tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-62571424796890749912024-03-13T21:12:07.969-06:00Without Money, Without Price"Behold, doth he cry unto any, saying: Depart from me? Behold, I say unto you, Nay; but he saith: Come unto me all ye ends of the earth, buy milk and honey, without money and without price." -2 Nephi 26:25Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01985990761616349746noreply@blogger.comBlogger78125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-15349677834061238142016-01-22T17:01:00.001-07:002016-01-22T18:06:46.946-07:00New Blog<div dir="ltr">
So, in case anyone is actually still paying attention over here...</div>
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Since I'll be posting about more things outside the realm of missionary work, I have a new blog to reflect that shift:</div>
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<a href="http://remultiplex.blogspot.com/">http://remultiplex.blogspot.com/</a></div>
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Whoever you are, you're welcome to check it out and/or follow it, if that strikes your fancy.</div>
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Have a wonderful day!<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01985990761616349746noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-42308790119006373192015-11-20T16:00:00.002-07:002015-11-20T16:00:57.924-07:00Home AgainI played a lot of video games growing up. Some of those games had a world map, with a little dot that showed where your character was in the world. In a way, the distance between your little dot and your home town was a measure of how far ahead you were in the game, how much you'd grown, the challenges and monsters that you now had the power to overcome.<br />
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One day last summer, sitting at the kitchen table in the mission-office apartment, I happened to open Google Maps on my iPad. I zoomed all the way out to look at the world. I saw the Great Salt Lake, and the cities and valleys next to it that had been my home for almost a decade. And then, all the way on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, I saw that dot.</div>
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In that mind-blowing moment, I realized I could go anywhere in the world.</div>
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I've been home for two weeks now. (Two weeks exactly, now that I think about it...) I wanted to write this post a few days after I got back, but it took me a little longer than I expected to get things together. It wasn't until I started pulling boxes out and unpacking them that I realized how much <i>stuff</i> I left at home. I wiped my computer and I've been using a new email address, and I got a new phone a couple days ago, so it's been a fresh start in a number of ways. </div>
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But, home is home. Most of everything is right where I left it. The biggest change is inside myself. Even though I'm basically going back to doing the same thing as before my mission (college and work), I feel like I can do it <i>better</i> now. Like my capacity has grown. A lot.</div>
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It seems like there was a bit of an eruption of noise and controversy right when I got back, with some uproar about an updated Church policy, and terrorist attacks in France, and maybe something else. (Something's telling me there was a third thing, but I can't remember what it was.) I feel peace, though. Direct experience from my mission tells me that God is still firmly in charge, and thus everything will work out fine in the end (however much it hurts in the meantime).<br />
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Right now I'm planning on setting up a new blog, though I'm not quite sure when exactly I'll be doing that. I may also keep this blog up as a place for Gospel-related thoughts directed towards members of the Church. We'll see.<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01985990761616349746noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-47821641421323035482015-11-02T14:51:00.001-07:002015-11-02T14:51:49.264-07:00The Ghost of Halloween Past<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Well, it's my last week. I fly home <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_1989091113" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); border-bottom-style: dashed; border-bottom-width: 1px; position: relative; top: -2px; z-index: 0;" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ" style="position: relative; top: 2px; z-index: -1;">on Friday</span></span>. <br /><br />I'm not sure what I feel. It's sad, to some degree, to leave Japan, but through Facebook I'm already connected to so many people here, so it'll be easy to keep up relationships. It's almost like when I moved from Pleasant Grove to Hooper, except this time I'm going back to a place I've been. I'm looking forward to seeing my family again, and being with them for Thanksgiving and Christmas. The gospel will stay with me, and so will all the growth I've had on my mission. I guess it mostly just feels like moving on to the next chapter. <br /><br />It just occurred to me that one thing that might feel really weird about being home is not having an iPad anymore. The missionary iPads were intended to replace the paper-and ink Missionary Daily Planners, and so while some other missionaries have been desperately hanging on to paper planners (they're kind of a rare commodity now), I quit using them altogether as soon as the iPads came out last year in January. I've been relying on this iPad to keep track of things for the past two years. My family has a cheap smartphone waiting for me when I get back, so we'll see if that can replace it. :P<br /><br />We got permission this year to wear costumes at ward Halloween events if the members asked us to. I ended up just wearing a cardboard sign that said「好きな仮装を想像して下さい。」(Please imagine a costume of your choice.) We had a talent show and a trick-or-treat (using the church classrooms) and a costume contest and piñatas. Halloween isn't normally celebrated in neighborhoods in Japan like it is in America, but there's Halloween decorations up in all the shops and some people put together Halloween-type events. And then yesterday, our investigator was showing us pictures from Shibuya on Halloween night. (Shibuya is a major downtown area of Tokyo that's outside of our mission boundaries.) Apparently there were a lot of people in costume there. </div>
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Two years ago, Halloween was my second day in the MTC. I remember that night back in the dorms so well; the decreasing disorientation, the anticipation of our first lesson in Japanese the next day, the older missionaries running around crazy and throwing candy at everyone and hiding acorns in our closets. A year later I was in Atsugi, surprised at the huge crowd of<i>kids</i> that were running around wild at the ward Halloween party. Somehow we had ten times as many kids at that party as there were in the whole ward. We had piñatas there, too. Piñatas are fun.</div>
