10-20-14

Hello familia

So this week went by pretty quick.

So Tuesday a funny thing happened while we were walking. Elder Peck and I tripped at the same exact time on the same exact thing.

On Friday we did carpet cleaning in the church. The guy that cleans the church always has the missionaries help when he does it. He had already poured soap water and scrubbed the floor, we just had to use a big vacuum thing to suck up the water and soap and dirt. Took a few hours. It is not just pushing around a little vacuum. We had to pull it and frequently empty out the dirty water that it was sucking up. He took us out to lunch at this octopus restaurant. It was stir fried octopus. I have had it before. It is pretty good, octopus doesn't have much taste. Just a little bit chewy. It was very spicy.

Sunday was pretty good. One of the members from my old area, Geumjeong, is in the stake presidency and he was visiting our branch today. It was weird to see him, he remembered me though. There is a kid in our branch that is super cool and he came this day. He is Korean but can only speak English. He understands a little Korean. He talks to his mom in English and she speaks back in Korean. They had lived in New Zealand for like 7 years (he is like 9 years old or something like that). Super cool kid, doesn't really like coming to church because it is boring but we are trying to get him to come more often. If he does we will need to translate to English for him because he can't really understand anyone other than his mom. He had a quarter for some reason and asked us who he was and then he showed us an Australian coin and Canadian coin too. His name is Robert. Doesn’t go by his Korean name.

Every week after church we go and visit a member that lives in the hospital and we take her the sacrament. She is a great member. Always reads the Book of Mormon, she has a gigantic Book of Mormon. We took her the sacrament and she also asked us for a blessing because her back was in bad pain. So that was the first time I have got to take part in a blessing in Korean just my companion and I.

Then later that day we had 2 choir practices. We are preparing for zone conference and both districts in the zone have to do a special musical number and Elder Peck is playing the piano for both.

Went to the dentist for my tooth and all they could really do was smooth out the edges. He said it wasn't big enough to be able to fix easily or something. He said it in really broken English so I wasn't completely sure. He told me that if I just felt that it was too ugly later then I could go back and they could try something. Pretty much he said if I don't feel ugly then it is fine the way it is....I don't feel ugly so it is no problem.

That is it for this week. Have a good one!

Love,

Elder Frampton

10-12-14

Dear everyone,

I have terrible news. I chipped my tooth this week! It was my front top left tooth! It is one I think I have chipped before in my life. I pretty much had a mental breakdown when it happened because losing a tooth is pretty much my worst fear. So I was eating a piece of soft candy and was biting it with my front teeth. Anyway I bit right through and my top and bottom teeth didn't hit right and just chipped the tooth. The moment it happened I knew and was even more sure when I chewed a piece of hard something...I accidentally swallowed it because I panicked. I look somewhat like a hill-billy now.

It didn't end up staying a bad day because we ended up meeting a guy that has English and gospel interest. It seems like he has some gospel interest and wants to meet so maybe this week we will get to meet him!

We got to watch General Conference this past weekend. It was really good, a lot of testifying about Christ. The spirit was strong the whole time. During Priesthood session President Eyring gave a talk similar to last year’s talk he gave. He shared some of the same stories so I found it very interesting.

Between conference sessions on Saturday we went on a 'hike/picnic' with our branch. Elder Peck and I realized how old the people in our branch really are. 

So this week we were walking and just suddenly we started talking with this dad that was holding a kid. We kind of stopped stared and I randomly said 'are you a family?' and we started to talk and we talked about the Book of Mormon and how it can help strengthen families. He accepted a copy and gave us his number, they looked pretty interested. It was a really good experience because we felt that we were guided to them. It was kind of disappointing when we called them and said that he wasn't interested necessarily right now. He said he was interested in Buddhism and first he had to finish a Buddhist book that was bigger than the Book of Mormon. He said once he finishes that he will read the Book of Mormon. He says he will get to that in April...Super frustrating! Maybe his wife will read it or something and then they will want to meet someday sooner or maybe when he will read it he will be touched by the Spirit.

God is a God of miracles but everyone has their agency and I accept that!

Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Frampton

10-6-14

Hello, so another super long week!

Has started to get cold lately so we are wearing long sleeve shirts every once in a while. Soon we will have to start wearing our suits!

