Monday, January 13, 2014

We already love you Scott.  That is all.  =)

Could ya learn ta love me?




Scott Clawson < clawson.scott@myldsmail.net> Sun, Jan 12, 2014 at 8:33 PM








To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>




Hey President!

Another super awesome week! And we actually had some lessons to show for it this time too! I'm excited for what these hold in store. I wouldn't call them new investigators yet, just by definition, so we'll continue to work on it! One thing that was especially cool was that there is a man who had attended church with a member friend of his a couple months back. He said to wait until the new year to try and meet him, so we did, and it was really great! He wasn't super forthright with his interests in the gospel, but I do think that he is indeed interested. He really enjoyed the chapel and the lack of a 싶자가 which was kind of fun for me. He even brought another friend of his who was interested in learning about what makes us different. Again, it was a very cool experience.
It's also interesting how our schedule prepares us. We went on exchanges with the zone leaders this week, and we had a teaching appointment whilst there. Honestly, Elder Thorup and I haven't had too many lately, but we're still working! During that teaching appointment it felt strange to teach a little bit, but it helped me have confidence for my appointment the next day. I love experiences like that. I find that many times it's not big impressions that the spirit uses to work on me, but he helps me in small simple ways, that I don't even think are promptings at the time. I'm really happy with where the work here is at right now. Thank you so much!!

Elder Clawson



Hey Everybody!!!

Truth be told this is probably one of the happiest email times I've had in a long time!!!  Not because I need a break from the week, but just because this week has been so stinking awesome!!!
So last sunday we got a new ward mission leader, which was super cool and the guy is just so willing to help out!  We met with him on tuesday, and it was really cool.  He speaks insanely difficult Korean and has a vocabulary that is just insane.  Well I guess that's what is difficult these days is vocabulary, but because of that, it's particularly cool for me to meet with him.  I'm not sure if you remember but I used to pride myself on having an elevated vocabulary in high school (no longer the case since beginning learning Korean) but it's a different story in Korean.  Vocab is a monster that keeps on giving!   You know how in English there are words that have like ten different meanings?  It's the other way around in Korean.  For example, off the top of my head I can think of three words for "to judge".  Not complaining!  Just saying!  Anyways, no more tangent, but that meeting was really cool.  He is really stoked to help as much as he can and has already put together some cool avenues for us to do some things a little more effectively in the area.  Also he taught me a little chinese!!! super cool
Wednesday legitimately had a mission changing experience.  So we were doing this 20 minute lesson program that our mission is trying to get going consistently, and we were at the home of some members who have recently moved to Korea from the US.  Super awesome family.  Husband works for Nuskin and actually just organized a school!  He used to work for the US board of education, and is just a boss.  His wife is a convert and an awesome mom.  Both so fun.  They decided to make their "investigator" roles really tough, and afterwards when we asked for feedback, he shared something with us that I didn't expect.  He says "you two elders have been together for about 8 or 9 weeks now, and you've both got better at things since we first got here, but if you don't love each other, every thing you get better at is worthless."  That was by no means, what I had expected to be told.  He proceeded to share experiences from his mission, where through actually loving his companion, things just changed.  full 180.  Regrettably, I know that he is totally right.  I know that with some of my companions, I haven't even come close to loving them.  My thoughts were just "you don't want to talk to people on the street? fine.  Just shadow me as I talk to everyone"  I never really thought that us just being in harmony would change anything.  It really is the only thing that makes sense.  Please don't chastise me for my stubbornness about not having loved people, but everyone that knows me well knows that I am far from an emotional person and don't like opening up to people.  It would only follow that's not too natural for me, but I am so grateful that I am now in a place to where hearing a message like that was able to help me to be a better missionary as I need.
I left that house with a different outlook, and I swear everything has been so much different.  All the people I've met since then I feel better about.  Everything I know was changed right there, and it's not even like I have to do anything too crazy!  Both me and my companion want to work hard, and now we know what stands in our way.  That's kind of what the subject line is about.
Wednesday we met with this guy in his ginseng shop which was fun.  He fed us this disgusting ginseng drink that Elder Thorup couldn't even finish, but I've gotten pretty good at eating or drinking just about anything within the bounds of the word of wisdom, so I almost chugged it haha.  That guy was super great and wanted a copy of the Book of Mormon and told us to come again later.  I'm thinking he can be an investigator pretty soon here!
Thursday was soooooooo cold.  The coldest day of the year so far, and my companion wasn't wearing his winter coat!!!  So scary.  He somehow didn't get sick though, so I'm glad.  We met with this man who the sisters in our area had been meeting with but his wife and daughter are in the Philippines right now so we are meeting him.  Very nice guy.  We shared about the Book of Mormon and then he kindly ushered us out.  I think he was really hungry and we were kind of just in between him and dinner at the time, but he's a really nice guy, so he should come to church soon!
Friday we went on exchanges with the zone leaders which was super fun!  I got to spend so much time speaking just Korean with Koreans!  It was awesome!!!  During the duration of that exchange, I got to have two meals with only other Koreans, which was awesome.  Kinda hard, but still cool!  Also the zone leader I was on exchanges with is from the same group that was with me in the mtc.  He's korean so he was in a different district there, but he's still 동기 as it is called in korean.  It was especially cool to be with him, because he's probably the best missionary I know at loving people so I learned a lot from him about loving people and still maintaining the spirit of our calling.
Saturday was the day of the appointment I shared about in my letter to president. check that out if you want.
Sunday was cool too!  Fun story!  So last week, this kid who moved in recently got ordained to the priesthood.  Interesting part is that he has never been baptized!  In korea because of culture, if you're talking to a kid, a lot of times if you're older they'll just kind of put their head down and just say yes to everything, thus our bishop thinking this kid had been baptized!  Now he's in league with Joseph Smith, Oliver Cowdery, and Alma!!!  How cool is that?!!?!

