2015-5-10

Hello Everyone!!

So I will be skyping tomorrow so I will keep this email pretty short. :)

This week was amazing.  It was Kid's and Parent's Day this last week so a lot of people we out and around, buying each other flowers and spending time with family. But since we are new  these past few days we haven't had anyone to teach. We had just been visiting a Less Active which we love but we can visit her everyday all day so we really needed some investigators. Before my companion leaves this week she had a goal to get me one investigator. And we have 2 and 3 potential. It was a HUGE miracle. One of our investigators literally came after the church services yesterday and ask the Bishop what the church was and that she wanted to join the church because she heard it was so great! So we have a golden investigator all ready for lessons. We have a French investigator that the Elders ran into on the street and 소개ed to us. She says I don't want to join your church but I wanted to go straight to the source to find out what Mormons are because I have heard a lot of things because there are so many lies and steoreo types. And she thought the elders were so friendly and open minded. She loves our message we share with her and she tell us we have this light and peace about us. She came to on of our Member's Baptism yesterday. She thought it was sooo different. (and Korean Baptism are slightly different than the ones I have seen at home, but the same principles) And she loved the feeling that she got from all the Koreans even though she didn't quite understand them. Sister Mortensen translated for her. My companion is BOSS at Korean. So anyways, we have a lot of potential investigators that are coming with us to the BYU Wind Orchestra that is coming to our Area. So that is truly a blessing. We are meeting with a lot of our less actives we is finally meeting with us. Last week we met with a Japanese women and gave her a Japanese BOM and she is the cutest thing! Her kids were adorable. She married a Korean and her English is fly so we are trying to ease slowly with her because she "wants to do it by herself" but pray that her schedule will open up. Oh, also another really amazing miracle. So there is this thing called 가가호호 I am not sure what it is called in English.. knocking on doors? Anyways, we started at the top of this apartment building and we knock on doors and try to 소개 or introduce or church and our English Program. People were soo mean. We had another appointment at a members soon so we were going to just give up but we decided to do just one more floor. So we look out the balcony and we decided to do floor number 9. It was 4 floors down. We had no idea why but we decided to go. We got in the elevator and prayed to find someone who would be nice and talk to us and be intrested in either English or the Gospel. So we step out and we see a women she is taking our the trash. We thought she was our miracle but she took our name card and went on our way. It was getting close to leave but we decided to knock on a few doors. A lot opened to us but soon closed on us. We were going to give up so we decided to just one more door. We knock on it. She opens the door and puts the door stopper down. And just listens to us. She was sooo nice. We got exchange numbers and she was going to let us in right then but she wanted to clean up a little and we have a returning appointment. It was amazing! All she did was listen and she was not only interested in English but Gospel too. So this Thursday we will start our 30/30 program with her. And one more miracle I will share. This last Tuesday we were walking around finding less actives and one of our appointment canceled so we were just 전도ing or proselyting until our next 식사 or meal appointment. And we walked by a Alpha (which is a craft store, Koreans love their 문구s) and she randomly started walking in but realized that she shouldn't go in there because it would take away from proselyting time. I don't know why I did this but just pushed her in! So we were in there for not a specific reason and she said we needed to talk to people and this lady comes up to her and ask where our church is. Apparently she has been trying to look for a church because some Elders gave her a name card and she doesn't have a phone to find it. So asked us if we could show her on Sunday and meet her at the 역 or station. She was an older lady so when Sunday came we think she forgot because she didn't show. But she know has our number and hopefully again soon we can meet her. I just thought that was amazing because we didn't need to buy anything but we both felt prompted to go into this store.

I love my mission. I am learning that God blesses us with many miracles. It is not until we count the little things when we begin to recognize the things He does for us everyday. I think I love that the most as a missionary. Not a lot of baptism goes on in Korea but God does bless all his people in his time. I am soooo excited to talk with you all again. Don't quiz my Korean because yeah... I am still getting there.

I love you all, talk to you tomorrow!!

