My First Korean Church Service

Hi all!

Guess what! Just when I thought that finally, after 10 months in Korea, I have run out of novel happenings, I finally attended my first church service here in Korea. All in Korean, of course!

A few months ago, one of my students had invited me to church, but since I am hardly ever at home at weekends, I hadn't yet gone. Well, when I was in the US, I went to church with my niece and co, to Every Nation in Nashville, which is where they fellowship, with Ps. Rice Brooks. Well, it felt so good being in church again after such a long absence, that I decided that I really must get back to attending church, even if I can't understand a word. As long as the Holy Spirit is there, then it should all be ok.

So, it is that I have just returned home after my first Korean church service this morning. So, allow me to describe....

The church is called Gunwi Evangelical Church. Morning service begins at 11am, but my students came to fetch me at home at 10:30 already. The church is only a 5min walk from I live. When we arrived, many people were already seated, singing worship songs from hymn books. Fortunately, my student, Hyun Ji, who sat next to me had a Korean-English Bible, which included all the Hymns, Prayers, Scriptures, in both Korean and English. So while everyone else sang in Korean, I could follow the music score and sing along in English! When the choir sang, "What a friend we have in Jesus", she was very surprised that I knew it! (We were not using the hymn books, this was choir only). At first it felt very Anglican, with all the responses, etc. They even recited The Apostle's Creed, which had me a bit confused since it mentions "the Holy Catholic Church". As far as I knew, this is not a Catholic Church. The minister is married. And all the usual Catholicisms are absent. They have a choir in lilac-and-white robes, with their songs in identical pink files, so everything was aesthetically pleasing. The minister was quite impassioned during his preaching. As far as the sermon went, the minister started out with "Africa" and "diamonds". He mentioned these a few times, and that's all I understood. At least I could read the Scripture! (Ephesians 1:11-14). Hyun-Ji had asked me if I wanted her to translate, but I felt sorry for her, and told her there was no need, that she should relax and enjoy the service. And towards the end of the service, my name appeared on the screen in Korean, and I had to stand up so everyone could see me and welcome me. The camera was even focused on me :( Funny that that felt normal :)

After church, it was very heartwarming when so many people came rushing over to greet and welcome me. I had finally returned to my celebrity status from many months before! A few of the cafeteria ladies from school were so excited to see me at church, that they practically ran over other people to grab my arm and kidnap me, despite not being able to speak to me in English! It was very sweet!

Then I had to meet with the Welcoming Committee for coffee and biscuits. And lo and behold, my GP and his daughter also attend this church, unbeknown to me. So someone found her, or she came looking for me (I don't know which...) and she ended up interpreting. She attended high school in America, and so her English is fantastic! I can speak to her as though she is a Native English speaker. (I had met her a month ago, when I visited her father when I had a throat infection, just prior to my trip to the US. She happened to be at the hospital with her dad, so she also sat in on my examination and interpreted where necessary.) She has returned to Korea to attend university in Seoul, so I might not see her again for a long time.

Anyway, so the service ended at 12:20 (Isn't that great?! Nice short service.) And after church everyone has lunch together in the building next-door. And this is what they do every week. It was also really cool to see my GP wearing long pink PVC gloves, doing the dishes in the kitchen!

I then had to meet the pastor's wife and the church elders, who told me that they hoped to see me often. :)

And I was also told that a "server" would contact me either today or tomorrow to pay me a visit at home.

So, it would appear that I am to be well and truly "churched" here in Korea this year. My optician friend attends a different church, next door to the Evangelical one, and he has already told his pastor about me and Bernice, and would like us to meet him. So, it seems there's to be a bit of competition regarding who can bag the foreigner? I hope not.

Anyway, in less than a week, I begin my very loooooong journey back home to you all. YAY!!!!

Love and hugs

Andrea

A Snowy Happy New Year!

Hello everyone!
I hope you all had a good Christmas and fun New Year's celebrations. I am totally missing an entire day from my life....I went from 2009 to 2010 without a transitionary New Year's Eve or New Year's Day. Time travel is so cool! But, I am getting ahead of myself. Let me travel back in time again, so I don't completely confuse everybody :)

Well, as you all know, I went to visit my niece, Verna and her hubby, Mike in Nashville, Tennessee. Sharon (from Ohio, previously Cape Town) joined us for the visit, so it was just like old times. I could speak Afrikaans slang, mixed in with my English, and be understood! (Happy times!) Of course, we all ragged each other everytime one of us slipped into 'American'.

With Verna, Mike and Sharon in Nashville, Tennessee!

After having gorged ourselves on good ole' Southern cooking, 

grits and all!

Many Americans here in Korea thought I was crazy to be visiting Nashville. I only understood this when I got there. Nashville is good ole country music city. (Now, I knew about the country music, but I think it was that old evil named discrimination. Americans from the North (New York, especially) seem to look down on and ridicule the country folk down South. Well, let me just say this...Nashville was the best place for my initiation to the USA. You will remember me complaining (often) about the Americans I meet here in Korea. The (country) folk in Nashville were wonderful, kind and friendly. And the funny thing is, that most people living in Nashville, have moved there from other parts of the US or the world. People enjoy the laid-back, relaxed attitude there. Everyone was quite polite, a nice change from the Americans I meet here.

