Monday, April 14, 2014

Yes Yes Yes, so I am a little behind - AGAIN!  Actually, I am super behind.  Here are a bunch of letters from Scott.  He is back in Incheon - this was his first area when he arrived in Korea so mnay months ago.  It is likely that he will finish things up there as well.  A very nice full circle.  Love love love this boy. 

General Conference is legit!!!
2 messages

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Apr 13, 2014 at 8:36 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
Hey everyone!!
 
First off!  If you heard Elder Ballard's talk in conference, dont forget to buy a Preach my Gospel and study it!!!  It's awesome!
So this could potentially be like the first full length letter you would have gotten from me in a while.  I hope I don't disappoint!  A lot has been going on recently.
So first off that I can think of that's super awesome.  I don't remember if you guys heard about the lady I found the last week that I was in Gangnam, we refer to her as Harmonica.  SHE'S GETTING BAPTIZED!!! Sick!!!  That's so cool.  I won't be able to go probably cause it's like an hour and a half a way, but that's okay, I don't really mind.  My companion from last transfer is going to baptize her which will be really good for him.  I want to testify to you all of the effects of a simple act of service. I don't know if you recall, but the way we met her was she was carrying all these boxes to recycle.  A lot of older people in Korea do that to get money.  She was walking a good ways, and she was willing to let us help her.  During the walk we told her about the church, and about the Book of Mormon.  Actually she asked what I was carrying so we showed her, and she asked for a copy.  I don't think I've given a copy of the Book of Mormon to someone that appreciated it so much.  When we parted ways, I asked if she had a phone so we could contact her later, but she doesn't have a cell phone, so we got her house phone and she got our card.  Didn't think much of it, but that night she called and asked what time church started.  She came on sunday, and apparently is ready to be baptized on saturday.  It's so small the things we do, but they have huge impacts.  This was the week before transfers, on a Thursday, and we get our calls on Saturday.  After I met her, I had this feelng of relief like "you can leave now".  I Don't really know how, but it's crazy how our paths cross people who are ready for the gospel in their lives, and they just drop what their doing to learn.  That was an awesome experience.
In our current area of Dapdong, we have some cool things happening, some frustrating things, and some whatever things.  This man that had a baptismal date, that we thought was abducted by his sister who thinks we're crazy, showed back up!!!  The awesomest thing ever!!!  He's back and came to conference on saturday!!!  We didn't get to talk to him after, but he's really close to being ready for baptism.  He has a date for the 4th of May, and I think if all works out he should be ready for that.  I think his sister will be working hard though because the Pope, yes THE Pope is coming to the Catholic church that is literally right next to our church, mid May.  Probably a super good guy, but all the same, it'll make it hard.  Not to mention will keep us from being able to go to our church that day probably.
We have another investigator who is bugging us.  He likes to smoke a lot, and is convinced not only is it not a sin, but it isn't bad for him, and that God doesn't care whether or not he treats his body well.  We thought he was like this super golden guy because he came to church like the first week we met him, but he doesn't even really like it.  Also yesterday he lied to us so he could not watch general conference.  Frustrating.  That and he's trying to meet the other elders in our area concurrently, so he can practice English.  Its okay, he'll come around.  We'll help him feel the Spirit and God's love and I think he can enjoy church and life more for that matter.  Also he's a welder and does TIG welding. He gave me a thing of tungsten.  He won't stop giving us stuff either.  May actually play to our advantage in helping him understand why we don't abuse our bodies i.e. gifts from God.
This week we've been having a lot of people set appointments and then not show.  Yesterday we had 4 appointments set and no one showed up.  Frustrating, but that's okay, worse things have happened.  We will be making a more concerted effort to meet people in a way so they know what we're meeting for and aren't afraid to actually keep the appointments they set.
This week we had interviews with the President which was good.  We got to talk to president about whatever we felt we needed.  Really as of late, I've been really happy with just about everything and it was hard for me to even come up with things to say.  He asked me what I've learned from being a zone leader thus far which was a super good question.  The biggest thing I've learned is that it does not matter who you are, but that you can ALWAYS learn from those around you, no matter who they are.  It's really true and I know it.
Conference was amazing.  Iearned so much!!!  So many great messages.  I love general conference, and am kicking myself for all the times I didn't watch it sincerely
 
I love you all!  There's not rally too much more of note that I can think of.  bye
 
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First full week as zone leader!

