Thanksgiving!

Dear family,

So this week is one of the biggest holidays in Korea, called 추석 it's like the Korean version of Thanksgiving, a celebration of the harvesting season. It means that everyone went to their hometown, so the big cities emptied out and everyone is on the road. Thankfully I don't have to travel on the road from Seoul to Busan, so I don't have to worry about the 6 hour long traffic jams, but it also means that for three days I have no appointments and can't really find anyone on the street and am forbidden to knock on people's doors. Yeah for three days of updating records!

I also am on a split and have no time for email, so sorry you all get shafted again on the email train. Have a great week though, even though you probably wont be celebrating it, have a great Chusook and eat lots of food.

Love you all

Birthdays and beaches

Dear family,

Yesterday a lot of us as missionaries got together and went to the beach. Although we couldn't swim we built sandcastles, played frisbee, ran to a lighthouse, ate raw fish and all the other things that correspond with it. But it also means I have no real time to write you an email, so I thought I would shoot you some pictures to let you know I am alive and tell you a quick story.

Last night after the beach we had to run to get to our appointment because we had set to have FHE with our ward mission leader and one of our recent converts. Except then everything seemed to go wrong, we couldn't pick him up, the WML was really angry, my legs were really hurting because they got a little sunburned, etc. I was more than a little concerned, but somehow it all worked out and we ended up having a pretty good time. Then as we were driving home our cute little recent convert looked at our WML and asked "Do you have FHE every week?" This boy is adorable, maybe 13 and the sweetest spirit ever. He has one older sister, but she already has 5 and 6 year old sons, so our convert acts more like he is a father than like a 13 year old boy. However, he has the sweetest spirit. Then when our WML said that yes they did, our convert looked at him again and asked timidly "Can I come next week too?"

Some people say that missionaries are like angels. I don't know about that, but I know that as a missionary I have definitely had the opportunity to see angels.

I love you all, have a great week.
--
Sister O'Bryan
Daejeon PO Box 38
Daejeon-si
Chungcheong bukdo 300-600
South Korea

The Second Coming...or just a typhoon.

Dear family,

Exciting things that happened last week:

• On Monday my companion and I made skirts, it was pretty fun. One of our recent converts works at a "made by hand" store so you go and pay to have them show you how to use a sewing machine and then make a skirt. I actually already know how to use a sewing machine and couldn't really understand most of the instruction (I'm not too up on my fabric, stitching, and mechanic vocabulary yet). However, it was still worth it.
• On Wednesday my companion had her birthday. We are born in the same year, which is a pretty big deal in Korea, it makes us automatic friends, also since our birthdays are only 11 days apart that makes us super great friends. Yeah! Also it means that the members get to throw lots of birthday parties. (We'll see about mine, since it's on Sunday and we're having a baptism there probably wont be anything else, but I'm okay with that. Yeah for baptisms!)
• We had a typhoon! It was at night and I woke up to a lot of crashing and I could feel our apartment shaking. However, I was really tired so more than anything it was annoying. The exact thoughts that went through my head, "Wow, that's loud. I wonder if I should get up and do something.... too tired..."
  
  The next morning we had no water or electricity. I must admit it was more annoying than anything so we went out to go to the public bath house, but the one near our house didn't have any electricity or water either. As we were walking we noticed that things looked a little different. A lot of trees were blown over and a lot of apartment complexes had the glass blown out. One container box (like a railroad car box, but people use them as buildings...) had fallen over on a car, and school had let out early because they didn't have any water or electricity either. Then later that day we went to help one of our members put the roof back on her house.
  
  It wasn't as bad as they have in like the Philippines, but it was still the worst that anyone in Seosan had ever seen. I'm not sure if buildings are just built better than the Philippines or what, but basically everything in the city was back in working order a couple days later. The country folk had a lot of crops that were in trouble, but besides that it wasn't too bad. Also I think it was sent from God, it helped us talk to people, it's a great conversation starter "did you see the typhoon?!" and when we talk to people they say they have never prayed so hard in their life as the night that it came... hehe, perfect...

I was reading this morning in 1st Samuel and I came upon one of my favorite scriptural heroes: David. He is such a stud, not only is he great at the harp, but he's beautiful, and soooo manly. I mean, he killed a bear and a lion with his bare hands and slew Goliath with a sling. I really like when he first goes to bring food to his brothers and they are really scared, but then he says to him: "Why are you afraid? This guy is a Philistine, but we have the living God" what faith, what strength, sigh. If only we could all look at our problems that way, really they are nothing considering we have the living God on our side.

It looks like Heidi's wedding was beautiful, congratulations!

Love you lots.

--

Sister O'Bryan

Daejeon PO Box 38

Daejeon-si

Chungcheong bukdo 300-600

South Korea