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I feel like I've had a strange mission... but looking back at it now, I don't think I'd have it any other way.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-30163700394384527322015-10-26T06:44:00.003-06:002015-10-26T06:44:41.883-06:00Penultimate<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
So, I only have so much time and energy available for emails each week, and lately I've been using it for personal emails (mostly to my mother) rather than these blog posts. In stark contrast, my brother (who started his mission last month) has written a novella of a weekly email every single week so far. o__O I wonder if he'll manage to keep it up.</div>
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It's interesting to see the contrast between my brother's mission and mine. Down where he is, people love to talk about Jesus, and he finds six or seven investigators in a week. (That doesn't happen very often here in Tokyo South... at least, not yet.) But then again, it sounds like he still has roughly the same level of challenges. </div>
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This week is the last full week of my mission. It's kind of surreal, and quite the mix of emotions... honestly, it is sad to leave. I love Japan. I love the language, I love the busy city, the narrow streets, the food, and especially the people. It'll be sad to leave, and at the same time I'm really looking forward to seeing my family again, and to see what's waiting for me in the next chapter. And just recently, I've been learning so deeply-- not really anything <i>new</i>; but it's like a lot of the things I've known or believed in all my life just make sense on a whole new, whole deeper level. And they feel <i>real</i>.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-55979991522142125782015-09-28T16:36:00.000-06:002015-09-28T16:36:13.466-06:00The Kouhoku Castle<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">So, I got transferred again for the last six weeks. This makes ten</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">areas and fifteen companions over the course of my mission. My last</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">companion is Elder Ikeda, a native of the Kansai area. I've been in</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">the same zone or district as him for more than half of his mission, so</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">we knew each other fairly well already. He was a railroad worker for</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">seven years before his mission (doing electrical work for the electric</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">trains, I think).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">The area is called Kouhoku. The ward building (which happens to also</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">be the stake center) is shared with the Kanagawa ward, and because the</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">number of missionaries in the mission has gone down, the Kouhoku and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">Kanagawa areas are now the same district. Up until yesterday I'd been</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">going to church at 10 am</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"> every single week, but Kouhoku Ward meets at</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">1:30 pm. It makes for a somewhat different Sunday </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">experience. :P</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">The missionary "apartment" in this area is actually a two-story rental</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">house on the edge of a sizable cliff. It was opened last year while I</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">was working in the mission headquarters, so I got to see it between</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">the furniture getting put in and the missionaries moving into it. I</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">moved into it myself last week, and when I got there the owner was</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">around back looking for leaky pipes with a jackhammer. Turns out that</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">it's a much older house than I realized.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-27957989524188870822015-09-14T10:01:00.003-06:002015-09-14T10:01:44.739-06:00We went Christmas Caroling<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">The elder's quorum in our ward planned this "Super Home Teaching"</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">event, which originally was going to be a thing where everyone went</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">out and visited less active members. We had four elders from the</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">quorum and four missionary elders (including myself) show up, and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">somehow it was decided that what we were going to do was go all</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">together and visit three not-less-active households and sing to them.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">The first one was a new member who was baptized last week. When we</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">piled out of the two cars and were next to his apartment building</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">discussing what song to sing, someone suggested a Christmas song and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">the elder's quorum president was like, "That sounds good! Let's do</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">it!" and so we went up and rang his doorbell and sang Angels We Have</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">Heard On High as soon as he came out. XD</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">The next family got to their apartment complex at the same time we</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">did, so we didn't get to ring their doorbell. They invited us in,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">though, and we ended up singing Joy to the World and Ye Elders of</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">Israel. The family was quite entertained. :P We just sang Ye Elders</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">of Israel at the third house.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">I get my last transfer assignment this Saturday</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">. My current companion</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">and I are going home on the same plane come November, so if they keep</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">us together for this last transfer then they'll have to whitewash the</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">area the next transfer, and that probably wouldn't be very good. So</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">we're pretty sure one of us is going to transfer.