Eternal planning is not as cool as eternal life

Check out the socks

Yes it it Thursday. Yes, I'm alive dad. [I was very good and didn't send anxious emails this time when she didn't write on schedule, that was last time she was late :)] We found out on Sunday there was a ward [church congregation] temple trip today so we last minute changed Pday. Sorry you didn't get a warning. As token of my apology, I'll write lots.

Monday: in the evening when we dendoed [Missionary Work], we weren't getting very far with people. I think it was because it was cold and they didn't want to stand in their doorway longer than necessary. So one time, and a lady was saying bye, I asked "before we leave can we pray together?" I didn't expect it to work. But it did. O shimai [Her companion] says it is gaijin [foreigner] power. It was fun, at every door after (that answered), to ask if we could pray together.

Tuesday: it was so cold. I think I was wearing 5 or so layers and I was still dying. Long sleeve shirt, shirt, cardigan, sweater, heavy coat. And of course no one wanted to talk. It was slightly frustrating. Towards the end of the night, we were looking at the map when T and S (recent converts) popped up and surprised us. It was the pick-me-up we needed. People still didn't want to listen but we didn't really mind. Because we knew eventually someone would.


Wednesday: we taught a less active lady from Korea in English. Her name is A. She was baptized while at BYU. Our joint was this lady, E from Canada. There was so much English. It was weird. I taught in English. O shimai said her 2 planned lines. It was so familiar.  It was me last transfer (but not me anymore). It was so odd.

Thursday: Zone Training Meeting. It was an all day affair. It took 2 hours to get there by train. It was a great training. We talked about how we have tons of blessings over our head and the way to access them is obedience. When we are obedient we can reach those blessings. Then we talked about how sometimes being obedient takes sacrifice. We were challenged to come up with some things we could sacrifice to receive those blessings and see miracles. As I've been thinking about that this week, I've decided to give up my free time during meals. Meals don't take the full hour because even when we talk it's not much. I normally have 30 extra minutes in which I normally write in my journal or read conference talks or watch Mormon messages. But I decided to give that up. If I want to learn the language I have to sacrifice. So now in those free minutes I'm going to study Japanese. It does not sound fun, but I'm willing to do it to learn Japanese. I've been reading the BoM in Japanese during meals this week. We'll see how it turns out. Also, Kaicho (president) surprised everyone and showed up at our meeting. That would have never happened in Naha. Also, I convinced my companion we needed a huge tub of ice cream. So we bought some.  She's very happy we got it even though at first she thought I
was a crazy person.
S. Chan She likes to steal my glasses. 
Sometimes it's problematic because
she runs away and I can't see. 


Friday: we had 2 lessons. One with J, from Taiwan. She's fluent in English and Japanese but loves English so we taught in English. And Ogawa shimai would pitch in in Japanese. It was odd but it worked. She is stellar. She committed herself to our commitment before we could commit her. What a boss. She brought her husband to play pingpong and chat with the elders while we had our lesson. She also bought me a
nice and toasty scarf. Sam, I've become a scarf person. I'll never make fun of you and your Frenchy scarfy-ness again. Although, they wear them different in Japan. It's not a fashion statement, more like a cover-as-much-of-my-face-as-possible statement. Except they look stinking cute as they do it. Of course this is Japan: land of the cute. Then we had a lesson with the the K family (recent
converts). We played jeopardy! Years of primary jeopardy paid off. (Thanks dad. I feel like whenever you substituted for my primary class we played jeopardy.) [in my defense those were times when I wasn't planning on substituting]. It was way fun but trying to explain it to my companion was a bit hard. She'd never heard of jeopardy before! What did she do in primary?!?

Saturday: we weekly planned all day. We also took a power nap in the middle of planning because planning causes exhaustion. We had kids Eikaiwa [English Class] in the morning which was way fun. We play games and color. That's my kind of party. Since this day is so short I'll describe Chikushino more. It's cold. Way cold. I miss Naha and its paradise-inness. When people find out I came from Naha they all have the same reaction. "Awwww. It's so cold here. Are you ok?" No, I think to myself, I can't feel my toes ever. But I do love it it. Don't get me wrong.

