September 17, 2012

Subject: Hey from the Land of the Morning Calm

Hey, so actually Korea is still not very calm because we're going through ANOTHER typhoon. The first one, Bolaven, was pretty bad for the southern coast and parts of Japan, and it sucked Tembin out from over China right up the same path. Now Typhoon Samba is heading up the other side of Korea. There's a lot of typhoons here! Samba was actually bigger than the first one, even, when it was over Okinawa, but now it's barely even a tropical storm as it goes over Korea. Okinawa is the southernmost island of mention in Japan, by the way. They say they get like 15 typhoons a year there, along with earthquakes and volcanic eruptions too. So you're either getting rain dumped on you, being blown away, being burned up by lava, getting the stuffing shaken out of you, or maybe even being blown soaking wet into a volcano as your house gets shaken over all at the same time. :D And yet they say that the people in Okinawa have some of the longest lifespans worldwide! I think I'll skip out on the earth falling apart around me even if it means I live five years less than they do. :D

Anyway, this week was pretty good. We survived transfers and still somehow managed to get a little missionary work done on the side. It's kind of sobering to realize that I'll only be involved in transfers two more times....I try not to think about that very much so I can focus. I think picking up the new missionaries is the funnest part of being in the office, though! Here's what happens: we drive out to Incheon Intl Airport on the best road in Korea (it's the best because it's a wide open freeway with almost no cars on it, kind of like America). Then we chill in the airport till they come through the doors, and take a picture with them. They're always pretty spaced out because they got on a plane in the morning 17 hours before that and somehow it's still early afternoon. It's really weird, actually, it was literally the longest day of my life. :D Then we load all their luggage in the van and take them onto the subway. We explain how to talk to people and then we help them go at it! It's really cool to see the fire they have as they talk to people and tell them about the church even though they've only been speaking Korean for 3 months. Sometimes it's hard for them though, like one of the elders that came through this last time. He had motion sickness from the plane pretty bad, I felt sorry for him. We don't push them too much on that first subway ride, because they just got off the plane and they're pretty tired a lot of the time. But we finally make it to President's house and then we have dinner, and President usually gives a spiritual thought before we get them to bed. I remember back when I first came, my experience was easier than that because my group was so big that they didn't want to take us all on the subway, it'd be like trying to take a bunch of sheep across Seoul. :D So they just loaded us in the vans with our luggage and we slept at the temple that night instead of President's house. And then for breakfast we had Korean food, and then we went to the same restaurant for lunch too. Anyway, getting new missionaries is always awesome. :D

And also this week we took the returning missionaries to the airport so they could head back to America/the Philippines. That was really sad, seeing some of the people I've known this whole time going back. I probably won't see most of them for a really long time. Thank heavens for Facebook! :D

Something I was thinking about this week was how we face our hard things. It's important to learn how to find joy in our hard times too, because you don't ever stop having hard times sometimes. That's life. The only thing we can change is how we see them. If you can find a little happiness even in the rough times, how much happier you'll be!

So that's what went on the past week. This week we're having our mission toured by a General Authority, this area's Area President. His name is Elder Michael T. Ringwood. I'll let you know how that goes next Monday. Hope you have a good week!

Love, Elder Dean

September 10, 2012

So, today is transfer calls day! Woo! This is a fun day. For the last week, we have been spending about 3 hours a day with President talking about who needs to go where. I think that putting transfers together is like a giant jigsaw puzzle, only the pieces change shapes sometimes and if you mess up it could make someone really depressed and have a negative impact on who they are for the rest of their lives and beyond. Kinda stressful. This one has been kinda hard because there are a lot of new missionaries coming in, but we finally got it figured out for the most part. Because of that I don't have much time today to email, also it's kinda another one of those days where I have to get out of the office or I will explode. :D

But we found a way cool investigator a couple weeks ago that we met for the second time yesterday. Here's what I reported to President Christensen about him: "Speaking of which, we met a great investigator for the second time this week! I don't know if I mentioned him last Monday, but his name is 민호. He's a college student, and he's SO prepared. He's really one of the 5 truly golden people I've met on my mission; he agreed to come to stake conference on Saturday and he really understands what we are teaching him. He doesn't agree with it all yet, but when we read Moroni 10: 4-5, he said he really wants to pray with real intent and a sincere heart, but that it would be really hard. The depth of his understanding with that really impressed me at the time, and the Spirit was so strong. Then we committed him to read and pray sincerely, and he said yes. That was one of the best lessons I've had on my mission. It was really amazing how strong the Spirit was and how awesome he is, and we're planning on committing him to baptism ASAP while he feels this way. As far as total missionary work goes...I still feel like we need to be contacting more, and I'm still working on getting us out on the street instead of in the office, so I'll keep you posted on how that goes. :D I think we're on the right path there. 

