Sanjo!

My travel suitcase, a journal, and a rice farmer hat

Dear Family!

It's me, your favorite child. ;) I LOVE JAPAN!!!!  SANJO IS AWESOME!!!!  It's like, the stereotypical Japan I always dreamed of.  Also, it is exactly what you described Hokkaido to be like.  On the topic, guess what??  Elder Okano is from Sapporo! :D So that's one cool way that we are connected.

Endless Rice Paddies!  Endless!

REAL MOUNTAINS!!!

As I write this email, Elder Okano and I are at a way good Tonkatsu place right next to the church which is one of the attachments to a shopping strip.  It's way weird!  I always feel like I'm going in to get a haircut and then suddenly I'm in a church.  But it's very comfortable and well kept :)

The Church!

Our ward is the BEST.  Er, when I say ward I mean shibu.  I mean branch.  Our branch president's name is Nakagawa Kaichou (kaichou means President,) and he's the nicest most patient man I've ever met.  Also his family is adorable, especially his oldest son Yuusuke (you-s-kay) who is 14.  He's dendo fire and loves to help the missionaries.

I've only met one of our investigators, his name is Toshiki!  His family is half members, half not.  He's really sweet at heart, but he's a little wild (like initiating sumo wrestling matches in the chapel,) and it's gonna take a bit of changing before he's ready to become a member of the ward.  Other than him, we have a few that I'm going to meet before long! :)

I absolutely love my companion, Elder Okano.  He's hysterically funny.  Partially his sense of humor and partially because of his English.  We just get along way well.  I was afraid to be in a 2-man apartment, but the fact that it's him is such a relief.  

The Many Faces of Elder Okano!

Despite going to an area that causes many missionaries lots of stress, I've felt more at ease and up beat than I have for several transfers.  I sincerely love this place! :) I think its my sense of adventure.

The train ride here was interesting.  Dang it, I'm running out of time.  The apartment I came into was absolutely filthy (do you know Howl's Moving Castle?  It's like that house.  Or kinda like the bath tub in Spirited Away.  Because those houses are Japanese.  And filthy ;) We've taken time out of lunch and dinner, and almost all of P-Day today improving things.  It's becoming really pleasant to live there, I love it! :) But we accidentally spent so much time cleaning up that I didn't save enough time to email.  I'm sorry!!! I'll email more next week!  But for now, I'll just say I had to go to the hombu to get a new residence card, so I was 2 days late getting to Sanjo.  I spent a day with the 3 nihonjin (Japanese) office missionaries who are hilarious, and it was so fun but really tiring!  Then I came here.

Spending time with the office elders!

Bike helmets for new missionaries!

I'm doing great, the week's been interesting.  We had to plan and execute an entire Halloween party the day I got here, so that's pretty much all we've done other than a kubarikai at the eki and talking to people on the street and getting dinner with the bishop.  It's been an amazing adventure so far!

Characters for a puppet show we did.

It was really really sad to leave Fujii and Matsuda and Hiroki.  And Urawa ward... especially my friend Neito kun, one of the young men.  I hope to see them all again.  I really came to love that place a lot and the people even more so.

I love you so much, thank you for your amazing letters every week! :) Shout out to dad, I'm grateful for your letters too, I'll send you a long one next week!  And same to Megan, your email made my day, I'm sorry I wasn't able to respond!!

Love you and miss you!!  Talk to you next week :)

    Elder Stout :D

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スタウト長老 ^o^