1-11-15

Hello Everyone!

me and some statue

So this past week we had some pretty fun experiences. I went and had to get a new foreigner card on Wednesday because of been living in Korea for a year now. So that was a fun little experience. We were also able to have interviews with our mission president and had a super good experience. 

mountains at the buddhist temple

So on our way to the interviews (which were in a different area) we got a call from our Bishops wife saying that she was wondering if we could come and give a blessing to a member who was sick. So realizing we would be late to interviews we decided to go right away rather than wait a few a hours. So we rushed over to this members house. The member is in a wheel chair because his legs don't work, and we gave a him a blessing. I anointed the oil and my comp did the blessing. Then he asked if we could help him give his baby a blessing too because she was getting sick. So the mom held the baby

and we all kneed down and I anointed the oil on the baby's head and the dad gave the blessing. 

daegu

Then after that he asked me to translate a blessing he had given his wife and baby a few weeks earlier into English since his wife is a Philippine and doesn't speak Korean super well. So I translated some blessings into English. Which was a little stressful but it was pretty awesome too. So then we rushed back to do interviews and it all went well and was a great experience. It was a pretty spiritual moment for me. And right after interviews we had another lesson with our pretty golden investigator. It went well and he said he wants to start meeting twice a week which is a really good sign. 

daegu

We have an activity coming up in the next couple weeks so we've been spending a lot of time preparing for that recently too. Today for P-day we went to a Buddhist temple out in the mountains of the outskirts of Daegu. It was pretty good. There are a lot interesting pieces of art that are really cool to look at when we go to Buddhists temples like that. Other than that not a lot more is going on. Missionary work is going good. Its very cold still. But thats nothing new. Well I guess I'll talk to you again next week! I love you all! Bye!

me at a skating rink

Elder Maccarthy

1-5-15

Hello Everyone!

This past week went by really fast I thought. Days just seem to be going by faster and faster now. This past week we were able to have a pretty fun time it seems like. We were able to hang out with a lot of members because for some reason new years is a bigger deal then Christmas in Korea and people have more time off. 

it snowed again

On Tuesday we met with our ward mission leader and another member and went to a really nice buffet, and at night we were able to visit a kind of referral we got from a member. It was kind of a referral in the sense that someone was just interested in our English program but not really in the gospel. But we met her and she seemed like she would come to our English class. So who knows maybe somewhere down the road her gospel interest will grow. That's what happens with a lot of converts by the way. A lot of members you talk to here will say that the reason they joined the church started from attending English class. So its a pretty sweet program. 

me with my fur hood

Wednesday it snowed again here in Daegu and we had district meeting and met with some less active kids who live aboutan hour and a half or so away from our house. They are really cool kids and we usually meet with them every other week. Since they live so far away its hard for them to come to church or activities but recently they have started to come out which has been awesome to see. 

snow angel

On Thursday we had a ward New Years Party which was really fun. We ate some weird Korean food (like you'd expect). It was some weird raw fish slices that even other Koreans that were my age were afraid to eat. But it wasn't super horrible I didn't think. Friday we were able to meet with our investigator Tom the college student. He was busy so we haven't met for a while but meeting with him just was really good. He is still super excepting about our gospel and says that our church seems more right about the other christian churches. He is super awesome kid and I feel like he will receive baptism before I leave Sang-in. 

me again

Saturday we had our English class and did some planning and Sunday we went to church and proselyted at night. Time goes by fast when you have appointments. Korea's vacation time just started so I think maybe we will start getting a little busier. Its super cold here in Daegu. The humidity makes everything seem like 40 degrees colder plus the wind is pretty killer too. But Winter is maybe half way or close to being over I think. Korea is a pretty interesting place and its been an awesome experience so far. 

we got a free selfie stick when we ordered food

As of next week I will have been living here in Korea for over a year. Time flies. Well I hope you all have a wonderful day. I love you all and I'll talk to you again

next week! Bye!