2 messages

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Mar 30, 2014 at 8:20 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
Hey everyone!!!

This week has been super awesome.  Lot's of cool things happened.  I apologize because again, I don't have too much time, but I want to still answer any questions!  So of course that is my goal.
Last Monday we cleaned our house which was seriously necessary, it was a mess. The sink in the bathroom wouldn't drain, and I'm not the cleanest person, but I really am not a fan of things that facilitate the breeding of nasty disease like things in theoretically clean places.  All good now though!!!
Also that day we went and met this one guy in a hospital who got a concussion whilst drunk and is now under close watch cause his brain is so messed.  He is a super nice guy and wants to turn his life around.  His speech is kinda messed up which makes talking over the phone... interesting.  He almost accepted a baptismal date, which was awesome!!!  He's got a lot of potential, and I don't think there's much that could really hold him back at this point!  Super awesome guy
Tuesday started the series of days where we had several appointments, the greater portion of which don't actually turn out.  Sad face.  BUT!  We did meet our iraqi investigator and the guy is a boss.  I swear that he's going to be the first member of the church in Iraq.  Unfortunately/fortuantely he is going to Iraq for 3 months where he will stay with his family for a while.  Super awesome guy, and I found out that one of the two sects of Muslim is really similar to the principles that our church teaches.  I love how there is truth to be found everywhere.
Wednesday was district meeting which was fun.  It was in this area that we needed to take a bus to, and you know it's hot now because I'm getting headaches all the time from the allergies, and buses are really stuffy too.  Not fun.  District meeting was good though
Thursday we had to do weekly planning because on friday we went on exchanges with the APs.  That was surprisingly less intense than I thought it would be, but something awesome happened!!!  For the first time in almost a year, someone corrected my KOREAN!!!!  So awesome~!  It's kind of frustrating cause once you become senior companion, it's like you never get corrected, but when I was with one of the APs who is Korean, he corrected me!  SO AWESOME!!!  I just want to sound Korean...
The big focus me and my companion, Elder Thompson, have right now is inviting people to big things when we first meet them.  Making sure we do not forget to invite people to be baptized as soon as time permits, and asking them to do things that aren't easy.  There's a talk that says that if you give someone a baptismal challenge "when they are ready", then it's not a challenge at all.  That's an agreement.  I have a firm theory that because of the mindset of missionaries historically in Korea, that if you ask someone to be baptized on the street then nothing good will happen, but that is exactlly the problem.  People won't ask in faith and because of that things don't happen.  It works in South America.  It should work in Korea, and it's going to start in Incheon.  Big things are going to happen here if everybody goes out and works relying on the lord that the prepared people will be put in our path.  They recognize us as servants of the lord when we do his will, which means being bold, and having faith in him.  That's where this starts.
Elder Thompson is a boss and an awesome companion.  We both get to work hard around each other which is awesome.  I love being his companion.
Other fun side note, my new favorite church meeting is SPM!  So awesome and stuff gets done!!!

Gotta go but I love you ALL!!!@

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Sorry!

2 messages

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Mar 23, 2014 at 8:04 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
So I don't really have a lot of time because the computer I was working on is being silly and won't let me type.  Hopefully you can get something a lot better next week.  We've been having a lot of fun this week, and throwind down with proselyting.  My companion Elder Thompson is the man and works super hard.  He has taught me a ton already just through who he is, and he knows how to do misisonary work effectively.  We have some solid investigators here, and I've seen a lot of people from my first ward since it's in the same stake.  I'm loving being able to serve lots of missionaries as the zone leader, being able to meet lots of awesome people as just a normal missionary, and being able to feel the spirit as a child of God.  I love you all you're super awesome!  Tell my Mom happy birthday, and keep on keeping on when it's tough!  There's always more, and we can always do better!!

