the fact that he is starting to love studying is kimochiwarui (a disgusting thought :P). He's so funny!

Hey family! I love you!

And Happy Birthday Kellie!!!! I love you so much and I miss you! Everyone says that you are a Bijin (beautiful girl) when they see your picture :)

Starting from the bottom, Go ahead and add the Yuichi Sakamoto san person to facebook. I met him at eikaiwa in Kotoni.

That's so cool that you're going to memorize a scripture a day! Good luck!

What! Boise is getting huge! That's awesome! We're about to break 100 in Sapporo and I'm way excited :) I guess sisters will go from 15 to 40 soon. It's so cool that everyone is going out to serve the Lord!

I'm really excited to see the growth of the ward as well when I get back :)

That Yosokoi song is really interesting haha. I got to go see Yosokoi and it was so cool! I got a lot of recordings and I'll send my memory card when it gets a little more filled up!.

I love love love love! Hearing about camp =D It makes me really excited to see how everything is changing. I remember I didn't like working at camp at first but that's because I regretted being away from my friends. Then I made friends and camp and I didn't want to return home :P

The mission is so similar. I've made so many good friends and memories here that I don't want to leave. I love it! It's pretty hard, but very rewarding :)

I got to see the training video as well this last Sunday as well and it made me really excited to fulfill my duties and made me want to be the best I can in any position I may be called to fill. Good stuff :)

As I've been reading the scriptures lately I've noticed a lot more connections in the Bible and Book of Mormon and it's so interesting! I love reading the Scriptures! My companion from Okinawa and I talk all the time about cool stuff from the scriptures. He is discovering his love of the scriptures for the first time right now. It's fun to watch. He said in a testimony recently that the fact that he is starting to love studying is kimochiwarui (a disgusting thought :P). He's so funny!

Well, a little bit about my week. And transfer.

We've been looking for investigators for a long time now and we finally are starting to see some people who are interested in the gospel :) That is a miracle. I can't remember any big specifics this week, but there are miracles everyday and answered prayers all the time.

I did have a good experience with following the Spirit. I had a feeling that we should visit a guy we met on the street a couple weeks ago and so when we visited him he let us in his garage. It was really cool! He is 80 and has a lot of Model cars and trains and guns and airplanes. We talked about lots of fun stuff and then naturally got into a conversation about how he wishes his body wasn't so frail. We then shared scriptures about the resurrection and testified of it's truth. He said he wants it to be true. He said he would read some of the Book of Mormon and we are going to go visit him again soon :)

That experience helped me learn to follow the impressions that come to my heart and mind.

Well I'm off to hike Maruyama mountain with my district now! Talk to you next week!

I love you!!!

Bye Bye!!!!

Elder Sotto

no time!

I love you soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much!!! Just thought I'd let you know...you know just in case you forgot ;P

 

Today was crazy!

We had a zone activity whereeveryone would go to Maruyama Koen (park) and play sports, but the AP Elder Hansen wanted to go running up to Maruyama mountain so we went running up the mountain for an hour before the sports. It was somuch fun!!! It was way beautiful looking over the whole city! Then we played ultimate frisbee! It was so much fun!

 

Wow, you are all really busy. It's way fun to hear about everyone! I gotta go back and take a shower cuz I'm a little sweaty and bloody :P

 

But for this week, the sisters have been teaching a lady we found and she's getting baptized this weekend! yay!!!

 

Alright...that's about it! sorry its so short! talk to you next week!

 

Bye Bye!!!

I have a lot of goals I want to accomplish, but I can't forget to love others

 I think back on the week when I write my letter to the Mission President (which I forgot to write...after :P) and I can't rememeber anything I've done! It"s terrible :P

I would die if I didn't have a planner to write things in.

 

Oyaji gyagu haha. There was a ward member in Hakodate that really loved Oyaji gyagu. He was a pro at making them. I find them sometimes and laugh to myself but not too often. 

