Week 48

Hey  Parents!

 

First off, Mom I hope you had a TERRIFIC AWESOME Birthday!  Darn shame I couldn't be there to celebrate.

 

So I just thought that I would let you guys know how my week was.  This past week was incredibly awesome for me and Elder Shiozawa.  Recently we've been teaching a family by the name of Leulu.  They are a family of 4 from New Zealand.  They are actually Samoan but they lived in New Zealand.  They were found a few weeks ago by one of the members here and they came to church one Sunday.  They don't really speak Japanese at all so I did my best to translate for them during sacrament meeting.  Then we started doing weekly family home evening with them.  Now it's to the point where we've taught them quite a bit (lessons 1-3 and the WoW).  On Saturday we asked them to be baptized and their answer was YES!!  We set, as a goal, the 24th of September for them to be baptized and they agreed.  So now we're working with them to the extent that we're able (which usually turns out to be once a week) and they love us.  And we love them because they're such a terrific family and they're so much fun to be around.  They have a 9 month old girl and a 3 year old boy.  And they are both sooooo rambunctuous.  So things are going extremely well with them.

 

Then a little over a month ago while I was passing out flyers for our English class I met a woman named Sharmeen.  She is from Alabama and she's been teaching English in Japan for a little over 8 years now.  She started meeting with us because she wanted to understand why she felt so much positive energy from us.  We've taught her twice now and she really has been prepared to hear the Gospel at this time.  It's been soooooo cool to finally be teaching someone who wants to hear the message that we have to share and is willing to put forth the effort to see for themselvs whether or not this message is true. 

 

So until next time I hope you guys have a great week.  Give everyone my love.  Especially you two.  Thank you soo much! 

 

Elder Keith

キース長老 

Week 47

Heyyy!!

The countdown back to school has started already?!  Yikes.  Things go by sooooooo  dang fast.  Today may or may not be my 11 month mark.  Holy smokes.

The work is going really well.  We are teaching a guy from Iran, a family from New Zealand, and a woman from Alabama.  And they all speak English!  Heh heh.  Those are not our only investigators but they are some.  And it is soooo easy to teach in English.  xD  That's why they sent me to a Japanese mission haha.

I have not baptized anyone myself yet.  But since I've come on my mission there have been 3 people who have received baptism that I have taught.  2 of them I know I had a direct influence on.  It's so awesome to see people find the gospel and make choices that will bring them eternal happiness!

Interesting foods:  I eat raw egg all the time.  I have tried Goma dressing (sesame seed dressing).  Maguro (raw tuna on sushi). Ika (squid, raw on sushi). Natto (fermented soybeans).  And that's just a couple. xD  I do have bean paste with bread pretty frequently. It's really good.

I catch flies with choptsticks nowadays!  Well not really but a lot of times I actually prefer chopsticks to spoon, fork, and knife.  

My apartment is way cool.  It's 2 floors!  And the stairs are wicked steep.  And we're working on getting it clean.

Oh and before I go. I did have 1 well 2 requests actually.  The first one is could you find a picture of me from when I was in high school and had long hair?  And send it to me?  I would appreciate that.  And then I was wondering if you could express send me another packet of poutine sauce.  I was talking about it with one of our investigators and he really wants to try it.  And we've got 5 weeks left in the transfer and there's a good chance that I may not be here next time.  So if you could do that I would be most appreciative.  Thank you so much.  Love you and miss you guys!!

Elder Keith

キース長老

Week 46

Hey Mom and Dad!!

 

So basically Kofu has not gotten any cooler.  And we had transfer calls!!!!  Well everyone in the zone did.  Except for Kofu!!  That's right me and my current companion Elder Shiozawa who also happened to be in the same room as me in the MTC both survived transfers and we'll be in Kofu another 6 weeks.  And both of the sisters stayed too.  Me and a sister named sister Tanaka have been in kofu for 3 transfers xD.  And we were in the same district back when I was in Tama.  xD.    And President Albrecht was saying that there's a good chance that we'll be staying longer in our areas so after this transfer I may or may not be in Kofu.  4 transfers is pretty normal to be in an area.  And more than 2 transfers with the same companion is rare.  So after this transfer... well it's a wait and see for who goes and who stays because we'll almost certainly be split up.  But we're both certain that we're both gonna have some kind of responsibility next transfer.  Which leads to the next point.  I am no longer district leader.  I kinda thought that it was gonna be temporary anyways.  It was fun while it lasted.  I enjoyed calling people every night.  Yeah the responsibility was kinda enjoyable but it's gonna be nice to just to go back and be a regular missionary.  But while I was District Leader, we had the sisters, who were both japanese who spoke mostly only Japanese. Well one speaks pretty decent english and the other about 2 words.  So yeah.  But being honest there were only a couple times where I had a hard time getting my point across.  Because while japanese is still hard, it's very rare that I'm not able to say what I want.  And that may seem prideful but I feel like I've been doing really well.

