솔날 (Solar)

February 23, 2015 by nhouston1 Leave a comment

Hello Family and Friends in St. George and around the world! This week in Korea it was Solar which is one of the 2 most popular holidays here! It is the new year celebration which goes by the Lunar calendar so that is why it is in February this year! It was on Thursday but is a 3 day holiday for the Koreans! It was a cool week and I will let you know how it all went!

Tuesday 2/17 -Just a regular day today! Proselyted and then I tried to make a stir fry for dinner that night and it was an epic fail but it was pretty funny even though we did not enjoy eating! It was a total experiment so I didn’t feel to bad. After our toilet somehow got clogged (hmmmm… don’t know what happened…..) so on the way back that night we had to buy a plunger and my companion saw “the ultimate plunger” his words, not mine and he had to buy it, so he did. It was around 8 bucks but it was pretty epic! He got back and was so excited to plunge! He started and it didn’t work! Hahahahah it was so funny! Oh man! but he kept going and then he got toilet water and stuff all over himself but did end up getting the toilet unplugged! It was interesting but hilarious and hey jack.. it worked in the end!

Wednesday 2/18 – We did service today and had a planning activity and then we did some proselyting!

Thursday 2/19 – Today was Solar! We had a mission conference! It was all the missionaries who are in Seoul! Which is most the missionaries in our mission! I also got to see Elder Reid my good friend from highschool! He was doing super well and we had a really good time talking for all of lunch! Haha it was a great time! For conference we watched a video about the Book of Mormon and a documentary of all these super smart scholars talking about it! It was really cool! We did a little activity after about the Book of Mormon. After that, we watched Meet the Mormons! It hasn’t come out yet in Korea but we got to watch it! It was so so good I really loved that show so much! Partially because I love movies and haven’t watched one for quite some time and also because it was just stinking good! Then president Christensen gave us a little training about how it seems that others like that are great and amazing and it is easy to compare and get down on ourselves. He then reminded and stated with confidence that we were amazing as well and that by small and simple means the Lord truly does his work! It was an amazing training! I know for a fact that my mission president is called of God. I know because every time I talk to him or hear a training, he says exactly what I need to hear and answers my prayers and questions completely! It blows my mind still but man I love President Christensen and his wife! They are amazing people! It was a fun conference! I also got my valentines package from my family and it was soooooo amazing! Thank you so so much!

Friday 2/20 – Today was Deep Cleaning day! There isn’t a lot of people on the street during solar so we had our semi-annual deep cleaning! It was AWESOME! I didn’t realize how much I loved cleaning but wow it felt so good to clean and move heavy stuff around and clean and WOWIE I had fun! I also got to wear my duck dynasty stuff that was in my Valentines package so I was stocked about that too! We cleaned from 9 to 2 and cleaned every nook and cranny we could! After we did some weekly planning for another 3 hours. Then we had a planning meeting for a thing we were teaching on Sunday! Then we had a dinner appointment with the Stake President which was really fun! He is really rich and has a way nice apartment so it is always fun to go over there! Haha we gave a cool spiritual thought at the end and Elder Smith made me extend the commitment which used some really hard complicated words and phrases but I was grateful for the experience!

Saturday 2/21 – We had an appointment that fell through, but then met an awesome guy and picked him up as our new investigator! He is an awesome guy and seems to like us so we are excited about that! We also met a cool and slightly crazy guy from Boston. He was Korean but also American! He has a Boston accent and was a funny opinionated guy but we hope to meet him again and help him out a little! While we talked to him on the street for over an hour a fight broke out between two taxi drivers. It was crazy and they were in the middle of the street going at it. I didn’t know if it was okay for a missionary to go get involved in a fight to break up or not. But then the cops came and just let them finish pretty much and then put them back in their taxis and they drove off and it was over! Haha it was pretty dang exciting though!

Sunday 2/22 – We had church and for 3rd hour we taught all of our members about member missionary work! It went fairly well even though we didn’t have as much time as we would have liked! After church we just proselyted and studied!

Well that is all for this week! A lot of awesome good fun stuff happened! Missions are definitely hard but man they are amazing as well! I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer and although it does require a lot of faith despite doubts at first I know that the Holy Spirit testifies of him and we can develop a stronger faith in him! I know he came and taught and ministered on earth I know he suffered the atonement according to the will of his Father, I know he was rejected and walked completely alone at times and I know he died on the cross and rose again on that beautiful sunday morning! I know he lives and through him our Father’s beautiful plan for us can be fulfilled if we so choose to let it! I love this gospel and know it is true! I love and miss you all so much, can’t wait to talk next week!

Love,

Elder Houston