Elder Dunn Called to Serve : Another Busy week!

Hello Everyone!

Well it is Sunday and this is the first time I have had time to write in my journal all week so I may miss a few details here and there.

Monday

We got ready and rushed to the church for conference call. It was good, we need to work on getting the conversion stories from all the recent converts in our zone so there is another assignment to work on. Immediately following that we began our Preparation day by writing emails! I was able to catch some of the family on which was a neat surprise. I worked on a few things for BYU and Elder Shurilla looked up where some recycle shops were in the zone and we got moving. We had lunch at a combini then met the sisters at the station and began our quest. We started at a house-off which is a thrift store that specializes in electronics. My companion, Elder Shurilla was a DJ before his mission. He takes old game boys and NES systems and makes music out of their sound cards so we were looking for old systems. Game systems are so cheap here! Old DSs in buckets for 10 dollars, buckets of old games. It was pretty cool. I found an Old Pokemon game that I really wanted, it'll be good Language study when I return. We then went to another store which had a music store next door so we looked around there, then went to a Watmans which had nothing, so we went to another store which was a little far, but we made it. There we found some super old computers! They were so legit! We also found a Nebula ball which Elder Seibach bought, it is way cool. We then came home bought groceries, ate dinner and then went to visit Marumoto Kyodais house. He is such a great man, we talked about Easter, and challenged him to come to church with us this week since he wasn't able to this past week.

Tuesday

After studies and lunch we walked to the church to do a few errands for the zone then we began a journey we walked from the top of our area clear down to the bottom. On our way we talked to some neat people. One person we stopped had a ton of interest and agreed to meet us next week really quickly, another man never had met missionaries before but thought we were the bees knees. After our walk we journeyed back home by train, ate dinner, then went to the church to teach our man Shokan! He is half Chinese and has great Japanese and English. We discussed gospel dispensations in a different way and it made perfect sense to him, pictures work great.

Wednesday

If going on a journey yesterday wasn't enough we went again today. We walked all the way to Costco. We talked to a neat old man who is Buddist but has no problem with all religion that was kind of cool. We worked on getting members to our lesson that night but no one was able to attend. When we arrived at Costco elder Shurilla and I bought our food and waited for the other two. After a while they came over. Elder Siebach and Elder Hall were renewing their cards. The woman who was helping them asked if they were a couple. I guess she had never met missionaries before. The best part was Elder Hall has been in Japan for two weeks and had no idea what was being said so he agreed with the woman. We also saw a girl in a kimono walking around, it seemed like the last place we would see someone wearing one. We then rushed to Eikaiwa to set up but ran into our investigator at the church so we had a lesson with him about gospel dispensations almost the same lesson we had yesterday. We are still resolving some concerns regarding baptism, but we hope to iron that out soon. Eikaiwa was great! We teach the beginner class with the sisters, it is a lot of fun. Our eikaiwa is much smaller than the one in Kichijoji but it is still a lot of fun.

Thursday

We woke up early and rushed to Yamate for their district meeting which was super early! It was a great meeting, afterwards we helped with the open house there. What is really cool about Yamate is that the church is a historical sight. It has a lot of information about the history of the church in Japan. It is pretty cool. After helping with an Easter Open house that they are having, we and out to lunch at a ramen shop! It was delicious! Probably one of the best I have eaten in Japan. We continued to help for a little bit then trained down to Yokosuka (the bottom of our zone). When we got to the church I realized I had forgot my iPad! We had a great district meeting with Yokosuka then went all the way back to Yamate. We grabbed my iPad and since we were running out of time we went out to eat again...this time at a pizza place, where we were able to teach the man who works there! That was pretty cool. He lived in Canada for a while and spoke fluent English. After a while another American man came in with his daughter. He was really interested that we didn't work for the mafia, we had black suits on. He had never met missionaries before and found our work fascinating, that was pretty cool. It turns out he works as a consultant for jaguar which is pretty cool. Talk about some inspired pizza eating.

Friday

After studies we had Kamiooka District Meeting, it went a little long, but was really good. Afterwards we began weekly planning. Weekly planning turns into "where do we have time to teach our investigators and find more people" there is so much stuff to do as a zone leader. After half our our weekly planning we went to the apartment for dinner, and then finished weekly planning, this next week will be intense o.O.

Saturday

After studies we went to probably one of the best indo curry restaurants I have ever been to! It was delicious! With a good old white day, with nothing planned we went on a journey to Kanazawa! Everyone we stopped just wanted to speak English to us! It was weird. We tried speaking Japanese to them but they just wouldn't let us! The walk was beautiful, right next to the ocean. Elder Shurilla called Sister Wada about his back, he has had a lot of pain recently so she referred us to a doctor. Since we didn't have time to go back to the apartment we went to Costco since it was close (I'll tell you what having one in your area is dangerous). At Costco we ran into a few members from the Yokosuka military ward! Then when we were eating a few Eikaiwa students came up to us! It was crazy how busy it was on a Saturday night. The Ogawas came and picked us up and took us to the doctor. My hatred of Japanese hospitals have continued, there is just no personalization there. Then we came home and Elder Shurilla laid in his futon in pain.

Sunday

We woke up and went to church! It was great! I love this ward so much, they make you feel at home so easily. After church we had ward council! Right before, sister Wada (a different one) stopped us in the hallway and thanked us for how our parents raised us and asked if we would come over for lunch on Saturday and share about our families. That was a cool compliment. Ward council was amazing! It was run exactly how it should be and it was great! After we wrote lesson reports, and followed up with the zone about their statistics. Then grabbed our bikes and went to the josenzu (they are from Okinawa) for dinner. I thought they were an American family until we got there. It was a great time, it was so delicious! I love Japanese potato salad so much! After we shared a message about Easter we ran to the Ogawas. They are hilarious. I have learned a lot of new Japanese from them.

Well there goes another week in the service of the Lord!

Big Hearts!

Elder Dunn

Zelda? Ocarina? Yes.