Back in Blue

Good morning folks,

I was just informed that I was reaccepted to the United States Air
Force Academy! I will re-entering and joining the Class of 2019. My
report date is August 3 a couple of weeks after I get home. I just
want to express my thanks to all of you who helped me re-apply once
again and allowed me to start this awesome adventure all over again.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.

This week has been pretty busy. Just like my last two transfer weeks
we were running around like our heads are on fire trying to take care
of all the stuff we need to do. It's been crazy that's for sure. The
best part of the week is that my health is essentially back to normal.
I'm eating normal food and I feel really good. As a result of not
eating yogurt, toast, soup, and bananas for a week I've lost around
two kilos (about four pounds) but I'm back to working out hard and
eating right.

As normal for transfer week, the dying missionaries came into the 本部
on Monday as we tried to continue working on all of our work. In the
afternoon we went out to go get Jones's license translated so that we
can begin his license application process as soon as possible.

On Tuesday we did something a little different than normal with the
dying missionaries. Jones and I said goodbye to Nakamoto (since he was
transferring) and took three of the Japanese missionaries to the 名古屋駅
(Nagoya Train Station) instead of the airport so they could take the
bullet train home. This group of missionaries were some of the best
Japanese missionaries in the mission who were 赤堀長老 (Elder Akahori),
堀尾長老 (Elder Horio), and 内村姉妹 (Sister Uchimura). As we dropped them off
at the station we noticed on our way out that there was a Krispy Kreme
donut shop so we simply had to stop by to buy a dozen donuts. They
were so good! It's the only Krispy Kreme in the whole mission I think,
so we felt like we were carrying gold in our hands. When we got back
we had to hurry and teach trainers training to all the new trainers.
We were having 10 new beans coming in so we obliviously had just as
many trainers to train. They are all way good and I am really excited
for their next adventure.

At night on Tuesday we went out to go pick up the beans. One (a
Brazilian who didn't go to the Provo MTC due to visa complications)
came in while we were dropping off the Japanese missionaries. His name
is Elder Espinoza and his English is pretty good and he's a good
enough guy. He acts like a South American soccer player because that's
exactly what he did before the mission. He was apparently invited to
play on some sort of semi-pro team in Argentina before the mission. He
acts a lot like the former Elder Valente, which makes sense because
that's who trained him in Brazil. He came with us to Costco and to the
airport to pick up the rest of the bean-chans. This group's flight was
delayed, but all of them looking super excited even though their eyes
were blood-shot from jet lag.

Wednesday was another busy, fast day with the bean orientation. It
went really well and these beans are way cool and are going to do so
well out here. Something interesting to note is I welcomed my
great-grandson into the mission (my bean's bean's new bean-chan if
that makes sense). Elder Jones translated for two of the Japanese
missionaries as I led the main points and it was so exciting, like
always, to work with these brand new missionaries. They have such a
light about them and it always gets you excited. When they meet their
trainer for the first time it's always so exciting for when they give
their first companion a hug for the first time without any idea of how
the next two years is going to play out. They are right there on the
brink of the biggest adventure of their life up until that point.

After all of the madness of dying missionaries and bean-chans,
Thursday rolled around and Jones and had a lot of catch up to do into
the office. We were able to have a good solid planning meeting with
President Ishii to schedule out this transfer. We are going to be
super busy real soon (well we are right now anyway) but busy is good.
Ishii gave Jones and I permission to stay in the office at night so
that we could get all of the work we needed to get finished done. Lots
of phone calls and paperwork for us.

To cap off our week we had a really good Mission Leadership Council
with the ZLs and STLs. We dropped a huge, unexpected change in the
mission and collected everybody's advise and comments about it. The
missionary department has decided to allow missionaries to travel solo
to their new ares and since our mission is so big with all travel done
by trains we had to do a lot of discussion about how we are going to
get this to run smoothly next transfer. At the end of MLC I got to
listen to one of my best friends, Elder Tommy Eadie, bear his final
testimony at MLC. He expressed his desire to keep working and how the
time has just flown right by for him. He expressed his deep love for
being able to serve and work hard for the Lord. I am so glad that we
were able to serve in the same mission together.

That's my week in a nutshell. Next week we have a mission tour so
life's going to stay busy for this guy. All's well. Best of luck to
everyone this week wherever you are in the world!

スピードと天使

堅城長老

写真

Pic 1- We went bowling last week with two members. Guess who won. It

was the guy in the blue shirt that says "ZOOMIES"