April 5, 2011 -email

Kazoku (family),

Wow - what a crazy time you've been having since I left! I love getting news about all you tell me - the weather, conditions in Japan, family gatherings, sports, local hooplah... I love it all.

Conference was indeed fabulous. Elders Oaks and Uchtdorf are ALWAYS 2 of my favorites. I also loved Elder Scott's talk too - it's so interesting to sometimes just hear stories about people and their families.

Dad- DO NOT look for my dictionary. I don't want it with me - I'm trying to figure out how much I can leave before flying to Japan.

I hope Cam is doing well. Could you forward me his e-mail this week, along with his e-mail address? I'd like to send a message to that guy. And what was the comment he made about missionaries and/or the apostles being the celebrities of the church??? Also, I've been praying for him to have a 'white Sunday'... is that missionary lingo? I have no idea what that means.

Today marks off the first month of my mission... time is flying by! Life at the 'incomparable' MTC continues. One day this week when I went to the gym to exercise, after doing a couple laps around the track I went to the stretching area to do some leg exercises. I was huffing and puffing along, and I looked behind me and 4 of the little Sisters from Japan were following me. We were a sight. I decided to give them more than they bargained for and led them through a fairly intense routine. They don't speak English a lot which made the whole thing sort of odd. : )

HAPPY BIRTHDAY this Sunday to HALLIE! I love you Hallsie and will be thinking all about you on that day! You'll be 6 right?

Mom, how was the Young Women's broadcast? You did end up taking the youth down on a trip right? All of us Sisters here were able to watch it this weekend while be Elders went to priesthood meeting. I kept thinking of you and all of your Young Women. It was a really good meeting I thought.

Dad- I don't mind that you thumbed through my sketchbook... it contains some of my very favorite things. I never put anything in there with the intent of having someone else lay eyes on it though, so don't judge all of the weird things I have. And recently I went through it and scribbled out a lot of the pages I no longer refer to because I was planning on transferring it all to a new book - so that's why some of the pages have colored pencil all over. I'm glad you liked that quote; it is pretty powerful. The story is that it was written by a man in Rwanda who was put in jail and told he would be released when he denied Christ/his religion (or something like that). He wrote that message after that I think. I heard the quote in a class at BYUI and jotted down a few of the phrases and then googled it later. I did eventually find the quote and a little bit of the story behind it but there wasn't a lot of information.
Also, you should know that my 2 favorite pages in my sketchbook remain the '100 things I learned from my mother/father".

Got to go!! I love you all!

-Love Waite Shimai