Love you all!
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TAKE IT BACK TO WHERE IT STARTED!!!!

3 messages

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Mar 16, 2014 at 8:49 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
Hey everybody!

First off I want to apologize for not putting a subject into the last email.  I know you were all heartbroken at that fact.  I will do my best not to forget again.
Anyways, transfer calls came and I will be moving back to Incheon where I started!  Not the same area, but back to Incheon nonetheless!  I will be a zone leader there and am pretty excited for that.  I have kind of wanted to be a zone leader more lately just because it's a wider scope of missionaries that I can help to serve.  There's a ton of super solid missionaries there and a lot of my friends.  I'm super stoked for everything.  Also, there's a chinatown  there so I plan on converting all the CHINESE PEOPLE!!!  I kind of wanted to learn a little Chinese for it, I'll probably just do it in my down time.  Also it's probably going to be my last area, so I'm pretty set on missionary-working that area to the bone! Gonna be legit!!!!
So this week was pretty good.  Monday night we were walking around and just trying to get some conversations in, and I saw this guy behind me wearing some timberlands.  Not a particularly common occurence in korea, so I commented on it to him, and he takes off his headphones and we talked and he's really interested in the church.  He was a pretty cool miracle.  After that we sprinted off to go do exchanges with the zone leaders because they wanted to.
On our way, we were riding on the train there, and there was a kid with a v-shaped guitar.  That is not common in Korea at all.  There's only like 3 kinds of electric guitar here, and that isn't one, so I went up and talked to him, and he was kinda thrown at first that there was a white guy speaking to him in Korean, and then again he was thrown by the fact that I knew it was strange to have a V in Korea, and then again by the fact that we liked the same music.  Haha, fun experience.  Gotta love all the miracles.  That was a fun miracle for me.
So the zone leader i was on exchanges with is this Korean and his name is Elder 석찬영 and he is like the funnest, best missionary ever.  He had been sick, but still is just such a boss of a missionary.  This guy is such a boss.  He's the zone leader and in the stake presidency meeting on sunday, he just floored the entire stake presidency.  They were talking about how the missionaries need to be the young men's presidents and how all the members need to be ward missionaries, and all this sort of thing.  He said he was really sick, and it was just like making him dizzy and one of the guys in the stake presidency looks at him as if to like rip into him or something, and Elder 석 shared something that I regrettably can't remember what it is right now, but it just shut everyone up, and the mission presidency were just nodding their heads in approval.  
Sorry I love to brag about Elder Suk.  He's my favorite.  Super sad that he's not my leader anymore, but he's still a boss and my buddy!!!
Tuesday we went and had a bunch of appointments and all of them cancelled.  Sad face, so we got to go just talk to people all day.  It was pretty fun.  There was this old guy who tried to show us this game where you put your index finger and thumb together and straighten out the rest of your fingers and the other person pulls them apart with their two index fingers.  He beat Elder Suk, and then when Elder Suk tried to open his hand, he just goes ahead and uses all of his fingers.  The guy was such a cheater, and it wasn't even sneaky.  Hilariousness.