 

It's cool to hear about Grandpa and the Book of Mormon! My friend has also decided to read the Book of Mormon and I'm way excited for him! You can't read it and not know that it is truly another Testimony of the Divinity of Jesus Christ. I love Elder Holland's quote from his grandpa, "No wicked man could write such a book as this, and no good man would, unless he were commanded of God to do so." The Book of Mormon is such a precious tool the Lord uses to help the world see that He is still reaching His hand out to us in Mercy :)

 

As for the questions:

 

My companion is the 4th of 6 children in his family. He came from Futenma, Okinawa and he is awesome. He used to ride Motorcycles and stuff a lot before his mission and he is a way hard worker. It's a lot of fun finishing up his training here in Moiwa :)

I keep learning this every transfer, but i learned that it's ok to have fun and be goofy every once and a while. I keep getting reminded of that if I get to serious. I get humbled or something :P I've really learned how to be a lot more observant of my surroundings with him. He can tell you who is home or not and what kind of people live in the house by looking around outside at the things they have in their yard and genkan (entrance to the house). He is really observant of things like that.

 

The principle of loving others and desiring their happiness has stuck out to me a lot this week. I find that when i get frustrated it's because I'm focusing too much on myself or my goals. When I take time to think about my investigators and ask them about themselves then they open up and an environment is created where the Spirit can dwell. I tend to work really fast and really hard and I have a lot of goals I want to accomplish, but I can't forget to love others as I try to do my best out here.

I've also seen the power of a testimony a lot lately. We have an investigator that has questions and concerns up the wazoo. Whenever we try to answer by proving things to him it turns out really bad, but whenever we bear our testimonies it turns out so much better.

 

We met what we call a kinjin (literally Golden Person) about a week ago and passed her to the sisters. I was praying all week that she would keep the passionate desire to find out if this is true and that she would come to church and she did! Simple, but I know that God answered my prayers :)

Also, it is so interesting to talk with her. She is really quiet and really humble. She wants to be taught. When she talks with me and my companion she is so polite and really respects us. One of the members says that she felt a special something about us when we first talked to her and it really built my testimony of living worthy of the Spirit. We don't convert people here. People feel the Spirit in us and the Spirit helps them to change their hearts. I really felt that I needed to become more Christlike and work on those attributes. In PMG it says, "It's not just about what we do as missionaries, it's about who we are." I want to become someone that radiates the light of Christ and is always worthy of the Spirit.

 

Alright, well I better get going! I think I'm going to the Chocolate Factory in Kotoni today! Have fun at camp dad!

I'll talk to you later!

 

Bye Bye!!!

The missionary language here is a good mix of both english and japanese haha.

Dear Mom and Dad,

Hello! It's so good to hear from you! I just love getting emails every week from you!

this week was...well...I can't remember. Let me look at my planner real quick. I can't remember anything anymore without my planner :P

Oh ya! One really cool experience! My companion and I went and taught a lesson with the sisters to a potential investigator that my companion and I found housing. We thought it was a weak appointment, but she called us after church on sunday to confirm the appointment and seemed really excited! When we got there, she was very eager to hear our message. She's been wanting to come to church for a long time and she's reading the bible by herself so we gave her the Book of Mormon and taught her to pray and she is very interested in baptism :) It really built my faith that there really are people out there that are prepared and ready to here this gospel :)

Also, I got to go on splits with my MTC companion for the first time since the MTC! It was so much fun! It's crazy to see how we've both grown and it was way fun to go out and dendo (find people) together :)

We are also teaching an investigator right now that thinks incredibly deeply, so I really have no idea what's going on in the lessons. It can be pretty frustrating sometimes, but I'm hanging in there and trying my best to follow the conversations.

It's interesting learning a different language because it seems there is no end to the learning. No matter how much I start to understand, there is always more that I am completely lost when I hear. It can be frustrating sometimes, but it's also fun knowing that I can still progress and grow if I keep working hard :)

The Bishop of Moiwa ward invited all the Oodori and Moiwa missionaries to come to his house for dinner last saturday night. There were 12 of us that came and then 7 others from the ward and the Bishop and his family! It was such a delicious dinner! There was corn, potatoes, gravy, fruits and juice, and stroganauf (I can't speel ;P) on top of rice. It was very american :) Natsukashii (Nostalgic). The bishop had a lot of cool missionary stories too. Way fun :) While we were walking back one of the missionaries was showing the picture he took on his camera, but he did it with the projector installed on his camera...that caught me by surprise :P nice camera! Great Elder :)

That article made me laugh dad :) There are so many words I use in japanese that I substitute for english words. The missionary language here is a good mix of both english and japanese haha.

Ok, well I better get going. Talk to you later!

Bye Bye