Tacos Party

So we had a way dope tacos party at the church on Saturday and we tried to gear it towards the young people and YSA in the branch. Well it turns out that not many of them could actually come for whatever reason and it turned into a branch activity and we had about thirty people come and we made tons of homemade tortillas (you can't really buy them here) and made some pretty bomb soft tacos and stuff. We had a total of like 6 investigators come too between all the missionaries and it was way successful. But the best part of the taco party didn't happen to me, but our young investigator Akira said to elder Reed "I can't come to church tomorrow, but if I come two more times I can be baptized right?" So he's thinking about getting baptized pretty seriously! He really wants it. We had a lesson on Tuesday with him and we asked why he wants to be baptized and he said "because I want to go to heaven." Man. He's so great. Also the other elders had a baptism this week with Fukumori san and he's way solid and I've been able to help teach him a few times and he just amazes me. He has a way strong testimony of the gospel and wants to share it with his family. He has
changed so much and he knows he has too.

Besides that the week has been alright. Nothing too spectacular happened. I met a polite white dude that gave us his number from Florida. That was a first. Also met a Peruvian dude that's lived in Japan for 16 years. He was an investigator in Peru who knows when I think. Or his brother was. I don't remember. My comp is kind of trunky (wants to go home). I guess that's what happens when you don't really like Japan at all and have a girlfriend. He's still a hard worker but this week was a harder one. He has a few transfers left and is kind of
just hanging on. I'm so glad I got dumped before my mission because it really is so much easier to work. But we get along great and don't have any relationship problems.

So I've been thinking about what it takes to continue strong in the gospel for the rest of your life and stuff. I was reading some of Brigham Young's teachings and he said something like "I hate when people say they will never go less active because they usually do. I will never say that I will never go less active. Why? Because saying that means you are relying on yourself and not God. Therefore you will leave. I really on God everyday and if I don't then I don't know what will happen to me." But he said it a lot better. Pretty much continued activity is a choice. Do you love God more than yourself or not? That's all it comes down to. That's all it takes. And if you love God, you will do what he says. Read scriptures. Participate in church. Help others. If you do so everyday, you will be on track with the spirit in your life. Anyone can go less active. I've known quite a few members here in Japan that used to be really strong leaders and they stopped because they got tired. They couldn't finish. They still can, but honestly the odds are that they're not going to. It's so sad, and all it comes down to is the little things that are so easy to forget, and one simple question. Do you love God more than yourself?

I also finished the Book of Mormon again this week. It's true. I invite you all to read it. No matter how many times you've read it, read it again.

Love you all!

Elder Tschirki
君を愛してるよ

 Taco party minus a few. Our young investigator Akira is next to elder
Reed behind the kid in the blue shirt.

A cool park. There was also a white lesbian couple a couple benches away from us. Not sure I've seen that in Japan.

 

A statue and river in Kagoshima. This place is pretty big and those buildings aren't that big. 

Sakurajima from up the hill to the church

 Me and elder Miyagi at tomato ramen

 

Booah Bounce Ball

So this week we invented a game called BOOAH Bounce Ball and it's way fun and we played for two days in our meal times and at night and quit for injury purposes. I will send a video. Elder Miyagi and I made it one night for fun.

This week was a pretty good one. I'll just talk about the exchange I went on with Elder Harrell. We met a kid on the street that Elder Reed and I met and made an appointment and he said this time that he was busy and that he'd be there on the 24th so he remembered and is looking to it. Then at night we went to this one apartment and met this grandpa and he loves his grandkid and we gave him a Book of Mormon and he asked if we're still have "many wives" and so we thought that this was just going to be another antimormon thing and we explained that we don't and we don't support it either and he said "I think we should start polygamy again. The population is dying and nobody has kids. Of course your wife would get mad but it's better for society." And that kind of thing and he was way funny and we just chatted with him. Then we went to another apartment and the first person that we talked to said that we came last week. We almost left but decided to stay and met a Seventh Day Adventist that says we can come over anytime and talk about Jesus and he sang for us. Cool guy but had been drinking a little. Paul condemns drinking in the bible buddy. But we might definitely go back. He's way open to listening to us. Then we met a 19 year old kid that is way cool and rich and says he's worrying about the future and what to do for his job and family and stuff. So needless to say we talked to him for a while and he loves us and wants
to learn and go out to eat and stuff. So we definitely met the people we needed to. But the polygamy dude was way fun.