I did however, experience a teeny weeny bit of culture shock, though! Everything was in English! or English/Spanish. A welcome change from all the Korean signage here :). Shopping was an absolute pleasure....it just went that much quicker, cos I was mercifully spared having to decipher pictures on products, trying to figure out what they are for. I was like a little kid, totally in awe of the amount of SPACE! As we drove around sightseeing, I would read the names of streets and buildings out loud, like a real, certified tourist! LOL! Don't mention shopping! Mike (my niece's hubby) had a good laugh when I got all excited that we were going to Walmart to pick up some groceries. I oooh-ed and aaah-ed at all the familiar product names, like someone who's not used to these things, you know? Can you just imagine it? (I'm still chuckling at the memory of it all!)

Culture shock moment #2: Feeling like I wasn't speaking fast enough in restaurants or stores. Placing orders in restaurants and cafes had me in a bit of a dizzy spin. I wasn't prepared for the American server-style when taking your order. It was all over in 30 seconds, and after what seemed like I was being barked at, I couldn't help answering in Korean! How's that for Culture Shock! I was so shocked at the lack of long greeting and bowing, that when spoken to in my native language, I completely forgot how to speak English, and answered in Korean as though I've been speaking Korean all my life! LOL! Lots of fun!

I got a total kick out of hearing new accents around me. I enjoyed dawdling around in stores, just to get an extra earful of Southern Country or Spanish.

Christmas Day was great! We were totally LAZY! We deliberately didn't dress up, each of us ladies cooked only one dish, to make everything equal. And we had a lovely lazy Christmas Day. Well, we couldn't exactly do much more than that, seeing as how we had spent the previous two nights, sitting up and yakking away till the sun came up.

And then just a few days later, I was on my way again, jet-setting back to Korea. And how I enjoyed it. Yes, it was a long haul. From Korea, I flew to Tokyo, then across the Pacific Ocean over Hawaii to Dallas, and on again to Nashville. I flew back in time by 15 hrs, so you can imagine that that first day was a looong one for me! I was eating dinner at breakfast time, and vice versa! It was crazy! And then, returning to Korea, we flew all the way up to Canada, skirted Alaska, crossed the Bering Sea, skirted Siberia, before heading back down to Japan, and then on to Korea. With LOADS of wonderful turbulence! The best I've experienced yet. The kind that makes you shake sideways in your seat and your stomach float in your throat! Lovely stuff! I remember thinking that I now have no reason to fear rollercoasters. After this trip, I can do the stomach-flipping rollercoaster thing! Wowee! Now all I need to do is cross the Atlantic, and then I can truthfully say, that I have traveled around the Globe!

And returning to Korea this time, was much better than last time. I actually experienced an odd sensation of relief! You know that feeling you get when you know the long journey has finally ended, and you are now home? Ghastly, I know, and bizarre to my mind, but yup! It's true. It seems I am now thinking of Korea as HOME! I can't believe it.

So as I was saying at the beginning of this email, I bizarrely lost almost an entire day, thanks to time travel. After leaving the USA, I traveled ahead by 15hrs and thus lost New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. If this confuses you, perhaps the following might help :) .... I left Nashville at 6am on Thursday 31st Dec, and arrived at Seoul at 8pm on Friday 1st Jan. Hopefully this won't affect my sense of time. 2009 might just begin to seem like a reeeeeeeaaaaaaaaallllllllllyyyyyyyy looooooonnnnnngggg year! Which is great! Coz then it means I can continue my 2009 travel trend :)

Anyway, I spent an ABSOLUTELY LAZY weekend at home, sleeping, eating, watching movies. And then back to work today. teaching vacation classes, cos as you know, these poor Korean kids have to attend school during school vacation. Strange, but true!

My first-ever footprints in snow!

And then the most wonderful gift of all! It finally snow-snowed here in my town today, for hours on end, it snowed. Everything was coated within a few minutes. I went outside with the kids to play in the snow. At first, I was just totally dumb-struck. It is a magical thing to behold. The world really does quieten down when it snows. My vocabulary had been reduced to nothing more than, "Wow!" "It's so beautiful!" "Wow!" These four words were all I could say for a long time. The kids were running around, snowball-fighting, one even lay down in the snow. I made my first-ever snowball today, and threw it at a kid! Of course, everyone was freezing afterwards, cos they had just run out in their slippers and socks, without gloves. But would we do anything differently? Of course not!

And when I finally got home, I just dropped my bag, picked up my camera and immediately went trudging through the snow. I took pictures of everything and everyone. Rice paddies literally snowed under. Cars covered in snow, my footprints in the snow, people shoveling snow away from their doors and gates. I even ate a few handfuls of snow! Just for the experience! When I got back home, I was still walking around with a silly grin on my face, and repeating my new 4-word-vocabulary. I am in awe, total awe, at being part of so much beauty. And what makes it even more special, is that this kind of snowfall is very rare in these parts. The ground will freeze over, yes, but it only snows like this once every 5 or 10 years. So, I am definitely here in the right place at the right time! It feels like a special gift from God :)

And so, work continues, just for a few weeks, and then I'll be in Cape Town from February 3rd through 28th.

Loads of love to everyone. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone soon :)

Love and snowy hugs,

Andrea