JT - Early Mail

Hey this is way early because we are going to go to Kyoto again today. I'm not sure how long this will be so bear with me. This week was Oshogatsu, Japanese New Year. We had at least one meal with a member everyday, so that was awesome. On Oshogatsu, many Japanese families are all together and they celebrate with lots of food and spending time with family. And so yeah, we had tons of food. I'll try sending pictures but it will probably have to do it next week. I didn't know I could eat so much food in my life. Before the mission, if you thought I eat a lot, wow that changed because I eat so much more now. On Friday, we had a lot of food with our Branch President and then 3 hours later, had more food with a recent convert. She also kept giving us more despite what we say. I was almost about to explode with how much I ate. Then the next day, we had two more big meals. Needless to say, I was very grateful for the members and their time and efforts, but at the same time, I felt like they were wanting to kill us with how much food they gave. So the food they gave us were a bunch of kind of appetizer size food which all symbolize some kind of luck for the next year. For example, we had some fish egg things and they symbolize fertility for the new year. There were a ton and I can't remember what else. There was a lot of different seafood and vegetables. It was an awesome experience and I tried a ton of food that I am not sure any of you would ever want to try, but it was all good.

2014 was a great year. So much change happened in this year and it flew by. I graduated high school, had the best summer of my life, got my mission call and left on my mission to serve the Lord in Kobe Japan. I think 2014 is a year that I will never, ever forget. Thank you 2014. Now for an even better 2015!

On New Year's Day, during personal study, we got a call from some guy who said he wanted to meet at the church at 10:00. He said his name, but we didn't recognize it. We looked in the Area Book and saw that he was an investigator who was dropped about a year and a half ago. So we got pretty excited as you would expect. So we went to the Church and he came. He brought a basketball wanting to play, but we don't have a hoop, so he just wanted to pass the ball out in the parking lot. After about 5 minutes of that, we convinced him to go into the church to teach a lesson. We were teaching about God, because he believes in like 800 gods or something. I think he said that he thinks he is a dragon too? Not sure, but it is possible. Then in the middle of the lesson, he got up and was leaving. He said that he would be back, he is just picking up a friend. So he left and after about 10 minutes, he came back with a friend on the back of his scooter. So we all went inside and we talked to the friend. He said that he has no interest in religion at all. He was primarily Buddhist, but not very firm in what he believes. We were talking and he said that his son passed away suddenly at 21 years old. He was devastated by that. He said that he doesn't care about money anymore or anything else like that. (apparently he is way rich.) We asked him, "How would you feel if you could see your son again?" He said "I would give anything to see him again." So we talked to him about the Plan of Salvation and that he will see his son again. He loved that idea. His attitude changed from no interest at all, to very very interested. We committed him to go to church, but he didn't come yesterday, which was kind of sad, but hopefully we will meet again and he can progress in the gospel. And if not, we planted the seed in him and maybe he can have hope in this life that he can see his son again.

Well that's about it for this week. I ate a ton of food for Oshogatsu. Maybe gained a few pounds, but Fast Sunday i think paid off for that. It was a good week. I love you all, I hope you will have fun with school, work and that this new year will be a good one for you!

Love,

Elder Lamoreaux