So:
1) We all got a new investigator this week. Our previous two investigators (who I guess we're still teaching) were our teachers acting as investigators, and this new investigator is a different missionary from our district. So each companionship teaches a different companionship, with one person acting as an investigator and one acting as a member friend. So each companionship both teaches a companionship and gets taught by a different companionship. Hopefully that makes sense.
Anyway, Eadie-choro is the investigator in our companionship, and he worked out exactly who he was going to play as and what kind of investigator he was going to be (he based it off a real person), but I, on the other hand, totally forgot. So, we're sitting in our first lesson, and after the missionaries got to know the investigator, they turned to me and asked for my name.
At this point, I panicked. If you've been to fast food restaurants with me you'll know that when they ask for a name I almost invariably supply the name "Voltron." Now, this is all well and good (I think), except for the fact that I've done this so much that Voltron is the first name that always surfaces when someone asks for a name. So, before I could really stop myself, I replied, My name's Brother Voltron.
They kind of stared at me for a second, with a look of "really?" on their faces, and then just went with it. So for the rest of the lesson we're all trying to take this seriously and feel the spirit, but we can't because we're all too busy trying not to laugh whenever someone says "Brother Voltron." This may be a hard activity.
2) Sometimes, our district likes to prank each other by hiding alarm clocks in each others' rooms, with alarms set for unfortunate wake up times. This is a fun activity, and so we told our kohai (the younger group of missionaries who came in three weeks after us, two of whom are in our room. I think I mentioned this last week.) about this.
Well, one morning I wake up at about 6:25, before my alarm usually goes off, and I look around for my clock to unset the alarm, and I find it in a weird place under my bed. I look at the alarm and it's set for 3:30 in the morning. I find this a little strange because I couldn't remember setting it like that and I didn't wake up, so I figured I just accidentally hit the buttons in my sleep or something.
In actuality, one of the elders in our room, a wonderful sweet spirit by the name of Birch choro, had the brilliant idea of "clocking" me. So, he got ahold of my clock while I wasn't looking and changed it to 3:30 AM and went to bed feeling very pleased with himself (this comes from him, not me).
However, he did not know that I am a very deep sleeper, and I have to believe, for his sake, that he just forgot we sleep in the same room, and didn't actually think he wouldn't wake himself up with this clock as well. Whatever the case was, 3:30 rolled around that morning, and the alarm apparently went off, but I didn't wake up. So Birch choro, after letting the alarm run so long it's turned into one continuous high pitched squeal, was forced to get out of bed, make the (I assume) very shameful walk over to my bed, and turn the alarm off himself. The poor guy pranked himself. Hopefully that teaches him a valuable lesson.
3) This isn't necessarily a funny story, but on Monday one of the elders in our district got a package in the mail from his parents, a cake. I think it was for the halfway mark in the MTC or something (it's not like we're counting or anything). Anyway, this event was probably the most exciting of our entire MTC stay here.
We took the cake out and did a "cake photo shoot" where we all took pictures with the cake and of the cake before chowing down. You guys, cake is a big deal here. It was actually not that special of a cake, but we were excited. I'll attach pictures below.
Language is coming well, I think. I'm still sure that opinion will change when I get to Japan but for now I'm feeling good. I can pretty much say what I want in lessons, even if it takes a very long time to get there. We did TRC again this week and could tell that our Japanese has improved leaps and bounds since last week, which is comforting because sometimes you don't notice the progress day to day.
Our lessons have been going a lot better. Last night we had two lessons, both of which went great. We talked about families in one (the other missionary investigator) and really got down to why prayer is important in the other, with Toshi san. We're both teaching more equally, which has been a struggle for us, because a lot of times one of us would just teach most of the lesson, but this time we were firing pretty evenly. It was great, we felt the spirit, and walked out of there both feeling really good.
On the spiritual side of things, I've been thinking a lot about how we really can't do anything to convert anyone, and that can be really frustrating. It's all on the investigator to find out for themselves, to take the information we give them, learn about it on their own and then take it to God and ask Him whether or not it's true.
We have one investigator who is really good about that (we assigned him to read a chapter out of 1st nephi once and when we came back he was into 2nd nephi) and one who is really bad at it (we're still trying to get him to realize that prayer is something he needs if he wants to learn about our message), which is actually kind of nice because we get to see the contrast in methods and realize how important it is.
However, I came across Alma 26:27 this week (well, came across again, I read this scripture quite often) but it particularly struck me in regards to the previous subject. If we "go among our brethren," teach them as well as we can and are just patient, both with them and with ourselves, then we will be successful, whether that success be baptism, or just the knowledge that you did your best.
So that was my week. Hope everyone else has a good one.
Elder Callahan
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