The Tanabata Festival! Check out the pictures, he ate fish on a stick!

Hey! 

  

We have two investigators now and they are both progressing very nicely!  

  

I miss mud Boggs! Kind of. I guess I never really went to hem haha but it just seems so American to me now! (We sent him pictures of us at the Mud Boggs, you haven’t lived till you’ve been to the Mud Boggs!) 

  

I looked for Japanese Pokémon cards but I could find any. I'll keep looking though! They have them for sure though. People here are literally in love with Pokémon.  

  

Yes I got the debit card!  

  

Well Godzilla is a popular monster here. Not necessarily a dinosaur haha but it's Japanese!  

  

We went to Fujisawa on splits this week. I was with elder Magaña this time. He is my same mission age. He's so funny! At night everybody was snoring way super loud and I forgot my ear plugs. So it's like 3 am and I'm plotting how I can get some sleep. I could kind of hear the refrigerator humming in the kitchen. So I grabbed the blankets I had on my futon and threw them in the narrow kitchen. I couldn't fit my futon but he blankets would do. I put my ear right up to the base of the refrigerator and it helped to block out the snoring. But I still couldn't sleep! So I got back up and found that they had some rice still in the rice cooker from the day before. I found a bowl in the dark kitchen and scooped me a small pile of rice. I couldn't find the chopsticks so I just sat there on the kitchen floor in the dark at 3 am eating rice with my hand haha. After that I was able to go to bed. I had a dream that I was in an interview with Elder Holland and he told me to be more accountable!   Needless to say, I will be studying accountability this week. The night this before we had massive rainfall. But of course I forgot my awesome new rain jacket. We got soaked. All the people we housed into were like, "you should seriously go home. Like it's unsafe to be out here. " haha we just thought they didn't want to talk to us turns out they were probably actually concerned for our safety!  

  

On the way home from Fujisawa, around Tsujido station, we were just riding the train and all in a sudden the train started to stop really really fast. I heard an alarm sounding in the corner doctors cabin behind me. The train came to a hard stop and the only thing you could hear was the alarm going off. Eventually a recording came over the intercom and said that someone had just pushed the SOS button. So we sat there for like 20 minutes and then another recording came over and said that there was a human accident with the train. So either we hit someone or someone jumped in front of the train. We waited for another hour in the train while cops and ambulances and fire trucks inspected the whole train.  

  

I made okonomiyaki this week. It's basically a big thick pancake with cabbage and pork in it. Well it destroyed me. My stomach was in so much pain. I was on splits with elder Carrasco and we had a lesson in like 30 minutes and a 15 minute bike ride ahead of us. I had to stop and go to the 7-11 and we had to call and delay the appointment. We ended up at another 7-11. I came out of the bathroom and saw Elder Carrasco preaching the restoration hard core with his bible open to some Brazilians. While we were talking to them the guy who we had the lesson appointment with showed up behind us! He is from Perú. Turns out that me and elder Lind housed into him a couple months ago! We taught him the restoration and at first he was kind of hard towards it. But then we taught about prophets and he changed. He immediately said that he would read the Book of Mormon and that he wanted his family to hear our message as well! I tried to speak Spanish as much as I could but it was hard haha. 

  

This week is the Tanabata Festival! It's MASSIVE in hiratsuka (where I live) specifically! I sent pictures. It's outrageously big. We ate some ungutted-fish on a stick and a half a melon. We were walking around and elder Sumsion (we were on splits) said out loud, "Heavenly father, please put a kinjin (golden investigator) next to us." No joke, probably two seconds later a Chinese kid named Chen walked beside us. We have a lesson with him again tomorrow night!  

We threw down a big kubari kai (passing Out English class flyers) at the eki. There were so many people. A guy came up to me and asked for a bible. I told him I didn't have one but that I had a Book of Mormon. I tried to do more but he left with the Book haha.  

  

One night we got to give a blessing to a baby in the ward. He had a really high fever and his dad was out of town for work. It was so special! He is such a happy tough baby.  

  

I love you! 

Elder Draper 

ドレーパー長老 

  

We plan on having Haydon's Homecoming talk Sunday Aug. 13 at 11:00 at our church building. We will be having a dinner at our house about 3:00. Please come! Even if you don't make it to church come and say hi at the house. Now there is one possible problem concerning this. Allie is due with her baby Aug. 8th. Now if this baby doesn't co-operate it could change our plans around just a bit. We will keep you posted.

Black Ice Cream...

Happy birthday mom!

