Korea Town Episode II Scene 5
Monday was pretty hot again. We went to go and email early because
the library is always packed with people and we have to email there for the
majority of our emails because it's a mission rule. We then went to go shopping
at Food 4 Less and I bought some stuff to make smoothies so that way I am not
just getting sick and tired of cereal. I also bought some stuff to make
tortilla wraps for lunch, we will see how all of this goes I guess. We had
plans to go to little Tokyo, but I guess I'm not suppose to go and visit there
or something because the plans always fall through. We ended up taking a pday
nap again because we were done with our normal pday chores than everyone else.
We headed to the church because that's what everyone else was doing and this
guy on a bike started to yell at us. He was upset because he felt that we were
mad at him for some reason and that for him to join our religion he would have
to change who he is (he thought we were another religion lets just say that).
We talked to him for a while and explained gospel truths, he wanted to just
tell us off because he just kept getting louder and louder and then rode off on
his bike, hopefully he at least rode off with a smile right? Elder P and
Elder V were at the church because Elder V was applying for
BYUI. I think they underestimated how long the application process is because
they barely got to the church at 3:30 and of course didn't finish. We ended the
night with a nice lesson with M B and his wife. We asked him
questions about what he read and he asked us good questions in return. It was a
good visit and a good way to end the night.
Tuesday was a bit of a bummer day. We tried talking to a lot of
people, but not too many really wanted to talk with us. It was also a super hot
day and so nobody was outside for us to talk to. We tried to visit a couple
families, but there wasn't a man present or the families weren't home, so we
couldn't visit them. We had to cook dinner because nobody signed up on the meal
list for us. We then went to go and see S. He is a slower learner and bit
older. His roommate and the son of the roommate were there during the lesson as
we were explaining the Book of Mormon to him. They roommate wasn't the most
supportive. He would bash on how S is not the best learner and how S professes to want to get closer to God, but that he doesn't. We invited
everyone in there to read the Book of Mormon. It was an awkward situation
because we were trying to take things slow for S, but the friend kept
telling him that he wasn't understanding. Hopefully next time we will be able
to bring some members or something for S so that even though he may not
understand intellectually the gospel, he can feel the spirit, and members
really do bring the spirit. We ended the night with correlation and that was
good. It was really weird because our WML had to work and so he wasn't there. I
almost lost my cool at this one member, but I caught myself. Sorry that this
day doesn't have more, I forgot a lot of the stuff that happened this day.
Wednesday I had the opportunity to go on exchanges with my DL
E L. He is in his last transfer and about to go home. He came to
my area and we decided to hit the ground running. It was a pretty intense day.
Talking to everyone is just so fulfilling as a missionary!! We talked to this
one guy and he wasn't the most welcoming to our message, but when we bore our
testimonies and asked if we could come back another day to talk to him more, he
said yes. We also saw a bunch of men working on repairing / remodeling a
building. A conversation was started with one of the workers and they looked at
us and said "sorry we are working" so we asked if we could help them.
They asked us if we could move some pieces of wood that were pretty long into a
certain area. Let's just say that was a little bit of a workout. One of these
grown men only took 1 at a time, so Elder L and I were smart and
decided to take 3 together, not too shabby. We ended up inviting one of the
workers named S to be baptized. He accepted the invitation and we have an
appointment with him later! He actually lives really close to us, so hopefully
everything works out! We talked to a lot more of the workers and they are all
from different states, they were just all hired by the construction company to
come to LA and work on certain buildings. It was pretty fun though. We started
talking to one worker, then another, then another. I'm pretty sure most of the
workers that were outside now know about missionaries and what we share. I
think I'm going to have to make this day a little shorter than normal, but just
remember that we talked with like 95% of the people that we walked by or
saw.