also that word 동기 (dong-gi)
it means like graduating class.
동갑 (dong- gap)
it means you were born in the same year.  big deal in korea

Sorry I'm out of time, but I love you all!  Keep being awesome!!!

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Thursday, January 9, 2014

Scott told me a few weeks ago that some mornings he wakes up and he can't believe that he is really living in Korea.  Yes Scott, you are living in Korea and here are a few pictures that prove it.  Love you Scott. 



Monday, January 6, 2014

YIKES!!!  So behind on posting these letters. Sorry Scott!   
 
Scott Clawson 1/5/14 (13 hours ago) 
to me
 
Hey Everyone!!!
I hope you all are having awesome weeks repeatedly and stuffs!  My weeks are always good.  Super fun.
This week we effectively started this new thing that the mission has been trying to get going where we get together with members not for a meal and just teach them a quick lesson as practice.  SOOOO AWESOME!  I was kind of skeptical at first just because our ward didn't seem too on board with it, BUT!  One of the members got really down to work and got us a bunch of appointments with people and we started this week and like I said and now I'm being repetitive and redundant and repetitive and redundant.   It went really well, and I think that it really helps out the members a lot.  We taught the first counselor in the bishopric and he kind of was asking ridiculous questions that there was no way my companion would understand but it was funny to see the responses he got anyways haha.
Wednesday we had district meeting and I have made a new goal for myself for district meetings.  Try and just get the best object lessons.  For Christmas one of my roommates gave me a rubiks cube and I taught myself how to solve it.  I used it as an object lesson to building better foundations for our investigators by using members in lessons.  Sure at first it's hard because you feel like it makes it so the investigator feels like he's getting pushed away a little bit, but in the long run it's the only way things work out, because every investigator that gets baptized eventually needs to become friends with members somewhere along the way.
English class this week was good as always.  There's this one guy Tom, I think i've talked about him before but the guy doesn't have a clue about english, but still just loves English class.  He's been coming for longer than I've been around, and is still so bad, but he is so entertaining.  I understand the language that is Tom.  No verbs are involved so it's left a lot up to reading minds but it's doable.  I didn't think I'd learn two languages on my mission but I did!  Now this other english class member can never understand what Tom says even though he's totally fluent in English, so he always asks me to translate for him.  Fun stuff.
Thursday was temple day which was super cool.  We got to see President and talk with him which is always cool.  Also shout out to Brother and Sister Nevarez!  Super thanks as well as to Grandma!!  You guys are awesome!
Oh yeah, fun story!  So monday we were meeting with this guy who met missionaries in another area some where recently and his English name is no joke, SANTA!  Guy also took us to his office where he runs like a architecture marketing magazine company.  He gave us two books to keep and I'm just like "okay, never gonna be helpful for me really..."  but I took them anyways.  Also our president asked us to make cases for our copies of the Book of Mormon so the Books don't get jacked up, and this guy took mine!  Oh well, I can just make another.
Sunday we had an interesting discussion with one of my recent converts.  It was testimony meeting, and we have this one guy in our ward who is kind of old and crazy and stuff.  He bore his testimony about going to a fortune teller and this and that, and it was ridiculous and our recent convert decided that based on this man, he doesn't like our church anymore.  He now decided that he wanted to go to the Catholic church instead.  We had a discussion and told him that he would be making a huge mistake and that he made a covenant with God to stay at this church, but he was stuck in his ways...
After that we went and told the Bishop because it's his ward and such, and he was really grateful.  The sister missionaries had just stepped in the church and he asked them to come into his office too, and he just told us that he is really proud of the work we do.  It was probably one of the coolest moments I've had in this area thus far.  I have really enjoyed all my Bishops.  They're particularly awesome.  All very different, but soooo cool.  

