Week 6

Yup its week 6. which means we get transfer calls tomorrow! yay. My guess is Elder Nuttall transfers out but only time will tell.

This week was good but i dont really have much time. we had a companion exchange and elder lee and I worked in Tsuyama for about a day and a half. he's a way solid missionary and a fun guy. it was sweet. we had a lesson with Kaiami and Uchida, our 14 year old kids. they couldnt focus at all. it was a mess. theres no way i was that immature when i was 14. shoot. So we really weren't able to make much progress on the investigators we already had this week, but we were able to do some good finding the last 3 or 4 days. we visited a potential investigator we met early in the transfer and her friend who had gone to eikaiwa once was there so we talked to her a bit about the book of mormon and whatnot and she seems like she has pretty genuine interest. we were pretty excited. she said she'd try and come to eikaiwa but if she doesnt, we'll visit again. Also, I've been working more to use the Book of Mormon more in my contacts with people while housing or whatever and its been working out pretty well i must say. We found one new investigator on saturday who wanted to know where we go after we die so we busted out alma 40:11 and got an appointment to talk about it.

Also, yesterday, some bhuddist guy invited us in to his house and told us all about what bhuddists believe. like pretty in depth. it was interesting. So we shared our beliefs too and gavehim a book of mormon. he wants to talk more so we'll be heading over to talk more with him sometime soon.

Lastly. We got a call from one of our investigators, Jotani-san who wanted us to come over for a BBQ. so we show up and he has a fire going and all but there were no hotdogs or hamburgers. only oysters. i really dont like oysters. oh it was a trial. i must have eaten like 20. man i almost went a whole transfer without eating them too. but it was fun. He's a way nice guy.

well thats about all the time i have. we're heading off to okayama to have fun for our last PDay.

so hope everyone is doing awesome.

Love,

Elder Horton

Tsuyama week 5

Pictures:
Some Japanese garden. i need a nicer camera.
Kaiami-kun and Uchida-kun before the Valentines party

Can't believe we're already on week 5. this transfer is flying by.

This week, we had our Valentines day party at Eikaiwa! everyone brought a ton of food and I taught everyone about how to ask someone out on a date and then all the different ways you can reject someone if they ask you. something i have no experience with but i acted like i did anyways. It was way fun. then afterwards, we shared a good message about love. we read John 3:16 and talked about God's love for the world etc etc. it was really good. I have no idea why, but Tsuyama has a really strong Eikaiwa program. Its a very nice improvement from Ako where we had somewhere between 0 and 2 people come each week.

We had a Zone Conference on wednesday and my old MTC companion Elder Nicholes and I got to hang out and even practice teaching together which was pretty nostalgic. but yeah that was good times. That kid is way genki.

We also met with our two favorite middle schoolers who are way funny. I'm learning tons of rude japanese that i dont get to hear from normal people so thats always fun. And they love praying. they're always either asking us to do it because we're "professionals" or volunteering to do it themselves. either way, its awesome and I've never seen anything like it. We're still working on their understanding and teaching principles multiple times to make sure they get it. like on saturday, we were playing dodgeball and asking them review questions and i ask,

"Who is God?"

"a prophet!"

"wrong."

So they're moving along slowly but surely.

another investigator who we're excited about is Sakamoto-san, who's wife is a less active. we called them this week and apparently him and his wife have been talking about it because she says he says he wants to join our church but he is poor so he can't pay tithing. Something we can talk about and once we strengthen his faith a bit, we can toppa no problem. So we have high hopes for him.

Yesterday at church, we were supposed to have 3 investigators and a less active member, Hiromi-chan, show up and none of them did. it was a bummer. but then last night, we met with a family, the Sakamoto's (not related to our investigator) and it was way fun. their dad, has extreme Dendo fire and actually just got called to be our ward mission leader! which means we have a ward mission leader! He's way excited and is already talking about how we're going to be baptizing 5 people and a family every month. so yay!.. But they're a way fun family and they're all off to a good start on their personal Dendo plan!

so yeah!

Love everyone. its almost march! that means one more sxsw i cant go to! woo!

Love,

Elder Horton

Zone Conference

Tsuyama week 4

Alright lets make this one shorter.

normal day on monday, we had everyone bring picture albums and showed them to eachother at our single adult family home evening. it was cool i guess. i need to take more pictures for my silly album. these things are important in japan. which reminds me, whats my blood type? anyone know?