This week is way fun. Our investigators are going well.  We had three investigators come to church which is my highest ever, and including a crazy dude from Amami named Sakuyama. He's way good at guitar and pretty good at English. Keep up the hard work people.


Elder Tschirki 君を愛してるよ


Ps we found a go go curry but it's in taniyama and we went to it with
a less active.

The branch here. The normal pics were fuzzy so this is the best one

 Tomato ramen after district meeting. Me and my boy

Booah Bounce Ball

Opera

This week was a good one here in the land of volcanoes and short people. It's funny because I've been here a while and now I'll say "hey there's a foreigner" and it's a Japanese person. Before you come here you think they all look the same but the more you're here, the more different everyone is and you can even kind of tell where they are from. So I have a cool story along those lines. Me and my boy Elder Miyagi were out before we had the assistants come and the president and his wife come and do a training and interviews, and we literally had nobody to talk to. Nobody was on the streets but women and we aren't allowed to approach them in the streets. Anyways, it was almost time to go and get a taxi to ride up the mountain to the church because we sure weren't going to walk up at 2 in the afternoon. Well we both kind of decided to go through one more light and then go back. Well we see this Asian dude with sunglasses on and usually sunglasses is a sign of being a traveler so we talk to him and he doesn't know Japanese. He's from Hong Kong and his English is perfect, probably about 40-50 years old and he knew about our church and had actually gone to Salt Lake City and seen the temple and did a tour and stuff a year ago. Well as we're talking I had to translate for him to Elder Miyagi to figure out if he was able to park in the parking lot he was in and so here's a Chinese dude with a white dude translate into Japanese to a Japanese kid who then talked to the employees in the place. Well the bad news is he had to move his car, but the good news is they let him do it for free. Well his wife and 20 year old son come out and the son is like "hey you're Mormons" and we were like "yeah" and then he too started talking about going to Salt Lake City and it went way good. We weren't really able to teach too much because they were going to go to a ramen shop for lunch and needed to go but we gave them our chirashi, which I have no idea what that is in English, kind of like a flyer but they're different here in Japan, and told them there's the church in Hong Kong too and if they went to Mormon.org, they could find the missionaries and stuff. Way cool experience and definitely not a coincidence. 

Well besides that, our investigator Yamanouchi kun came to our first basketball activity and
had fun and we taught him about the Book of Mormon and we arranged right there for the member present to bring him to church. Well he came to church in a tie and everything (they usually don't here unless you've been baptized for reasons unknown. I really don't know why) and said in gospel principles class at he looks forward to coming to church every week from here on out. The only problem he has right now is time because he's trying to get into college. His mom isn't against him learning about Jesus, but is kind of concerned about whether or not he will get into school and such so the amount of times we can meet our limited but we are going to do what we can to help him learn.

This week we also went to an opera concert for free because two members, one a kind of less active but really rich and is only less active because she goes to Tokyo a few times a month, and a regular member performed in it and other members went. The tickets were 30$ and it was really cool. We were even able to talk about the gospel afterwards with some of the people that performed which just shows that no matter where you go, you can do missionary work. We even met people that knew the sister missionaries and they might come to our
English class again.

Look for missionary opportunities because they're everywhere! Always look to share the gospel to somebody!

餡土龍 K. 赦輝長老
日本福岡伝道部

愛してるわ～

Some members took us out to eat at a hotel buffet at the top of a mountain so this is what Kagoshima looks like. I also probably ate more than $30 of food which is how much about it is per person.

Me and elder Reed with the three coolest people from the opera. None are members but the lady plays piano like a boss and since she was four. Keep practicing piano. The dude on the left played guitar and the dude on the right did the percussion.

The district with the two assistants and Egan shimai. 

We went to the volcano this week on pday. 

Taught eikaiwa in a college room because the regular room was taken. These people are way cool. Elder Miyagi was annoying so I had to tell him to be quiet a couple of times haha