Well hey, I gotta go!  Bye

감기 조심하세요!!! (gam-gi jo-shim-ha-sae-yo)
be careful not to get a cold!
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Happy Anniversar​y Sister!!!

Scott Clawson
12/29/13 (8 days ago)
to me
 
Hey President!!!

This week was awesome!!!  Super good as usual, but some extra cool events too!  Lately as you've been talking about people just coming up to the missionaries and saying "hey, I want to learn about what you're spreading," I've kind of just been thinking "yeah sure, that'll never happen to me."  BUT!  I'm sure you could have guessed at this point that we had an experience along those lines.
We were just walking down this street that we had planned to contact on at that time, and Elder Thorup was mid conversation with this Chinese man, and I thought to myself "maybe it will be better if I just kind of trail behind and if he needs help (not to say I speak chinese, because I don't) he'll let me know.  While trailing, I was trying to start talking with some of the people coming the other way, and everyone seemed busy, and there was one man on his phone, I would say hi, another listening to music, hello, another talking to his girlfriend.  The trend continued, but as we approached an intersection, one of the men that seemed to be listening to music had caught up with us and asked if we could talk for a while in this nearby coffee shop.
That led to a really good discussion, and I know that the spirit was just sooooo involved in that chain of events.  Unfortunately, as per the pattern that seems like that seem to follow here for us, he left the country for Hawai'i today.  Unfortunate that we won't get to teach him for 3 to 6 months, but still so cool that we got to see the Lord's hand so blatantly present in our day, after we made a plan and followed it.

Thanks for everything President!  See you at the temple!

-Elder Clawson


Hey Everyone!!!

