into swans. Like that.

I'm not sure what caused the sudden upswing. I think the swiftly-approaching springtime has something to do with it. Also the complete change of scene and society, coming to Ulsan to serve with Pak Min Jeong for her last transfer. Also I now have the space and means to exercise again. And there is natural light - lots of it - in our apartment, and enough space that you can be by yourself in a room for awhile if you want to. I think the tiny, dark, dirty Taegu house was taking more out of me that I realized. And I think that Sis Pak Min Jeong may end up being my favorite companion besides Sister Matthews. She has very Western tastes - she likes baked things, and sweet things, and doesn't much care for fireydeath!spiciness [sic], so I can cook things and she will actually eat them and like them. She speaks Chinese and is very good at Korean calligraphy, which she promised to teach me. She's hardworking, but not ambitious, obedient but not Nazi. And SHE KNOWS ABOUT KOREAN HISTORY. We're on a bus right now to Kyongju, capital of the kingdom of Shilla, so she can show me around and teach me about all the stuff she knows. I went once before but had no fun, 'cuz no one could explain to me WHY this Buddhist temple was so famous, and plus we had lunch at a place that was too pricey and not very delicious. Things are lookin' up today.

Love ya,

RoseE "

*This was the care package with chocolate in it that I didn't send until the end of January because of . . . well, mostly laziness.

**On a very cold and slushy and disgusting night in late December, when I was on my way to church to help with the monthly homeless shelter dinner prep, I saw two very cold and discouraged looking elders on the sidewalk, hunched against the snow. All I could think of was RoseE, so I quickly parked the car, hopped out, and chased them down. I told them that they are doing a good work in the Lord and never to lose heart, because they were loved and needed and their Heavenly Father was smiling down on them with joy. They looked at me like I was crazy, but I told them both I'd keep them in my prayers and ran back to my car, since I was freezing and running late. I hope against all hope that someone in Korea will jump out of a car or go out of their way to love RoseE and remind her of her Heavenly Father's eternal and uncompromising love, when she really needs to hear it. So if it was a miracle, it was hers, not mine.

In Which RoseE Fights the Flu, A Needle, and Commercialism

2010-02-11T02:21:00.001-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

So thus it is. I'm glad that Grama had everyone around her, and that the funeral went smoothly with all the folks there assembled. I've been praying, and thinking of Grama every time someone asks me if I'm . . . German? or Russian? You look Russian, maybe. No, Irish, say I. Like my great-grandmother.

Well, this week in life in general. As you probably know from watching my weather, it's been gosh darn well pouring rain. Which suits me fairly well, except when my toes get wet and cold. I've been slowly swinging up from the flu, aided not at all by the well-meaning efforts of the ward sisters. It took nothing less than fast Sunday for me to get any kind of appetite back. Thursday night, we visited a new-member middle school student, whose lovely less-active mom ordered us tangsooyook, which of course I love. But I could hardly eat it. I was trying. I was workin' hard at it. But it felt like eating lead. And then I made the mistake of pleading illness. Never doing that again.

'Cuz there is this traditional Korean home remedy for any and all stomach disorders that involves stabbing a person's finger with a needle and squeezing 'bad' blood out of it. I'd heard about this before from missionaries who had been subjected to it, but never before had I been faced with a woman pulling out the one-time-use-only spring-loaded needle and a box of tissues to catch the blood with, ready to 'bleed' me like an Edwardian fever patient.

Well, my natural defense reaction kicked in, as it always does when it's me vs. the needle: I went really pale, started shaking, responded to any question with a trembling giggle verging on tears, and hung like grim death onto the nearest warm body (Sis Pak Min Jeong). This defense has never before saved me from being stuck, but, thank goodness, it did this time; the needle was put away and I was given instead a couple of pills to swallow. I didn't know what was in the pills. I still don't. It could have been cyanide for all I cared. As long as I avoided that needle without mortally offending our hostess, I was happy to eat 'em like Smarties.

I would like to state for the record that I am perfectly capable of facing injections/blood draws bravely and calmly, when I've a mind to. This was not one of those times.

In other health news, as soon as this 24-hr flu thing lifted off me it hit Sis. Pak, as is life in a companionship, and I got a morning 'in' while she slept it off. I made banana bread. We haven't eaten it yet.

In other chaotic news, Sis. Son Yoo Jin, about whom we're so excited, turned down the invitation to be baptized and then left town for the week, so we're not sure what's going on, exactly. Our friend Katrina from Alabama is going home for a couple of weeks, so we won't be able to teach her. And to top off the mess is a woman named Kim So Jeong. The District President refered us to her. She is the mother of two little ones, aged 3 and 5, and is going through a hard stretch because of a number of medical problems, the biggest being an itchy and painful skin condition whose exact English name I cannot find out from anybody, which is generally managed by a carefully controlled diet, but due to some other internal complaint Sis. Kim can't keep much of anything down. So she's exhausted and in a lot of pain, homebound with her two adorable little snips.

When we visited her, she sat down with us and promptly burst into tears, recounting all of this to the sympathetic Sis. Pak and the bewildered-but-also-sympathetic me. She really needs friends and company, and this we can gladly supply . . . not to teach her very forcefully, but to serve and love her.

That was earlier this week. Yesterday we made an apointment to visit her again, and planned to bring with us a sister from the branch named Ii Yeong Hwa, who is just the nicest soul ever -- think Marjie Carpenter, but Korean. Just fine. So we met up with Sis. Ii a little earlier and had lunch, and went with her to do a Visiting teaching visit to a less-active sister. Still fine, no problem. And as this less-active sister works for NuSkin, Sis Ii ran Sis. Kim's skin problem by her to see if she had any advice on the issue. And Sister Mun offered to come visit when she had time that evening and see what she could do to help. Still fine.

Except what ended up happening was Sister Mun showed up with another brother from the ward in tow, also a NuSkin employee, and our supportive try-to-be-helpful-and-loving-and-make-friends-and-feel-the-Spirit visit became a NuSkin sales pitch. No, really. We were so frustrated and embarassed we nearly cried. In fact, we did, at home, when we called Sister Kim and apologized profusely. And then we called half of Korea trying to get Sister Kim some actual help--she'd ordered medicine from a supplier in Seoul, but her order was held up in the pre-Solar shipping mess, so we got in touch with the Seoul missionaries to find somebody to pick up the medicine from the supplying pharmacy and take it to the bus station and put it on a bus to Ulsan, which apparently you can do, bypassing all the shipping companies entirely. And we managed to make that happen, thank goodness. Saved face a little bit.

So it's been a frustrating week, missionary-wise. I, selfish creature that I am, am not 100% devastated, though, because I got a care package from Emily that was full of chocolate so it's hard for my outlook to be entirely bleak. I'm having a very 'Dad' week--very even-keeled, so much so that I wonder if I'm just an unflappable person or if I'm not as invested in this missionary service thing as I should be. But Sis. Pak, tired and dragging herself out of influenza, is straining to remain calm so it's probably better that I can act as a counterweight to that. That's this week. Who knows what next week will be. Other than Solar, aka Chinese or Lunar New Year. It's causing P-Day to move back to Monday, so I may e-mail again next Monday or next Thursday or both. Not sure yet. I'll get SOMETHING out.

Did my videos come through all right?* I've backed up all the videos on the iPod onto a flash drive, just to make sure that the records are not lost. I've become paranoid about that kind of thing.

Oh, and also last P-Day I got The Call. The one from Sis. Bagley at the mission office, asking which airport you'd like to be flown home to. It scared me to freaking death. Fly WHERE? WHEN? You're asking about this NOW? It's only JANUARY! (February, Sister Hadden. It's February.) (Oh, for dumb!) So that was a little surreal. I'm not quite sure how to react. It was a shock.

Okay, gotta go wreak some more havoc in the great nation of Korea. Tell me if the videos came through and I'll send more. Unless they didn't.

Mom, hang in there; you can only do so much in the face of chaos, but all chaos blows over. It's called the Plan of Salvation, and it applies to reservation systems, too. Everything Will Work Out In the End If You Are Doing Your Best.

Love ya

RoseE"

*from Blogmom: I've got three of the videos on YouTube, links below, and more to follow.

RoseE and Sis's Musser and Matthews sleep over

Last Day in Taegu/Going Shopping

Farewell Dinner at Vips Buffet

In Which RoseE Looks Back To See Where She's Been

2010-02-02T12:39:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Well, welcome to the first day of the rest of my mission. Today pretty much everything changed. New companion, new home, new rank, new responsibilities, new role. New feeling. We had lunch today with one of the two new American Sisters, a one Sister Elizabeth Chan from Washington, D.C. She and her MTC companion, Sister Crowther, are the first American sisters to come to Pusan mission since Sister Ogelvie came, six weeks after me. It's been eight months. And over lunch, I found myself saying to her all the things that Sister Beckstead and the other now-long-gone sisters said to me when I was that jet-lagged bewildered greenie. I'm a co-senior and a sister rep. I'm a leader now. And the funny thing is that I don't feel incompetent, I feel secure. I have a new companion, Sister Pak Min Jeong, in whom I have much confidence and with whom I can communicate as much as I need to. I am going to an area with a great reputation--but more importantly, I am leaving Taegu with a good reputation. When I got there last summer, no one liked Taegu. Too hot. Too cold. The members aren't helpful. The people are mean. There haven't been any investigators for months and months. The leadership only cares about stats. The sisters' house is tiny, dark and filthy. I think the only thing I really changed was the dirtiness of the house, but I've watched investigators spring up, support from the members increase, a new and wonderful bishop be called. Taegu is a more desireable place to serve in now than it was when I arrived. I didn't do it, but I watched it happen, and because of that I am well-satisfied. I feel good about my mission today, and that's a big change. But I like it. Let's keep that up.

So I feel like an acceptable missionary. I feel optimistic, as though the best is yet to come. And I don't feel panicked, discouraged, or overwhelmed--I can't tell you what a relief that is.

I've also started to think about The End, and After. And I'm finally starting to "get" the mate straws, the steak knives, the waffle iron, the little po-dunk Argentinian restaurants in Provo, the alfahores*. Your mission never really lets you go, does it?

I love you,

RoseE"

*RoseE's Dad went on a mission to Argentina, and brought all these things back with him (except the restaurants in Provo) and they are treasured items.

In Which Many Wonderful Things Happen

2010-01-28T01:32:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

I'll pray for the ward. That's a lot for everybody to handle just now. But I'm comforted and gladdened to know that it's not just that many families are dealing with hard times right now; it's that the ward is dealing with problems in many families right now. That's how it should be. Hard times come. But we're a ward and we're a team. And my prayers are with Gramma*, too, and all the family.

In news of drastic contrast, this week has been about the most fun, fulfilling time I've had since Sister Matthews left. It is due to a number of factors:

1. Sister Pak Min Jeong. Yes, my third Korean companion named Sister Pak. Will I ever have a companion of any other name? I know not. This Sis. Pak is a descendent of the Pak who was the first King of the Silla dynasty, who came down from heaven on a white horse, and his wife, who was born out of the side of a dragon. Sister Pak knows Korean history. Well. And loves it. A lot. And has already filled my head with stories of it--of a prince going out to seek his fortune with half a broken sword, while his father keeps the other half as proof of their relationship, but when he returned home the father had remarried and the stepmother tried to have him killed, so he fled and started a new Kingdom -- of the last King of Pakchae who had 300 wives, and when the dynasty was overthrown all 300 of them dressed up in their finest hanboks and jumped off a cliff, which is now called 'The Cliff of Falling Flowers'--of formal state dinners in the royal palace at Kyeongju, overlooking an artificial lake and islands covered in twisting pine trees. There's no way to tell where the story stops and the history begins in Korea. The stories are their history. So when Sis. Pak Min Jeong tells me that she is the descendant of dragons, I can't help but believe her.

So yes, Sis. Pak is teaching me history. Today we're actually in the national museum in Kyeongju, about an hour's bus ride up the coast from Ulsan. My most favorite thing ever.

2. Our apartment. It is large and clean. I have room to exercise, to dry my clothes, to cook, to sew, to study, to sleep. And room left over besides. It's astonishing how happy that can make you. We even have a sofa, to sit on if you don't feel like sitting on your study chair or your mattress. And there's a potted plant, that I'm taking care of.

3. Our branches--Shinjeong, Hogae, and Bangeojin. Ulsan is a district, not a stake, and the units are branches instead of wards, for all they're larger than some wards I've served in. They're about an hour's bus ride apart from one another (I'm getting lots of Korean study done) and everyone is just lovely. We went to church at Shinjeong branch on Sunday. There is a new American family that just moved in; I simultranslated Sacrament meeting and Relief Society. I did it very badly, but it was good practice. Sister Charlotte (that's her name now; last names being a vague concept in Korea) was immediately taken in by all the RS sisters, who love her and her toddler son Logan (red-cheeked blue-eyed smiley thing that he is--he was practically designed to be the cutest thing any Korean could imagine). The teacher even asked her a question during the lesson. I helped her answer it, amazed that this wonderful little unit would reach over the language barrier to help an American sister feel included in their gospel study.
The branch president of Shinjeong is legendary for feeding missionaries boshimtang--dog soup. No, not soup eaten by dogs. He asked me if I wanted some, and I told him honestly that no, I didn't, but if he commanded me to eat it (I used the word for 'command' that I'd picked up in the Book of Mormon, so it was suitably dramatic and deferential) I would. He laughed, and I think I might have escaped his traditional missionary hazing.

4. Our investigators. We have a lot of investigators, new members, potential investigators, and work to do in general. This pleases me. The most extraordinary person I've met has been a sister Son Yoo Jin. About a month ago, she knelt down and prayed for help to find meaning and purpose in her life. And when she stood up, she felt like she should try to find an English class. Random . . . but she looked, and found Shinjeong ward's 5-on-Saturday class, and showed up. Sis. Montgomery was teaching, using as her text Pres. Monson's talk on 'What Did You Do For Someone Else Today?'**. Sister Son Yoo Jin loved this talk, and started living according to the precepts taught in it, and became happier. Really. As simple as that. And the more the sisters teach her, the more excited she gets. When Sis. Ogelvie taught her the Plan of Salvation***, she kept saying over and over, "I know this. I already know this. I don't know how, but I do. I've seen this before." And yesterday, when we taught her about the Word of Wisdom#, we asked her to cut down on her coffee intake by two cups a week. This she agreed to do. Then twenty minutes later she told me, 'You know what? I'm just going to quit coffee. If you know something's right, you just do it. Life's very simple that way.' I've taken to following her from room to room like a puppy just to feel the Spirit radiating off her. She glows.

Thing . . . what, now? 5? that makes me happy . . . Being Chamei depyoja. Sis. Pak Song Hee and I are in charge of going on splits with the sisters, making sure that sister housing is in good repair, getting EVERYBODY ready to train very soon, and writing a Sister Rep Training Packet, of which right now there is none. I'm really excited about this. Also I got to go to the committee meeting with the Zone Leaders, which involved the most-coveted lunch in the mission. We had chili and cornbread and apple pie and ice cream. I could barely walk by the end.

So I'm typing this in a museum that I have not yet explored, and to my eternal frustration this computer has no USB jacks on it, so I can't send anything with it. RRRRRGH. I hope we can snag another computer before P-Day ends, because I have a lot of videos I want to send. Rather a backlog, really. My life is beautiful right now. I'm so happy to be in Korea. I'm so happy that (#6) the weather is warming up and spring is coming. I had my first strawberry of the year today. It tasted like warm sunny days and life and laughter. And it wasn't even a very good strawberry. There are better ones to come.

The sun is out; it's cool and windy, but bright. I just saw the Sacred Bell of King Seongdok. I'm wearing pants--now mended with a butterfly patch over the little tear that's been in them since last April. This has been a week of history and hope. I'm glad to be alive in it.

Now if I can just find a dratted computer with a USB . . . .

Love

RoseE

Oh. And Sis. Pak Sung Hee and I get to call regularly, and I also this week got to talke to Sis. Linford, long-lost MTC companion whom I have seen a total of 3 times since arriving in Korea. She's also going home in July. We're both glad to be able to finish this thing with the same person with whom we started it. And we're gonna watch Wall-E. She's really excited.

Sis. Matthews and Montgomery both went home last transfer. Sis Musser is now the oldest American sister, followed by Me and Linford, Ogelvie, and then the new greenies. We are much, much older than they."

* RoseE's great-grandmother is dying.

**"What Have I Done For Someone Today?"

***Plan of Salvation

# Word of Wisdom:

to Sister Thorderson 12/28/2009

2010-01-24T17:03:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Sister Thorderson,

Really, honestly, 100%, I cannot thank you enough for the wonderful Christmas package you and the Beehives* sent. It absolutely made my Christmas. It was the only thing I got in time--I would've had nothing to open on Christmas morning otherwise**. But instead of feeling sorry for myself, I was laughing my head off and had my nose in the scriptures, feeling immensely loved and having a marvelous time. And how could you have known of my desperate need for dental floss? I think it must be a miracle.

Thank you so, so much. And please give my thanks to all the Beehives and whoever else was involved. Have a very happy New Year, too.

Love,

Sister RoseE Hadden"

*Beehives: The Young Women program is divided into three classes: Beehives for girls age 12-13, Mia Maids for girls ages 14-15, and Laurels for ages 16-17. Once they turn 18, they graduate to Relief Society.

