Merry Christmas 메리 크리스마스! [week 13]

안녕하세요 여러분. 어떻게 지내세요? 

Hello guys, how are you? I'm doing just peachy-keen, thanks for asking. 

This week has been pretty wholesome. Very high quality. Super nice. 너무 좋아요. Anyway, last Tuesday I went to district council. The zone leader is super cool. He got 6 baptisms as a trainee. He asked us all to tell everyone why we came on a mission and that we should be honest. He said he used to hate the idea of going on a mission, then he told an awesome story about how that changed. It's too long of a story for this email, so just take my word for it. I said I have always wanted to serve and my reasons for being here keep getting better the longer I'm out.  GO ME! 

On Christmas Elder Titensor and I went out and about and delivered presents to all of our branch members and teaching friends. We bought candles and Elder Titensor wrote a nice note in Korean and I origami-fied the notes and we gave them out to people, plus candy for kids.  The things Elder Titensor wrote on his note were: "We love you, Jesus Christ  loves you, if there's any service we can do let is know, Merry Christmas, during the Christmas season if you focus on Christ you will find more happiness." 

We got some good, teary Korean gibberishy (because I still don't understand what is being said) reactions.  It was swell. 

This picture is from a baptism on Christmas day--we traveled up to Daejon to be there for the baptism of Brother 뢰건명.

Left to right it goes elder Harmon, Jito, Me, then Brother Rowae Kon Myong, then Elder Rau,
then elder Doe (front) Titensor (back), then idk, then elder dickey.

We also got to eat cake and pizza that some members provided. The cake was DELICIOUS, and the pizza had potatoes and corn on it, so the first two bites were disappointing, but then I realized it was just shepherd's pie in disguise. And I LOVE shepherd's pie! It was a Merry Christmas after all!

The delicious cake.

Right now I'm in a waiting room to get some booster shots or something, and there is a Korean game show on, and it the most highqualityentertainment I have ever had the privilege of laying my eyes on. I can't wait to watch more when I'm a fluent RM. 

This week I have grown a lot more than I have helped anyone else grow. So it was a great week for me. I grew closer to the Savior and improved on the language. I can't wait to help others out with the Gospel. That's why I'm out here, so I'm looking forward to that the most. 

Alright, I love you guys! Thanks for your prayers and kind words. You're all the best!

PICTURES!

I went to a Buddhist temple. It was amazing! I loved it, it was easily my favorite Korean cultural experience. 

There's those big, murderous, colorful statues. They were huge, I should have taken it next to myself so you could see the scale. 

The picture with me and the huge statue in the background is a Buddha statue. It's the tallest stone Buddha statue in Korea at eighteen point something something meters tall.  

• From the article in that link: "The statue, which is widely known as “Eunjin Mireuk Buddha” as it is located in Nonsan’s Eunjin village, is 18.12 meters in height, the tallest in Korea.
  
  This Buddha statue is wearing a cylindrical coronal on its head. Its large head and face with strong features make it all the more impressive. Unlike Buddha statues in the Unified Silla Dynasty, which pursue refined and ideal beauty, it boasts enormous size, massiveness, and bold beauty.

The green lanterns are in the ceiling of one of the rooms in the temple. Very pretty, the smoke detector kinda ruins the magic, but whatever.

There's a picture of me with a funny tongue sticky outie statue behind me.

The picture with all the happy-looking, super handsome, (but ugly in comparison to ME) elders is us at a noodles restaurant. SCRUMPTIOUS! Left to right it goes me, Elder Titensor, Elder Jito, and elder Harmon.

The picture with the figurines behind glass are some One Piece action figures in a super nerdy nerdy museum called robot museum. You had to buy a drink to get in (I got hot chocolate because it's cold) and you go in, and there was a room absolutely FULL of robot action figures. Then there was another room full of one piece and other anime action figures. It was so nerdy and awesome! I taught Elder Titensor how to play GO in there. 

The flowers on the street are projected.  There's tons of projected advertisements and art on the streets at night. 

The torch statue I just thought looked cool, and I had room for one more picture on this email, so there you go!

Allright love you guys! I'll schedule this email to send tomorrow morning for me so I don't notification bomb you all in the middle of the night. Love you! 

Truly Truman. 

