Service and Seaweed in Ishinomaki

Hey family. Wow was last week a ridiculously busy week. Every day was jam packed with stuff. Started with Monday calling a bunch of people to get all our stuff in order for service. Tuesday visiting Broth Wako and going to the mission home. Wednesday Mission Leadership Council which was interesting. It used to be Zone Leader Council but as you may have heard the church made a new position in the missionary heirarchy. Sister Training Leader. So we now have sisters as leaders too. No one really knows what they actually do. For the time being president has just made up their role. Oh well. Then the next day was zone training meeting which was good. A lot more lively with U choro there. He is a very energetic person. Then Friday we went to Ishinomaki for service. That was a lot of fun because its been awhile since we have done service. It was a little different this time though. Instead of cleaning stuff up and such, we actually just worked their jobs. So I learned a lot more about seaweed then I ever cared to know and I never want to see it again in my life. Ha. Oh the stories to tell about those seaweed and the crazy things that happen to them. Then general conference which we were thankfully able to listen to in English. Then on the bus for service it was scary because we had the MC the whole time which president didn't want everyone to sleep so we planned a bunch of activities and such to do but yeah. Ended up talking to president for about an hour about the zone and he told me a lot of the upcoming transfers and gave me power to split a district when I felt it needed to be done and a lot of other unknown details we talked about. Kinda freaked me out to see how much he trusts us. In just this week its been ridiculous how much I have heard from him which I have known I can't tell people. But yeah. Ok so lastly mothers day calls. So this time we got permission to Skype which looks like it will work out with the church computer. So I need your skype details and we need to plan a time and all that jazz but yay for skype! So thats the details of that. Talk to you later. Love you bye.

Week of Miracles

So this week have been good. Just getting used to the new companion and such. He is like the complete opposite of O-choro. He's funny, he is way good at english. Lets see. This week there is like no time. Today P-day will be preparing for Friday which is service we are doing in Ishinomaki. Tuesday night we go to the mission home. Wednesday we have zone leader council, zone leader council activity, planning for zone training meeting, and eikaiwa (Yeah I kinda freaked out on O choro when he called to tell us that we would be doing all of that on that day) Thursday zone training meeting, a lesson, weekly planning, FHE. Friday service. Saturday General conference. Sunday General Conference. Sigh. Just getting tired typing it. Anyway. Wasn't all bad though. Below is what I wrote to president and I figured you would enjoy. So this week was full of miracles. I will tell you the two biggest. So as part of Bishop F's vision of missionary work in Kamisugi he wants us to visit members a ridiculous amount and even if they are not there leave a message. Also with Elder U just coming I felt like it was a good opportunity to introduce him to some of the members. So we went to the "H" familys home who the mom is never home because she is always busy but even meeting the kids would be good. Well by some miracle the mom was home. She told us that she had a friend over so I saw this going downhill quickly but after leaving for a second she came back and said that her friend told us to come inside and rest for a minute. Well we didnt want to hurt her feelings so we came inside and over a glass of mugicha were able to exchange pleasantries with her and from that that led to talking about how she went to Ishinomaki eikaiwa 20 years ago and heard some of the lessons which even "H"姉妹 was surprised about. Which then led to her talking about how she had had some worries about after a death recently. We explained that that was why we are here, to teach people about stuff like that. She said she was busy during April getting her kids in school and such but to please come teach her in May. "H"姉妹 offered to take us to her house and she told us her address and phone number before we had a chance to even ask. As we were leaving her friend added that she hoped her son (maybe 5 years old) would some day become a missionary. Then yesterday in sacrament meeting H姉妹 shared about that experience and about having always felt good about that friend but never knowing how to proceed with her and also about her never being home at that time but God knowing she was home at that time. How cool is that! The second miracle has to do with someone I may have mentioned before. "W"兄弟. He is one of the less actives that the ward council has picked to especially work with. And I learned that "T"兄弟 who is the one that actually picked his name has actually never even met him. But anyway as you may have already heard from the assistants we have been trying to look for someone from the time he got baptized because we thought that would help him and might be able to work through those memories to help him remember why he was baptized. So O-choro and I had joked about maybe N-choro would know him because he dendoed here a long time ago. So apparently O-choro just directly asked N-choro and not only did he know him he had taught him and done his baptism mensetsu. What are the odds? Luck? Not likely. Perfectly heaven sent guidance! We talked with I-kyodai about it at DCS. We probably wouldn't be working so much with W-kyodai if he wasn't on this list because from what I heard of his past visits they weren't anything special. But through him being on the list we have decided to put more time toward working towards him and we are seeing the results now. Still just a start and we need to work with Noonchester-choro from this point to find a time we can visit him. I'm excited though.