My study has been really good this week. I've started the study method that Sister Bennett mentioned in her 마지막 말씀, where you choose a missionary "question of the soul" and look for all the verses in the Book of Mormon that answer that question as you read it. It's been really amazing. I feel like my study lately has been stagnating, but that this new method is breathing life into the scriptures for me again. My question is, How can I be a good servant of the Lord? I figure that if I can do that, my decisions will be based on the right stuff rather than popularity, money, or personal comfort, and I will just be a better person. I love the scriptures and I love the Lord, and I love being a missionary!" 

I included another part of my letter too for kicks. :D Every week we report to the president about our investigators, our study, and any other problems or concerns or things we have. He's here to help us be happy and successful as missionaries. 

Anyway, that's all I have time for. :D Hope you all have a good week, love you guys!

Elder Matt Dean

September 2, 2012

Note from Elder Dean's mom: Matthew put subject lines in Korean on both this letter and the personal letter he sent to just our family. On our letter, he wrote: 이걸 읽을수 있으면 천원 줄게요, which means "If you can read this, I'll give you a thousand won ($1)." On the letter below, he wrote: 아버지 빼고 아무도 이것을 읽을 수 없어요, which means "Besides Dad, nobody's going to be able to read this."

Hi everyone, 

So I survived the typhoon! It was actually pretty disappointing. We got all ready for the storm and moved stuff everywhere and had the missionaries on the west coast sleep in Seoul and got all ready--and then it was nothing worse than a particularly windy rainstorm. I've seen normal storms here that were worse than the typhoon, at least for people in Seoul. But I heard the people on the southern coast got pounded pretty hard. Actually a lot of the fruit crops got destroyed, so I guess the price of Asian pears and mandarin oranges will go up quite a bit, unfortunately. Actually, something interesting about this typhoon--there was a smaller one called Typhoon Tembin that was heading in over Taiwan and into China, but the one that hit us was so strong that it sucked Tembin back out into the Yellow Sea where it promptly dumped a bunch of rain onto us. Tembin was actually worse than the first one, I think. Anyway, it's all over now and I can finally see the sun again!

I attached some pictures of the office where I basically live now. The Korean in one of the pictures is the one who went home, but he made a really funny face so I wanted to show it to you. :D My desk is the one on the left. I like the office, it's pretty good. The missionary work here is decent too when we can get outside. I'm working on getting out and proselyting more. 

We found a really cool investigator yesterday! His name is Shin Min Ho, and he's 26 in American age. He was doing some small business stuff for a while, but he pretty much gave it to his friends and he's now working at a hospital while he studies some more. And he has a lot of religious interest along with English interest, which is what we picked him up for. He REALLY wants to know what the Plan of Salvation is and how it answers the questions of the soul that everyone has about before and after this life. He's pretty golden, and we're excited to be teaching him! Frank, our high school student investigator, will hopefully be baptized this Saturday,  so we're really excited for that too.

We're getting ramped up for Zone Leader Council, the monthly meeting with the Zone Leaders at President's house, and transfers, which happens next week. It's hard to believe transfers are already here; the time is going really fast. I think it's really fun, though. I'm learning a lot about administration and coordination with my companion. Life here is good, and it's not a bad place to finish your mission. 

Hope everybody has a good week! 

Elder Matt Dean

Elder Dean making faces

The office where Elder Dean works as an AP.

August 26, 2012

Hi everybody!

So I know I misspelled the subject line of this one, but I left it because it's funny. :D (the subject line reads: 'Hurrincane time!') But really there's a typhoon coming. For everyone who wonders what the difference between a typhoon and a hurricane is, I looked it up because I wondered too: There's basically no difference. Just that if it's in the Atlantic, it's a hurricane, and basically everywhere else is a typhoon. Why? The dictionary wouldn't tell me that. But just in case someone wonders if it'll be dangerous, don't worry, it's hyped up way more than it will be. It's not even raining here. The rain is going to be the problem here anyway. So don't worry, we'll just be getting wet, pretty much just like monsoon season a few weeks late. 