**The family Christmas package was mailed out on the same day as Sister Thorderson's, but RoseE did not received it until nearly New Year's Eve. Very frustrating!

To Auntie Cat 21 Jan 2010

2010-01-21T04:11:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Auntie Cat,

You wrote your Christmas letter in verse. Did somebody dare you? how the heck did you pull that off? I'm deeply impressed. Seriously, though, thank you--it was wonderful to get news of your family and know that they're all well and safe and happy.

Life continues well in here in Korea--I can't say "in Taegu" anymore, as I'm riding the train to Pusan with all my worldly possessions either in a suitcase or already shipped to my new area. The next stretch of my mission--possibly the last--is upon me. Weird.

But in cheerier news, last I heard you and Mum were going to a workshop* together. Finally! You've been planning and scheming a get-together for how long now? A long time. By the time you get this (or even already; I'm fuzzy on the dates) it will all be over and done, but I hope you both had a great time and that you learned a lot of bagpiping/drumming stuff and that all complications/catastrophes/other nonsense were safely averted.

We're coming up on Gupo station; gotta fly. I love you!

RoseE"

*We went to Winter Storm in Kansas City, MO, in January.

In Which Everything Changes Drastically and Sister Pak Has a Cow

2010-01-21T01:04:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"So the tricky thing about P-Day on Thursday and transfer calls on Friday and Transfer Day being not 'till the following Thursday is that I just have to know about and deal with the new state of affairs for a solid week before I can let y'all know about it at home.

So as quick as I can manage: Our area has been closed. I'm going to Ulsan, Sister Pak to Changwon. Sister Pak Seh Ra and Sister Ahn Ta Yeon, the other Taegu team, are covering all of Taegu for a while. We got this news and FREAKED OUT, because we have INVESTIGATORS who need HELP and SUPPORT and we love them and they love us and they NEED Sister Pak and WHAT are we gonna DO? Sister Pak even called Prez, begging to have the circumstance mitigated somehow. She cried most of the night and fell asleep holding my hand.

Next morning, we got another call from the A.P.s. Oh, by the way, you're BOTH the new Sister Representatives.

Aside: Sister Representatives (Chamei depyojas) are our mission's Girl Zone Leaders, kind of. They do splits with the sister missionaries and sort of keep tabs on the needs and mood of the female side of the mission, which they report to Prez. There are always two: one Korean and one Foreigner.

So hey, what the heck. we're the Chamei depyojas. Which is why we had to be sent to opposite ends of the mission. Thanks for remembering to tell us that last night when we were bawling our eyes out, APs.

So in the new system we've got the better part of a week to wrap things up in our old area before we transfer. Which ended up meaning that we ate LOTS of food with people. Because goodbye isn't goodbye without FOOD. We even got taken to a beef buffet, where we ate what I'm fairly sure was an entire cow of Korean Beef, which is about the most expensive food known to man. I ate what I think was steak tartar (it was cut up and not cooked), and what I know was raw marinated beef liver and shredded beef tongue. They ain't kiddin' about this cow thing.

But yup. So now I'm in Ulsan, which is on the east coast of Korea. I have heard they eat whales here, but missionaries seem to be able to avoid this. My new companion is Sister Pak Min Jeong, a very competent and able sister who is on her last transfer. Sister Pak Sung Hee is serving with Sister Ogelvie, my bestest mission friend. And for the first time in eight months, we have new American sisters. I met one today: a sister Chon (Korean heritage, but not a word of the language) from D.C. That was a strange experience. I'm the big kid on the playground now. And Sister Pak Sung Hee's old trainee, Sister Beh In Yeong, is trainging Sister Chon so Sister Pak is officially a grandma. Weird.

Once again, hate to do this but gotta fly. Next week I will do all within my power to get out a proper long epistle with some video in it. I love you all so much and pray for you every day! Let me know how things are going with Bethe's health. Mom, I'm glad you had a grand old time bagpiping! Dad, letter in the mail shortly.

Love you

RoseE"

In Which, With One Thing And Another, Seven Days Pass

2010-01-14T09:38:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

It looks like you had tang soo yook. I love tang soo yook. That stuff is dang tasty. And yeah, most soups in Korea are served Still Boiling, and they continue to boil for several minutes after they're served. Koreans can eat 'em straight like that. I can't.

Sounds like Bethe had a hard week of it. No fun. Fortunately, the week in question is over, or nearly over. I'm struggling to get going on regular exercise, too . . . it's been harder with the weather too cold for me to go and jog outside. But I received dying Sis. Matthews's hand weights today as an inheritance, so hopefully those will be useful in getting me up and moving again.

Piping workshop sounds like a blast--give Cat W. a hug for me, tell her thank you for the family newsletter, and tell her I'm writing her next week--ran out of time today.

Sis. Pak is doing a bit better. She's up and about. Elders Murray and Hamilton are both dealing with illness of some kind, too, but so far I've been spared anything more than general grogginess that comes from it just being cold and dark. And that's winter. What'd'you want. I'm from Minnesota. Winter doesn't last forever. Seems like it, mid-January, but not a January yet has failed to end so I'm confident this one will come 'round, too.

It's been a good week, mission-wise. We met twice with Un Jeong, our member family's daughter's friend with the less-than-parental dad. I don't think I've ever met someone accept what we're teaching so readily and joyfully. The onnly religion she's had in her life has been from her grandmother, who is Buddhist. Un Jeong thinks that Buddha is scary. She said that she likes 'our God' (she used the inclusive 'our' form, like 'the God that we all have, that we share together) more because he's nicer and he loves her. She'd never prayed before this week. Our last lesson, all we'd planned to talk about was faith, but baptism got mentioned in passing and she jumped on it. "Can I get baptized? When?" And she's excited about being part of the Young Women's organization, about learning from the scriptures, and about feeling the love of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. She's an amazing girl.

What else happened this week . . . well, Sis. Pak and I did a Costco run (freaking cold outside Costco) to get stuff for tacos, 'cuz we're doing an activity tomorrow with our various junior-high-aged investigators, less-actives, new members and pretty much anybody else who wants to come. Tacos and movie. Just to get all these kids to kind of meet each other. Many of them aren't coming to church because they don't know anybody there. Finding taco seasoning has been an adventure, but Sister Abbott (branch president's wife) is being a dear and finding some for us. Should be fun.

Last night Sisters Matthews and Musser slept over (in our tiny apartment not fit for four; six was an adventure) and we just had a dratted blast. Then in the morning we went and had breakfast at Tollets', so Sis. Matthews could say a proper goodbye. The rest of the day M&M went visiting people, but I met up with Sister Jennings and the two of us FINALLY went to Seomun market and just had a good long shop. It was great fun. Sis. Jennings is very knowledgeable about fabric and sewing and also market shopping, but doesn't speak Korean. I also don't speak Korean, but I feel much more competent when my Korean companion isn't around--people talk to me, not my comp, and they talk slower and more simply and I tend to understand fairly well. That's a good feeling, right there. So we found a great deal on just what I needed, an O Dong for my hanbok to lengthen it enought for it to fit me.

aaaaah crap they just turned the lights off.

I love you

RoseE"

28 Dec 2009 In Which We Get a Glimpse of a Train's Eye View of the Mission and of Life

2010-01-13T20:40:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Writing this from the Mugunghwa--the slow stops-at-every-little-station train, which I like better than the KTX* because it's cheaper, it's more comfortable, and it gives me more time to write/nap/gossip/whatever. I love riding the train. I love what a hassle-free form of transportation it is, and I love the nice rumbly rhythm of the cars along the track, and I love watching the mountains go by outside the window. America's very dumb not to have a proper train system. A high-speed train from LA to Vegas would be brilliant. Or would the airlines throw a fit? I don't know. Beats me what goes on in America anymore.

I hit my one-year in two weeks. Halfway point for all the elders of my dongi, beginning of the end for me, Sis. Linford, and (six weeks after) Sister Ogelvie. A year. A whole year of my life behind the black tag. You wonder if you should feel accomplished, or overwhelmed, or frustrated or something. I don't, really. Coming off of my Christmas call, I feel as though home isn't terribly far away and that it'll be nice to get there. I don't think I'm realizing either just how long or how short six months is. It's just tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. Three-day cold snap, four day warm spell. Ten more vocab words every day. Another page in the journal. Teaching Hyeon Ji the new member lessons. Getting Jin Mok Hwan ready to go to the temple. Getting Hyo Ui into the habit of reading her scriptures. Coaxing Ju Hyea to church. Tracking down Abdul. Another day, another week, another transfer. That's life. Just like the train. No blazing-fast KTX . . . just the steady, stop-and-go local line on which you have plenty of time to work until they announce "West Daegu Station" and you have to scramble off without time even to be miffed that the ride's already over.

I'm okay with not being panicked. I think I'm like you that way. Mom likes to freak out about stuff**, but I don't like to think about drama and goodbyes until they actually hit. Hence my trying to be allowed to work a few morning hours before going to the MTC. It's good to be working so you don't think too much. Thinking too much just stresses you out and causes problems. So . . . one day at a time. Investigators. New members. Prez interviews. Splits***. Ten more vocab words. One more train station.

Speaking of which, I'm gonna grab a nap before we make it to Dongdaegu, so next P-Day I'll tell you how the museums are. They've been a long time coming.

Love you,

RoseE"

*KTX high speed train, few stops

** Very true, I do.

***Splits: the missionary companionships split up for a day, so that RoseE might teach with Sis. Oglevie and Sis. Pak might teach with Sis. Matthews. Likewise, Sis. Oglevie's and Sis. Matthews' companions would go teach with other sisters. There must be an order to it, but I haven't figured out what it is.

In Which It Snows Buckets in Taegu

2010-01-07T06:07:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Videos worked? Yes!!! I will work on getting some more made and out to you. They've got to be pretty short to be sent by e-mail, but I should be able to manage.

So life in Korea this first week of Thursday P-Day . . . well, it's been darn good. We got the heaviest snowfall in ten years here in Taegu, and the city pretty well shut down. Yep. Just can't go anywhere in two inches of snow. And people kept calling us to check if we were all right, as though it were snowing pointy objects or acid or something. And every plan we'd had that day got cancelled, on account of it being too dangerous to travel when there's snow on the ground. I think my tongue is bleeding from being bitten so hard. So we spent a long, snowbound day at Hyeah Ji's house, hanging with her and her friend Ju Hyeah, watching Testaments, teaching lessons, figuring out Book of Mormon reading challenges and talking about baptism dates. Yep . . . Ju Hyeah's getting ready to be baptized.

Also this week . . . we met twice with a woman named Kim Jeong Nam and her daughter (also Kim; weird) Kim Min Jeong. Kim Jeong Nam is a friend of one of the Suseong ward members, who refered them to us saying that Min Jeong was interested in practicing English and that they'd probably listen to the gospel message, too. Not promising, but we thanked her and set up an appointment anyway. And OhMyGoshTheyAreFantastic. FANTASTIC. We taught them both the first lesson and asked them to read the introduction to the Book of Mormon. And when we came back a couple days later, they had read it. Both of them. And knew what it said and could talk about it. And had questions about how the Book of Mormon was structured and what exactly they were reading. And were excited to hear more. Really. And when we taught Min Jeong about the Plan of Salvation (we'd been teaching Jeong Nam, too, but she had to run out to the bank for something so she missed a lot of the lesson) . . . I have never seen anybody so excited about the prospect of living with her family forever. I half-expected her to ask if we could go to the Celestial Kingdom right now. She said she'd come to church on Sunday. And her mom said that what we were teaching them was '신기하다', shingihada, cool, neat, wonderful, amazing. Which it is. I've just never heard anyone say that, really. It was exciting.

Also this week ('this week' is a disorienting concept--when did it start? Last Thursday? Last Monday? What did we do in the interim?) we met with one of the Jungni ward Young Women (her family's awesome--dad's the 2nd counselor in the Stake Presidency and we eat at their house all the time) and her two best friends. One of these friends is a source of great concern for the mom of this family. She (the little girl) lives with her not-really-on-the-parenting-ball dad, her mom having run away to Pusan because of domestic violence. Kim Yeong Lan (the member mom) has decided to all but adopt this girl, and bring her into a healthier home environment as much as possible, including teaching her the gospel. The girl's name is Un Jeong. She's fun and smart and playful and eager to learn, and we're excited to be teaching her.

Also the elders found a woman named Pak Song Hee (yes, same name as my companion) who met with the missionaries a good couple of years ago, and they've started teaching her again. We all went over last night and taught her and her husband about the First Vision and answered some questions that they had.

So yeah. We have work to do! We have people to teach! People are progressing and learning about the gospel! Isn't that AWESOME?

And when we finish e-mailing we're going to the Daegu National Museum--a smaller branch of the really BIG museum in Seoul. And when we finish that we're going to Camp Walker for dinner with the Lambert family, who are delightful (their two teenage daughters have become good friends of mine). So it's going to be nothing but wonderfulness from beginning to end. Except that Sis. Pak has a cold, poor thing. She requires sleeping. Sleeping is important.

Oh, and I went to Ulsan on splits this week. (I told you 'this week' was an odd concept). I got to spend New Years' Day with Sister Corrigan, a lovely girl who's going home (along with EVERYBODY ELSE . . . we're going from 16 sisters in the mission to 10, and only 4 of them Americans) at the end of the transfer. On New Years' Day in Korea you eat Ddeokguk, which is soup made of the chewy not-duck rice stuff, and the eating of this particular soup on his particular day makes you one year older. So now I'm 26. Man, 25 sure went by fast. 24 even faster. How the heck old am I??? But I learned to play Yoonori, which is a very fun Korean board game if you know how to play and a very boring one if you don't. I've played a lot without knowing how--instead of dice, you throw four carved wooden sticks, so as long as you throw the sticks when you're told to you can play forever without ever understanding the rules. But now I understand the rules and it's a lot more fun. Even if Elder Kerrigan beat me three times. Blast him.

And when door-knocking later in the evening, we got invited into a house! Not for our message, really, but because we were sitting on the stairs outside the apartment reading maps while blowing on our fingers to keep them mobile. So the dad invited us in for some hot chocolate and we chatted a lot with his three great daughters and had a lot of fun. And that was a really good feeling. I felt really good about my Korean, too. It's amazing how much better you feel about your Korean when your companion is suddenly a foreigner instead of an actual Korean herself. You feel like you can actually do something.

So that was Ulsan. I once again got in and out of the city without eating any whales. It was a really big bowl of Ddeokguk, though, so I FELT like I'd eaten a whale.

And we had interviews this week, as fun as ever, Sis. Jennings being in rare form telling stories about raising her kids in Korea and using me as a sounding board for various knitting issues I cannot begin to understand. And President assured me that I will not be in 100% Koreans-Only Land forever, but you can never take statements like that really seriously, 'cuz Prez just says anything during interviews. Oh, well. I like talking to Prez anyway.

I love you to an excessive degree! Stay warm and drive safe and be careful--there's snow falling from the sky outside.

Oh, and when I e-mail again it will be my exact and official one-year mark. Nuts, huh?

RoseE"

Check out the video on the last entry!

2010-01-01T06:39:00.000-08:00

I don't know: when I make a change to a blog entry, does it go out to y'all again?

If it doesn't, check out the last entry again, because I've added a video that RoseE sent us yesterday, here:

Happy New Year!

Blogmom

In Which RoseE's Christmas Box Finally Arrives

2009-12-31T07:50:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

No, I haven't snuck on when I'm not supposed to--today is "Half" P-Day, to skip us through the transition from Monday P-Days to Thursday P-Days. So I get to write a proper e-mail. Which is good, because when I left the train station I got a call from the Suseong Elders that my package had, in fact, arrived safely, and that Elder Murray knew what was in it but had torn the customs label off so I would not be allowed to know.

So I waited, with little patience, until district meeting on Wednesday, when he finally showed up and presented me with . . . a letter from Emily. And then, after a glare, the box. Which I opened. Firstly: my stocking*! Mom, no wonder you were freaked when this didn't show up on time. I've never really known you to let stockings out of the house, much less the country. It is safe in my posession, you'll be glad to know. Sister Pak says thank you for the chocolate orange--I whacked and shared mine at the meeting (the whacking scared Sis. Pak a bit), and she still hasn't opened hers.

And then oh, my goodness, y'all DIDN'T.

You did NOT buy me this beautiful purple iPod, which made Elder Murray exclaim, "Is that like the one McCAIN has?" (Apparently Elder McCain also got a 5th Generation Nano for Christmas, and was the envy of every Elder in the mission.) I was visibly shaking when I realized what it was. And it's full of videos! Of my family! And pictures! Of everything that's happened this last year, of EMILY'S WEDDING FINALLY, of last year at camp (I hadn't one camp photo with me out here, or one of Cara, or one of . . .) And Wall-E, which I discovered WHILE district leader Hamilton was hanging over my shoulder ogling the beautiful piece of technology in my hand. I've sworn I won't watch it, and at interviews I'll ask Prez for permission to watch it on the plane home in July. Nobody has yet found out about Wallace and Gromit, though. Jury's still out on that one . . . ]:-)

So I'm going to try to send you some videos through Gmail. Let's see if we can get video contact established.**

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jhIparFce0

I listened to the lecture (part of it) while I was excercising this morning. Pretty cool, Dad. I remember you told me about it way back last year. I'll finish it and gab more later.

