SUBJECT: Just pictures and videos
FROM: ELDER Conner Carlini‬
DATE: Dec 29, 2014

So this week we got some pictures and video. 'Twas a good Christmas
week. Also very very busy. As was today. So I'm just gonna send
video(s?) and pictures, haha. Happy New Year!

Santa came to Japan and came to our church! Haha, he was giving
presents to the kids and it was a fun time.

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老

FROM: ELDER Conner Carlini
DATE: Dec 21 at 9:07 PM
SUBJECT: Christmas Week is here!

Wow it's already Christmas week! It doesn't even feel like it and
there's no snow here to remind me! Anyways, we have quite a busy week
this week actually and I don't have much time to write today either.
So basically it rained a decent amount this week and we got to build
good relationships with ward members. On Tuesday me and Elder Scott
ate a mega size bowl of something called Butadon (a ton of rice and
pork basically) at a restaurant and got our pictures taken by the
store workers because it was apparently like a record for that place
so far. Kinda cool. I was dying near the end way bad. My stomach was
in great pain the rest of the day. We went with a recent convert and
he bought it thinking we couldn't do it. Elder Scott did it pretty
handily. I was joking when I said I'd get the biggest size, bought the
convert bought it anyways, haha. We got posted on their facebook page
so that's cool. Wearing the tags to represent. But unfortunately in p
day clothes because we played ping pong at a sweet place with the
recent convert. Anyways, besides that I got to go to a District Leader
conference and see Elder Bates and a lot of other awesome people I've
missed from the mission in other areas. It was magnificent! Then
yesterday we had a mini church open house and me and Elder Aoki had
the chance to have lunch with a ward member and have a really good
talk about life and goals. It was great. Sorry, no more time really.
Gotta go teach a lesson from here. I'll throw a few pictures your way.
Love you!!

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老

Conner Carlini
Dec 21 at 8:47 PM
Skype Calls?!

Hey, I just wanted to ask what would be best for the Skype call this
week. I'm thinking either tomorrow at around 5:30p.m. Your time. Or on
(your time) Christmas Eve at about 9:30p.m. or 10:p.m. ish. Sorry it's
a bit late, all the Sister missionaries here are doing there calls on
Christmas Eve so I can't do it till later. Anyways, let me know what
you think! Also, I really want Taylor to come over so I can see him
for a bit. If only 20 minutes or so that would be fine. He sends me
videos and stuff every week so we owe him, haha. Let me know and let
him know when too! Bye

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老

Subject: Already a Year in??
From: Elder Conner Carlini‬
Date: Dec 14, 2014
Hey, how's everyone doing? Sometimes the time just flies. So, this
was the week that it happened. I have now been a Missionary for over a
year and have lived in Japan for 10 months of my life. And what an
experience it has been! Although there are more ups and downs than a
roller coaster, I am incredibly grateful for things that I have
learned because of my mission. And from here on I'm ready to strive
for more improvement and experiences. Life is wild sometimes.
Anyways, this week there were a couple things that kept us busy.
First, was that we met a good man named Amada, who now goes by
"Sarunosuke" because he wants to change as a person. He is not quite
like any investigator I've had before. And this week we probably
taught the most lessons I've taught in my mission in a week. Which was
about 7 legit lessons. This may be laughed at by some Missionaries,
but it is quite difficult to get lessons with people in Japan. People
are veryyy busy. Or just not interested enough. But Amada is both
interested and has free time. He is a little bit medically depressed
as well, so he has been hoping to and is finding peace in church and
Gods teachings. He loves prayer. The first time we taught him about it
he prayed immediately. And he prays twice or more whenever we meet. He
is a man with great faith. We also set a baptismal date with him.
There are a few things we need to teach him and help him to create
roots in the gospel quickly, but for now, he looks good. We'll see
what happens!
Another thing we got to do that was special this week was our
District Blitz! Those are always a lot of fun. We went to a place
called Oizumigakuen that's in our area, and did our best to spread the
word of our upcoming Christmas Party at the church. The purpose is to
get people slightly more comfortable with the church as a building
before they commit to coming to an actual meeting. I think it will be
a lot of fun and the party should provide for some new potential
investigators I hope. It was overall a success and I even got to work
with my good friend from the MTC Elder Loboccaro! Having him this
close-by is quite the blessing I'd say, haha. Because speaking of
that, we got to celebrate our 1 Year Mark together! We basically just
ate a bunch of food and "partied" as a couple of missionaries. But
don't worry, we still got in our Futons by 10:30 hahah. So that was
mainly what went on this week.
Does anyone have any special plans for Christmas? We are doing a
Christmas Conference in Kichijoji with the whole mission on the 23rd,
so that should be a lot of fun. I will get to see all of my friends
from the MTC and other areas again! Great people. So, if you're near
your families now, have a great Christmas with them! I'll be in
Japan...but I'll see you for next Christmas!!
Until next time...Enjoy the Christmas season!!

皆を愛してます！良いクリスマスを過ごしてね！

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老

Basically the only picture I took..and my Mom was at home taking many more.