How's it going?!?!?!  I hope good.  Especially for Lindsay and Tony, it's still their special day!!  Wow congratulations!!!  A year!  And many more to come!!!  I don't know the appropriate way to congratulate this sort of thing...  Maybe just next year I'll be able to say it in person!!  HAH!! 
Anyways, like I said in my email to president, this week has been really good.
We started out last monday with this caroling activity that we were going to do, and it kind of didn't work out because the people that tried to organize it didn't do too hot, but they tried and turned out okay!  We just didn't get to carol.  We were going to try and do it at this pretty crowded station. but since we didn't get a permit or anything for it, they kicked us out, and sent us to this one side where it would be literally impossible to hear us.  Totally open, and not super highly trafficked. SOOOO...  we were standing around, and since I was getting kind of bored and there was little to no point in trying to sing, a couple of other missionaries and I just started doing a bunch of street contacting in that area.  It was super fun, and I talked to this guy that knew a jazz fusion band that I knew and was super into in America.  Afterwards we went to the food court and I found this restaurant that sold my favorite food 닭갈비 for pretty cheap.  It was pretty awesome.
Tuesday we had our mission conference for Christmas which was pretty fun.  It's kind of sad because the sisters that I came to the country with go home at the end of this transfer.  HOW CRAZY IS THAT?!?!?!?!  Not cool man, why does time go this fast...  Well at least I have 6 months more than them.  Conference was really cool.  There was this activity that we had to meet missionaries that we hadn't ever had a conversation with, and it was really hard for me.  Not because I'm not outgoing enough, but because I just know too man stinking people!!!  Well I guess you can never know too many people, but it was legitimately not very easy for me.  There were maybe only 5 or 6 missionaries in the room that was full of about 80 that I had never talked to before.  Call me the social butterfly.
Oh yeah, Christmas eve it was like 10 oclock at night, and I was playing guitar, pretty quietly mind you, and then someone comes and knocks on the door and really rudely tells me to stop playing guitar.  I'm just like "it's 10 oclock lady!" in my head, and I just said, yeah okay, I won't play anymore.  I guess that's what happens when you have to be up at 3 in the morning everyday to yell at your roommates.  (not us, her)
Christmas was awesome!!  We opened gifts and had an awesome breakfast, and made horchata again, which was delicious.  So awesome man...  After all that we went to the stake center and played sports which was super fun.  We started with footsol which is basically just really small soccer which was fun, then basketball.  I'm not too great at either of those.  Not very good translations from water polo... sad face. that's okay!  It was still fun!
We also had english class that night which was super awesome because our class brought a ton of food and they we had this super good meal.  Also there's this one english class patron who is just like the ditzyest person ever, and she's just filthy rich.  It was a pretty funny combination and she was just making a huge mess with the cake she brought.  As part of the English portion, I asked everyone what they did for christmas and no one had very good responses for Christmas.  For the gospel message I asked if they knew what the meaning of Christmas is and rich ditsy lady all snidely responds "yes, it's about jesus's birth and everyone knows that".  It was a really good opportunity to share with people why that was important.  They may have known why Christmas is a thing, but none of them could feel why christmas is a thing, and for that little short message, we could share with them how we felt about it, and it was really awesome.
Thursday I called my family!  YAYYYAYYY!
Friday was when we had that crazy cool experience that I wrote to president about.
Saturday we had English class again, which was pretty great and lots of other conversation times.  Nothing too crazy.
Yesterday was pretty cool.  We had the opportunity to teach a practice lesson with some members and this member was bringing up some tough questions, I really liked it.  I had a pretty cool experience with Korean then too.  The member we were teaching's wife was saying something about the scriptures, and I understood it in Korean, so she told me to explain it to my companion.  I couldn't do it.  I knew how to say it in Korean, but I could translate it.  It was pretty funny.  Super cool for me.

Well sorry for the abrupt ending but I gotta go!

Korean phrase for work hard
화이팅!!  (hwa-ee-ting)
just koreanized fighting!

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so remember that time I said I wouldn't get to email this week

