Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Transfer 5.6 Pictures

Me and my first district! Almost 5 transfers later... (Minus Elder
Hill and Elder Crandall)

Transfer 5.6 Pictures

Beautiful Fuchu ward singing at the fireside!
Beautiful two zone conference! (But seriously, everyone in this
picture looks so good. It is a fantastic picture. Miracle picture.)

Transfer 5.6: I Never Dreamed of a White Week

Hello everyone.

This week....

We....

Did...

PRACTICALLY NOTHING YAAAAAY

And by that, I mean we did a whole lotta Streeting and tracking and
mostly handing out flyers at the train station where we were nicely
ignored by most.

Lately, our investigators have really enjoyed doing this thing where
they are saying that are coming to something and then not showing up,
so then we are just there awkwardly by ourselves! Yaaaay! Don't worry,
I am the master of awkward.

Ok, maybe I am exaggerating just a little bit. We did have something
that we did! We had an exchange where I got to go with two adorable
sisters in Kawasaki (Sister Yoshida and Sister Handy) where we had an
interesting member visit and a great mogi lesson. Also, a bus
adventure. All that means is that I don't know how to read Japanese.
So that was a lot of fun! On Sunday, we had a lot of fun with the
Honda family and other families for FHE and dinner! So much fun!

It is a big festival starting today, so most everyone has work off.
Let the awesome Dendo time begin! Expect some awesome pictures. Golden
week shall be the best!

Yesterday was a wonderful busy day that included lunch with some
wonderful members, an interesting LA visit with the Elders and a good
first lesson to wrap things up! I LOVE busy days! I wish every day was
that busy. Seriously. Fill every single day up with stuff. Make Clark
Shimai a happy girl.

This morning, we got a surprise email saying that we needed to be at
the temple and hour earlier than usual.... AKA we rushed like crazy.
Yeah, this is a short email this week. But know that I love you all
dearly! I got all the letters that filled my heart with joy!! Thank
you so so much!!

Keep working hard. Remember that The Lord loves every part of you.

Sincerely,

Sister Teagan Clark
クラーク姉妹

Sunday, April 20, 2014

Transfer 5.5 Pictures

This week, I finally made guacamole for the first time in Japan. It
was delicious. Also, I bought THE MOST DELICIOUS STRAWBERRIES I HAVE
EVER EATEN my goodness, they were absolutely delightful.

I have other pictures, buuuuut... My camera died on me while on the
way to the internet source. Unsurprisingly, all my pictures have to do
with food.
させがクラーク姉妹

Transfer 5.5: Giant Eggs

Happy Easter, everyone!

I hope you all had a wonderful day yesterday, being able to celebrate
together to resurrection of Jesus Christ.

I hope you have also had the opportunity to eat an enormous amount of
delicious Easter candy. Nothing quite like karate chopping a giant
chocolate egg open.

This last week is all quite a bit of a blur. We were in Kichijoji... A
lot.... That is because we had ZONE CONFERENCE yeeeeeah and that was
absolutely spectacularly. I have quite a few friends in the north
zone, and so it was really nice to be able to see them. Here are a few
of my notes:

「We've gotta be weird, we've gotta talk to everyone, because the more
we talk to people, the more seeds we plant.

We want to GET TO THE CORE quickly.

You can see whoever you want! As long as you have an investigator. You
gotta Dendo when you are with your investigators! 」

...yeah. That is the basically the life of a missionary right there.
Learning about how to help people and make lives better, but in crazy
missionary tango, of course. Wouldn't have it any other way.

I also had exchanges with the lovely Sister Tavo this last week.
Probably the most exciting thing about that is because she visited, I
got my camera changer back! YES! I have hardly any pictures on my
camera from the last two transfers. We are about to change that.

On Saturday, we had the opportunity to go to Kichijoji.... Again... To
take a potential investigator to see a presentation by President Wada!
It was wonderful. Our PI had an awesome experience. We were also made
aware that Golden week is coming up soon! Apparently it is a huge
festival in Japan... I guess we will find out.