Later we ate this really spicy octopus for dinner which is now among my favorite foods.  After dinner we went to church to use the bathroom and there was institute and some other stuff going on, so I ended up seeing a bunch of people from my first ward!  Exciting!
On wednesday we finished up the exchange and had district meeting.  District meeting was awesome.  Nobody could focus or calm down at first, but it ended up being okay.  I tamed the district down a bit, and we had the meeting, and it was awesome.  I think it was among the best trainings i've delivered.  It was about becoming friendly with members, so that we can have good relationships of trust.  I hope it worked.  Ironically the korean missionaries are the ones that have problems with this.  At least in this district but whatevers.  Just gotta be friends with all the members!  That's one of my favorite things!
Thursday wasn't too crazy.  We went and helped this less active/recent convert clean his house.  It had been a year since he last cleaned it.  He had some nice stuff, but just had trash, everywhere!  It was crazy.  Good guy though.  He made it out to church this week too.
Also thursday night, we helped this lady carry some boxes around she was trying to go recycle so she could give the money to her church.  She said she would come to church on sunday and she did!  Her name is Monica heo but, the way she says it, it's like harmonica...  heehee.
Friday we had lunch at this buffet which was good, the members that took us said we did a good job of eating there.  If you don't eat a ton, it's kinda rude.  I am pretty sure I was a couple bites from throwing up, but it's okay cause I made it!
Weekly planning was the same as ever really.  Nothing too crazy.  BUT!  Before we got started this guy TJ called us and wanted to meet.  Guy is such a boss.  Looking for work around Gangnam and wants to come closer to God.  He thinks that we have the right path, and is looking for instruction.  Excited for him.  
That night, this guy called us and asked us to come to this big hospital on saturday morning to help give a blessing to his mom who is in a very fragile position and also in a coma.  When we went saturday morning, he basically just asked us to bless her that she will have a safe journey from this world.  That was a really interesting experience for me, especially since he asked me to give the blessing.  I don't think I've ever been around someone whose life was in such a fragile state.  The way the guy explained it, it seemed like he thought if it was a day later, she would have passed away.  It was a really humbling experience.
After that we had English class which was interesting because we usually teach the basic grammar class, and the sisters teach the free talking and usually our class is bigger.  Not that day.  We had two in our class, and they had like nine!  It was crazy.  One of our english class members keeps on telling his friends to come.  Go O'neil!  Guy is a boss.
Saturday night we got our transfer calls which was interesting.  We were the first people in the mission to get our transfer calls!  That was kind of neat.  I didn't think that would ever happen, but I'm excited for what it brings!
Sunday, Harmonica did end up coming to church, and she's so loved by all the members already.  Gotta love Gangnam ward.  Just doing work.  I got a ton of pictures with them, and accordingly will try and send some!  

