Korea!

Well I just talked to all of you on the phone because it's Mother's Day in America, so I'm not really sure what else to say! Haha, but as you know - I'm in Korea and it's awesome.  The area I'm in is called 군산 (pronounced Goonsahn, but it's romanized to Gunsan) and it is the best.  I know there's a lot of awesome places in Korea and all new missionaries will call their area "the best", but my area seriously is the best, not kidding.  One reason why it's super awesome is the fact that there's an American Air Force Base just outside the city and so my companion and I cover the branch that is on the base - so we have American members and investigators too, it's awesome.  Anyway, Gunsan is considered a small city in Korea, but it actually has almost 300,000 people living here so it really is a decently sized city (Salt Lake City has 180,000 in its city boundaries, for a comparable reference).  Also, everyone lives on top of each other and everything is so dense, so that makes it feel even bigger than it is.  Koreans live in apartment buildings, it's just what they do, so the streets are lined with 20-30 story apartment buildings everywhere. 

My companion and I live on the eighth floor and our apartment is awesome.  It's only the two of us living in it, but there's 3 bedrooms, a family room, a full-sized bathroom, and a kitchen.  The bathroom is pretty crazy because there's no shower curtain, there's just a removeable shower head (the ones that have the hose so you can move it around) attached to the wall.  So in other words, the whole room is the shower and everything gets wet.  Because we have 3 bedrooms, we sleep in one, use the other for our closet, and use the other for random storage.  It's awesome how much space we have.  I would love to send pictures BUT I left the USB cord back at our apartment, and I'm at the church typing this right now, so I'll do that next week (I feel like I say this every week, but I really mean it this time).

Being in Korea is crazy, but it's awesome that I'm finally here.  My companion, Elder Ward, is the best - I couldn't have asked for a better trainer.  I'm super excited these next few weeks to fill you in with all the amazing stories about what I'm doing here.  I don't have a lot of time life left, so I can't tell you everything this week, but next week I'll be a little more settled in and I'll be able to use the full hour for email.  One funny thing about being here is that fact that I'm tall and American and my companion is exactly the same.  We stick out like a sore thumb, it's hilarious.  Also, every single Korean knows at least one english word, and that's "hello", and so when we're walking down the street, the kids will call out "hello!" and we'll say "hello!" back to them, and then they'll giggle and just say "hello!" again haha.  The kids here are adorable, it's ridiculous how cute they are.

Anyway, I'm going to have to say goodbye.  Next week I'll send a million pictures, I promise.

-Elder Graf


***Here's a picture that we stole from the mission blog of Christian and his new companion. Elder Ward is a cadet at the Naval Academy and is from the Sacramento area, so basically we all think he's great already.***