First Week in the Field! [week 12]

안녕하세요! How are you all on this fine day? I am doing fan-darning-tastic! (Darn is the strongest euphemism I can use, but if I could have put a good old flip in there that would have sounded better) ANYWAY, this week has been mighty swell. I got to teach two lessons. Or my companion got to teach two lessons while I watched. Well I helped a bit in the English lesson, and I learned a lot. We taught a guy named Dipen (in English), and a guy named Rooney (in Korean).

President and Sister Sargent!

We talked about temples with Dipen. His main question was "Why can't we say the same prayers that members of your church use in other religion's temples?" We told him about sealing power and how the temple is set apart and is a sacred place and lots of good scriptures were read, but I don't think we made a ton of progress with him. We are meeting with him again next week. Oh, I almost forgot, I suggested we pray to know the truth in the middle of the meeting, and then I suggested we have a minute of silence to let the spirit work on us, but no one wanted to speak first, so it turned into 25 minutes of silence. That was really neat. 

Dipen has a strong desire to know the truth, but he is wary of choosing one church. He doesn't know how we can claim to have the true church when so many other churches claim the same thing. Elder Titensor, (my new companion) said he has taught all of the lessons at least once to Dipen, which would include the Restoration. So I think if Dipen continues to desire the truth, then he will be baptized eventually.  He was a cool guy.

I am not sure exactly what we taught Rooney. (I love that band: Rooney) I know it had to do with the gospel of Jesus Christ and his earthly ministry. I LOVE Rooney (I'm talking about the person now) he had an 애기 (pronounced eggie, which means baby) and a three-year-old daughter and a wife. His apartment was full of family pictures and baby toys and educational posters for his kids. You can tell he got interested in the church because he wants the best for his family. What a nice guy. He was constantly holding his baby and smiling at him. I think he will join the church for sure. He is in a place to feel the promptings of the spirit.

Elder Sean Titensor and Elder Truman Renfroe

My new companion is elder Titensor. He is super cool and obedient to the rules. We both like lo-fi hip-hop, and punk rock, and anime, and the author Brandon Sanderson. He just got done being trained, and now he's training me, so he is a top-notch Elder. He's pretty good at Korean. I'm going to learn a lot from him. He is an upstanding young man!

I met the Sargents in person. President Sargent is so super fun and nice, but definitely more intimidating in person. Sister Sargent is super nice and loving and fun as well. I love them, they are good presidents (or President and First Lady? First Sister? IDK.)

Dickey and Renfroe, eating at the Sargents' house

Binks and Prock, at the Sargents

President Sargent showing us cool stuff

Some friends of the Sargents sent them these Mandarin oranges from their own tree

My new favorite food is 떡 (dohk). It's delicious rice that has been processed into a kind of hard, cheesy texture. I had it deep-fried. It was so good!

Well I think that's all fellas. I love you guys!

PICTURES!

The pictures of the city are pictures of the city.

The sleeping fellow is Elder Titensor. He fell asleep while studying... 

The two food-looking triangles are rice balls. One was tuna the other was mysterious. They are also the same food as in some Asian video games, and they are used as health potions (e.g. Spectrobes, Naruto, Pokémon Go). Yeah, I'm that cultured on Asian culture. 

I Got Out of Quarantine! [week 11]

 Hello! 안녕하세요 여러분. 어떻게 지내세요? Guess what!?! I got out of quarantine today and it was a most joyous experience. Most joyous indeed. INDUBITABLY JOYOUS FOR A SURETY, WITHOUT A DOUBT! Me and the quarantine 선교사 (Sonkyosa missionaries) got to go to a sushi buffet with some other elders. It was a jolly good time. Then me and Elder Binks split off from Elders Prock and Dickey, and we wandered around 대전 (Daejeon) for a couple hours it was great! Lots of stores and sculptures and art galleries and big buildings and people. EVERYTHING! 

I'm talking to this guy named 규 (Kyoo) right now, and he is a chill fellow. I met him on HelloTalk, which is a language exchange social media, and we are going to play some 장기 (Janggi, Korean chess). Then after I destroy his face at Janggi, I'm going to resurrect his face with the Book of Mormon. 규 seems pretty cool. He agreed to meet already now we just need to figure out when. 