Tom and Jerry

So lets see what we can talk about today. So lets start with the most exciting parts of this week, today! Today was transfer calls . So this time it effects me. Elder O is going up to the honbu to be assistant, and I'm going to get a companion by the name of U-choro. He's a good guy, he was in my district last year and is probably a little more than a year into the mission. 8 people changing in the zone, 4 beans coming in. One set of missionaries "white-washing" (both will be new to the area) so lot happening in the zone. Other than that nothing too much exciting about transfers, kinda dont know whats going to happen to me after this transfer but as father loves to say, "theres going to be some changes around here" Two new district leaders will also cause this. Its going to be rough though honestly O-choro has been doing a lot of the work for the last 3 transfers. So lets see what else there is this week. This week was focused on lots of LAs(less active). Well at least thats where the majority of our success is. We were able to do a lesson with an LA that we havent been able to before. And our 20 year old that has hated the church his whole life made some progress this week. Maybe its the crazy person inside us that makes us want to work so hard for him but when someone tells you, "You will never become happy as a Mormon" it peaks your interest. So this week he took us to his house which was an important step. I feel like we were be friends in "real life" too. He's quite the nerd and the thing that got him to like us was doing riddles or mind exercises with him. Which brings me to my request. If anyone has simple but interesting puzzles like that send me an email and let me know, kinda how we get more appointments with him. But from there we talked about why we are here and how we think he's just misinformed so he thinks he will never be happy. O-choro went LA about the same time that he did and became active at about the age this guy is now so they were able to talk about that. Possibly the best LA lesson I have ever seen and I didnt do any of it. It always seems like doing the opposite of missionary things works the best. Complimenting a man's tattoos, telling an LA how much you hated church, lighting a man's cigarette. Very interesting. Also did super short splits with the assistants (2 hours) which basically consisted of one lesson and then chatting about the zone. It was interesting because it was E-choros previous investigator so led the discussion. The joint and I were just laughing the whole time. I think O-san put it best when at the end he explained the day's lesson as an episode of Tom and Jerry with E-choro as the cat and O-san as the mouse. I think it was really good for him though. We also visited with a referral that the assistants found and invited him to church. He is a Chinese guy and he knows very little Japanese. He just knows single words so that was way interesting but he came to church the next day because he sits down and then O-san comes later and as he sits down he is just eyeing K-san until I say, "Yes he's Chinese" and so he explained what was happening in church in Chinese to him. Its way interesting to talk to chinese people because when they dont understand you write it out and they can get the jist of it. Like we invited him to church but he couldnt figure out where we wanted him to go until we pulled off our name tag and pointed to the part that says church. So thats basically it for the week. Talk to you all later.

