Japan 6 months 2 weeks-37

So want to hear a funny story? I thought that Thanksgiving was always on the Thursday of the third week in November, so I already celebrated Thanksgiving! I was so sure that Thanksgiving was last week so we celebrated it on Thursday November 21st. I got an amazing Thanksgiving package from my terrific mother with lots of American Thanksgiving foods that we made for dinner. We had a feast!  It was a lot of fun, but I remember thinking that it doesn't feel like Thanksgiving. Not because I wasn't with my family or in America, but because it felt early. Well it was. A week early. That is okay though! I get two Thanksgivings now! 

Thanksgiving Week Updates-

This week we found a ton of new people. My first transfer in Tomakomai we only found one person who actually had interest. Just this week we found 5 new people with interest and we are teaching them! Tomakomai is an interesting place because I think only single mothers with children are allowed to live here. All of our current investigators are women, and the new ones we found are women as well. Well here is how we found them.

Sato san is a funny old lady with a blind lazy eye. We found her pretty late at night when we pinged her house. We talked about God and she said we could come back. We came back and taught her prayer and she said she is going to try it on her own! She is a really funny old lady from Kraft? Craft? It is an island in Hokkaido that used to be apart of Japan, but now Russia owns it.

Okabe san. She is a younger mom. I didn't find her. We were on splits with the Zone leaders this week and she was found at that time. They pinged her door and she just talked to them through the voice box thing. She didn't even come to the door. She said she was way busy and can't talk. They asked if we could come back and she said yes. Well we came back and turns out she does have interest she really was just busy. Most of the time when people tell us they are busy it is just a lie for ' I have no interest ' but she was serious and we gave her a Book of Mormon. 

Komata san. She is already an investigator, but this week her daughter turned 8 so she became a new investigator. Her daughter is amazing. We teach the mom (Komata san) but her daughter has the most interest. We gave them a Book of Mormon as well and the next time we visited them Komata san said that her daughter has been reading it every day and taking it everywhere she goes with her and telling all of her friends about it. I am excited for them. 

Doi san. She is a really skinny quiet mom. We taught her prayer. Throughout the entire lesson I think she said a total of 5 words. It was really funny. I would laugh and she would just stare at me. She is listening, but I am not exactly sure if she has interest yet. We will see. 

Shimizu San. She is actually an English Class student. So this week after Eikaiwai (english class) we were eating food when Shimizu san came up to me and said, 'Mecham Choro! You have a zit on your face! Look at you! You are so young!' I told her sorry that I am still a child and get zits sometimes. She then said 'You can't even drink yet! But you have been drinking before right?' 'Nope. Never' 'It's okay you can tell me. Just a little beer? I won't tell anyone.' Then out of nowhere a new student just jumped in the conversation and said 'NO! THE MORMONS REALLY DON'T DRINK' He hates it because he is a bartender. Well this lead into a discussion about our beliefs and why we do the things we do and turns out Shimizu san has interest. So I would encourage all of you to show off your zits, because you never know when they will help you share the gospel.  But really though you never know when you will have the opportunity to stand up for what you believe. I got an email from my fantastic friend in Germany #Schwartzenberg (The spell check for that is Schwarzenegger) She told me a story about how just by wearing her missionary name tag she was able to share this amazing message with another person. It's so true. You never know when or where it will happen, but there are always people who will want to hear. Just be ready for it! 

This week we were really busy meeting with new people and making appointments with them for this next week. I am SO excited to report about this next week. The real Thanksgiving week. It is going to be a lot of fun. I love you all so much. Be excellent to each other! 

Japan 6 months 1 week-36

We fed ducks at this pond and then the crows came and tried to eat us. 

They followed us... 

It was cold so we got ice cream. 

Selfie. 