Sister Leavitt

P.S we had Transfer Calls yesterday. I am getting a Greenie Breaking a Korean. And I guess I am Senior now. I am not really sure what it means but I am a little nervous but I have met this Korean. She is super cute and super fly at English but I am going try my best to only speak Korean to her. :) I will tell you more tomorrow

P.S.S The pictures are us at the temple this last Thursday. One with my companion and one with my New Companion (at the this time we didn't know we would be companions)

2015-5-4

Hello everyone!!!

Okay this week was so much fun.

So because my companion is leaving we got to go to her Greenie area to 소개 or refer a investigator to the other sisters so us 4 and this investigator went hiking up this huge mountain where you can see all of Korea. It was sick. Korea is sooo pretty it is insane. Lately, everything is so green and it is starting to get really hot and humid!! AHH!!

Anywho, the next day we had Zone Conference. It was raining and we went on this island on the Han River and had our training there. It was really fun. I love getting to see our Mission President and his wife. They are seriously the best. They really are like your parents away from home. So that was really fun. So President Morrise has been encouraging everyone to do this "7 minute work-out" because he really has been stressing about exercising in the morning. So at Zone Conference we had the chance to do it. And if we bet him we got a sticker and we go on the board and if we just "participated" we got a sticker. Anyways, he is a 60 something year old man... How hard can it be do all these work outs in 7 minutes and beat him?.... Yeah, that was super hard. I haven't worked "hard core" for a long time. The old man beat me :) He pretty much beat every single one of us. It was soo funny. And what the best part was that the sticker was a picture of his face. I definitely put that in my PMG next to the work out section. :)

This week was just a day full of traveling. The next day we spent 4 hours traveling to do a Pass off with our APs. We also visit a bunch of people. We even have a new potential investigator. She is Japanese and was super sweet. She wants to read the Book of Mormon but wants to do it by herself and she is really busy so we are hoping that  we can continue to contact her as much as possible. Also during weekly planning we made a lot of appointments this week. So this week should be a crazy one! We will have to baptisms. (One a member and one is the Elder's investigator) and we have transfer call...ALREADY!! I can't belive I am going to be getting a new companion soon! I think that is crazy! Oh and our area just got bigger. So now we have half of 2 other areas so Bucheon just got bigger. We already have 150 members and it will go up to about 170-180. So I need all your prayers for when my companion goes home I will be able to handle all of this..

I love you all and I hope that all you dreams come true. You know I mean you get the answers to your prayers. I pray for you all and I hope you all doing well. Remember who you are and what you stand for!

LOVE AND MISS YOU ALL SOOOO MUCH!!

LOVE,

Sister Leavitt

2015-4-26

Hey family!!

Weeks are going by soooo fast!! LIke I feel like I just emailed you! So let's see what happened this week. Not too much. It is really hard to find people to teach so just a lot of walking and this weeks we saw a Korean women with a Georgia accent. It was seriously the coolest thing I had ever heard because it was like a Korean Southern accent. Anywho, yeah we meet a lot of people. I love getting to know people now. Sometimes it is hard but it is fun. And a lot of people don't "have time to meet" but really in realitly Korean people really are just sooo busy. The only funny thing is when you are at a 4-way intersection and we tried to talk to someone and they say that they "I am busy, don't you know!" and they are standing waiting for the looong red light to turn green. People just really don't like 선교사들 (missionaries) becaue there are sooooooo many here! We have taught like 3 now. You will see on the streets people bible bashing and it is just not good.

One good thing that we did this week is we opened a HUGE new Stake Center in 인천 Incheon. It is 4 floors with a balcony! Like it is way bigger than my last building.( Just ask dad how big that is ㅎㅎ)  So we did service, picked up trash around the building and then we had a big open house for it and did some tours. This building is super Americanized it is crazy!! It is weird. My building right now is much smaller and Koreanized and it fits 150 members and now its going to be about 170 members because our ward just got bigger this last week. So anyways, moral of the story is the church is true. And no matter where you are things need to have the same importance and we live the same gospel. Just remember that.