Tuesday, we visited a bunch of less actives trying to get everyone to go to the special conference we had yesterday because Elder Cook of the 12 came up to Okayama stake and spoke to everyone. so we really wanted to get everyone there. of the 3 we visited, nakagawa-shimai said she was going, Hiromi-shimai also said she'd go if it didnt snow because then she's have work (it snowed). and yamamoto-shimai wouldnt make any promises. then we had Eikaiwa! 10 people came! it was way cool. among them, were the two kids who were at church last week. they showed up and said it was a lot of fun and afterward, one of them said he showed his sister the pamphlet we gave them and she was "meccha inotte iru" or like 'praying like crazy' i guess. so hopefully we can talk to her sometime too. these two kids are way funny though. one of them also saw all the pass-along cards and pamphlets we have at the entrance to the church and was like "are these free?" so im like heck yes they are and he took one of each. it was pretty funny. more on those two when i get to sunday.

wednesday was normal. we had our library reading activity and we read a story about a very adorable kitten who thought the moon was a bowl of milk.

Thursday was also normal. though we had a member lesson with the Hisemune family and they were pretty interesting i do suppose.

then Friday and Saturday, we spent pretty much those entire days on trains going to and from Kobe for the mission conference where Elder Cook spoke to all the missionaries. We spent friday night in Akashi which was way fun because thats also where my good friend Elder Burhoe and my previous companion, Hasegawa長老 where staying. so we had some fun. then the actual conference was way good. Elder Cook talked to us about some of the relationships the members of the 12 and first presidency have with Japan and talked with us about the importance of teaching about dispensations. so it was way good. It was also fun seeing a bunch of the missionaries i know who are spread all over the mission right now.

So Sunday, we got to go see Elder Cook again, this time we rode on a bus with our whole branch and our investigators to Okayama. We had 4 investigators come with us and we were stoaked. the two interesting kids, kaiami-kun and uchida-kun, sakamoto-san, and Jotani-san. we decided id hang out with the two kids and elder nuttall would work with jotani-san and sakamoto-san. so on the bus, the kids bust out their psp's. but these are like new and improved psp's that i had no idea even exsited. kaiami-kun was talking on skype and stuff from the bus on his little psp and i was freaking out. so yeah they're way funny. As i expected, during the actual meeting, they couldnt focus hardly at all. i tried my best to help them learn something but i wasnt able to do much. i planned on that from the beginning, but afterwards, they said it was fun and they'd come to eikaiwa again this week. so horay! they're funny kids.

Yup so that was our week. this transfer is going by fast.

hope everyone is genki and stuff.

love,

Elder Horton

pictures

1. LOOOL

Tsuyama week 3

OK

SO

Monday we had a pretty normal sit-around-and-do-nothing P-day. then after we had our family home evening with our lonely single adults. I shared Moroni 7:45-47 or where ever it is that talks about Charity and then we all did a practice activity where we all take a piece of paper, write your name on it, and pass it around and everyone draws part of your face and writes something nice about you or whatever. and it was actually really fun. ill post a picture of how my paper turned out. the nice things are all pretty boring and i dont know that anyone will be able to read them but the picture is worth it. I look like a scummy politician.

Then Tuesday was pretty normal and stuff. did a lot of housing before Eikaiwa. this week, only 4 people showed up for Eikaiwa, but we were able to give a much more organized lesson so it was pretty good anyways. guess there are going to be up and down weeks in tsuyama. tsuyama means 'port mountain.' haha that sentence is like one of those sentences that you see on those proof reading excersizes that are like "which of these sentences should be deleted?" completely kankei nai(not related). anyways.

Wednesday, we had a lesson with a less-active and stuff and then in the afternoon, we had our library service activity where we go and read english childrens books to some kids and their parents. I didnt think it would really turn out to anything to big but it was actually way good. afterwards, we got to talk to a lot of the parents and one lady said she wanted to come to church but then she remembered that she had to go to hyogo-ken this week. so hopefully we'll see her at the next time we do it and we can set up an appointment because she was way nice and seems to have interest. So thats actually a really good activity and we're way excited.