We had the opportunity to visit with C C. She is the
less active member with the prosthetic leg. She had a problem with being in the
old habit of praying and ending "in the name of the father, and of the
son, and of the Holy Ghost" so a little weird. We explained simply the
doctrine and how to pray. We then invited her to pray and when she prayed, she
accidentally said the same thing, BUT afterwards she realized what she did and
explained to us that she thinks it's just a traditional way that she had always
been taught how to pray. She also explained that she understands the scriptural
blessings if we pray in the name of Jesus Christ. Elder L then tried
to go and talk to this one lady on the street, but she completely ignored him
and just kept walking on. If you don't know us missionaries,, we walk alongside
someone that we are talking to in the street. It was so awkward because the
lady obviously ignored us, not too nice she was. We then biked to another part
of our area and started talking to people there. We went to contact a referral
that we found out doesn't live in the apartment that she wrote down, so that was
sad. Elder L stopped to talk to this Latino man selling ice cream on
the street. It was so crazy. He told the man what we do as missionaries and the
guy just didn't seem to like us one bit. He then asked him what brings hm joy
in this world and the man responded "nothing". He then asked him if
he believes in God to which the man replied "I believe in nobody".
The man's attitude and demeanor were pretty strange and then Elder L explained that the feelings that the man felt were not feelings that God gives
to us, that the feelings come from somewhere else. We left to go back to out
bikes to go to dinner when a random guy in a car honked at us and waved for us
to walk over and talk to him. I didn't know what to think when we were walking towards
the guy. He got out of the car and started to walk towards us. He introduced
himself as D and said that he recently moved here to LA. He explained to
us that he is a member, but now less active because he didn't know where the
church is. He expressed to us his desires to come back to church and it was
super cool. We set an appointment to go and visit him the following day.
We then biked to the P family for our dinner hour. While
there Hermana P gave us rice, salad, and barbecue ribs... !!! Score!! It
was really good. We had a mini Restoration lesson with A and A and it
was super good. They are doing awesome and they explained to Elder L "that they are returning to activity in the church". Ha! They said
it, so that means that it's going to last! It was cool. We then left and talked
to a group of people outside. In this group you could tell that the
commandments of keeping the Law of Chastity and the Word of Wisdom are
definitely commandments that would need to be taught to them to bless their
lives. We got their information, and sent the referral to the English elders.
My stomach wasn't feeling too good so we stopped by the other elders apartment
(they live in our area) to take a break. We then biked to the most northern
part of our area and decided to go and find the elect. We were on the corner of
2 streets and hadn't even locked up our bikes yet. People started to pass by
and we started to talk with them. It was really cool because we talked to like
8 people before even locking our bikes up! Some people weren't too interested
in us talking to them, and others flat out ignored us. The majority of the
people that we stopped actually had a conversation with us and it was pretty
cool. We talked to a lot of Latinos and a couple brazilians. We talked to a lot
of people and some people stopped to bash with us and tell us that we are
really secret agents for the Congress of the United States. We even found this
former family named the C family. It was a weird experience, but basically
we are going to try and visit them again because it's a family of a lot of
kids, hopefully they are ready and prepared right now for the gospel.
Thursday we switched back from the exchanges and then we had a
special meeting in which we met President and Sister Haynie. We were all so
nervous. I wore my nice blue suit with a nice tie, the fancy watch, wore my
contacts, shined my shoes and lint rolled my suit just in case. Yes, did a lot,
but hey, I wanted to look nice. We got there and everyone had to show up 30
minutes early for the meeting, which everyone did. Basically there was just a
STEPP talk and then some singing, and then they said that the Haynies would
like to meet us. We lined up to go and meet them and Sister Haynie is so awesome.