But now I have to go try to e-mail some videos. Hang on.

RoseE"

* Each person in our family has a hand-cross-stitched Christmas stocking. Bethe's is specially designed by me.

**I'm going to try to put them on the blogsite. Dunno if that's even possible.

From President and Sister Jennings 2009/12/16

2009-12-30T03:18:00.000-08:00

President and Sister Jennings write:

"Dear Brother and Sister Hadden:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from the Korea Busan Mission. We pray that God's choicest blessings will be yours.

When the wise men from the East found the young child with his mother, Mary, they brought gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. This began the tradition that we follow today of giving Christmas gifts to our families and friends. The first Christmas gift, however, was not gold, frankincense, or myrrh. It was God's gift of His only begotten Son. He sent His Son into the world to save the world knowing that, unlike the test of Abraham and Isaac, there would be no ram in the thicket to spare His Son, for the Son is the sacrificial Lamb of God without blemish. "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." (John 3:16)

A second great gift of Christmas is seen in the magnificent irony of the Son's descent from His throne on high to a manger in an obscure stable. The path through mortal life of the King of Kings and Lord of Hosts led from that stable to a carpenter's shop to the dusty roads of Judea and Galilee--and finally to a garden called Gethsemane and to a cross on Calvary. Jesus gave the gift of His sacrifice "because of his loving kindness and his long-suffering towards the children of men." (1 Nephi 19:9)

Sister Jennings and I are also mindful of a Christmas gift that you are giving to us and the Korean people this year--the gift of your daughter. Thank you for sharing your precious daughter with us this Christmas. We know how hard it is to be without one of your loved ones at this time of the year. We know that the Lord will bless you for your sacrifice and will, in return, fill you with His Spirit. We pray that His peace and love will abide in your home.

We know that God lives and loves his children throughout the world. We know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and the Savior of the world. He is our Master, and the living head of His Church in these, the latter days. He lives today and has prepared the way for us to live, to serve, and to return to Him. Your daughter is His emissary to the wonderful people of Korea. She is discovering the same magnificent irony of finding miracles in unexpected places here in the Korea Busan Mission. May Christmas 2009 truly be a memorable one for your family, filled with the miracles of the season.

With love and appreciation,

[signed]

President and Sister Jennings
Korea Busan Mission"

In Which Christmas is Summarized

2009-12-29T03:45:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Once again, aaaaah! Barely a second to write, 'cuz the darn on-train internet cafe disappeared. We went to Changwon today (faraway city) for a housewarming party for Sis. Ogelvie and her companion, who just moved to a new apartment. Lovely. We had a great time. Sisters Corrigan, Musser, and Matthews were also there, the latter two only for a little bit. Sis. Corrigan asked the dangerous question "So what is this Doctor Who* thing about?" and . . . well, it's a good thing she's going home in three weeks, that's all. She'll be able to find out what happens next without coming across Korea to find me and make me tell her more. And plus I always get the scene order mixed up in 'The End of the World." I should ask Bethe to write me a summary.

Sounds like a heckofa Christmas . . . merry chaos, as ever, but that's as is. Ours wound up being spectacular. After a few rounds of Yahtzee and Scrabble with the Tollett kids, we went to member Britta's house for her Christmas Dinner party (think Cara**, but an active member living in Korea. Other than that, pretty much the same person) and then straight to Suseong ward for the Christmas party there. Belly dancing was done . . . with the Elders. It was a lot of fun, and seems to have endeared my to all the Relief Society. Well, whatever works.

Other than Christmas, it's been a quiet second-half-of-the-week, which is good becuase I'm down to four minutes here. Eyes still open for your package. It's been Christmas plus weekend plus not seeing the mail-picking-up Elders all day. I'm not too worried yet. And I got through Christmas only crying twice: once Christmas Eve reading Luke 2 out loud to myself, and once after I hung up the phone***, but I hid in the bathroom and (bless 'em) the Tolletts just get it when the just-off-the-phone sister needs to hide in the bathroom for a bit. It wasn't too bad.

Regarding travel: I make no attempt to deny that having parents in Korea to show around would be all kinds of cool, but Dad's tantalizing offer--going to England# with all y'all afterwards instead--is intriguing as well. And it would be less headache for the mission. And I was pretty resigned to the idea of just going straight home for most of my mission anyhow. So I'm quite open to that idea. And flying 'round the long way to Korea, standby, is probably just unimaginably awful.

Outta time--love you

RoseE"

* Doctor Who: A BBC TV series that started in 1963 and is continuing to be--or is again--a big hit with fans on both sides of the pond, including the Hadden Family. http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/

**Cara: a friend of RoseE's from college who is crazy about shoes.

*** RoseE called on Christmas Eve and we put her on speakerphone (Thanks, Caiti & Jeff!) and talked for nearly an hour. We opened our presents from Korea during the call so RoseE could explain whatever needed explaining, and even got to talk to her companion, Sis. Pak. Some of us cried at the end of the call, (no names mentioned), but only at the end.

#We have plans to go to England in August 2010 to visit a Hadden aunt, and a famous author

In Which RoseE Goes Carolling and Gets Stuck in an Elevator with 4 Other Missionaries

2009-12-21T11:53:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Arrrrgh I hate this slow post office computer--particularly because the one right next to it is top-of-the-line, but Sis. Pak always gets it first. Drat her.

Anyway, business first. Plan is right now for me to call at roughly 11 a.m. my Christmas morning, which would be I think seven o'clock Christmas Eve for all y'all. I think I'll use the calling card from the church land line--Sis. Pak is suggesting I call on our cell and have you call it back, but I seem to remember Prez discouraging that; I'm not sure why. International calling is still a mystery to me. I'll double-check on Wednesday at 'combined zone conference' (mission conferences still being forbidden by the Powers That Be).

So . .. the cold hit. Yep. I heard rumors that Thursday set a new low-temp record for that date in the fine city of Taegu. And where have we foolhardy missionaries been but out and about, with little Korean hymnals in hand, caroling our heads off. We've been caroling, to members' houses and investigators' houses and randomly on the subway (we got kicked out one time--that was fun) and in post offices and elevators and all over. It's been a blast. But with all six of us in the district, elevators have been kind of a problem. Your standard-issue Korean apartment elevator will honk in protest if you load it with too many people, and it gets to decide what constitutes 'too many' on any given day. So when we caroled to the home of the bishop of Jungni Ward (10th floor), we made our exit by all piling into the elevator singing 'We Wish You A Merry Christmas' until the doors closed. Then the doors opened again without actually having gone anywhere, so we pushed the'door close' button and started singing again. But it just opened right back up. We ran through this three or four times, until Elder Murray decided, "We must be too heavy." He stepped out. The doors slid closed, and his good idea quickly became a bad idea as the elevator took off towards the ground floor with Elder Hamilton in it but Elder Murray stranded upstairs. We could hear him banging on the door as we disappeared. We quickly started pushing buttons again, and brought the car to a stop on the seventh floor, whence Elder Murray was sprinting, yelling his head off so he could at least remain within sound, if not within sight, of his companion. I just about collapsed laughing.

So yeah, Christmas continues apace here. We managed to sneak in five minutes (okay, ten) at the military branch's Christmas party, and the Elders get to go to the Tollets' for Christmas Eve dinner, which is nice for them. The Jungni ward Christmas party is at six o'clock Christmas Eve, so no Christmas Eve for me--gonna be working. Oh, well. At least I get to dance.

Yeah, Sister Ii Mi Suk lent us all of her belly dance stuff, so last night we played around with hip scarves and veils a lot. It was so much fun to put on a hip scarf again. It brought back very fun memories, and the comforting assurance that I wasn't always stuck-in-stockings-and-long-brown-skirts Hadden Chamenim . . . that I used to be a very quirky, fun person, and will be so again someday. I felt like Clark Kent combing that one little curl down onto his forehead. I am very boring, but somewhere inside me there is an attention-getter.

Oh, and I'm wearing PANTS today because we're all going ice skating. PAAAAAAAANTS. YAAAAY FOR PANTS.

On the missionary front, we just got loaded up with a bunch of new referals, mostly people's friends, so we've got a lot of work to look forward to. And Sis Jin Mok Hwan, our hairstylist, decided in sacrament meeting yesterday that she needs to start paying tithing so she can go to the temple. She decided this, and whispered it to me. And I just nodded, thinking about how we could have taught her about that for months and it wouldn't have made as much difference as her simple, Spirit-prompted decision in an ordinary sacrament meeting on an ordinary Sunday. We've been worried about her financial situation--single mom running her own business and all, it's no walk in the park--and wondering how to teach the counterintuitive principle that paying tithing is the surest way to become financially stable. I don't know how this is going to work out for her, but I know that it will, 'cuz it's always worked out for me, sometimes in the most bizarre fashions imagineable. The Lord takes care of full-tithe-payers. It's freaky.

So I think that's the news from this abominably slow computer. I'm so excited to talk to you on Friday! Merry Christmas! I love you so much! Why do I always cry when I type this last paragraph, gosh dang . . .

RoseE"

In Which Santa Lucia Day Happens by Brute Force and Plans for Christmas Are Made

2009-12-15T02:56:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Well, keep that cold weather the heck away from me! It's been astonishingly nice here in Daegu. I don't think it's gone below freezing or even anywhere near it. We are praying in gratitude every day that the warm stretch holds out, and have armed ourselves with scarves and ear warmers and extra stocking-looking socks and the whole thing, ready to go as soon as the weather breaks.

Despite the warm weather, Santa Lucia still came. But as it's just me, in a houseful of Koreans, with limited baking resources and no time to myself . . . you better believe I did Santa Lucia anyway. I made cookie dough the night before, stonewalling Sis. Pak who kept asking me, "Are you making them for Hyeon Ji? That's a good idea. Or for Son Mi? Why are you making these cookies? Why did we have to make a special trip to get sugar TONIGHT?" And then next morning I got up at five to cut them (with a knife), decorate them (with 1 ancient half-can of sprinkles and a bag of Halloween-colored peanut M&Ms), and bake them (in the oven). My darling roommates were bewildered but in general accepted my gesture of festive goodwill in the spirit in which it was given. They even ate some of the cookies, which was very sporting of them. THEN Sis. Pak and I made a bunch more for investigators and new members, and she had an absolutely grand old time. She'd never decorated cookies before, and thought it was as great idea. We're still spice-hunting for gingerbread men; I've got ginger and cinnamon but other stuff's eluding me, which is sad 'cuz I want to make wassail, too. Sis. Jennings suggested Home Plus, so that's the next stop.

Othe festive pursuits of the season include belly dancing. Yup. I bragged myself into something I now can't brag myself out of, and BOTH wards want me to dance for their Christmas parties. They want the Elders to dance, too, but I don't think it's gonna happen. They're all sports and they'll do any crazy thing they're asked, but last night Sis. Pak tried to learn how to do an undulation (and she's an experienced song-and-dance girl), couldn't manage it and woke up the next morning sore all over. I don't know if the poor elders' abs could take it. So I, who have never choreographed, never performed, never soloed and hasn't practiced in a year, am going to do a solo performance of some choreography I'm making up in the evenings. Well, one way or another, we'll get some laughs out of it.

Ward Christmas parties in Korea are on Christmas day. Really. We've got one the 24th and one the 25th. "Sister Hadden, what do you do in America when you go to Church on Christmas?" "Um . .. we don't go to church on Christmas. If Christmas falls on a Sunday, we drastically reduce church or just cancel it altogether. We stay HOME on Christmas."

The Military branch's annual curriculum order came in and it was full of copies of True to the Faith in Tagalog and French. So I have a new toy. And since the order got processed after I quit at Distribution*, this is not my fault.

Oh, I ate my guts out on sushi this week. One of the members took us to this really nice sushi resterant, where the stuff just kept coming in course arfter course. It was pretty darn mind-boggling. I just about killed myself eating it all . . . particularly as Sis. Pak played the Korean-exclusive "Oh sorry, I don't really like sushi" card and was NO help whatsoever. Rrrrgh.

Progress in missionary work is coming slowly, but still coming. Hyeoh Un faithfully read her scriptures yesterday. And Hyeon Ji, confined to the hospital with sixteen nails in her legs as she recovers from bowleggedness-correcting surgery, is reading, too. (We're big favorites in her leg-injury hospital ward. We always leave with more fruit than we came with.)

Transfers brought our well-beloved Elder Hamilton up to be our District Leader . .. and it was his birthday this week, so on no notice whatsoever we tossed together a surprise party for him, for which I provided a nutella-filled poorly-decorated cake. Anyway, Elder Hamilton's dream is to spend all Christmas season caroling all over Taegu, and hey, we're all game, so that's what we're doing this week. Fun times.

Um . .. I think that's all the big stuff for this week. I didn't keep a list of stuff to write, so I have no idea what to put, really. Rumor has it Sis. Jennings, Sis. Matthews, and maybe even new couple-missionary Sister Bagley could FINALLY come up to hit Seomun market . .. keep your fingers crossed. I'm gonna go play with multimedia now, to find belly dancing music and maybe send some pictures.

I love you! Christmas is awesome! I miss you, but I think the Lord is blessing me because it hasn't quite HIT me yet, you know?, that I'm missing out on Christmas at home for the first time in my life. On the other hand, I'll never have another Mission Christmas, so that's good reason to keep my eyes open and my pen scratching. And hey, I get to call** on Christmas, and I hit my year mark right after and life's pretty good, really.

Love ya much

RoseE"

* RoseE's job before she left for Korea was working as a translator at the church Distribution Center, where all the books and magazines are printed and from where they are sent out.

** Missionaries get to phone home on Mother's Day and Christmas Day.

In Which RoseE Speaks French and Does Not Get Transferred

2009-12-08T03:23:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

Well, the first-off the bat news is that Transfer Calls are in. The blood I painted all over the doorframe* seems to have worked like a charm; no one in our house is transfering. Elder Son Oo Shik, our district leader, is going to be Zone Leader in Shilla, and coming up as his replacement is Elder Hamilton from Haeundae, a dear old friend of mine and fellow English major. The other Taegu district is getting back the not-very-much-loved Elder Kemmerer, but I guess we'll all survive. Other than that, Taegu stays Taegu through the holiday season. I'm exceedingly relieved. When it came right down to it, I really didn't want to go anywhere, not when we've got stuff happening here finally and I still haven't been able to take Sis. Jennings shopping at Seomun Market.

So particulars of this week. The big thing was Abdul, the man from Senegal. We (my team and the Suseong elders' team) visited him and taught him his week. He's an amazing person. We'd got him a Livre de Mormon**, which he was very interested in. He's Muslim, and thus believes so many very true and powerful things: the importance of prophets and scripture, of serving others, of learning truth through revelation. He's studied both the Bible and the Koran extensively, and seemed fairly itching to get into the Book of Mormon. He speaks English quite well and is learning Korean, so we taught him in a mixture of all three of my languages. It felt so good to speak in French again.

The day we taught him was the day before transfer calls. As soon as we left his house, Elder Murray told me, "You can't transfer. This guy needs you. We've got to tell President." And Sister Pak chimed in with, "If you transfer, what are we going to do? I can't teach him by myself!" However, there were only four hours until calls. Elder Murray eventually called Elder McKenna, our Zone Leader, to ask permission to call Elder Aquino, his friend from Pusan, who has a book about Islam that he now wants to borrow, and Elder McKenna promised that he'd call up to the A.P.s to explain why Elder Murray needed such a book (and, incidentally, why I couldn't be transfered). This was a heck of an elaborate scheme, but it seems to have worked.

We also went down to Pusan this week for Sister Pak to take the dreaded Michigan Test*** again. We all went for lunch to Sister Ii In Suk's restaurant, which has moved half a block to a much more visible building (this freaked me out; I know this address! Where the heck did the restaurant go???? Oh, there it is). Sister Ii is still as wonderful as ever. She still has the tree Sister Montgomery gave her last April, and it's still growing. And her deijigukbap is still the best thing I've ever tasted. I've had deijigukbap here in Taegu and it's nothing to write home about, which would explain why you haven't heard about it. And I spent the duration of the test with Sister Musser, from the MTC, and first-transfer roommate Sister Hill, who is officially out of missionary circulation starting today. Gone also is my friend Sister Beckstead. We're losing missionaries fast, and they're starting to be missionaries that I know.

It's been a pretty slow missionary-work week, as it's Exam Time in all the schools so we can't meet with anybody because they're all busy cramming. Next week promises to be better. I'm busy explaining what White Elephant is and pressuring Elder Murray to give me the apple juice concentrate the Tolletts bought for me and gave to him so I can make wassail. Thank you so much for the cookie recipes, by the way; I really wanted them but wasn't going to request them after seeing the price sticker on the birthday package. I'm a greedy enough missionary as it is.

Oh, everybody in Korea thinks that my green cable-knit hat# is the best thing in the world, and at least five times I've been asked where I bought it. Three people have tried to steal it. I may have to staple it to my head.

Okay, I'm going to go mail a passel of letters now and see if I can load your pictures onto Liz . . . Dang Vista on this computer won't do it, so I'm going to switch with Sis. Pak. I love you so much! Really, really, really. And I miss you like crazy. Put some books or something on Bug's head; he's getting waaay too freaking tall.

