Hello Beautiful People!!


I hope this week was wonderful for you! I hope General Conference was as wonderful as I heard it was! I am dying to watch it! We get to watch it on Saturday! This week was definitely a roller coaster ride. Our emotions were everywhere we had extremely happy rewarding moments and then the next hour we get dropped or we learn some sad things about people. But it's worth it! We are continuing to help Marjorie work towards baptism and we only have to teach her a couple more commandments and she is good! She brought her baptismal dress home last night to get it all fixed up and her mom is a little concerned about how soon she is getting baptized so we might have to set the date back a little. But we are praying for her and I know that she is ready. She even told us that she stopped hanging out with her friends because she didn't like the feeling she got when she was hanging around them. I was so proud of her. She was at church yesterday with us from 10 am to 5 pm. That girl cannot get enough. I love her. :)

We also met Mika for the first time on Saturday, it was pretty hard meeting her. She has been wanting to meet with the missionaries for months but her boyfriend wouldn't let her. It was an extremely physically violent relationship. When we got off the Eki to meet her it was a hard sight to take in. She had some pretty terrible scars on her. My heart ached for her. She seemed very nervous and shaky. She listened to us teach her about the hope of the gospel and she stopped shaking and was calm. I saw a light in her eyes and hope. We asked her if we could teach her more, but she said she didn't know if she could see us again. Her boyfriend was always calling. I said a prayer in my heart that she would be safe. I thought of our loving Father in heaven and how much he loves her. How much he aches for her and her situation. I feel very strongly that Satan is trying his hardest to destroy the hearts of the people of Japan, he is working so hard on them because he knows how much Heavenly Father loves them. There are a lot of hard things we see. But we see so many wonderful things too. The people of Japan are the sweetest, most courteous, and selfless people I have ever known. I love them. They are just so lost without the gospel. This experience made me want to work twice as hard to find those souls that are beaten down by the horrible things of this world and guide them back to our Savior. I love the people of Japan. I know that God has a very special place them in the kingdom of heaven. I know God loves every single one of his children and cares about their trials.


We were discouraged as we were at the train station (Eki) last night because a very mean man said some terrible things to us as we were trying to share our message. We started to walk home and Vail Shimai saw a woman on the phone and she wanted to talk to her. We waited while the woman talked on the phone for a while and I looked at my watch and it was 8:45! Almost time to be home! I said we needed to go but vail shimai said no. We need to talk to her. So I talked to another lady about God while we waited and she gave me her contact information to teach her more about our message. When I turned around to talk to the woman on the phone, she was in complete tears. Her name was Yako and she said her mother just passed away a couple days ago. Vail Shimai was testifying to her of the Plan of Salvation. We have a appointment with her on Friday.

The Lord is in charge. I know this is his work and glory. I love you all and the examples you are to me. Until next week!

Matane!

Staples Shimai

P.S. We met with the Nakayasu family the dad is a recent convert and we had them set a date to go to the temple on April 4! Sister Nakayasu said they always have talked about going, but never followed through. Now it is actually going to happen! I am so happy for them!!

Q&A:


· Are you learning to make some Japanese dishes? How often do you shop? What are the grocery stores like? Is it easy to find most of the things you need?
Yes I can make soba, refried rice, stir fry. I don't shop that much. In the grocery stores I can see over all the stalls and it's kinda nice. haha. They have a lot more fresh food options. We go grocery shopping every week. Japanese don't buy in bulk.
· Have you gone to the Tokyo temple?
Nope, we get to go in 2 weeks!! :))







Yes we must bow.








The men make sure they don't get into a crash at the next stop light.




And they are SAFE. Thank you very much.




Interesting house! While we were biking out to go housing


We had dinner with Marjorie at the Pancake Factory (where she works) and we taught her the Plan of Salvation and the WoW.






Dinner at the Nakayasu Family's apt. We had them set a date to go to the temple on April 4! yay!