So Tuesday we met a guy that we had met on the street my first week here. We had to ride a bus 30 minutes to the very edge of our area. He was waiting for us at the bus stop and we went to his house....the very first thing he said to us was the when we were with him we can speak only English with him, but when we talk to anyone else we can speak Korean....well he wants to do English so we explained the program to him and he agreed. Well we went to eat with him after and then he took us to his office. He works at a senior citizens college. We met the president and stuff. They gave us free umbrellas! It was kind of funny, we were just chilling there. So actually we first walked in and sat down with the president guy and he was talking to our friend then turned to us and was just like "okay say what you have to say." Then our friend was just like 'ohh no they are my friends they didn't just come looking to talk to you.' we were just somewhat confused at what was going on. We then kind of just sat and talked and drank some soy milk. As we were getting ready to leave there was this other guy that came in that worked somewhere else and just stopped by to drop something off or something. He was just listening as we were talking about whatever we were talking about then he said he wanted to do our English program. Also he had gospel questions because he has heard about the Mormons so we got the opportunity to just teach a short version of the restoration! It was a good experience! We didn't get his number though because the other guy rushed us out of there....we really hope he calls. We think that through this friend we will be able to meet other people and pretty much get referrals because he knows a lot of people.

Saturday we met this other college student at a cafe for our English program. He doesn't have much gospel interest but he really wants to learn English so hopefully he will try the things we ask and come to learn that the gospel is great!

That’s it this week!

Love,

Elder Frampton

9-29-14

Hello! 

So this was a superrrr long week! Elder Peck and I kept thinking that we did things at the beginning of the week when they were actually the day before.

So not really much happened this week but I'll just say one or two things about each day.

Monday we had family home evening at the church, it was their first one and they are only doing it once a month. There were a few people there, it was fun, we wrote some letters to less actives and played a game called 'Do you love your neighbor'?

Tuesday we walked down to the beach area in our area and talked to people along the way, it started to rain at the end of the day and it wasn't very fun.

Wednesday we had to go teach another areas English class because both the Elders and Sisters there are training new missionaries so they were up at mission headquarters. It was really awkward because we did not know the class members!

Thursday nothing too special happened. Friday we had district meeting with the new district. I realized that I am pretty old missionary. Only 2 out of 11 other people have been in the mission longer than me. Today we went to look for a service activity at the city hall but they didn't really have any so they put us on a 'will contact if something comes up' list. Later that day we happened to run into a guy that said we could come do a lecture about America/gospel type stuff at the old people school he worked at. We called him later, he actually wants to do an English program with us so maybe he will become an new investigator!

Saturday we met this really awesome guy that I almost passed but then suddenly started talking to him. He did a lot of talking and it was really hard to cut him off because he would always cut us off when we tried to say something. Anyways he likes church stuff and the bible but he knows there is not correct stuff in the bible. We were able to share a copy of the Book of Mormon with him and it seems that he is willing to meet later!

Sunday we had church. Our branch is about 30ish people and most of them are older people. Super interesting. We took the sacrament to a really nice lady in the hospital. Later went with the branch president to visit a less active who wasn't there so he took us to dinner at his house. He is a young guy with a family, daughter serving a mission, son senior in high school, and like a 10 year daughter who is really fun! Wife is super nice too. They lived in the middle of nowhere.

So just some other information. Elder Peck is from Mesa, Arizona. 22. Cool guy. Our apartment has 2 beds so I get to sleep on a bed! Pretty old bed so not the most comfortable I have slept on but is still better than the other things I have slept on.(except the 7 yos in my last area) The apartment is the biggest one I have been in yet and it is pretty nice. We are getting a water boiler tomorrow (up until this point it has been central heating).

Super great area and I am excited to continue to serve! That is it for this week!

Love,

Elder Frampton

9-22-14

Hello everybody!

So I have news! Well I got transferred again, after only 6 weeks in Gyeongsan I am leaving! 

I am back in Busan again in an area called GweJeong. So one of the subway lines in Busan is the orange line and when I served in Geumjeong I served on the one end, now Gwejeong is on the other end of that orange line. Quite the big feat there. It was sad to leave so soon from Gyeongsan but I look forward to serving here. 

I think the thing I will miss the most is Brother Kim. He was doing so well. When I was talking with him on Sunday he said he has been doing good with smoking. Trying to keep to the schedule we made even though he got behind he was caught up apparently. Down to 8 a day. He said it is a miracle. He never really thought about smoking he said, it was always just natural. Now he said that he is very conscious of it. That when he smokes, he thinks 'okay how many did I smoke today, how many more can I smoke?' He recognizes this and considers it a miracle. When we met earlier in the week it was so miraculous. It is just a miracle. He said he prays 2 to 3 times a day just about smoking, and acknowledged that he knows he is weak but Heavenly Father has been strengthening him! He knows that Heavenly Father has made him more aware of when he smokes! He said he can see the blessings of the gospel in his life, when he didn't have it and now when he does. He thinks that if he was raised in the gospel that he could have become the prophet....I kind of just nicely laugh that one off because I don't really know how to answer that. He is sooooooo great! I will miss him and he was really sad that I was leaving! I also gave him this past week a list of 31 good scriptures that he can read...kind of a read one a day thing and think about it throughout the day so he can receive the strength of the Book of Mormon to help overcome his addiction. He is super great!!!

