May 4, 2010

Dear, Family,

I received the pictures of Katie last week and also the picture of dad from Dallas the week before. They were great. I’m going to try to send a lot today. I’m sorry I forgot about Jason’s birthday. I feel really stupid. Happy Birthday Jason. I actually got a present for him last week which is weird because I had forgotten. It’s nothing really cool. I’m actually still on my first transfer. We find out what is happening next Tuesday.

In other news, I ate an entire fish yesterday and I don’t mean like I ate an entire fillet by my self. I ate a whole dang fish; head, brains all of it. It was gross...yes, yes it was. Here is a funny story. We were eating at Coco’s last week which is the closest thing to American food here. I always get a least one plate of French toast. I sometimes get pizza and a Quesadilla and a piece of cake too. Anyway, on the cake part I didn’t want this strawberry sauce, so when I ordered I said sasu janai. Janai means “to not exist.” But sasu is actually the Japanese word “to point” and sosu was what I was trying to say which actually means sauce. So I was saying. “I’m not pointing” as I was pointing to the sauce. The waitress was a little confused. Hopefully by the end of this next week I’ll be able to order food in Japan. I do get a lot of practice. I usually just say, kore, which means “this.”

Katie your letters were once again wonderful. I love hearing from you. I’m trying to collect things to send to you. I miss you so much. This week was actually quite hard. I got pretty down about the language. A guy from Fuji came to visit our ward this week. I felt bad I think he had a pretty severe social disorder. It made for some awkward experiences. They had me bless the sacrament (bread) and I messed up the first time. I said shu instead of sho at one part. I had to re-say it and I think I said the same thing again but they understood that that is how I pronounce Japanese anyway. I was blessing with the Darth Vader man who is like 160 years old. After we pass the bread we remain standing, and the guy didn’t even come up to my shoulders. It looked kind of weird. He also couldn’t stand still. He was swinging his hips forwards and backwards. They asked me to share my testimony. I finished and realized everyone had a look on their face like, “I understood the words but I’d never heard them put in that order before.” Also I have to give a talk in the last Sunday of this month. Maybe I would like to be transferred next week.

A lot of things just seem more difficult in Japan. Things like cleaning the dishes and cleaning out my ears just seemed easier at college. I don’t know why. Anyway, I pushed through Sunday. Dad’s letter really helped because I received it that night along with two other letters. It was very nice and Dad said just that right things as usual. By the way Katie, I love math as well. It’s not weird of you.

So I went fishing today with some members and investigators. I caught ten fish. It was pretty interesting. We didn’t use rods with reels. It was just like a 9 foot rod. I felt like a real Japanese person. I squatted down until my butt hit my feet and then held the pole between my legs and sat there. It could have been right out of an ancient drawing. So if I ever come back to Japan it will be during this week. It’s golden week here. Ask someone about it. No one works for a week. They take the whole week off. Almost everything is closed. They also have festivals. They close the main streets around the train station and they have ancient reenactments and dances with the flowing dragon things. It’s super cool. It’s good dendo activity. Dendo just means everything involving missionary work. There was an organization there that is against smoking and they were picking up trash so we grabbed bags and help. They took our picture and thanked us. It was a great way to talk to people because we could just ask if they had trash and then they would ask us why we were in Japan and it was a smooth transition to Jesus Christ. It was also good rock star (or famous doctor) training. People would stare at us and giggle. I walked by two girls that I could hear talking about how big I was and I said 高いでっしょ which means, “tall huh?” and they giggled even louder.

I’m doing well. Things are moving forward. We have some very solid investigators that are doing well. Please don’t move from Montana by the way. I now weigh over 190 pounds. It’s ridiculous. Not a whole lot is fat though. I’m just going to try to send pictures now. Sorry it’s short once again. Love you all

Elder Tyler Hooton