저는 인천으로 즐겁게 가겠습니다!!!!
(cho-nun Incheon-eu-ro jeur-geob-ggae ka-ges-sum-ni-dah)
In korean it makes more sense but it directly translates to "I'm going joyfully to Incheon"
But hey, Korean doesn't always work in English.  What can I do?!?!

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(no subject)

1 message

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Mar 9, 2014 at 8:58 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
Hey Everybody!!!

This week was good as always.
Monday, I think the highlight was finally cleaning the house.  Thing was so dirty, but we kept on being dumb and not cleaning it.  So mad at myself for that, but I guess my life will go on.  Fun part about it is that we totally don't even live in that house anymore!!!  Me and my companion moved into Gangnam on wednesday which has been a journey to say the least...  For the first like 4 days we didn't even have a fridge or stove.  Certainly made food fun.  We ate out a lot.
We went to this music store which was fun.  Whilst there this really really awkward thing surfaced where two of the missionaries in my district are like, in love...  Not cool.  Being district leader I got to have the task of dealing with that.  I think it's mostly taken care of for the time being, but may resurface in the future.  I'm mostly worried about what it's like for their companions!  Can you imagine how stressful that would be?  Being the companion of someone who is in a relationship as a missionary with another missionary...  Not cool, so I'm now doing my best to help the missionaries make the situation as appropriate as possible.  I think that would be the first kind of experience I've had like this in my life, and hopefully the last, because outside of missionary work, I don't think that it's even a problem anywhere!
That was my birthday pday, so it was an interesting gift to get on a birthday!  My companion did get me ice cream though.  Delicious.  Keeping the tradition from last year!!!  Woohoo!!!  We also got food from this place called Lotteria which eveyone else says is really nasty, but I really enjoy, but it wasn't as good as usual... sad face.  That's okay though!
We did meet our new investigator though!!  Guy is a boss.  Super genius, speaks english and really likes the church.  Recognizes that it's the closest thing to the original concept of christianity... maybe because it is the original christianity...  Anyways, the guy invented a microscope that you plug into your smart phone and is trying to sell it to Nuskin or something.  Crazy smart.  Tried to give me this book about Hindu, and I really wish I could have read it just because it's the same invitation that we give other people about the Book of Mormon, but as missionaries we aren't supposed to.  I told him and he was really understanding.  Guy is a boss, and has an incredibly cute dog!  We're meeting him again tomorrow!
Tuesday was fun.  We met with our awesome investigator Bob for the last time.  He was doing this program where you only meet them for 6 weeks because it's english and gospel, and his time was up so to speak.  Kind of a crude way to put it, but I guess that's how it goes... He's a great guy and if he reads the Book of Mormon, I know he'll come back to the missionaries.
We also met with one of our recent converts and he asked us to come help him clean his house in the future!  Excited to finally help a member with service!!!!  This is the first time that this will have happened for us!!  We also met with another recent convert who said that he can't come to church anymore.  It was a sad meeting.  He's convinced that life in Korea is pointless and said that coming to church in Korea especially is pointless.  My immediate response was to turn to Elder Kelson and say "well let's go home then" and then the guy is like "What?! no".  And then I explained to him that if it were pointless to come to church here that we would not be here.  The church wouldn't be here, and I would not have a certificate signed by the prophet that says that I am a servant of God.  That was a heated moment for me...  I don't like being told I'm pointless.
Wednesday we had a finding activity in this area Seocho and none of the missionaries from seocho even came to it!!! So lames...  It's okay though!  No worries.  After that me and my companion took a bunch of our stuff to the new house in Gangnam!!  We had dinner which I guess in Korea your supposed to have this stuff called jjajangmyun when you move into a new house.  I like it, but the restaurant was awkward because they were playing eminem... :( not missionary music...
Thursday we had a zone training meeting which was good.  We had a district leader counsel which I think was one of the most effective counsel meetings I've seen as a missionary.  Super awesome.  Loving it here.  I like seeing why I'm in certain positions at certain times.  Makes me feel good.  After zone training we had to hurry back to gangnam for this really depressing appointment with a guy who doesn't love his family.  The guy is like 80 and doesn't have any motivation to care for his family aside from bringing them into the world... sad face...
Friday was mostly just conversating with people on the street.  One of my hobbies.  We did weekly planning which was fun.  
Saturday we got our fridge and stove!!!  We can eat now!!!  So awesome!!!  I never thought about what it's like to not have those...  Important things in our life nowadays...  We also met this guy who was leaving for Iran that night!!!  Crazy!  He was baptized forever ago, and just hadn't been in contact with the church since he originally moved back to Korea from spending time in the middle east on business.  Guy is a boss.  He gets back in  April so I may or may not be around to see what happens.
Church was cool yesterday.  We had more foreigners there again.  I got to do a fair portion of translating for these guys too.  Interesting part is we have this rule where we aren't supposed to speak anything but Korean at church on sundays, so I felt like I was being a bad missionary, and then talked to my zone leaders about it and they said that it was okay.  Good thing.  I don't like feeling bad...
We are supposed to get desks today which we haven't had for study yet...  Excited for that but accordingly I gotta go!  Hope everyone has a great week!

좋은 주 되싶시오!!!!

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생일 죽하합니다!!!
5 messages

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Mar 2, 2014 at 9:08 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
Hey Everyone!!!

