Missionary Moments

Another month has flown by and it has now been nearly 4 months since Jakob left. he is certainly having some life changing and growth experiences. He also now also been transferred from his first area.... Here is a little of what he write over the past few weeks....

 On the 15th of July he wrote.....

It's been a good week. The weather has been really really hot, up until Saturday. It was about 1pm and we had just visited an investigator. We heard a few rumbles of thunder as we were riding to our next appointment. We had pretty far to go so didn't want to turn back home to pick up raincoats and stuff. It didn't seem too bad anyway. Then all of a sudden it hit us. A massive storm, lightning everywhere, the thunder was so loud, and the rain was like a constant stream and the wind blowing like crazy. We were completely drenched, the street partly flooded and it was like riding through a lake, the water up to my ankles almost. We kept going though, slowly. All this was so that we could pick up a DVD from the other Elders in the area next to ours. Thankfully it was worth it. The lesson we had that evening was really spiritual because of it, we progressed really far with one of our investigators. 

Sunday was a bit stormy too, but nothing like Saturday. My talk went alright. It wasn't too hard, my pronunciation is getting better all the time, and I could basically just read it out and only go out on a limb for a few things.

Talking about transfers, guess what? So, general rule is that you stay in the same area for your first two transfers, as you're training, and move out after that or one more. I'm getting transferred to Habikino, part of Osaka zone I think. My new companion will be ......Yoshida choro. Sounds Japanese, but he is only half, and didn't know the language before coming out....

We got another load of cereal this Sunday. Bought more milk today to compensate.

Oh, and Japanese people think Dad looks like Nicholas Cage, Aneika is amazing and Henry is good looking. That amused me. I like sharing photo's, and the Japanese love to look at them..... 

On the 22nd of July he wrote.....

Sounds like my prayers have been answered. I asked for Dad to get work, even if he'd have to travel far for it, as long as the family was okay. And that Aneika would find something productive, and that I would have a Trial to to test my faith.... Dad and Aneika have work and I'm in the new area way over my head, walking and working by faith every day....So I've immediately got the work load of a full missionary, on the sense of what's expected of me, I lost my last half of training :(.... Japanese are really patient. We kinda go through the wrote memorisation parts of the contact, then they say (something) back and we stand there smiling blankly at them, while our brains slowly process the information. It's maybe not all that bad, but yeah, a bit scary.

Elder Yoshida and I get along..... He's from Idaho.

New area isn't as nice. I kinda took Katsura for granted, thought I was going to be there 3 transfers. This one's smaller and a bit grungy. The apartment is a lot older and a bit dirty (or was before I cleaned it). However, the Chapel is 4 stories high...

I bought myself a fancy sports bag last Monday, so could carry that with me, that way all my luggage fit and there were no problems. I met a few of my douki (MTC group) mid transfer, it was good to see them again. It seems like almost half are being moved on, as our trainers are needed for the ever increasing intake of missionaries, or a being made ZL. 

I haven't eaten all the weetbix yet, maybe 2 or 3 boxes to go....