Scott Clawson
12/22/13
to me
 
Hey everyone!
well I was wrong, so I made a mistake once!  I'm sorry!  Regardless this week also, as per usual has also been pretty cool!
Last monday was all over the place.  So it was pday and we started at a meat buffet. well sort of.  So we emailed and then went to this other area in our zone and we were going to have chicken buffet but it was closed for whatever reason. Kind of sad, but meat buffet is still good.  Whilst there one of my good buddies Elder Nixon and I had some cow intestine.  I was really impressed with how it tasted!  I thought it was going to be awful!  It was delicious!!!!  I'm not weird.  I promise.  I will say it was one of the more chewy things that I have ever tasted though.  Somewhat unpleasant in that regard.
Afterwards we went to a bath house which was nice.  I am a fan of bathhouses.  Also I got to talk to a guy about the gospel whilst there.  That's how not awkward of a setting it is.
So last sunday night, we had a member tell us he wanted to have us over for dinner and his family home evening, and it would start at 6.  I thought okay, sounds good and he said he'd call later to figure out a little more about what we'd do.  I remember that our area president has been big on if there are no less actives or investigators there, then we should do our best to eat from 5  to 6 and not really stick around too long after.  I remembered that and when we talked later, I told him and he was on board, but that meant that we couldn't meet monday night.  I was kinda bummed, but I felt good because I was doing what I was supposed to.
While we were at the meat buffet, right after the cow intestine, this other member calls us whom we gave the book of Mormon to the week prior, and he was just talking and saying all this nonsense about how he called this member, and that member, and how all the missionaries needed to be present to give this lady the book of Mormon, and all this craziness, and I'm not too sure he knew what he was saying.  It wouldn't have made just as little sense in English as it did in Korean.  Anyways, we decided to meet at 6, at this place that I wasn't sure if it's in our area or not.  I made some calls, and it wasn't so we changed locations, but finally we ended up at this coffee shop that is indeed in our area, and had a super awesome discussion with this lady about the Book of Mormon.  And then we referred her to another area... sad face.
tuesday was transfers which was kind of sad, but cool at the same time.  A lot of missionaries went home this transfer.  Well relatively speaking, up til this one only like 6 missionaries went home in the last 3.  Crazy.
Wednesday was cool.  We had district meeting which was whatever.  I've trained so many times that it's hard for me to even think of things to train on at this point, especially since all but like 5 of my trainings have been heard by at least one of the people in my current district.  I think I'm at a total of like 22 now.  Ridiculous...  soooooo many trainings, but I get to keep going!!!  And I'm going to do my best to enjoy it.
Kind of awkward that day.  So the aforementioned Elder Nixon like me is really into guitar gear, and we talk about it from time to time.  We were practicing for the choir for Christmas conference and a couple of guys started arguing about something insignificant and I was standing next to Elder Nixon so I turned to him and we both just kinda were doing our best awkward, and I say "you wanna talk about guitar gear?!?!" and it was really funny.
Saturday we didn't have English class but we did get to go to a performance of Handel's Messiah and then had our Christmas party.  It was a busy day.  We were supposed to host the choir and the orchestra which was one of the hardest things I've done on my mission.  These people are like the arrogant and big headed of the arrogant and big headed.  Well not all of them, but some certainly were...  SOOO hard for me.  I had a really hard time relating with any of them, and I felt like I failed super hard in trying to.  It's so much easier for me to talk to Koreans.
Oh yeah, Thursday, my old companion Elder Lee,  now returned home and called just Joon, is back in Korea for a while and I got to see him!  Fun stuff.
Other side note, saturday was Murphy's birthday, and he was at the Messiah!  Soooooo awesome!!!!  I got to see my buddy Murphy!!  He's still a punk, but it was fun.  Also, I had a ton of people from old wards say hi to me.  That was really cool for me.  I had a lot of people remember me which was good for my self esteem.  I guess I'm impacting people.  
THe Christmas party was awesome too.  We sang What Child is this, and I got to do the accompaniment on guitar.  We were going to have someone play piano, and then the night before we decided that I would play the guitar...  It worked out pretty well though, so no complaints.
Also between those two events we had a total of 12 nonmembers in attendence.  Our Bishop was stoked.  Super solid.  
Last night to finish the week we met with this guy who speaks english and is moving to LA on saturday.  Interestingly enough, he's known missionaries forever and is a pretty cool guy and likes the church, but he has some oppositions and I think he just wants to learn about the church for educational purposed but all the same was a really cool guy.  This week is going to be really good too!

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!!
모두 매리 크리스마스!!!

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Happy Birthday Dad!!!