Thursday we helped a less active who has some mental issues move out of the hospital. she's an interesting one and likes to talk, but she really wants to go to the temple so in order to do so, shes going to work hard. and she calls us every morning for no apparent reason. then that night we had a lesson with one of our few investigators, Jotani-san. We taught him a two hour lesson about the plan of salvation and he taught us about a whole bunch of his confusing bhuddist beliefs. We were hoping to be able to baptize him this transfer, but it looks like it is going to take more time to work through some of his issues. but he reads the book of mormon and keeps commitments so we're happy. it was a really good lesson even if it did go way too long.

Friday, we had district meeting and after was a companion exchange with the Zone leaders. So Maesawa長老 and I worked in Okayama for the day and it was wayyy awesome. first we taught a lesson with their deaf investigator about the word of wisdom which was really interesting and frankly a bit awkward at times but it also went well. Hes going to try his best to stop drinking coffee from what i can tell. after that we had a lesson with one of their recent converts who was a way cool dude who also was having problems with the word of wisdom so we taught that again. then we went out to the streets and talked to people. there are a ton of people in okayama so it wasnt hard. but we seriously found the greatest investigator ever. he was this Chinese guy who's name is Ryou and he has been living in japan for 8 years while his wife has been in China. He was ridiculously nice and actually right there on the street asked us if there were any foods or anything he needed to stop eating in order to join our church. thats the first time ive heard that. but we taught him the word of wisdom and the Okayama elders will be meeting him on tuesday. He'll get baptized without a doubt. he was awesome. so we taught word of wisdom three times that day. Maesawa and I were way stoaked.

Saturday, we exchanged back, and then that night, Elder Nuttall and I went out with our super cool friend Iria who we met last week at the mall. It didnt turn into a lesson really at all though we did give him a book of mormon. we just went around visiting his various friends in cake shops and we ate some pretty delicious udon. hes really into Kendo so we might go out and see one of his matches and talk to people at the same time one of these nights. we dont know how much interest Iria has but he has a lot of a friends and a friend with a lot of friends is a good friend fo have for missionaries.

Then yesterday was also way good. throughout the week, we've been trying our best to invite everyone we talk to come to church. so on sunday, the members were cured of their flu's and were all at church. and then two pretty young guys- theyre around 14 years old- randomly showed up for sacrament meeting. So got them in a room and taught them a solid lesson about the restoration. They have a hard time focusing but they took books of mormon and said they had fun and would probly go to eikaiwa. they're pretty interesting but we're going to need permission from their parents in order to teach them more. So i dont really know. guess we'll find out. Then we had a lesson with Sakamoto-san who is the husband of one of our less-active members. that was also a prettty solid restoration message. so hopefully we'll be meeting with him more in the near future. Then lastly we had Family home evening with the Koyama family. we showed up and they fed us food, i ate crab for the first time it was aight. then, because it was fun the first time, we did the same charity activity and this time it was even funner! mostly because we were doing it with young people, but yeah it was way good.

goodness this was a long email, but we did a lot of stuff this week and it was a lot of fun.

i probly forgot some stuff too.

but hope everyones genko etc etc

Love,

Elder Horton

pictures

housing in tsuyama

Tsuyama week 2

Yeah yeah yeah so this week had some ups and downs i do suppose. Monday, actually during email last week, we got a call from one our members say he wanted to take us to see tsuyama's gundam. so we went and did that and you'll see from the pictures, that it was pretty legit. i know where to go to when Godzilla attacks tsuyama now. though really thats quite silly. godzilla would attack a much bigger city and one that was actually on the coast. not to mention that hes wouldnt like the cold here. but anyways, theres a big robot and its cool. then after P-day, we had our family-home-evening with the single adults in Tsuyama branch. that was pretty interesting. We shared a message, played a game, drew some pictures, ate some food, and i played a really awesome game of shogi with one of the members. I started off really strong and was beating him but then he started fighting like a freaking lion i swear. he just wouldnt go down. we actually ran out of time before we could finish but the activity was a good way to strengthen some of our members. next day, we headed over to Aeon mall for some "mall-dendo" (basically just talking to people at a mall). which is usually pretty hard for a lot of missionaries myself and elder nuttall included. something about starting casual conversations about the gospel in a mall is difficult. but we were actually able to do it pretty successfully that day. we had a 20 minute long conversation with this guy named Iria and he was way tight. we exchanged contact info and later that night, he mailed us saying he wanted to get some food sometime so we're going to meet him and his friend on saturday. We are a little worried that his plan is to take us to a bar to pick up some chicks or something but if thats the case, we'll turn it into a teaching oportunity. thats like the word of wisdom and law of chastity in one right there. we also talked to another cool cat by the name of Niki who said he was interested in eikaiwa and actually showed up that night for the class. from what ive hear, they usually have around 5-7 students at eikaiwa here, but on tuesday, for whatever reason, we had 10. and it was my first week and things were a little chaotic. i dont think we made a super great impression on some of the people who were coming for the first time, but hopefully they'll come again. Im not super worried about it.

