Seventy-Seventh Week Email

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   Well transfer day and yes I'm being transferred. I guess I learned what I needed to here in Gwangju and now I'm off. That or I'm just a trouble missionary haha. But I'm off to Daejeon to an area called Sun-hwa and my new companion is Elder Allan who is starting his second transfer. I will be a District Leader up there as well and my District has 17 people in it haha. Our mission is starting to get a lot of new missionary's with a total of 25 coming in this week and 4 people leaving I think. We're creating a new zone and a lot of new districts as well. This mission is just changing and it's such a great thing. We had our weekly conference call with the mission where we talked about everybody who was baptized in the last transfer. The missionary's just introduced all of the people and talked about them for a little bit and it felt nice to actually hear about these amazing people.

   Well I'm sitting here with Elder Dyer and we are just talking about what we learned this transfer. I was completely blown away by how far I was out of my comfort zone down here in Gwangju. And Once I started to get the hang of things and picking up all of the member's names, I'm off to Daejeon. I am excited to get going again. Being with Elder Jung made me realize how much I still have to learn but he has taught me so much. And not just Korean I promise. Elder Jung has an amazing story and he's a really amazing missionary. We had some really interesting experiences together and it's a little sad to say goodbye to him so soon.

   I'm sorry this is a really short one today but I have to get going. I have a lot of packing to do. I felt like I just unpacked but I guess that's why I can fit all of my possessions in three suitcases. I love all of you and hope you have an amazing week.

Elder Jensen 

Seventy-Sixth Week Email

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   Another week came and went and now the transfer is almost over. I'm not really appreciating this time situation. Somebody made a comment that I had 4 transfers left the other day and I had to get that out of my head pretty fast haha. But as always Korea was a amazing place this last week. We're all still working with all of the changes we have had lately and I feel like we are all doing pretty well with all of it. President Shin did do a round of visits and interviews this past week and I have just missed him since the MTC. And when I say they are changing things that means they are literally changing almost everything. We had a hour long conference call this morning with everybody in the mission and we will be doing that weekly. Also after they visited our house they called us about an hour later and said that they had already talked with the Bishop and we will be getting a new house because ours is pretty interesting....  Anyway we all have to pack everything up any day now to prepare for moving and I have no idea where we're going to find the time to do these things but we're missionaries, so somehow it will get done.

   Well this weeks are getting better and better here in Gwangju. Elder Jung and I had plenty of work going this week but somehow by a miracle we got everywhere we had to go. I had a split this week in probably one of the most beautiful places I have seen in a long time. I went down to Elder Jo in a city called Najoo, which is a pretty small country town in Korea. I also can't even put into words what kind of person Elder Jo is, because he has to be one of the most interesting person that I have ever met. Well I still remember just walking across this overpass in the middle of this giant valley that was just rice fields clear off into the distance until they reached the mountains. It was a really windy day and we would just watch these giant waves run across the valley of the tall green rice fields. And it was just peaceful as we visited some of the members in the branch who were just loving. Also Elder Jo was happy to have a foreign companion, because I have little kids stop and yell foreigner out in Korean and point at me all day. He just loved seeing people and as I started to talk to them he would just point and say foreigner and I felt used because I was from america haha. But we met some pretty amazing people that day and it was completely different from being in a big city. We would stop and talk to somebody about their farming as they were working in a field and the next thing I knew was that Elder Jo was going back next week to eat some of the fruits and vegetables they were growing and to talk to them some more. It was just such a nice feeling being out in the middle of nowhere with people who weren't afraid to strike up a conversation with anybody who came a long. I feel like all of you.... more experienced people must miss those days.

   Another nice part about last week was church. I can't speak for all missionaries but during my mission church has always been a little fast paced... When you have friends coming out and you're trying to make sure everything is okay with the people who are sitting with them and you have to run around to a few classes and share messages with the different classes, and we have to teach all of our youth who act like a bunch of teenagers haha. But I love them and I get to pick on the young men to get them going so it's completely fine. With everything like that going on at church it can be difficult sometimes to actually stop your thoughts and just focus on what's being taught and what's going on around you. When I finally did that yesterday it made the biggest difference in the world. And our ward and stake have been gun ho on all of the missionary work going on so it was such a nice Sunday here in Gwangju. I hope all of you feel the same way about your Sunday today as well and I love all of you.

   I have to get going now but I love all of you and you're all in my prayers. Have a great week!