Love you

RoseE"

* Exodus 12

** French Book of Mormon

***Michigan Test: used by colleges and universities to assess English language ability

# cabled beret knit for RoseE before she left--to match her coat

to Dad, 7 Dec 2009

2009-12-07T03:13:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Somehow the second I realized what that tree* was, I knew it had to be your idea. Where did you find it? It's fantastic!

I'm bummed I missed your sacrament meeting talk. I love hearing you speak in church--never blasphemous but always unorthodox. Fortunately, I'm your daughter and get to hear your musings on religion all the time. I just feel sorry for the rest of the ward, who only hear them once in a blue moon when the Bishopric works up the nerve to ask you to speak. Well, sucks to be them.

Friday night was transfer calls. The angel of death passed over our house, and nobody's leaving. Must be because we're keeping the Word of Wisdom**. (Except one of the elders' investigators brought them a coffee bun, and they didn't know what to do with it, so I said I'd eat it and I did. My companion was shocked. But it didn't taste like coffee--the flavor was more gnat than camel, I think I'm gonna be okay. Sisters Linford and Jung Min Hee, my MTC cohorts, are being sent out to the heretofore-elders-only area of Jeju Island. I thought this was a lie when I heard it. Sisters just don't go to Jejudo. But they are. And since flying out there is expensive, they'll probably be there a while and I am not likely to see either of them again until Sis. Linford and I go home in July. It's a sad day, but quite a privilege for them, opening a new sisters' area.

I'm still junior companion. My feelings on this are mixed. Some of them are:

"Yay! Six more weeks of minimal responsibility!"

"Wait . . . seventh transfer and I'm still junior? Sis. Pak Sung Hee and Sister Montgomery were trainers by their fifth."

"Who cares, as long as I get to stay in Taegu?"

"Does President think I'm irresponsible or immature, or what?"

"You ARE irresponsible and immature."

"Well, yes, but I don't want the whole mission knowing that Prez knows that."

"Sister Beckstead didin't go senior until her eighth [transfer], and she ended up being a darn good missionary."

"Yes, but prior to that she'd had several meltdowns and tried to go home. All I've done was tell Prez in one interview that I was kind of lonely."

"Do you WANT to be a senior?"

"No . . . I just don't want to be THAT sister, that's all: the one that's a burden on the mission, that Prez doesn't dare give responsibility to."

"If you were THAT sister, Prez would have sent you to Sister Musser instead of trusting you to handle a fifth transfer with an all-Korean house. And he's threatened to make you train."

"He also threatened Sis. Matthews with that, and she's going home in six weeks, trainee-free."

"Look . . . what's your bottom-line goal on this mission?"

"To be as good a missionary as my father was."

"And how long was he a senior?"

"Like . . . three days, or something."***

"Right. And you've still got four more transfers to become senior in. Twenty-four weeks. You've got plenty of time before that goal comes into jeopardy. So stop fussing, count your blessings, and get back to work."

Yeah, that's pretty well where I am right now.

Three weeks until Christmas! My little tree is displayed proudly above my desk. I tried to decorate it a bit but in the end just decided to stay with the one red ornament, to keep it a simple, unadulterated Charlie Brown Christmas Tree. It makes me unbelievably happy.

I love you! Talk to you in three weeks#.

RoseE"

*For her birthday, we sent her a Charlie Brown Christmas Tree-- one with a few scraggly twigs and some needles falling off. And one red ornament.

**Word of Wisdom: members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have been commanded to abstain from coffee, tea, alcohol and tobacco; this commandment group is referred to as the Word of Wisdom.

*** When it was discovered, two days before he went home, that Todd had never been a senior companion, the mission president made him senior for the last day of his mission.

# Missionaries are allowed to call home at Christmas Day and Mother's Day.

In Which RoseE Has a Birthday and Ages 3 Years in 3 Days

2009-11-30T18:29:00.001-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear all,

Only time for a very quick rundown.

Thank you so much! My presents are awesome! I took a video of me opening them . . . don't know how you're gonna watch it before July, but it's took, at least. I'll work on getting it into a workable format.

I woke up this morning seven minutes late (the roommates let me sleep in) and as soon as I stirred my three darling Korean roommates started singing Happy Birthday in Korean. Then they sang it in English but forgot the words halfway through. They'd decorated the kitchen with Halloween balloons that said 'Happy' and a poster that said 'Birthday Rose', and had made me a birthday breakfast of all my favorite things: pancakes, bacon, asian pears, mashed potatoes and Healthy Choice chicken soup. (Elder Murray was suppsed to get them gravy mix, but his appointment ran late last night, so now Sis. Pak is mad at him.) I showered, had breakfast, and got chased off the dishes by Sis. Pak Seh Ra, and opened my presents from home. Oh, gosh, Dad, I almost cried at the tree*. Really. That was about the most fantastic present I've ever seen. I'm decorating it with whatever-the-heck, including the ribbons off the presents. (Oh, and my family portrait is now strewn with paper chains made out of old message-card-making supplies.) And Mom . . . SOCKS! Best socks EVER! My gosh, they're phenominal! I love my socks!

So as it was my birthday and P-Day I got to do whatever I wanted, which was go to Seomun market and buy my last Christmas presents. But first we had to pop by the church, because Elder Son Oo Shik called to say that I'd received a package and he'd leave it there for me. And so we went to the church, only to find all the sisters, The Suseong Elders (more came later), a Costco cake with roses on it, some darling little presents (a pretty painted case for my dochang stamp that's got a little stamp pad hooked to it), and the giant Suseong tv with Prince of Egypt and Joseph: King of Dreams (marketed in Korea as 'Prince of Egypt 2'; this caused but a LOT of confusion and miscommunication between Americans and Koreans). So we ordered chicken and ate cake and watched movies. Sounds like the best birthday in the entire freaking world to me.
And as soon as I finish this e-mail we're going over to the Tollets because they asked us to come over and help decorate for Christmas. I nearly fainted when Elder Murray told me this, I was so excited.

Other parties this week: the branch did a communal Thanksgiving with the four or so largest families and all 22 Kyeongbuk Zone missionaries. Well, 21 of our zone and Sister Corrigan, who got sent on the luckiest split in the entire world and escaped Thansgiving-free Ulsan just in the nick of time. Sister Pak Sung Hee ate her very first turkey. But not much of it because she thought the ham was a different kind of turkey and took a lot of that, instead. She also had never considered eating sweet potatoes with marshmallows . . . you eat them with kimchi here. And the tapioca salad just blew her mind entirely. It was really funny to watch. I think every American missionary was near tears with happiness--some elders had their plates six inches deep in food. Really, there were mashed potatoes as far as the eye could see, plates and plates of them. And a non-member family came as well, and brought a pan of ratatouille. They were very impressed that I knew what ratatouille was and were tickled to death that I was so excited about it. And their four-year-old black-haired girl Valerie ran around for the whole meal with the Tollets' youngest, white-blonde-haired four-year-old Kailee. They were very cute.

And I met a man from Senegal on the subway. And my French is much father gone than I thought it was. I sound like a babbling idiot. This is not good.

But other than that, it was a wonderful week of parties galore. There's more news but no time to give it. Suffice to say yesterday I was 23, today I'm 24, and tomorrow I'll start working with Koreans again and will be 25. Also, Bethe's birthday and my birthday happened simultaniously . . . I wasn't planning on this when I requested she be born on some other day.

I love you all so much! Have fun with y'all's non-Charlie-Brown trees! My shoes are whole, my toes are warm, I am swimming in joyous familiar European and Utahean chocolate, and life is very, very good. At least for now. There's always next week.

Oh, and I met Elder Choi Yoon Hwan of the Seventy this week. That happened, too.

Gotta run!

RoseE

Bug, I promise a letter next week.

* Dad sent her a Charlie Brown Christmas tree: basically one twig with a few needles on it, and one red glass ball ornament, the weight of which makes it bend way over. You can get one just like it at Sears. Go watch A Charlie Brown Christmas if you can't remember what it looks like or what it represents.

2009-11-24T03:04:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Like, pet mice, or like "OH GAAAAAAHHHH IT'S MICE!!" mice*? How big are the lizards**? Can you sic the lizards on them? I'm sure Soxie's*** being no help at all--not a mouser, really. More ornamental than useful, as far as cats go.

I'm also intrigued by Cuin's lizards' sibling rivalry issues, that they need constant supervision. Hmmmm.

I need to work up a Santa Lucia# scheme. Of course, Santa Lucia Day is after Transfers, so who knows where the heck I'll be, so maybe I shouldn't make too many plans too fast. Both Sis. Pak and I are hoping and praying that we both stay, as we've got a lot of good stuff happening and we want to be around to see how it plays out. And Sis. Jennings keeps promising to come up to Taegu on a P-Day and go shopping at Seomun Market with us, but she hasn't had a P-Day free in two transfers. Hmph.

Oh, I got your package safely this week, and have obediently stuck it under my desk to await my actual birthday, when I will be . . . twenty-five. Just like I am right now. Korean "age" is a strange bird.

So last week the big news was . . . Hyeon Ji got baptized. Yeah. She didn't even have a baptismal date at time of last e-mail. It all happened pretty quickly . . . she decided she wanted to get baptized on Thursday, on which day Sis Pak was on splits in Ulsan (I was with yet another Sis. Pak, Sis. Pak Min Jeong), so we had only part of Friday (most of the day was riding buses back and forth from Ulsan to get MY Sis. Pak home) and all of Saturday (minus everything else we have to do on Saturday, including teaching Hyeoh Un and teaching Jungni ward English class) to get her baptismal service put together and the interview done and everything. Fortunately, the new bishop (he's FANTASTIC) and our ward mission leader (ditto) really pulled through, as did the Spectacular Sister Tollet (chocolate chip cookies), and everything was great in a very short period of time. The time crunch was because in two days Hyeon Ji goes into the hospital for pretty major knee surgery, and will be holed up in there for a good couple of weeks. So she got confirmed at the baptismal service, which is not usual for converts' baptisms (usually they're confirmed in Sacrament meeting the next week). So while she's recuperating we'll teach her the new member lessons and hopefully she'll be off to a good strong start with a brand-new knee and brand-new baptsimal covenants well before the turn of the year.

Hyeon Ji's really shy. But really. It may come from being less than five feet tall (she's a tiny little thing). I was amazed that she worked up the nerve to be baptized, and held onto it when she saw that most of the ward had showed up for her baptismal service (as well as a LOT of missionaries and some members from other wards, as the service was right after stake conference). Her uncle, with whom we've been teaching her, baptized her. This was the fist baptismal service I've been able to watch from 'backstage' . . . . the first baptism I've seen of a sister whom my team has taught. It's a humbling thing. I mean, we just said some stuff, and prayed a bit, and she up and decided to change her whole life AND allow herself to be dunked underwater in front of about a hundred people. Once again, I feel like none of this can really be my doing. I'm still just watching in awe and confusion as the work of the Lord goes on around my head.

And it's continuing to go on. We think that little Hyeoh Un will probably be ready to be baptized in the next couple of weeks . . . we taught her everything, and she's accepted and is living it all. We're mostly waiting for a free Sunday, since the Elders have I think two baptisms already planned. (Cool, huh?) Student Ju Hyeah is also still doing well, and is thinking ahead to her own baptism. And this week we FINALLY managed to meet with a young woman named Ryu Nah Hi, who stayed with an LDS host family while visiting Utah and was impressed with what they lived and believed. We've been trying to meet her for weeks but keep just barely missing her. But she's really eager to learn what we have to teach, and we've got high hopes for her. So yeah, not a dull moment around here. (Except on the bus back from Ulsan, when I got to TAKE A NAP! A NAP! It was GLORIOUS!)

We had dinner at the Tollets' last night (bless this wonderful family) and there were two big bowls of mashed potatoes.

I had three helpings.

Sis. Pak had one and said it was really good, but I don't think she quite gets what I see in them. I've tried to explain gravy several times, but it never quite comes out right.

Anyway, shorter than usual this week, sorry. Everybody's fault but mine, as everything always is, of course. I love you! Happy Thanksgiving! I'd tell you to tape the Macy's Parade, but . . . well, have fun watching it, anyway. The Military Branch is making Thanksgiving Dinner for the entire zone (that's 22 missionaries, most of them hungry American boys and one of them a Korean who has never SEEN turkey. Never. Except on t.v.).

Oh, and it suddenly got warm again. I'm not getting this Korean weather thing.

Love you

RoseE"

* we have mice

**lizards - we are watching her uncle's kids' pets for the holiday

*** our 15-year-old cat

# Santa Lucia Day: a Scandanavian Christmas holiday, December 12

to Dad 16 Nov 2009

2009-11-21T17:38:00.001-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Once again, sorry about the stationery. I'm running out of pages on this letter pad--I'll probably grab a new one this week sometimes.

Sister Pak is deeply annoyed on my behalf that I missed both the France trip AND the Disneyworld trip. (But it's okay, because there will be other opportunities, right?) I'm sorry you didn't get to see the rocket launch. Them's the breaks, and it sounds like you had a good time, anyway.

My brief bout of illness seems to be gone, so I haven't yet had to resort to the dreaded hygiene mask. (When I told Melody, of the military branch, that I had a cold, she demanded to know, "Why aren't you wearing a hygiene mask?" to which I responded, "Because they look completely ridiculous!" She laughed and agreed with me.) I can't believe they do that much good anyway--they just cause you to touch your mouth and nose more than you would otherwise.

You'll be glad to know that I am on my way to ride a bike on my mission. We're in Kyeongju, and we're going to rent bicycles to ride around the tombs of the kings of Silla. But I'm wearing pants. I'm not exactly sure what we're going to see or where we're going to end up--everyone I talk to seems to think that someone else is planning this. Oh, well.

Oh, seems like we may be headed for a temple. We'll see what we see. It's pretty dratted cold outside, but I'm well-layered so I hope that someone else will freeze before I do.

I love you!

RoseE"

In Which Winter Sets In and Some Good Missionary Things Happen

2009-11-16T12:01:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

Miss you like crazy, as always. I just sent off a box of Christmas Presents, minus Bit's and Bug's (for which I am still looking; they'll be on their way soon, I promise). Getting it there in time for Christmas made me very grateful for Grama Rosie's present. I'd like to express this gratitude to her, but I don't have her mailing address . . . *puppy dog eyes* I'm such a gosh darn high-maintenance missionary, I'm sorry. ;-( That's the last thing I'm requesting, I swear. I'll be good from now on.

35 cents is a good deal on medical care. Good job, Bug.

It's dang cold here, too -- the green coat is out and working, as are my lovely hat and gloves. Everybody likes the hat and says it's maushiitda (stylish) . . . this word keeps throwing me because it sounds too much like the French mauche, ugly.

Well, this week was Pepero day, which is like Valentine's Day would be if Valentine's Day had been invented by the company that makes the conversation hearts. The Pepero company just made it up about twenty years ago to boost sales, but hey, I'm all for giving and receiving chocolate-covered cookie sticks. I'm just a little smug that for once our version is older than their version.

We also had President's interviews this week, at which Prez looked at his paperwork and realized what had come to my attention some weeks ago, vis. that every Korean missionary in Kyongbuk zone is either in my district or my apartment, and that the only American missionary I ever see is Elder Murray. (Elder Murray's pretty cool. His family owns Nightmare Mansion and he wants to grow up to be a conservative radio talk show host.) So Prez asked me how that was going for me. And what could I say? I wanted to come to Korea, and boy, I'm here with a vengeance now. I'd love to feel sorry for myself, but when I do my companion gets hurt and sad, which I would too, if I were in her shoes, which I need to be more often. So staying positive. Learning Korean. Working. Being happy. That's the plan.

It was a pretty big week for missionary work. We Got Through A Door. WE GOT THROUGH A DOOR. You NEVER get through doors when you're doorknocking. I think the stat is 1000 rejections for every invitation to come inside and teach a lesson. But we got through a door. . . and taught the first lesson to three great kids whom I love already while their sweet grandma brought us persimmons. Awwww.

We've got a lot of people we're working with right now. How did this happen? This area was dead six weeks ago. I like this better, really.

Sunday sort of sums up what's been happening lately. Get ready for a name string, 'cuz these were the people I was excited to see at church: Jin Mok Hwan (less-active hairstylist friend), the new move-in recent convert from Taejeon we've been trying to track down, Hyeh Ji (new member/less-active), Ju Hyeah (her non-member best friend), Ii Un Kyeong (new member who's been missing church due to an ongoing fight with cancer) Hyeon Ji (member's niece/our investigator), our ward mission leader (he's missed two weeks; we thought he'd gone less-active), Ii Mi Suk (now sporting stylish headscarves to match her outfits) and the bishop's dog. Now the former bishop's dog, 'cuz the bishop got released and now we have a new bishop, Pyeon Chang Gi, who is one of my favorite members and married to another of my favorite members. And little Ryan Tollett got baptized and there was American junk food for all. And we rejoiced. But we still don't know what the former bishop's dog was doing in sacrament meeting. Welcome to Korea. Welcome to my life.

Today every missionary in creation (not really; just a bunch) got taken out to Kyeong Ju, which was the capital of the kingdom of Silla (read: very, very, VERY old). In the city now, all the buildings have traditional Korean roofs. Even new buildings. They have to build 'em that way; it's a law. Really. We went exploring in another temple . . . again, a sad experience, firstly for the thought of so many people believing that bowing to a statue will make their lives better, and secondly for the jarring collision of religion and commercialism that happens when still-active places of worship become tourist destinations. But the temple that we went to still has some wooden buildings that predate the Japanese invasions of the late 1500s, which is hard to do because the Japanese burned down pretty darn near everything.

