Letter from Matlock – 11 May 2011

Dear (Family in Japanese characters),                                     2 May 2011

 It is officially rainy season!  Or as I like to call it, May madness.  If only I could get brackets going it could be just as fun as March madness.  For those of you who don’t know how to play here are the rules for May madness.

1.      You are allotted a maximum 1 minute interval between clear skies and pouring rain.

2.      If you forget your rain gear it will rain.

3.      No time outs

4.      Have fun!

No one really follows the last rule though…

Speaking of having fun I managed two more flats on my bike tire.  I think there’s more patch than tube in my back tire now.  Someone has yet to tell me the most patches you can put on a tube before you have to buy a new one so I’m just going to keep going.

This week brought a lot of ups and downs, starting by meeting the biggest jerk that I have ever had the misfortune of crossing paths with.  He was so rude that my companion thinks he’s part of the Yakuza or something because normal Japanese people are simply not that rude.

In contrast to that we were able to teach a lesson to our new investigator!  She liked everything she heard and wants to dive right into the Book of Mormon.  We set a baptismal date for the 21^st of this month.  Whether or not we can do it by then is another question.  Whether or not we will even still be her by then is also a whole other question.  Apparently those rumors circulating around the “mom network” are actually pretty accurate.  Today half of the Tokyo missionaries are returning to Tokyo.  I am in the half not going back to Toyko.  I’m glad too, there’s still some work to be done here in Suzuka!

We were able to have a great meeting with another part member/less active family.  The father was baptized but went inactive when he went into high school and so the mom and children are not baptized.  We had a really great time talking with them.  Apparently he has a friend who teaches at BYU and he got a Christmas family letter type thing from them but since it was all in English…he couldn’t understand any of it!  So I translated it for him and he was very happy to know what his friend told him.  Then he played some guitar for us and he is really, really good!  Afterwards I got to talk with the mom a little and it turns out she likes sewing and cooking.  Especially cakes!  So I offered to get (and translate) some cake recipes from my American mother.  J  Thanks mom!  Sorry but if she makes me your cakes you may get temporarily displaced…kidding, kidding , love you mom!  They invited us back over to eat yakisoba sometime before we get shipped off to Tokyo, so exciting!  Coolest family we’ve found yet.  In Japan that is.

Love you all,

(Elder Wyman in Japanese characters)

3/18/2011 - excerpts from email from Nagoya mission president

Dear Parents of Missionaries serving in the Japan Nagoya Mission:

We are grateful for your example of love and service. Your example is evident in the lives of your sons and daughters who serve here. THEY ARE REMARKABLE! They are without doubt the finest young people in the world and the best missionaries in the church. Their lives of faith are a reflection of your own. Thank you.

All of the missionaries are safe. Sister Baird and I are sensitive to the trust you place in us by sending your children into our care and keeping. We love them. We rejoice with them in their successes. When they have difficulties and trials we weep with them.

As you know the church has a world class risk analysis system and they carefully tune to events and conditions around the world. The Brethren are particularly concerned for the well-being and safety of missionaries wherever they serve. From the time Christ’s Church was restored in the modern era, missionary work has been a part of the fabric of who we are and what we do. The Church is very experienced with all manner of natural and political disruption. The pattern of decision making, no matter what conditions our missionaries face, has been to focus on the safety of the missionaries.

We welcome many missionaries previously assigned to the Japan Tokyo mission. The pattern of caution and prudence for which the church is known, led to a decision made by the Quorum of Twelve Apostles and the First Presidency to reassign missionaries serving in Tokyo to the Nagoya Mission as well as other missions in Japan. The press statement made by Church is informative and represents the policy of the church regarding the safety of missionaries. Though you have probably heard or read it, I include it again at the end of this message.

In addition to the direction we receive from Church Headquarters, each mission has emergency response procedures. These procedures are developed locally based on principles guided by the Church’s long years of experience and research in such matters. As you know, Japan is an earthquake prone nation. Aftershocks are common following large earthquakes. Aftershocks of varied intensity are understandable. We take aftershocks seriously. Missionaries are asked to report in subsequent to each occurrence. There are multiple means of communication with each set of missionaries including local members who love and watch out for the missionaries. We stay abreast of and follow warnings from local agencies and governments. Being prudent qualifies us for the protective powers of heaven.

