Hanbok, Nokbeon Festivals

We made some new friends at the Hanbok Festival Saturday.  They were asking about our favorite Korean foods and attractions.  They asked if I had any American money to show them.  I had a $5.00 bill and one boy said "Abraham Lincoln"!  They had been practicing their English lessons!

You can see a big blow up bicycle in the background because they had lots of bike stuff on display too.

This girl is pedaling to make electricity for the cotton candy machine!

A fashion show?  Lots of people were dressed up.

This Fall Festival is held on a street by the chapel in Nokbeon, so the missionaries and members had some games, face painting and some activities too.

Lots of people like using the church bathroom facilities too.

The elders had a cute game where he has to guess what the card is on his hat.

The kids acted out what the card says until he gets it right.

Everyone got a free paper hat.

Lots of missionaries around!

Lots of food to try.

These little crabs were battered and deep fried.  They let us taste one.  It tasted pretty good, but it'd be better if they took the shells off first.  It took a while to get all the shells out of our teeth.

The police had these guys out taking photos with the kids.

A few performing groups.  Some traditional Korean, and some not so traditional.  There were some belly dancing groups. Some of the dancers made me feel better about my figure. (No photos)

This is a rice thresher that the kids could operate by a foot pedal.

This machine pops out rice cakes!

After church today, the road was blocked off for this game.  Hundreds of tables were set up.  The game is called baduk.  Some kind of board game with black and white stones.  I don't know.

The building next door is coming along.  They now have plywood on the roof.  They're making lots of noise, so apparently they're making progress.

I guess they're making progress on the side walk too.  At least on the gutters.  Now we get to walk in the street.  At least they put up cones to keep us safe from the buses.

Seoul Stake Center. New Apartment

These cute sisters were enjoying watching Elder A work on their lights.  Lots of light problems these days!

The sidewalk is not finished yet, but they did roll out something to keep us out of the dirt & mud.

Next door, they are putting up some actual trusses to make a new roof.

We spent a day with the office elders and the Dongducheon sisters getting a new apartment ready for the new couple arriving next week.  They will work at the military base and take over when the (other) Andersons go home in December.  The elders brought this refrigerator over from the old apartment.  I cleaned it, then they came back and took it back.  It turns out that it belongs to the old apartment's landlord.  Well, at least we returned it clean!

We told the missionaries that some elders get to clean up after hurricanes and floods, but some get to do different kinds of service!

There is a beautiful view here.  You can almost see North Korea!

Our branch had a party at the park on base.

We have a nice group of single adults too.

We went to the Seoul Stake Conference Sunday morning.  Elder Yamashita of the 70 was here to dedicate the new chapel.  He mentioned the faithful saints that have been the pioneers in Korea.  He also told about visiting a sister recently who had lost her son and her husband to suicide.  He was concerned about visiting her, thinking that she would be very depressed.  But she had a happy countenance and told him that she knows that Heavenly Father loves her and she is at peace.

He told the Lambert story again (The sheepish lion).  He told that story when he came to the English District Conference a few months ago.  He asked us (and the children) to think about if we are children of sheep, or children of God.

These boys have some nifty Transformer toys!

This outdoor courtyard is a nice feature on the second floor.  This photo was taken from the R S room.  The first floor of the building is for parking.

I love these little tables in the nursery.  They can be arranged as needed.

Someone has made a nice drawing of the plan of happiness here.

And Happy Anniversary to us!  This is how cute we used to be 43 years ago!

Chapel Open House

These elders needed some more light in their apartment.

After we helped them, we went through this marketplace.

It's chili season again!

All kinds of dried fish and other sea creatures.

And turtles??

It was a huge market.  We did find some nice kiwi, apples and a watermelon.

One of our office elders had a birthday.  We celebrated with Indian food!

We went out to find another apartment this week.  The agent spoke Japanese so she & Alan got along fine!

As we left the office, we discovered that they're redoing the sidewalks.  Be careful not to fall off!  Just another project they're working on.

It's time for Zone Conferences again.  Seoul and Gangneung Zones met this week.  There will be three more next week.

Saturday was the open house for the new Seoul Stake Center.  It is an amazing beautiful building!  The missionaries gave tours in the afternoon.  In the evening, they had a program.  Several wards had a choir, a few soloists and our missionaries sang.  They did great!

We've had some serious medical issues back at home.  Our daughter's mother in law had a liver and kidney transplant.  

Our four year old grandson had a nasty fall. When we talked to him he was excited about his new puzzles and coloring books!  Thankfully, they are both doing well and on the road to recovery.

Transfer Week!

We were happy to welcome 16 new missionaries on Tuesday!  And three of them are from Arizona!  We were waiting for their dinners to be delivered to the mission home and when our elders called to check on it, they discovered that it was ordered for the wrong day.  (Oops!)  But the restaurant was able to bring dinner anyway, just a few minutes late.

They looked more rested the next morning.  After they met their companions and had a little training, they were off to work.

But that means we had to send some back home.  11 went home this time.

Including one of our favorite office elders!  Love you Elder B!

We also spent some time looking for some apartments this week.  We have three senior couples in line to arrive in the next few months.  Our replacements have been called and will enter the MTC on January 1, 2018!  And thankfully, the weather has eased off to a more comfortable-ish temperature and humidity.

On Saturday we were able to go to our District Temple day.  We had two full English sessions and lots of other work too.  One of our senior couples helped provide baby sitting so the young couples were able to attend together.  Several people have commented on the promise given at the Seoul Temple dedication that the people will be protected as they attend the temple regularly.

And here's an update on the de-construction project next door.

Now they're starting to tear down the brick part of the building.  The roof has been removed from the main part of the building.

We saw this display of different kinds of masks all over the world that was pretty interesting.

Our friend has a son serving in Houston Texas.  We saw some photos of the damage to their mission home and office.  We're grateful that we're safe here.