guess it didn't work. But I will try and redo it again.
Christmas week was so awesome! We started it out awesome with a flash
mob at a mall in Narita! Ai chan came with us and so did the ushiro's
(Ai chan's best friend's family are members and hey are the ushiro
family) there were 40 missionaries there and about 70 members. It was
soooo cool! We all gathered together in a random hallway before it and
had a good pep talk. President budge and his family were even there!
We all took our spots in the lunch court and ate our lunches. Then two
elders jumped on the stage and bursted out "joy to the world" and
slowly all of us missionaries joined in and at first you could tell
they all thought we were just crazy foreigners but then all of the
members stood up and they were all shocked! A lot of kids were smiling
and jumping up and down and a lot of people were surprised. We sang
silent night after that and the spirit was so strong in the food
court. We got to talk to some people about the gospel and it was a
powerful experience for us. It was definitely a testimony builder for
Ai chan. The Ushiro parents talked to her about baptism and what her
parents might feel about it and she said her parents are totally okay
with whatever religion she has, that's a miracle! Parents are usually
always freaked out by religion here. So it's sooooo good! We are going
to continue to work with her!
That night we went to the recently released bishop's house To go
caroling around there neighborhood. We got to talk to a lot of the
neighbors about what we do and the bishop's wife (Iwanaga Shimai) gave
all of her neighbors a nativity video or some video to do with Jesus
Christ. I love her she is such a good missionary. We are going to have
dinner with one of the neighbors soon with the Iwanaga family to
introduce the gospel to them. Soooo excited!
On Wednesday we had christmas English class! I made homemade cookies
for all of the students and put them in baggies with "he is the gift"
cards with links to mormon.org on it and all of us missionaries acted
out the nativity for the students. Sakamoto Shimai was Mary and I was
the angel. It was a lot of the student's first time ever seeing it and
it was way cool! We got to teach the Christmas songs in English and
sang hymns with them. It was soooooo fun! I love them so much!
After our English class was over we went home and sister Sakamoto had
bought each other Christmas presents at a dollar store on pday ( we
made sure we couldn't see each other's stuff. We made sure we could
see each other's heads over the aisles. And yes this is asia and the
aisles are short enough that I can look over. I am huge here thank you
very much.) we were squealing as we opened them up and at about 10:15
our doorbell rings and we thought it was our neighbors telling us to
be quiet. We got a call from sister Oscarson (ward mission leader's
wife) and she told us to open the door and look down. We ran to the
door and found this huge box full of Christmas presents from the ward
and it was soooo nice of them. They are sooo good to us! I loved this
christmas I am so glad I got to spend it in Japan. It's my favorite!
This week was good. We had to stay in our apartment for most of it
because it is New Years and a very 'sacred' time and knocking on doors
isn't polite and nobody is one the streets. There are also tons of
people who are drinking and it just gets weird. So on Tuesday we
talked with airin Ushiro about Ai chan and now airin is going to teach
Ai chan the lessons and we are just going to help her. It is going to
help prepare her for her mission and we are excited!
Wednesday was deep clean the apartment day and we completely gutted
out the place and threw away stuff that has been here for centuries.
Thursday we read the Book of Mormon all day in apartment and renew our
testimony of it and it was awesome! On Friday we went to a mission
conference about an hour and a half train ride away and we got to have
so much fun with the mission! We folded 12000 cranes to represent all
the people who came into christ this Christmas season. It was soooo
cool! We had 45 baptisms and 57 less actives come back to church and
it was sooooo cool!
This week has been slower because all of our investigators are out of
town but we were able to see Rika today and she has a hernia in her
spine or something so she is in tons of pain so she can't go anywhere.
We walked an hour to get to her apartment and talked to lots of people
on the way. She was so touched and cried when we came over. She has
such a tender heart, I love her.
The work is wonderful, and I am excited for what happens within the
next couple weeks, months, and years to come as I continue working as
a missionary all of my life. Member missionary work is the best! I
love you all!
Love, Sister Staples
ステイ姉妹と坂本姉妹より
末日聖徒イエスキリスト教会
Mount Fuji
the sine when people are celebrating New Year
dumping meat in egg! It is delicious!
MTC district self!
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