I think it's awesome how members around the world, no matter who you are, are all a giant family.

Cancellations because of MERS were up the wall this week. Luckily we were still able to meet with some people! We've had questions like, "how many people have you met with in this past week?" "Have you ever met anyone with MERS?" Well if I did meet someone with MERS, I definitely would not be calling anyone to make appointments! I would be quarantined! Haha some people are really freaked out because of it!

We contacted this former investigator and asked her if she wanted to meet. Instead, she told us she was being stalked big time and that she needed us to help her. Why do we always meet people with the strangest problems? I mean that's awesome that she was asking for our help, but how are we supposed to help a girl that is getting stalked..? She's hiding out in a hotel and everything.. Any ideas?

We ran into an American family that are members on Gang nam Dae ro and they were on their way to dinner! We hadn't eaten dinner that night for some reason and they invited us to join them! We gladly accepted and ate the best burgers in the world! Okay maybe just Korea, but I don't remember the last time I ate that. It was magical. The best part though is that we were able to share a wonderful message and really bond with this family! I think it's awesome how members around the world, no matter who you are, are all a giant family. If you're a member, you're automatically bonded in that way. The church is awesome!

We met with an investigator this week and for some reason, every time we go over to her house, her other church friend shows up. EVERY TIME. So it's hard to start up gospel discussions. Her church friend is the one that takes her to church every week. That church friend is not the nicest person I met. She always finds some kind of way to criticize me in her nice but slightly evil way. If I wasn't a missionary she'd be sooo nice! But she scares me. Haha we're hoping to meet with our investigator and do gospel FIRST before her church friend shows up. Or maybe our investigator invites her church friend on purpose?! As I'm typing about the story I realize it doesn't really sound like a big deal. But if you were there, you'd definitely feel the hate vibes in the air! It's sad..

I also realize I don't really have good stories to share this week so I'm kind of just rambling on. But it was a WONDERFUL week nonetheless! I went on exchanges and slept in our STL's fort they made with their yo's (sleeping pad), I watched the District with my companion for part of her training and I really LOVE this work!

Being on a mission in Korea may be completely different from serving in California, but we're all working towards the same goal and I love that! I know I'm here to help people find Christ and I truly am doing that! MISSIONARY LIFE IS COOL.

Have a great week!

Pray for me and my comp so we don't get MERS!  

Sister April Johnson

Masks for MERS. Can't get it as a missionary! Which sucks cause we talk to so many people and go out and about...

I don't know if people have heard, but recently there is this virus called MERS that is currently in Korea. It started from a camel in the middle east? Not quite sure if that's true, but apparently it's a big deal. Schools are canceling for days, people no longer want to meet us, and our ward party that we planned so hard for got cancelled. So yes, MERS sucks. There's a hospital in my area where one of the doctors didn't know she had MERS and she had treated 10,000 people that day! The disease is gonna spread like wildfire. So pray for all the missionaries in Korea! 

BUT Sister Northridge and I had the great idea of a new baptizing tactic! She's had a cough lately and so we decided she has MERS. Our tactic is great! We're going to go to a big business building and have Sister Northridge cough on everyone we see. Then they'll quarantine the whole building and they'll have nothing else to do but listen to our message! Genius, right? We thought so too.

We met with a girl named Sunny this week. We found her old record in our area book and decided to give her a call. It turns out that she studied in Utah for 10 months and her homestay family was Mormon! The dad was even the ward bishop(: We then found out that she's going to BYU in the fall! Just a few days after I get home! SO we basically became best friends and have plans to meet up in Utah. Until then, she's just killing time and having fun at home. So it's my job to meet her often and get her interested in the gospel! She already knows so much and she's going to BYU! Is this not perfect or what? Even if I can't help her now as a missionary, I can still work my best and help her back in good ole Utah! I have a good feeling about this!

We had interviews with our mission president this week and we had to discuss one of the Christ-like attributes we were working on. I chose patience. Throughout my mission I've had really hard times, as everyone does, but without patience I don't know what I would have done! I probably would have been long gone by now! But whenever I remember why I came on a mission and focus my thoughts on what my Savior would do, I was able to overcome and conquer! Of course I'm not nearly perfect with patience, but I know it's one attribute that I will always strive to have.

There's a quote that I love. I don't think I can quote it right but I'll give it a try.

"We all have our own little Gethsemanes in life, but only then will we understand what the Savior has truly done for us." Ahh yeah I definitely butchered that. But you get the point! Through my little trials in life, I truly have become to really understand what He did for me.

Anyway, running out of time! I love you all! Please pray for me so I won't get MERS!

p.s. only TWO more months?!?!?! I'm freaking out!

Have a MERS-free week!

Sister April Johnson

Eating southern Korean food with my parents mission friend!

