Hey all,
Wow, it's been almost 5 weeks since I got to Sindang. Time flies when you're having fun, I guess.
So, the kid that we baptized last week...he didn't come to church yesterday. In our church we believe that without an ordinance where you receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost, baptism isn't complete and doesn't mean anything. He was supposed to get that yesterday, but he didn't show, and he hasn't answered our calls or texts for a couple days. We're working on contacting him, but we think something might have happened. We're not really sure. It's sad, though.
But other than that our week was really good. I'm having a fun time with Elder Jeong. He's such a funny guy. We were talking about girlfriends the other night before we hit the sack, and the girlfriend of another missionary came up. Her name is Gretchin. So we spent about five minutes straight just laughing about it. :D He said it sounds like a monster name; that was probably the hardest I've laughed in a while. So fun! (sorry to anyone named Gretchin out there, but missionaries need laughs when we can get 'em)
We found a cool investigator the other day. His name is Cha Ji Hyeon, and he's a sophomore in high school. He spent like 7 hours with us on Saturday--for a lesson, and then a basketball activity with our ward, and then dinner, and then the weekly Friendship Night activity, and then just playing random sports after that in the gym till we all had to go home. Then he came to church the next day, and we're meeting him AGAIN today. I think he likes us, which is good. :D If we can help him get permission from his grandma to come out to church on a regular basis things will be great.
It was really good to see all the kids just playing random sports for a while after the meeting on Saturday. It reminded me of the stories the older members tell about the good ol' times. Back when the Church started in Korea, and really got some momentum, the kids and young adults would just hang out at the church. They played ping pong or other games and just chilled there, every day. It sounds way fun. But slowly the times have changed; because of the increasingly competitive economy and job outlook in Korea, study has taken the role of the focus of the Korean kid's life. These days junior high and high school kids in general spend from 8 to 5 at school and then from 6 to 11, 12, or sometimes 1 in the morning at "academy," which are private institutions that help your kid learn math, an instrument, social studies, etc. So now the church is empty and dark every day except Sunday, sadly. BUT--after our activity, the kids just all grabbed a ball and started hanging out. Some people played basketball, some threw a baseball, some played dodgeball, all packed together in the gym of our church. It felt really cool to see that again, to see Korean kids just being kids instead of college students.
Tomorrow for Pday we're probably going ice skating and then eating dog soup. I love Korea. :D Hope you have a good week!
Note from Elder Dean's mom: Matt just sent us a whole bunch of pictures on an HD card, and I will get some posted as soon as we can go through them!
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