Brazilian Miracles--In Japan! 5-25-14

Konnichiwa, kazoku!

Wow sounds like it sure was a crazy week! I cannot believe Logan is officially graduated from high school and coming up on his mission! I am so proud of him. I sent off a little letter last week that should be coming soon. I am glad  dallin Logan and Spencer got to help out with all the fun aspects of branding this year. DAd, of course you are right - the reason I know how to work is from growing up on the  ranch. :) But really - I am so glad that I was able to learn the importance of hard work from that. Mom - I am sorry to hear about all that crazy mouth business going on - I hope you feel better soon! I really liked the idea for your students with the choir final. I am glad that worked out for you!

MAN it was a crazy week. A few things came up with Tomiko so we are still planning on baptism but her date will have to be pushed back a bit. She is great, but has had some hard experiences with churches in the past so we are going a little bit slower through the lessons than we had originally been planning on. However, she has told us several times that she feels really good when she meets with us and comes to church, which is super exciting. 

So many things happened this week but I am totally running out of time, so I will try to get out as many things as I can! Alright - last week we had a zone training meeting in hiroshima, and they needed willes and  I to help out with a few musical numbers and things going on with training so we headed up the night before so we could set things up, then stayed the night with the hikari hiroshima sisters. It was a lot of fun - they are both Japanese and way fun. It was interesting - if I had had a similar situation when I was a bean, I probably just would have been scared and quiet, but we had a great time! We laughed and joked around about all sorts of things. They are great. That was on Tuesday. Oh and that day when we were finding here in Saijo - we were a ways out in the countryside, and it started raining a lot. I had my raincoat, but not my rain pants like I usually do and willes was the same - we were DRENCHED. We were out all afternoon, and when I came home for dinner looked a bit like a drowned rat but it was okay. We got to wring out our skirts and our hair, and admire our pruney hands and feet. Loads of fun. Rainy season is coming up! Huzzah for that.

Zone training was great - every transfer our leaders keep raising the bar. Missionary work - exciting stuff! (sorry. that was kind of a lame sentence but I don't have time to explain or expound right now.)

GAH So many things to tell you but I am way outta time so here is my favorite miracle of the week.

We have one portugese book of mormon that we ordered from the mission office.

Yesterday, we went to visit some brazillian PIs so we took it with us. Unfortunately, neither of them were home, but we tried Umeda san (our first brazillian that we have had a few lessons with) and she answered! We havent' been able to get ahold of her for a few weeks, so we were way happy. She invited us in and we were able to have a lesson with her. After that, we were streeting and ran into a foreigner couple with a cute baby. We started talking to them, asking where they are from and the woman said she was from Brazil! We had a great time talking about her family, what she was doing in Japan, and things like that and she asked us a lot of questions about what we were doing here as well. We were able to talk about the fact that we have a message about a special book, that we normally just carry in japanese but today had it in portugese. She looked at it and said, "Well, you must have brought it because you would meet me today! I would love to talk to you more about this, but unfortunately I am going back to Brazil on Tuesday. But I would love to read this on the plane!" We told her there were missionaries like us all over Brazil as well, and asked her to look on mormon.org. WHAT A MIRACLE. She was golden! I am a little sad that we won't be able to teach her but I know the Lord is looking out for her and will lead missionaries to her! That was such a happy experience.

Last bit of news - this past friday, Zaima was baptized! He was one of  the saijo elders' investigators. our little branch is growing! it was an awesome service, full of saijo love. I love it here. I love it. Missionary work is hard but so good. I know this is where I need to be!!!!! Thank you for all of your love and support. I love you all and have a great week!

Ai shite imasu!

Flake Shimai

Happy Mothers day 5-11-14 and 5-18-14

5-18-14

Konnichiwa, kazoku!!!

It is always so great to get your letters! We had an awesome week! The most exciting news is... we were able to set  a baptismal date forJune 8th with Tomikosan - so please keep her in your prayers!!!!!!!! But I will share more on that later. :) 

It sounds like your week was pretty hectic. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for the wedding announcement in the mail. I can't wait - they are the best. Speaking of that, I sent of the wedding package last week - if you could let me know when it get;s there, that would be great. I just have this fear of customs tearing it apart. I hope the boys had fun with Father and sons - sorry I couldn't be there for you, mom but I hope you know I am thinking about you! I also still absolutely cannot fathom the fact that Logan is graduating so soon and leaving on his mission. Tell him how proud I am of him with all of his endeavors! 

