Interview Week and Fortress Visit

This week we met in formal interviews about half of the missionaries in our mission.  Next week we will get the rest.  What a delight to sit for only about 20 minutes each with 50 outstanding young men and young women of great faith and desire to share the joyful message of the Plan of Salvation and the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  The stories of miracles and personal blessings have been amazing.  I was able to shed tears with a few.  Meanwhile Terri was providing her home made peanut butter bars and getting to know them more intimately.  They are a joy to be around!

There are no pictures to go with the interviews.   However, our hearts are full of the experiences with this fine young adults and the love they have for  what they do.  It seemed like when we were not in interviews we were in the car! Not a great picture, but every where we go we have to go through tunnels.  It's so much better to go through than move the mountain!

We found a tower somewhat similar to something in a recent trilogy.  It's now called the Lotte Tower and we drive by it almost every day.  The area has been somewhat built up since Frodo was there.  It's pretty awe inspiring.

Each weekend we attempt to attend a baptismal event celebrating with the missionaries the love they share with others accepting the gospel and making sacred covenants.  Here's a young man, aged 27 who recently joined the Church with the young man who taught him, Elder Evans.

In planning for a major zone conference during one of the two biggest holidays in Korea, Chu Seok, or Thanksgiving in September, Terri and I took our two mission assistants, Elder Craven and Elder Kim to Hwa Seong Fortress in Suwon.  It was completed in about 1796.  There is an interesting story surrounding it's history.  Unfortunately, it was almost entirely destroyed in the Korean War.  However, the records for it's construction were found and it was almost completely rebuilt.  Here's a site to learn more about the special historical site: Hawseong Fortress - Suwon

We had the amazing opportunity to see some martial arts demonstrations which I really wanted to link here, but all you get is a picture with us and a few of the warriors.

There is an artist's street which we walked down looking for a quiet lunch.  I was grabbed by a dragon.  By the ball in it's mouth you can see it is good luck and he let me go quickly:

We found the local Buddhist temple and took a few pictures for posterity.  They really keep their sacred places clean and the landscaping well cared for.  It was a hot day, but we were glad to be out.

We decided to take a bike ride, but had difficulty getting on it.  We settled for a Kodak moment.

Terri loves flowers and when she saw this giant hibiscus she was quite taken.  This is one of our church buildings kept up by the members and not professional landscapers.  They had a wonderful flower garden all around the building.

We may amend this posting as we find more pictures that seem to be lost in cyber space.  Until next week....