Nice to go "home" to Furukawa

Hey family! Whats up? So lets report on another week! So we started off the week with heading to Furukawa which I was way excited for. I felt like a little kid looking out the window of the train as it came into sight. We had some extra time that night so we tried to visit an old investigator too but didn't work out cause they weren't home. It was a new experience for sure. Biking down the road and knowing exactly where to go and who we were visiting and such. Also some sweet vindication visiting some of these people that I tried so hard to get lessons with and coming back a year later to tell them they couldn't escape! Also visited to members which was way cool and definitely makes you feel loved when they see you and they just freak out with excitement. Apparently I was loved back there. Although I didn't get a chance to meet "T"-shimai (The baptism right after I left). But it was fun. The visiting authority was an adventure. Was a lot more running around than with the presiding bishop because there were a lot more moving parts; none of the least of which was making sure we were going to have lunch prepared by the relief society. But it was a good meeting. He is orginally a Korean guy so that was too bad but its a lot different having your area president come visit because he knows a lot more about us and what we go through so that was cool. Actually one of the better feelings I had about a general authority coming. The highlight because it was just hilarious and none of the Japanese elders understood it because it was in fast crazy English but we had a question and answer portion and so one of the elders wanted him to explain the vision of Eikaiwa since the area presidency changed it. So he goes through on how it hasn't really changed which was weird because it has. Then president, trying to help, adds. "I think what he is asking is since we don't share a spiritual message and don't pray..." to which he gets cut off "NO! We pray! We are a church and we will pray if you use our building."Ha. It became quite the thing. But anyway, it all ended well. This next transfer is ridiculous with missionaries coming. The onslaught of sister comes about June. So yeah So have a good week. Talk to you later.

Excited for Splits in Furukawa

Hey family. What up? So busy week this week......well kinda. Lets see. I felt like there was a lot I left out of last weeks email but I cant really remember what. We had a baptism here this last Saturday. "N". He's from Canada and is fluent in French, English, and basically fluent in Japanese. Been in Japan for 6 years and makes apps for a living(Hence I never talk with him because I know I couldn't focus at that point). But it went well. Lots of people came to the baptism including "S"-san the self-referral from around Christmas that we passed to Izumi. It was nice to see him and he seems to be doing well with going to church and all that jazz. Also was interesting because they said the baptism prayer and he was confirmed in English which I'm not sure they ever got permission except from me. Ha. But it was for Nicolas more than it is for the members so I was all for it. He gets the priesthood next week. Ok so mother you can't get mad at this comment but it made me laugh because it shocked me at the bluntness. So after the baptism president came to watch and he walks up to me and says, "....Elder Carter.....come by the honbu someday and we can get you some new white shirts......this one has seen better days." Ha. Now don't be sending me white shirts mother! There are about a billion and a half cheaper and better ways to get them here but it was way funny. It got better because I think he felt guilty after for saying it because he kept coming up to me after and saying things like, "Its just cause you are working so hard in it." "You're strong, you know I don't have anything against you" etc. I didn't really care. I told him I would take them to get dry cleaned and he seemed to agree that that would probably be good enough. Good stuff. Then this week we have the Ringwood choro conference. Elder Ringwood is our Area president so we are pretty excited about it. Its not a mission conference but still. Half the mission will come to our meeting. Its going to end up being a lot of prep by us but oh well. The poor Relief society is making 70 meals. What else. Tonight we are going to Furukawa for splits tomorrow. I'm way excited to work there again. I may just plan it myself. I think N choro is excited too because its always fun to work with someone that has been in the area before because they have a lot of crazy ties and can work with members but also are only there for a day so they can be bold. Yep, way excited. Other than that not a whole lot going on. As for my language skills being "as like it is my native language" I'm basically convinced that the fulfillment of that prophesy is that I just won't be able to speak English either. Still not good at this language. Abby knows the word "place" thats impressive. Baby A bosses the dog around, just a matter of time. Hope you all have a good week.