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">We got a pretty good earthquake the other day. It happened early in</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">the morning and woke us all up. It doesn't seem like it damaged</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">anything, but afterwards all the trains were running late that</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">morning.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">These pictures are from the JMA website (</span><a href="http://www.jma.go.jp/" rel="noreferrer" style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" target="_blank">http://www.jma.go.jp</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">). If</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">you look up Yokohama in Google Maps you'll see roughly were I am.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"><br /></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-55434269599651520112015-08-17T20:32:00.004-06:002015-08-17T20:32:51.261-06:00Castle on a Mountain<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">
The Kamioooka (上大岡) area is full of hills and hills and gigantic hills. (That's why it has three of the letter <i>o</i> in its name.) There are some flat parts, but other than that it's all hills. We live in a really nice (and very visible) apartment complex on top of a really, really big hill. It's basically a castle on a mountain. This area is also very densely populated. Any square meter that's not a park is covered in buildings. </div>
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<br />They had the Bon festival last weekend. I wish I payed more attention to what it was about (it has something to do with ancestors) but it was a good chance to talk to people. Apparently there are going to be a lot more festivals coming up here soon.</div>
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Lanterns floating down the river in the Bon Festival</div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">These two were going at this drum for hours... and then one of them </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">got on the stage and started dancing with these clappers. I talked to </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">one of the drummers afterwards (the one who's drumming in this video), </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">and he said he'd been doing it for eighteen years.</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-62739672256205100962015-08-10T09:47:00.002-06:002015-08-10T09:47:05.463-06:00ClosingI'm being transferred to Kamioooka! My new companion will be Elder<br />
Kennedy. He was in my MTC district.<br />
<br />
Another reason I felt weird last week is that I had a pretty good<br />
image of what life after my mission will look like, but I had no idea<br />
what the last three months would be like. I was pretty sure I'd be<br />
transferring, but I really had no idea where I'd be or who I'd be<br />
with, no idea what the ward would be like or who I'd be teaching or<br />
what kind of finding we'd be doing. It was a big, black void in my<br />
forecast of the future. That kind of uncertainty hasn't ever bothered<br />
me before, though. Oh well. At least I have half of that filled in<br />
now. :P<br />
<br />
We saw Elder Cluff off at the train station this morning. He'll be<br />
well on his way across the Pacific Ocean by the time we go to sleep<br />
<span class="aBn" data-term="goog_717986035" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ">tonight</span></span>. In the meantime, I've been attached to another companionship<br />
because transfer day isn't until <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_717986036" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ">Thursday</span></span>. My companionship is<br />
closing this week (there are going to be four elders in this area from<br />
now on, instead of six), so I'll be making sure that my investigators<br />
are set up with the other elders.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-24398738397470461022015-08-04T11:05:00.002-06:002015-08-04T11:05:32.544-06:00I don't know what time is anymoreThis is Elder Cluff's last week in the mission field. We've got a<br />
busy week set up, too, between lessons with investigators, and members<br />
who want to have us over for dinner before he goes. I just hope we<br />
have time for him to pack before he has to go.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, I've been having weird feelings. I feel like I'm<br />
almost done with my mission, but at the same time I know all too well<br />
that an awful lot can still happen in the three months I have left.<br />
(For example, I could go through two new areas and two new companions<br />
(assuming no emergency transfers) and it wouldn't be surprising given<br />
how it's been for me so far.) I also have a nagging feeling in my gut<br />
that I haven't accomplished enough yet and that I need to make the<br />
most of what I've got left. And at the same time I feel like my<br />
mission so far has been a success...<br />
<br />
It's going to be an interesting three months~Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-8146739095175159442015-07-14T12:50:00.000-06:002015-07-14T12:50:13.903-06:00Summer Heat<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Elder Cluff has been calling up all the people he knew when he was in</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the area last year, and we've been able to start meeting with quite a</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">few of them again. He was here in Sagamihara quite a bit longer than</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">I was, so he had more and better connections. Incidentally, Elder</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Cluff is known as one of the biggest goofballs in the mission. He can</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">make people laugh. We've been having a lot of fun. ^__^</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">It's been raining for the past couple weeks, but over this weekend</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">it's all cleared up and the sun's been out in all its glory. It's</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">humid. And hot. Even the wind is hot. I feel like I'm swimming</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">through the atmosphere. The sun reflects off the sweat on the back of</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">my hands. I want the rain back. :P I'm glad I was working in the</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">mission office last summer (air conditioning <3).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">We got news (from a member of our bishopric, who saw it on Facebook)</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">that they have Meet the Mormons translated into Japanese and they're</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">going to send a copy to each ward. That's really exciting. :3 We've</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">already been using it in the mission, setting up movie nights and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">providing our own interpretation. It's going to be a lot easier to do</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">that once these new copies show up.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">I saw this at the supermarket across the street, and I knew someone</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">was going to want to see a picture of it.</span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"></span><br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-60195265671841765262015-06-30T09:12:00.001-06:002015-06-30T17:29:32.811-06:00Green Mountains<div>