Elder Dickey has found TONS of people on HelloTalk. He found this woman who is Iranian, and she is super interested in the church. You can tell she could feel the church is true. Unfortunately, Elder Dickey found out that if she converts to Christianity, her government will sentence her to death. So he sort of had to stop teaching her forthwith. 

I saw four baptisms over zoom, that was awesome. Three on the 12th and one on the 5th. It was very nice to watch. The kids on the zoom call went crazy! They all wanted to get in the camera and say nice-to-meet-you. And they make head hearts and peace signs. They are happy little guys. 

We had Korean etiquette training yesterday. It was most informative: 

• Give and receive everything with both hands
• Don't put your hands in your pockets when talking to someone (especially oldies) 
• Stand up and bow when someone older than you walks into a room
• Don't point
• Use exact titles
• Don't hang up the phone until after three seconds of silence (hanging up has always been a struggle for me, so having set rules on how to do it is nice)

Elder Prock beat me at Janggi... again. The score is 3 to 1 now. 

OH! I forgot to mention this a few emails ago, but my uncle Eli sent me a bunch of super cool wood cuts of Christmas ornaments and tie pins for the mission. He made one for each member of my MTC district and for my mission president, and he made a Plan of Salvation puzzle in Korean for me to use when  teaching. 

He is a super cool uncle! I remember when he went on his mission to England, and I wrote him a letter or two. I thought of missionaries as superheroes back then, and I looked up to Eli so much, along with my other uncle who went on a mission to Japan, uncle Kevin.  I love those guys! I never had any doubt about going on a mission because of theirs and my dad's example. I'm glad I get to be out here to share the gospel of Jesus Christ. It has brought me so much happiness and peace, and I'm going to spread it around. 

Alright! I love you guys! Have a good week, merry Christmas! 

Truly Truman 

PICTURES!!!

I went to two art galleries today. One in an underground mall, and one in an above-ground-not-a-mall. The picture with the tiger was the above ground place, and the bird and horses and nice smiling lady were in the underground mall.

The two cute chubby monster statues were also in the mall.

The plate of delicious food was from the buffet. This was the first good meal since the MTC, and the first really good meal since my mom's cooking. 

First Trainer!

Posted by Elder Renfroe's Mom: 

President and Sister Sargent are so amazing at keeping the mission and families informed about the work going on in Korea.  It's actually pretty incredible.  Here is a screenshot of what Sister Sargent posted today, December 7th, 2021.  Truman's trainer will be Elder Titensor from Bountiful, Utah!  They will be serving in Nonsan.

We just had a zoom call with our most recently arrived Missionaries who are still in quarantine. After interviewing the missionaries, and lots of prayer the last couple days, President Nate Sargent matched them up with their trainers tonight. It was pretty fun! After introducing themselves, the trainer usually says he/she is serving in the best area in the whole mission. And, it’s true! ♥️🤷‍♀️♥️

Elder Seth Rau will train Elder Gavin Dickey / Seosan

Elder 박현준 …Elder Phoenix Fisher / Icheon 

Elder 이동우 … Elder Staley Binks / Bundang

Elder Hyun Sung … Elder Jared Harden / Daejeon 2

Elder Seth Clawson …Elder Caden Greene / Gongju

Elder Jake Nelson… Elder Mason Prock / Chungju

Elder Sean Titensor… Elder Truman Renfroe / Nonsan

Sister Synnova Blattman … Sister Grace Sunhong Min / Jeongeup

Nonsan, Republic of Korea

Fun Facts About My Companion: Elder Prock

Elder Mason Prock, from Mesa, Arizona

• Where do you fall in your family?  I am the youngest of 3 kids
• How many siblings? Order of brothers/sisters: I have 2 older sisters
• What do you want to study/work after the mission? I hope to go to law school and eventually go into sports law.
• What is your favorite thing about Korea?  The Korean people are so amazing and are so incredibly kind!
• Favorite color: Green
• Favorite candy bar: Twix
• Favorite book: The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins
• Favorite movie: The Dark Knight
• Favorite gospel quote: "Forget yourself and go to work"
• Favorite scripture and why? Jacob 6:5 because it shows us  how badly God wants to be close to us--we must make the effort to come unto Him.