Masks for MERS. Can't get it as a missionary! Which sucks cause we talk to so many people and go out and about...

We had a combined mission conference with Seoul South and the Seoul Mission. The Seoul BEST missions!

So one of the Elder's dad in my district was companions with my dad back in the day! Just wanted to share that!

Buddha's actual birthday was this past week. We went to go check it out. So many people with beautiful lanterns! That's my kind of birthday(: haha

We had an appointment with our one investigator this week and we were running late for the appointment because we still had to print off the English lessons. We got to the church and the printer was jammed! I tried for so long trying to get it to work, but gave up because we weren't going to make it for the appointment. So we go to the appointment without the English lessons.

 I was praying that somehow it'd be okay that we didn't have papers to teach with. When we got to the lesson, our investigator tells us that she won't be able to study English today because two of her baby grandsons were there so it was chaotic! BLESSED! Satan didn't want us to have a good lesson, but Heavenly Father helped us out and sent the grandsons over. Haha kind of a weird miracle. But I was stressed a lot. So it was HUGE for me!

I started teaching Sister Northridge the piano. We'll see how long that lasts! All I know is that I'm never teaching someone piano again! It's wayyyy to hard! Especially when you're not all that great at piano yourself!

Has anyone seen the" David Archuleta: Called to Serve" DVD?? Well if not, go find it right now! I'm totally in the video from when he came to the MTC. I'm like smack-dab in the middle. I look like I'm bored out of my mind. I don't know why they chose to put me on the DVD. But maybe this just means we're meant to be and I'm gonna go home and marry him, right? That was fun news this week!

We had a combined mission conference with Seoul South and the Seoul Mission. The Seoul BEST missions! It was great seeing everyone for the last time! Elder Ringwood and Maynes from the 70 came to speak. I learned a lot and actually found one of the things really interesting. Elder Maynes compared Joseph Smith to an investigator. Someone who was seeking the truth. He then said that Heavenly Father and His Son, Jesus Christ were the first missionaries in this last dispensation and we as missionaries now are just following in Their footsteps! I had never thought of it that way, but we truly are doing Their work as missionaries(:

The Bongchun sisters put together a musical night type thing at their ward and invited us to participate! We put together a great dance. Wearing wigs, cat shirts, grandma pants and sockssss. The crowd loved it! We put it together really fast. And knowing me, I can't dance. But it was a good time and that's all that matters!

We also had ward conference this week! Out of the blue, my trainer Kim Yoon Ha was there! It surprised me so much! She was at our church with her whole family. One of her brothers is dating one of our members so they came to church to meet each other's families! Anyway that's not the point. The point is, that my trainer's parents served with my dad back in the day as well! And so Kim Yoon Ha's dad literally called my dad while I was standing right there wanting him to talk with me!!! NOOOOOO. Haha luckily everyone kept saying that was a bad idea and I didged that one!

It was a crazy week. It was so busy and full of things that we didn't have a lot of appointments and we also dropped our investigators... So hopefully next week I'll have more spiritually uplifting stories!

Have a great one!

Sister April Johnson

PICS:

Me being bored on David Archuleta's video.

Our dance.. someone stole my red afro :(

My trainer!!! The grandma, mom and granddaughter photo(:

I became really close with her and helped her through the mission paper process! Guess where she's going on her mission?!

So many things to share this week! I'll start with the biggest news!

In September, when I was in Gok ban jeong the BYU students came to our ward. They stayed for a semester attending a university in Korea. One of the first few nights of meeting them, Angel came up to me and said she decided that night to serve a mission because of our influence on her! I became really close with her and helped her through the mission paper process! She finally got her papers in and guess where she's going on her mission?! KOREA SEOUL SOUTH MISSION! 

Haha seriously though what are the chances?! I hope she goes back to Gok ban jeong ward as a missionary. The members would go crazy to see her as a missionary! She enters the MTC in October, so I'll already be home by then, but I'll get to see her a lot before she leaves on her mission and sit front row at her farewell! She was in Korea when she decided to go on a mission, and she's coming to that same mission she was at! Ughh words. English never sounds right to me anymore.

I have a fan girl! At English class this past week, there was a member from the Seoul mission just visiting. She saw me and told me that she knew my name! Haha turns out she's a fan of mine! She said she watched the video of me opening my mission call on youtube! She pulled it up on her phone and showed it to me. Yup, it was definitely me. As I talked to her more, she told me that she had seen the video over a year ago! 

