Skaters and Strollers and Octopi, Oh My!

Sister Evans got a picture of me helping a lady push her stroller.

We are almost as graceful as those figure skaters!

The octopus the kind lady made for us. That is a few of the 8 she cooked. 

New Year's with our bishop!

Ward eating the soup!

Missionaries playing this traditional game, but I don't know what it's called.

Look what temple is here in Korea! :)

The amazing Olympic sports rink!

The woman second from the left is the gold medalist. 

Guess what the name of this bar is? Anyone? It's "Laman's Bar". How appropriate. 

This man in the ad is 42 years old. I was absolutely shocked, so just had to share more proof of the fountain of youth located here in Korea.

And Happy New Year! (this mannequin is advertising a business, but they dressed her up in a Hangbok on New Year's day!) Everyone is getting in the spirit!

Starting off 2015 the Korean way!

Jan 4

So this week has been really good. We started off the New Year just the way we should, with the ward!! We met the ward at 6:40 am on a mountain called Mangusan on one of the coldest days we've had yet this season! We hiked to the top of the mountain which was actually a graveyard as well. We all stood in the snow and watched the sunrise over the most beautiful city in the world with some of the greatest people on earth. It was crazy watching the sun come up and realizing that I have been in Korea for all of 2014. And thinking back on all the incredible times we have had here was really special. To end, Bishop said a prayer, and then we all headed back to the church for traditional games and Dokkook (a mondue and rice cake soup). At the new year everyone gets one year older (you don't age on your birthday, the whole nation just gets one year older Jan. 1) So I am 25 in Korea- they also count age a little different here. It's been so much fun, and I love this ward oh so much! We got transfer calls, and I will be staying here in Jungnang with Sister Gil for my last transfer. Sister Evans and SIster Ahn will also stay the same, so lucky sister Evans will have lived in the same home as me for 6 straight months in Feb! I keep telling her how lucky she is. :) 

We are meeting with a family from Mongolia, a mom (Chuka), dad, and cutest little son ever (Onkel). The parents are pretty good at Korean, but the son knows very little. And they don't really know gospel vocabulary, so we are trying to find a member who can help teach in Mongolian. But they have a lot of interest, and have come to church several times. So we are really excited for them! And Ha Yeh Been is doing great.She is the 17 year old student we have been meeting with and is scheduled to get baptized on Feb. 8th! We watched The Testaments with her this week to help give her more background on the Book of Mormon and Jesus Christ. And she said "Wow, I didn't even fall asleep because the movie was good." So we took that as a good thing. 

And in other news, last p-day we went ice skating at the Korean Olympic training rink. The rink is huge, but we were informed that we could only use a small portion, since we came right at the time that the figure skating and speed skating Olympic teams would be practicing. So we skated a little bit, but mostly just watched in awe as we watched Olympic athletes (including the female speed skating gold medalist-who practices with the men's team because she is too talented to practice with the women) as they floated across the ice and it was the absolute coolest thing ever! We all left with the desire to be Olympic athletes one day.

Well that just about sums up our week! It's been great and I love this area and I love this work. We are staying warm and having fun, and are seeing miracles every single day. Nothing could be better! Thank you all for all you do and your wonderful examples to me and everyone else. I love you so much! have a great week!

-Sister Shanelle Seegmiller :)

Arms

These are some pictures of our ward party. I am the arms for my tiny Korean companion.

Cake!

Our adorable investigator, Ha Yea Bean at the Christmas party. 

Our little Christmas party celebration in our apartment, complete with the cake given by a ward member.

Not a week for the weak!

Dec 28

Where to begin. I love this ward 중랑 or Jungnang so much. They are seriously the greatest people on earth and love missionaries so much. So very very much. They love us to death. Or very close. We had 7 meal appointments in 8 days, and meals here are not quite like at home. Generally, they have no real main dish and millions of side dishes. And everything is delicious. Most memorable, we had a meal with the 4 sisters at our ward mission leaders home. They made us a feast of some of the best foods ever, and by the end we were stuffed. I have literally never been so full in my life. They had the sisters over first, and the elders were going to come later. There are 8 elders and 4 sisters in our ward, and they had made the same amount of food for both groups. If that gives you any idea. Anywho, we were all struggling to walk out the door, and went to visit a member who ensured us she would not feed us. But when we arrived, she was making a cauldron of red bean soup and gave us each a large bowl because we just had to try it! We were so incredibly ill afterwards, but were ensured that the gift of tongues was very real in so many senses of the word. We couldn't eat again until dinner the next day.

We had our ward Christmas party on Wednesday, which was so much fun! They decided to have each group (primary, YM, YW, and RS) perform something, and then the missionaries performed as well. We had close to 15 investigators come, and several less actives as well. It was a great turn out and so much fun to be with everyone! Koreans don't celebrate Christmas much, so it was fun to have some kind of party. On Christmas I was able to call and talk to all of you wonderful family members, and that was so much fun. It was loud and crazy and just the way it should be. We may not be the most proper bunch, but everyone has told me that ours is the family they would like to visit most, because we seem fun, happy and loving. And I couldn't agree more!