Yesterday our branch had 2 baptisms. Both sisters, one maybe 11, the other like 30s. Had the baptism in the neighboring areas church because our church doesn't have a baptismal font. It was really good, the missionaries in our district sang a musical number and I accompanied on the piano. I only messed up a little but it was okay, one of the papers fell off the piano so I elbowed whoever was behind me hoping they would understand that what I needed, they got the idea and picked the paper up for me. The service was really good though 2 really great sisters!

Not really much else happened this week really so that's about it. I look forward to serving in my new area!

Have a good one!

Love,

Elder Frampton

9-15-14

Hello!

So this past week was a pretty good week.

Last Tuesday, we took our investigator Brother Kim to family home evening in a members.  It was good. We just played a Korean traditional game and ate some delicious food. So brother Kim, because of the holiday was unable to keep to the schedule that we had made for him to quit smoking. We will work with him more closely to help him! So this week we taught about priesthood. When we taught that it was by the priesthood all the apostles in the scriptures performed miracles and that we had the priesthood too, he asked us to perform a miracle right there and then. To explain how it works we showed a Mormon message about a football kid getting struck by lightning and a new priesthood holder giving a blessing and that he turned out alright. Anyways media is such a good way to teach...luckily we had a computer in the church we could show it on. He also came to stake conference on Sunday and liked it. After there was a baptismal service that we took him too! It was a really good experience that we got really lucky with.

On Wednesday we got together with our missionary district and did a proselyting activity and a riverside park. Some people could play the ukulele and guitar so they played primary songs together and we talked to people. I talked to a lot of people, especially to old guys. I love talking to old guys. A lot easier than younger people...

On Friday Elder Aoyagi of the area presidency came to our Zone as part of mission tour. His wife gave her talk all in English, mainly just reading from her paper that maybe someone else translated to English for her. I don't know but it was fun, she said the purpose of her speaking was to keep us awake. She even had us do a little dance to put your shoulder to the wheel. So odd but so fun! For lunch they had some sandwiches that were egg sandwiches and jelly put together...sounds weird but super delicious!

Saturday's session of stake conference I tried translating to English for Elder Fairhurst, the elder of the couple that works with the military branch, the one that took us to go bowling. Anyways I didn't do a very good job. First of all it is super hard to understand Korean over loudspeaker because everything slurs together, two because they speak really fast/read really fast, three Korea is hard. But it was fun, he was only there to see how the translator (that would translate his talk the next day) how well he would do. That night the translator was translating President Barrows talk. 

Today we are going to "E-world" an amusement park place, it should be fun!

That is it! Have a good week!

Love,

Elder Frampton

9-9-14

Hello,

So sorry for the late email this week. Yesterday was the Korean holiday Chuseok. We gathered as a missionary zone at one of the other areas church buildings pretty much all day and had lunch, talent show, and board games. Very fun. Because of that event we did not have time to email yesterday and also because pretty much most stores are close so we don't have access to computer. So we were allowed to email today.

So this week was pretty good and pretty slow.

We met Brother Kim last Tuesday and set up a plan to help him stop smoking. It puts him giving up smoking sometime next month because he started out smoking 20 cigarettes a day. We have not been able to meet him since then because of the holiday but we will meet him today actually and see how he has been doing. I have kept in touch with him every day to encourage him. On Friday or Saturday he sent a text saying something like 'I prayed and asked for help to give up smoking and it seems that I have received help to meet my goal.' He was talking about his goal for the day but it is amazing to see that he is receiving heaven sent help and that he truly desires to give up smoking. 

So we met another potential investigator this week. He is a man from Nepal in Korea looking for work. We met him a few weeks ago and finally were able to meet. He said he was very interested in what Christians believed and said he wants to learn the gospel!

So this week was one of the most sad weeks on my mission....I lost the 'Apollo moon' tie bar that I always wore. I wore it every day on my mission except for 3 days when I forgot! I was getting up out of my seat on the bus when it fell off. I thought I heard something hit the ground when I got up so I turned around and didn't see anything. It wasn't until later when I realized it wasn't there that I realized that it was my tie bar that had fallen! Super Sad!!!!

Once again sorry for the late email!

Love,

Elder Frampton

Parents Note:

Since we did not hear from Chris on Monday, Belinda scanned the Internet for anything that may be happening in Korea that would not allow Chris to not be able to write.
She found a Busan Korea Facebook page and was scanning it when she saw a photo. Upon looking closely at the photo she saw Elder Frampton was in it.  She sent it to him and he did not even have a copy though he knew someone had taken it. They apparently made the poster out of cardboard and put topics that my be important to people and asked people on the street put a sticker on the one they thought was important so they could start a conversation.

A miracle!