Email #33      June 8, 2015

Dearest Family and Friends,

This has been a crazy day so it'll probably be a shorter email this
week. I'm transferring! After only one transfer in Oyama, they are
closing our area and I am going to the mission home to be tech staff.
I have absolutely no idea why they made me tech staff because I both
have no desire to learn about computers and don't know anything about
them, but it will be a blast! I'll live with 4 other Elders including
the assistants and Elder Yoshino, my favorite guy ever from my zone in
Sanjo. I will learn a lot from all of them and it will be an awesome
experience, I'm excited! My new companion's name is Elder Alder, he
was Elder Nielson's companion and I've heard nothing but good things
about him. I'm a little bummed that I won't get to work with our
investigators here in Oyama anymore and that I won't get to know the
members as well as I would like to, but I am really excited to go to
Tokyo and have the opportunity to live and work there. This week went
really well. We had some good lessons and our investigators are all
doing really well. We played ping pong and taught Hyuuma on Wednesday,
the first college student we found who has been a referral machine for
us. We didn't set good expectations to teach him when we found him,
but we taught him the restoration and it went really well. He has
interest! He asked really good questions and said we could keep
teaching him. On Thursday, we had an awesome lesson with Kei. We had a
lesson scheduled but he cancelled right before we pulled up. We didn't
see his text and got there right as he was living with his friends,
but he said we could teach him a quick lesson so he grabbed his three
friends and they went in his apartment and we taught them all. We
showed them the Because of Him video, it went really well. One of his
friends has really good potential. On Friday, we had a fun music
festival and I sang a song with Daiki, another awesome college student
with really good potential. On Saturday we had stake conference in
Kiryu. It was awesome. After, we went home with Nakai Kyoudai. We got
to Oyama at around 9:20, and he asked us if we wanted to eat. We said
yes because we were fasting tomorrow, but we thought he meant it in
the are you hungry sense. He said we should eat out, and we agreed
because he asked us where we wanted to go. We said McDonalds so we
could make it back on time but he said he didn't want to eat there. We
ended up eating out at a steak and hamburg restaurant and got home at
10:20! The food was really good and it was super nice of Nakai Kyoudai
but the feeling of being wonp (not following the rules) sucked. We
felt so bad. Never again! On Sunday we had stake conference again and
Minagawa came. It went really well, the talks were awesome. I didn't
understand them at all, but Elder Shimoji translated them for me
afterwards. We had a bye bye party for Elder Shimoji and Sister Nitta
that night that went really well. We had three investigators come and
Elder Shimoji bore his testimony. It was at the Adachi's house,
they're the best. I'm going to miss them! That was this week, today
has been good too. We went out to eat with Matsunuma and Kawaguchi
Kyoudai at Stamina Taro, this all you can eat meat place. It was good!
I'm going to miss the members here! Please pray that our investigators
will keep meeting with Elder Crosby and his new companion! Love you
all, have a great week! I'll email you from Tokyo next week!

Love,
Elder Calhoun

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1) My main man Hyuuma
2) Ueki, another college student who loves One Direction and is way
chill. We went and had thai food with him
3) the fattest cat ever. He belongs to a member and is also crosseyed
4) the bye bye party! Brother Adachi, the most genuinely kind man
ever, and Kamishima Kyoudai in the back
5) Nakai Kyoudai and the wompsack dinner

Love you all, have a fantastic week!