This week was really good. We had our first Zone Conference in the time that I've been in the office, on Wednesday and Thursday. It went really well! Actually other than getting 1 and a half hours of sleep the "night" before Zone Conference, the week went really well. We worked on preparing the conference from about 6 on Tuesday (that's when P-day ended) until 5:20ish  on Wednesday morning, got some sleep, and then got up at 6:30 to prepare and travel to the conference site. Yep, I'm never doing that again. :D There was a lot of stuff that I didn't think would take that long that actually took 5 times as long, like my companion having to translate the newsletter, and putting the agenda together. We're going to do things a little farther in advance next time. :D 

Then the day of the conference came. I foolishly decided to conduct the first day, and I started off the meeting by saying I was presiding and then realizing it and tripping up on my words, and everybody including me laughed. It was a funny way to start a conference, I guess. :D The rest of the conference went really well, though, except for not really having enough time for the missionaries to practice our training and having two of the speakers speak for 40 minutes each instead of the 10 we told them to do. First day: lots to improve on. Second day: almost literally perfect. We got there early enough to set everything up (like projectors, TVs, computers, etc), I didn't have to conduct (haha), we planned the training out better so we had more time for roleplay, and the Spirit was so strong, it was awesome. I like giving trainings when I'm prepared for it. :D 

That was the big event of the week for me. Now that that's done we have more time for normal missionary work. We are meeting a high school kid named Frank, and he says he wants to get baptized in September! We're working on getting him ready for the 8th. He's really, really good at English, and he's been meeting the missionaries for a long time here. He's the on in the picture I attached (he's holding Orange Julius that we made at President's house last weekend). 

That's all I know for now. Hope everyone has a good week, don't dry up out there!

Elder Matt Dean

Frank

August 20, 2012

Hey all,

So I've decided that my subject lines are really boring, but luckily they don't mean that much anyway. :D This week was markedly better than last week. The missionary ended up going home after all, his parents came to pick him up and everything (he's Korean). He said he'll come up to the office to see us sometimes before he heads off to his mandatory army service. It's kind of funny, he went home from missionary work to spend like three months at home before he has to go to the army for 2 years. I think he thought he was getting a break, but that sounds to me like going from best to just ok to awful. Hopefully everything works out with him.

So after all that jazz on Monday, we went to eat samgyetang which is like Korean chicken soup, with ginseng.  Ginseng is really bitter but they say it's really good for you, and it's kind of a Korean taste. Then we went to the public bathhouse! Woo!  I don't think anyone but my dad knows how awesome those are. Seriously, when you're having a super stressful weekend and missionaries are going home left and right and you're super cranky because you skipped lunch AGAIN, there's nothing better than the bathhouse. Then we went to a big bookstore and bought more flash drives. I remember when having like a 1 gigabyte flashdrive was super expensive, and now we get like 16 gigs for 20 bucks or less. And we have terabyte external hard drives. Craziness! What happened to dialup Internet and the blue screen of death?

I learned something about myself this week: if I skip a meal, I get really slow, tired, and unhappy. Most people can skip one jut fine, but not me. I also learned that I need to make eye contact with people more--bad habit from learning Korean and not knowing what to say for a year, though I wasn't the best at that before my mission either. It's interesting how much you learn on your mission, both practical and spiritual.

So on Friday night, we had dinner at our bishop's house. It was the first time that Elder Lee has been there since he came in February; usually you're pretty close with the bishop (the leader of the local unit of the church which consists of up to a couple hundred people), but ours here in Samcheong is pretty busy. However, he had time randomly, so we ended up getting to go to his house for dinner. During dinner his kids came home (two boys, 3 and 6), and the younger one started messing around. He's a stinker, and he knows it; he's really fun to play with, but I think I encouraged him a little much, and so his dad took him into the other room for some discipline. Oops. :D I learned my lesson there. But anyway, that's not why I'm telling you this story. After dinner, we gave a short spiritual message; it was the one with the teabag about faith. I've done this like ten times. So you put an emptied-out, straightened-out teabag (which is in tube shape) standing up on someone's hand. I did it to the bishop. You tell them that if they don't move, it won't hurt, and say "Do you have faith?" Of course they say yes. So then you light the teabag on fire! The fire goes down and down, and the person's like, "Uh oh, should I move?" It gets almost to their hand, and then the last little part flies into the air before it burns up. Its super cool. Only this time, as I watched the fire burn down towards the bishop's hand, I thought, "Hm... it usually flies by now...." and then the bishop was like, "ouch!" and jerked his hand away. I burned the bishop's hand! Just kidding, it didn't even leave a mark, but it still hurt for a second. I learned that if your activity fails, trying to tie the lesson into it really fails too. :D I had to end up by saying, "Well, my promises don't work out all the time, but God's do." :D me and Elder Lee were talking about it on the way back to the house, and he said, "Well, they might not remember who you are after you leave, but maybe the kids will be in their teens and say, 'A long time ago there was some missionary that came over to our house and burned my dad's hand...'" I thought that was pretty funny. It was a good friendship building experience with the bishop because we all laughed about it when it happened. 

