Hello Family!
Wow, this week was good. Really fast. Today is Saiki Shimai’s birthday. She is 23. I drank a lot of water right before bed last night so that I would have to wake up and then I could decorate for her- it worked. I decorated the apartment with all sorts of balloons and streamers and doo-dads, and put out a dessert I had secretly been working on every night while she was in the shower. It’s sort of difficult to plan a surprise for someone you aren’t supposed to ever let out of sight or sound. Sunday night I had also gotten up and blown up a bunch of balloons and hid them in the back of my closet so that I wouldn’t have to do it all this morning. Then, Monday morning while we were eating breakfast one of them popped. She was concerned, but didn’t know what it was. Then during personal study, another one popped. It must have just been getting way too hot in the closet. We study in the same room as my closet, so she knew that the noise had come from there. I tried to brush it off but she wasn’t about to rest with those random noises, and she opened the door and saw my whole pile of balloons sitting there! It was pretty funny.
Then about 5 minutes after we got up this morning the doorbell rang. It was the other 4 elders from our district. They sang happy birthday and gave her a card and a ball of rice (a joke). Then they shoved a piece of bread full of whipped cream in her face. I knew they were planning to do all this, and was having fun watching until suddenly there was whipped cream in my face too. It was pretty fun. Yesterday was our last district meeting together this transfer and we have had a lot of fun the past 6 weeks.
Last week I got a letter from Cam that had a page torn from a Jehovah’s Witness’ bible and in the middle of the page was.... The Black Spot! HA! What a guy. Then I heard from you that he sent you a whole book full of pressed flowers and such. Wow. A couple weeks ago some Jehovah’s witnesses knocked on our apartment door one morning. Kind of funny. Also, we were knocking on doors at this huge apartment complex a couple weeks ago and finally we found this lady who seemed interested and already like the bible. She never let us in (everyone in Japan just sort of talks through their intercom if they have one, or just through the wall/window... people very rarely actually open the door), but we talked to her for a while and gave her a Book of Mormon through her mail slot. A week later we decided to go back and see if we could talk to her again. We went, and as we approached we could hear multiple voices, so we wondered who else might be there since we were pretty sure she lived alone. Saiki Shimai listened for a while and started to grin really big. It was the Jehovah’s Witnesses and they were all having bible study together. : ) We just left.
Dad- How is the foot? How was the recovery for everyone after the hike last weekend? I can’t believe there will be 6 13-year olds... maybe this was a good year to miss out on. HAHA! Just Kidding! So when is the actual date that you all hit the trail?
Mom- How was Aunt Sara’s house? I wish I could see Lucy. She and Evelyn will be walking and talking before I ever meet them.
Girlsies- How are you all! Hannah and Maren - how is personal progress coming along? I love hearing about that. It would be fun to be doing it together. Any luck finding jobs this summer? Hallsie and Sades - are you ready for the big hike? Ainsley - are you getting used to living at our crazy house? Janes- how was the birthday?
Investigators: This week we met with and taught a lady from Brazil named Veruzka. She about 28 and speaks English, Portuguese, Japanese, Spanish, and a little bit of Italian. She believes in Jesus Christ but is skeptical about the Book of Mormon (the gold plates, and that there were people inhabiting the Americas from Jerusalem). Interesting lady.
We also met a lady named Joy on the street who is from the Philippines. She actually asked for something about our church that she could read, and we are meeting with her next week to give her a Book of Mormon because the only ones we had were Japanese. (The Japanese BOM has a lot of old characters in it and is difficult to read if especially if you aren’t a native speaker.)
Also, we met a lady from Mongolia named Sara last week who went to our church twice when she was in Mongolia. She’s coming to a little dinner-gathering we are having this week.
And, a member in our ward has a friend from the Philippines that we met while at the members’ house and are hoping to be able to teach.
Plus, Ko and Nie are from China, as well as Lilly. The point is, we seem to find ourselves talking to and teaching foreigners more than native Japanese people. Tokyo has so so many foreigners. (This isn’t a list of people to pray for, I just thought you would find it interesting.)
Prayer list: Misaki - she missed her interview and now she is rethinking baptism. Ko and Nie - they are really poor. When they come to lessons, Ko rides her bike and Nie rides the bus because they don’t have money for both to ride the bus. Also, she is in pretty poor health right now - i think mostly because of stress.
Culture: Lots of you probably already know some of these things about Japan... but I didn’t : )
-People in Japan only use cold water to wash things (their hands, the dishes... etc.) When we shower we turn the hot water on, but other than that nothing but cold water comes out of the tap.
-Everyone here carries around a little personal towel/washcloth to wipe their hands on. Public restrooms rarely have anything available to wipe your hands on. And they also use the rags to wipe the sweat off their face in the middle of the day when it’s so humid. You always see people walking around carrying their little rag.
-Japanese people don’t really care if they match. You know how a lot of people are sticklers about whether or not you can wear brown and black together, or black and blue... well anything goes here.
-Seiza: Usually when we go to people’s houses, if we are invited inside to sit down we usually kneel (seiza) on the floor. Normally they have little pillows for us to kneel on, and they are usually situated around a coffee table. A lot of people have normal couches and tables too, but pretty much everyone has a little table to kneel at and talk or eat. Anyway, after a couple of minutes of kneeling down, one’s feet and lower calves begin to go numb. Its lots of fun! There have been lessons where we get up and walk out the door and I can’t feel my toes until we are half-way down the road. I thought it was just because I was American, and wasn’t used to it, but even Saiki Shimai had to use her umbrella as a cane the other day as we hobbled away from a members’ doorstep.
Dad, you know that quote that is in my sketchbook from the guy who was in Rwanda - the one that says he won’t stop until he has done everything he can for the cause of Christ? Can you perhaps send that to me sometime?
Alright, well, I can’t think of anything else boring to tell you so i:ll wrap this up. I love you all so so so so much. Tell everyone hello for me.
-Waite Shimia.
P.S.- 4th of July is SOON!!! Celebrate my FAVORITE holiday with some watermelon just for me please : )
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