Elder Maccarthy

12-29-14

Hello everyone!

me and an investigator from yeon san and an old companion at our mission christmas party

So the past week was a little slow to be honest. Last Tuesday we had our mission Christmas party in Busan. So we had to wake up at like 4:30 in the morning to get there on time, but it was pretty fun. We listened to some talks, some some performances by missionaries, ate food, and kinda just hung out. We also watched Ephraim's Rescue which was good. 

mission christmas party

Then Wednesday we just set up for our ward Christmas party

all day. We practiced our skit and song and it all went well.

Christmas day wasn't all to special. I went to our bishops house and skyped with my family which was fun. Afterwards we had lunch with them and me and my companion just proselyted the rest of the day. Friday we proselyted a bit and then we did some planning
for some future activities. Saturday we had our english class and did some other stuff. 

 thinking about goin out for zz top

And Yesterday we had church and street boarded with the other Sangin missionary team. So ya nothing to exciting I guess. Just regular missionary work. Christmas isn't really a thing here in Korea. There were so many people outside it felt so strange. So we had a fun time and i dressed up with a Santa Claus hat and a big white beard. It was cool. But other than that nothing else happened. We had one investigator come to our Christmas party and a couple of less actives too. So that was awesome, but other than that nothing else really happened. But it was a good week. 

christmas eve dinner

Well i hope you all have a happy New Year! For New Years our ward is having a breakfast together so that should be fun. I love you all. Talk to you again next week!

proselyting on christmas day

Elder Maccarthy

12-24-14

We got to talk to Connor!

12-22-14

 Hello everyone!

my jacket has a removable hood that has fur on it. i wear it sometimes when its really windy outside... dont judge
thats just the fshion in korea for dudes and girls

So my mission president actually changed our pday back to monday so ya here i am. The past week was really good actually. That one korean kid we met last week we were able to  meet last week. 

my stocking from nicole hung up with a hanger i foun in our house

We had a super great lesson where we were able to teach just about all of the 1st and 2nd lessons. He accepted all of it and said how everthing we said sounded true. He is a really awesome guy whos name is 채언재 (Chae Un Jay), and his english name is Tom. His family is buddhist but hes always wantedto be a christian. He has so much  interest in us as missionaries and in our church too. He has a lot of questions bout lik traditional christianity and how some of i doesnt make sense to him, and its pretty awesome how the restoration and plan of salvation can answer just about most of his questions. So that was awesome to do. 

me next to my christms tree

Other than that we didnt do much else. We walked around daegu with a sign saying free christmas cards and gave out just bunches of our He is The Gift video cards. That was pretty fun too. We had a couple of member meal appointments which were nice to go to. Other than those things ya thats about it. 

my christmas tree composing a whiteboard with a green drawn on christma tree, blue magnet ornaments, and some plastic candy canes that i found (pretty sweet huh)

This week we arent really super busy. Im not 100% sure yet how it will roll out but im sure it will be fun maybe. So ya. Have a great christmas! Ill talk to you all again soon! Bye!

Elder Maccarthy

12-16-14

Hello Everyone!

This past week was pretty good. It seems like our long weeks of proselyting have started to pay off. For starters we have recently gotten these new pass along cards for our churches new christmas video "He Is The Gift" that we have been handing out to people and its been pretty good so far. This past week we were able to meet with our one investigator, Shin Han Cheorl, and he is doing very well. When we met

with him before we started teaching the gospel part he said that he really liked listening to it. We taught the last part of the 2nd lesson, The Atonement. When we explained the whole 3 Kingdoms process with him he immediately told us that that seemed right unlike other beliefs about just heaven and hell. So he is doing great.

 On saturday night we had a small little ward party where we all got together and had a little barbecue. But instead of hamburgers we had oysters and crab a little different from american barbecues. We have been spending a lot of time proselyting recently in the super cold weather of Daegu. The humidity makes it pretty killer. Just last night we were outside street boarding trying to talk to people. Usually we get a couple people but last night no one would come and talk to us so we just stood outside for about 2 hours and it was freezing cold. 