Sunday: fast Sunday! It snowed. How terrible. Biking to church in the snow was way weird. I think I showed up looking like a snowman. But when we went outside after church it was like 50 degrees and sunny. What? So when we were housing the temperature was really nice. But when we bike home the son was gone and it was freezing again. Well, at least housing wasn't miserable. Mini miracle. The cutest thing happened at church. S, the 9 year old recent convert wrote a letter to Jesus during church and then wanted us to deliver it to Him. It was precious.

Monday: it was a weird day because it was Pday turned normal day. But my body wanted a Pday. We did have an awesome lesson with his young mom, J. She has a 1 year old son. We taught her the Plan of Salvation. It was so cool! I taught a lot of the lesson (which was terrifying because I didn't have much time in language study to
prepare). And it was by no means perfect. But I spoke. Without having to refer to my outline every 3 seconds. I even said some unplanned stuff. Modern day miracle! She was way nice. As we taught her, she said that everything made sense. Then after, while O shimai and J chatted more about life (in too deep of a way for me to
understand), I played with her son. He was so cute. And I realized something something cool. Recently I've been praying a lot for the gift of tongues so I can understand and get to know the people better. But I still don't seem to understand anyone any better. I speak better, but my understanding is still way minimal (except for O shimai. I'm starting to understand her Japanese). Anyway, back to my
story. I was feeling sad because the language barrier was keeping me from getting to know people (so I thought). But I learned something new. I speak kid fluently. I seem to become everyone's kids best friend. And somehow that helps me get to know their parent and helps the parent trust me. Today in the lesson, J wasn't really opened to me. But then, after I played with her son, she was just chatting away to me (not that I completely understood.) I got to know her! And not even by talking to her. Long story short, God has been answering my prayers for the gift of tongues, just in a unexpected way. Typical God, He's really a God of miracles.

Tuesday: we finally finished weekly planning. During the week we were planning for. Better luck this next weekly planning. We had district meeting. In our district of 6 the shimai [female missionaries] overpower the choro [Male missionaries]! That's a first. The we went out and Indo-curry (which is huge in Japan. I didn't know that because it's not big in Okinawa). It was way nice to chat in English and get to know people in English and tell/understand jokes in English. It was a good break. Then, in the evening durning our extended dinner (Og shimai wasn't feeling too hot), we read the BoM together. She read in English and I read in Japanese. It was good language practice for the both of us. And it was sort of fun. 

Wednesday: Senpai day😭 [Senpai means the senior or older person, not sure why that means she is in charge] That meant I was in charge of everything. Blah. We taught A again (the less active from Korea). We talked about when we felt the most happy in our lives. I talked about how when we went hiking up old rag and we were all being goofy together and saw the sunrise and the scenery was beautiful and I was just with my family. And it was only a couple days before I left. But I was was happy to be surrounded by God's beautiful creations and my beautiful family I was leaving for a year and a half. I was happy. Also, who doesn't love hiking. A has been having a hard time recognizing the spirit but we were hoping we could get her to recognize that happiness is a feeling that comes from God. O shimai told a story in English! We worked on it together in language study. It made me so happy. While we were Streeting we crashed into a Chinese couple. O shimai started talking to them in Japanese and they said I don't understand Japanese and looked worried until they saw me and said I can talk to you. So we talked about God and how we are His children and how we should love each other. The biggest miracle was that I had a Chinese pamphlet in my bag that I could give to them.


Thursday: temple!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 
Before the temple we went to good ole Micky D's and I had a delicious shrimp patty. It was so delicious. Not to rub it in. Then we went to the temple. I got a cool name tag that said English and some sweet headphones and translator. I didn't realize how stressed I was until I walked in and bam, I felt so chill. And it was peaceful. It I didn't even worry about the fact I had to speak Japanese. It was so nice to go to the temple again. It had been too long!  Well, that's my week and a half. I'm doing great here in Chikushino. The weather these past 2 days has been so warm. But I heard there's going to be snow again next week. Bummer.

LOVE LOVE LOVE
ベアマン姉妹
Aka your favorite daughter in Japan






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