August 22, 2010

Dear Family,

Hey, well this week was alright. It’s getting pretty tough though. Before I forget, can you be sure to thank Grandpa Hooton for his letter. It was really great. It helped a lot.

So we went and visited a woman last week who was a referral that we found out had been taught by missionaries 20 years ago and disagreed in a lot of ways. Now she is studying the Bible with some JWs. She wouldn’t even touch a Book of Mormon. Luckily she listened to us when we read out of it though. She threw the usual stuff at us about how the Book of Mormon goes against the Bible and we just explained how we get that a lot and then we explained how it agrees with the Bible. She wasn’t being very cooperative so we just bore testimony and gave her Moroni’s promise and left. It felt good to just bear testimony and promise her an answer and leave it up to her. We will probably go back sometime this week and just check to see if she’s read it. If not then we’ll put her in the area book and have some other missionaries another 20 years down the road see if she has changed her mind.

Wednesday I had an exchange with the Zone Leaders. I was in Fuji with the Japanese one. It made communicating a little difficult but it was a good experience. I knew I was treading on thin ice because Elder Wilson had dropped an investigator right before I came here. The Zone Leader I was with, Elder Furukawa had found that investigator a year ago when he was in Fuji. So the first thing we did was to go and visit him. Elder Wilson had dropped him because his interest and commitment was minimal and was only sparked when food was involved so he was sort of freeloading. We went and had an hour and a half lesson with him (3 lessons) and he said he’s only eating rice and he can’t focus on feeling the spirit if he is hungry. I felt bad for him but I was a little suspicious of some of the things that he said. We set up a time for Elder Wilson and I to go back the next day. I was scared to tell Elder Wilson that we had the appointment because he wasn’t going to be happy about it.

The next morning Furuwaka Choro and I were riding to the train station and we were a little early so he asked if we could go to a convenient store. I said sure. He bought a bunch of little meal things and I thought they must be out of food in Shizuoka so for some weird reason he is buying food now since he has time. Then I realized that he was buying it for the investigator. We dropped it off at his door. I was pretty upset. It’s rewarding this man for just saying he has interest. I am completely fine with giving him food as if he really needs it. The Church does it all the time. I just don’t want a handout to be correlated with us teaching him. I want him to progress as an investigator solely based on his feelings and not based of if he gets food. So I told Elder Wilson later that day and he was furious. We taught a lesson that night and it went alright. Then yesterday the investigator came to our night sacrament meeting and showed up late (for the closing hymn) and then got up and left right after. There were only 7 people there but he literally ran out of the chapel. We didn’t get to talk to him at all. It’s a weird situation. I hope he is genuine but with the way he’s been acting I’m finding it hard to believe.

I haven’t been mentioning this but in this ward they have a missionary talk every week. So I have to give a talk every other week. It’s been stressful to say the least. Unfortunately I don’t know if I’m getting any better at it. My talk yesterday was pretty sketchy. Jason, Dad, Quincy, anyone, if you have any ideas for talks on “missionary work” (the topic every week), feel free to write. I’m all out of ideas and I think I’ve shared every story from every missionary in the Book of Mormon. Does anyone have any good talks from their missions? So yesterday the member of the Bishopric that was conducting said, “Thank you to sister Yuriko for your talk on being worthy to enter the temple and the youth speaker for his talk on obedience and Elder Hooton for...well whatever the crap he talked about. We’re still trying to figure that one out.” Not really but he did mention everyone’s topic but mine. He just said my name and said thank you.

We have this member named Higa that I’ve talked about. We sometimes go to the church with him on Saturday nights and play a game, make food, and share a message. Well, when I was on the exchange we went and visited him and I set up an appointment (he didn’t say a word he just shook or nodded his head). Then Elder Wilson and I were at the mall watching something going on and he walked up behind Elder Wilson and started playing with his backpack. We turned around and tried to talk with him but he just walked away. Then we were trying to do missionary work on the trains but just taking trains back and forth talking to people (worked out alright) and we ran into Higa on the train. He only said a couple words. Then we had the appointment with him and only got him to talk a little. He’s pretty good at Jenga. Together we got the highest one I’ve ever seen. It was 13 blocks crisscrossed. No doubles. It was sweet. Elder Wilson thinks that Jenga is more technical than Operation. I told him he’s crazy. Then I talked with Higa about coming to teach and praying and stuff and he wasn’t being very receptive. So we left (the cake we made was good) but then Higa came to church the next day. It was awesome. I was so happy when I saw him slink in with his ridiculously long pink tie and sat down behind us. Then later that day we saw him on the street and he actually answered our questions instead of just shaking his head. So he is progressing. It was way cool that he came to church.

Hey thanks to my friends for sending letters. I got some good ones this week. It was way exciting. I got a little Betty Crocker brownie thing. It was super good. I loved it. Thanks Abby. I don’t know if I told you but a couple of weeks ago our gas bill wasn’t sent in so we had to go two days without gas. I now appreciate electric ovens in America a little bit more (unless the electricity goes out). Our main food this week was eggs, bread, rice and curry. I’m turning into a Japanese missionary finally. I’ve given up and now sometimes I’ll just eat rice. I never thought I’d see the day. I showed Elder Wilson a picture of me from when I was in Takaoka and I guess I’ve lost a lot of weight. He said my face is much, much skinner now. I look like a fat blob in the picture. My cheeks like jiggled and stuff.

We were trying to talk to high school kids that were on the beach last week. It was interesting. I’ve decided that you can’t contact guys here if there are girls around. They get super defensive and just try to make fun of us and act stupid. They are okay if they are by themselves. They feel like we are a threat if girls are around (frankly because we are). Their instincts kick in and they try to be the alpha male. I think it’s one of the main reasons why there are so many more women in the church in Japan. They will come and talk to us. They are more open, (more spiritual), and they aren’t defensive against us. It was way funny though because Elder Wilson and I came from behind a bunch of giant cement jacks (like the game jacks where you have to bounce the ball and grab the little rubber things) that are used to break tsunamis and both of us had bloody elbows and I guess my backpack was wide open and we were dripping sweat. I’m sure it was quite the sight. We just meandered out of the jacks, two weird foreigners.

It’s so weird being at these internet places where there are people reading comic books and stuff. I want to yell, “You’re a grown man! At least go play pool with the last bit of dignity that you have left.”

I’ll send this off for now and try to think of some more things after I get some ice cream. By the way for whoever might be wondering, I am six foot four or if you use the metric system that’s 192 cm.

Love,
Elder Hooton