'Twas the Week Before Christmas: Week 57 in Japan

This past week was all over the place. I sang for 3 days in a row. I swear I can sing all four parts to every Christmas song found in the hymn book. Also lost my voice on Sunday it was really funny.

So for starters, I may or may not have bought a katana out of a small sketchy shop tucked up in the mountains. Luckily if you ship something by boat it's decently cheap. It just takes 3 months to get to The States. Hopefully it'll make it through customs.

I'm gonna name it!

We ran up a Mt. Takao on Saturday with Yokosawa Kyodai, he's a counselor in the bishopric. He's a crazy man. Im not sore but I wasn't prepared for the cold air and it left my lungs BURNING. Its all good though, he does it every Saturday morning so we may be joining him every once in a while, also gives me an excuse to run more in the mornings. I actually asked him what he does when he's not running up Mt. Takao. His response killed me, he looked at me, smiles, and said, "I just find a really steep hill and sprint up and down it until I get really tired." He's a wild man. Never a dull moment with him around. Also I'm stealing his workout.

I was dyin', man! He's way fast!

So last year around Christmas I was still in the Machida Stake and we had a huge crazy concert in Tama that had a big professional set up with speakers, amazing singers, and I skipped around the crowd while jingling bells. Well this year was no different. Literally did the exact same thing and as expected, it was amazing. We decided to round out the same evening I had a year ago by going to get ramen. You wanna talk about De Ja Vu, I'll tell you about De Ja Vu.

Another concert in Tama.

We spent a lot of time caroling this week, and despite being in 2 decently large concert groups my favorite was on Sunday after church. We got together with some families in the ward and went to a couple nursing homes and sang in a small, slightly out of key group. I love to see people smile. A lot of the people at the nursing homes could barely move, or even talk. But you can't ever stop someone from smiling when that Christmas Spirit is around. I love this time of year and what it means. I love that I have this belief in Christ and the peace it's provided in my life. And as satisfying as it is to have this direction in my life, it doesn't even come close to the satisfaction that comes from seeing someone else experience that peace and direction in their lives. What can I say except that I'm happy to be here.

メリークリスマス！
Elder Cuff