Come Follow Me: WOAH! First week of the field is here!

September 28, 2015

Hello from Takamtsu Japan!! こにちわ‼︎ Well before I get into my life, it sounds like everyone is doing just wonderful and all is well! I totally forgot about Swiss Days being right now, oh how I miss that's! But so glad everyone had fun going together, running the 5K (WAY TO GO MY CUTE ANDELYN), and watching the fun parade. Gotta love Swiss days! But it sounds like life is busy as ever for everyone and like everyone is just keeping busy and out of trouble. Keep it up family. Okay, I know you are all dying to know all the details about the greatest place ever, JAPAN! Well the traveling here was so long and insane like wow! Our Korean flight was SO long and the airplane food was even nastier than American airplane food because Korean food mixedwith airplane food was just EEWW. But it was an experience that's for sure. And we almost missed our last flight cause our Korean flight was late so we were sprinting down the Korean airport hahaha it was so hilarious. But sad cause I wanted to experience the Korean airport but oh well, I can now say I've been to Korea right! And we got picked up by our AP's at like 10:00 pm Japan time so needless to say we were exhausted and ready to get to the mission home. We finally got there at like 11:15 ish, met President and Sister Welch for a few seconds ha THEY ARE THE SWEETEST PEOPLE EVER. I am so blessed to have them as my mission presidents. But then we got to bed and then the next day was training all day with them and the AP's. But we started off our morning with a jog with the AP's around Kobe and it literally was the greatest. During training we learned how to use our iPads, which they are SO helpful in missionary work and just trained ALL DAY. We had a 5 minute interview with President Welch so he could receive revelation where we should go and who should be our trainer. Isn't that insane he gets it that fast? As I walked out of the interview he is like, "you two in this area will do great!" Like ah I wanted to know so bad but we had to wait till the next day. And we all ate with President and Sister Welch every meal and boy do I LOVE Japanese food so far. Yummmm! But yeah just a long day of training. Then the next morning we ran up to the top of the mountain and played rugby together up in the mountains and it was the prettiest. Ill attach a picture, it was pouring rain as well. What's better than that?! We had a blast together. Oh funny side story, at the park where we were playing rugby, there were like 10 old people listening to weird Japanese like character music while doing weird yoga/stretching. We were all busting up laughing. Love those Japanese people! Well after that, it was time to meet our trainers and find out our area. Boy, was that nerve racking or what?! So we go into a meeting room, no one knows who is with who (not even the trainers) and he calls each of us up, tells us our area and who our trainer is and from there on out you are with them. So... I got Weber Shimai from Virginia and she has been out 10 months and is actually half Chinese notJapanese haha but she is SO great and SO cute. I love her to death. We got our stuff that I needed to go and took about a 5 hour bus/train ride to our area which is Takamtsu. It's an island right below Kobe and it is a big area. It's us two and then a companionship of Elders in our area. And we also have the smallest district and zone in the mission but I haven't met any of them until Friday so I'll let you know about that. The area is mostly city but also a little country with rice fields as well. The rice fields are the worst because they have A MILLION mosquitos and I got bit 10+ times the other night ping ponging or door knocking as others say. I'll send a pic, they are HUGE bites I think they are infected haha anyway... The food is so yummy here! Sadly I haven't been out to eat so I don't know what restaurants are like but everything my companion has made and little things I have tried is so so good. It's rice or noodles a lot with veggies and some meat. Hahaha but I love it. I think my area isn't way into the like authentic Japanese food so maybe in another area I'll experience more of that. The nastiest thing I've eaten though is NATO. It is basically fermented soy beans and it's way healthy for you and they eat it for breakfast but uh ew no thanks. I tried it and about died haha so.. But they have THE best ice cream bar here that everyone eats. It's called black thunder.. Oh my so yummy it has like crushed Oreo in it and dark chocolate around it. Wow, I love it. Everyone asked about the language, well I feel like I am starting back at square one again ha I don't know what anyone says ha they speak SO fast and like mumble so yeah I'm working on it. The worst day was Sunday cause it was all just fast Japanese and everyone wanted to meet me but half the time I was just smiling because I was SO confused haha Bry, Aus, Jen, Chad.. I'm sure you know what I mean. Haha but our apartment is nice ha it get so hot in there but it'd nice and I am grateful for it to be a nicer one. Um... It's so humid here all the time and you just sweat like a beast! But besides that the weather is so nice. Um.. I'll just tell you two little moments of these past few days cause this is getting long but we sadly only have 1 investigator right now and that is Kana. She is like 22 ish and is so cute. So we have game night every week here with the ward and she came this weekend and she had a blast ha so that was great. Also one of the elders investigator came, his name is Tai. He is fluent in English as well so that was nice haha but we enjoyed our game night. But lastly, we went ping ponging or house contacting and boy was that hard and did that hurt. No one wanted to listen. Here you ring the door bell, and you talk to them through the intercoms and they can see through the camera as well so no one opens the door like ever.. They always just say "I'm busy or I have a religion." If they do that, you just leave a card in their mail and hope for the best. And it just hurts cause you knowthey need it. But it was hard cause my trainer made me do a few and woah ha the language struggle.. But I have grown a lot these past 5 days haha I have truly learned to rely on my Savior. I was reading in 1 Nephi 17 and its when Nephi builds a ship.. Nephi is an amazing man and such an example. Boy do I love him and his faith. In verse 9 he asks the Lord how? He never asked why or complained, he just said okay I'll do it just help me to know how. And that's what we need to do through our hard times. I needed to hear that. Tu do him, be obedient and he will help you through building that ship. I know that to be true. I've seen it here already in 5 days. This gospel is so true and brings people so much joy. Share it to those who need it and news joy! It will bring you even more joy I promise you. I love you all and miss you everyday. But I love doing this work, I love serving others and my savior always. I pray for you everyday and hope you are all safe, healthy, and being like Christ. He is our Savior, I know that for a fact and I love him. Until next week! #trust あいしています！
-Smith Shimai