I guess I can't really explain my subject line very well, but Satan has been working harder than ever this Christmas season to turn people away from Christ. Unfortunately he has had some short victories, but we as missionaries just need to pray more and work even harder to win the tug of ward for these incredible people. Unfortunately, Pak Hee Een was not baptized on Saturday. On Wednesday we lost contact with her, and no one has been able to contact her since. We are not really sure what happened, but if you could please offer some prayers on her behalf it would be greatly appreciated. 

As for some follow up, woman in the family- have you been able to watch that video "You never know" I told you about? And if not WATCH IT THIS WEEK! As well as the Live Nativity, He is the Gift, and Because of Him. Also, I reread the story about the bread from three conferences ago, SOO GOOD! And the talk from last conference, "Approaching the throne of God with Confidence" or something like is also highly recommended. That's all I have to say this week. I love you all so much, and I hope you have a great New Year's! Let's all work together to make 2015 the greatest year we have ever had, and recommit ourselves even further to be disciples of Jesus Christ and building His Kingdom, wherever that may be. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ. I love you all so much!!!

-Sister Shanelle Seegmiller

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas Conference with our zone! 

Dinner with our bishop and his family! 

MERRY CHRISTMAS!! 메리 크리스마스^^

Dec 21

Let's start off with some announcements. First of all, a reminder for everyone to watch "He is the Gift" and "Because of Him" videos on lds.org. The church has made a huge push, especially now with "He is the Gift" and have bought advertising space on Times Square for it. If the church thinks its that important, so do we! Please watch and let me know your thoughts, or how you were able to share it with someone who needed it!! 

Also, this is for everyone but especially the woman in the family. I watched a mormon message last week that had me teary eyed all day and made me think of all the amazing woman in my life. It's called "You never know". Please please watch it. It's about 8 minutes long, but it is so worth it. Especially with the crazy Christmas season coming up, it's so good!! Watch it okay?? :)

I don't know if you all heard about the World's Largest Live Nativity that happened in Provo a few weeks ago, but they made a youtube video about it. It has David Archuleta and Alex Boye and some other people I don't know. But it's super cool, so you should check that out too. And, for years people believed that the earth was the center of the universe, and the sun moved around us. But if you read Helaman 12:25, they knew the truth even back in 7 BC. That's why we trust the prophets. 

So lots of miracles this week! First, we decided the Eeh Choong Song needed another visit. (she is the one who was struggling a lot last week) Well it turns out she was still struggling just as much and was deciding whether going less active was a better solution when we showed up once again on her doorstep. She said it's so crazy how every time she is struggling the most missionaries arrive. We were able to testify of God's love for her, and how important she is to Him to keep sending us over. She is doing great now and we are so grateful to have listened. 

We visited another less active, Oh Chang Soon, this week and it went pretty well. She just asked us to teach English. But then two days later she called and asked us to come over again. She told us about her son who had passed away suddenly several years ago. She wasn't able to cope with it well, and asked if we could come more often and review the Plan of Salvation with her. Absolutely! 

And biggest miracle of all. We got a referral from some elders in the Tajun mission.. Her name is Pak Hee Een, 28 years old, and she is perfect. She called the elders for English help, attended a baptism three days later and told them "This is true. I need to be baptized." So they met her everyday last week, taught her all the lessons and she accepted everything. She moved to our area on Sat, came to church yesterday and is seriously an angel from heaven. We had a lesson with her afterwards, and she said the closing prayer. She began crying as she thanked Heavenly Father for this opportunity to start a new life and find the truth, and after the prayer she told us how excited she is to receive the gift of the Holy Ghost and always have that feeling with her. She wants to get baptized Sat. Dec 27, so she can be confirmed on the 28th and become a member before 2015, and start the new year as a disciple of Christ. It's been so unreal and incredible and I am just so incredibly grateful to have met her!!! We are going to try to contact her daily and help keep her faith strong and bright, and we will let you know when she decides for sure to get baptized. These people are really out there. Oh my goodness, they really are. And they are truly the elect of God. She is the most amazing person I've ever met. 

I absolutely love being a missionary. Sometimes it's cold, sometimes it's hot, sometimes lonely, sometimes you just want to be alone, we are tired, hungry, sometimes WAY too full... BUT NONE OF THAT MATTERS!!! This is the greatest work in the world and it truly brings the greatest joy any of us have ever felt. The gospel of Jesus Christ is true. I know it with all my heart. I love you all, have a very Merry CHRISTmas and remember the reason for the season! I will talk to all of you on Christmas! I LOVE YOU!!

-SIster Shanelle Seegmiller :)

"If you haven't chosen first the Kingdom of God, it will make little difference what you have chosen instead"