In the midst of the pre-Christmas festivities (which I'm trying very hard to not think about missing), if you on Temple Square meet a Sister Durtschi (American), please tell her I say hi.

Love you! Gotta run!

RoseE"

In Which RoseE Gets A Good Scare, and We Are Confused By Lots of Korean Names

2009-11-10T03:15:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

How will I talk when I get home? Well, strangely enough, probably a lot like Dad. Korean structure puts pauses in a lot of the same places Dad does when he wants to see if anybody's actually listening to him. "I . . . *pausepausepause* want to go see a movie." Koreans do this. "Chonun . . . *think about it* 모모모." Also after conjunctions. "I want to go a movie AND *pause pause pause* eat yangnyeom chicken." And I've discovered that I can't really do normal introductory questions anymore. I can't spit out "So what's your family like? How many brothers and sisters do you have?" It just falls out Korean form: "How does your family become?" I'm sure you'll notice more in a few months.

It shouldn't be getting too much worse for a while, though, because the dreaded Michigan Test is coming up again in December, and since Sis. Pak failed it last time around she's going to take it again. So I'm going to put a lot of my Korean practice on hold and make her speak and listen to English. She improved a lot when she was living with three weigukins*, but she's been with hangukins** pretty much ever since and has started slipping.

Well, inasmuch as we are a united, eternal family, I up'n got sick too. Not bad. Yesterday was lots of sniffling and sneezing, but today it seems to have cleared up. I don't think it's the dreaded H1N1, which everybody is self-diagnosing this week (a couple schools are closed and the hygene masks are EVERYWHERE) . . . just a wrapup to the blissful seven months of healthiness I have thoroughly enjoyed since leaving the Pit of Disease and Death otherwise known as the Provo MTC.

Well, the cold snap hit and then it was gone. The weather's as lovely as it gets. Which is SO weird. Because it was blinkin' freezing for about two days, and we were frantically trying to make sure everyone had enough blankets and that their apartments were well-insulated (Elder Draper, out in the boonies, is looking for a new apartment because their place is colder inside than it is out) . . . and then the cold went away. Gone. Poof. Gorgeous outside.

So . . . missionary work is happening, or something. Hyeoh Un participated in the Primary Sacrament Meeting program yesterday, as did all of less-active Kim Mi Hyang's kids (BOTH their parents came, AGAIN, which is AWESOME). She's nervous about getting baptized, but she has a strong testimony and her mom is completely okay with whatever. And Gu Yeong Eh's niece Hyeon Ji came to church again, and we taught her the third lesson, and checked up on if she'd been reading the Book of Mormon . . . "Well, I got to First Nephi 14," she told us, pulling out her copy and flicking it open. Colors. On almost every page. She's Been Marking Stuff. "I didn't understand this part with the dream about the tree*** that Lehi had, but then later on it explained it really well#, so that was good."

You could have knocked both Sis. Pak and me over with a feather. Nothing blows missionaries away like someone actually, earnestly reading the Book of Mormon. Looking at that book was like Christmas.

So yeah. Hyeon Ji's doing fine.

We ALSO taught the first lesson to our less-active new-member friend Hyei Ji's best friend Ju Hyei (getting mixed up with the names yet?). She's attended church a few times, and told us that she loves Sacrament meeting and feels really good when she goes. She has been GETTING HYEI JI OUT OF BED TO COME TO CHURCH ON SUNDAYS. No, really. Our non-member has been dragging our less-active to church.

We ALSO taught the first lesson to Son Mi, aka Miracle Girl. We met Son Mi on the street two weeks ago with a couple of her friends, said hi, introduced our message, wished 'em a good day, moved on. Then, two days later, we were walking down the street and saw a girl talking on a cell phone. And I was (in my head) like, "Maybe we should talk to her." "Nah, she's on the phone." "But maybe we really, really should." And I hesitated, and looked at her, and she caught my eye and smiled (this DOESN'T happen in Korea) and hung up the phone. It was Son Mi.
Now, y'all know my memory for faces, vis., I have none. I didn't know her from Eve. Didn't recognize her at all. But it was the same girl, that I just randomly felt that I needed to talk to. Or perhaps not so randomly.

Anyway, we invited her to the Halloween party, and she came and helped out and had fun. And this week we made an appointment to teach her, and Sis. Pak made muffins.
We get to the church. She's late. We text. She replies. Sounds like she's not coming.

"Aww," Sis. Pak texts back, "we had a present we wanted to give you."

"Oh, okay," says Son Mi. "I'll be there in half an hour."

Sis Pak looks at her little bag of four muffins and decides that, while it's a fine surprise gift, it's not much to make a special trip for. So she and I went on a mad hunt through the chapel to find something that would be a better present. And what did we find but: A copy of "Stand a Little Taller" in Korean, colored paper, markers, stickers, scissors, tape, and ribbon. And we had a perfect little present waiting when she showed up, to listen earnestly and attentively to the first lesson, at which the Spirit was most decidedly in attendance.

So missionary stuff's goin' darn well in the fine city of Taegu. To quote Independence Day ('cuz it's P-Day and I can do stuff like that), the last couple of days have been REALLY exciting.

So, other news . . . oh, kyool. Gotta tell you about kyool. It is kyool season here in Korea. A kyool looks like an orange or a tangerine, is slightly larger than a golf ball, and is so sweet and lovely and delicious that you can just eat them like candy all day long. Sis Pak and her older sister once ate 250 of them in three days. Their skin turned orange.

Speaking of Sis. Pak, she hit her one-year mark this week, and we all had ribs at TGI Friday's to mark the occasion. (Lunch special. Missionaries are pros at knowing where the good lunch specials are.)

Also speaking of Sis. Pak, I keep forgetting to tell this story but I'll tell it now. A few weeks before Halloween, one night we'd just finished planning and I got up to go use the bathroom. When I came back to our room, I found Sis. Pak standing just inside the door with her very long straight black asian hair combed down over her face.

Three voices started up in my head. One was saying, "Huh. Sister Pak is standing just inside the doorway."

The second said "AAAAAAAHHHHH ITS THE FREAKY ASIAN GIRLDEMON THING LIKE FROM THE RING AND IT'S GONNA KILL ME AND I'M GONNA DIE OH CRAP"
The third said, "Oh, Sis. Pak is trying to scare me. That's a great Halloween idea. I wish I had cool Asian hair like that."

Unfortunately, it was the second voice that got control of my muscles first. So while the first and third voices were like "Wait! Don't!" I screamed my head off and smacked her clean across the face as hard as I could.

She was okay. And I was really, really sorry. And it was all really funny in a horrible kind of way. So yeah. I get to join the ranks of those sister missionaries who have in very fact physically attacked their companions. Lucky me.

Anyway, that's the news over here. We're gonna go watch Prince of Egypt (which Sis. Pak has never seen; some of the elders got permission for a movie day) and I'll write a bunch of letters and life will be good.

Love you! Be Good! Church is True!

RoseE"

*English-speaking companions

** Korean-speaking companions

***1 Nephi 8:4-38

# 1 Nephi 15

to Dad 10/26/09

2009-11-06T15:31:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Well, transfer calls are in and I'm staying in Taegu, so you don't have to worry about me getting tsunamied. It would take a heck of a tsunami to get across fifty miles of mountains.

Ken Burns has a new series out? Man, I miss all the good stuff. Right up your alley, too--history of the National Parks.

What you said about change echoed something I was dwelling on back in first transfer. We were studying one morning when we heard the phone ring in the other room. Sis. Hill picked it up--it was Pres. A few minutes later, she appeared in the doorway to announce, in a very somber voice, holding her bathroom tight around her, that her father's cancer had disappeared entirely.

And we all started sobbing.

Not that we were upset that her father had been spared from certain death--quite the opposite. But it was a change. A big, drastic, wrenching change. And change hurts, even when it's good. And I thought about the changes I'm going through. Maybe they're good changes. Maybe I'm becoming a better person. But good or bad, pain and fear are just naturally a part of that. And it's the same for our investigators and less-actives. Coming into the gospel is hard and scary--I forget that a lot, but it's true. This is hard. but like Elder Holland* says, Salvation was never a cheap experience. It's supposed to be hard. If it weren't hard, it would be easy. And what's the point of that?

I love you. Keep being a good dad. Because you really, really are. And don't get cancer.

RoseE"

*Elder Jeffrey R. Holland

to Bit 10/26/09

2009-11-06T12:06:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bit,

Happy 16th Birthday! I hope this package gets to you in time--though as I'm sending it before Halloween, it might very well show up super early. You never know.

I hope you and Dasha had a great time at the horse show! What was your time on the barrel race? How is the NAC's little orphan mustang doing? Have they named him yet? Who's going to train him?

My friend Sister Beckstead wants to know where your riding teachers come from. She's going home in December, and she's interested in doing some volunteer work with horses. She's an excellent rodeo rider and a great, patient teacher (she's taught me so much about missionary work ) and wants to know how she can get involved. I told her I would ask you.

Not much is happening here. It's starting to get pretty cold. Elder Chai Youn Hwan of the Seventy* is coming to visit us next month before he moves to Japan. I'm saving up to take my district out for Baskin-Robbins ice cream cake on my birthday. The cranes are migrating.

I love you!

RoseE"

*Members of the Quorums of the Seventy are called to proclaim the gospel and build up the Church. They work under the direction of the Twelve Apostles and the leadership of seven brethren who are called to serve as the Presidency of the Seventy. Members of the First and Second Quorums of the Seventy are designated General Authorities, and they may be called to serve anywhere in the world.

Weekly email 11/2/09

2009-11-02T11:34:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom and Dad,

Thanks for the updates on Gramma Olsen, and the letter from Bethe. Sorry the video didn't come through. This is probably the fault of this less-than-celestial e-mail server, which refuses to acknowledge that I have space in my inbox despite the fact that I have deleted all but five e-mails and, in truth, have nothing BUT space. Thrice-accursed thing. So if you sent a news-of-the-family this week, I didn't get it, and this is why I am not replying to it.

Life's good here in Korea. It got Very Cold and windy but Very Fast, so we're pulling out the heavy coats and running them to the dry-cleaners' downstairs. I finally found extra blankets on top of the other team's wardrobe, so I am sleeping much more comfortably now. And I got a BOX! Which makes life very happy indeed. I shared the Monster Cookies with the roommates (Sister Pak Se Ra thinks they're about the most delicious thing ever) and (some) of the Reese's with the Halloween party, but the rest of the Reese's and the candy corn are my private stash. I'm trying to eat them slowly . . . failing, but trying. And what was up with the nesting envelopes? Somebody got bored in Sacrament meeting, looks like. I love seeing the Sacrament meeting programs, though. It's great to see what's going on in the strangely-surreal world of Rose Park. I took a video of Sis. Pak opening this box, too, and finding her mouse, but all the dialogue turned out to be in Korean so I'll have to translate it before I can transcribe it. But she was way excited and thanks you a lot, and then proceeded to gloat that her Kiore was bigger than mine and hence its 'hyeong' (older brother). Which is fitting, because she's older than me and thus is my 'onni' and I have to do whatever she says. Not that I don't anyway, being junior companion and all . . . but this is a big deal in Korea, who's older than whom. Or bigger, in the case of knitted mice.

So this week was conducted with an Eye Single to the Glory of the Halloween Party. We had a last-minute wave of help in the form of Elder Son Oo Shik's new companion Elder Murray, whose family owns Nightmare Mansion. No, really. His family are professional haunted-house makers. Having no budget and no time cramped his style a little bit, but he came through with flying colors, as did every other missionary in Taegu, and the thing was an absolute success. The party opened with a dance number to the theme music from 'Bewitched', at the end of which Elder Hansen shot Elder Murray stone dead (he had to be dragged offstage). Then there were party games all over, including sack races (garbage bags we found in the chapel), bobbing for apples (all given to us by members as Chuseok leftovers), a pinata (four balloons, tape, last week's newspaper from our door guard, a bag of flour also found in the chapel, and a candy run to Costco (plus some, but not all, of my Reese's from home)), balloon-stomping competitions (leftovers from the pinata-making) and eating donuts off strings (these had to be purchased fair and square--darn it). I face-painted all evening, doing lots of pumpkins with the orange paint on the inside of the jar lid (a pinata and four other decorative papier-mache pumpkins go through a lot of orange and homemade red/yellow sort-of-orangey pink). The second floor of the chapel was the haunted house. The Zone leaders brought dry ice from Baskin Robbins, and we had a lot of curtains and stuff from a bag of scrap fabric a less-active sister was about to throw out when we visited, and the Elders just had a grand old time jumping out of closets and such. It was great. And lots of people came, members, non-members, less-active members, friends of members, people we'd met on the street two days before . . . AND many of the above came to church the next day.

Yep. Hyeon Ji, the girl we taught the first lesson last week, came to the party AND to church AND we taught her the second lesson. Yaaaay! And our hasn't-been-seen-in-yonks recent convert Hyeh Ji brought her friend Ju Hyeah to church again, and we're going to meet them later on this week. (Hyeh Ji hasn't been coming to church because she doesn't have any friends her age here. I can see this situation working out very well.) And Jin Mok Hwan, our hairdresser friend, has been at church every week for a month. Her fantastic daughter is over-the-moon happy.

One notable absence at church was little Hyeoh Un, who was forbidden to attend by her father because she hadn't done all of her homework on Saturday--she'd gone to a friend's house instead. We called Sunday night to check on her, and she was in a sulk about it. She REALLY wants to go to church. Her conversation with Sis. Pak went something like this:

"So you couldn't come to church today?"

*sigh* "Yeah."

"Awww, that's too bad! But it's important to do your homework, too."

*sigh* "Yeah."

"Can we still come over this week and teach you?"

*no sigh* "YES!"

"Okay. See you on Saturday!"

"Okay! I love you!"

"Love you too!"

I love this kid.

Sunday was Operation: Save Yeongchon Branch*. Yeongchon is a tiny town of no importance a good ways out of Taegu, and as people have been migrating away from it into bigger cities like Taegu and Pusan the branch has shrunk . . . and shrunk . . . and now there are about seven people regularly attending. (The elders are very smug about knowing the names of Every Single Active Member of their unit.) It's in danger of collapse and closure. So we got the whole zone together (some twenty elders, plus we four sisters), fasted and prayed, and went to Yeongchon. One team went and visited less-actives with the branch president, another team knocked doors, and two other teams (self included) did streetboarding all afternoon with the stake presidency. I was with Sis. Ahn Ta Yeon, the new greenie (who is awesome, by the way). And all afternoon we just talked to people. I'm generally scared to death of street prostelyting, and hate doing it, but Sunday it was different. We had a real, concrete goal in mind: find people who are ready to hear about the gospel, and bring them to Yeongchon branch, so that the Church doesn't vanish from this city. We worked hard and gave the Yeongchon elders a lot of contacts to follow up on. All that prayer, fasting, and work can do will be done. And the stake presidency worked with us--got to see that we are working, and working hard, despite the low stats that come from kicking the 30/30 program.

And . . . not much else, really. I've discovered a refreshing beverage made from mixing water, blueberry vineagar, and rice syrup (when apple juice is unobtainable, you start improvising). Sis. I Mi Suk has shaved her head, cutting her hair off herself rather than letting the chemo take it (you go, girl) and she lent me one of her bandannas for my pirate costume for the halloween party. Oh, and the other big news . . . she's lost a lot of weight, what with having cancer and all, and had these bags of clothes that were too big for her. Had. Because she made me take them all. T-shirts from the Japan/Korea world cup, sparkly sweatshirts reading 'Killswitch Engage', a capsleeve that says 'Naughty and Wild Kittens' in HUGE letters (funniest thing in the entire universe to give to a sister missionary--I love it) and . . . a hanbok. No, really. A beautiful yellow hanbok**. I tried like twelve times to refuse it . . . you don't just give people HANBOKS, for crying out loud . . . but she pulled the I'm-older-than-you-and-therefore-the-boss-so-do-what-you're-told card, and the hanbok is now mine. I'm still speechless at the thought.

And now I've officially written a lot. I love you, be good, stay out of trouble, hope you're not dead or dying, thank you for the box, a reciprocal one will be in the mail soon.

RoseE"

*a branch is smaller than a ward, approximately 60 members or less.

**hanbok: traditional South Korean dress. Check the link for hanboks and other fantastical Korean wearing apparel.

To Bit 10/19/09

2009-11-02T11:27:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bit,

Hi! How's high school treating you? How did you and Dancer do in the barrel racing competition?

I still don't get to ride horses for exercise. :( But I was looking around my tiny apartment, and in a cupboard that was stuck shut (I almost had to pry it open with a chopstick) I found a book about yoga. So now I can do yoga in the mornings, too. It's hard, but fun. But it's getting cold here in Taegu, so the corridor outside my apartment gets dang chilly. You have to do yoga in bare fee, otherwise you slide around and can hurt yourself. Cold feet! I might try to do it inside, but my apartment is so tiny I don't know where I'll find space. Hmmm.

I heard you are taking a class at SLCC*. How's that? I remember Cat did a lot of those when she was in high school. Do you have to take the bus down south to campus every day? Or is it just on Saturdays, or what? What are you learning?