What did you do for your birthday? Anything spectacular? You might have actually written about it but I'm writing this before I've looked at your email so let's see!

Our investigator is repenting and feeling refreshed from it! It's awesome! He is really progressing well! The only thing is that he has work on Sundays so that is hard for him to come to church. 

Man that sounds like a way fun week! Zoos, fires, camping. Sounds way fun! 

My stomach has been alright. I don't feel nauseous anymore but it still isn't the best. Haha as for food... I don't know! I found out that green marshmallow pudding salad stuff actually destroy's my mouth with canker sores so maybe let's not eat that one haha. Let's have a weenie roast! That's actually what I miss the most when it comes to food and activities haha. I miss weenie roasts! 

That's crazy that they just found out! (referring to when Tanner comes home) I thought the mission just automatically contacts the parents but I guess not! By the way I lost my flight plans. Do you have that emal? If not I can just ask the office for it again. (by the way, to those reading this…he will be flying in Aug. 11^th at 5:30 p.m. so if you want to come!)

This week was great! It was a fast one! They are all fast! It's about 33 degrees here. I don't know F. But it's fun! Unfortunately it hasn't rained since I bought my jacket haha. They call it a Karatsuyu which means an unusually dry rainy season. But typhoon season is still coming! 

I have been studying about the pioneers this week. I have so much respect for them! Man we have it so easy compared to them. I am so grateful for all they did for us. One thing I loved was a story about a guy who came across in the Martin handcart company. Some years after the trek he was with some people who were criticizing the church for only giving the members handcarts for their journey across the plains. He told them that he doesn't regret coming by handcart. It was the hardest thing he had ever done but it was through that trial at he became acquainted with God. I think of my life and how at times I was t as grateful as i should have been. But it doesn't matter what kind of trial comes our way. They are a normal part of life and if we endure them well and hold fast to what we know is true then we will come closer to God and be better prepared for the next trial. I am so grateful for my life and how close I have been able to become with my Heavenly Father. 

We have been finding Filipino people a lot lately! Haha last P Day when we went to a Enoshima we found a guy from Bolivia (so he spoke Spanish) and his friend was from the Philippines! So Elder Carrasco (who is from Mexico) were able to talk to them for a while in both of their native tongues! It was pretty cool! 

While we were at enoshima we got these vanilla ice cream cones but they had ash in them. So they were pure black. It was good though! There are tons of Seahawks on the island and they will steal your food if you aren't careful. I saw a massive seahawk shook down and basically grabbed a lady's food and then threw it at the ground hahaha. It was kind of hilarious. Then I saw one circling above me and I hid myself and my ice cream. 

Elder Bullag finally got his Bike! Woot woot! We've been taking buses and walking everywhere! When we first started it took us exactly thirty minutes to walk to the church. By the end it took us like 20-25 minutes! So we got faster! But still not as fast as a bike haha. My bike's chain is super bad right now. It makes horrible noises when I pedal. Buuuut seeing that I'm coming home in like a month I don't really have the motive to go fix it. But it's ok because it still works. Just bad noises is all I think. 

It's fun living in Japan. Sometimes it still feels weird that I live in Japan and speaking Japanese. I've been here for a while now but it still feels weird to me that I'm not in America speaking English haha. 

Well I'm not sure what else to say. But this week was good and I'm glad to hear that you week was good too! 

I love you so so much! 

ドレーパー長老

2 emails in this post

  

There are 2 letters here. We were in Reno so I didn't get the other one sent last week. He's feeling much better! Less stress! yay!!!!!!!!!!! 

  

Hey! (Fun fact: Saying hey (especially in texts) is rude in the Philippines) 

  

My New Companion is.......(drum roll)....... Elder Bullag! (Pronounced Bool-yag) he is from the Philippines!!! He is literally the best. He is super obedient, loving, hard working and so much more! He's fluent in English, Tagalog, ilongo (his native language), and he speaks some Spanish and now Japanese! Elder Hattanda came back! I got to see him and give him a hug and talk to him. It was so good to see him again! The other Elder is Elder Shephard. Ya I know him! I was with him when he tore his ACL in Kichijoji at sports night. Elder Bullag and I found a new investigator on Saturday! His name is Ookahara. We just stopped and talked to him on the street and we ended up teaching a lot of the Plan of Salvation, gospel of Jesus Christ, and about the Book of Mormon and then we took him to church and showed him the baptismal font and everything. We have a lesson with him tomorrow at 7pm. The dinner appointments were great! We had another one last night with the Markhum Family. They are from California. The wife is half Japanese. We also had a recently re activated broker come with us. I love this ward! 