A final note includes our respect for the people of the nation we serve. In many places in the world, natural disasters are viewed as a license for looting, theft, vandalism and other criminal acts. The human effects can compound the severity of the event. I am not aware of a single incident of this type in Japan. There may have been some, but the Japanese people are patient, frequently waiting in long lines for scare basic necessities including water. If supplies run out there is no fight or contention simply patient waiting. They are tolerant and kind. Though there may be panic in their hearts, there is calm in their demeanor. We admire them. We love them. We would rather be in Japan, in such circumstances, than any place else in the world. Your prayers on behalf of the missionaries in Japan are powerful and comforting. Thank you. President and Sister Baird.

Concerning parents of missionaries who were in Japan Tokyo Mission;

Following a 5 hour bus ride we safely arrived at the Nagoya Mission Home where we were greeted graciously by President and Sister Baird; and many of the Nagoya missionaries.  We felt their love and testimonies and we are excited for the work.

Elder Bullock

Former Assistant of the Japan Tokyo Mission

Letter from Matlock – 30 April 2011

Dear (Family in Japanese characters),                                     25 April 2011

 We went to our new investigator’s house for lunch and she kept talking to my Japanese companion like he understood English.  She is the lady from Africa (specifically Nigeria) that we met our first week here.  She’s married to a Japanese person and if you’re wondering how that worked out, so am I.  At least I was.  So he moved to Africa and lived there for 25 years while he learned Swahili, an African language, and English.  So because of his parent’s failing health he’s come back to Japan to look out for them.  Interesting right?  So she is Christian down to her bones and the husband is Christian also.  Unless he’s with his mother, then he’s Shinto.  So in other words…who knows?  It was so funny.  I would at times translate for my Japanese companion who would then laugh even harder.  Despite not being able to understand, it was still amusing him!  We watched some conference with her then she showed us clips of the astounding poverty in Africa.  People are just living in slums fighting for survival every day.  There’s not a whole lot I can do for them but that definitely gave me some more perspective on things!

On that note…

Love you all,

(Elder Wyman in Japanese characters)

Letter from Matlock – 25 April 2011

Dear (Family in Japanese characters),                                     18 April 2011

 So I’m reading the book of Mormon in English and in Japanese independent from one another.  Unfortunately my reading in English caught up with my reading in Japanese this week.  Much confusion followed.  I cannot follow the story line at al land the spot around Alma chapter 25-30 is one big jumbled mess.  Oh well…

More exciting than that however is the two new people who came to English class this week!  With two more people that brings our attendance up to…two!  They are both college students and one of them spent the last year in London and has a smashing accent.  We finished the flier and are distributing many in the hopes that attendance will double by next class.  Can’t be too hard right?  Oh, the interesting thing about those two is that they found out about the class on the internet!  The one typed in free English class into a search engine and out class came up!  I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the only one to come up!

The other great accomplishment for this week was the new person we found to teach!  We met her yesterday and she really wants to learn about the church.  Now I know what you’re thinking, “but where is she from?”  The answer is not Japan but Brazil.  She actually teaches English here in a Brazilian school so we do all our communicating in English.  Not so great for my Japanese companion, but I’m ok with it, oh – and get this – we just happened to have a Book of Mormon in Portuguese with us.  I’ll tell you; honestly I don’t usually carry one of those around!  We’ll meet with her and her husband this week.  Excellent.          

Love you all,

(Elder Wyman in Japanese characters)

Letter from Matlock – 18 April 2011

Dear (Family in Japanese characters),                                     11 April 2011

 Wow, another week went by already.

It’s sakura season here!  If you don’t know what sakura is check it out on google or somewhere.  All the trees are blossoming and it looks pretty cool.  It’s a shame I’ll only catch it one time on my mission…

So general conference showed last weekend here in Japan.  It was fantastic!  Fantastic even though I ended up counseling about companionship problems in between all the sessions.  Later that night they sent me an email saying they got things settled and had a great lesson.  Excellent.  If only not doing anything could work this great every time.

Final update for this letter, transfers, which would normally happen tomorrow, will happen next week.  The next group coming in are being delayed due to – well, current events.  So we’ll see how this turns out.  If one of us gets transferred I will have had quite a few companions in 2 months’ time.  So we’ll see how this turns out!