Uhh... yeah... So after our Stake Conference we went home and started planning for the next week. It was about 8:30 and our Bishop calls and says meet at E-Mart in 15 minutes. So we quickly run over there because it is our bishop and he has a grocery cart and he says," I don't like shopping so lets do this fast. We want to feed you and we haven't bought you rice in the past 4 weeks." We were so confused. We did not want anyone to have to pay for us. So we thought we were just getting rice but then he starts thowing in the cart; meet, pizza, oranges, apples, snacks, tuna, rice, 고추장, 깅, and just a whole bunch of stuff. He spent about 163 dollars on us. I about cried. I was so happy. We were running out of money and we still have a week left. It just was the nicest thing. And our Bishop is so busy with his work that he took time to do that. I just love him. He is the sweetest. Thats one thing I love about Korean. They all will take care of you. The just have the most compassionate heart (unless they really just don't like missionaries) but I haven't met too many unkind people. I think the world should be more focus on the things that other people need and not always on ourselves. That is exactly our Savior thinks. I don't think he would ever take back what he did in Gethsamene because he wasn't thinking about himself but he thought about everyone that had lived and would live. We are here to help others and our selves come back unto Christ. So this week please go out of your way to do something for someone else. Even just the little bit of grocercies for us would have made us happy.

 17 And behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; that ye may learn that when ye are in the service‍ of your fellow‍ beings ye are only in the service of your God. -Mosiah 2:17

I love you all! How was moving? Looks like everyone has been involved with something lately! I love seeing the pictures. I forget that life keeps going on for you all back home! Keep me updated. I want to know ALLL the details!!

I pray for you all! I love you and miss you all soooooooooooooooooo much!!!

Love,

Sister Leavitt

2015-4-19

Hello EVERYONE!

Had a really good week. Last week we went to the zoo! is was sooo much fun. We were suppose to go with our Zone but we couldn't find them so it was us and our District Leader and his companion. The zoo was extremely fun! We also got a new investigator. She is not in our area but she golden. But the only problem is that stopped calling us. We are hoping it's just her phone.

Anywho, Work here is going slowly but surely. This next week we are meeting a bunch of members and even a Less-Active wants to come to Stake Conference with us!! We are stoked. So At this stake conference. They are combining wards and all that great stuff so a lot will be changing. The Stake Center (which is in 인천) is HUGE!! It is 4 floors. 2 sacrament rooms. A bunch of rooms and even has a balcony. The best part about it, it is right on the intersection and right outside of a subway exit. People are going to swarming in. Korean culture is that they like anything that is super close. Sometimes they will even convert because the church is close :/ but anyways, this will be a good thing!!

The past few days have been raining. I haven't taken off my jacket for a while. So it is not too warm yet. I think Heavenly Father has been listening to my cries. I am soooo afraid for summer it is crazy!! I wish that it would stay like this for the rest of the time :)

Uhh... It is hard to tell you what has been going on because we have spent a lot of our time doing finding. WE walk and walk and walk AND walk. We are like the prioneer children. Man, these joke are good. Missionary for life. hahaha Yeah, just finding less actives and anyone who will talk to us :)

  

Can't wait to talk to you all in less than 3 weeks!! I miss you all and hope everything is going strong back home! LOVE YOU

LOVE

Sister Leavitt

Zoo

2015-4-12

Hey familly!!

This week I have like no time to write a whole email again. I know sad. With our zone we are going to the zoo and it about 2 hours away so we can't stay long too long. (Yeah we were going to go last week but we took the wrong subway so we went to China Town instead)

We watched conference this week. IT WAS ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!! I really loved it! I will say the Saturday session didn't apply much too me because it was about marriage and family but I did still get a little out of it for my and my companion :)

I really liked how the Sunday session was based on the how the simple basic truths is all we need to focus on in the church. It is good to know all the details but just like me as missionary, we only teach the simple things because that is when the Holy Ghost speaks to us the best. And that is the answer I needed. This last transfer it has been really hard for me to teach. I always want to get into things that aren't really necessary for people to hear... I think that is why I was sent to Korea to help people but not to overbear them but because of my small knowledge of Korean I can't expound on too much. :)  I also learn that we each must have a testimony of the atonement and what it means to us. I have had a pretty decently good easy life. I never have had to use it as much as I have on my mission. I never realized how much "disobedient" I was before my mission. The point of the atonement is so that we can become like God. That is why the fall happened. Christ literally broke the bands of death that we are just in a free fall. Because we can be forgiven and now that we know good and evil we can one day return to the presence of our Heavenly Father. 

