2018 Feb 19 - The Transfer is Over

So, the transfer is over and I’m leaving Nagamine. I’m headed to a place in Kagoshima Zone called Taniyama!! It was the same district when I was in Sendai, oh and I’m the district leader now, that will be different. The week was fun, we had cleaning checks and that ate up a couple days, and we almost got a 100 percent but, there were some small things we forgot but, we quickly cleaned it up pretty quick. We had a fun Sports Activity, a lot of people came and we shared a small message at the end. So, I got the call to be District leader last night after FHE and I was a bit surprised and when I found out I was going back to Kagoshima Zone, I was even more surprised but, I’m way happy.

Kishi, (?), Me, Sis Johnson, Sis Rosen, Sis Bills, Nakata, Furusho

2018 Feb 12 - The Email That Almost Didn't Come

Hello Everyone!! Sorry for the ridiculously late email. What ended up happening today is we went with a Kumamoto investigator, a black guy named Cooper(sorry, no pictures) over by the city hall and spent most of the day there, it was fun but, he likes beer so, he was very drunk. Anyways, it was an interesting week mainly do to the fact that our Zone Leaders wanted the Zone, as a whole, to be able to talk to 7,000 people. I didn’t like it a ton because we did some things that took time out of our 伝道 time, like lesson or FHE and to the ZLs it made it look like I wasn’t really working which made me kind of mad but it was a good week. Most of the stuff we had been doing was housing but, on 巡回 Elder Kishi found an area we could do streeting and that is what we have been doing. We also found an old investigator that we 1. called during phone伝道 2. met while streeting and then 3. called and then went to go get Yakiniku. Our Sports Activity was fun, not a ton of people came and there is a couple who got called to be senior missionaries in the Sapporo temple so, we had a goodbye party for the after the Sports Activity.

1. It snowed

2. Good picture of me and Kishi

4. Kishi was tired

5. I got pretzels, it’s been so long

2018 Feb 4 - A Week Ago It Was Week 1 And Now It’s Week 4, What?

So, no freaking joke, it felt like the transfer was going on forever and now it feels like it went bu super fast. 

Monday, me and Elder Kishi went bowling and I lost horribly but, it was fun. FHE, we had the lesson but, it was supposed to be the Kumamoto Elders but, they had to pick people up for Mensetsus tomorrow. 

Tuesday, it was way fun talking with the Egans today and afterwards we slammed hard. 

Wednesday, we had an absolutely dreadful lesson with an Eikaiwa student, I would ask a question, he would respond then go on a tangent, it was all not fun. But, Eikaiwa was pretty fun, I tried out an idea I got from Egan会長 and started to read the Book of Mormon with them. 

Thursday, we tried pulling out money but, Elder Kishi had some trouble so, we spent a lot of time running around and then after that went to the doctor to have my hand checked out because it has had a weird amount of dry skin but, I’m fine. After weekly planning when 伝道 and found 2 way cool moms, they weren’t interested right now but, we’re hoping they will be. 

Friday, 巡回, me and Elder Nakata. While we were 伝道 we found a way nice grandma and when I asked about a folding fan she had, she gave it to me and then a bunch of other stuff, I felt a little but bad for asking. 

Saturday, so, most of today was sports activities, morning was a an activity done by Kumamoto ward and they brought a bunch of friends and it was way fun. Afternoon was our activity and no one came. 

Sunday, church was good, it was really cold, it snowed a bit. In the evening we met a way cool dad that excepted a BOM from us and then visited a referral that the 姉妹 gave us.

Something that I have noticed as the weeks have gone by, is that I am getting more and more tired.

愛しています

- Brinkerhoff 長老

2018 Jan 28 - The Slow Week

So, I don’t know how the week was for everyone else but for me, it was flippen’  slow, like I should of had Pday a couple days ago slow but, it was good. 

Monday, 普通 day and all the missionaries came to FHE but there was only one member so, that was kind of sad. 

Tuesday, fun district meeting and had a RA that we went to but the guy didn’t show. 

Wednesday, normal day, Eikaiwa was pretty normal. 

Thursday, kishi長老 actually got a little sick so, he slept most of the day and I cleaned and did other stuff to prevent boredom but, he is all good now. 

Friday, found someone that remembered the sisters and gave her a BOM and then we did weekly planning and then we found a mom that had met missionaries a year ago and is really trying to learn English. 

Saturday, fixed up the Kishi長老’s bike, the brakes had gotten really bad. We had GameNight but, no one came except this one lady we met at last week’s reception and she came with her daughter, who is around 5 and that was a lot of fun. 

Sunday, church and then we had a meeting with the bishop about how we can help the ward and then a meal with some members. After that the 姉妹 showed us some people that had some potential. Then we got a message from a kind of investigator, Hiro, saying he didn’t want to learn anymore and that was pretty sad.

FHE

The other Elders asked for rice and said make it black, so I did my best

Layman, Barlow, Nakata, Me

2018 Jan 21 - Elder Choi

So, this week we had a member of the 70 come to our mission and give us a training on Wednesday. So, that meant that we had 16 people sleeping in our apartment, it was kind of rough but, it was a way cool training. The first half was about the missionary classic, marriage . Then we helped everyone get to there buses and that was a lot of work. Then Saturday, we had a member that got married in a different Prefecture come back and the ward did a reception for her there, it was pretty fun. 

Sorry the mail is short, I’m dead tired and I’ve been doing cleaning all morning so, I’m more tired.

1 FHE

2 we put all the expired spices into a bag and called it death spice

3 Nakata長老 was pretty tired too

4 I food coloring so, I made green spaghetti 

2018 01 14 - Round 2 Nagamine

For everyone who didn’t read last weeks email, I’m still in Nagamine. It was a fun week leading up to today. So, Elder Nakata’s Companion was stuck in his last area do to extreme snow and didn’t get here until Sunday, crazy. Now until Sunday, we were a 3 man, again. I love Elder Nakata but, I don’t like 伝道 with him, it’s a bit of a way unneeded powerful struggle. Cool things that happened, it snowed, we found a cool mom and daughter and when we went back to teach them we ended just teaching the mom’s w daughters(I thought it was a little weird) we found a different cool mom but, haven’t been able to teach her but, she has started reading the BOM. 

2018 01 09 - Transfer Call

Hey, so today we got our transfer call and I’m staying one more in
Nagamine and with Elder Kishi. This week has been a busy one, 

Monday,
New Years, the biggest holiday in Japan and we went over to Tsuboi and
hung out there all day. We went to a sports center called Round 1 and
then went and checked out the shrine near the Kumamoto castle, then we
went over to a member’s house and had dinner. 

Tuesday, district meeting then we went to the Matsuzaki’s house and ate lunch then had
dinner at the Hirata’s house again. 

Wednesday, had lunch at the
Sakata’s house, their family is big fans of Star Wars and then had
dinner at the Aoki’s house and the Usui family came over too, it was
hilarious and a ton of fun. Then we left to go to Eikaiwa, which very
few people came to and we left early because Furusho asked for a
blessing. 

Thursday, fairly normal day but, because we didn’t do FHE on
Monday we did it today and sadly no one came. 

Saturday, normal day,
people weren’t happy with us but we were able to make some Mochi, it
was way fun. 

Sunday, fast Sunday and we had church at 9 other than
that, it was a pretty normal Sunday. Monday, it rained all freakin day
and it was pretty cold rain too. We did have FHE and it was way fun
because people actually came.
I have spent most of the day at a famous land mark here called Mt Aso
and it was way cool and freezing cold, it was snowing and it was super
windy.

愛しています
- Brinkerhoff 長老

Making Mochi