As you might know, we spent this week in a tri-companionship due to Fox Choro currently undergoing treatment for his wisdom teeth. He should be back on Wednesday or Thursday, but for now, Wheelwright Choro has joined me and Hill Choro.
This week was pretty interesting. Instead of holding our normal Saturday Eikaiwa, we went to Misawa along with an Eikaiwa student for their Halloween Party. Misawa is the location of a military base, so that means that a ward of nearly two hundred Americans gathers there every week. It was almost intimidating to be surrounded by that many Americans. After living among Japanese people for more than a year, it`s difficult to talk naturally with those from the homeland. The behavior, way of talking, and general attitude of Americans is significantly different from the Japanese. I pretty much stayed with S-san, the Eikaiwa student, the whole time. We got a lot of American candies, but when I put my candies down for a picture, some child stole them all! At least I got to eat a lot of chili, a food I hadn`t had in a very long time. I`ll send pictures!
We also helped with the city`s Halloween party. Basically, all we did was stand and have our pictures taken with children desperate to be seen with gaijin. We got to talk to an ALT (assistant language teacher here in Japan through the JET program) from Australia during breaks, as well as give Eikaiwa chirashi to the high school students volunteering with us. We weren`t allowed to proselyte during this activity, but we were able to both plant seeds and meet people who are at least interested in Eikaiwa, which is always a good start. The ALT was also really nice and seemed at least sympathetic to our message. Foreigners here often seem really nice to missionaries for some reason, perhaps a side effect of living in this country!
We also did normal missionary work, of course! We taught two investigators this week, "Bob" and K-san. "Bob" was especially strong this time, pretty much telling us that we believe in a lie and that he didn`t expect us to convert, but that if we didn`t we`d go to Hell. He is not very good at listening to us, which means he might not be an investigator for too much longer. K-san is the husband of an active member, but he`s older and has a hard time understanding things. After a year of being taught nearly weekly by missionaries, he really hasn`t changed too much, but he`s started showing some signs of improvement, like praying properly. We`re trying to find new investigators, like always, but other than a guy who actually is searching for the true church that was found through chirashi kubari (probably a first as far as I`ve seen in this country), we don`t have any great prospects. We`ll be at it again tonight, so pray for us!
We have an extremely busy week with interviews with the Smith Kaicho, Halloween Party, ZTM in Aomori, and District Conference in Aomori and Misawa. Basically, it`s a lot of important but busy stuff, with the Transfer Call topping it off. I`ll tell you next week what happens!
Aishiteimasu!
Elder Earl
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