Taegu has an Opera Festival every year, and it's going on right now. One of the elders here, Elder Hansen, was studying to be an opera singer before he came on his mission, so the Stake Young Women are having an activity to learn about opera from him. Then afterwards we're doing a Halloween party. There isn't Halloween in Korea, so the missionaries have to do it themselves. I'm going to be a pirate. Even as a missionary, I refuse to miss dressing up for Halloween.

I love you and miss you! Sugohaseyo! (This means "please work very hard")

RoseE"

*SLCC: local community college, about 3 miles south of the high school.

to Bug, 10/19/09

2009-11-02T11:16:00.000-08:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bug,

Is it showing yet at home? It's windy and sunny here. I'm at a lake outside a city called Gumi--we and some elders made a special trip out here to spend the day with the branch president and his family. We went up to the oldest temple in Korea to eat PB&Js and see all the leaves changing color. There was also a big bell, the kind you hit from the outside instead of swinging it. Sister Pak wasn't supposed to ring it, but she did anyway, very softly, and it made a big, soft, deep GONG sound that made my bones feel all tickley and itchy. Then we drove down through the rice fields, which are bright, bright yellow because the rice is almost ready to harvest, to this lake, where the elders are fishing. Or trying to. They're not catching anything as far as I can see. It's really windy down here, so we sisters, the branch president's wife, and the kids are hanging out in the car.

This is the last week of the transfer--on Friday night we'll get The Calls telling us who has to move. I think my roommate Sister Ii Yeong Bin will be leaving, because she's been in Taegu a long time. We'll see.

I love you! Don't grow up too fast.

RoseE"

Pictures!

2009-10-26T12:44:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

I'm glad to hear that Bug is still alive and cancer-free. This news is joyous to my soul.

(actually the expression on our faces when we found the camera)

If I know Dad, he's getting Bug a wheelchair at Disneyworld so that he can have an extra line shortcut. Maybe one for himself, too, if the coughing gets much worse. Awww, I miss random for-the-heck-of-it Dad trips. We tried to do a random for-the-heck-of-it trip to Pusan today, to hit Nampodong market, but the Zone Leaders said no soap so we proved them wrong by CLEANING OUR APARTMENT but HARDCORE. I've been scrubbing at the kitchen whenever I get a chance (we have a fruit fly issue), but even now, after all that and two hours of intense black-sludge-getting-rinsed-out-of-my-washrag labor, it still needs so much work. The bathroom looks much better, though, thanks to Sis. Pak. Even the broken sink faucet is shiny and sparkly. And I found muffin tins in the gook under the sink, so I can make muffin-shaped muffins now.

All this cleaning was mostly because of the transfer calls. The verdict is in: Sis. Pak and I are staying, so I'm in Taegu at least until the first week of December. Sister Ii Yeong Bin is out, and Sister Pak Se Ra is training the new Korean sister. And we thought it would be a bit traumatic to come in after training day to our tiny grubby apartment in the state it's in. So it's in a better state now. And it's full of food; Sis. Pak got a box this week, not from her family, but from a soon-to-be-baptized investigator from back in Sujeong ward. An enormous box, full of ramen, snacks, and new shoes. Yeah. Everyone thinks that this is a decidedly flirty move, and he is single as far as we know, so perhaps it's a good thing that Sis Pak's staying up here and not getting transfered back down to Pusan . . .

Last night we got to teach the first lesson to Sister Gu Yeong Eh's niece, which was lovely. I like teaching a lot better than prostelyting: I feel energized and positive when teaching, whereas I feel like I want to throw up when prostelyting. Yeah, still scared to death of that. Sigh.

Other news . . . I'm having to remember everything cold-turkey, because I left my 'news' list at home . . . um . . . Well, we're teaching Hyeoh Un lesson 4 now, Commandments, and getting her ready to be baptized probably some time in the coming transfer. Between her, and Hyeon Ji (the above-mentioned niece), and the truckload of referals we got from Church Headquarters (we think they're from Temple Square at conference time, 'cuz a bunch of us got a LOT), we've got a lot of work to do. Which is good. I don't like having no work to do; my mind wanders and I get sulky.

Halloweeen's on Saturday, and Sis. Pak and I are putting the Halloween party together. Mad schemes are underway for 'bobbed apples' and a 'sacrace race' (I couldn't correct these because they were just too adorable) and a haunted house on the second floor of the chapel. As we were planning it, we got ourselves pretty well creeped out, so we figure it's gonna be hard to go wrong. Halloween decorations are thin on the ground over here, but we found a bunch of plastic cardboard-y stuff that the remodeling place 'round the corner doesn't want, and I'm brushing up my kleenex-ghost-making skills. More updates to follow.

Um, what else . . . oh, there was a Fireside on Friday night that the Missionaries had nothing to do with as far as planning or implimentation goes, which is quite novel. We did perform "I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go"* and "Called To Serve,"** and Elder Son Oo Shik played "Come, Come, Ye Saints"*** on his okaraina (traditional Korean flute, kind of like the little ceramic turtle-flutes you sometimes see . . . it's got a lovely sound). A girl in another ward who's leaving for the MTC today (serving in Anaheim) was nearly made to perform with us at the last minute, but mercy prevailed, and she was only made to bear her testimony. A good collection of investigators came from all over Taegu, and there was strusel bread from Paris Baguette afterward, so everybody wins.

Um . . . and . . . well, the straps broke on my black shoes this week, so (after several futile repair attempts) I cut'em off and now have a brand new-looking-sort-of pair of shoes. It's variety. They're really standing up to ten months of abuse astonishingly well.

Um, I really think that's most of the news for this week. So I'll quit typing here and go work on picture sending/backup.

. . .

I love you! Which is why I'm teaching you ㅗ, which is O, like the name of the letter. So now you can say 모모, which is Korean for 'bla bla bla' and also conveniently the name of a flying lemur who chatters but cannot talk.

Kiore on the Train to Gumi

Making kimchi at Jin Jang Hi's house

View from the mountain we climbed

RoseE"

* "I'll Go Where You Want Me to Go" LDS Hymns #270

** "Called To Serve" LDS Hymns # 249

*** "Come, Come Ye Saints" LDS Hymns #30

to Auntie Cat, 26 October '09

2009-10-26T09:55:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Auntie Cat,

Gosh! You're such a faithful correspondent and I've been simply atrocious about getting back to you. I'm going to work on repenting of that. You are an astonishingly forgiving person.

At any rate, thank you so much for the newsy emails! I love hearing what's going on with you and your family. Is the pipe-and-drum performance season pretty much over, or do you still have gigs into the fall and winter? Have you and Mom yet concocted another plan for one to visit the other sometime soon?

I don't think I told you (but maybe I did and I forgot) that in the small jewelry collection that came with me to Korea is the necklace I made from one of the shells we found out at the beach that one time. It's a white shell with little touches of tan at the edges, and it looks great with dark tops--and as all my blazer-like things are black or gray, I've been wearing it a lot. Cold weather = black jacket = shell necklace. And it's gonna get colder before all's said and done. I'm staying in Taegu (way inland) at least until December, so I'm probably going to get fairly well chilled before either the weather warms up or President transfers me down to Masan on the south coast. But that's okay. I'm from Minnesota. I can take any weather Korea cares to dish out.

In other news, well . . . last night we were given the opportunity (on very short notice . . . this is the kind of surprise I like) to teach our member friend's niece the message of the Restoration. I think that spending an evening talking about Heavenly Father and prophets and apostles and eternal families, with a small fuzzy dog curled up on your lap, to someone who wants to listen, is my new favorite activity. We get so few opportunities to really teach like that, but I think that those experiences are the only things that really give me energy. It's so easy to get really tired and frustrated when you spend all day trying to talk to people who don't want to listen. (Both my companion and I are still scared to death of talking to people on the street, she because she's a Korean woman [Korean women generally don't speak to strangers--it's not polite] and me because I have all the communication skills of a fairly well-trained bottlenose dolphin.) But when we get a chance to teach somebody, suddenly we both feel like a million bucks (well, 1 billion won, in Sister Pak's case) and like all the work is worth it and anything's possible. I wish I could feel like that all the time. I'm working on it. Study more, pray harder, love less selfishly, and work-work-work. They tell me this does wonders.

I love you. Thank you so much for your love and support and prayers, and for all the good you do down south there. You're an amazing, loving, wonderful person, full of faith and energy, and if I could be more like you I would be very well pleased.

RoseE"

Second Box from Korea

2009-10-19T16:39:00.001-07:00

We received the box RoseE mentioned in her email earlier today. Here, finally, are the pictures of the contents of the box. Sorry for the blurriness. This camera doesn't do close-ups well.

1) Little red baby booties. Sister Anderson, who serves in the office, is learning to knit and made them for all the younger sisters' trousseaus*. I don't think I have a trousseau.

2) Some "thank-you" New Zealand chocolate from Sister Matthews.

3) Some more Fanta shakers, as per Bug's request.

4) Chalduck Pies. This is the much-talked-of "duck," filled with red bean (I lied: it's more like chocolate) and dipped in chocolate.

5) Pineapple cookies. Joyous to my soul. Not for Dad.**

6) DVDs! Korea is the Tortuga of DVDs. These are MINE and they are PRECIOUS, so if you want to watch them, TAKE GOOD CARE OF THEM OR I WILL KILL YOU!

7) A book, which was a present from Brother Cho Jung Gol when I transferred. (He just got called to the Elder's Quorum Presidency. Yaay!) I can't read it right now, so it's going home.

I'll add the pictures later. Stay tuned.

Blogmom.

*I think she means a hope chest. A trousseau is for your honeymoon, containing a traveling suit, a negligee, a swimsuit, etc; a hope chest is for when you get home and set up house. It has things like tablecloths, napkins, quilts, sheets, beeswax candles, silver spoons, and baby layettes and booties. Stuff like that.

**Dad is allergic to pineapple.

to Todd, dated 10/12/09

2009-10-19T16:31:00.001-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Behold the first page of the "military" section of the stationary pad. I'm going to be in it for a while. Inasmuch as 2 years' military service is required of all Korean men, there's a big "writing-to-your-army-boyfriend" niche. (Sister Jung Min Hee's military boyfriend just Dear Jane'd her . . . or possibly she Dear Johned him; I didn't pry . . . but in honor of the occasion she cut her hair short. It was an admirable gesture of strength and defiance, and she looks great, so we all have high hopes she'll get through this okay.)

I like your mission goals*. I haven't baptized anybody, and probably won't, but we did teach and see baptized Bro Cho Sung Gol, which I think fulfills the requirement. (I've heard both that he's been called as Elder's Quorum 2nd Counselor and that he's gone inactive, both from uncertain sources . . . either way, I'm in Taegu and he's in Pusan, so if he needs help some other missionaries will have to give it.) Senior I think I'll have to be someday, because all those sisters older than me are dying in December, and when that happens, the language will come because it has to. Lofty goals are all well and good, but there's something to be said for just getting the blessings you truly need, and not the ones that "will make people say "Wow--what a great missionary!" when you get home. I don't think I want to be great. Even being good is quite enough to be shooting for right now. We'll see.

I love you.

RoseE"

*Todd's mission goals: 1) perform a baptism; 2) become senior companion; 3) learn the language

The Lord Watches Over Missionaries

2009-10-19T13:45:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

STOP THE PRESSES! The camera's back. Yeah. Like, fifth degree miracle (if 1 is a little miracle, on the miracle scale that I made up just right now). It's back, it's fine, it was rescued by the little old man who runs the watch store and Sis Pak (much more in tune with the Spirit than myself) was directed right to him to ask about the camera. On my exact nine-months-out anniversary. MIRACLE in big letters. I'd tell you all about it but I have SEVEN MINUTES to write this e-mail because Gosh Dang Elder Ii Son Gi dragged us all out to Gumi today, which was fun, but not at the expense of my e-mail time. Rrrrgh.

So top of the list: I got a letter bounced back this week sent to a one Madame Felicia Marshall, my punk ex-roommate who seems to have moved. If word should by any chance come to you, through, say, a former roommate who is reading the blog, of where Felicia lives now so I can send her her dang letter, please pass it along.

It up'n got cold! I've gotten out my old cordoroy jacket, and am thinking about running the green coat to the dry cleaners--it's been suitcased for a long time.

Hyeoh Un is working towards getting baptized. Her mom is utterly okay with this, which is very weird to me, because, as we all know, Mormons are a devilcult. But hey, whatever works. Her little brother Dong Oo sat in on our lesson this week, and listened to the whole thing, which is a remarkable feat for a six-year-old to accomplish of his own free will.

We found a less-active member this week who got baptized some twenty years ago and has since become a teacher in another church, and who Bible-bashed us freely for some two solid hours. Sister Pak was a saint through the whole ordeal. It is hard . . . it is SO hard not to fight about doctrine with someone who is trying to provoke you into it. I mean, it's easy for me, 'cuz I can't say much of anything, but hard for Sister Pak, who was made to feel like crap because she doesn't know the Book of Revelation backwards and forwards. But she stayed calm, kept the Spirit, and held to her testimony of the Restoration and the Book of Mormon. That's all we can do. We were both emotionally drained by the time we got out of there, but somehow felt like really good missionaries . . . rejoicing that we were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name, I guess. And rejoicing that the roommates had ice cream and sympathy when we got home.

Okay, Sis. Pak says I've got fifteen minutes more than I thought I had, so that's good. No pictures this week 'cuz I'm e-mailing at the train station where the USB jacks don't work. But I will (VERY SOON) be BACKING UP MY MIRACULOUSLY RETURNED PHOTOS and hopefully sending a copy home for safekeeping. So let me fill in the camera story here.

We were walking past the fateful bus stop where I set the camera down in a moment of abstraction and never saw it again, and the bench where we'd been sitting was being mopped by a little old man. And Sis Pak stopped dead and told me, "You should ask him about your camera." So I did. And then Sis Pak translated what I said, because old people can't understand my Korean. And this little old man grumbled a bit, set down his mop, hobbled across the sidewalk to the watch repair shop where we put money on our bus cards, opened a back cupboard, and . . . there it was. Not a scratch. And he just handed it to me and that was that. Well, that wasn't that . . . there was a lot of gasping and bowing and thanks and screaming and crying and prayer on my part. But the camera and all the pictures are safe. So if Grama wants that $50 back (much thanks to her, by the way) she would be quite justified. I'm refunding Elder Overmeyier the 'sympathy cookie' he gave me. I'd refund y'all sympathy cookies, but . . .

By the bye, I slow-boated a box home about two months ago, so it should be getting in any day. Tell me when it gets through, if you would, please.

I am praying for Great-Grama.*

We do get the Ensign; we'll be okay on that.**

Good luck on Bug's surgery***; please remember that those recovering from surgical procedures are entitled to get their way about everything all the time.

I love you all! I'm gonna go look at pictures now. Oh, and please tell Cat Wilson I've been downright evil about not writing her back, but I'll remedy that next week, 'pon my soul. Oh, and next week's transfer days, so the die will once again be cast.

Today you get to learn the consonant ㅣ, which says E (like the name of the letter). So you can say 미, which is the second syllable of my Korean name.

Love you!

RoseE"

*Rose Olsen, aged 95 3/4, still kickin' and crackin' jokes with the best of them in Montana, but starting to fail.

**General Conference reports, printed in the November Ensign.

**Small Brother has a tumor on the top of his left femur. It is being surgically removed on 10/22.

Loss of a Camera, Conference Notes

2009-10-14T03:46:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mom & Dad,

Glad to know that everyone's still alive out there. It was a bit of a freaked-out week last week.
. . .

Well, news of the week. Bad news first. I'd give you all the excruciating details of how this happened, but that would just make me feel awful again, so suffice to say that I lost track of my camera at a critical moment and the odds are now EXTREMELY small that I'm ever going to see it again. When I realized this, I just about fainted. Really. I got all shaky and couldn't talk for about fifteen minutes. My camera. With all of my pictures. The last nine months of my life.
Salvage operations are underway. The backup disk I sent home is safe in your keeping (right?), and the photos I e-mailed home are okay, and I have prints of a few others here with me. I also got a flash drive and am passing it around to the missionaries I've served with, to get copies of THEIR pictures of people and events that we both photographed. So it's not the end of the world--it just really, really felt like it for a while. I used that thing every day. It was how I memorized names and faces, how I navigated, how I copied down things I didn't have time to write by hand (Yeah . . . the granola and muffin recipes are gone, too), and contained my collection of Strange Korean Business and Product Names. And that picture of Elder Robb when he fell asleep on the bus that one time. It's been a very Book-of-Mormon week, when you realize just how precious your records are and how diligent you should be in keeping them. I haven't been as diligent as I should, and now it's coming back to bite me.

I also have to get a new camera. I don't really want to, because a. I loved that camera like my own child and b. I'm not exaaaactly sure about my personal financial situation right now, much less what it's going to be when I get back. My big talk about iPods aside, I'd been hoping not to touch my personal money for a good, long while. But I do need a camera, so I guess I'll just have to (as Cara says) burn that bridge when I come to it, be as economical as I can, and hope things work out.