From: Elder Conner Carlini‬
Date: Dec 7 at 8:33 PM
Subject: And another week swiftly moves by

Hello family and friends. This week, as does every week on a
mission it seems, felt a bit slow. But it's now suddenly finished. So
I had another set of slow days and a fast week go by, haha. Anyways, I
unfortunately got sick, officially starting on Monday night. I wasn't
feeling that good because the air here has been really cold lately,
and I've been breathing a whole lot outside, hah. I also developed
quite the headache when trying to help set something up for a few
P.I.s in our area and everything seemed to go wrong on my end. But
everything worked out great. I just felt like crap and laid on the
ground for 40 minutes. So that was a nice start to the week, haha. I
mainly slept and took vitamin C for dayz. And then I bundled up and
started doing some simple streeting to get back into things by
Thursday. And speaking of Thursday, that was Transfer Day!! But since
I didn't move again at all, it didn't affect us. However, Elder
Gutierrez was sent off, and a good friend from the MTC (Elder
Lobocarro) came to Hibarigaoka! He is Elder Scott's companion, but we
still are living in the same apartment. It's been great so far. Now
that we are almost half way into our missions, we get to spend another
Christmas together, haha! So that'll be fun. We have a Christmas
Conference on Christmas Eve at the Mission Homes area (Kichijoji) and
I'm excited to spend a little time there.
Hmm, besides that little tidbit, the main thing that happened this
last week was on Saturday night. We met with our most progressive
investigator Nakai Yuuta, and we got a member to join in who worked at
the same place Yuuta works at now. It was a good lesson that started
with reteaching the Restoration, and then turned towards making a
baptismal date with him. We've been wanting to make a baptismal date
with him so that he could have that goal to work towards, but it just
hadn't felt right in our recent lessons. But tonight we brought it up,
talked about it, and set it (as of right now) for Valentine's Day,
February 14th. And which is also his Birthday! We may move it sooner
if he's ready but for now, it's building up his faith and talking
about commandments. It's good to see him progress and hear his
experiences of receiving guidance and feeling thankful. He's a good
man. That's about all I can think of for now. Weeks go by faaast. So
until next week.....I have some pictures actually. One sec

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老
We ate sushi with an Investigator. Going hard on the Tenpura!
/Users/Home/Conner/Conner's Mission/FROM Conner/From Conner 2014/From Conner 12-8-14/image1.JPG

From: Elder Conner Carlini‬
Date: Dec 1 at 3:10 AM
Subject: No time

Sorry family. No time. We had Thanksgiving this week and got to go to
a members home in Fussa to eat. It was a lot of fun. We ate a good
amount. We also had appointments with investigators. They are doing
good. We got our transfer calls today and I'm staying in Hibarigaoka
with the same companion. But we have a member from my MTC District,
Elder Lobacarro moving in to the apartment!! It should be a lot of
fun. I'm really excited to be reunited with a friend from the MTC.
That's it. Christmas is quite soon huh? Enjoy the snow, if you live in
Utah, hah. Bye

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老

From: Elder Conner Carlini‬
Date: Nov 25, 2014
Subject: This week. In Japan.

Heyyy, so another week has gone by and it went by quick. But I'm
gonna try my best to remember the moments I had. And holy heck, it's
almost the end of another transfer. I will soon find out where and who
with I will spend my 1 year mark and Christmas in Japan. Crazy stuff.
So, on Wednesday I got to go on a split to Tokorozawa with Elder
Young. It was a fun time and we got to workout with a potential
investigator who likes to hang out with missionaries. We went to the
park and beat our legs up a bit using a flight of stairs. It was
great. Then we had English class that night and it was cool to see the
students of Tokorozawa. There's just awesome people anywhere you go ya
know? Then on Thursday, we finished up splits and me and Elder Aoki
went to classic, Shakujikoen station and met with our Progressing
Investigator, Nakai Yuuta. He's doing well and it was good to talk
with him. We showed him some scriptures and discussed them. He's a
deep thinker and his attitude towards life has changed significantly
since we first met him. Yeahhhhh
Then on Friday we had a zone meeting in Tokorozawa actually. I was
supposed to do a training on getting something called S.O.S.
contacts, but because of time, I didn't get to. So now I have a sweet
presentation (just notes written down on what to say) and no audience.
Anyways, after we got back from that, we had been invited to dinner by
one of my favorite Ward members, the Fukuda's. So since we only had a
little time to get there, I threw in an address with "Fukuda" in it
that I had written down, then we rode our bikes there. After about a
45 minute bike ride to "their house," we realized it was a different
Fukuda's home that we went to....and when we looked on the map to
where they actually lived, it was the opposite direction from where we
started. So unfortunately we didn't get to go enjoy a nice dinner and
give them a message that night. But, because they are so awesome, they
drove over later that night to our apartment and gave us some
leftovers that were great! Awesome people.
Then Saturday we had a Zone Family History Blitz in Kichijoji! It
was the first zone blitz I had done too. We had a Family History focus
and got to do some missionary work in that area for a few hours. I
realize now how amazing Kichijoji park is and want to bring the family
there someday. And if I ever move to the Kichijoji area, I'll probably
be broke from buying all this cool stuff they sell there. Tons of
people too. We talked to some really cool mates.
Lastly, Sunday! We had the Baptism of Hibarigaoka's favorite
stubborn investigator, Nakamura さん. He has been coming to church and
rigorously investigating the church for over a year now. I'm certain
he knows more information in the scriptures and whatnot than me. He
has always had tons of questions and he was never fully satisfied with
the responses. We have taught him about faith multiple times and how
sometimes we just don't know. But he felt for quite a while that if
you just tell yourself you don't know and you accept everything as
correct, then your just kind of brainwashing yourself. But he was
finally moved by our man Elder Scott and he looks quite happy now. It
was a great baptism. The ward already loved him, and now he's a part
of it. Pretty great guy.
So yeah, that was my week as far as I mostly remember. Too many little
things happen in a day on a mission, haha. Good thing there are
journals. Talk to you next week. I have pictures.,.,./;&

Elder Carlini
カーリニ長老