So being pretty discouraged we decided to wait for like another 5 or 10 minutes and cut our losses and go home for the night. hen right after that some kid about my age came up to us and started talking to us in pretty much perfect english. He was wondering why there was some random foreigner in korea and I told him how I taught a free english class and he was super excited cause he said he has been looking for just foreigners who he could talk with. Then he was asking about us some more and I told him that we were missionaries and he got super shocked look on his face and started talking about how recently he's just been wanting to learn a lot about christianity and Jesus Christ. 

So i was just like perfect, and I told him about how we teach a program where we can teach him english and about Jesus Christ all for free. He immediately gave us his phone number wihtout us asking for it and told us we could call him any night after 6 to meet. Him being a student in korea that is just about unheard of to me personally. He texted us earlier today also to make sure we had his number and told us ton contact him soon. 

So hopefully we just found someone who has really been prepared. It made me really happy to know that the work is being payed off. A lot of times, especially this past transfer, I've gone home at night pretty down thinking that Im not making any kind of difference. Of course i never let it get me too down, but its always nice to have a good confirmation that you are doing a good thing every now and then. Nothing else much to report on. I love you all! I hope you all have a wonderful christmas season! Bye!

Elder Maccarthy

11-23-14

 So this past week was alright. Tuesday was Elder Paks birthday (he is one of the other elders that I live with). So we didn't really do anything super special that day but we get a meal appointment from one of the members. But that member lives like an hour away in the middle of nowhere. Our area, Sang Een, is pretty big. Its in a part of Daegu called Daileso(달서구), and a few other tinier parts of Daegu, and even some parts that arent in Daegu. So this member lived in some little countryside town way out in nowhere. It reminded me a lot of my first area Samcheon Po. 

So we went there and came back. Wednesday we went to Daemyeong for our district meeting and proselyted for the rest of the day. Daegu is a pretty awesome place to proselyte because people really like talking to foreigners (sometimes in english). A lot of people dont have interest in religion but a lot of people like to learn english so we make it work. Thursday we didnt have a plan so we proselyted some more and visited a less active. And Friday we were able to meet with an investigator at nighttime and had another dinner appointment at night. 

So we just proselyted a little during the afternoon and we had a pretty good day. Saturday was really fun because we got to help a member move her house in the morning. Koreans live in the tiniest houses but they have so much stuff. The usually have two refrigerators too. One for Kim Chi and one for their other food. Then we had English class, abd after that a little youth activity. After that we proselyted. 

Sunday we went to church and had 2 people come out of nowhere saying that there relatives got baptized in Busan and that they wanted to come to church to see what it was like. So maybe they will become investigators. Plus the less active we met on thursdays two kids came to church so we will probably start teaching them the lessons too. After church we did a little more proselyting and went back to the members house that we moved and gave it a blessing. And we also went and visited a less active for about 10 minutes. 

Missionary work is moving along here. Its pretty tough though. Really the only way we can get investigators is through member refferals and those dont really come often. So we have to spend a lot of time proselyting which isnt really effective but we don't really have any other choice. But even though its hard we are still able to make it work. Im sure its a lot harder in other areas of the world. Im super greatful that I can speak english. It never really seemed like a super bug gift until i came here as a missionary. Its been pretty awesome to be able to serve people in a way that only i could. Its fun too! 

Nothing really super fun happened this week but Im always ready for surprises to happen because sometimes those come out of nowhere. Anyways have a nice week! Its raining pretty hard outside right now so maybe it'll snow in the near future! talk to you all again next week! Bye!

Elder Maccarthy

11-16-14

 Me eating a little baby octopus

11-10-14

Hey everyone!

A picture of our district from last transfer

So my new area is pretty awesome. We had 72 people attend church which is like bigger than any church meeting i've probably been in for like a year. Speaking of which in the 3 days I will have hit my year mark. Super insane how fast time has gone by. My new area is really cool. Daegu is super nice. It reminds me a lot like America to be honest. Within maybe 10 minutes of our house we have A McDonalds, KFC, and even a Burger King. I havent seen one of those in a super long time. My new, or rather familiar, companion is pretty good to. 

Me at a flower show

I remember first coming to Korea and hime being my first district leader. I couldnt understand 1% of what he said. But now its completely different. 