They changed the transfer schedule again. We're still getting transfer announcements <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_814655452" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ">on Saturday</span></span> but transfer day is <span class="aBn" data-term="goog_814655453" tabindex="0"><span class="aQJ">Thursday</span></span>
again (instead of Monday, which apparently caused some problems when
they tried it lat time :P). My companion is transferring out this week,
and my new companion will be Elder Cluff. This is going to be his last
transfer, and he's coming back to his first area. I've been charged
with making sure he doesn't get "trunky". </div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
We
went up to the furthermost corner of our area last week (a place called
Tsukui), and I realized that I'm relatively comfortable with Japanese <i>city</i> culture, but I'm a bit more clueless when it comes to <i>country</i> culture. o.0 Fortunately the country people are a lot more laid back, so it's not as bad to mess up.<br />
<br />
<br />
Tsukui<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">This is the most bizzare No Soliciting sign I've ever seen. (It says </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">something more like "we refuse all soliciting", which is normal in </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Japanese, but that cat...)</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-40936298024317272402015-06-22T12:35:00.000-06:002015-06-22T12:35:54.573-06:00InterpretationFor all the zone meetings and mission conferences and what not in our<br />
mission, it's done in English with someone interpreting it<br />
simultaneously into Japanese for the native missionaries. The mission<br />
office has a set of interpreter devices (radio receivers with<br />
earphones for the listeners, and a transmitter with a microphone for<br />
the interpreter), and for most meetings the interpretation is done by<br />
older missionaries (or missionaries who happen to be at least fairly<br />
fluent in both languages). When a General Authority comes, usually<br />
interpretation is done by a member who does interpretation<br />
professionally.<br />
<br />
(By the way, "translation" is for written language, and<br />
"interpretation" is for spoken language.)<br />
<br />
I got invited to an interpreters' training last week, and it was a<br />
really good experience. A lot of the principles we talked about apply<br />
to missionary work and to life in general.<br />
<br />
Japanese and English are some of the hardest languages to interpret<br />
into each other. In order to get the meaning across with our<br />
abilities without falling too far behind, we usually have to simplify<br />
and sometimes reduce to the most important parts of each sentence. We<br />
just have to remember (and this is one of the principles I really<br />
liked) that they'd rather get 40% or 50% than 0%, so we just work to<br />
get that percentage as high as possible and let the rest go. It's<br />
like that in missionary work or the rest of life; there's a lot of<br />
things we just can't get perfect, but when it has to be done, 70% or<br />
50% or 30% is better than 0%.<br />
<br />
Some other principles were things like understanding the speaker's<br />
feelings and what not, and imagining how what you're saying sounds<br />
from the listener's perspective. Brother Wessman (who was giving the<br />
training) said that changing complex sentences to simple ones is the<br />
same skill as tailoring the message of the Gospel to people who aren't<br />
familiar with it already.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-54502625770573838082015-06-16T12:37:00.000-06:002015-06-27T06:44:04.349-06:00Meat and Vegetables<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">I got word the other day that my brother got called to the Little Rock</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Arkansas mission~! He reports to the MTC on September 9</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">, so he's</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">going to be in the field about a month before I get back home. I'm</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">excited for him. ^__^</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">We had a ward BBQ last Saturday. In Japan they don't really do</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">hamburgers and hot dogs, but they had all other kinds of meat. It was</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">pretty good. They had potatoes too, but those all got eaten before I</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">got to them. We got to bring along some investigators and students</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">from English class, and they all had a good time, too. :3 It was</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">kinda cool because I was here for last year's ward BBQ, too. Last</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">year they did it down by the river, but this year it was up at a</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">campsite place up in the woods.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">We found this out in the farm country. Basically, you drive through</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">and buy things from machines. They had food, drinks, and other really</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">random stuff.