She talks to the elders much more than Sister Weidman. Sister Haynie was asking
about the area, how long we have been serving for, where we are from, things
like that, super nice. President Haynie is cool. He talked to me and Elder B at the same time and Elder B asked him if he had ever tried gator before (at
this moment I wanted to face palm myself). After that comment President Haynie
was just like "nice to meet you both" and then we went to go and sit
down. The Haynies are super nice too. They are both taller than the Weidmans,
and they have 4 daughters. They have lived in the Midwest for most of their
lives and also in Washington State. We all thought that they were going to go
over all the mission rules, but mainly they just bore their testimonies of our
calling as missionaries and how important and blessed we missionaries are,
especially in this mission. It was pretty cool. We then went back to the
apartment and had to grab a quick bite to eat before we biked to go and see
D. D is the less active that wants to come back to church. We visited
with him and a member of his family named F. We shared with them the
message of the Restoration and it was a good experience. D is super pumped
about the gospel, he just needs to have some friends along the way. We invited
F to learn more and I'm not sure if we invited him to be baptized, I
think just to read in the Book of Mormon, but definitely this week we will
invite him!! We then had a dinner schedule with the C family. We had
planned that we would also share with them the message of the Restoration
because L, the brother, isn't officially investigating, so we decided to see
how the lesson went. We started off and the C's that are members thought
that it was just a review, but then when we directed all the questions and the
lesson towards L, they were at first hesitant. We boldly invited L to be
baptized and he accepted the invitation, on the condition that he could read
the Book of Mormon to know if it is true... Tough bargain I tell ya. The
C's had like a light switch. We promised blessings from the Book of Mormon
on baptism to Luis and there was a cool moment for me when L and I made eye
contact and I was promising him that he could be cleansed from all sin... That
moment... It was awesome. He accepted a baptismal date for the 31st of July!!
It was cool. We then went to the apartment and started contacting people for
the rest of the night. We ended up swinging by C A because he is
coming back to full activity and he has a friend named William that we are
trying to get a hold of so we can all meet together and have a lesson!
Friday was looking like it was headed to be a long day, and there
were some ups and downs. We had our weekly planning session and then we left
the apartment. We went to the most northern part of our area and started to
contact the people and try to visit potential investigators up there. We talked
to some people and a couple of the people we talked to were really nice, but
the majority didn't want to hear us. We then had about an hour before we had a
set appointment with an investigator when we decided to call up D. She
picked up the phone and we asked if we could come by in about 10 minutes, to
which she said yes. We told ourselves that we would need to review the
restoration with her so that way she understands what we are talking about. She
understands at a slower pace, we will put it that way. We went to go and visit
her and she was all smiles, as always. We talked to her and asked if she
remembered anything about the restoration, or the message that we shared last
time, to which she said no. We reviewed the restoration super simply and told
her that everyone needs to be baptized to become a member of God's church to
which she looked at me and asked "when?" So we simply replied
"the 31st of July". We promised her blessings and she accepted the
date! She also told us that she would need a ride to get to church and so we
told her that we could help her find a ride. We then went to go and visit with
S, another older person who understands at a slower pace. We came in and
Y, a young boy at age 14 was there. He was there the last time we visited
S, I just didn't know his name exactly or how to spell it. We explained to
them the need for the proper priesthood authority to be baptized and we showed
in the Bible and the Book of Mormon where Christ gives authority and then the
apostles/disciples go and baptize. Y understood what we we're talking
about, but Samuel the whole time was nodding his head, saying how awesome it is
that the priesthood has been restored, but that he has already been baptized.
He even showed us his baptismal certificate of another church. (First off on
the certificate, it doesn't even prove that the person who baptized him has the
authority, which obviously he doesn't, and it also didn't show that he was
confirmed or received the gift of the Holy Ghost.... Sooooo ya). We set a
return appointment with them and they committed to come to church, fingers
crossed. After that we went back to the apartment for dinner because nobody
signed up to feed us, and when we were leaving our apartment to go and visit
some people, my tire was completely flat!! NOOOOO!!! THE INDESTRUCTIBLE TANK OF
PEGGY!!!!!!!!!!!!! What happened, or what looks like happened, is that in the
inside of the tire, there is a tube, so that is a rough spot and so I think
that is what popped the tube. We tried to fix it real quick to go and visit
somebody that lives a ways away from our apartment, but it was too much. So we
left the apartment to go and talk to a couple people before the night
officially ended.
