Hello again!

Hello everyone! Merry Christmas!

Tuesday: We had district meeting. That was fun. There was chocolate. That night we had a dinner with the family of Mark, the street preacher guy from Minnesota. His wife made French-dip sandwiches. It was amazing! We had the opportunity to share our testimony with them. But the sandwiches were great and the spiritual promptings were real.

Wednesday: Today was the Christmas conference for half the mission. We were with Fujisawa stake, so I saw the old district. We sang most of the Christmas hymns. There was a white elephant exchange and I gave these things with hands on the end and an eternal pass along gift from the apartment. I got a kendama, a Japanese toy. Really fun. Then we had a great Eikaiwa. Some of the students are really prepared, just super busy.

Thursday: Today was weekly planning, always takes forever, but is worth it in the end. Then we visited Sal, from Turkey. He was tipsy from whiskey, but he made us some really spicy habanero soup. Then we went to ping pong night thinking that Kurenuma was coming, but he didn't. He missed 2 appointments this week. We were worried about him.

Friday: today we did less active visiting and the ward Christmas party. We had a lot of cake, pizza and we sang "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing". That was a busy day. We passed 1000 flyers in about a week for that. Opened the package and found the advent calendar late. It was fun though.

Saturday: we cleaned the church, which was just us after the party. Then we went to Tokorozawa to do caroling. That was amazing. We made so many people smile! Lots of gaijin, kids, and old people stopped for a while. We sang for 2 hours. We then streeted around and taught a really cool kid who asked for a Book of Mormon. Then we had a lesson with Kurenuma, who has reset his baptismal date for January 14th. He really wanted Spackman Chōrō to baptize him, but we cleared it up that he is not coming back anytime for a long time. But he wants to be baptized and he is doing great.

Sunday: Christmas! We had lots of random people show up to church. It was a big loud after Sacrament mingle where members gave each other presents. We had a great shokuji (meal) in Kiyose and in Shakujikoen. The Kiyose one was a nice short one with a young family, the Ishimines. The night one was with the Toma clan. It was huge! I was so full! Great day, just like back home.

Monday: called family, I think they will tell you about it. We had a nap. Went shopping, sat. That was about it.

I love you all!
マーフィー長老

Hello and Merry Chistmas

Hello everybody. I'm a little short on time today, but I will do my best.

So last Monday we had a dinner with the Asada's. there sister Asada I had her old book of Mormon. When she was and investigator, she didn't know if it was true or not. But there was a fire and that book of Mormon was saved. And everything else burned. All of the other religious books. And then she read it cover to cover even though didn't have covers. And she knew that it was true after reading it. I know that it is true too.

Nothing really happened on Tuesday. But on Wednesday, Spackman Chōrō and I went to Kichijoji to help Mission Office out. We were test dummies for a new pamphlet. That was hard. We talked about "who is God?". That was pretty much his last dendo opportunity. Then we had Eikaiwa, which is always fun. We had more than one student in class this week.

Thursday was transfers. Millard Chōrō successfully moved rooms. He is transfer 8 and from Tennessee. We went hard. We met all of our goals, talked to about a hundred people in 4 days, and got some new people to teach. This next week is already mostly booked. I don't know how they do it in other places, but there is a lot of time spent in Japan just finding. We had a guy tell us he would love to meet and we set up an appointment and then he said that he didn't want to meet because he is Buddhist.

"Elder Murphy is the snack machine. I've never seen a man eat so many snacks in one day it's quite amazing I count it as a miracle in my prayers at night" (Elder Millard)

I have actually lost a lot of weight here. I don't know how. But yeah, Friday and Saturday and Thursday were all very finding filled days.  It was also very windy and cold. But we are doing our best to make it fun. Going to a different station to talk to people it's really fun. It's only four minutes away but it's a really different atmosphere.that is about it for the week. Today we talked to people, ate food and wrote emails. We went shopping for white elephant, but you will have to hear about that next week.

Love you, keep asking me questions so that I can give better emails for you.

Love you, マーフィー長老

Hello from me!

Hello everyone! Great final week of the transfer. I am staying in Hibarigaoka and my companion is Elder Millard. He is the district leader right now and we went on splits for at least half of the transfer. This transfer is 8 weeks, so we will get a lot of work done.

Tuesday. I was on splits for today so that Elder Spackman could give training to the Kichijoji district leader. We visited a really nice less active named Uenoyama Kyōdai. He went on a mission to Hawaii about 50 years ago. His English is still perfect. Then that night Kurenuma had his interview. I had to wait out in the hallway, so I read Jesus the Christ and ate marshmallows and drank Blood Orangina, which might be my new favorite drink.

Wednesday: District meeting, fun, lots of snacks. Baptism prep, great, lots of phone calls in Japanese for a couple of hours. Eikaiwa, fun, we only had one student in advanced class, so we talked about what the missionary schedule is like. My kanji is 摩府医, which basically narrows down to mafi, but means magic metropolitan doctor.

Thursday: Zone meeting in Kichijoji. Lots of talk about finding and improving Eikaiwa professionally. We also did weekly planning, which is "always" fun. We played ping-pong with a less active named Nakamura Kyōdai and Kurenuma. That was intense. Real Japanese takkyu. Then we taught about enduring to the end.