Love you all,

(Elder Wyman in Japanese characters)

Letter from Matlock – 13 April 2011

Dear (Family in Japanese characters),                                     3 April 2011

 The interesting part of being down in this part of Japan is that there are more people who speak in strange dialects.  Occasionally we run into someone who I can hardly understand at all!  Apparently there are some parts of Japan like Okinawa that can’t be understood even by a normal Japanese person.  Thank goodness I didn’t end up down there!  That’s the last thing I need is to re-learn Japanese.

This week we met with the branch president and talked about what we could do here in Suzuka.  As he was going through the computer looking for names of less actives he commented that there was a plethora of people on the member list that he had no idea who they were.   So, we volunteered to figure out who on earth they were!   We bought a map and started sticking pins in it and yesterday we finished by sticking in the 118^th pin.  If only contacting them could take as much time as it did to pin them on the map!

We were at a member’s house this week.  A few of their kids were around and the mom asked how old I was.  I said, “20”.  Then she responded, my son right here is 20 too!  You’re on a mission and he’s sitting here playing his Gameboy!  How embarrassing!  It’s funny, cause that’s pretty much what I did up to the point I left on a mission.  Then I thought, yeah it’s kind of embarrassing.  I didn’t say that though.

So the Brazilian Elder’s in our apartment were out doing their thing when they met another missionary!  For what religion do you ask?  Take a guess.  It’s not Jehovah’s Witness, not catholic, protestant or any of those.  They met a Buddhist missionary.  And she was American!  At least she was, I don’t know if you can be considered a full-fledged American if you convert to Buddhism.  We all arranged to meet together because I could hardly believe it and had to see this for myself.  They had a Buddhist conference type thing and invited us to it so we decided to go check it out.  I went with the assumption that if someone could convert to Buddhism, then Mormonism wouldn’t be too big of a challenge.  So we get picked up at the train station and they drive us to the house where they were showing the film.  As we arrived a lady came out and asked us to remove all of our crucifixes.  Ok, easy enough don’t have any of those.  Then she requested that we take off our nametags since they had “Iesu Kirisuto” written on them.  She was surprised to hit a brick wall on that as we would not take them off.  Finally she obliged and slipped us into the back so no one would really look at us.  Then the American, Bethan, sat next to me in the seiza position pulled out some beads or something, wrapped them around her hands and started chanting under her breath and bowing.  Anyone else who came in did that too.  Except for us.

On the TV there were just people going up to a podium and reading something.  I couldn’t understand a word they were saying.  Just all nonsense to me.  I looked up a few words as they were talking and was able to follow a little bit.  They were just talking about the earthquake and different peoples experiences that they had…which were basically the same because, well, they were all in the same earthquake!  We asked Elder Fukushima about it afterwards and he said it was the most boring thing of his life.  (ok, he didn’t’ say it exactly like that- I’m taking some liberties with the translation.  It probably was the most boring thing of his life though.)  Then it ended and they escorted us out as they started to chant together.  Good thing too, I don’t know what I would have done in a room full of chanting people.  We walked back to the car and they told us more about Buddhism and what they believed, and we listened attentively.  As it drug on they began to say that their Buddha guy was greater than Jesus because he couldn’t be killed and how unfortunate it was that American’s aren’t truly happy because they are not following Buddha.  I’ll admit I got a little angry.  Usually its common courtesy to not trample right over things that people hold near and dear to their hearts.  Apparently that was not as important at the moment.  I held my peace though because I could have turned it into an argument in a heartbeat and we needed to maintain good relations.  After that they encouraged us to forsake Christianity and to become Buddhists, the path to world unity and true happiness.  Ha ha…I told them, yea…I think we’ll stick with Christianity.  When I pray and go to church I really feel God’s presence and I’ve gained a really strong conviction.  So strong that were I to reject it I would become a liar.  Then I invited them to come see general conference next week and they said, and I quote “no”.  Apparently they cannot fraternize with other religions including reading books or watching their material.  They’re just Buddhist Jehovah’s Witnesses!  I couldn’t believe it!  We went through all of that and they won’t even let us introduce our own beliefs!  I was not happy!  With that kind of attitude all they’ll ever find is contention.  But you know what, that’s ok, they can do what they want.  Philippians 2:10-11.

One cool thing that happened this week – we met a half Pilipino – half Japanese on the train.  I talked to him about how I was using the Book of Mormon to study Japanese, and then gave him a copy!  He was an interesting guy.

Well, that’s all the time I have.

Love you all,

(Elder Wyman in Japanese characters)