On Sunday, we had a really special opportunity to sing with our ward
in a special fireside where the General YW president and the General
RS president spoke. One of their husbands made a comment "I wonder of
there isn't anyone who isn't in this ward's choir." Which made me
laugh because indeed, the "choir" is the entire ward. It was a sweet
experience.

I am afraid I don't have too much more to report on. Oh! Shout out to
Mama Bates! Elder Bates wants letters and packages and more letters. I
told him to try sending some letters first and maybe he'd receive
some, but I dunno how well that advice was taken. (≧∇≦)

I hope everyone has a wonderful day!! Keep coming closer to Christ.

Sister Teagan Clark
クラーク姉妹

Sunday, April 13, 2014

Transfer 5.4 Pictures

For Easter, Sister Harpers parents sent her a package and they were
really kind to send me some chocolate too, Including this giant
wonder.

Transfer 5.4: An American, A Brit, and A French Person Walk Into McDonald's...

... Yeah, it sounds like the beginning of a weird joke, doesn't it?
Well, it isn't a joke. That would be the reality from this week. The
punchline would probably have to be that we were all speaking Japanese
to one another. Probably very amusing to the Japanese people around
us.

It has been a great week. A slow week. A really, really weird week. I
don't even know where to start.

The Elders haven't had much luck in contacting some of their
investigators. I had a feeling that they would run into them soon
enough and that they shouldn't worry to much about it. It turns out
that my feelings were only half right. It wasn't the Elders who ran
into them. It was me.

Three days in a row, I ran into someone the elders are working with.
It was kind of ridiculous. Tuesday, I ran into one of them while
handing out flyers at the train station. That was quite the experience
in itself. Though I don't think I should explain everything that
happened in that circumstance on my blog, please feel free to email me
(Clark.kathryn@myldsmail.net) and I will certainly explain every
aspect of that... Interesting... Experience. Let's just say that I am
apparently so beautiful that I make Fuchu station look like heaven.

The next day, I made the suggestion that we try a new place to hand
out flyers. It turned out that that had been a small piece of unknown
revelation, as we ran into another one of the people that the elders
have been wanting to meet with. He explained how he had recently
become busy with work and school and still wanted to meet with them.
(He happens to be one of the nicest guys ever.) Sister Harper and I
found the situation to be amusing and she joked "let's see, who will
we run into tomorrow? I think Arnold." I told her that I doubted that
would happen and we continued on our way.

Well, guess who we ran into the next day? Yep. Arnold. (Name has been
changed) but seriously, it was ridiculous. I suppose occasionally and
rarely, you CAN be in the right place, at the right time.

On Friday, we ate with a new friend of ours and that was fun. On my
mission, I have grown to seriously LOVE Indian curry. I plan on eating
it regularly in the future. It is delightful. After that we went to a
small town outside of the city we were in to find a referral that we
had been given. While in the town, we saw what looked like some kind
of racing oval. And old man approached us and started asking us weird
questions, and when it looked like we didn't understand, he made
motions at us as if he were pedaling a bike and mentioned something
about a newspaper. We politely excused ourselves. On our way back to
the station, another man made the same biking motions at us and we
were very confused.

Sister Harper decided that there much have been two foreigner girls
who recently won a bike race and it was in the newspaper and they all
thought we were them. I dunno if that is anywhere close to true, haha,
but I will take it.

General Conference was wonderful. I look forward to applying the
things that I learned to better my life and myself.

I love you all dearly. Stay true to the faith.

Love,

Sister Teagan Clark
クラーク姉妹

Sunday, April 6, 2014

Transfer 5.3 Pictures

And a RAAAAAINBOW!