A slide I went down this week.
So this week we had splits with the Muroran Elders. They are in an area that is about 45 minutes away by a fast train. In their area they had 4 inches of snow fall in one day, while here we have no snow and it is just cold and windy. I went on split with Elder Lee. The funny part of that day was when we went to go visit Nakao san. Nakao san hasn't been able to make any friends since moving to Tomakomai last year. She tells us almost every time that she really wants to make friends but doesn't know how. We tell her that if she comes to church she will make TONS of friends, but she never came. So we brought a member with us. Kotani Shimai is the one that takes us everywhere and buys us everything. She loves the missionaries almost too much. Well we went to go teach Nakao san with Kotani Shimai. The first thing Kotani Shimai does when she sees Nakao san is say, "we are friends now. I love you." Well.. It was definitely a bold way of becoming friends. Somehow I think it worked and right before we left Kotani Shimai ran up and hugged Nakao san before we left. Hugging is not normal for Japanese people. I even got a little freaked out. It was an attack not a hug. BUT the awesome part was it was exactly what Nakao san needed. 

The day before this we went out to lunch with Kotani Shimai, her friend and Tamori Shimai. Tamori shimai is a less active member and did not want the missionaries visiting her. Kotani Shimai somehow worked her magic and scheduled a lunch with all of us. We went out to eat literally a 20 second walk away from Tamori Shimai's apartment. The food was taking forever to cook so we had a lot of time to talk. Kotani Shimai just sat there and Kotani Shimai's friend did a lot of talking. She would ask us the weirdest questions and say the weirdest things. Tamori Shimai was the reason we were there and she kinda just zoned out for a bit and sat there. We eventually we able to get us all talking about something we all liked, food. Tamori Shimai was talking a lot and it was really good. Then out of nowhere Kotani Shimai says, "Oh yeah! When we used to work together making underwear!".... It was quiet for about 20 seconds then Kotani Shimai's friend said, "Yeah... Isn't that a little weird to say..." It totally made the day for Tamori Shimai. She thought it was so funny. Kotani Shimai's crazy attitude saved us once again. 

There were a lot of little 'crazy' things that happened this week that turned out to be exactly what we needed. But I learned something really awesome yesterday that helped me understand why we had these 'crazy things' #challenges happen so much. We were talking about missionary work at church and a return missionary in the ward said, " If you want your mission to be easy, don't work hard. If you work hard it shows you want to improve, you want to be more like Christ. When you work hard you get trials and you work through those trials. That is when you feel the most joy." This is so true. Lately missionary work has been a little rough for me. I felt like I wasn't fully there or what I was trying to say wasn't coming out right. I blamed it on my Japanese and kinda slacked off for a little bit. Then I kicked right back in and changed my mind. It was really hard to work through it and to get over myself. It didn't make everything easier or funner, but it made it worth it. Then I was happy. 

I love you all so much. I hope you have a great week. Be excellent to each other! 

-Mecham Choro. 

Japan 6 months-35 weeks

We went to the Ainu Village. It is the first people who lived in Hokkaido 

Baby face----This time they gave us a big spoon. 

We fed bears last monday for P-day

Too Good

This is what happened while we tried to walk to church in the morning. 

This week was full of a lot of miracles. We started the week with a lot of less active members that we wanted to visit. I have tried to visit them before when I was here with Tokuzawa Choro, but they were never home. Well this was the week we met all of them! My favorite was Iwai Shimai. She is a blind old lady with crazy hair. She really looks like a witch. When we visited her she was sooo excited that we came. She hasn't had a visit from the missionaries in over 5 years. She had this funny attitude about it though. She just kept asking why we haven't came over earlier. It was really funny. When we were about to leave we read the Book of Mormon to her because she can't see. It was amazing to see it calm her down as we read it. The whole time we were talking to her she was moving around and scratching her eyes, but when we read the Book of Mormon with her she calmed down, sat still, and listened. She then said thank you and said we have to come back soon. I am excited to visit her again.  

So the craziest stuff happened this weekend. On Saturday we had 2 member lessons. One with Masuko san and one with Chiba san. Before all of our lessons that day we had a goal to make baptismal dates with all of them. Well we did our best and invited them all, but they dropped the muri bomb on us. (they said it was muri which means impossible) But the amazing part was in Masuko sans lesson she said that her husband is working on Sunday so she can come to Church! Next was Chiba san. At Chiba sans lesson we planned to teach The Plan of Salvation. It started with The Atonement, moved to eternal families, then the spirit and then prayer. It was one of the craziest ways I have ever made an investigator pray. We didn't want to pressure her, but we really wanted her to pray. The member team ups said what if one of us prays first and then you try? That is a tool that we use often, but this time one of the other members said, YEAH! All of us will pray one at a time and then you pray last. There were 5 of us in the room. It started with my companion Elder Galeria, then me, then Chiba San's daughter, then Kotani Shimai, then Chiba san. After all of us said our prayers and it got to Chiba san it was quiet. We probably sat is silence for 2 minutes doing nothing. Then out of nowhere Kotani Shimai says 'Chiba san, go' Then she prayed. It was a one sentence prayer and I didn't even understand what she said, but she prayed! It was a huge miracle. 