Scott Clawson
12/15/13
to me
 
Hey everyone!  Hey Dad in particular though!  Happy birthday man!!!
This week has been good as always!  Every week is good.  I think it would take a lot of not good for me to say it wasn't good, but I don't think the Lord would let that happen to you guys.  You can't get a sad email!
So last p-day my companion wanted to go shop for suits because he had a wanting for Korean suits so that's what we did and it was pretty solid.  He scored and was able to get two suits for a discount because the lady who sells them really likes me.  I guess it helps that I've brought her a bunch of customers who like those suits a lot.  Helping people get business and neat suits!  Fun stuff.
We've also started working on this song that we'll be singing at the ward christmas party.  As the missionaries you kinda always just get stuff thrown at you.  It makes it fun though!!!  Anyways, if any of you were wondering I'm still really bad at singing.  Not one of my strong suits, but what can you do?  You practice a bunch and pray for help that's what you do!
Tuesday we had this big follow up meeting for trainers and trainees at the mission headquarters.  People started pointing out while I was there that I have trained a ton and also that I have gotten advanced in mission age.  Fun stuff I suppose.  This is only my third time training but I guess that's a lot considering a lot of missionaries go home never having had trained.  Not to mention I still have time.  Anyways, that meeting was super cool!!!  Lot's of cool things learned and I got to see how a bunch of the other new missionaries are doing.  I am really grateful that me and my companion are able to get along pretty well even though yesterday he practically tried to run away from me!!!  Wait a bit before that story though.
That night, this member of our ward called and he wanted us to come by his house and bring a copy of the Book of Mormon because he had someone that he wanted to give to someone.  We were planning on just dropping off the Book of Mormon and then going back somewhere else to do some street contacting, but nope.  We ended up going to his house which was really small and very humble.  He is a very humble man and loves the gospel.  His computer is filled with the scriptures and Mormon Tabernacle Choir performances.  So convicted in his testimony, and knows the importance of the gospel in his life.  We didn't have much time, but he wanted to give us so much food.  I didn't even know what to do about it, he was just so set on us sticking around and hanging out with him, but we had goals to reach and needed to take some more time to hit them.
Wednesday was district meeting and it was pretty good.  I talked about Jonah again.  Jonah is such a good bad example for missionary work...  It was cool though, one of the APs was in attendence and he really enjoyed it even though I'm sure it didn't benefit him much at all just because he's so much of a better missionary than me but he is a good friend nonetheless!!!  Actually transfers are tomorrow, and he will no longer be AP after tomorrow because he's going somewhere to be zone leader and things and stuff and things.
Nothing changes with my district at all.  I was kind of bummed because there were 5 changes with zone leader spots among the 12 possible spots, and I kind of wanted to do that just because I want to experience a lot of different leadership opportunities and see what it's like to help more missionaries, but I'm at where I'm at and that is where I'm supposed to be!
Anyways wednesday we also had english class which had one of the best turnouts in a while, which was totally awesome!!!  Loved it!  English class is really fun for me these days.  A lot of missionaries really dislike English class but not me!!!  It's lots of fun.
Thursday we went on exchanges with the zone leaders because that's what we do being that I'm a district leader.  I was with a missionary whose mission ends this week.  His name is Elder Annen and he is a boss.  Love hanging out with that guy.  He's a boss at missionary work too.  Especially teaching which is something I need to work on.  Another thing I learned is the best way to deal with your mission coming to a close.  He's handled it really well, and I hope I can do so as well.
Friday was cool, we met with this guy that the APs were actually intending to refer to us, and he fed us traditional Korean food.  It's all really good, but they have a bunch of fish, and don't even begin to make an effort to remove the bones for you, so I got wrecked.  I hate fish bones.  The only food that I can't really deal with.  I'll eat anything, but I don't like fish bones!  That guy was super cool and he has a lot of great potential.  Trying to get him to come to the performance of Handel's Messiah this weekend.  That's going to be really exciting!!!
Saturday was crazy busy, at first we met at the church to meet with this less active and his home teachers and it went super well.  They took us to this chinese restaurant and it was amazingly delicious.  Also the less active really enjoyed it and he's been having some trouble with the members of the ward lately, and it was really hard for us to meet with him prior.  Excited for him!!!
Yesterday was cool too!  We talked to a lot of really cool people and I was getting this one guys phone number and he was super nice, and then all the sudden I looked up and Elder Thorup was no where to be found!  He just ran away!  Not really though, he was trying to talk to this other guy.  Just doing what he's supposed to.  Anyways, that was stressful for a bit, but we got back together and it all worked out just fine!!!
 
So... out of time.  love you bye.
 
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