Minutemen: Week 67 in Japan

Spring is Coming!

Alright so some fun happenings from the week. For starters I got stopped by police while going on splits in Hachioji. Police in Japan are so incredibly nice. They commented on our Japanese, asked about our day and then just checked that we had the right license stuff to be doing missionary work. All while smiling. They also walked away with a couple flyers and one of them may or may not be joining us at
Eikaiwa.

Elder Duke and Elder Casper have been in and out of health problems throughout the transfer and finally there was a day when they both went down so Elder Wayas and I went on splits and had a very busy weekend. We had to cut some studies and meal times short between going to and from appointments and then we ended up helping a member move in the middle of all of it. It was a good time.

We have a few Investigators who have been progressing wonderfully and 2 of them have started coming to church consistently. In fact one of them is chilling with me right now as I'm righting this, we hiked Mt. Takao with all the other missionaries in the Zone and he joined in. 

Also used to work at a Dango shop on the mountain and somehow invited his old boss to Eikaiwa. It's the same guy who went tracting with us and has invited a bunch of people to the Polynesian Night event that the mission set up. In the last lesson we had he brought another friend with him who is now also taking lessons. He's an animal.

I don't have a lot of time left but it's been an absolutely killer, busy week. The month of February has absolutely flown by, it's ridiculous. I've found the importance in Time Management and biking fast. But mainly time management. It's such a blessing to be given the time we have in this life and to use it the best we can to not only grow, but to help others do the same. Just happy to be here.

愛しています、
Elder Cuff

申し訳ありません Part 2: Week 66 in Japan

Had dance practice in Kichijoji today and I totally could've written emails on the train ride there and back, but I didn't. So here's some highlights and pictures.

- I rode a pink bike up and down a bunch of hills.
- We taught about The Restoration to this older guy who's a pro saxophone player. Then he took us out for Sukyaki. It was awesome. Oh, the sukiyaki was good too.
- A member made us a strawberry cream cake out of nowhere. The members
here are awesome.

- We went tracting with 2 non members who randomly showed up for a Stake Dendo activity. One of them was our investigator the other one was a random guy our investigator met that day and they decided to stop by the Hachioji church on their way to lunch when we were in a meeting. They knocked doors with us, and stayed for the testimony meeting afterwards, then we all ate butter cookies and drank corn soup. They loved it and really respect what we do as missionaries. Now his friend has also started taking lessons with the Elders in Hachioji. It was a
glorious afternoon.

- I translated again at Zone Conference. It's such an awesome service opportunity. Also I've found it's gotten a lot easier with time.
- Ive found I have a really bad addiction to Nizakana and Katsudon. Like it's bad.
- Pants don't really fit me in Japan.

Stay safe and love one another. Also go do something really hard. It's really satisfying when you do something hard.

愛しています、
Elder Cuff

申し訳ありません: Week 65 in Japan

Alright, I'm so sorry, but this week is gonna be kinda short and I don't have any pictures. Party foul on my part.

So basically we've been all over the place this past week, lots of appointments, lots of fun finding opportunities. Our man Yamaguchi is still nowhere to be found, but it did look like he made some effort in fixing his garage last time we dropped by. By some effort I mean he put up a couple wood planks that look like really sketchy support pillars. He didn't answer so we wrote out a note and left it on his door.

Hashimoto San is still getting a bit bumpy, we hit a big road block with him though. He works at a bar/restaurant which is really busy on weekends so he's not able to make it to church on Sundays anymore. Also he went on vacation to celebrate finishing testing so he hasn't been reading. But we're still cruising along.

We've started with some other people we had a chance to find this week including this one guy named Ookura. He loves art and jazz music, in fact he's amazing at the saxophone. He's actually a friend of some of the older members who live in the old person community where we do the bike taxi service and they introduced us to him. We're way stoked. He said he's always just felt some type of emptiness in his life and he thinks he's found the solution in learning of Christ. I'm sorry but that doesn't happen too regularly to me so that was a cool moment. We'll be hanging with him every Saturday.

As far as funny stories go, I don't really know if I have one this week. I mean there were a lot of laughs and joking around but there were all kind o "in the moment" type jokes so I honestly don't have

anything. Again, sorry for the dry email.

Love you all!

愛你們,
Elder Cuff

Pants are overrated! Week 64 in Japan

Alright transfers happened and... I'm staying in Takao! Everyone was surprised. Elder Call only got to be here for 1 transfer before getting sent out to Kawasaki. My new companion is Elder Duke, he's from Hawaii.

Alright so some updates from this past week. We haven't been able to make any contact with our buddy Yamaguchi San. His garage is still caved in but the man has suddenly gone completely off the radar. Last thing we heard from him is he just wanted to escape the world and has decided to go into hibernation. So this will be interesting.

We recently had some solid lessons with our man Hashimoto San. He's a college student studying international trade and economics. We had an awesome lesson last time around and he accepted the invitation to be baptized! We're pretty excited for him, he's been progressing like crazy. After the lesson we went out for lunch and he introduced us to this cheap donburi restaurant. Good time had by all.

There's a college up the street from our church with a rugby team. Some of the team members are from New Zealand and Australia and are here on scholarship and I've been able to stay in contact with them. They all have Christian backgrounds and really enjoy just hanging out, but aren't too big on actually keeping commitments and following through when they say they'll come to church. But just yesterday one of them calls me out of nowhere and said they had a new team member from Australia who's a church member. He showed up for church, and just got to Japan 3 weeks ago. We're hoping to be working with him in regards of the rugby team and I might be joining in on a few morning practices with them. Also he doesn't speak much Japanese (although he's pretty good for only 3 weeks) so I now get to translate church for the rest of the transfer. My brain is gonna be fried by the end of this. But hey, can't be too upset about another service opportunity.

Last thing is a fun story. Throughout my mission I've had multiple occasions where someone answers their door without any pants on, and at one point nothing on. They're usually really awkward and I'm still trying to figure out why this consistently happens, but this time was a bit different. So a guy answers the door and despite his uncomfortably tight undies we just continued to talk with him. Turns out he's Chinese and is studying abroad but speaks fluent Chinese, Japanese, a  thought God exists. He kind've stopped for a second, scratched the back of his barren thighs, and said he's never really thought about it before. We got to testify to him about a loving Heavenly Father and it was solid to see his attitude change. We
talked a bit more and now we're teaching a guy named Qing (pronounced Ching). We're really excited for him, also he offered to teach us some Mandarin. Despite being in Japan I've come to really love Chinese people while out here.

But all things are all good in the hood. Thanks everyone for the birthday wishes last week. The works been moving along and the food is still out of this world. Stay safe and party on.

愛を込めて、
Elder Cuff

Sorry I don't have any pictures from this week. But here's one from when we got ice cream about a month ago.