In other news ---- we celebrated our year mark this past week! Unfortunately it wasn't quite as joyous of a celebration as I would have hoped. It was way fun to be with Willes and Williams (we all came out at the same time) but it was way sad to think that we are two thirds done. However, it is A-okay - we still have plenty of time to keep doing missionary work. We went out to a buffet called the Casual Viking. Don't ask - I don't understand either. It was way good, but as I was eating I realized I definitely eat some things that are pretty different than I used to eat these days. I had some shark pizza and something like orange chicken (but it was octopus instead of chicken) - and they were way good. Prettty normal. Mom, I don't want to freak you out or anything - but let's just say I have eaten way weirder things than that here that haven't tasted as good as those did.

It is starting to warm right on up here and we are officially in my favorite weather of Japan. It feels almost like Arizona right now - it is starting to warm up, but it is not super humid yet because the rainy season hasn't started. Granted it still rains at least once a week or so, but I am scared for rainy season to bring in the humidity - it will be raining all day every day come June. 

It is that time of year - for the bugs to start coming out. I had forgotten the feeling of summer - furiously biking down a rural road and bugs flying into your eyes and getting tangled in your eyelashes. That has happened so many times it's not even funny. 

Lastly, our week was crazy but so good! We started teaching a few new investigators, which is always exciting. And Tomikosan came to church again, and when we talked about baptism set a date with us! We still have a bit of a path to go down, but we are so excited to be working with her. Another miracle of the week was Katou san. She was found and started taking the lessons from the missionaries here in Saijo about a year ago, but had to move suddenly and lost contact. They were really sad and tried over and over again to contact her and find her but to no avail. Last week, the elders were housing and "happened" to run into her! She was willing to listen to us more, so they passed her to us and we went by last week and were able to talk about some concerns she has in her life and how the gospel can help her. She has had a really hard life. We are working on building her up and doing our best to help her see how much the gospel will help her. I think one of the most amazing things about being a missionary is that I have the opportunity to see that change in people. I feel so blessed to see it over and over. I love talking to so many different people and really getting to know them and their personal concerns - but also being able to help them come to see how much Heavenly Father loves them. The other day, Willes shimai and I were reflecting on a few things and realized how exciting it is to see our Japanese improving. We've had lessons as of late that included concerns with gambling, cancer, depression, and all sorts of hard conversations and deep concerns that we can understand and try our best to help with. Don't get  me wrong - I  still can't understand every single word, and it is still most definitely a work in progress, but The Lord really is helping us every step of the way in this work. I feel like I have a thousand more things to say to you but that will have to wait for another day. I love you all so much and am keeping you in my prayers - thank you for all of your love and support!!!!

Ai shite imasu!

Flake Shimai

May 11, 2014

Konnichiwa, kazoku!

Well, first off, I would just like to start by saying I feel pretty loved. I talked to you not too recently on Skype and you still had a lot to email me!! Thank you for that - I love hearing all about your week. I probably won:t be able to give tons of details today because I don:t have lots of time, but I will try to explain a bit. And thank you for telling me all the news! I am so happy for Jeff and Shannon - didn:t see that one coming but I think it is wonderful - tell them congratulations for me! Yes, in response to your question - it does make me feel weird to have so many classmates and even people younger than me getting married and starting families of their own. I am really happy for all of them, but also most definitely know that I am exactly where I need to be. I honestly can not imagine what my life would be like if I had not come on a mission, and had not come to Japan. I love it here. The people I have met have changed my life forever. I am not trying to be dramatic - it is just the truth! As you saw when we skyped, little things have changed me culture wise as well. You best believe I will be pretty weird when I step off the plane. Bowing, speaking to you like English is your second language, and much, much more. Mom, be grateful you don:t have to see me in my full glorified awkwardness for quite a while. :) 　As far as your questions go:

It is really weird to teach in English after teaching in Japanese, but we don:t do it very often. It is kind of weird - sometimes when we teach in English, after doing a lot in Japanese, is that I find myself translating what I would say in Japanese into English. But it is also nice to be able to express things fully in English.

Willes shimai and I speak in both. Majority of the time, it is just a really weird mix of Japanese and English that we both understand perfectly. We speak a fair amount of japanese together, but we are trying to be a lot better with speaking more Japanese to each other.