The new area doesnt really have any investigators so we will have to work hard and find some. Plus it seems like the missionaries arent super tight with the members so I'll have to change that too.

 Last week I just got to know the area a lot and did that kind of stuff. Daegu is very pretty. Im glad to be serving here. 

Recently I have been having some really good study times in the morning. I've had a lot of questions that I've been wondering about for a while now answered. I always hated studying but something about studying about the gospel and korean is just different then the studying that i used to do. 

So thats really all the big news that i have. Nothing really too exciting or out of the ordinary seems to happen much but rest be assured that im having a blast doing missionary work out here.

what i wore to
our halloween party( mainly just the bolo tie)

 I love you all! Talk to you again soon!

Elder Maccarthy

10-27-14

Hello All! 

Well this past week has gone by super fast. We haven't had a lot of missionary opportunities the past few weeks but we were pretty lucky to get the opportunity to teach in a couple of situations. Our one investigator, Kim Han Joon, broke his arm the other day so he had to go to the hospital to get surgery. So we visited him there and talked with him a bit about stuff. We were able to start a good gospel conversation and were able to bear strong testimony with him. It was a really good time. 

We were also able to meet some random guy after our service project and started a really good conversation. And ya we also had Zone Conference which was pretty fun too. And thats the most part of what we did in the week. Today for pday we ran another 5k. The mission president made the whole mission matching t-shirts so those were pretty cool. The 5k was fun. Afterwards we just played basketball. Well im pretty tired right now from running and I really dont have anything else to talk abobut. So ya have fun this week. Stay safe and I'll talk to you again next week!

Elder Maccarthy

10-20-14

Hello everyone!

The buddhist place where we made 김치(Gim Chi)

So this past week had its ups and its downs. We've still been struggling really hard to meet with people because of testing month so thats kind of a bummer. I dont remember spending this much time proselyting since my training area where we had no investigators. 

 me and elder brown my trainer

But hopefully by the next couple of weeks that will change up a bit.

the boxes of gim chi

We had a couple of fun activities that we did this past week however. We went to a really fun service project with all the missionaries in our zone. We went to a Buddhist Temple area and made Gim Chi for the poeple who were affected by the floods and lost there homes. 

a giant budha or something. then we went to haeundae beach

So we spent a couple of hours there last thursday helping out. We used about 2,000 heads of cabbage in total I heard. It was fun but a little hard. And very messy. 

We also had a stake scout activity where the scout youth and leaders with about 20 missionaries went on a bike trip. It was super fun but my bike was super bad and the chain kept on coming off. But it was still fun. It was 20 kilometers total biked I think. 

different parts of haeundae

different parts of haeundae

Other than that we didnt really have a lot more that we did this past week. The weather has been cooling down a lot so thats been nice. For pday today we went to haeundae. It was really fun to go to the beach. 

Its a rule that you arent allowed to go to beaches in california, but i guess here in Korea you can. So that was super fun. Well that was my week. 

different parts of haeundae

I hope you all had a wonderful week. Ill talk to you all again soon! Bye!

Elder Maccarthy  

10-12-14

Hello Everyone!

This past week was pretty awesome. Mainly because I was able to watch conference. It is October as you all know, but what you may not know was that in Korea this is also finals month for Koreans in school. So what little time our investigators used to have is now at a zero so we spent a lot of time proselyting. 

We did the most with that we could do but we didn't really get to teach a whole lot this week. But we were able to watch conference just yesterday and the day before that. The messages were amazing and it was wonderful. 

I went on splits with another american elder so that we could watch it in English in the Family Research center in Yeon San Building. It was pretty cool just have 4 american missionaries huddled around a small computer to hear the words of prophets seers and revelators. 

We couldn't watch the Sunday afternoon session in English because one of our investigators came. So we went up stairs with him and watched it in Korean. So hopefully I will be able to watch it soon and really understand what they said. 

But Conference was amazing nonetheless whether in Korean or English. Things are going very well over here. I just realized that in one month will be my one year mark. Time has gone by pretty fast. 

But I'm glad I still have time enough left to serve. Have a great week. I love you all!

Elder Maccarthy