Next we went to go visit a referral who ended up not being home. We decided that because we were close we should go visit Mizumasa san. When haven't met with her in a long time because she has been so busy lately so we had the intentions to just say hi and schedule an appointment with her. Well it turned into a long lesson about baptism and she said that she wants to get baptized but it is just really hard to quit alcohol and coffee. But she said that she is going to be coming to church on Sunday. 

Sunday was the craziest Sunday so far. It started with Typhoon number 3. We decided to walk to church because our bikes would blow away. We thought that nobody was going to show up to church because of how bad the weather was. When we got to church we saw Chiba san there. We then saw Ikeda Shimai who told us that Masuko san was on her way to church when she got in a car wreck. hahahaha of course. We felt so bad. She was totally fine, and when we texted her (cause we are not allowed to call her or her husband will murder us) she said that she is just embarrassed and will try to come to church the next time she can. Halfway through church Mizumasa san showed up! She was able to make it to sacrament meeting. It was so awesome to have all of them there. After church we had one of the scariest lessons ever. It was forced by a member, Tanaka Kyodai. He basically dragged Mizumasa san and us into the primary room and sat us all down and the first thing he said was, How is alcohol? Are you drinking? It was so awkward. We tried to hard to stop him from interrogating her, but he would just keep going. He stopped after 15 minutes and looked at us and said did you have anything you wanted to say? We said sorry for this crazy lesson. Mizumasa san was so nice about it and said that she knows how it was all out of good intentions. She said that she is going to come to church as much as she can this month. 

It was a crazy week full of a lot of miracles. My companion is working me so hard. I am getting so tired, but it is helping me out so much! I love you all! Be excellent to each other! 

-Mecham Choro 

Japan 5 months 4 weeks-34

Ladies and Gentlemen, Brothers and Sisters, Young and Old, Fat and Fatter, we had Transfers! I am still in Tomakomai, BUT I have a new companion. First sad news because it makes the crazy news sound so much better. This is my first American companion :( He is from Thousand Oaks, California. (Yes where the rich people live) Now the crazy news. The transfer before this transfer he was in the mission home because he was assistant to the president. Yeah... that means that I am horrible missionary so they felt like they needed to send me an incredibly strict companion. He has made many people cry. HAHAHA! I am too excited. His name is Elder Galeria. His first area was Tomakomai and his last area is going to be Tomakomai because he is going home very soon #expirationdate That is the exciting news of the week. I am also very low on time again because we are going to a crazy fish festival in 20 minutes. I also forgot the cord to upload pictures so if you only wanted to see pictures and not read an email please forgive me. 

This week was a lot of fun. I got to go back to Sapporo for Stake Conference on Saturday. When I first got to Japan it was Stake Conference. This means that I have been in Japan for exactly 6 months. Too crazy. Okay Two stories

ONE: Wednesday was my last day with Tokuzawa Choro and his last day in Tomakomai before he transferred on Thursday. We wanted to visit as many people as possible, but a lot of the people we wanted to visit were not home. We went to 3 members on the east side of the city and they weren't home so we went back to the mall to pick up something that Tokuzawa Choro needed before he left. When we were there we were talking about how we really wanted to say goodbye to Masuko San before Tokuzawa Choro transferred but that it is not going to happen because her husband won't let us visit her and she had work that day too. Right then we were about to leave when we saw Masuko San at the mall! It was awesome. She was so excited to see us. It was a little thing, but these little things mean a lot and have helped Masuko san and us so much. 