</span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"></span>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-47158336292622517532015-06-08T08:10:00.001-06:002015-06-08T08:10:49.959-06:00Persecution :P<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">So, last night, my companion and I parked our bikes in the parking lot</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">of an apartment complex and walked down towards the end of the parking</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">lot, getting ready to knock on some doors, even though we suspected</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">that most of the complex was uninhabited. Then we got an email to our</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">phone, so we stopped to check it. There was a big guy in a red</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">tank-top behind us walking in the same direction, and I was getting</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the feeling that he might be some trouble (not particularly dangerous,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">but troublesome.) While we were looking at the phone, this guy came</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">up to us and asked us what we were doing, and then he yelled at us to</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">GET OUT. And my companion asked him "why?" and the guy just started</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">yelling and ranting. So I'm like, yeah OK I get it, and I just turned</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">and started walking out. (The guy, in his rant, did mention that</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">nobody lived there, which more or less confirmed our suspicions.) My</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">companion said afterwards that he was really tempted to just start</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">yelling back in English, but he turned and followed me. I started</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">pulling out my keys to unlock my bike, but the guy started following</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">us and yelling louder, so I just picked up my bike and walked out. I</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">didn't pay much attention to what the guy was saying; it was mostly</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">along the lines of "hurry up" but he did rant something about</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">religion. After we were out of the parking lot and on our bikes again</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">we just picked a different block to work on.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Interestingly enough, that's the only time on my mission (19 months so</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">far!) that I've been yelled at like that. I hear missionaries in</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">other places have to put up with that kind of thing a lot more often.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Japanese people are really nice.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> "And blessed are all they who are persecuted for my name's sake,</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> And blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute, and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake;</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> For ye shall have great joy and be exceedingly glad, for great shall</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">be your reward in heaven; for so persecuted they the prophets who were</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">before you." 3 Nephi 12:10-12</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Just before that we had visited a really cheerful elderly fellow who</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">was very happy that we stopped by, and on the way back into our</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">apartment we passed another guy who greeted us with a smile and a</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">"good night!" It's interesting to see the variety of attitudes in the</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">world (all in the same city, too).</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-15962842064849725032015-06-06T08:44:00.002-06:002015-06-06T08:44:51.226-06:00Is This Real Life?<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">There's a religion (?) that started in Japan, and in English it's called Happy Science. (In Japanese it's 幸福の科学 </span><i style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">kōfuku no kagaku</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">, which means the science of happiness, well-being, and abundant life. I'm pretty sure it was the Japanese founder himself who came up with the English title, but I'm not sure.) We pass the local Happy Science building every time we leave our apartment, but last week was the first time I ever met a Happy Science member. It so happens that he's the oldest Happy Science member in our area. And he was a pretty happy guy. xD We gave him a copy of the Book of Mormon. Apparently, as part of their philosophy, they take all the best teachings from all the different religions in the world and put them together. </span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-20391802888471324322015-05-19T11:27:00.002-06:002015-05-19T11:27:05.955-06:00Back to the Countryside<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">I've been transferred back to Sagamihara! I was here exactly a year</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">ago. I even got the same desk in the same apartment as last year, and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the same side of the same closet. I'm sleeping in the next bed over</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">from the one I slept in last year, though. :P I'm looking forward to</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">seeing the members again on Sunday</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">. It's going to be interesting</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">serving in the same area with completely different missionaries. And</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">it'll be really nice now that my Japanese is a lot better than it used</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">to be. :3</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-9874520166930707142015-05-11T10:27:00.000-06:002015-05-11T10:30:49.699-06:00Birthday, Mother's Day, Transfer Day<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">We finally did my birthday cake the other night. Only about 50 days</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">late. :P It was a two-layer cake with the bottom layer made from</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">cookie dough, and it was all cooked in the rice cooker. It was kind</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">of a crazy venture and it turned out looking bizarre, but it was</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">delicious anyway. :3</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Today I talked with my family via Skype for the last time before</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">coming home. My family video-called some of my other relatives during</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the call, so I said hi to my grandparents and a couple of my aunts</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">through my iPad through the Internet through my laptop through a</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">smartphone through the Internet through their computer...it was kinda</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">cool :P My next oldest brother will most likely be out on his mission</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">by the time I get back, so I'm expecting that the next time I'll see</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">him is over Skype this Christmas.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">We got word last week that they've altered the transfer schedule.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Instead of getting our transfer announcements on Monday next week</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> and</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">transferring the following Thursday,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> we're getting the announcements</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">this Saturday and transferring on Monday</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">. o.0</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">The top layer was made like a normal cake. The bottom layer was made</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">from cookie dough. It's half cake, half cookie cake. And buttercream</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">frosting.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Elder Wallace made it for us. :3</span><br />