Email #32     June 2, 2015

Dearest Family and Friends,

Sit down and buckle up because this is going to be a long one. This week was jam packed with crazy stuff, it was one of the best of my mission. On Tuesday, I went on exchanges with Elder Crosby. We went out to visit some members and potential investigators and ended up biking for a long time, like 3 or 4 hours total. We ended up talking to all the people we wanted to though and talked to quite a few people along the way. That night, we met with one of their investigators named Shun. He speaks really good English and is absolutely obsessed with Owl City. Like literally his whole world revolves around Adam Young, the main guy. Owl City had a concert here in Tokyo on Thursday and he figured out where they were staying and which train they would take and stuff, it was pretty impressive. He wanted to test his english to make sure Adam could understand him when he saw him. We had a lesson about prayer and being happy no matter what would happen. He ended up waiting at the back entrance of the Owl City guy's hotel and it worked. Powerful. On Wednesday, we had a really good district meeting and learned about studying and Japanese and feeling the Spirit and all sorts of good stuff. Later that day we went and visited one of our investigators, Kubota San. He does not have a happy life. He has two kids and is married but his apartment is a wreck and his teeth are destroyed from smoking and who knows what else. He just looks ravaged. He came out in his wife's v neck and it was way too small on him. The gospel will bring so much peace and happiness to his life. Teaching him is really hard though because he always has his kids with him and they are loud and distracting and we're just standing outside his apartment. We're trying to teach better lessons with him and get him to come to church. On Thursday, we had a blitz up in Utsunomia, the biggest city in our zone and in our prefecture (kind of like a Japanese state) but with not a lot of investigators. We ate and then went on exchanges to blitz there and find some more investigators for the missionaries there. I ended up with Elder Amado, who was in the MTC at the same time as me, we're the same transfer! He's the man, he's from Peru and speaks English super well and is a convert of 3 years and is 26 and has already graduated from college. It was super fun to dendo with him. We just went for it and the first four people we talked to accepted a Book of Mormon. We only had four on us so we passed out pamphlets until time was up. It was really awesome. We testified about the Book of Mormon to each person and they accepted. It was super cool. We both had no idea what we were doing but it was a blast. I'll include some pictures from the day. That night we went to Ooki Kyoudai's house and had curry with him. We ate on his ping pong table. The curry was so watery but it was still good. He taught me how to box afterward, he used to be a collegiate boxer. He's such a funny guy. We have chorus every Friday and we sing "Take Me Home, Country Roads" every week and he can't pronounce half the words. It's hilarious. After that, we went and ate donuts with a member, Brother Watanabe. I love him, he's so awesome. On Friday, we had our last interviews with President Budge! Scary. This transfer ends next week, and next transfer we get our new Mission President. Exciting but scary! I really love President Budge. The more I have gotten to know him, the more I love and respect and appreciate him. My interview was awesome. We just talked about faith and love and lots of good stuff. I asked him how I could improve and he was so nice, he just said to look forward to the rest of my mission and realize that "the best is yet to be." It was so comforting and really nice of him, especially because there are lots of things I could be doing better. We had weekly planning later and then went out to eat with Kei Yamanaka. Last week or two weeks ago I called him Yamanaka San, but he asked us to call him Kei. He's the man, he seriously is. He is progressing so quickly and understanding so well and such a good guy. I really, really like him. Please pray for him and that he can keep progressing and receive an answer to the Book of Mormon's truth. Anyway, we ate with him Friday night, we were going to eat ramen but the place was closed so we went to Sukia, this gnarly kind of fast food chain. Google it! After that, he came to church for a second and we talked about what would happen on Sunday. Friday night we had ping pong and chorus, and two new Eikaiwa students Elder Shimoji found on exchanges came. One said he was really good but he wasn't. So disappointing. I'm honestly not even that good at ping ping but I've never had someone better than me come to ping ping night. Some day. We gave them each a Book of Mormon after chorus and one of them could have interest. On Saturday, we had a baptism! One of the sister's investigators got baptized. It was good. Later that day, we meet with a potential investigator named Ueki and taught him about the restoration. It went well, hopefully we'll be able to meet him again! We also had a lesson with Arnaldo. We set a new baptismal date and talked about getting a blessing in order to stop smoking. Elder Shimoji and I started feeling a little sick on Saturday, but still went for ramen because it was closed on Friday. It was good. Sunday was awesome, except Elder Shimoji and I got sick. I rocked a surgeon's mask for the first time. But we had four people come to church! We would have six but two came late and didn't count. Kei came and brought a friend! It was legit. After sacrament meeting, we had some members talk to Kei and his buddy to become friends with them. After church, we taught Arnaldo. He had a bunch of questions about olive oil. It went well. We slept after church because Elder Shimoji had a fever and we were both feeling awful. I gave my first blessing! It was a cool experience. That night, we went to the Bishop's house with an investigator, Minagawa. It went really well. The last lesson we taught him did not go well, he is super shy and doesn't have a whole ton of interest and last lesson was too much. After dinner, Yanada Shimai asked us why we became missionaries and it turned into a testimony meeting. It was really good, it wasn't too strong and the Spirit was super strong. He committed to come to church! On Monday, nothing super crazy happened. We were both still feeling pretty out of it so we did some planning for the rest of the week and visited some members. We also visited Jared, a 14 year old investigator from Peru. His mom is investigating too, and his grandparents are members here in the ward. Recently, Jared hasn't been progressing because his grandpa is pushing him so hard to get baptized. Please pray that their relationship will strengthen so Jared will want to read and pray and can progress. Today, we went to the temple! It was awesome. We woke up at 5 and took a bullet train, it was sweet. It was so fast. My voice is completely shot, but I'm feeling a lot better. After the temple, we went to a restaurant called burgermania. It was really good, it felt good to have a good burger. I had this famous kind that all the missionaries love called the cherry burger. It had this cherry paste stuff that was super good. Elder Nielsen was also there, it was so good to see him and Elder Mobley and Elder Walker and all my buds from earlier. I love those guys! Going home was an adventure. Tokyo is crazy. People there are nuts. Girls wear some of the craziest stuff I've ever seen, like lace up converse platform shoes with like no joke a 6 to 8 inch platform. It's crazy. We also saw a guy drinking milk out of a water balloon. People are weird, but Tokyo is so cool. It's huge. The train stations are massive, I can't even believe it. On the way home, we took an earlier train that we were expecting and it followed the same route until we hit a fork, and it took the wrong one for us. We got off a few stops later but it added about an hour. Elder Shimoji and I were out, if felt really good. We got home and shopped then had family home evening. Kei was supposed to come, but he thought it was on Wednesday night, so he missed it! Bummer. All good though, we're meeting him tomorrow. It was an amazing week! Love you all, have a fantastic week! I'll email you on Monday! 