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Seventy-Fifth Week Email

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   Another week and i'm here again e-mailing all of you. But don't worry because it was a pretty great week. We had so much to do all week and when we finished with calls last night I was just done haha. But I still love that feeling so it was a great way to finish a week.

   Well we had a lot going on here. Our weekend was just so busy we didn't have anytime it felt like. The Gwangju Stake had all of the wards put together a big party for the Korean EFY that's coming up at the end of the month. They pretty much told us that we had to have all of the games and messages prepared so that's always fun. The Bishop of our ward just wanted us to build really good relationships with the youth and it was the perfect thing to do that. So I had talked a little bit about the ward I was in up in Jeonju and this ward in Gwangju and how they were very different. Well one of the biggest differences is the youth. The youth in this ward are just little punks sometimes and I absolutely love them. They back talk all of the time and they fight like crazy but i'm excited to basically pick on them like I needed when I was that age. Well we started the EFY party and it took us twenty minutes to get all of the kids to participate and get them off their phones but once that happened I can't even explain how fun it was. And it was one of those parties where everybody tells all of the kids to bring friends and nobody did because when you're that age you just don't want to. Who wants to go to a party with 5 foreign missionaries and when you think it's going to be boring and awkward the entire time. But we were able to have some of our investigators there and we planned well enough that at one point somebody was just on the ground from laughing so hard. And when it came time to talk about the EFY coming up it was pulling teeth to get them all in chairs again, but once it started it was great. I guess what I'm trying to get at is that I'm sorry to everybody who had to put up with me when I was that age, but I can understand how you still loved me.

   We also had some pretty great meetings with our investigators and we were just out working. My companion is amazing and I am just growing to love this area and the member's more and more. Also this Stake is just hopping on the missionary train. I was able to see the Stake President who was in my greenie area and my ward mission leader and I was amazed that they could still remember me. That made my day a long with everything else that happened yesterday. We are in charge of teaching the youth out of preach my gospel for an hour every sunday and since we did that EFY party we just actually know the kids now. The mood of that class was completely different and we were able to sit down and just talk with the youth. Yes I still picked on the young men but that's because they need it. But at the end of the day we were told that one of the young women was planning on asking a friend to come to the next EFY meeting and it was just a great week. That's about my explanation for everything these days because I can't put in words the things I see out here.

   Well I have to get going but I hope all of you have a great week. I love all of you.

Elder Jensen

Here's the cookie game where you have to slide a cookie from your forehead down to your mouth to eat it. You have one minute and you can't use your hands.

The other game was that there was a tiny little candy inside a pretty big pile of flower and they had to get it out with their mouth.

Seventy-Fourth Week Email

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   Well another week in Korea flew by here in Gwangju. It's been a really interesting week for me here. We started off the week by getting our new President. And that has just flipped the entire mission on it's head haha. As if transfer week wasn't change enough our entire mission changed. We also lost one of our zones to the Soul South Mission so there has just been a lot of change lately. But it's still amazing to see this giant change and push for missionary work in the church. And trust me it's keeping all of us missionaries on our toes. Especially when our Bishop drops a program on the ward called 7+2. In the month of July they want every auxiliary to have two people lined up for the missionaries to be taught and be baptized. It was dropped on our ward and they also introduced a book called the power of everyday missionaries. And I can't begin to explain the change in the ward, mainly because I haven't been here long but this stake is definitely hopping on the train of missionary work and it's been amazing. Just the feeling of the entire ward is amazing. I have never seen an entire Elder's quorum discussing something with so much energy and I'm pretty excited to see what can happen here.

   Other than that we had a pretty good week. It is the rainy season in Korea so that means if you took a long hot shower and got out. That feeling of a really hot humid room doesn't go away for the rest of the day. We also had a record amount of rain a few days ago and I got home and it was like I walked through a pool up to my stomach. This is always an interesting time of year in Korea.

   But probably the best part of my week was meeting our friends here in Gwangju who are just amazing. We have a friend who's in High school and we have been able to meet him a few times this week. It has been so interesting teaching with a fluent Korean all of the time. I love teaching with Elder Joung because I have just been learning from him constantly. Not just the language but it's been nice to see the culture and the relationships that he has made with our investigators. Our friend Brother Kim really likes us a lot and he's been really accepting the gospel well. He's starting to come to the meetings with questions and I still just kick myself because when I was his age I was off being a punk kid. But i have really enjoyed meeting all of these new people and it's still been a pretty great time here in Gwangju.

Well I love all of you and I have to get going but I hope you all have a great week.

Elder Jensen