"Holy Cow! I'm in Korea!!"  Yes, yes you are Elder Clawson!  He sounds great! 

Holy Cow! I'm in Korea!!
So this has been easily the most overwhelming experience in my life, but I doubt that's news to anybody at all really.  The area that I'm serving is called 계산 (Gyaesan) and it is an interesting area.  We have like half of an investigator that was there before I came into the area.  It is a tough thing to come into your first area and have virtually nothing to work with.  I say we have half an investigator because he's pretty much already an active member of the church, we just need to give him the lessons and then we can babtize him.  In all honesty from what I understand the missionaries didn't really do much in regard to the conversion of this man.  I'm going to call him George cause we're not supposed to use names and I think and he is in his sixties I believe.  I'm not a hundred percent because it's virtually impossible for me to tell age here.  I still am of the disposition here that virtually everybody looks the same.  I guess I have a ways to go in that regard.
So my trainer is pretty awesome!  I'm still not sure about the names thing so I'll get back to you about that at a later date.  This is his first time training as well as his first time being senior.  Before this transfer he never really had to speak Korean much just because he didn't really need to with his previous companions.  He's been out for just under a year I believe and despite what he believes his Korean is way good.  My Korean on the other hand, well that's a different story.  I may have been good in the MTC but I guess what everybody says is true and we learn two different languages really on our missions.  Today while we were on our way here, I did my first full subway 전도! 전도 is proselyting, you basically use that word for contact too.  So the guy I talked to was the first man I've ever met who knew anything about the church prior to us talking to him.  My companion gave me the cell phone with a text that had a bunch of mistakes asking him if it was correct.  Unfortunately it was correct or so it seemed to the guy that was checking it.  I was just like oh... well I came to Korea on tuesday, can I practice my Korean?  So basically that's the way I use to talk to Koreans all the time. It's a pretty solid strategy I think but it's life time is limited.
This first week of ours as a whole was crazy busy though.  So I got here to the area on Wednesday and I was just so beat.  Jet lag rocked me those first couple days and it showed.  I played ping pong with an investigator who had gotten baptized in July but hadn't been confirmed yet.  He has some difficulty with some of the commandments so I think he's slow to kind of accept what's going on in the church.   Our ward also has pretty much nobody that is close to him in age so he feels lonely sometimes.  One of the older members with a kid wants to try and fellowship him though so I hope that goes well.  The investigator is a way cool guy and wants to be good, but has little direction so he's kind of confused with what he should do a lot of the time.
Korean food is a bit of a chore for me at this point.  I can eat this meal thats called 비빈밥 but much more than that gets tough.  On friday we had a real Korean meal and they served it with hot water which was just about the most disgusting thing I have ever experienced.  I was looking for something cool to quench my thirst and I get hot water!!!! So grody.  Anyways, it's going to take some time to get used to whats going on with this food mess.  There's a lot of really easy to eat stuff we've tried, but once you get to any home cooked meals, I'm toast.  In time I guess I'll do better.
It's good to hear about stuff from home though!  I'm glad everyone is doing well pretty much!  The wedding sounds like its been pretty fun to try and get ready for and yes, I agree Bosco should have one of me, provided no mutilation will be involved.  Granted it is cardboard, but I guess its the thought that counts.  I was wondering about the harvest festival a little bit actually!  It sounds like it went pretty well which is way good! We had this halloween party and it was okay I guess.  Nothing is quite as good as an American party for an American holiday.  Also glad to hear that Brother Evans can still scale trees in order to take down the lights.
So about the mess that was travel!  Well our flight ended up being delayed a total of 2 hours out of Salt Lake.  We didn't arrive until 20 minutes after the first groups flight left.  They did get to go to Korea that day however, but they had to have a layover in Narita Japan.  Everybody on that flight kept saying "Yay! We get to go to Japan!" But come on, lets be real, it doesnt count unless you get a stamp, airports do not count as the country.  At least I dont think they do.  So Korean air was simply put. nuts.  So the first thing, right as you get on the plain and go to your seat, on the seat is a blanket, pillow, headphones, toothbrush, toothpast, and slippers.  Also, instead of just some programmed TV thing, you had a personal control with a gang of programs and stuff to watch, a bunch of music, and video games to play whilst on the flight.  The Branch president in the MTC said that we could go ahead and watch documentaries and use the games if we wanted to.  My game controller however was broken so I didn't get to use that feature, but that's okay with me.  I ended up just reading the scriptures, and we were allowed to listen to classical music if they had it so I was just listening to a bunch of orchestra stuff and what not while I read the scriptures for a while.  I also watched a documentary on Giant octupuses which were way legit.
The biggest thing I've noticed in Korea is just how tough missionary work can really be.  That stat from Elder Beck is way depressing though.  Only an 11 percent retention rate of members is way tough, but I guess they just weren't ready for it.  People in Korea are really slow to learn and take lessons and stuff.  Its not quite like finland where the average investigator takes 3 years to be babtized, but its a lot longer than other places.  I'm not too sure what all to expect as far as stats go, but we do a whole bunch of contacting which is amazing practice for Korean so that's way good.
Well I'm now just going to try and address shorter answers to questions that family has asked.  I have no idea what my address is and we will have to tell you later.  For packages, buffalo pretzels and jalapeno pretzels are always awesome, not so much honey mustard and onion.  No I am not jet lagged anymore but I am always tired just cause of the work.  It does not smell all like garlic all the time, nor did the airport, but half the time it does smell like balboa beach.  Yes I did sleep on the plane, it was way nice and I slept like a rock.  The service is unreal and awesome on Korean air.  I'll try and have fun things to tell every week but until next week 안녕히 계세요!

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