oops I think I sent that early!

This week was really cool! We went on a drive with one of our old friends. He drove a little jerky and it was kinda scary at some parts. He took us to this beautiful part of the island where there were some cool looking rocks and you could see a little bit of the reef! There are some huge manta rays that live there but we can't swim/dive to see them! I really want to come back to Ishigaki some day!

We had a game night at the church! 11 non-member friends come! Only 2 members came (one of them inactive) and it was so much fun! Right after that we joined the Shimadas and Elder and Sister Domo (Quorum of the 70) at dinner! They came to our branch for some reason that I didn't catch in Japanese. They were super nice and they spoke in church yesterday! We were only to be at dinner for 15 or 20 minutes before we had to bike back to our apartment for bed! Sadly that was enough time for me to be convinced to eat a whole fish head. The inside of the eyes are hard, don't bite down on them. We got home on time!

Today we made 餃子 (Gyoza)! Elder Nagao used to make it with his family everytime they had a birthday or other holiday. We made 100 but he said they would make 150 or 200! I ate too many. 

We are teaching one daughter and Mom and the daughter is super into learning! They're awesome! The time before last (first lesson) we taught about the restoration and gave her a restoration paphlet and invited her to read it, she did and said she thinks that it is true! Yesterday when we taught we taught about the Plan of Salvation and she said she thinks that is true too! This week we can hopefully invite her to be baptized! 

I love people who speak english (and people who speak Japanese and every language)! There is a couple about to have a baby, the dad works in Canada normally but he came to Japan because the baby should be here in the next few days/weeks! He only speaks English, a little bit of spanish, and basic duolingo japanese so I talked to him during the branch's yuntaku (food party thing after church/lingerlonger). He joined for one of our Eikaiwa lessons this past week which was really cool, during the gospel part he helped so much! 

I listened to a talk from President Holland this week called "Tomorrow the Lord Will Do Wonders Among You." It was the last talk in the 2016 General Conference and he talked about how we can have a better perspective about coming down from personal spiritual experiences back to the "world." He talked about how we should hope from these experiences, that, through our fait hand our works, one day they won't have to end. Our Heavenly Father blesses those who seek to improve, who try their hardest, even if they don't succeed perfectly. Keep trying, its hard, you may trip and fall, but cling to the iron rod, use it to steady yourself, and you cannot fail. 

Elder Soares is coming to our Mission Conference next week! (I'll be flying to Fukuoka again) In our mission-wide zoom last Friday, President Hara played us a video clip of one of Elder Soares' talks where he compared the temptations from the devil to magnets. At first the pull from the magnet is small, manageable, but suddenly *snap* the magnet is stuck. Once the magnet snaps on it is so much harder to get off, so much so that we alone cannot get it to come off. We have to turn to someone stronger to help us remove the magnet. That person is the Savior, Jesus Christ. Only when we turn to Him and work through the power of His Atonement can that magnet truly be removed. When we turn to Him he gives us the strength me need, to do anything he asks! Again hold to the iron rod, it leads away from the magnets and closer to our Heavenly Father!

OK! Health update! I've been to the hospital twice (not emergency, I'm just on a small island so there's not much else). I've been having issues swallowing I think mainly due to allergies. I'm going again next week and they are going to look at my throat/stomach with a camera. Foreign allergies aren't fun. Also funny thing, last pday I got food stuck and it was very difficult to get it to come up, it took about 2 hours and I ended up blowing a blood vessel and parts of my eyes have been blood red this week, it looks a little freaky. But the doctor said it should be gone by the end of this week so we are OK! No more zombie eyes! Pray for me!

I love you all!

Elder Rasmussen!