Because we have been white washing I have not had any lessons this week. We had one and today (actually while I have been writing this email) I realized that the things that I learned in Conference, must be applied in my mission. I think the Lord needs me to be prepared with my lesson plans and my simple doctrine so that when my companion leaves this transfer I will be able to take over. I have not been able to teach at all! It is crazy. I really know that the Lord is blessing me each day that I am able to teach because it really isn't not me doing it. :) So if you could pray that I can learn how to teach this week. I would love it so that I can be more prepared for people. 

In my first transfer my Zone Leader once told me that if I am prepared with just one lesson plan that God will give me someone who needs to hear exactly what I prepared for, nothing more. That can be applied to life. We must all have our personal testimony of the simple doctrine so that when we are in certain situations that we maybe able to overcome them or help someone else understand more fully.

I really do love my mission. My companion is awesome. I haven't really told you much about her yet. She is flawless in Korean. I kill her this transfer. She is an amazing singer and love soccer. She is almost as weird as me and she does a killer Brian Regan impersonation. She is not trucky at all. She is one of the hardest working missionaries out there and she is great at talking to people. Which I am not. I thought I was until I became companions with her ;)

So I love you all. Remember who you are and what you stand for. Gain that testimony for yourself; don't rely on others. 

I love and miss you all sooo much!! Be safe! 

Love,

Sister Leavitt

                      

                                               In China Town

2015-4-5

FAMILY!!

Happy Easter.. Yeah Easter isn't really popular here bt it was my first Sunday in my new ward! This ward is HUGE! There are sooo many kids. It made me miss our wards in America :)

So I got a new companion. Her name is Sister Mortensen. She is the nicest ever. She loves sports and she is an amazing singer. She dies this next transfer. So I will say that I will probably get the most companions in our whole mission. Right now she is my 6th.

1st day with Sister Mortensen

Because we are white washing/ re-opening an area we don't know anything about it. We have to find a lot on our own. We are meeting with the girl name 유리 yu lee. She is really different and everytime we try to teach her she ends up like teaching us about her religion and shows us pictures of demons. So it is really weird. Anywho.. that is the only person we have met so far.

I love my District they are soo fun. Today we are going to the zoo and I don't really have that much to tell about this week because well... it is just all new to me.

The house we live in is so cute and ghetto. (In the ghettoooo...) <--- I forgot what that is off of and I think Elvis sings it.

Anyways, we have matress!!! Like what!? yeah I have been sleeping on 요 (yo) and it is a Korean sleeping mat. But we now have a matress!

I am soo sorry this email is soo short..

Don't Forget to watch the video and General Conference. I really would like to hear what you thought of it. I haven't watched it yet because it has been translated into Korean but we should be watching it this week! I am excited!

I love you all soo much. This church is true.

HAPPY EASTER!

Love,

Sister Leavitt

Ps.. remind me when I have to move again that I need to throw things out because packing everything was sooo hard!

2015-3-29

FAMMMMMIIIILLLY!

Okay this week went by so fast! So to start off the week we did a lot of searching. We have been running down on investigators and this month we are doing a 40 days of fasting for new investigators. But we didn't seem to find any. 

We did however, get to see Valeria. She is our Russian investigator. She is the funniest/bluntest person. She has been investigating for maybe over a year and some things are just really hard for her to grasp. She is though probably more faithful than a lot of members. Anyways, we watched Legacy with her. THE GREATEST DECISION EVER!! hahah she was like the commentary behind it. I t was really good. She learned a lot from the cheesy movie. But we love spending time with her and I will definitely be friends with her after my mission.

