Things that happened this week:

# 1 Fun Thing: TAUE! An older member couple asked us to come help them plant rice in their rice field and we were more than happy to help. I'll attach a lot of pictures below. We showed up at 12:00, they fed us lunch consisted of rice balls made out of their homemade rice, made us put on old Japanese farmer hats, and then we got to work. You basically just walk around barefoot in a muddy field submerged in water and stick the rice sprouts in the mud. It was super fun and involved a few mud fights and more than a few sunburns. It took about four and a half hours and by the time we were done we were absolutely covered in mud. Super super fun. 

#2 Fun Thing: Barbeque! We had a branch barbeque Saturday morning which was awesome! They bought a bunch of Brazilian meat from a Brazilian import shop the next town over and we grilled and ate all morning. The branch president also wanted to use it as a tool for missionary work so in preparation he printed out 1000 flyers and asked them to put them in the mailboxes of people who lived around the church. It ate a lot of time, but it was worth it because on guy showed up. He walked up to the parking lot and was just kind of standing there not knowing what to do so we went over there and welcomed him and got him some food. The branch members were way awesome and were super friendly and nice to him. We got to talking and we asked him about his experience with religion and God and whatnot and he seemed not really interested. But then we got talking about English, and he said he was interested in that, so we got him a flyer for our 30 minute English/30 minute Gospel program that we do. He was reading it and saw the part that talks about what our church meetings are like, and pointed to a part where it talks about Priesthood Meeting helping people become better husbands, and said he wasreally interested in that, more than English. So he asked if we could meet again and talk about it and we said sure! So that's pretty exciting. 

Other interesting things:

That less active that wanted to meet at the park that I mentioned last week met us on Wednesday. I didn't know what to expect, really, so I was a little unsure. We sit down, and he immediately just goes off. He starts telling us all about this religion that believes in six saviors, the sixth having been born in Japan 25 years ago, and how there are people trying to kill this guy so that all humanity will perish but there are people trying to protect him, and both the protector people and the trying-to-kill people have infiltrated the ranks of this big Japanese TV company and how if you watch reality TV closely you can see them broadcasting out messages about this guy. Pretty fun stuff. He also tried to prove the the church wasn't true because ancient paintings of Jesus look different than the ones the church uses...? And that the church was hindering science because BYU doesn't let you study science. He didn't really know what to say when I told him that wasn't true and that I was going to study science at BYU, so he went back to talking about the painting thing. After a while of this I was done so we just bore our testimonies and walked off. Not much use arguing with people like that haha. So that was a fun experience. It was interesting because as he was talking I had such a strong feeling that what he was saying was so far away from the truth. It was almost a physical reaction. Not sure how people who once had the light of the gospel can ignore those feelings and head down a path so far into left field, but I guess it happens. But it was a good testimony to me, though, that the Spirit always always warns you of spiritual danger. 

We had our branch conference on Sunday which was way awesome and then we had a great Shokujikai afterward (I forget what that is in English but it's when everybody brings food to church and then eats it afterward). It was so good. The best food I've ever eaten in Japan. 

Other than that, kind of an uneventful week. Love you all, have a great week!
Elder Callahan

Taue lunch!

Farmer hats

Farmer clothes

The rice field 

Dear Everyone,

A couple cool things that went down this week:

-We had a lesson with that American we met a while back named Matt. He is way cool and it was way weird to teach someone A) in fluent English and B) who already knows about and has faith in Jesus Christ. He had some really good questions and was really interested. We ended up having a really deep discussion about the Plan of Salvation for two hours. It was great! 

-We met Matt for our lesson at a grocery store, and then walked over to a restaurant that he wanted to take us to. While we were sitting there waiting, an older Japanese man walks up to us and asks us if we're from America. We say yes, we are, talk a little bit about where we're from in America and why we're here, and then he asks us if we understand a little bit of Japanese (mind that this whole conversation was in Japanese). I said yeah, a little I guess, and then he launches into a recitation of an original poem that he wrote. It was way funny! He was standing there in front of the grocery store in the "What light through yonder window breaks" Romeo pose reciting his Japanese poem about spring on a hill. He finished, we told him how good it was, and then he said thanks and started to walk off. We were both kind of stunned and didn't really know how to react to what just happened, but we managed to give him a flyer for our free english class before he walked off. The next day he showed up and was ready to learn haha! He's a taxi driver and we've seen him around town a couple more times and he honks and waves at us. Next week we're going to try to start up a 30 minute english 30 minute gospel program with him.