Transfer 5.3 Pictures

I seriously love Japan. ☆*:.。. o(≧▽≦)o .。.:*☆



Sister Teagan Clark
クラーク姉妹

Transfer 5.3 Pictures

Me and blossoms and Sister Harper

Transfer 5.3 Pictures

These are going to be a lot of pictures of flowers. Hold onto your hats, boys.

Transfer 5.3: Fading Sakura Blossoms

It is sad that the Sakura season doesn't last for long. But boy, have
I been enjoying it while I can! The weather is lovely, and Japan is at
its finest at this time of years! I wanna come here every year for a
Japanese spring. I wish I could show you every bit of Japan's beauty.

I have had a number of interesting experiences that I wish to share
with you today. Hold onto your seats, folks. We are in for a ride.

Last P-Day, we had the opportunity to work with the seminary students.
What is interesting about this is what happened later that evening.
While we were handing out flyers for our free English class, I began
talking with a young woman who was from a church called "Providence"
which I had never heard of. She asked me some questions about our
beliefs of resurrection, which was miraculously the very thing we had
talked about in seminary that morning. Recalling the scriptures we had
read and reviewed with them, and I was able to more clearly share and
teach our beliefs and extend an invitation to her to read the Book of
Mormon and listen to our message.

On Friday, we cooked and delivered cookies to one of our investigators
and their family. Sister Harper has a great love for birds and we knew
of a place where we could see many birds near by our investigators
house. We decided to go e long way around the get back to the church.
Luckily, because we decided to go this rote, we were also able to talk
to the husband of the family as well, who we ran into on his bike. It
was a good experience to be able to see all of them, of whom we do not
see often. The wife had also expressed that the timing had been
perfect, because in the next few minutes they were about to go to a
soccer practice and wouldn't have been home.

On Saturday, we visited a less-active and shared a message. She
promised that, if it didn't rain the following morning, that she would
definitely come to church. The forecast for the next day was rain, all
day. But I prayed very hard that the morning would be clear so that
she could come to church. Miraculously, the rain stayed off and she
was able to come. It began raining as we were walking home, a few
hours after church ended. It waited just long enough.

Although these may seem like small and simple things, thy are truly
miracles, and they are the things that keeps me going every day of the
week. Heavenly Father is watching out for us. When we watch for it, we
can see his hand in every aspect of our lives.

Accidentally smacked a dent into one of our cupboards.

While handing out flyers on another day, I had an excellent time
making friends with these two hair stylist guys who were also handing
out flyers. They were pretty hilarious and enjoyed using their limited
English to crack some jokes. We saw some pigeons fighting (pigeons are
demon birds, I swear) and also, in the midst of it, a woman came up to
me. She pushed some booklets in my hand, pointed to a website in the
bottom corner and said "this website has many languages" ...

... Yes, boys and girls, it was JW booklets. But then she just walked
off quickly, so.... It wasn't a very effective conversion. Not to
mention that I can't read Japanese.

Which brings me to an epiphany that I had today. I have been wondering
lately, why the questions that people ask us are usually like "what do
you believe about the technicalities of the second coming?" And quite
a while ago I had the question "what does it mean to look beyond the
mark?" As it mentions in Jacob 4:14.

But as I studied today, I received light and knowledge by connecting
the two questions. It reads in Jacob 4:14, that people "sought for
things that they could not understand" or, otherwise stated, that
people want to know things that we simply do not know doctrinally yet.
These people have blindness, which "blindness came by looking beyond
the mark."

The reason many overlook our message is because our message is simple
and pure. They look beyond the mark. Beyond the target. Too far into
the future. There are many things that I would like to know and many
things that I would love to know, but many of those things I simply
will not know until a future time. I find myself asking "is this
pertinent to my current salvation?" And if the answer is no, then is
just don't worry about it. That has brought much happiness and
understanding into my life,

I am so grateful for personal revelation and the mercy of our
all-knowing Heavenly Father. One day I may know all things. But today
is not that day.

Love you all so very very much,

Sister Teagan Clark
クラーク姉妹