Loss of a Camera, Conference Notes

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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.