-We went to visit a less active member about a week back. The record said that a lot of times he'll be home but send his wife to say he's not, but we were in the area so we decided just to stop by. He was leaving for work at the time and he said something along the lines of "yeah yeah, maybe next time, bye" and it felt like he didn't want to talk to us. But, a few days later he called and thanked us for stopping by and asked to meet at a park. So that's cool. No idea why he wants to meet us but I'll take it any day. 

-We went to visit another less active member who lives way up in the mountains. He wasn't home so we left him a note. On Saturday he called the church asking for us, and I talked to him but didn't actually understand anything he was saying, so he said he wanted to meet because he had some questions about some of the branch activities and things that we're doing right now. That was cool too.

Other than that though, there's been some roughness this week too. A couple of our investigators who had so much potential have just dropped off the face of the map, won't answer the phone and won't open the door when we visit, completely out of nowhere. So that's been pretty hard. But, what I'm starting to learn (but obviously I haven't learned it well enough yet) is that when rough patches on your mission hit sometime's it's not because of anything you did, but because of something you have to become or to learn. In times of trial I've drawn closer to the Savior more than any other time in my life and sometimes that's the point of this all, when everything starts going bad and you can't figure out how to fix it on your own. Jesus Christ is always, always there for us, and always here with us, and when we rely on Him everything will be ok. I know that's true. I love you all, have a great week!

Elder Callahan

Member FHEs!

More member FHEs. We taught him "Come at me bro" and this is what happened.

Played basketball with some less active kids. One wanted to play with my iPad instead.

Made this friend one day, just hanging out on the sidewalk.

Dear beloved people,

This week marked the end of the transfer. Kind of a strange week. The first half of it was really dead, missionary activity wise. Monday we went as a district to the lake and hung out and ate there, which was way fun. As we were biking back home just as P-Day was done, my bike got its 7th flat tire in 2 weeks...I finally had to humble myself and take it in to get fixed, rather than patching it myself. Apparently there was something in the frame that kept popping it? I don't know, but it burned our entire evening. 

Tuesday we headed down to Nagoya for a special training since my companion's brand new to the field. It was way fun and it was good to see some old friends. Just after we got to the church a surprise typhoon hit and it was pouring, so we got to go hang out at the mission president's house for a little and then President Yamashita drove us back to the eki haha. Wednesday we saw the Yamashitas again, they came up to Suwa to do some special training with our area. We did some roleplay lessons with them and they helped our teaching skills a lot. 

Friday we had a fun experience when we met an atheist man from Israel who was here visiting family. He spoke super great English (I have no idea what the official language is in Israel) and we talked for a while. Really nice and really funny. He was super respectful of our religion and what we were doing, but absolutely zero interest haha. He talked a lot about how he really disliked Judaism though. Apparently growing up really close to Jerusalem left a bad taste in his mouth (he thinks the Holy Sites are cool though). 

Saturday and Sunday was District Conference, so we were up in Matsumoto, the District Center, for the whole weekend. That was way fun and it was a great conference. Sunday after it was over we were eating our lunch and waiting for our train home when a member came over and said "Hey, let's go eat at the castle." So we jumped in his car with another companionship of Elders from a different branch and all ate our lunches at Matsumoto castle, which was fun. Yesterday we also met a Jehovah's Witness who wants to learn more about what our church believes, and a less active's husband who is way nice and wants to learn more about the gospel. Also, we were visiting with a less active who lives next door to one of our investigators. Our investigator saw our bikes outside and walked into the house and said "I'm ready for a lesson, let's study!" so we taught him an impromptu lesson on prayer haha. It was pretty funny. We've been seeing a lot of great stuff recently. God really does sanctify your best efforts and turns them into something that is actually useful. One of the biggest lessons I've learned as a missionary is that when things start going well it's easy to forget that all of the success you see comes from God and to start to think about how great you are for making all of these things happen but that's when it all goes away and you're left with nothing again haha. Everything comes from God and you just have to be humble and work hard to qualify to help him with it. Love you all, have a great week!
Elder Callahan

The Isrealite name Gaul

Lake Suwa

Dear everyone,

I don't have a whole lot of time this week due to Mother's Day Skype calls, but here are a few highlights of the week:

Met an American named Matt and talked with him for and hour and a half. Way nice, way smart and wants to hear our message. Meeting him next week. I have no idea how to teach in English, this should be fun.