Saturday we got permission to go and fix my tire at the shop that
is just right down the street. Because the tire and the tube had a problem in
it I had to carry the frame of the bike and the front tire all the way to the
bike shop, and let me tell you, Peggy is no featherweight here... Ugh. We saw a
former investigator from the W days and because Elder B was trained by
Elder P after I left, they recognized both of us. The uncle that was with
the former, Wendy is her name, was always a jerk to us. Here we are with a bike
in pieces walking out in the hot sun and all he says to us is "false
prophets ride bikes"... Y yo no quise que le di caso. Anywho the bike shop
that we normally go to that is run by a Korean was closed till Tuesday and I
was really sad because my bike is really heavy. BUT we found a bike shop around
the corner that is run by a Latino and I think I like them better now. They
found that in my tire was a little itty bitty tinni tiny piece of wire that was
lodged on the inside, so that is what popped the tube. They gave me a new tube
and it cost me about 9$ for the whole thing, not bad especially because I'm
pretty sure no other place would've looked for a tiny piece of wire for me. We
then went and saw the P family and they are doing good. We read in the
Book of Mormon with them in Alma 36 and 2 Nephi 2 so that was good. A, the
older brother is super funny. We asked him how he would respond to someone
asking about faith and he responded "well let me tell you a story about a guy
named Alma the Younger"... I about died laughing. They then promised that
they would stay for all of church!! We then went back to the apartment to
finish our studies because time allowed for it. We then had a couple lessons
fall through but that's ok, we are seeing plenty of blessings, no need to get
discouraged. We actually ended up talking to the brazilians again and we
invited them to church. I also recommended that they try "this really good
food place called California Donuts" but the reply came "I'm
vegan".... Oh. I'm sorry for your loss then, naw I'm kidding. Ya you could
say I invited a vegan to try donuts... Felt pretty bad about it afterwards
though, maybe that's why they didn't come to church. We finished off the night
trying to meet with the elusive William, friend of Carlos. The mother of C works at Yoshinoya, which is basically the cheap version of Panda Express and
not even close to being as good, but hey it was free and I like Chinese food.
It was a nice way to end the day.
Sunday was extremely stressful. It was fast Sunday and we had a
meeting with the bishop at 8 in the morning. We woke up and headed there with
our progress record and everything. We were expecting a lot of people to show
up to church. We had the meeting and the bishop is out of town so a member of
the bishopric was in charge. Hermano G, the member of the bishopric, is
super cool. He served his mission in Miami and he is just a fireball when it
comes to helping the missionaries! The meeting was really good. Afterwards we
were waiting for people outside so that way we would know who showed up to
church. Basically nobody showed up... That's not true, no INVESTIGATORS showed
up to church. It was really sad. We couldn't find a ride for D, so that is
our fault, I don't know why M B didn't show up, Samuel didn't show
up, and L and the C's didn't either!! We did have the P brothers
come again (3) times in a row now!! And C came with his mom along with
D!! We didn't think D showed up, but after sacrament meeting he said
that when we called him before the meeting to see if he was there, he was
already seated in the chapel and didn't want to answer his phone... Amazing!!
E didn't show up either and that was disappointing as well. Church was
good, lots of good testimonies. Hermana P bore her testimony and you can
just tell how happy the parents are that their kids come to church now!! Both
were crying during the testimony and the kids were all like "ten bucks she
cries.." Yup. Anywho. Basically we had random plans that we made because
of some calls earlier in the week and some random less active members calling
us to come by, then all the people called us back to cancel... So thoughtful of
them to call at least. We ate dinner with the R family again, just like
every Sunday, and they made us "vaca negras" or root beer floats.
It's a thing to call them dirty cows or black cows in English right?? When
Hermano R was holding up his root beer float he said "viva la azucar"
it was funny hahaha. Anywho, missionaries don't often get root beer floats
while serving in Spanish so it was a real treat. We then walked and talked to a
couple people. We have been getting a lot better at talking to people on the
street and explaining things in an easier manner to them. We ended the night
with an FHE with the A family and now C is going to have a goal to
finish the Book of Mormon by the end of summer which means he has to read 12
pages a day!! His mom also wants us to help him start seminary, so we talked
about that with him too.
Happy 4th of July everybody!!! AHHHH!! Oh funny thing: we went
running this morning because we had to go to the laundry at to get coins for
laundry and while we were running we saw and heard a Korean lady belting out
awfully the Star Spangled Banner, this was like at 6:45 in the morning... Oh
the joys of the mission I tell ya. Well today we have to be in the apartment at
6:00 cause it's a mission rule, but no buggy, we have some fun plans today with
cool elders that I like. We are going to be making lip syncs and raps... And of
course yogurt land or something haha.
Love y'all tons and bunches!
Elder Roberts
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