TWO: Yesterday we visited the Saito Couple. They are amazing. The husband was baptized in 2008 and 2 moths later they went to the temple. 6 moths after that they went on a mission. As soon as they finished their mission the husband got really sick and now is in a wheelchair, and can't make it to church anymore. They told us about how they want to do SO much but they can't because their bodies won't let them. I felt just like them. There was SO much I wanted to say to them and SO much I wanted to be able to do, but I just can't do it yet. We began talking and they said that we just need to do our best with what we have right now. Of course we have goals to help us progress, but we have to do our best with what we can do before we try to do something we can't. That was a great reminder. Right after we went and housed. I tried the things I new and I found myself learning new things and Japanese was flying everywhere. I ended up talking to this one lady for 25 minutes about service and I have no idea where the words I said came from. I learned to not be scared, but just try. Plus is it way funny when we mess up. My companion is doing a GREAT job at laughing when I mess up. I could choose to be upset or laugh too. Laughing is just a lot easier and so much more fun. This transfer is going to be amazing. We have already seen a lot of miracles and I know more are going to come! Sorry I am low on time again and I forgot pictures, but next week will have great pictures. Be excellent to each other. 

LOVE YOU. 

Mecham. 

Japan 5 months 3 weeks-33

BAHAHHA

Ninja town! 

Ninja 1

Ninja 2

#noguso the right way to poop

Cats eating humans

Oh yeah we had a halloween party too.. We were zombies. 

I attempted to be a zombie for the party. I used markers hahahah it failed. 

i dont understand either. 

JENALYN please tell me you know what is in the background. Oh and dad we stole your doughnut idea. Thank you. 

kau ga nashi (no face)

It was otsuka shimai. She is the most recent convert. Baptized in May. She is 22 and sooo funny. 

otsuka shimai winning best costume. 

Masuko san!  She gave us melon bread after! She is the shortest one. 

Ikeda Family
I love them so much. The branch president is James Snow. Laughs just like him.

This is normal. Weekly Planning
This week was a lot of fun. Exactly a week ago (last Monday) after doing emails we went to an ancient Ninja Castle where we watched Ninja's fight and cats eat humans. It was like being at Disney Land but Ninja style. It was a lot of fun. But instead of talking about that you can just look at the pictures. 

In total (including members) we only met with people 3 times this week. (2 out of the 3 were members) We have been doing SO much finding lately. Something I don't exactly love. Obviously I need to be learning more humility. I could talk all about our finding but really it is super boring. We bike to a spot that looks good, park our bikes, ping a door 'kekko desu' 'iranai' (I'm good. Don't need it) and then leave to another spot. We only taught one lesson this week and it was our last contact yesterday. 

The first group of people we met with this week were the Takahashi Family. (The oldies) there are two Takahashi families and one of them are the Grandparents. We went and visited　the grandparents. When we pinged their door the first thing they said when they saw us was 'why? What do you want?' Hahahah needless to say our visit was a little awkward. They felt obligated to feed us, even though we said we just wanted to talk about doing missionary work. That said that doing missionary work is harder than making food for us so they made food for us instead. We tried SO hard to talk about ways they can share the gospel, but Takahashi Grandpa just kept talking about dead people and how he had his finger cut off for being bad. 

The next group of people we met with was actually a lesson. It was a lesson with Masuko san. It was one of the best lessons we have ever done. Masuko san has heard all of the lessons many times and does not know what to do next. She needs more faith and a strong testimony so we spent a whole lesson talking about faith. We had the help of two sisters in the branch team up with us and it was so powerful. They were able to help explain to Masuko san that through faith she can do anything. Masuko san really wants to know which church is right and really wants to be able to come to church (she cant because her husband is way against it) but during the lesson something clicked for her. She asked us why she always cries when she reads a certain story. Immediately one of the sisters said 'because you understand the spirit' Masuko san then began to cry and said, 'really? So I do have a testimony?' It was a huge step for her. She even sent us a text later that night thanking us for one of the greatest days she has had and from now on she is going to do her best to come closer to God. The thing I learned from this lesson is that in order to invite some one to where you are you first need to be where you want them to be. As I was testifying I felt my own testimony getting stronger and by doing that Masuko san had her testimony grow as well. 