She would constantly show that video to ask other missionaries if they knew me from the MTC. Haha she had been waiting over a year to meet me! She saw me at the BYU wind symphony concert and was so shocked to see that it was actually me! I think she found out I was serving in Gang nam and so she came to actually meet me. She's super cool and some people would think that story was kind of creepy, but it's sweet! My one fan probably got me a lot of views on my youtube page(;

So last week actually wasn't Buddha's birthday. People kept telling us the wrong dates for some reason! TODAY is actually his birthday. The area is going to be so crowded and awesome for proselyting! And casually looking at the lanterns while doing it.. haha last pday we went to Gok ban jeong and I was really sad! reminiscing about the good times and I realized that if I was this sad about an area and I was still in Korea, how much more sad (English..) would I be when I leave Korea?!

We tried a service project this week! We stole the Elder's trash tongs and went to work! I had Sister Northridge pick a street on our map and we headed out! We started picking up trash for about an hour and we had a TON of success. It was mostly all because of Sister Northridge. People were shocked to see a white person picking up trash in THEIR country! They kept coming up to her and asking her what she was doing! Of course no one gave me a second glance cause I'm Korean. Cool. But we gave out our number a lot and we might have some investigator potential! 

Anyway, we picked up so much trash during that hour. It's sad how there's so much liter in Korea! It's because there are no garbage cans to put trash in! Our trash bags were full by the end. Most of it was cigarettes too! Sometimes when there were other people around, I'd emphasize that I was picking up their cigarette buds and now maybe they'll feel bad about littering their smokies!

We met with our investigator this week and I asked her, "Have you ever thought about why there are so many churches on the earth today?" and she said "Yes! Because God is busy!" Hahaha I think that was the best answer I've ever heard.

Also, one of the Gang nam members is dating my trainer's brother. So this week we asked our member if we could do a practice lesson with her and we set a time to meet. We go to the appointment and her boyfriend shows up. We were totally crashing a date! We ate yummy food and even got dessert at the end. I've never been on a date as a missionary, so that was a first! haha missionary life..

Anyway, random stuff this week. Like always.

Have a great one!

Sister April Johnson

PICS:

Picking up trash

Sticker boarding on Gang nam Dae ro!

We got to see a ton of the Seoul missionaries so I got to see all of my old MTC friends (:

We ate "fire ramen" this week! And seriously. The name perfectly explains the taste! IT WAS THE WORST THING EVER. It wasn't a hot taste. It was a spicy taste. If that makes any sense. We would eat it and then feel like our mouth was on fire. Drinking anything did not help. The only thing that helped was to keep eating the stuff! Haha adventures. Plus we had the bright idea that 7up would be a good drink to go with it. WRONG. The carbonation would just come back up and bring all the heat with it. Haha we're smart.

We got to go to the BYU Wind Symphony this past week! They had a couple concerts in Korea and so we were allowed to go to the Seoul Mission with our investigators. We had an investigator and a less active come with! It was probably one of the most craziest, but fun nights ever. We were running around trying to find tickets and seating and finding our investigator and things like that.

 On top of that, we got to see a ton of the Seoul missionaries so I got to see all of my old MTC friends(: ALSO I ran into An seong members and Gok ban jeong members! YAY! My favorite family of all time was there too! They were in An seong but recently moved to the Seoul mission so I knew I was never going to see them again. But low and behold they were at the symphony too! It was a great day(: I saw one of the daughters and ran and hugged her when she wasn't looking! We both cried.. I'm such a cry baby!

Then we had a crazy Friday. We actually picked up an investigator! We're going to do the family English program with her and so that will be good! She met missionaries 10 years ago, but recently referred herself so we could start that program again! I hope there is lots of potential with her(: Right after that lesson, we got a phone call from a former investigator. We met right away and she started asking us about the Book of Mormon. (She thinks we're all Indians because the Lamanites were cursed with dark skin) But it was a good 갑자기(all of a sudden) lesson! She wanted to meet again around dinner time so we had some time to kill. 

We decided to go to the Buddhist temple nearby to look around and "proselyte" (I put that in quotations cause we're not supposed to proselyte at other church's areas... bad missionary) ANYWAY. It's Buddha's birthday soon so there were lots of decorations and lanterns. Super pretty. 

We ran into some members visiting from Utah and started talking to them when an older guy comes up and asks if we were Mormons. He then continues by coming really close to my face reciting scriptures in English. I swear I was having flashbacks from the last time this happened with that lady! 

I was definitely getting creepy vibes. That's when a worker called us over. I thought we were gonna get in trouble cause we're missionaries of a different faith at a Buddhist temple. Turns out that she just saw the whole situation and wanted to save us from the creepy man! She told us that we shouldn't talk to strangers... Uhh.. Little does she know that that's what we do as missionaries though... haha there were more crazy things that happened that day, but I'm running out of time.

Anyway, I hope everyone had a great week and I hope you all have another one!

Sister April Johnson

WE ATE DOG THIS WEEK!

Okay last email I said it was my brother's 21 birthday. I lied. He's only 20... HAHA TYPO! But on the plus side! His Bells Palsy is almost perfectly healed!!!! YAY!