Friday: Another splits day because of Tokorozawa and Kichijoji district meetings. We had a full plate of lessons. Too many to remember, especially with the baptism the next day.

Saturday: Transfer Calls. The zone leaders are going back together and the new Elder coming in is Elder Hawkins from England. Fun! We had all of our appointments fall through today, that was bad. Then we went and started filling the font with 60 degree water (Celsius). We start that about 2 hours before the service and 20 minutes before it starts, we have the Kurenuma experience (see first paragraph), and find out there is something wrong with the water spout. We and a couple of members start to fill the font with 2 buckets and a tea pot from the other sinks on the first floor. That was great. Other than the two setbacks from the day, it ended well with Hiro shimai being baptized! We also went out to eat with the Aoki family. I love squid and octopus. Just a heads up, when I get back, we are eating real Japanese food as soon as I find a good place in Spring.

Sunday: I am exhausted. It was all kind of a blur, but we did get to talk with Kurenuma. He called us and asked if it was still ok if he came to church. We were really confused, but he thought that we were really mad at him. We were not, we were ecstatic that he still wanted to talk to us! We also biked 6+ miles in the freezing cold to check on a referral. That was not fun. I couldn't feel anything when we got back, but I hope the family called us back, they weren't home.

Monday: Not much. Shopping with the Elders. I found a cool cup, forgot to take a picture. Got some socks, a new tie, and some good snacks.

I love you all! Check out this talk: "What Lack I Yet" by Larry L. Lawrence from October 2015. It was really good! Can't wait to talk to some of you at Christmas.


Bonus letter to Dad:
There are so many good snacks here now that I know where to look. I can have sour, sweet, spicy, and salty at anytime, but I dint know about eating a whole plate of cookies. My diet has changed a lot. We eat rice everyday and I have been making French toast almost everyday this week. I get bored of rice sometimes, so we have noodles! It is pretty much what everyone eats in Asia, so I don't feel so bad. I am looking forward to seeing you guys at Christmas, but I don't know when it will be yet, the president hasn't told us yet. Love you,
Connor



マーフィー長老

The week of these days

Went to Yokohama for p-day

Hello! Right now I am on the train from Yokohama to Hibarigaoka. There are so many languages here. German, French, Chinese, Japanese, English, and that is just within a couple of seats of each other.

Recently, I have been teaching lessons on Dendō time (that is a joke, I do that all of the time). We had a lot of lessons with new people, so after Kurenuma is baptized on Saturday, we will still have people to teach.



On Wednesday, we had District meeting, which was weird because Millard Chōrō (DL), was sick and didn't feel well enough to make it interesting. He is better now though. 👍 I went on splits with him to go and meet with a Street preacher from Minnesota. He pretty much talked at us for an hour and a half, telling us that we should not believe in the Book of Mormon or in having works, but to only have faith and that we insult Heavenly Father if we try to do anything for Him. His pointless argument made me not a happy camper until Eikaiwa, which always cheers me up. Shig, a really skilled old guy, said that he is going to make our names into kanji, so I am looking forward to that.


Saw some big fish

Thursday was MLC, for all of the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders, so Millard Chōrō and I were together again. We went hard! So many people on the streets outside of the Pachinko and Karaoke parlors. We met a guy who just got to Japan from Turkey, but is half American. He is opening an American and Turkish souvenir store. He showed us his friends restaurant, which was amazing. That was the best Kebab sandwich I have ever had. There are a lot of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern restaurants here. He was really prepared. He literally told us his life story over dinner and he was really open with hearing what we had to say.

Friday we did normal stuff. (Did I mention there were district meetings in Tokorozawa and Kichijoji, so I am still on splits). Spackman Chōrō and I got back together and we went to a shokuji with the Asada's. the Asada's are this cute old couple in the ward and Asada Shimai can cook like no other. We went with Kurenuma and we had a lesson about tithing and fasting. The Asadas were perfect for that. They have had so much experience with tithing, they really helped Kurenuma. Asada Kyōdai served a mission when most of northern Honshu was a mission. They could wear hats and the Americans were there for 3 years so that they could learn Japanese.

Saturday was long. We cleaned the church, and did some studying. Then we went to Kichijoji with Kurenuma. We went for a baptism and concert. Michiko, the lady being baptized, is so funny. She basically told Kurenuma, I am being baptized, so now you have to be baptized. She was so happy, maybe the happiest Nihonjin I have seen in a while. The concert was the Shibuya Institute Choir and that was awesome. By the end of it, everyone was crying and all of the choir members were really emotional. You could feel the Spirit a lot there. You should see if they are on YouTube or have a website. They are the Little Witnesses.

Sunday was good. Church, a good lesson in Gospel Principles class about the Ten Commandments. We submitted stats and went housing. Met some really cool people, had some awkward conversations, and it was less cold than it has been recently.

Monday, we went to Yokohama and met some of Spackman Chōrō's friends from Yamate. We had Chinese food, which was weird compared to Japanese. We walked around Chinatown. It has been a long day. Also, the December Ensign is really good, you should read it.

 

Ok, I need to go, but I love you!