Okay Tuesday was the worst day.

I woke up at 6:30 and began by exercise. We had already done the full 30 minutes of exercise and I decided to do a little extra and I was doing sit ups and my hands where above my head and I guess I might of done it too fast because I ripped my back. It hurt sooo bad. At first (just like my ankle incident) it didn't hurt but when I moved it was this horrible pain. I just fell to the floor on my stomach. the rest of the day for the next 24 hours I was switching back and forth from stomach to back laying on my bed. Every once in awhile We would put a hot bad then some frozen vegetables on it. It was thee worst. For the next couple of days it would hurt. But the strangest thing was that as I was on my stomach with the ice pack on my back. I prayed. It wasn't a long prayer but I just didn't want to have to go to the hospital. (they don't have clinics) And on my left side of my back I could feel this tingly feeling, like I could feel it being healed. The next morning that side of my back didn't hurt. I will say though, that my left side of my back still hurts every once in awhile but that was a miracle. I didn't think I was going to be able to walk for a few days but look I walked to the PC baong. I am fine :) 

Bad Back

Down for a couple days

This week we had a lot of good lessons. Everyone seems to progressing really well. Our 10 year old investigator got her answered about the Book of Mormon. She said that when she prayed about it she felt warmth and really good about it. So we are excited about that :)

Saturday, I went on exchanges with my Sister Training Leader. She came to our area with my other 2 companions and I went to her area with her Korean greenie. It was sooo much fun! I just want to share one funny story that happened while we were there. So we went to a potential investigators house. She fed us 순대 which is this sausage that is meaty and fatty. It is the Pig Intestine. This was my first time eating it. In Korea it is very very popular. I thought I was going to hate it because usually is is running and bloody but mine was actually really good. So after we ate sundey. ( don't know how to spell that in English) We were talking to her and I mentioned what I did to my back earlier that week. She then runs to her bathroom grabs her toothbrush pull up my shirts (garments and all) and places her toothbrush on my back. I had no idea what she was doing. I was afraid at first. She then tell us that her toothbrush has a lazer on it and it can cure anything. She tell us all these experiences that she has had with the toothbrush and I was so confused. But to make her happy I turned on the lazer and put it on my back. Koreans have a cure and a solution for everything! hahahaha

But that was my week. 

Oh yeah...... I AM FINALLY TRANSFERRING!! I am going to 부천 (Bucheon) I have been in the Seoul city area my whole mission and now I am going a little farther out that isn't too city like (at least that is what I have heard) I am really going to miss my companions though! They are so much fun! When we got our transfer call they first told me I was going to be companions with Sister Holt and I was freaking out! I went to tell her but the APs actually messed up, I guess LeVitre and Leavitt are too similar so I spent like 20 minutes thinking I would be companions with my best friend in the mission but they had to call us all back and fix the mistake...hahaha dang it! Soo close.;)

Sister Holt

Okay my commitment to you all is to spread the word about the new Mormon Message. It is about His Resurrection. It is an amazing video. Remember why we celebrate Easter. #BecauseHeLives The church is going all out this year with it. We have to hand out a lot of things to get people to watch it. Next Sunday, all over Youtube it will be advertised. It is going to be the homepage. So spread the word. Make our lives easier as missionaries. ;) 

I know He lives. Happy Easter!!

LOVE YOU ALL AND MISS YOU ALL TERRIBLY! 

LOVE,

Sister Leavitt

:)

2015-3-15

Hello FAMILY!!

Last week we went to a 목욕탕 last week. It was soooo refreshing. Lately I have had some really bad back problems. Like I have been aching in the weirdest spots on my back. I haven't ever had back pains before but I go to this "bathe house" and it was the most relaxing thing and I even talked to people and handed out name card. One lady even bought me a water. Koreans are soo nice. Anyways. Ohhh.. yeah yesterday we went to one of our English member's house to eat and share a small message with 3 other families. One of the mothers was talking about how she gives her kids pass along cards and they pass them out like crazy. And I was just curious. Do you all do that? Because it would make missionaries lives SOOOOOO much easier if you passed out the cards to people you know. It is more awkward for us to hand it out to people we absolutely don't know rather than members handing it out to friends. People see your example and that is really what bring people into this gospel. So my commitment to you is to hand out 3 name cards or pass along cards to your friends or co-workers. I know you are in Utah but find someone that stands out that really needs the gospel. 