In better news, this week was General Conference! Which was great except that I'M THE ONLY SISTER MISSIONARY IN TAEGU WHO SPEAKS ENGLISH. Which meant that on Saturday, when none of the American branch showed up for Conference, I had to stay with my companion. Morning session we watched together in English, upstairs with the elders, and afternoon session we watched downstairs, in Korean, with the Stake. Being in a dark room listening to a language you don't speak being spoken by someone who isn't going to require a response from you is not a surefire formula for staying awake. So I started taking notes. To give you some perspective on my life right now, here are my notes on President Packer's* talk--every word I understood, written as fast as I could scribble.

My father dispensation restoration of the gospel. We are children of God. We wear bodies of flesh. Agency. Through the Atonement, we can be clean. Through baptism members of the church receive the Holy Ghost. Physical eyes spiritual eyes. Prez Uchtdorf conference experience Indiana Holy Ghost guidance these words 30 min tree big tree Holy Ghost calling received. Airplane please bless start California through prayer learn time prophet Gift of the Gholy Ghost men and women and children angel not just men little children Christ teaches and guides (scripture reference: my thoughts higher than your thoughts) Please pray Please be clean the Seventy serve his mother China? But one hour during method started last me my mother 30 meters American mission what work? Prayed. Next letter What work time parents were praying experience (scripture reference) feel 4 times older brother pray to mom because of prayer dad how this way (something funny) like Amulek in heart pray They will please don't sent to this world face (scripture reference) We sin Thomas S. Monson LDS Church special testimony received calling through revelation all spirits through revelation authority they through Lord Amen.**

Yeeeah. And that was someone speaking slowly, on a topic I was familiar with. That's basically what Korean sounds like to me right now: lots of words, but no actual meaning.

But Sunday was better. The Americans showed up, and so did Sisters Hill and Corrigan from Masan, so I got to watch the whole thing in English and enjoy the bliss that is the American Branch Between-Session Potluck Lunch and try to get four-year-old Gabe to eat something besides Pretzels. It was fun just spending time with the American branch, getting to know them as Me and not as Sister Matthews' companion, and also not as 'I'd-love-to-chat-but-I'm-technically-serving-in-the-Korean-Ward-So-I-Sould-Really-Go -socialize-with-them." And yikes! Was not Elder Holland's*** talk something else? Elder Holland's on the (very short) list of people I absolutely adore, deeply respect, and am scared to death of.

Also this week we taught Hyeoh Un again. This girl is great. She's retaining a lot of what we teach her (much more than I would have at any age, and she's only ten), and when we asked her if she'd been praying like we taught her, she responded, "Yes--I've been praying for my dad to stop drinking and smoking." We haven't taught her about the Word of Wisdom yet. We're now praying for her dad, too. And we just had a great time at her house, playing with her and her little brother, and singing for their mom, who was laughing her head off at her wonderful crazy kids. She looked like she needed the relief of it. We were able to bring the Spirit into their home, and only good can come of that, for their whole family. We are filled with love and hope concerning them.

Sunday afternoon, after Conference, Sis Pak and I ran into a festival going on along our river. We walked through it, wishing like crazy that it would keep going 'till Monday (but it didn't) and getting an eyeful of all the fun stuff. There was a kabuki puppetry group retelling a Korean folktale (Sis Pak filled me in on the plot) and a woman walking around in a kimono (why, I dunno . . . VERY Japanese/VERY not Korean, and also probably so much less comfortable than a hanbok#) (but it looked cool) and a bunch of cool colorful sculptures in the river and a stage where local dance groups were performing. There were a bunch of traditional Korean drums offstage, but we didn't get to hear them because we had to go to a dinner appointment. Rats. But it was great to see all of the color and energy, all the families out to have fun and spend time together. If I weren't a Saintly Sister Missionary Who Is Always Focused on the Work, I would have even been a bit homesick, for such activities on weekend afternoons with my own family. Ahem.

The members keep giving us fruit. We're drowning in it. Oh, and I made myself a treat this week; last transfer I got a box of Hamburger Helper from one of the weigukin families, and I whipped that up. Without hamburger, of course--with bulgogi. But it was still pretty tasty and I've got lots of leftovers.

On the scripture front, I passed a big hurdle: I finished the book of Alma in Korean. HA! Just in time, too, because at Zone Conference Prez gave us all a new reading challenge--to get through the Book of Mormon in our native language before Christmas, marking specific things like Names of Christ, 'Thus-saith-the-Lord' direct quotes, references to the attributes of Christ, and (my favorite) things that might be construed as a parallel of life in our mission. (Laban fallen to the ground drunken## . . . you see a lot of those around here). I'm having a blast with this, and Sis. Pak and I have a lot of fun discussing it in companion study###. And when I'm done with that for the week, it's back to slogging through Helaman, one unknown word at a time. I made it through Alma, though . . . I'm gonna finish. I'm gonna do it.

So I think that's the news of the week. I'm healthy (although I stepped on a roofing nail@ this morning--through divine providence, I was wearing my wedges so it only damaged the shoe, not the foot) and well content, pretty much, well-fed and I'm now going to go used clothes/camera shopping for the rest of my P-Day. I love you! Dad, you've got a letter coming; couldn't write any last week.

RoseE"

*President Boyd K. Packer, acting president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

**General Conference talks will be available in a week or two online, and I'll pass you the link when they are. It'll be pretty interesting (and probably amusing) to compare RoseE's notes to the actual talk.

*** Elder Jeffrey R. Holland, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles

# hanbok: traditional South Korean dress

## Our Hero, Nephi, and his brothers Laman, Lemuel and Sam, are fleeing Jerusalem with their family about 600 B.C. They are commanded by the Lord to return to the city to obtain the record of the Jews and also a genealogy of their forefathers, engraven upon plates of brass, at that time in the keeping of one Laban, a somewhat imposing Jewish Elder. The brothers collectively ask Laban for the plates several times, even offering to pay in gold. Laban takes the gold but understandably refuses to give them the brass plates. Nephi finally goes into a darkened Jerusalem alone and finds Laban passed out drunk. After having a little argument with the Lord about the 6th commandment wherein the Lord wins, Nephi takes Laban's own sword out of it's scabbard, chops off Laban's head, puts on Laban's clothes and by deception obtains the brass plates which his family uses to keep themselves on the straight and narrow--sort of--for centuries after. See 1 Nephi 3 and 4.

### Companion Study: every morning she and her companion study the scriptures together for an hour.

@RoseE has a history of stepping on (rusty) nails. The first incident was in a Chicago hotel. The nail went into her foot and she had to be rescued by her baby sister, then aged 2. The second time was at a northern Minnesota language camp. The nail again went into her foot, and she had to be taken by van into the nearest town to have it removed and get a tetnus shot.

letter to Todd, early October

2009-10-14T03:18:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

Will I still be able to give blood when I get home? I know you know. And why do you so thoroughly dislike Oklahoma? We've never lived in any of its border states, so it can't be a border rivalry. But next P-day we're going up to Palgong Mountain with the Tollets from Tulsa, so even if they do know the outcome of the game and I can't win a bet, I can still offhandedly mention that my school beat theirs.

Who puts together the Sacrament Meeting programs*--Brother Landon? It seems like that one** was particularly chosen just to drive you nuts and make you look everybody up. Sacrament programs are not done in Korea, which is inconvenient, because it would be nice to be able to learn names while listening to people give their talks. Oh, well. If the Korean Church has to drop some institutions and practices, it's probably best they ditch the Sacrament program and not something like Primary.*** There are things that matter and things that don't. Sacrament Meeting programs, like Sunday School attendance records, are Don'ts.

Do you know, or can you find, a dish called yang nyeon chicken? (I think that's the romanization.) It's a fried-chicken thing in a lovely sweet, sticky, a little bit spicey, dark red sauce with sesame seeds sprinkled on top. If you're still exploring Korean cooking, this'd be a good one to hunt down. I'd give a lot to know how to make that sauce. If you'd tried it, you would, too.

Love you!

RoseE"

*Sacrament Meeting programs: a printed sheet of paper, folded in half, that outlines the speakers, etc, for Sacrament Meeting on Sunday.

** One Sunday the picture on the front of the Sacrament Meeting program was an old photograph from 1856 or so showing a collecting of Church officials. No names were included. More people that just Todd spent hours looking up the identities of the collection of bearded men.

*** Primary: the Sunday School organization for children ages 3-12.

2009-10-06T13:06:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Dad,

. . . I went to a baptism . . . of a girl Sister Pak Sung Hee and Sister Hawkins had been teaching. The whole ward was there to support her, and Prez. and Sis. Jennings came--Prez gave one of the talks*. Her mom had been baptized a while before. And I thought, this is how it needs to be. This is the right time, the right way. This is a good day for this wonderful girl. It took months of work and patience and prayer, but it was worth it. A baptism like that is like a temple marriage**.

. . .

I don't want to be ashamed of anything that happens or that I do on my mission. Even the dumb stuff I occasionally do, like jaywalking across the freeway or wading a creek with my skirt hitched up to my knees--yeah, maybe it was dumb, but I'm not ashamed of it. I did none of it selfishly to the harm of others whom I should be protecting. I've heard tell of "baseball baptisms" in Japan and the interminable 30/30 English program*** in Taejean, Seoul, and Seoul West . . . and even in this mission, under the former Mission President, the missionaries were supposed to yell every morning as they left their apartments: "Pusan Sankyobu! Fighting! Let's Do It! One thousand baptisms! Why not?" Pak Ji Yeon still did this, out of habit. (Elder Hansen's personal interpretation of this was "One thousand less-actives! Why not?") President Jennings has ditched the thing entirely in favor of "I love missionary work!" which has the advantage of being quicker off the tongue, at least. So yeah. Busan Sankyobu. Fighting. Let's do it. Our stats are crap but our baptisms are solid. (Sister Kim Yoan Ha, who's serving in Yeonsan now, told me a while back that Bro. Cho Jing Gol had been called as Second Counselor in the Elder's Quorum Presidency#. It's a dang small ward, to give that calling to a convert of 1 month, but the news was pleasing to me. That's the kind of responsibility you've got to stick with, and that makes you get to know the ward but fast.)

We're still working on cleaning up the swarm of once-baptized-and-never-heard-from-agains. Thankfully, the wards just got computers a few months ago that let them update their own CMIS## records, instead of having to send things to Seoul (which never got done, and if it did often got lost in the paperwork shuffle up there). The missionaries are being called on to do a lot of the legwork on this, which is tiresome, but I'm glad to be able to help with it. Forgotten less-active members are like unresolved sins on the conscience of a ward. Missionaries don't want to bring new converts into wards where so many investigators before have just been forgotten. It's beyond my knowledge whose fault any of the paperwork mess really ends up being, but I'm glad it's getting better and not worse--that we're finding those people we can find and re-defining how wards work in Korea. Or at least in Pusan mission.

Bye the bye, I didn't tell you at the time, but I think I found the river you meant when you said the North Koreans got held up in Taegu. Because there's a big, actual river river outside town that I didn't know about until a couple weeks ago. The kind that would actually give a sensible general pause.

Autumn's coming here. I can smell it. The air feels a little different, somehow. I think my only summer in Korea may be over. Gosh, this goes fast. Except the part in the MTC. That stretch was so long, I think I'm still enduring it.

Love ya,

RoseE"

*at an LDS baptism, 2 talks are given by members of the baptizee's choice: one on baptism and one on the gift of the Holy Ghost. These talks are supposed to give guidance and counsel to the new member, and being as they are given by somebody who knows the baptizee, have the added advantage of being able to be tailored personally to him/her.

**Instead of being married "til death do us part", in an LDS temple couples are sealed together for time and all eternity. Temple Marriage

***30/30 English program: for Koreans wishing to learn English, the missionaries would teach them 30 minutes of English if they would listen to 30 minutes of gospel instruction.

#RoseE participated in Brother Cho's baptism last month. There are 2 counselors assigned to the Elder's Quorum president; the Elder's Quorum being "the group of men in the ward ages 18 to about 40. The muscle of the ward. If you have to move or have a roof redone, they are who you call." (from Todd) Second Counselor in the Elder's Quorum Presidency is a calling with a lot of responsibility.

##CMIS I think this is the computer system that the wards use for records.

Korean Holiday

2009-10-05T14:03:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum & Dad,

Looks like there's some kind of scramble going on over there, because I don't see an e-mail from all y'all. Maybe it was just a really boring week. Or maybe (as is more likely) my gosh darn e-mail account is bouncing things, despite being all but empty (it refuses to admit that I've got space in here. It's possessed or something).

Anyway, we're doing all right over here. The big news of the week was Sisters' Conference, which happened over Chuseok since we can't really get any missionary work done when Chuseok is going on. (It was eerie. Really. There were moments when I could hear No Cars At All.) Anyway, Thursday afternoon we hopped on the train and went down to Pusan, where we got to go into the mission president's house for the first time since I got here. It was great to see absolutely everybody--Sister Matthews, Sister Montgomery, Sisters Beckstead and Ogelvie, Sister Linford and Sister Jung Min Hee from the MTC, Sister Musser, the legendary Sister "Ace" Acey . . . well, everybody, in fact. There were talks, of course . . . fairly inevitable . . . but there was also Costco pizza (lots of it) and a game of Jeopardy (funniest sight ever: a dozen Korean sister missionaries frantically trying to figure out the meaning of the expression 'trick or treat') and a watching of Errand of Angels, complete with Korean subtitles. This movie is a whole different experience while on a mission. Things that are absolutely true around here: the empty apartment staircases, the awkward appointments, the impossibly endless amounts of just FOOD . . . Things that don't happen in our mission: beds on frames, off the ground (what the heck are they sleeping on?), and silent and solitary two-man apartments. There are some two-man sister houses, but I've only lived in such an arrangement one transfer out of five.

Speaking of sleeping arrangements, we all slept in Prez's living room on a bunch of yos*. Sister Jennings made it clear that she would eat our souls if we stayed up talking past 10:30, so we all faithfully found a spot to lie down on . . . but not a soul of us could sleep until well past midnight. We just lay there, in eerie silence, occasionally sitting up to exchange "You can't sleep, either?" looks with others doing the same. I toss and turn when I can't get to sleep, and since I didn't want to kick Sis. Kim Yoon Ha I tossed and turned the other direction, off the yo and eventually in between the potted plants and the wall, where I finally dozed off for a few hours.

(side note: Sis. Matt's package** came while we were all at the house. I took a video of her opening it, but since the video-sending plan doesn't seem to be working, here's the transcript:

(Scene: The living room of Prez's house. The floor is covered in yos. In the background, Sis. Linford and Sis. Ogelvie, in pajamas, are folding up their prostelyting clothes. In the foreground is Sis. Matthews, wearing an "MTC: Enter to Learn/Go Forth to Serve" t-shirt and a turquoise necklace, with a toothbrush in her mouth and a small cardboard box in her hand.)

Me: Well, it looks like you've got a toothbrush in your mouth. So let's open your box and see what's in it.
Sis. M: holds up her box and looks into the camera) First I wanna say thank you, to the Academy, for, um, this opportunity . . . (starts on the tape)
Me: You know, most people brush their teeth BEFORE coming to the Academy Awards.
Sis.M: Yeah, well, I'm from New Zealand. We do it backwards. (Is discovering that the tape won't come off) Augh!
Me: (veers camera over to Sis Kim Yoon Ha, who is chilling out, sprawled on her back on a yo) This is Sister Kim Yoon Ha. She's on the floor. (Veers back to Sis. M.)
Sis M.: (grabs a pen off the side table) Currently, I have no knife, so also in New Zealand, we use our MacGyver skills . . . (goes after the tape with the pen)
Me: Was MacGyver from New Zealand?
Sis M.: Yep.
Me: Okay.
Sis. M.: He's Maori.
Me: Maori from New Zealand. MaoriGyver.
Sis. M.: MaoriGyver. He's my cousin's uncle's sister's brother's friend.
Me: As is everyone in New Zealand.
Sis M: Yep. You know us too well. (is still having trouble with the tape) Ah, cham. Ah, freak!
Me: Yeah, this is what we call "Murphy Packaging."
Sis. M: Who did this?
Me: Cuz you see, in Ireland, there's this family called the Murphys, and they always use way too much tape on EV-ERY-THING.
Sis M: Is it my family's auntie's siser's cousin's Murphy? There's some Murphys in New Zealand. Except they're Maoris. See, everyone's Mauri. Oh, man! (Abandons the pen and goes back to pulling at the tape) What do I need a ball pen for?
Me: (incomprehensible)
Sis. M: (ditto)
Me: Get it open!
Sis M.: Augh! (Rips off a big strip of tape. The box pops open. Sis Matt squeals and grabs the mouse out.) AAAAAHHH! My Kiore! Is it identical?

Me: (laughing) No, it's different.
Sis M: (screams and tosses it at Sis. Kim Yoon Ha, who shrieks and rolls out of the way, then picks it up and puts it on her shoulder) Waaaaa! I love Kiore! (bows to the camera) Kamsahamnida! (scares Sis Kim Yoon Ha with it again)
Me: And there we end.

So that's how that went down. It was very funny.)

Anyway, in the morning (like 6 a.m.) those as wanted to went to Hoshimchang, the awesome bathhouse. I was 'as wanted,' of course. It was raining, which was pretty cool. The outdoor baths are fun in the rain. Sis. Ogelvie had never been, and came with and had a lot of fun.

