And it came to pass...

And it came to pass,that after I had thus spent much of my days in the MTC I began to speak after the manner of my forbears. psych. But seriously, I catch myself talking like a Book of Mormon character sometimes. I made the goal to read the Book of Mormon from beginning to end by the time i leave the MTC-I'm already to Helaman and almost into 3rd Nephi! I know you'd be so proud of me, Dad. Since you were always asking me if I was reading my scriptures when I was at home, and a lot of times I wasn't-but now I can't put them down. 

Anywho, Mom, I just saw Elder Choi in the hallway. He is so funny. He acted as an investigator at the TRC and completely tore apart two of my elders, saying thing like Jesus was a liar, and asking if God could give him lots of money. He said all of this in Korean, and I was watching on the TV's, and it was very funny. I gave him my leftover Cutler's cookies because we just couldn't eat all of them. And he said he is so happy about that. 

I taught for my second time in Korean this week. It was pretty hard, but I was surprised that I could answer most questions, and understand what my investigator was saying to me. The only thing I couldn't answer was-what is baptism? I just sat with a blank look on my face, and then said--uh, fully immersed, mul an-ae--I did this along with very exaggerated hand motions. Errr, yeah. 

Somebody said hi to me from Thomas, and she said that Thomas and Boram want to come to the TRC. Yes! You ALL should come to the TRC. We really need the investigators. We have a zone of over 50, and so we don't get very good TRC experiences, because there are never even close to enough volunteers. It would be so great if Mom, Dad, Jason & Romy, Minji, Boram & Thomas came to the TRC, and anybody else that speaks Korean. Please come. 

OH! I forgot to tell you right at the beginning! I am leaving early! I leave either on the 24 or 25 of January because they want to get us there before Korean New Years. Soo, ookay. Theres that. I'm really really rully rulelyy excited. Its not that I don't love the MTC, but I'm excited to get back to Korea and eat Korean food, and speak Korean. Oh, and Richard: I run into Caleb sometimes-I just ran into him 10 minutes ago, and he says he is leaving tomorrow. okay.

So, I'll share an experience with you that I had this week. Or I guess overall. So, before I came into the MTC, I had mixed feelings about learning Korean. Anybody who knows about my last attempt to learn Korean knows that it was a huge disaster, and that I was pretty much a failure. I dropped out of Yonsei purely because I couldn't take it, I was the worst in the class, and no matter how hard I studied--I just couldn't get up to where everybody else was. It was one of the most humbling and frustrating times in my life. So, needless to say-I was nervous to come and attempt to learn the language that had destroyed me a summer ago. So, when I got into the MTC, and I realized that I actually knew more than everybody--I started to feel..better..maybe a bit of pride seeping into the timid heart of last summer. I was learning Korean well. Everything was coming easily to me, and I was memorizing roughly 35-40 vocab words a day, and everything seemed easy. I didn't have to put much effort into it, and I attributed it to my own geniur. Yeah, i just spelled genius with an r. gerhehr. Anyways, so this last Friday we were playing Jeopardy grammar review, and I thought-awesome! I kill everybody in Korean Jeopardy. Andddd, guess what my score was by the end of the game? Zero! And that wasn't because I didn't get the daily double. 

So, that humbled me purty good. The TRC was humbling as well, trying to teach a lesson in Korean. On Sunday I decided to dedicate my fast to how I can better study the language. During my fast, I was in a meeting with President Shin, and he told me that I should not worry soo much about learning Korean, because if I have faith-then it will come. I thought a lot during the day, and I realized that I was not working nearly as hard as I could be. So, I told God that I would try my hardest every day to learn as much about the gospel and the language as I possibly could. I also asked God to help me utilize the Gift of Tongues that he blessed me with during my setting apart. The next day, yesterday, I accidentally spent all of my MDT language time reviewing grammar. I was a little frustrated as I realized I had no time to memorize vocabulary. But, I took comfort in President Shins words to have faith. I realized that, I don't have the ability to learn the language so quickly, I am oh so aware of that fact. However, I realized that I'm with God, and God is with me, and God can do anything, so I knew that it wouldn't be a problem for me to memorize my goal of 40 vocabulary words a day. So, I took my vocab notebook with me for the rest of the day, and somehow I managed to memorize 61 vocab words, an amount I have never been able to before. And, I have no idea where the time came from to learn all of those words. What a wake up call for me. 

Anyways, this whole story might just sound silly and coincidental to some, but for me it was a strong spiritual experience. I know that if I am with God, then I can learn the language. I don't need to be afraid of it, or proud of my work, because all I need is faith to learn it and I know that God will help me with it.

So, other things that are new--we got a new sister this week: Sister Chelsea Burns. She is very fun and spunky. I like her a lot. She is from midvale, and she will be serving in the Daejeon, Korea mission with me. We also got 22 new Elders, and so that has been really fun. New Years came and went and I hardly noticed it. I celebrated a bit back at the residence hall with the Native Korean sisters. Dad, can you believe that I didn't stay up until 6 in the morning celebrating? haha. I was in bed by 10:15 waiting for lights out. So, HAPPY NEW YEARS EVERYBODY.

So, that is pretty much it. Oh, we get 11 native Koreans tomorrow, that will put our zone at over 60 I believe. And I think that we are getting two native sisters which should be really great. Okay, I love you all. Saranghaeyo!

 

Love Cutler Chamae