1st Regular week in a while, I'd say...

So this week was pretty good. This is a weird picture of us shaving...yeah. Last week we went to the tourists center in Tomakomai and the lady gave us a bunch of cool things to look at. It was interesting. There's not really much here in Tomakomai, but there is a bunch of cool stuff in the other citys around. The old Indians of Japan...called Ainu, have this little museum thing over in the next city. And apparently there is like a super crazy beautiful lake up north in the next city. So we got the shaft here in Tomakomai I guess...ohh well! But last week on Monday there was a pretty cool expirience. So me and Huefner choro were dendoing in a big apartment complex and we were on the bottom floor of the complex and as soon as we were done with one of the last doors, this guy comes in from outside and starts chewing us out...big time! He is like yelling at us and telling us that we shouldn't be trying to spread our religon and telling us that if we keep trying to dendo, the people in the apartments are going to get annoyed and call the police and he just went on and on and on...but I have no idea what happened, but within the next 15 minutes of us talking to him and him yelling at us...it ended up that he was cool with what we were doing and as he went up the elevator he was telling us to keep up the good work! How cool is that? What a miracle! He went from totally angry to way cool with everything. Didn't care to listen to our message, but he wasn't fuming anymore. That my friends is totally the Spirit, and the power and authority of a missionary. Our calling is from God.

Tuesday...yeah, today wasn't as productive as it could've been. We had two lessons spoke on us, so during the time we could've been teaching, we talked with one of the couples in the branch and their conversion story and it was pretty cool. Sister Saito had been waiting pretty much her whole life for her husband to get baptized, and he finally did! Pretty cool story. The members in Japan have crazy conversion stories.

Wednesday...we had a lesson with our Sasaki-san. (We thought he was a golden...) But on Wednesday we set a Baptism Date with him and it was a good lesson. We also met with Endo-san. He is the brother of the former Branch President. Endo-san is a pretty good guy...we have been working with him for some time now...he is finally praying and reading. Next on the list is getting him to church, but he (like almost all the japanese investigators) has problems being in big groups...so we'll just have to keep working with him. Then I dendoed a little bit with Takei choro, and we went and visited some less actives and one of their investigators. Kanenishi Family is like 30 year old less actives...so they might come back to see the new church building. Then there is Kimura-san, who we visited and we pretty much talked to her about God and Jesus and the Holy Ghost and what the differences are. But I can't stand when people smoke in their houses. It just kills me! I can't breath and then I come out smelling disgusting, but that's life.

Thursday...Today we had a good Weekly Planning Session. Then we went to teach Endo-san. I want to help this man so much....he has so much potential! But yeah, the lesson, I believe, was on Prayer. He didn't really understand why we would pray and so we explained it to him and told him to pray before he goes to bed. But Thursday night we visited Ipposhi-san. He is a pretty cool guy. He drives like this wicked awesome sports car and he is a business man. He is about 26 I think. But we met him before...like a long time ago, and we recently bumped into him again and we taught him about the Plan of Salvation and about the Word of Wisdom. He didn't think he could quit smoking, but we promised him that if he kept meeting with us, he could. But I just love his lessons. He is an outspoken guy so it's so funny to hear him be hesitant and deny the things we're saying, but then have that spark of intrest. I don't know how to explain his lessons, but I love them!

Friday...Today was Zone Conference. It was a pretty good time. We learned a lot! Short bold contacts, Member lessons, and President Daniels always does this deep dive stuff that is always pretty interesting. This week he talked about how the Book of Mormon is true, and we went into what Intelligence is, and what the Soul consists of, and stuff like that. We also talked about how Joseph Smith's background, and the 3 witnesses, and like Book of Mormon chiasmus'. It was pretty cool I guess. Then after Zone conference...we played Dodgeball...how weird is that? So yeah...I ran around in my suit for a little bit. It was exciting.

Saturday...We met with Sasaki-san today, the one with the Baptism Date, and he pretty much dropped out on us. So we are one investigator/baptism date short. It was too bad, but hopefully he will meet the missionaries again some day. Had another lesson with Endo-san, and then with Suzuki-san...he is like 20's and he came for the first time to the church and we did a little tour and did a lesson. It was pretty cool. He was a pretty cool kid. We're planning on meeting with him again in like a week. I also thought about thoughts today...interesting statment isn't it?...what are thoughts made of? Why do we have to watch our thoughts, words, deeds? It was a good time.

Sunday...We had a good time at church today, just like everyweek. The Tomakomai Branch is so awesome! I love them all so much! The other Elders got one of their Investigators to church. Ito-san. He seemed pretty cool with church. He also got to hear a talk on Tithing...haha. He now doesn't think that tithing is a good thing, but at least he thought church was good. So we ended this week with 10 scheduled lessons which is way good, I hear. The rest of the day on Sunday, we pretty much rode all over town to invite people to come to the Branch FHE tomorrow, so that should be pretty fun. I'm excited. Hopefully someone comes! I'm counting on it!

Well that's the extent of my week this week. We had a pretty fun week, and the weeks, from here on out, are going to start getting faster and faster. This week already went by crazy fast! It's incredible how fast weeks go by. It's because as missionaries we're trained to use pretty much every second of our day effectively. I really want to keep that principle in action after the mission. But I hope everyone else's week's were good! Keep up the good work!