Other than that we've been really busy preparing for conferences and stuff. I'm still getting the hang of all my responsibilities, but it's coming along. And I enjoy being here. Hope you all have a good week!

Elder Matt Dean

August 12, 2012

Subject line: Wow, crazy weekend

Yeah, so this weekend has been one of a kind. There's a missionary that is set on going home early, and he's been having a really rough time. So we've had him up here with us at the office trying to help him. what he doesn't understand is that his rough time and indecision about whether to go home or not is making a ton of people have a hard time too, having to babysit him. It's a good opportunity to serve someone, but it's sad to see someone who doesn't understand what they are missing by leaving early, and what kind of a homecoming he can expect. Missionary work is never easy, but it is always, always worth it, whether in the moment or a little later. I wish I could talk to every missionary who wanted to go home early and tell them what's on my mind right now.

So because of that, I don't have time to write a big email today. We've had so many things to do because of him, and I need a Pday really bad at the moment. So I love you all but I'm not writing a ton this week, sorry. :D have a good week!

Elder Matt Dean

August 5, 2012

Dear everybody, 

This week has been a pretty crazy week, for sure. Just like last week. :D We have a big meeting tomorrow when we meet with the next tier below us of missionary leaders to discuss plans and goals for the mission for the upcoming month. It's called Zone Leader Council. We've been spending a significant amount of time every day preparing for that and just keeping the office running. Here's an example of that from my journal, which I am now typing instead of writing (which is a great perk of being in the office :D):

"We’re trying to do study this morning, but Elder Lee Gyeomjin (from now on Elder Lee) had to translate between a mission president in America and the stake president of one of his missionaries from Korea. The sister missionary has some severe mental problems and she needs permission  from her parents to get medication, so her president had to call us on Presidents’ phone and Elder Lee called the stake president and translated. It sounds like everything went really well. This is probably going to happen a lot. :D "

Here's my journal entry from last Friday:

Friday, August 03, 2012

Today we went to the embassy and the Korean driver’s license division to get my license. It was a crazy day. We finally got my license after having to go back to the office to get my passport, and the picture came out super well. I really like it because my eyes look super blue for some reason. :D but they misprinted my name on the card so it says MEAN MATTHEW TYLER. I thought it was really funny. :D I really appreciated the efforts of the ladies working at both buildings; they were really nice even among stressful situations. I want to be the same as I work here in the office.

That took the entire day and it was a headache, but I can now drive on the crazy Korean streets. :D Actually driving in Korea seems kinda scary, but  there is a method to the madness. I just have to learn it. :D 

Let it be known that from now on, you can just assume that I'm really tired every day. I just won't be typing it anymore. :D One good thing that happened today was that I got four letters from people! Woo! Now I have nine people to reply to, so that'll be an adventure. It was hard enough to find time to write letters when I WASN'T in the office... 

I gave my self-introduction talk at Sacrament Meeting at our ward (Samcheong) yesterday, and it went really well. I was up on the stand trying to think how I could get them to laugh, and then I remembered that Koreans have a great national pride for the Korean language, so I decided to mention how my Dad would always say "kapshida"and "kidohapshida" instead of "let's go" and "let's pray" as I was growing up, and sure enough, they laughed. :D I think that first day went really well, and I can tell that I'm going to have a good time with them. I just have to figure out how to get close to them so I can help them. 

The thing that's keeping me going right now is that Zone Leader Council ends tomorrow. :D There will always be another big meeting after that, but next week should be relatively normal. I think that I need to find out how to do more things in less time, like study, good planning, and my journal, on top of all the other things I do. The biggest challenge to that is having to do it all while attached to another missionary who has some similar responsibilities but some other different ones too; matching schedules isn't always the easiest thing. But I'll figure it out. 

Well, I'm off to have lunch before we do some other crazy thing at the office. Zone leader council is over tomorrow....yes..... :D Have a good week, love you all!

Elder Matt Dean