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Exactly 50 days late, if I'm calculating correctly...</div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Screenshot from today's Skype call. This is the last time I call my</span></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">family before I actually go home in six months~~~</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-36627984312104137592015-05-06T08:46:00.003-06:002015-05-06T08:46:36.018-06:00Open House<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">May 3-5th in Japan is a string of three different holidays right in a</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">row. Because of that they call this week "Golden Week" and have</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">festivals all over the place. We saw a Pokémon festival going on up</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">by Landmark Tower today, and there was a J-pop culture festival going</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">on in one of the parks the other day.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">For Golden Week, Yamate Ward turns the church into a temporary</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">visitor's center and opens it up for tours. There were displays set</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">up for family history, temples, the Book of Mormon, and the history of</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the Church in Japan, and a room with lemonade and cookies and movies</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">playing, and organ music playing in the chapel. They had missionaries</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">and members come from all over the stake to help give tours, to stand</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">out in front of the church to direct people inside, and to go out into</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the parks and hand out fliers to the crowds of people. That was my</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Monday and Tuesday</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">. Our P-day got pushed to Wednesday</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"> as a result.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-19515956001838433212015-05-03T15:48:00.001-06:002015-05-03T15:48:56.466-06:00Young people, old people<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">This past week we've met with a few different 60-ish-year-old men. One of them is trying to get us into the Chinese medicine business (he says that it'll help us raise money for our missionary work), and another is a retired English professor who's trying to get us to study Jewish history and academic theology (he thinks that'll make us more qualified for our missionary work). They're really quite passionate about their respective fields, and they have good intentions, but they talk so much and listen so little that we haven't been able to explain to them that our missionary program doesn't work that way!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">It's got me thinking about how the missionary program of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints does work, though. Young men get sent out on full-time missions for <i>only</i> two years, and they have to be younger than 25 years old or they're not allowed to go. This by itself means that from an academic perspective, the elders will never be as educated as our professor friend. We're not required to have the same kind of training that some other churches require of their ministers, either. The Book of Mormon says "they shall teach with their learning, and deny the Holy Ghost, which giveth utterance" (2 Nephi 28:4). We have to rely on the Holy Ghost to make it work, and it does work! And then, once the two years are up, we go home, go back to school, and usually pursue majors and careers that aren't religious! We become engineers, doctors, lawyers, programmers, entrepreneurs, and so on. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">From a worldly perspective, it's a really weird way to run a missionary program, eh?</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-55409915012058953802015-04-13T09:57:00.000-06:002015-04-13T09:57:07.687-06:00April Rain<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">This past weekend was Japan's weekend for General Conference. An </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">American family in our ward invited us over for the first two sessions </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Saturday, and they got pizza from Costco in between the sessions. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">:3 And then we went to our ward building for each of the other </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">sessions. It was the first time they'd shown it at the local ward </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">building (before that, everyone had to go to the stake center in </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Hakuraku). Only a handful of people showed up, though. Apparently </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">most of the other members either watched it at home or went up to the </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">stake center anyway to see their friends from across the stake. It </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">was the quietest General Conference weekend I've seen here.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">It's been raining a lot lately. The cherry blossoms didn't last very </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">long this year... maybe because of the rain. But we definitely </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">enjoyed them while they lasted. ^__^</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">I got invited to a district leader training conference this week. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">This might mean I'm going to get assigned to be a district leader. Or </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">it might mean nothing at all. :P I honestly don't think I care </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">either way.