It is a lot of fun. Our week was way good - Tomiko san (the one that reminds me of gma flake)came to church yesterday and we were way excited about that! I am so sorry I don:t have time for lots of details but I hope you have a lovely week! I love you and am praying for you!

Ai shiteimasu!

Flake Shimai

Cherry blossoms and museums 5-5-14

Konnichiwa kazoku!!!

Thank you so much for the email! I hope you realize that in five days we shall be talking face to face! I will send you the details with the skype situation.

As far as your week goes - sounds like it was crazy as always! That is way sad about the Jeppesons! I love them and have learned so much from both of them. But I am glad they get that opportunity :)

 Yep - one fun fact about teaching here in Japan - the majority of the people that we talk to every day and teach have never even heard of Jesus Christ before, or if they have, they don't know anything about him. It really is such an amazing experience to be able to start with that but then see someone's testimony of their Savior grow. It is incredible. So as of late, we have acquired a few Catholic investigators and I soon came to discover that I do not know how to teach Christians! :) But that is a-okay. We definitely had to do some switching of teaching styles, and everything is working out okay. We were able to teach Kimurasan and Sasakisan a few times last week. They are our cute little grandmas that love us, and they study the bible with their friends every week. Things are going well, but they are very content with their church and bible study. One thing that has been a little hard with them has just been that they haven't really been able to connect with us because we are young and American. We are going with one of the members from the Hikari, HIroshima ward this week to meet with them again, and I can't wait to see how that goes. I don't know if I fully explained this before, but our little group in Saijo is a group out of the Hikari ward (whichi is about 45 min by train from here). So, we go to Hikari every fast Sunday for church. A quick report on Ayako san!!! Things are really improving with her. She is one of our very Buddhist investigators. The first few times we met with her were some of the most frustrating lessons I'd ever been in. We would try to explain something and she would talk right over us, with random inapplicable questions, and wouldn't let us get more than one sentence out. We have been praying so much for her, and trying our hardest to do exactly what Heavenly Father needs us to do for her, and we have been blessed to see some huge miracles with her situation. The last two lessons we have had with her, we have really been able to see growth. She still has questions, but they are sincere. We have been able to really have good discussions, and strongly testify to her of why we know this message is true and will change her life. This has been one of the most treasured experiences on my mission to see how the Lord really is helping us to be the missionaries He needs us to be. I guess this really was just such a huge testimony of how this is His work; not ours. 

I almost forgot to say, but we had another unforgettable experience this past week. Last p-day, we went to the Atomic bomb museum in Hiroshima. It was a very unique experience that I am grateful I was able to have. Honestly, it's pretty much impossible to describe how I felt during that. I have never felt so personally responsible for such a huge, devastating situation. It really was heartbreaking to see what happened, and the effects of that atomic bomb; especially after having lived among these people and growing to love them all so much.Basically, I could go on about how I feel about that - but I'll save that for another day.

Some last notes from the week - 

I mentioned it earlier, but it was really great to be able to go to Hikari for church a few days ago and meet more of the members in the ward. One really nice thing - one of the families in the ward invited us over for dinner after church, and they fed us a feast. So much food it was ridiculous. I feel like that was the most food I had ever seen; it was so nice of them. They shared their conversion story , and how important the gospel is to them and it was one of the most touching things I have ever heard. The importance of member missionaries is huge. They are an awesome example to me. Really though, all the members here are. They are incredible. Last of all - we had an FHE (in Saijo) with members from our branch, less actives, investigators and missionaries last night and it was great. The exciting news is this - for the first time on my mission, I was able to do recreation therapy. And it was the first time I had ever done that in Japanese! We did a rec thearapy game, processed, figured out how everyone felt about it, and tied it in to a scripture that explained we all have various talents and that we all need each other. It was one of the happiest times. I love our Saijo family. It is an incredible place to be.

Anyway, sorry for the abruptness - I love you all and can't wait to see you in a few days! Have a great week - I love you!

愛しています！

フレーク姉妹

                                                 Cherry Blossoms!!!

                                                           Playing the koto (traditional Japanese instrument)

                                                   

                                                         Happy Mothers Day!!

                                             

                                                 Peace Banner made out of origami swans

                                             
                                                       The Atomic bomb dome