One thing we did have this last week was the Relief Society Establishment Meeting. Our Stake did these dances and singing things it is sooo fun! Korean go all out for these things. I will send you a video our Ward did handbells and 2 women sang the OLDEST Korean song out there is was fun!! L)

Well time is flying by sooooo fast! We get transfer calls in like 2 weeks. I think I will be leaving YeongDong-Po ( I don't know how to spell it in English) 

I LOVE YOU ALL!! Be safe! Miss you

Love 

Sister Leavitt

Preaching the Gospel

Hanna was down for a couple of days. This is how she spent her time.

Back Problems

2015-3-8

FAAAAMMMIIILLLLYYY!!!

Okay haha let me just tell you what I ate last week. (weird way to start off an email) 

So we were at one of our member's house. This is the old grandma I have told you about. 임복심 she is thee funniest old person. She feeds us very traditional Korean food. And as we are eating a whole bunch of food her and Sister Stastny started talking about Sting Rays. Sister Stastny had heard that they smell like pee and she wanted to know, so 임복심 pulls out of her fridge this frozen Sting Ray meat. She smelt it and there wasn't a smell so being a nice old grandma she wanted us to feed this to us too. She throws it in the microwave and within seconds, as it is heating, you could smell it. It smelt like ammonia. Like it was the strongest smell I have smelt here. She also grabs out of the fridge some HOT sauce to dip it in. So being Korean she takes one of these raw fermented drenches it in this sauce and throws it in her mouth like NBD. So Sister Stastny was like yeah I want to do that. So she does it first and she didn't mind it but she said it stung... then Sister Nebeker tries it and her face said it all. She did not like it, She looks at me and says, " I can't feel my tongue." haha I was terrified. They both looked at 임복심 and said "맛어요!" So then the Grandma looks at me and tell me to eat it. If a Korean tell you to eat something, it is really respectful to eat it. So I took the sting ray dunked it in some sauce and ate it. AHHH it seriously stings. The smells goes throughout your whole body. Like I really just at raw poisonous fermented sting ray and I did not like it. Here in Korea Sting Rays are super expensive and no one really likes them except the older generation, so we took our last opportunity to eat it and I hope it is the last. haha It was fun. So we had so much food and the member then gave us rice. Rice is soooo filling and you have to eat it all. Which I usually can. But I couldn't finish it. When she was watching her Korean Drama I rolled it in a ball and hid it in my clothes. I didn't want to offend her and I really wanted to eat it all so that was the last option I knew to do. #lifeinKorea

So yeah Korea is amazing. My Korean on the other hand is getting better but I am not even close to being fluent. I can understand maybe 30% now. That's a lot for me. 

. But I am teaching about 40-50% of lessons now so that is really good. Don't be surprised when I come home and I still don't know Korean. It is hard.

Scripture of the week:

 31 And now, O my son, ye are called of God to preach the word unto this people. And now, my son, go thy way,declare the word with truth and soberness, that thou mayest bring souls unto repentance, that the great plan of mercy may have claim upon them. And may God grant unto you even according to my words. Amen.

I know when we are MEMBER MISSIONARIES we are blessed.

 And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ.

I love and miss you all sooo much! I pray for you daily!! Be safe and do God's work!

LOVE

Sister Leavitt

2015-3-1

Hello FAMILY!!

How are you all!! I miss you! Not enough to come home but I miss you and love you all! I really want to here about how you all are doing! I should be sending 2 packages in a short time or maybe just one big one.. we will see. Anyways, this week was soooo interesting! haha I will start on Tuesday.