So I have very little time and I'm going to try and get in as much information as possible so if there are a whole bunch of typos, I apologize!!!!
So this week was another good one!  Also my birthday finished it off, but that's not too big of a deal haha. Monday was cool.  We had pday which was good.  Went to a bath house.  I'm not particularly fond of those at this point just because it's nothing special to me really anymore but it was still nice.  After that we were walking to our house to find something else to do and we walked by this music studio and one of the missionaries in our house, Elder Watts, plays drums and had been itching to play drums for a fair amount of time so we looked into it and ended up goofing around in the studio on the keyboard, guitar, and drums for a little while.  It was pretty fun.  Kind of strange cause none of us really play the same kind of music, but it was still good especially since Elder Watts got to have fun with it.  I felt a little bad because Elder Kelson isn't a musician really, but he said it was fun.  He is a fantastically charismatic singer though.  No shame in that man.  I love it.  I'm still the worst singer in our house, but that's okay, didn't expect much less than that for the greater portion of my life.  ^^
Tuesday was cool.  We met with our awesome investigator Bob who was great.  This week we finally got him to take a book of Mormon.  It took forever, but I know that if he reads it with real intent, he will find out that it is true.  He's a good guy, but seems like he likes to hide that a little bit sometimes.  Tuesday Murphy came by Gangnam and gave me my fantastic birthday present of old school 3D glasses.  You know the kind with the red and blue plastic lenses.  Super awesome.  I think it was one of the best things I could have gotten for my birthday.  It really is crazy though.  Just wearing them around the house is a trip.
We also met with this guy for dinner that night that kind of considers us like little brothers.  Super good guy.  We had pig feet for dinner.  it was fantastic.  Bet you wouldn't have thought that pig feet are tasty but they are!!!  The guy brought a friend of his who is a deacon in his church and he was a really nice guy too.  I actually think that guy is more likely to be an investigator in all honesty.
Wednesday we had zone conference which was awesome.  I love being able to be at meetings with president.  He's the boss.  We learned a ton of cool stuff that day.  I love being around a bunch of people who have a lot I can learn from.  Fan of that thing these days.  Learning.
We had to leave a little early for a baptismal interview for this guy that was super prepared.  He ended up getting baptized which was awesome.  Go other people in the district!  We're working on them in Gangnam too.  The bishop is looking for em to happen.  Hope we can fulfill a bit.  
Thursday we had service which was fun.  We worked at this kitchen for old folks which was great.  This guy told my companion how to do the dishes like 14 different times at least.  It was kind of frustrating because he wasn't really doing anything on his own.  In fact kind of making the process less efficient, but he's a nice guy.  Just trying to help the mindless americans.
After that we went to the church because these people were coming to film an intro to the church video in Korean and they were using our chapel for it.  We happily obliged and they were super nice people!  Made things lots of fun. 
Friday was mostly nothing special but we finished up being on exchanges from the day before which was cool.  I like exchanges.  Cool things happen
Saturday we had english class and one person came.  That was fantastic.  It was a holiday though.  Afterwards was when we had dinner with this guy visiting from america on business.  It was fun.  THere were these people at this other table staring at us, and they were saying things about us and so I acknowledged it said we were missionaries, and then said we were mormon missionaries, and they immediately avoided any further interaction.  it was pretty funny actually haha.  
Sunday was cool.  It was my birthday and testimony meeting which was a fun combo!  I bore my testimony and it was kind of neat because everyone kind of sat at attention.  That was kind of a cool feeling for me.  Still not good at public speaking really...
This other family invited us over for dinner and didn't know that it was my birthday because I'm not one to really announce that sort of thing, but they invited us over nonetheless.  It was the first counselor in the bishopric, and literally I walked into the church shook his hand and the first thing he said was "hey come over to our house tonight for dinner."  Super fun.  They gave us a ton of food.  It was fantastic.  And they sang happy birthday to me. 
Also for you other missionary parents,  nerf guns are like the best birthday present ever!  Our house is ridiculous now.  Unless they have a hard time focusing then it's a problem.  SUPER AWESOMELY FUN THOUGH!!!

생일 죽하합니다!  (saeng-il chuk-ha-ham-ni-da)
It means happy birthday!!!

I love you all!!!

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President is da boss and when he gives you a challenge, you do it!!!!!
2 messages

Scott Clawson <clawson.scott@myldsmail.net>Sun, Feb 23, 2014 at 7:33 PM
To: Nancy Clawson <neclawson@gmail.com>
Hey President!

So I guess this email is two fold urgent, because I was supposed to mark it for the reasons for mission ending dates, and about when we hit the goal of 200 conversations. For the mission ending date, I would like to start school again directly after returning and I think that it would only work out if I went home in July. Sad thought. I don't want that day to come, but on a brighter note, we hit the goal of 200! Super awesome!! It was kind of strange how much more natural it seemed. We probably had less contacting time, but it was just like the right people were being put in our path, so that we could talk to them.
There were some particularly cool experiences, one in particular being one day after we met with a recent convert who wanted to read the Book of Mormon a bit together, and we were walking back to the station to ride the subway home, and we just said hi to this guy, and he turned around and kind of looked at us, and then we talked and we're meeting him tonight! He said he wants to feel what faith is like and notices the difference it makes in people's lives! Super cool, and I hope things go well with him. I'm really excited for what will come as we continue to strive and hit this goal for as long as is possible.