 

I love the Japanese food.  It, for the most part, is way dang good.  I wonder about how I'm going to find all the stuff that I like after my mission.  What do I like most about Japan?  Well it's kinda hard to pick one thing.  One thing I do really like though is the train system that they have here.  It's so readily accessible, so widely used and, you can basically get anywhere you wanna go by train.  What do I like about serving a mission?  I love talking to people I love helping people and I love the change that I've seen in myself.  It's so much fun.  I honestly am having the best time of my life.  I miss you guys like crazy but I just love Japan and being a missionary so  dang much.  It's gonna be hard to come home xD. Thank you for all your support.  Say hi to anyone who asks about me.  Especially Brother Larson if you get the chance.  But I have places to go.  Souls to save.  So until next week I bid you 気をつけて下さい。 (take care).  Love and miss you.

 

Elder Keith

キース長老

Week 45

Heyyyy,,,

 

Thank you muchly for the whats up back in Canada.  xD  Davin's going on his mission.  As if.  That's sooo weird.  Yeah, the sisters in my doki hit their year mark last transfer.  It's wayyy weird.  Good thing I'm nowhere close to halfway, ha..ha..ha......(nervous laugh).

I'm glad you got my letter.  I just kinda figured that everyone in Hawkesbury was kinda waiting for a letter or something haha. 

 

Grandpa's gone to windsor?  ...  whoa...  the house must be totally different right?  ... weird haha. 

 

So yeah besides that, all's well here in Kofu.  We get transfer calls this Saturday.  Oh yeah and last week on Wednesday, we found out that our district leader was being transferred to the mission home because he's becoming the new commissarian.  And therefore they decided to make me district leader til the end of the transfer.  xD  ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.  Responsibility nooooooooooo.  But it's ok.  I kinda like it.  The only thing is that now I have to make calls to everyone in the distict every night so my personal journal writing time and such completely nakunarus (that means passed away).  In any case.  Yeah this transfer, we kinda expect someone to leave but it really could be just about anyone.  But yeah we've got places to go and people to see today so give everyone my love.  Thanks for your letters I really appreciate them.  =D

 

Elder Keith

キース長老

Week 44

Heyyy,

So this week has been really really busy for me.  It's funny you think that it would be because of the laptop and stuff but we hardly used it at all this week.  We had like no time at all.  Yeah don't worry Dad, I'll stay away from the games.  It's actually not even the slightest temptation for me.  Nor is doing anything else 'illegal'.  In fact I would have been perfectly fine had we not even had computers.  I means it's good in some ways and for a lot of people it will be really effective, but I was just kinda like 'mahhh whatever xD'. 

Yes I was able to go back to Tama and see Mai get baptized.  It was amazing.  It meant getting up at like 4:30 so we could get on a train at 5:30 (the earliest one) and just barely make it in time.  It was one of the best experiences in my mission. 

I've also sent you a letter addressed to the Hawkesbury branch and I was wondering if you could put it on the bulletin board.  That would be much appreciated.

AHHHH everybody is growing up sooo fast.  Ben and Ariana are going to the YSA ward?  That's weird!  And Thomas is apparently wicked tall now?  I'm guessing that Adam's probably over 6' now then. xD  I'm such a shorty hahahahaha. 

So actually I have something by way of request too.  There's a member in my ward right now who's planning on, at some point attending TOCAD (Toronto college of art and design) and so she's really interested in what Canada's like.  I was wondering if you could send me pictures of Canada, and/or Toronto and stuff.  That would be very much appreciated. 

It's funny to see how much a mission changes you.  Like before my mission, service projects were not fun and I felt less than over-enthusiastic about doing them.  Now I actively seek out ways to help the members of my ward.  Like the other day, we went and cut a lawn.  Before that we helped move furniture and then sort receipts.  And then for the first time in my mission (in a really long time actually) I kept little kids occupied.  (Background:  We have an evening Sacrament meeting for those members that work during the day and have no choice.)  So, we've been attending this and recently a less-active, that the sisters have been working with, has started coming and she's been bringing her 3 kids.  Then one of the others members brings her 2 kids.  And so afterward (the service is only about 30 mins) after we were done clean-up and everything, I went to give one of the kids a hi-five, and he ran away from me!  So then I proceeded to chase 4 young boys around and have them squealing and screaming and running away.  It was sooooo much fun.  I was sooo tuckered out by the end though.  I never knew that kids had that much energy.  I'm gonna need to start working out a lot more if I'm gonna ever think of having kids, who will almost certainly be rambunctious.  But yeah so my week went by fast.  And this next week too we have something almost every day.  And this transfer has only 2 weeks left and that makes me sad because my companion is terrific and we're working really hard but the possibility is very big that President will not keep us together next transfer.  We both think that we're gonna start getting younger missionaries as companions now xD.  Ahhh mission life.  I really do love it.  It's soo terrifically fun.  I really am having the time of my life.  Thanks for helping me get here!!  Love you both soooooo much!

Elder Keith

キース長老