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-92125558859665958762015-04-01T08:33:00.000-06:002015-04-01T08:33:01.313-06:00Pictures<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">This guy is totally juggling fire. This actually happens all the time </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">in this area~</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">The sakura (cherry blossoms) are out again~</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-56156920482928002452015-03-23T08:05:00.003-06:002015-03-23T08:05:54.361-06:00One Does Not Simply Rice-Cook Cookies<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">So, there's this setting on our rice cooker that we thought said</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">"cookies", and we wanted cookies, so our fearless district leader</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">mixed up cookie dough and put it in, and then he was like, "Oh, that</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">says 'cake', not 'cookie'." And then he pushed start. We didn't</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">exactly get cookies out of it, but it was really good. :3</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-34547446758739987272015-03-23T08:04:00.001-06:002015-03-23T08:08:43.771-06:00Mission Reset<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">We had our combined mission conference with Elder Russell M. Nelson</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">last Wednesday. It was for the next phase in testing technology for</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">missionaries. Elder Evans (the member of the Seventy who's in charge</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">of the missionary department) was with him. He said that when they</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">were coming up with the title for the conference, they figures they</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">couldn't just call it "Mobile Device Training" because Elder Nelson</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">wouldn't like that. So they came up with the title "Missionary Work</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">in the Digital Age" and took that to Elder Nelson, and he in effect</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">said, "If that's what you're doing, I'm not going." They ended up</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">settling on the title "Disciples of the Lord in the Digital Age". The</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">reason for that is, it's not just about doing missionary work more</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">effectively; they want to help us develop good technology habits now</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">so that we'll have them for the rest of our lives. That was more of</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the focus of the conference.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">As far as the test goes, the Tokyo Mission and the Tokyo South Mission</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">were given test iPads last year, and then a few months later we</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">started using Facebook. Now they're rolling iPads out to the rest of</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Japan, and they're doing a "reset" on the Tokyo missions and giving us</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the same training that they're giving to the rest of the missions.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Half the mission (including me) traded in the test iPads (white 16GB</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">iPad Mini) for new ones (black 32GB iPad Mini 2), and the other half</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">is trading theirs in at another event this week. The training is</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">going to be in three phases: teaching & learning, planning &</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">record-keeping, and social media. To start with, the other missions</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">are just getting the apps that help with study and teaching (they're</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">still using paper planners). We still have the Area Book Planner app</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">(because otherwise we'd lose the records and reporting mechanisms</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">we've been relying on for the past year), but they disabled Facebook</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">for now. We heard we'll probably get it back around May, but that's</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">not for certain yet. The Quorum of the Twelve is overseeing the</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">training schedule.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Also, apparently the Church decided that only missionaries in Canada</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">and the United States will be paying for their iPads, and they have</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">the option of taking the iPads home with them. Other missionaries get</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">to use them for free and they don't get to take them home.</span><br />
<br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Aside from that, we got some new apps in the past few weeks. They</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">made Quizlet (a flash cards app) available to us the other week, so we</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">can use that in studying Japanese. It's actually really nice. The</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Church is also developing a pamphlets app. It has interactive</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">pamphlets for all the missionary lessons. :D It's up on the App</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Store already (under the title "LDS Pamphlets"). I don't know if it's</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">up on Google Play or not. They've only got them in English currently,</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">but they're working on Japanese.