Love,

Elder Calhoun

My drink artsified. It's this weird soda that has jello in it.  I like it.

Me and Elder Amado toasting to an awesom blitz.

Tanaka Shimai.  She's so nice.  HEr husband is less active but she comes every week.

 Elder Shimoji doing him.

Where I'm getting my haircut on Monday.

Email #31       May 25, 2015

Dearest Family and Friends,

I am exhausted! This past week was awesome, I'll just give a quick recap of the past two weeks because I'm so wiped. The week before last was awesome, we taught a lot of lessons and had a lot of fun. Our investigators are doing well, we had a lesson with a new one named Yamanaka last week that went really well! We gave him a Book of Mormon when we found him, and he had read 15 pages between then and our first lesson! It was awesome. We're meeting him again tomorrow, but I'll be on exchanges so I won't see him. Last p day was amazing, Nikko was a blast. We then went to the BYU Wind symphony concert in Tokyo and I got to see a bunch of friends from the MTC and Sanjo. We have temple p day next Tuesday, so I won't email until then. It's going to be a blast, my first one! I think that is one of the times I feel most happy, just seeing my buddies. It reminds me of Alma 17:2 and 3: "...Alma did rejoice exceedingly to see his brethren; and what added more to his joy, they were still his brethren in the Lord; yea, and they had waxed strong in the knowledge of the truth; for they were men of a sound understanding and they had searched the scriptures diligently, that they might know the word of God. But this is not all; they had given themselves to much prayer, and fasting; therefore they had the spirit of prophecy, and the spirit of revelation, and when they taught, they taught with power and authority of God." It's so legit that we're brothers in the Lord, spreading His gospel together. I love those guys. This week also went really well, we taught a lot of lessons and found a couple cool people. Arnaldo had a cool experience this past week. He's been working on the Word of Wisdom lately and loved coffee. He drank it like water before we taught him the Word of Wisdom. Now, he hates it! It gives him a really bad stomach ache whenever he drinks it. Super cool. Now he just needs to stop smoking! On Saturday, we went to a mountain really early in the morning and dedicated Oyama for missionary work. It was a really cool experience. Today we woke up early and went to seminary and we were the only ones that showed up until the last 5 minutes! Reminds me of high school. It was a great week! Love you all, have a wonderful week and a day, talk to you on Tuesday!

Love,

Elder Calhoun

1) Me and Yamanaka, he's the man! After our lesson, our first one, he

gave us mango soda!

2) We went went and happy birthdayed a youth's house from the ward

3) There was this random guy with a ferret at Nikko, he was holding it

up so it could watch the parade. No idea why

Have a wonderful week!

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