The last group of people we met with was the Ikeda family. They are perfect. They need to be exalted right now. It is the branch president and his wife's family. They had us over at their house last night for dinner. It was some of the best tempura I have ever had. After we ate we shared a message on how to do missionary work. It turned into the Branch President talking for 20 minutes but we were totally fine with that! He did a great job and the lesson ended with us singing 'Because I have been Given Much' and the whole family crying. #success 

This week we did a lot of waiting as well. We had another Typhoon so we went to the mall to try and talk to people, but it failed. But that is when I learned if we are working our hardest God is too. Yesterday we met a kid named Tsuburai kun. He is 16 years old and happened to be friends of two of the Ikeda family kids. We taught him about God and prayer and he said that he really wants to learn more. It took us a whole week to find one person to talk to, but all of our hard work paid off. I love you all very much.

Be excellent to each other!

Mecham Choro. 

japan 5 months 2 weeks-32

Wow I am just still sooooo cool.. 

Yummy. This is what happens when it rains. 

I have no idea what this is but my companion wanted a picture with it so I kissed it. 

Incredible. 

the sister we are going on an adventure with today. 

Going to go out as slender man! 

The Elder I went on splits with and the guy I contacted in the background.

Minasan Konichiwa! Genki? I only have like 10 minutes because we are going to a castle with a member soon. At the castle we are going to learn how to be ninja assassins. Needless to say I am freaking out. So I will quickly update on this week. 
So this last wednesday we had a typhoon. It was like a hurricane before puberty. We were on splits that day with the Zone Leaders so it was my first time in a long time being with and American companion. We were trying to plan what to do that day because we couldn't really go out and bike because we would get blown away. I tried to use an umbrella and the send I walked outside it broke. So we called a member and asked us if he could take us to the mall! I mean what else would you do as a teenager on a rainy day? We got to the mall at about 1:00 and decided we were going to find people to talk to until 5:00. I was lucky because I was with another American so we really stood out. There were almost too many girls that kept waving to us like we have been friends our whole life. WHAT?! "You don't even go here!" Well we were trying to talk to people but they almost got scared of us because we are American and taller than they are. That is when we decided to go to Starbucks. We got hot chocolates and sat down next to this College student. We tried so hard to pretend like we weren't sitting next to him JUST to talk to him, but we were really bad at it. I even took a picture of him hahaha. Well we contacted him and talked about taking pictures and of course America. We talked to him for about 30 minutes and when we brought up God he said that it is better not to know if God exists. Well that ended our conversation pretty quickly. We then invited him to English Class and he said he would come! He will change. We then realized we were running out of money so we realized that we couldn't really go into stores with the intentions to buy anything. We went into this one store and started to look for people when a worker came up to talk to us. This is when we had our genius idea. Contact all of the workers! They can't avoid you so why not just talk to them? We would first ask about their store to see if they had anything. We had a one up here because the Elder I was with at the time was extremely tall so we would ask for sizes and they said they don't have them in his size. They would feel bad so we would begin to ask them questions about their lives because they felt bad that they had to turn us down. It was awesome! We were basically selling to salesmen. We were talking to this one guy who worked in a Crocs shop (which by they way are out of control in Japan) and he said he was Christian. He said he really wants to learn more about Christ and would love to meet with us. Then his boss came out and he got awkward so we hurried and gave him a flyer and had to leave because we were getting in trouble. We did this for 3 more hours and talked to so many people! It was amazing. I learned from what happened two weeks ago when we had many opportunities but did not take them. This week we really took every opportunity. We talked to EVERYONE we saw. I mean EVERYONE. Even a man/lady thing that I still don't know if it was even human. It made this week so much more fun too. Although we didn't see much success with finding people, we had so much fun doing it. I realized that when life does suck and you think you aren't seeing the success you are working for, or when you feel like you are working towards nothing, these are the times when you have the most fun. When we beyond tired at night from working so hard during the day, these were the best feelings I could ever ask for. As long as my will is in harmony with God's will, everything will be all right. 
Love you all so much! Look forward to great pictures next week! Be excellent to each other! 
ミカム長老　Elder Jake Snow Mecham.

Japan 5 months 1 week-31 weeks

This week was easily the most unsuccessful week on my mission so far. Yes I said it, I said it and I meant it. There were SO many "things" that fell through.  

On Monday we dendo-ed (did missionary work) like normal for the 3 hours of dendo we had. 