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">On a lighter note, I found this funny sentence in my dictionary:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span></span>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2JoEgSrAPl0uz7tT9JLF908lnc-jvX-nb80aEOIOdU8TC4xCx0AvUWcNm4r6nWEwKNjJ6bK1lVOM7oh57y5hyAxzFCCyMIJlGBvSlVUWksMq6CsaZ67pG81f8rQSBTrHilXsiUq66Bqs/s1600/image1.PNG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2JoEgSrAPl0uz7tT9JLF908lnc-jvX-nb80aEOIOdU8TC4xCx0AvUWcNm4r6nWEwKNjJ6bK1lVOM7oh57y5hyAxzFCCyMIJlGBvSlVUWksMq6CsaZ67pG81f8rQSBTrHilXsiUq66Bqs/s1600/image1.PNG" height="480" width="640" /></a></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-69742947242378850882015-03-16T12:42:00.001-06:002015-03-16T12:42:21.283-06:00Old Friends<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Last week, in an area on the other end of the mission, an investigator</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">that Elder Strain (my companion) once taught asked for Elder Strain to</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">perform her baptism. So yesterday, we went to the other end of the</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">mission! Fortunately our mission is geographically very small. It</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">took about two hours by train. It was a very joyful baptismal</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">service, and while we were there we talked to one of her friends and</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">helped her understand what was going on. Her friend is really</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">interested. It was a great experience overall ^__^</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">This week, we have a conference with Elder Russell M. Nelson about</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">digital missionary work on Wednesday</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">, and then we all get new iPads on</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Friday. (We're handing in the "test" iPads and getting the "official"</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">ones, which are a later model.)</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Here are some pictures of my area~ It goes all the way out past Landmark Tower, which is about a 45-60 minute walk from the apartment.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;"><br /></span>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">There's a lot of history in our area. We came across this memorial one day as we were exploring.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">Also, you know how some people, when giving a presentation, toss candy to people who answer their questions? Our mental health advisor gave us onions instead. o.0</span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">"Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak: for your work shall be rewarded." </span></span><br />
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">--2 Chronicles 15:7</span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6257142479689074991.post-84444109773134095972015-03-04T12:42:00.001-07:002015-03-04T12:42:39.713-07:00Deviating from the Order of the Universe<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8000001907349px;">
Sorry for not writing in so long!</div>
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I threw all my long-sleeved white shirts into the wash this morning, and then they weren't done when it was time to go out, and we're not allowed to just wear short sleeves in public during the winter season (it's a rule of Japanese business attire or something), so today I'm wearing a suit jacket over top of a short-sleeved shirt. It feels weird. Hence, the title of this post--it describes my feelings today. I don't plan on doing this again. o.0</div>
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This past transfer has been rather slow. Because of that, I've had more time to reflect on the past and future. I learned a lot, seeing patterns I hadn't seen before. It's one thing to know God loves you, and another thing to <i>feel</i> that love, and yet another to grasp the deep and apparently subtle implications of that love as it connects with God's wisdom and foresight. I feel like it was really good for me, but towards the end of this six-week period I've been feeling like it's time for a change.</div>
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Yesterday was transfer-announcements day, but it was also the day Elder M. Russel Ballard decided to have a combined mission conference with the Tokyo and Tokyo South missions, so transfer calls became transfer emails this week. And we got the emails after the conference.</div>
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Elder Ballard was traveling with his wife and with President Rasband of the Seventy and Bishop Stevenson (the Presiding Bishop) and their wives. They all got to speak to us. It felt so good to hear Elder Ballard's voice at the beginning of the conference as he greeted us and announced who was going to speak in which order. </div>
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In the second half, when Elder Ballard gave his talk, he spoke about teaching people who don't have a Christian background. He said, "You have to be the best teachers we've ever produced." He said that part of the reason for that was because the world today is full of clutter (mobile devices, the Internet, so much information everywhere)--it's hard to get people to settle down for a minute. Another thing is, we have to make sure they understand clearly who God is before we can really move on to any of the other doctrines we teach, or it won't quite make sense to them.</div>
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The awesome thing, I thought, was that if we link what Elder Ballard said to 1 Nephi 3:7, we effectively have an apostolic promise that we can be the best teachers the Church has ever produced! But that, along with what Elder Ballard's companions said, made me realize that I really need to get on the ball, because I'm not getting <i>nearly</i> enough teaching practice right now.</div>
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Elder Ballard read Acts 3:1-11 to us, particularly drawing our attention to the phrase "fastening his eyes upon him" in verse 4. He used that as a theme for the rest of his talk. He told us we had to be able to teach any doctrine, at any time, in any circumstances, by the power of the Spirit, and he talked about "fastening our eyes" on individuals--making sure they understand what we've taught; making sure their needs are met.</div>
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Before he left, he shook hands with all the missionaries. ^__^ Then he directed the mission presidents to spend a bit of time with us, so President Wada and President Budge switched off sharing their thoughts and impressions. Then we went home and got our transfer emails!</div>
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I'm transferring to Yamate (山手), in Yokohama City. That's the area where the first LDS missionaries to Japan, including Alma O. Taylor and Elder Heber J. Grant, landed. It's where Elder Grant gave the dedicatory prayer for Japan. My new companion (who I'll be meeting on Thursday) will be Elder Strain.</div>
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I'm looking forward to it. ^_____^<br /><br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt;">
"Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak: <span style="font-size: 13pt;">for your work shall be rewarded." </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13pt;">--</span><span style="font-size: 13pt;">2 Chronicles 15:7</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0