Then we got home to fantastic Sis. Jennings breakfast (I cannot tell you how joyful breakfast food is) and, as it was raining, decided to have all our meetings in the morning and play in the afternoon, instead of staggering them as originally planned. So we did Christlike attribute activities (more fun than they sound) until lunchtime, when we packed up bag lunches and went to Haeundae beach for a few hours. We were all wearing matching pink-and-white Sisters Conference t-shirts, so we looked like an elementary school group. But oh, well. We played in the sand and the water and ate good food and took pictures and listened to Pres. Jennings talk about anything (he's like the random information generator. It's like watching Discovery Channel) and generally had a good time. Then we went back to the house, had a testimony meeting, ordered chinese food (NOT like chinese food in America) and watched Horton Hears a Who. Which is all about missionary work. No, really. It's freaky.

By then, it was too late to get back to Taegu, so we four Taegu sisters stayed in the Gupo house with the four (Korean) sisters living there . . . yep, just me and seven Koreans. 9_9. And then we went home.

The Elders, meanwhile, had a full P-Day. Which should have been lot of fun, but wasn't because none of them could decide what to do with it, so they cleaned their apartments and ate at MacDonald's. HA.

So today is not actually P-Day. It's just e-mail and go day. We were going to go up to Palgongsan with the Tollets, but Sis. Tollet is sick so we're just going to sneak up to their apartment and decorate their door to wish Bro. Tollet a happy birthday, and drop off some yooja tea for Sis. Tollet.

We had Chuseok dinner with the Relief Society president and her husband, and also Sis. Li Mi Suk (who is out of the hospital!) and her son. There isn't actually a special 'Chuseok dinner' . . . the only specified food for the season is little balls of duck (the rice stuff) filled with this really good stuff that's like honey and sesame seeds and something else. I likes 'em. The members gave us a nice shampoo gift set (that's what's exchanged at Chuseok: gift sets of food and gift sets of bath products. I've seen people with them on the bus all week), so I'm set on the shampoo front for the duration.

Yesterday we had Sunday lunch with Sis Li Mi Suk, too. She made us absurd amounts of spaghetti, which I ate with shredded radish kimchi (I don't understand how we eat spaghetti without shredded radish kimchi. How do we manage that?) and had fun dressing up in the wigs she'd bought for when her hair starts to go from the chemo. If positive attitude=speedy recovery, this woman has it in the bag.

Anyway, that was the week. It sort of got out of rhythm, with the holiday, and not much work got done. But good times were had, and on we go.

I love you! Be good!

RoseE"

* yo: less than a futon but more than a sleeping bag.

**I sent RoseE a tiny knitted mousie stuffed with lavender petals to be in her photos and to remind her that we love her (it's the lavender and the knitting, I guess). Sister Matthews fell in love with it and asked for her own, since she and RoseE are not companions anymore. So I made one for her, too. That's the box that arrived.

To Bug 9/14/09

2009-09-29T03:39:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bug,

Any of this look familiar?* Surprise! You can get more Eiffel Tower stationery in one Korean mungu than you can probably get in all of France put together.

So word is that you've been limping due to some injuries and your right and left legs being different sizes. Freaky! You and Isis can be gimpy twins. (Is Isis still limping?** Haven't heard any news on that in a while.) I'm limping, too, but it's because I wore a hole in the lining of my shoe and it's cutting into my heel. I'll fix it with some tape when I get home tonight.

I am so jealous you get to do archery. I used to hang out at the archery range all day when I was at Girls' Camp. Never got very good, though. And that string snap is a killer, so watch your arm. You're injured enough as it is, goodoness knows.

I love you! Stay out of trouble, but have fun. Kids in Korea don't get to have fun--they're in school from seven in the morning to ten at night, so have lots of fun for their sakes.

RoseE"

* The picture at the top of the stationery is a watercolor of the Eiffel Tower in fall, surrounded by Korean characters. We visited Paris in February.

**Isis tore her ACL some months ago and limped on it for a long time. The vet said she probably would heal herself, and she has.

To Bit 9/14/09

2009-09-29T03:24:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Bit,

It sounds like you have some fun classes in school. Mom alwys told me to take Auto Mechanics*, but I never did, because I was afraid of being the only girl in the class. I wish now that I had. I will try to find a class like that in college when I go back.

What is the animal class you talked about? (I don't have your letter here on the train with me, so I'm trying to remember what it said.) And are you still slogging away at Chinese? My district leader, Elder Robb, is what we sometimes call a hanja jengi (person who loves learning honja) and sometimes call a hanja spazz. He has learned more than 200 characters. But now he's moving down to the other side of the city, so I won't be able to talk to him much any more.

I am riding home to Taegu with my new companion, Sister Pak Song Hee, on the KTX (the fast train). I love riding the train. It's so quiet and peaceful, and out the windows I can watch all the beautiful Korean mountains go drifting by. There are so many trees out here. It's absolutely amazing, even to me, and I live in the woods in Minnesota three months out of every year! (Also you can buy little walnut-shaped walnut cakes with red bean paste in them from the snack cart. They're pretty good. Man, I'm hungry now.)

I love you and I miss you! Stay focused.

RoseE"

*I don't remember telling her that, but even now it seems like a good idea. They never let me take auto mechanics or shop when I was in high school.

Chuesok, Persimmons, and It IS a Small World, After All.

2009-09-28T09:49:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

So Isis* is walking again, and Margie is walking again, but Teancum's down for the count**? Can we not get all of us on our feet at the same time? Holy betsy. What did I TELL you guys about getting cancer while I was out here? Did I not specifically forbid it? If I didn't, I'm doing it now.

And he's going to Greek school. To learn such useful things as "If Person A has three goats and Person B has five goats, how soon will they marry?" I'm sure someone else has already made this joke, but if I'd been there, I would have made it first, so ha.

I told Sis. Pak this week about all the fruit trees in our neighborhood. The thought blew her mind. In the older neighborhoods here, the ones swarmed with little old piled-up-like-legos houses, there are still some fruit trees . . . not like you're thinking, though. They're mostly pomegranetes and persimmons (have you ever had a persimmon? I had one this week. It's like eating a tomato filled with half-set orange jello), and the wider streets are lined with ginko trees. These are in fruit at the moment, and smell to high heaven . . . and every day I see someone standing underneath one, either kicking it or throwing something up into the branchest to knock the fruits down. Then they step on them, so the pit in the middle slides out of the smelly fruit stuff, and they pick the pits up and put them in a bag and take them home to dry in the sun, and then they eat them. Sister Pak says they're really good pan-fried. Um . . . . . . . we are not in Kansas anymore, Toto.

In Sunday School yesterday we had a new family come in . . . from Mongolia. Yep. Two sisters and the younger sister's husband. Their Korean is about as good as mine (so . . . not very), and the older sister speaks a tiny bit of English and plenty of Russian. So Elder Ee Son Gi taught the lesson in Korean . . . but he taught it dang well, clearly and simply, in sentences even I could understand, making liberal use of the chalkboard and his passable artistic skills. And for the few really tricky words I whipped out Liz, whose 11-language feature does not include Mongolian but does include Russian, so with English, Korean, Mongolian and Russian all going at the same time, we got through astonishingly well. We're not sure what we're going to do about Conference, though.

Speaking of, Conference is not this coming weekend but next (it comes to Korea a week late). THIS weekend is Chuesok, one of (as far as I can see) only two holidays actually celebrated in Korea, the other being lunar new year, when everyone gets a year older. Chuesok is basically like Thanksgiving. Everybody's with their families, talking and eating and talking and eating for three days straight. They also go clean up and give food to the graves of their departed family members, which is the only instance in which you can stick chopsticks straight up in a bowl of rice. (If you stick your chopsticks in like this at any other time, it's basically a declaration that you wish everyone around you were dead, and is the second-rudest thing you can do at a Korean table, short of not eating all the rice.) So the Elders get Chuseok day itself off entirely. Full P-Day. The sisters get to go to Sisters' Conference and sit in meetings all day. We'll get blessings.

So last night at a big Suseong ward potluck dinner thing I ran into an American named Brother (I think Keith) Jorgensen, who mentioned offhandedly, "I knew a Hadden in grad school . . . Barney***?" Yeah, so he and Barney were in the same ward at UCLA. And I ran into him in Taegu. He's doing fine, if Barney asks. Teaching geography at one of the universities here.

I made myself a treat this week. GRANOLA. Yeah, I finally got the ingredients together to use that recipe. It ended up being a little unorthodox . . . honey got replaced with "sweetening syrup," and included in the mix were corn flakes, banana chips, and chocolate-covered peanuts, as well as a bag of sunflower seeds that I think have been living on my bookshelf for a very, very long time. But it tastes dang good, and I am eating it with yogurt for breakfast every morning, and am happy.

The work's picking up here. Sister Pak seems to be the tipping point for these wards. The pressure's been on for a long time to change the way missionary stuff works around here--the Area Authorities have been pushing from above, the missionaries from below, and President Jennings from the side. And for a long time the only Korean sister serving here was one that was a little hard to get along with. But Sister Pak, of course, is an angel, so people are now coming out of the woodwork to tell her, "My niece really needs to hear the missionary lessons. Here's her address," or "You need to start teaching so-and-so's family. If you want me to come along, I'm free in the afternoons." And just now, walking to the post office to e-mail, a woman (wearing a hygene mask, so she was almost completely incomprehensible) stopped us and told Sister Pak, "I met with your missionaries a long time ago, and I have some more questions. Could I get your phone number?" And as far as Sister Pak is concerned, this sort of behavior is par for the course. She's just like that.

I got a letter from Dad this week containing an essay by Orson Scott Card that has caused me to repent of last week's rant. I'm sorry! It was all about the type of missionary that people trust, and the kind of missionary that people don't. I'm trying harder this week to be the former--to know better how to teach, to talk less about myself and more about the gospel, to just say what's true and leave it at that, and to not go into anything without preparing well and thoroughly. And I'm also cramming vocab like a madwoman again because I HAVE GOT TO LEARN THIS LANGUAGE! I don't know how the missionaries in Center Ward are doing. Have them teach you the First Lesson and see what you think. And if they ever get themselves stuck in a really awkward situation because of the rules (like, they can't accept a ride from you if you're the only sister in the car, so they have to call someone else for a ride or just walk home), then they're probably pretty good.

We didn't get to hear the RS broadcast. Is it printed in the Ensign? Or is that the YW broadcast? Can't remember.

Sister Beckstead is a barrel racer#, I think. I'll ask her for tips at Sisters' Conference.

Um . . . I think that's the news of the week. I didn't jaywalk across freeways or ford rivers . . . just crammed and sulked and repented of the sulking and kept on keepin' on, as we must.

I love you. Don't do anything too dumb or too fun until I get home.

RoseE"

* Isis: our dog

** Teancum was diagnosed with a benign tumor in the top of his left leg, which is what has been making him limp for the last 5 months. Stay tuned for treatment . . .

*** Uncle Barney

# Bethe is going to compete in barrel racing in a hippotherapy rodeo in October.

My Desk

2009-09-20T21:27:00.001-07:00

Can you spot:

A postcard from Beaune
Dad's mission photo
a Quebec flag
Bro Cho's baptism phot
A handkerchief press
Kiore
a maglite
a family photo
our area books
a tiny green bible
a journal given to me by Sara W.
a rubber duck?

RoseE

If you have spotted them all, write RoseE and tell her and you will get a prize.

2009-09-20T21:05:00.000-07:00

RoseE writes:

"Dear Mum and Dad,

HA! Sister Matthews is going to have a fit.* I should tell her companion to take a video of her opening that package.

Um . . . Sister Pak Sung Hee wants a mouse, too. She thinks Kiore is adorable.

It's very funny that you think I could help with a Korean phone call about airplanes. I can't even say 'airport' reliably. It's something like 'heng gong,' but I don't remember what, exactly.
But in honor of the international keyboard on the iPod, here is your first Korean lesson:
ㅎ This is a hiyeut. It sounds like H. Pretty straightforward.
ㅏ This is a vowel that says Ah, like at the dentist. Like a face with its tongue sticking out. (Korean vowels are all sticks, some with sticks sticking off them.)
So to write ha, like ha-ha that's funny, it's just 하.

And if you add one more consonant (ㄴ, neyeon, which sounds like N) it gets stuck to the bottom of the syllable, so you write it 한, not ㅎ ㅏ ㄴ. And 한 means 'great' and is in things like Hanguk (Korea) and Hangul (the Korean Alphabet). It's also my Korean last name, because it's sort of like Hadden. Kind of.

So, this week. Well, Sister Pak is a patient sweetheart and I love her to death, though I do miss Sis. Matthews. But I got to see her this week; we had a sleepover in Pusan so Sis. Pak could attend her convert's baptism. My old house! My old mattress! That apartment is HUGE. I never realized it. It's enormous, especially for just two people. We four in Taegu are living in a third of the space.

And with Sis. Matthews gone I'm discovering that I know absolutely nothing about navigating Taegu. So we've been getting lost a lot. Including two nights ago, when we went walking in the river park to try to talk to some folks. It was really nice; the weather was beautiful, and Suseong bridge was all lit up, and underneath it a guy was playing traditional Korean music on a saxaphone, which was cool. And we crossed the river on this very pretty stepping-stone bridge, to walk back up the other side. Except on the other side there's no way to get onto the street, because the freeway runs right along the edge of the river for a good long way. So we, um, jaywalked. Just across an offramp. We had no choice. We were trapped. And we're not dead, so it's all good, right?

In two weeks, over Chuseok** weekend, we're having sisters' conference, because Chuseok is useless for missionary work. And Sister Ii Yeong Bin, roommate and Sister Representative, asked us to give a talk.

"On Chastity," she told me.

"On WHAT?" said I.

"Chastity," said she. "You know. Chastity. The pure love of Christ."

Me: "Um . . . do you mean charity? Because a chastity talk addressed to sister missionaries probably isn't going to take up fifteen minutes . . ."

Yes, on charity. That's what she meant. Good thing, too.

Oh, food tip of the week: Costco hot-dog onions with ketchup and mustard. Everybody mixes this up as a side-dish salad when they eat at Costco. It's good.

I love you! Sorry it's brief; I was writing rants.

Love,

RoseE"

* I knitted RoseE a tiny mouse, stuffed with lavender, which Sister Matthews promptly fell in love with and named Fiore, which is "mouse" in the Maori language. She humbly asked for one for herself. I have just finished Sister Matthews' mouse; it will be sent out tomorrow. I would love to see the video of her opening the box. I hope RoseE can arrange it.

** Chuseok weekend: I'm guessing this means General Conference weekend, where the Prophet and Apostles counsel us on what we need to work on for the next 6 months. No regular church services are held, as everybody is (assumedly) watching Conference and listening to prophets' voices. General Conference happens the first weekend in October and then again the first weekend in April. At one General Conference in October 1855 or so, President Brigham Young got up and advised the church members that 3 handcart companies from Winter Quarters, Iowa had become stranded in the mountains and were out of food. Everybody IMMEDIATELY went home, packed up 250 wagons with food, clothing, shoes and blankets and set off to rescue them. A month and a half later they brought the survivors into the Salt Lake valley. Shortest Conference ever, I bet.

A Missionary's Advice

2009-09-20T20:55:00.001-07:00

Last week I asked RoseE what our ward here in Salt Lake could do to help out the missionaries assigned to our Stake. She wrote:

"Ooooh.

Okay, I won't rant, I promise. I'll just say the following:

Missionaries do love getting fed, this is true. Nothing like a good member meal. They sure do 'preciate it. But they would happily live on ramen in their own apartments if the members were too busy talking to their friends about the gospel to have time to feed them. That would be missionary heaven.

Strike up conversations with people about church and what we believe. Invite people to ward parties, Enrichment, Achievement Day . . . any ol' get-together. Don't be pushy; just be open, and keep yourself ready for when those teaching opportunities come. And if someone asks you a question you can't answer very well, just say, "You know what? The missionaries could probably answer that better than I could. They're eating at our house on Thursday; do you want to come too?" These are Magic Words. (For further Magic Words, see Preach My Gospel. There are more good ideas in there than you think that there are.)

Ask the missionaries to introduce you to the people they're teaching. Say hi to these people when they come to Sacrament Meeting. Call and invite them to stuff. Ask them how they feel about what the missionaries are teaching them. As you're making Christmas cookies/fudge/cute poems for ward friends, make one for them too. (I know you're all getting ready to make them. I remember Christmas in Center Ward.)

And DO YOUR HOME AND VISITING TEACHING. A ward that doesn't take care of its own is not a ward missionaries want to bring people into.

Okay, that became a little bit of a rant. Sorry. But being a missionary has made me understand a lot about what a goshawful member-missionary I was. Honestly. When new converts got baptized in our ward, I never went to their baptisms BECAUSE I DIDN'T KNOW THEM. Jeeez louise! That's the whole point! Of COURSE I didn't know them; that's why they're called 'new converts.'

The thing that I didn't realize (and, I think, that many wards don't realize) is that a ward is not just a unit of a stake. It's not just the place where you go on Sunday to chat with your friends about the gospel. It is these things, yes. But missionaries think of wards as units of their missions. Really. Center Ward is part of a mission, and in it missionary stuff is going on right now, and it was last year when I was there and I didn't know about any of it. A ward is a growing thing.

Um . . . six short paragraphs. Sorry. Please edit as you see fit.

RoseE the Ranter."