"Losting"

Hello family. I feel like this week was a busy week so lets see if I can find stuff to write about. Ok so I totally forgot to tell you about Bishop D. Well there is not a whole lot to talk about but yeah. He gave a nice little talk on temples and prophets at the member meeting. The poor AP got roped into translating the Japanese into English for the Americans there. Then the missionary meeting was nice. The bulk of the talking was by president and he didn't even talk that long. Elder Y and Bishop D didn't even talk. They just walked up together and said, "Lets do question and answer". Then lets see. Tuesday was our zone leader council activity the day before the actual zone leader council which occurred to me is actually not a church thing. So they have been trying to have us avoid the simple robotic things so we have done LA stuff, straight training, riding a subway, etc. So this time it was something called "Losting" which I would like to point out I invented. Basically the idea was that they would drive us around the city then at random places tell us to get out and then we have to get home by talking to people. Anyway so they start dividing everyone up for the splits of the activity and everyone gets matched up and I don't have a partner.....strange. Then the assistant looks at me and says,"And Elder Carter with be with President" ha ha ha. Funny. Except he was serious. Like I want to do splits with president!? Ha. So we drop everyone off and then we head out from the church as he is leaning over and saying stuff like, "I'm going to do nothing" "I'm just a junior companion" etc. This doesn't help. Just adds to the stress. So we walk down the street and I think, "Well might as well say 'Good evening' to everyone" so I start to do that and thats still not getting me anywhere then I see a lady walking two little pugs. Well I can work with that. So they try to attack me which is perfect. I call them cute and what lady can resist you when you compliment her dogs so I pet them and ask her where she is walking to and she answers with "You are people from that church over there" "Yep" "My friend is an alcoholic and I told him to go there(Side note she used a very condescending way of saying 'go' which I thought was funny when I learned this friend was not related to her and was like 50)" "Oh really? Did he?" "No" --insert more talking-- "Well can we meet your friend sometime?" "Sure....what are you doing right now?" "....going with you to your friends house." So we did. Met the man. He just restarted his life by moving across japan and started living with this lady (I think its some kinda boarding house thing because she lives with a lot of non-related people) anyway. We were in the middle of praying with them when another man walks in. Score! Anther investigator....not. Even president gave up on him as he started cursing us for being part of a religion that has a commandment against what we eat or drink. So near the end she tells president "Tell him he has to go to church (again condescending)" "I think better that 'Go!' is 'Come with me to church?' (this conversation makes so much more sense in Japanese)" So she agreed to it. Then president looks at me and says, "And elder carter will come here on Sunday and take you to church" Ha. So we did. Didn't go to my own ward but went with them to church which was cool. Anyway. Long right! So therefore I don't have time to write much more so you will get more next week. I think. This next week doesn't have a whole lot of events. Talk to you next week.

Lost in Kamisugi

Hm lets see what we have done this week. So this week we had two splits which are always half fun and half stressful. So Tuesday I did splits with a new district leader which is always a stressful position. We tried a few new things to see if we could get a new way to find investigators but for the most part it didn't quite work. I didn't want to give up too fast so we went to a different library to try and give a Book of Mormon but again it didn't work but this time we at least got them to consider changing the old version of the Book of Mormon for the new Book of Mormon. (I learned the Book of Mormon has been translated like 7 times in Japanese this week). Also we were able to set up a dinner with an LA boy to come to the young mens presidents house with another youth boy. Worked out awesome and way grateful for how much the members helped. It really only took two phone calls and like 10 minutes to get it all set up. Then splits with H choro in Kamisugi which was fun but I have never been so lost in my life. But we had a lot of fun together. He's way funny and we have some things in common so that was fun to talk about. Also the wind was way crazy. Maybe the strongest of my mission. Other than that not a whole lot happened this week to be honest. We were able to meet with O-san once this week but that was on splits and I wasn't there and apparently O-choro tried to get him to change his schedule to be able to come to church next week and he yelled at O-choro. Really not a whole lot to say about this last week. Just meh. Ha. What else. This week is zone leader council so again a busy week. Then I'm probably going to be doing a baptism interview this week with a Canadian so that will be interesting.....and in English. So whatever. Well I hope you all have a magical week. Talk to you later.