Monday, March 10th, 2014

Dear Family,

Missionary life is like Star Wars.  Or rather, sometimes as
missionaries we feel like we are Jedi Knights.  This past week, Elder
Call and I have been doing a lot of George Lucas-tioian heroic brigades
around Japan.  Our days have been filled with interviews, trials,
councils, battles, which ultimately led to the baptism of a wonderful
sister.

On Tuesday, I traveled down to my old stomping grounds and did some
training while President was interviewing missionaries at the Kanagawa
church.  It was good to be back in my first area for a day.  It's
crazy seeing all of the new missionaries in the same area that I was
in when I was a new missionary.  Being relate-able is an important
attribute for an assistant, missionaries have to be able to relate to
us to trust us.  I can tell those new missionaries there that I was
once in their shoes, I know exactly what it's like to serve there, and
I know how hard some things are.  But that also means that I can tell
them how worth it it is, how many great blessings they will receive,
how much joy they will have when they serve the people there.

Wednesday turned out to be interesting.  When I woke up, I could taste
in my mouth that I was sick, there was this sick atmosphere in the
air.  But when I climbed down from my bed, I felt totally fine, like
my body was moving fine and I didn't feel sick.  But at the same time
I felt sick.  I don't know how to explain it, but to make a long story
short, I ended up going to the doctors in Tokyo and I had a sinus
infection.  A sister with the same symptoms didn't take care of it
quick enough and she ended up having vertigo because the sinus
pressure was causing her ear balance things to get messed up.  I was
starting to have my jaw lock up on me 'cause the pressure in my
sinuses was building.  Anyway, so he gave me some antibiotics and
painkillers, which kinda put me in a haze for a few days.  But I have
finished taking all of my pills and am better now.  It was just a
weird experience 'cause my body felt totally fine and I didn't feel
sick, but I was starting to get really sick.

On Thursday, we had mission leadership council.  All of the zone
leaders and sister training leaders got together and we spent all day
training each other and strengthening our testimonies.  We talked
about various missionary protocols, reporting methods, teaching
styles, and reviewed conversion stories and our mission performance.
However, probably the biggest thing was we rolled out Facebook access
to mission leaders to start using for dendo.  This is the second big
step to rolling out Facebook completely in our mission.  I guess we
will see how they use it and what kind of obstacles we face before we
give access to all missionaries.  People have both been very hesitant
and overly excited about using Facebook for dendo.  For some people, it
may be a huge distraction, but Elder Call and I have been pretty good
about staying focused on our purpose as we use it.  That is the key to
this whole thing, all we gotta do is just stay focused on our purpose.
Mission leadership council is fun 'cause we all sit kneeling in a
circle on a tatami mat and President Wada stands behind us and reviews
our performance zone by zone and if we don't do well enough he pours
cold water on our heads and strikes us with a sword.  (just kidding,
but for real though, one of our investigators told us that that is
what use to happen to him at his work at the end of the day, crazy
right?)

We spent quite a bit of time doing what we call a kubarikai which is
where we stand in front of a station and hand out fliers.  Well this
last week, we invented an effective way to do this and we have had a
lot of fun doing it.  We stand back to back in a two man or four man
and just as loud and as annoyingly as is possible to do as a
representative of Christ, we do all we can to make them laugh, take
our chirashi, and stop and talk to us.  It gets pretty interesting
when you get 4 big white people stopping people in unison and
finishing each other's sentences.  But from this, we have found quite
a few PI's and have been able to make a lot of great contacts at the
station.

Then on Sunday, the Sisters golden investigator, a self referral from
Mormon.org, got baptized after church.  We had some of our friends and
investigators come to that, including Kazuya who is getting really
close to joining the church now.  We still are not totally sure what
his concerns are, but he is really growing close with us and becoming
our good friend.  We are going to lay off the hard core preaching a
little bit and focus on getting him to warm up and open up a little
more.  In reality, he knows all of the gospel principles and believes
in it, but he just for some reason doesn't have the confidence to
follow the example of the Savior.  But at any rate, I have high hopes
for him and I know that he is going to be a great church member
eventually.

Kichijoji ward is starting to catch the wave.  All we have to do is
keep doing what we can and don't worry about what is outside of our
circle of influence.  That is something that I learned very well this
past week.  Just don't worry about It, just do what I can.  I love you
all very much and hope you have a wonderful week!!

Love

Elder Crandall