Met a fun less active woman who invited us in, gave us disgusting vegetable juice, asked us to help her set up her email on her tablet, and played for us some strange Japanese instrument that was like a giant vertical guitar neck. Then she made me play the electric organ and we sang hymns. I did pretty good, considering I've never played an organ in my life. 

Went down to a town way south of here to visit some members/less actives, got lost, met one member, then missed our train and were stuck for another hour in the middle of nowhere, then it started raining. Good times!

Met a way cool guy Japanese named Alex who speaks fluent english and is interested in Jesus Christ so that was way rare....happened after we felt like we should go visit this investigator who lives on top of a mountain. We finished our hour long ride just as he drives past us down the mountain and honks. We knew we were supposed to go up there so it was way confusing, until we met Alex. God knows what He's doing way more than us and if we just trust him he will provide for us and lead us to where He wants us to be. I know that and have experienced that. Love you all, have a great week!

Elder Callahan

Dear 愛する all y'all,Hope you all had a great week! Ours was pretty cool. Some fun stories:

We met a man last Friday night on the street who seemed way interested. We set up a next appointment at a restaurant on Tuesday. We showed up, he didn't. After about half an hour we gave up and started talking to people. At 8:00 he calls us and asks if we can still meet. We had a great lesson with him and he is probably the most interested investigator I've ever met. Way prepared, way ready. We're really excited about him.

On Friday night, we were biking around the train station talking to people when a bird pooped on my hand. I was trying to find someplace to wash it off when we saw this high school kid and instead of washing off my hand we went and talked to him. As we started talking he was looking at my hand all weird so I looked at it and said "woah, that's gross I should go wash this off. Will you show me where I can?" and he walked with us to the train station and I washed off my hand. We ended up talking with him for another hour that night about the Plan of Salvation on a bench outside the station and we should be meeting him again tonight. Way cool and smart kid with a bunch of correct ideas about God and repentance. Super excited about him.

Mori san! We talked about the Word of Wisdom on Wednesday and he's having trouble understanding why coffee is out. He's a computer programmer so it's his favorite drink haha. We've been working on getting him a testimony of the BoM so this becomes less of a problem. Still on track to get baptized in May though.

I went on an exchange with Elder Bedwell, one of the Zone Leaders this week. The day consisted of:

Meeting them at the train station

Biking back from the train station

Running over a day on the way back

Walking home

Walking to the bike store

Buying a patch kit

Walking home

Patching the bike

Walking to the bike store to get my bike aired up

Biking to go get lunch

Getting another flat tire on the way

Walking to go get lunch

Getting lunch

Walking home

Patching my bike again

Walking to the bike store

Getting more air

Going home teaching with the branch president

Going to a member FHE

The end.

So I guess you could say it was a pretty good day. Then Saturday night right before we got home my tire went flat again. I was mad so we went to a convenience store to get some ice cream to drown my sorrows. I bought a parfait and a thing of ice cream, but I guess I didn't look too carefully at them because they both had rum in them haha. Somebody should have carded me. So that was a sad end to a sad night. Sunday afternoon we spent two hours trying to patch up the bike tube. Every time we put on a patch a new hole opened up. By that time we had like an hour and a half left of the day so we just gave up and walked to a less active's house and then walked back. Good times. It's all fixed up now though don't worry.This week really was awesome though. We saw some incredible miracles this week with the people we've met and we're way excited to see the work keep moving here in Suwa. It's really awesome. Love you all, have a great week.

Elder Callahan

The Grill That Thought it Was a Bicycle, coming soon to a children's book store near you

Suwa

Suwa

Member FHE

Failure