Tuesday:

We did the normal, studied for 3 hours and had lunch. We then had a lesson with one of our recent converts. 박준회 (Park June He) She is the nicest smartest woman I have met. So We had a nice conversation and asked her about her week. She broke down telling us about her hard time with life and family. We then talked to her a little bit about how we can overcome problems and she just really wants to know what to do with her life and what path to take. So we then taught her about patriarchal blessings. Patriarchal blessings are really such a reward that we can have personal scriptures to help us make decisions and to guide us through out our lives. in Korean this is kind of a difficult subject to talk about and we had a little miracle. The institute coordinator had been walking in and out of our lesson to get things ready for whatever she was doing. Then she asked if she could help us out a little bit. We appreciated it so much. She then went on to tell her the importance of patriarchal blessings and she can used and receive it. The spirit was really strong and now she is getting hers this week! So I encourage everyone to get it. I have read mine at least once a week. It really does help to grow and to strengthen you spiritually.

But... this wasn't the "interesting" part I was talking about. So... after the lesson 박준회 & 김승하 came with us to a member's house right after the lesson. We head out and I got lost. I went the total opposite way and we had to figure out which way we needed to go. When we finally got to the subway station that we need to be at to transfer. ( 당산) We saw these deaf Korean people walk passed. All 5 of us had been taking Sign Language classes at church and we knew how to introduce ourselves so we kept thought about it and I had a feel like we needed to try to talk to them. So me and 긴승하 back and I started the conversation with them. "Hi, what is your name?" "My name is.." "I am learning sign language.." "Want to come to our class" And at this time I was trying to find the Korean Sign language missionaries' number ( I couldn't find it for the life of me) and I turn to my companions and I see Sister Stastny with this weird look on her face. And apparently as I was trying to talk to the deaf men another man came up to Sister Nebeker and stroked her arm and was talking so to her face. He was a drunken man who wanted to know why we knew sign language and then started talking about a bunch of weird things. 박준회 then tries to have Sister Stastny get us out of the situation and she was like you know Korean and you are 30, get us out of this. We eventually had to like tell him we have a appointment. As we were quickly walking away from him he like yells at us to have us eat with him. We said no but he kept insisting so we just ran. 

We get on the subway that took us to the stop where our member lives. There is literally two subways you can take. And there are sooo many stops. ( I will explain later why this is important) So finally get to our member's small house with us 5 and taught about hope and listened to her talk about life because she just really needs someone to listen to. Anyways, on our way back from our 45 min lesson (so it has been an hour since we were at the station) and we saw the same man again!!! He didn't see us but we ran sooo hard to the subway and this is where our miracle kicks in. 

Like I said there are 2 subways. One is an express which misses some stops and one is a normal one. So the first thing that was weird was out of all the stops we saw the same man twice but... as we were waiting for the subway to get back we were deciding on which one to take. At the moment I didn't care which one we needed to take. So we decide obviously,which ever one came first. The normal subway came up first and we were going to hop on it and that is when I decided... no, we should take the express one. As I said that the express one pulls up and we were caught in trying to pick a train and I was firm and said we need to take the express train.

They were going to argue. The express train doesn't take as long to get to our destination so we hopped on. The subway was a little packed so I was standing really close to this other woman and being a missionary you look at all your surroundings to pick up on something to say to them. This lady was on her phone (like anyone else) but I decided to try to read what she was reading. SHE WAS READING HER BIBLE! I like nudged my companions and our members and told them "Hey, she is reading her bible.What do I do!?" I then looked again to make sure and she was even reading in Mark! So I was nervous as ever so Sister Nebeker took it like a man and just started the conversation about the Bible. Then our members started talking to her. We thought we would have to end our conversation with her but she got off at our stop. We talked about who were are and our members bore testimony. We exchange numbers and got an appointment. Just like that we have a new investigator and a fellow-shipper. Our member is even staying in contact with her! It was such a blessing!! 