Thanks for the challenge president! It really has brought a bunch of miracles!

Have a great week! See you wednesday!

Elder Clawson

Hey Everybody!!!  So this week has been super cool.  If you actually read the email for President it kind of explains why to some extent.  Last week, President emailed my companion and told him that we should go for 200 conversations this upcoming week.  At first I kind of thought that it might be unlikely being that sometimes you kind of have to work up to that sort of thing, but we were mistaken!!!  We just kind of went for it and at one point it seemed kind of out of reach.  Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are typically our bigger contacting days because the weekends can end up somewhat busy, not to mention just the regularly occurring meetings that happen on weekends, and we had 100 conversations at the end of the day thursday.  My companion said something along the lines of "let's just do it" and from Friday to Sunday we got 104 conversations on the street.  It was kind of crazy.  We plan on hitting it again this coming week.
Interesting thought about what I said with it possibly being something you ease into, but I thought about that a great deal more this week.  With some things it's okay to just ease into it, but when it's something that is a bit more urgent, and something needs to change, there is no better way to do it than immediately.  I've kind of learned that a whole bunch on my mission.  This week made me feel a lot better about that too.  In the past I had a goal of trying to get 200 conversations in one week before the end of my mission, and now that's happened.  Right now I'm trying to feel out how many I should go for within a week again.  I really do enjoy talking to people now.  You have so many fun experiences.  Random people have a lot you can learn from.
Here's a fun tidbit I forgot to share last week, I gave my companion a bloody nose one night!  We were in bed, and when he knelt down to pray I kind of tried to push him over just for fun, and failed.  During my prayer he pushed me over, and it was pretty funny, but that couldn't be the end of it, so I finished my prayer, and then decided to kind of jump on top of him, and my hand kind of just hit him in the face.  It was glorious.  
Other fun story this week, so we were walking somewhere and walked past this guitar shop.  I thought, "hey, we can try and make that guy an investigator"  We've got investigators before from stores, so I thought, that could be a thing.  We went inside and talked and looked around a little, and I noticed he had a bunch of PRS guitars.  For those of you who don't know, PRS stands for Paul Reed Smith and is this insanely awesome guitar company.  I've never played one, only just kind of oogled over them, and so I thought I could try it and see if I could impress the guy working there or something.  Not successful.  I forgot that I haven't played electric guitar, like, ever on my mission and as such am not remotely close to used to it.  Failed...  Still going to try and make him an investigator though.  Also I now understand why PRS is so stinking awesome... Just trying to use all the preparation in my life to benefit my missionary work!!  People have gotten baptisms off of screen golf, why not guitar?
Saturday was fun.  We had English class and since my birthday is next week, a couple people wanted to take me to dinner, so we did.  Incidentally this other ward member who is from japan but spends a ton of time in Korea wanted to take us out as well.  So what was two meals, turned into one, and then by the time that the meal was over they both offered to take me out again, so it turned into three.  So lovely.  
Remember that surprise baptism I told you about a month or two ago?  Where the ward baptized this girl and then were just like "hey this is a convert".  Well she came back to church for the first time in a month or two.  Thankfully.  I've heard she kind of actually knows a little bit about the gospel now.  Nevermind knowing that at all before your baptized...  ridiculous.
Still love it so much here in Gangnam.  I was going to say it's my favorite area but everywhere is my favorite area I feel like.  It's all the best.  so great.

Here's a good korean word for that!

짱 (jjang)
it basically means the best, like in Nacho Libre where he talks about getting up everyday at 5 o'clock and makes the kids breakfast "It's da best!"  that kind of best.  Super fun.  I love it here.  Stupid release date having to exist.  Not making me happy about that

Well Everyone have a good week!  I love you all!

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