Tuesday is the day we get on a train at 7 in the morning to go to the city about an hour and a half away for our district training meeting. We had the meeting and then it was time for us to come back to Tomakomai. The Muroran Elders were coming back with us as well because we were going on splits with them the next day. Well the first "thing" that happened was that we missed our train. We were stuck in the Eki (train-station, please forgive my engrish. It just happens) for about 45 minutes waiting for the next train. This was a great opportunity to do some Shizen Dendo (naturally talking to people? I think that is what it means) BUT we did not take the opportunity. Instead we complained about how we wasted time and we are stuck waiting for the next train. I felt like I needed to be doing something so I started to stare at people. Americans have a special power in Japan. Japanese people are ALWAYS staring at americans and they are so bad at pretending they are not. But if an American stares at a Japanese person it is probably the craziest and most exciting thing that will ever happen in their life. So I started staring at people. I think I scared them because I was angry but this one guy came and sat next to me. That was already extremely rare and brave of him because Japanese people are very afraid of Americans #segregation Well I was a loser and did not take the opportunity to talk to him. I slept instead. 

Wednesday. It rained the whole day and we had no bikes. We walked 6 miles that day and talked to 12 people. I felt like it was the most pointless day of my mission. We had the opportunity to change our plans and visit nearby members and dendo nearby because we didnt have our bikes. Instead we chose to walk miles and talk to nobody. 

Thursday. Every single appointment we had scheduled fell through. We met with nobody that day. We had the opportunity to try nearby potential investigators or to go housing near their areas, but instead we just traveled to the next spot.

Friday. It was basically a typhoon here. There was so much rain and so much wind. I didn't have a hood for my rain jacket so we went to a nearby sports store to try and buy one. While we were looking for one there were a lot of people staring at me and I could tell there were people I should be talking to. I had the opportunity to talk to this one guy, but I got scared and walked away. I bought the hood that makes me look like I am wearing a cape and part of a freaky cult and we walked outside to no rain. 

Saturday was general conference. This was the most powerful general conference I have ever watched. It had the potential to be the worst General conference ever. First we walked into a room with more empty rows of chairs than people. The TV screen was tiny. The room was empty. There was this one set of headphones on this sad looking chair that was designated just for my english listening ears. A member got up and started the DVD. At that point I realized how much time I wasted this week. I realized how many opportunities I was given, but not taken. I said a quick prayer asking for help to change my attitude and to learn as much as I can by watching conference. The music started and I started to shake. This happened to me once before on the mission. Right before I came to Japan, the Japanese missionaries sang a song and it was so powerful that it even made me shake. ( I thought I was having a seizure. It was scary) I looked sooo weird. I was shaking in my chair like I had some animal attacking my legs and everybody in the room was watching me. I eventually calmed down and then the talks started. Every thing that was said was exactly what I needed to hear. Ironically enough my favorite talk was by Elder Bednar about Tithing. (Something missionaries don't even do while on missions) I will never forget that feeling I had as I realized that because of my change of attitude I am learning so much more. 

The biggest thing I learned this week is that EVERYTHING we have is for a reason. Every opportunity we have whether it may seem good or bad, is for our benefit. There were so many times this week where bad "things" happened, but in reality those were just amazing opportunities to talk to people we don't usually talk to. God really does answer our prayers. They are answered in His way and His timing for our benefit. 

To end on a great note I am going to share what happened yesterday. 

Sunday. We were housing and we ping-ed a door and heard dogs barking. I usually don't get scared because all Japanese dogs are small and ugly. Well.... the lady came to the door and opened it and a tiny dog comes running outside. I scream like a girl and it bit my companion Tokuzawa Choro on the hand. I started laughing and then it bit his leg and tore a piece off from his pants. By now I was dying with laughter. The daughter got the dog inside and the mom came out. "Sorry about my dog. But I have no interest. Leave" She shut the door. HAHAHA we were literally attacked by a rat/dog and then told to leave. I have a great gift given to me by my wonderful mother that whenever something incredibly horrible happens, I laugh. I was laughing the whole night. We didn't see any success that whole night, BUT we had a lot of fun. 

Love you all! Be excellent to each other! 

Jake Snow Mecham Choro. 

#longestemailyet #yolo #followme #artsy #instawin