Then wednesday up till saturday, the mission had its leadership training thing which i didnt go to but my companion did which meant that i was sent to an area called Kurashiki to hang out with two elders by the names of Elders Nakamura and McGuire. And actually I've done exchanges with Mcguire before since we were in the same district when i was in Kakogawa. I dont like Elder McGuire a whole lot. my previous exchanges with him were... rough for lack of a better word. but I was able to live through 3 days with him this time without doing anything too rash. though i did almost snap when he was explaining to me the science behind those stupid powerbalance bracelets. ooohhh. anyways i guess that means my patience has leveled up since my first transfer. so thats good and stuff. Friday night, though, one of Kurashiki's awesome members took us out to visit lessactives and then to this awesome all-you-can-eat yakiniku place and it was insanely delicious and i almost died i ate so much. then on saturday, we went with a bunch of our eikaiwa students to another all-you-can-eat yaki-niku place! and i ate so much i almost died again. That whole thing was planned by one of our investigators, Joutani-san and it was good to be able to meet and talk with him.

Then yesterday wasnt super great. the flu is apparently going around in Tsuyama and there was hardly anyone at church. maybe 10-15 people. and after church we went around and visited various less-actives and potential investigators and all of our visits just didnt quite work out as we had hoped. it was a bit of a bummer. but next week is a new week and im excited it should be a good one.

sorry this email is a bit long. sometimes i have to stop myself from typing unnecessary things. sometimes i type them anyways.

hope everyone is genki!

love,

Elder Horton

ホートン長老

写真

１。ガンダム

Transferred to Tsuyama

Yup I'm now residing in a very cold area by the name of tsuyama. President said in interviews that he was going to send me to a bigger area where i could see more lessons and whatnot. the area is definitely bigger. not really so much in the way of being more urban like i thought he meant. land mass didnt seem like the topic of that conversation. But Tsuyama is more urban than Ako. But we definitely don't seem to be seeing more lessons here. They didnt find one investigator last transfer so we are already doing a lot of finding. So i guess president had a change of heart or forgot about me. But actually, I'm quite happy about it. One of my MTC teachers, Bishoff-sensei served here for like 6 months and he told us some things about here while i was in the MTC. that and my good friend Elder Burhoe served here for 3 transfers before he went to Himeji so ive heard a lot of stuff about the place. Its not the greatest area, but im really quite happy to be here. unlike my last area, i wouldnt mind staying here for 3 or 4 transfers i think. But yeah it is very cold. yesterday i got to experience my nose hairs freezing which brought me back to my winter at BYU. 'cept at that time, i had a mustache which froze too. And this city is waaayyyy spread out. theres about 100,000 people living here from what one of the members here told me, but there arent really any big building or places people gather because everything is so far away. So it makes talking to people a little difficult. There isnt a ward here, its another branch with around 30-35 people coming to church. but the members are all really nice. its not the greatest area. aparently most missionaries before me havent liked it, but i think its good.

My new companion is a Elder Nuttall. I dont have a lot of time so ill just say he's kind of like a spiritual version of Jon VanWagonen. He keeps life interesting and its pretty relaxing to have a companion who i can speak english to. But ill miss Hasegawa. we had a lot of good times.

So as for what happened this week, we didnt do much other than look for people and introduce me to various members and less actives we visit. Saturday, we had a Nabe party where we got to eat some pretty tasty food and yesterday, we visited the hittori family. they have two kids at home who are both returned missionaries so they were fun to talk to. it was a fun visit and we actually ate good food.

again, I'm pretty short on time so i may have to cut it here. Tsuyama is pretty cool and way cold. im excited to be here though. You'll here more from future emails i guess. hope im not forgetting anything too important...

hope youre all genki

love,

Elder Horton