12th (마지막) Transfer... 시작!

Okay so I thought I would start this email with a picture of our new district and our branch president's ADORABLE daughter. She took this selfie after church yesterday ha ha. She took it on our phone, so the quality isn't the greatest, but I thought it was worth sharing. :)

And as you can see in the picture above, my new companion is Korean! :) I am training a Korean! Her name is Sister 이수기 (or in English, Sister Lee SuGi... or even simpler, Sister Lee) . She is super cute! :)  She is learning English, but we speak mostly Korean to each other. Sometimes I accidentally speak English to her (like if she asks me a question right after we wake up in the morning and I am not all the way awake yet) without thinking. I can usually understand her Korean, but then for some reason sometimes English comes out of me. When that happens we laugh. :) And sometimes she asks me what a word in Korean is in English, and I can't think of the English word. Then she jokes that I am Korean, not American.

Anyway, I can promise you one thing. By the time I get home my brain will be mush. 6 weeks of speaking only Korean and my English is gonna fly out the door.  Sometimes I catch myself thinking in Korean and I can't switch back to English. The problem is, I am not fluent in Korean either. So basically I left on my mission speaking English expecting to master another language, but I will probably return fluent in neither language. Haha we will see. :) Anyway, my new compy is from the Daejon mission area. She was actually baptized just over a year ago, so she is a recent convert. She was baptized while I was on my mission! So that is crazy.

Another cute pic of our branch president's daughters, :)

Okay so this last week was kind of crazy. Transfers and picking up a new missionary... then new missionary training meetings and explaining mission rules in Korean (which is still a work in progress haha). It has been an adventure.

We farmed again today! We have tried so many times to get a good picture with both of us....and this is literally the best we got.

We were able to meet with almost all of our investigators this last week! We are meeting with one of the young woman's friends, and we taught them the Plan of Salvation from start to finish. They accepted it well and we think that they will get baptized soon! This work truly is the Lord's work. :) Also, since I have a Korean companion, people have started paying more attention to my Korean. Immediately after meeting me, my new compy told me that I spoke "cute Korean." I just laughed. But then on Saturday the young women started gushing over my "cute Korean" because apparently I speak Korean really... cutely....? Haha I don't know. But whenever I speak the young women always smile and say "oh so cute!" in Korean.  My companion says that when I speak Korean it is really cute and high pitched, kind of like a child. But she said that when I speak English I sound like a professional business woman. Haha who knows. Maybe you'll get to hear my "cute Korean voice" when I get home. I think it is just normal. Haha.

Anyway so this week was the beginning of my last transfer. It is so weird to think that I have been a missionary for 17 months already. I feel like I am still a brand new missionary. But then I look back and realize how much I have learned out here... and the blessings of being a missionary are priceless. I thought I knew what I wanted in life before my mission. I had pretty high dreams and desires. But going on a mission was like putting on glasses for the first time. Everything is so clear now. I know almost exactly what I want for almost everything in the future -- school, marriage, family, career, etc. My dreams and desires have both specified and broadened. My future has been refined by what I have done here. A mission was definitely the best decision I ever made.

I know that this gospel is the true gospel, and I know that Heavenly Father restored it back to the earth through the prophet Joseph Smith. I know that God created a perfect plan for us through which we can return to live with him again, and with our families forever. I love being a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I just love life. :)

Love and miss you all!

With love always,
Sister Maughan