18 Months in the Land of the Rising Sun: 今週は最高だった！ AND 総大会と台風 General Conference and Typhoon!

FIRST OFF...this is Lacee's mom. I have to apologize for being a slacker and not getting Lacee's blog updated for a few weeks! We have been travelling and the wifi and connections to get this done just were not cooperating with me from most of the places we have been!!! So, I'm sorry. But here are the last two weeks' emails!

Oct. 5, 2014
(For those who can read the Japanese characters - good on ya! For those of us who can't, we just have to use our best guess or our imagination since Lacee didn't send me a translation! :) )

This week was awesome! It was a way good week! We had our Special Training on Tuesday. Way cool stuff! They gave us some DVDs with Mormon videos and stuff on them. We talked about how we can use them with our investigators. They are starting to talk about how to use technology in our dendou (work) lately...I'm thinking it won't be too long until we get iPads here. Probably December or January. But the training was super good. Alma 22 is pretty much the coolest chapter ever! It is PMG (Preach My Gospel...the missionary handbook) chapter 10 used perfectly! Aaron is the man! It was way good to see everyone. We were combined...both Hiroshima Zones, so that was way fun stuff. We watched a video where Elder Nelson was talking. He said something I really liked. I didn't catch it exactly, but it was something along the lines of: perfection comes not in this life but the world to come. Something like that. You get the point. It was super awesome though!

Then we had another AB (after baptism) lesson with Ling on Wednesday. Airi and Chie chan did most of it. They are doing a really good job. They taught Ling and Ryoma.

Friday we went on Junkai (Working with the other sisters) in Hatsukaichi. It was way good!

Saturday we went to go do Helping Hands up at the cemetery again. We were digging out haka and moving bags of dirt and stuff again. Then we went and dendo-ed. Super fun. It was just a great day of dendou (work). Then we went and visited Hasegawa Shimai. She is the nicest lady! I sure love her! We were almost late (sometimes it's hard to get out of there :) ) but we rode home SO fast, and made it at 8:59! Yay!

Yesterday was way good! We had normal church and stuff. Ling is still coming every week! :) We had dinner at the Nishiyama's again. Super fun! This time Yoshimi went too, so Nishiyama Kaicho gave us a ride. That was nice. It was delicious and super fun. Kuchar and I had planned this awesome message to share (Mom- the one about fortifying families you sent...we translated it!) but we ran out of time, so we couldn't do it. :( Next time! But Nishiyama Kaicho drove us back home. He had to drop us off with Yoshimi at her house because we couldn't be in the car with just him. So we were walking to the church to get our bikes and go home. It was a little after 8:30, but we live super close so we had time.

There was only one girl we saw on the way home. It was right after we started walking. It was late and raining, but I stopped her and started talking to her. She was super awesome! She is actually a new investigator now! She liked the message we shared and said she would be interested in hearing the lessons! We have another appointment with her tomorrow! She was super cool! Her name is Miyo! I am super excited about her! Pray that we can meet with her again and start teaching the lessons! It was definitely a miracle!

This week is going to be crazy! We will be on junkai in Saijo on Thursday and Friday. Then General Conference is Saturday and Sunday in Takasu. All the missionaries from both Hiroshima Zones will be there. It's going to be crazy! But it's going to be an awesome week!

The Church is true! Missions are the best!

Love you all!

Babcock Shimai

October 13, 2014

(This email came a day late because of the typhoon. We received an email from the mission office notifying us that the missionaries would be staying in their apartments for safety during the typhoon. They also told us that all the missionaries had a 72-hour kit in case of an emergency and that we would be contacted AFTER the typhoon had passed and the missionaries were safe.)

So this week was pretty busy!

It was pretty normal until Wednesday. We had normal District Meeting and stuff. P-Day was good. Wednesday we packed our stuff and left straight from Eikaiwa (English class) to go junkai (work/split/meet with the other sisters) in Saijo. The junkai was way good. I got to dendo (work) with Burgon and Flake Shimai. They are super awesome. The Saijo missionaries are a blast! We were actually there at the same time that the ZL's (Zone Leaders) went on junkai with the elders, so for 2 days there were 14 missionaries (counting the Lamb couple) in Saijo. Isn't that crazy! We had a cereal breakfast with the 12 of us Thursday morning. It was way fun.

We saw some crazy cool miracles! Last time we were on junkai in Saijo I went with Flake Shimai to teach the first lesson to this lady. This time we went and she was having her Baptismal Interview!!! Whaa! So awesome! She remembered me which was super awesome! She is so cool and is getting baptized this Saturday! Super cool miracle. I feel so blessed to have met her twice now on junkai. She is definitely one of the Lord's prepared people!

It is 酒まつり in Saijo right now. The Alcohol Festival! Exciting stuff. It was getting all set up and stuff. Saijo is super famous for it's alcohol. Apparently the water is really good or something. But there was a ton of stuff everywhere. They were going all out! So Saijo was super great. There are a bunch of awesome missionaries in Saijo right now. Fun stuff!

Then Saturday and Sunday we had General Conference!!! Woohoo! It was SO GOOD!!! I LOVE Conference!!! All the missionaries from Hiroshima were in the one little English room. So much fun. It was way good to see everyone. Then the talks were amazing, like always! I learned so much, and have so much that I want to apply and work on now. I loved Elder Jorg Klebingat's talk! So good! He just threw down a little bit, but it was so good!

Oh random fun fact, Elder Hamula that spoke, I knew his daughter in the MTC. She is in the Tokyo South Mission right now. Cool stuff! Oh an then we have the best branch ever! Kuchar Shimai and I were in a hurry to make the train, so we forgot lunch on Sunday. We were sad because we couldn't even go buy food because it was Sunday. So we were just going to be hungry. We get there, and during the break between sessions, Kunichika Shimai, and Nishiyama Shimai both brought us food! It was way delicious, and the nicest thing ever! How awesome are they! I feel so blessed to be serving in such a great place. We have the best branch in the entire world!!!

Then yesterday we couldn't leave the apartment because of the big typhoon. It was rainy and pretty windy, but we didn't get anything too bad. The wind was the worst. So we were cooped up inside all day. We got our Area Book super duper updated and called all the people in it. No luck. We also super cleaned our apartment and did LOTS of studying. It was boring, but we did get some good stuff done. So P-Day was moved to today. We're going to hang out with the Hikari missionaries today in Hiroshima. Should be some pretty fun stuff!

Next week is transfers! I can't believe it! This transfer has FLOWN by!!! P-Day is Tuesday again next week. Love you all lots!

Babcock Shimai