So to explain the title of my email.. WE ATE DOG THIS WEEK! And it was actually pretty good! The only part that really freaked me out was the fat. Just cause I knew it was dog fat, it was really hard for me to get down. Haha I'm on a mission in Korea. I had to eat dog at least once! Probably won't have it again though.. Those poor doggies..

Last week I ended my email pretty abruptly. We had a member bring his grandchildren to the church for a brief discussion. First of all, the grandchildren thought they were gonna have a fun day with the gramps! Until they got out of the car and realized they were at our church. He opened up 1 Nephi 14 with them (about abominable churches and stuff) and they just sat quietly while he scolded them for going to the wrong church. It was pretty... awkward. But he is such a good member!

 He has such a strong testimony and he just wants to share it with his loved ones. Maybe not the right way to approach it though.. Haha it's okay though. We cleared all the awkwardness up and gave them pamphlets about our church in case they ever wanted to learn more!

We also went to the temple this week! We haven't been since the beginning of last transfer and the end of this transfer so the last time we went was in February! TOO LONG. But it was amazing as always. The spirit you feel there is comparable to none other. I'm so privileged to be able to attend the temple as a missionary!

We have an investigator that never actually wants to meet with us. So we just do our lessons with her over the phone. Last time we committed her to read the Book of Mormon and we asked her if she had read it, but she hadn't because she had been on "prayer mountain" for 10 days. She's had a really hard past and has big trauma from her ex-husband who was a pastor. She has a hard time trusting organized religions because of the pastors. She can't trust their "angelic" image. Luckily for her, our church doesn't have pastors! Haha I told her that and she was pretty shocked! Just more the reason to start coming to our church, right? 

Anyway, she's been focusing on trying to get the bad spirits our of her on that prayer mountain. The priests there have been trying to cast out the devil inside of her... So as we were on the phone, I told her to maybe focus more on God. That as she focuses on Him, Satan won't be able to haunt her as easily. He becomes blocked as that belief and faith in God takes over! I told her that if she focused on the bad spirits and trying to cast them out, it just makes her concentrate on the bad. But if she focuses on God, then they'll just be automatically blocked out! You know...? Smart, right? haha I tried really hard to get her to come to church, but maybe next time I'll get her!

In zone training this month, we learned about diligence and obedience. What's the difference? Diligence is doing something because you DESIRE to do it. Obedience is doing something because you HAVE to do it. As missionaries, we have a saying "Obedience brings blessings, exact obedience brings miracles." But our mission president has changed it to "Obedience brings blessings, diligence brings miracles.”

 I need to work on being a more diligent missionary and working my hardest! Not just do thing just because I have to. It was actually a great training for me because I have been in a slump lately. I feel like missionary work is just numb. But now I know how to change! How to become a better missionary. I just need to be diligent and do it cause I want to(: 

 Sister April Johnson

I knew that even though I felt like a bad missionary for not having much success in this area, I knew that I was still doing an okay job

First off, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY BROTHER! He's turning 20!  Also, he just got Bell’s Palsy and so his face is half paralyzed. Pray for him!

On Monday it was still my birthday in America and so we went hiking with some members and the district! We also had a picnic and had a feast! Then we went to the Han River and went bike riding with some awesome sisters! I also got to see the 63 three tower. I don't have pics of it cause my camera is broken but it's cool for three reasons. One: it used to be the tallest building in Korea. Two: apparently it's on the new Avengers movie! Three: it's where my dad proposed to my mom! Super sweet, right?!

Ran into a Gok ban jeong (my last area) member on the subway the other day. She was heading to the temple! I almost cried when I saw her! It's crazy how much these members have truly impacted my life!

Anyway, lately I have been feeling like a bad trainer! Gang nam isn't the easiest place to do missionary work.. No investigators, not many member appointments, and no one actually lives in Gang nam. They all just come to shop and sight see. So I've been feeling pretty lame lately- a bad missionary, not having a lot of teaching practice for Sister Northridge. I've been pretty hard on myself, but at 12 week followup (a meeting for trainers and their trainees) they have the greenies bare their testimonies about something they learned in Korea that past month. One sister's testimony really hit me. She said that all missionaries were amazing. Why? Cause they are all here to serve Him. As simple as that. But as she said it, I knew that even though I felt like a bad missionary for not having much success in this area, I knew that I was still doing an okay job because at least I'm out here trying to serve Him. I made that sacrifice in my life to truly share the gospel.

Anyway, lots of crazy things just happened so my mind is all over the place. We just had a member bring his high school grandkids to the church and tell them that their church isn't true and that they needed to repent and join the true church. So... gotta go and help figure out that one... BYE! Have a great week!

Love y'all!

Sister Johnson