Week 37 March 23, 2015 No longer a "greenie"

    It is crazy how fast this past transfer went by. We get transfer calls on Sunday so this is the last week of my 5th transfer! I am slowly turning into an "old missionary" now and can't be labeled a "greenie" anymore so I am pretty excited about that. My companion right now only has 2 transfers left after this one so my prediction is that I will leave and he will train to the death. I did although just get to Siheung so who knows what will happen? I definitely don't know but it is all in the Lord's hands and whatever happens is what is supposed to happen. My companion and I struggled a bit this week in our relationship but I was able to learn a lot from our disagreements and we managed to get over it. We still don't a lot of the times see eye to eye but that is just something that will happen and that we have to work through. I am so lucky that all my companions have been way hard workers and have pushed me. I mean I still have a loooong ways to go before I can say I have become a "consecrated missionary" but with time I believe I can get there. I still lately have been way tired and it is super hard to stay awake sometimes. So I am not sure how I will get over that because even when I get up and do all the things I am supposed to, I am still tired! I sleep good at night so I don't know what it is haha. Probably just a hard thing I will have to somehow master being out here on my mission. Well I am officially not from Washington anymore :( I am just the typical Utah boy Mormon missionary now. It is going to be like just another transfer when I come home to a different place then where I left from because I won't know anything about the area, have no investigators, etc. haha. 

     We got to play bball with a potential this week so that was pretty ballin'! We played with a guy that owns his own little restaurant and we met him by eating at his restaurant. We only had 3 people so I had to take my comp and our friend 2 on 1 but don't worry I still beat them. I still somewhat can ball but for sure need to start playing it more so that when I get home my old man can't beat me ;) Dad you might still get me on the jump shots but I will just make you run around and get tired haha. We played horse too and I tried to do a trick shot from the top of a playground set thing but could never hit it. While I was over there a bunch of little kindergarten age kids came up to me and were trying to talk to me saying "are you a foreigner? where are you from? etc" just like all kids say when they see me. I said I was Korean and they were like woah haha. I think they were on like a field trip to the park or something because they had a supervisor there. I somehow made them think that I wanted to play tag so then I was chased around the playground by like 20 screaming little Korean kids and man was I scared. Then the supervisor lady said it was dangerous and called all the little kids over and they stopped chasing me. My comp jokingly said "nice, way to be a good example" but hey it wasn't my fault they just started chasing me. After playing bball we went to lunch with our buddy and got some Japanese food. This week we met Mr. Kim and his daughter Lucy at the Gym he owns. We just randomly met this guy through me being my curious self and wanting to walk into a Gym and see how much it costs. Mr. Kim at first seemed to only have English interest for his daughter but after meeting then we could both tell that he has a really good heart and may have slight gospel interest. We taught them both English and were able to share a message about prayer too. Mr. Kim told us we could come to his Gym anytime too. So I was pretty stoked about that and the blessing of being able to work out at a Gym for free! We just have to get up earlier than usual to go so it is pretty hard sometimes but have gone a few times. 

     This week we met our investigator 김기준 and ate dog with him. While we were eating with him he ordered a beer and we didn't know what to do so we let him drink it and then everything went south from there... He has struggled with alcohol every since my comp met him 4 months ago and we have been trying to help him but idk. He doesn't have a job right now and is pretty old so his life just isn't the best at the moment. We ended up having to walk him home because he was so drunk and even carry him part of the way. He even tried to go to the bathroom on the street but we didn't let him and found a bathroom. So that was a pretty crazy night to say the least. We had to drop him because we both felt we couldn't do anything more for him. He didn't keep our commitments and was kind of just meeting us without putting forth work on his side. So hopefully in the future we will be able to help him more but at the time being all we can do is pray for him. 

    I got to go to the Temple this week so that was awesome! After temple we went to this mega buffet that literally had every kind of food you could think of for a missionaries' last hoorah that goes home next week. Yesterday the other Elders had a baptism so that was way cool to witness! It was my first one that I have seen on my mission and the spirit was way strong during it. I am just so blessed to be apart of this church and it is incredible how all around the world the wonderful ordinance of baptism is being performed in the same manner that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ was baptized in. I will continue to push on with this mission thing and do my best so don't worry about me. I love you all so much! 

Love, 

Elder Picard

Eating dog in Korea

Mega Buffet