  

Yay for being done with radiation!!! Man that's so cool! That's awesome! Right now in our apartment there are two Americans, one Mexican and one Filipino. Elder Sumsion, Elder Carrasco, Elder Bullag and myself! 

  

I love family. I love that our family just keeps getting bigger! And all the families are so nice and awesome.  

  

I'm so happy with my apartment right now. Everyone is so obedient and happy. It's pretty great. My stomach has been pretty bad this week. Sister Warnick is trying to get me some medicine for it. I feel nauseous sometimes. Like the last two days was pretty bad. My eyes are still yellow. I'm not the DL anymore. I'm glad to be wherever I'm told to be so that's not a problem! Plus it's less stress! Today's plan is to email, then we will go eat ramen because it's Elder Sumsion's birthday this week.  

  

Oh that's right you guys are going to Reno right. I hope you have fun! Japan is getting super hot right now. And humid. But I'm so grateful! Elder Bullag is telling me of the conditions in the Philippines and how it's like even hotter and they don't have AC unless you're rich and stuff. So I'm grateful we have AirCon!  

  

Ya so this week went back to Kichijoji for like the nth time! I woke up at 5:30 and got on the nearest bus by myself and rode trains to shinjuku and then to Kichijoji by myself. Coming back my stomach was super nasious (I don't know how to English anymore!) so we stopped at a couple stations to go to the bathroom. But we have just been working hard and finding people! I'm super excited for this transfer!  

  

I'm not really sure what to talk about. Haha this week went ways slow but at the same time I can't remember what we did! I am just so grateful for Elder Bullag! If I think of anything else I'll send another email haha 

  

I love you!  

  

ドレーパー長老 

  

Hey! 

  

Ya elder Bullag is still the best! We got two. New investigators this week and set up a baptismal date for the first of August with Ookahara san! We taught him the first half of the Plan of Salvation and we asked him if he believed what we taught and he replied, "Hai" meaning "Yes". He's super cool! There are so many prepared people in Japan! You just gotta find them is all. And my eyes are still yellow yes.  It  said sometimes they may just be yellow because I have the Gilberts Syndrome.  It isn't always connected to stress. Sometimes it just does it. My stomach is feeling better now. 

  

The desert has become so beautiful to me! Definitely one of the most beautiful things in nature to me now. I miss the desert so much! I love to tell people that I love in a town that is called "Mountain Home" but there are no mountains haha just desert. 

  

That's so cool that Robert (as in my uncle Robert right?) is the stake young men's leader! I remember going to that camp. That was like the best time of the year! I hope I can work in young men's one day! 

  

 Ya Brei has been keeping me updated with how much she's been running! That's awesome! I have started jump roping every morning. I went back to Kichijoji and found the jump rope I left ere last year haha. I do about 200-300 times in the morning. It helps me to sleep at night too!  

  

We met with Ookahara and set a baptismal date for August 1st! He is so awesome! At the end we all kneeled and he prayed for us. He was pretty nervous because he had never prayed before. But we talked about the things he was thankful for and what he wanted to ask for and hen he said his prayer. Can you imagine the position we are in? He doesn't know God, but God knows him. God is his father and has been away from him for a long time. God hasn't heard from him because he has never prayed. So there we are, head bowed and knees bent and we get to witness this persons' first words to his father in Heaven. It's such a humbling and awesome and spiritual experience. He said that he was so grateful at he had an opportunity to accept the gospel. He is already worried about others not having an opportunity in this Life! He was like, "man that's really important to share with everyone isn't it!" And we were like, "ya it is! Acts why we are here!" Haha it was so cool to see him understand and believe so much.  

  

I have learned this week that if you anticipate success, you will succeed. If you go into something expecting to fail, well then you'll most likely fail. Every time we go outside expecting Heavenly Father to guide us to help somebody, we do! Anytime we are doubtful and think that there is no way we could succeed today, then we don't succeed! It even applies to temptation. If we expect that we will fall to temptation, we will! If we expect that we will triumph over Satan and his tricks, we will! It works with sleep I've found as well lately. (I've been fighting going to bed lately) If I go to bed with the mindset at it's going to be another long night of tossing and turning, then it will be. If I don't worry about it and just expect to be able to sleep, then I will. I hope that we can always have a positive outlook and attitude on everything we face. I know that God wants us to succeed and be confident that we will with His help.  

  

I love you guys! Only 7 weeks or so till I get to hug you all and tell you how much I love you in person!  

  

Elder Draper 

  

  

 ドレーパー長老