Saturday:

I am going to try to make this one shorter. So we went our with a member and her non-member husband to dinner. They took us to a NICE restaurant. Very Americanized. So at this restaurant it was as much wine and beer you can drink. Because he husband isn't a member he had about 3 to 4 glasses of wine by the time we went to share our message. It was actually kind of funny. We started to teach about Matt: 3:13-15 and how we can give Christ our burdens. He then talked about how he doesn't know if there is a God. How miracles are of the devil. But then would contradict himself by saying there are good. It just was interesting. And every time I spoke he questioned something. Like they were bad questions, they were actually really good. But I didn't have enough time to even explain what I was testifying about. But then she bore her testimony. And even in this busy loud restaurant I could feel the spirit so strong. You can tell she has just been going through a hard a time. Sometimes we plan a lesson who we think needs it but can end up being for someone completely different. 

On the way home, we were already going to be late getting to home (we have to be there by 9 or if we teach a lesson 9:30) and we were out of our area but still in our zone. So from Gangnam to Yeongdung-po it takes about thirty minutes and it was 8:45. But... we didn't get on the right subway. We went accidentally on the other side and as we sate there for about 20 mins Sister Stastny looks out the river and sees the river. She looks to me in a panic and says,"AHHH we are crossing the river, we have to get off NOW!" So then we had to call President about it. We were scared out of our minds. He handled it so calmly. We eventually got back to our house though around 9;45~10:00 

Anyways, this is the life a Sister Missionary.

I don't have time to write anymore. I love you all! I will try to send pictures!! Do good in the world!

LOVE AND MISS YOU

Sister Leavitt

2015-2-22

Hello Family & Friends

So this week went really slow because it was the Chinese New Year and it is Huge here. So now one was out in the street and everything was closed until today. So we didn't get to see or meet a lot of people. But.... We had another baptism!! WHOOT WHOOT!!

We have been meeting 조하니 자매님 (sister Jo Ha Ni) for only a few weeks now. She was a referral from another missionary because she moved into our area. So all we had to do was teach the 5th lesson and get a baptism date. She has been pushing back the date with the other missionaries because she really doesn't want to break any commandments after she gets baptized. When she was worried about stuff like that I knew she was ready. She really lives a good life and wants to do good. She just wanted to make sure everything was for sure before she went through with it. She prayed and prayed and she finally decided on this date. Me and my companion weeks early made a goal to have her get baptized on this date but we never reach out the invitation for this day. We kept asking to do it few weeks earlier but then she finally texted us the date she had prayed about and it was the day our original goal was. So that was really cool. She is a super sweet girl. I am excited for her journey ahead. I felt the spirit strong in her baptism. It reminded me of my own baptism. I am living my baptismal covenants everyday. Remembering the promises we made with our Heavenly Father can really make this easier in life. Just live as the Savior would. I am slowly learning this. Sometimes it is really hard to do this. I want to be my crazy immature self but I am learning that I must act as the Savior would but still have my own personality. 

So as you can see from the picture, I also got a new companion. This is my 3rd three some since I have been in country. She is my 5th companion. That is more than a lot of people who are older than me in the mission. But she is super nice. Her name is Sister Nebeker. She is from Salt Lake. She has been out for 9 months. She is the cutest nicest thing ever. She is 22 and has done A LOT before her mission like went to China to be an English teacher. Us 3 are working really well together. I am excited to see what we can do.

Also this week we had Zone Activity. Because no one could teach because everyone was celebrating the New Year, we all went hiking and watched "Meet the Mormons". I never even knew they had this movie in theaters. (you all should see it, it is way good!) We had our zone training on the mountain looking out at Korea. Well you couldn't really see Korea but you could see something that they were building and just a lot of country so it was really pretty. We called it our "Sermon on the Mount." (but not in a disrespectful way) 

The rest of the week was pretty boring. Life is good. Korean is hard. Companions are awesome. I love my mission!!

Everyone be safe. Go to church, read your scriptures, say your prayers, and go to the temple.

I LOVE YOU ALL AND MISS YOU! I pray for each one of you! Have an awesome week!

LOVE,

Sister Leavitt

Hiking with my District