Last PDAY....not sure what reaction to have......

Hey everyone! So since I'm coming home this week I'm not going to write a lot of stuff :)    (I have to save some stories for when I'm home :) But today the weather is crazy. Like we can't ride our bikes the wind is so insane. It hails and rains randomly and then it's sunny. And apparently there was a pretty good earthquake earlier that happened while we were walking outside but we didn't feel anything. Crazy.

We had the ward Halloween Party on Friday and for Muroran ward it was the best turn out they've ever had. Yes! It was lots of fun. 

But ya so that's all I will reveal until we see each other in person......wahoo!

Hope you all have an awesome week! I hope I survive the 14 hours of plane ride to see you haha.

Love

Murray shimai

p.s. if I speak Japanese and bow constantly and make weird noises just go with it. It can't be helped at this point.

These boys are all english class students

Hey! So this past week was awesome. Highlight would probably be that we started the Free Family English Program with this really awesome mom! She's a friend of a member. And the fun thing is that they live really far away. Fun thing about Hokkaido is that some areas are humongous. So we have to ride the train for 45ish minutes or 20ish if we get the fast one and then the sister picks us up at the train station and we drive for another 30 minutes to get to her home haha. And it is some of the most beautiful scenery you've ever seen. You all should visit Hokkaido because WOW. It sounds weird in english but when you look at the scenery you're so moved and feel so amazed at the power of God. 

But ya so we started the english program and it went so awesome. Her english is already really good and she has a little bit of a British accent because she lived in Britain for a little bit when she was younger. So she has a cooler english voice than me haha. But it was really fun. And everyone (there's four of us) copy the things I do because they don't know what's normal and what's weird so it's really funny. I'm actually more nervous about the english part than the lesson part because I've forgotten english. It's kind of a problem. Anyways the lesson part went really well. The mom is one of those people who is totally prepared for the gospel. She feels the spirit all the time and told us that when she ate dinner with the member's family and they prayed to bless the food she felt something and she wants to be able to pray like that! 

This whole experience is just a testimony builder to me that God really does have a plan. The member family has only lived there for 5 years and there aren't missionaries where they live. So through that member who is living the gospel everyday we were able to meet this amazing mom that probably wouldn't have had an opportunity to meet the missionaries or learn about the church otherwise. Being a missionary is so awesome! Everyday we get to see the hand of the Lord guiding and working in people's lives. 

Yesterday I gave my last testimony in Sacrament meeting. It was kind of weird because they told me a couple weeks ago and said, "You have 10 minutes and your topic is things you have learned on your mission." haha! What! In 10 minutes!? But it went really good I think.

Yup. Hope you all an awesome week!

Love,

Murray shimai

This is my companion, Jo shimai. She was born in Brazil but grew up in Japan. Her mom is Japanese but was born and raised in Brazil and her Dad is Brazilian. He was a professional soccer player and now teaches soccer here in Japan. She's way awesome. One of my favorite comps ever!

This is a yuki mushi or snow bug.

The farthest left is a sister in the ward and the lady next to her is the one we started the english program with. We're at her house which is like in the middle of the mountains haha. It's sweet.

Hey everyone!

Another chilly awesome week has past. This last week we had zone training meeting! It was awesome! We had workshops about purifying and preparing ourselves, faith, and gathering the elect. They were all so good. Sometimes as a missionary you get stuck in the mindset that you're good and will always have the Spirit and stuff because you're a missionary and it's a given. But missionaries more than ever need the Spirit and we aren't exempt from the rules of how the Spirit works. I've found on my mission that purifying ourselves as often as we can is the only way to constantly have the companionship of the Holy Ghost. And we need that companionship. In the workshop about Gathering the Elect we talked about how we don't know who the elect are or where they are. Only Heavenly Father knows. It's our job seek God's guidance and talk with everyone despite what our impression of them is because we don't know. And I've experienced meeting someone who we thought wasn't going to receive the gospel or understand because of certain circumstances but they turned out to be one of the most prepared people I've ever taught. 

This truly is the Lord's work and it's only through his Hands that we can see success. 

I love this gospel so much and I can promise you that the happiest you'll ever feel in your life is when you're sharing the gospel with someone else! Try it!

We had sports night on Saturday. Ping pong of course. And also a huge breakthrough was made. There's this adorable little girl in the ward and she never smiles when I wave at her and her face just never changes. But at sports night she was standing there with her usual face and I rolled a big ball towards her and she got this huge grin on her face and rolled it back! Yes! And then we kept rolling it back and forth and I added some sound effects and she threw out a laugh!  Couldn't believe it! Then yesterday at church when she saw me she smiled and waved! Greatest success of the week. 

Anyways hope you all have a great week this week! I love being a missionary!

Murray shimai

Heyyyyyyy

Hey everyone! I watched General Conference this weekend!! It was so awesome! There was a lot of talks about following and sustaining the prophet but what stood out to me the most was the need for each of us to develop our own personal testimony of the Savior and His gospel and to constantly cultivate the testimony through receiving personal revelation. It's so important for us to receive our own personal witness of the truthfulness of the things we hear and read. I also loved the talks about preparing for and keeping our temple covenants in the Women's meeting. We can receive such powerful blessings from our covenants but we need to be constantly remembering them and keeping them. That was a good reminder for me. 

It was a pretty awesome week here in Muroran. We saw lots of miracles and met lots of awesome people. One investigator said she wanted to come to church once to see what it's like and another said she had been reading the Book of Mormon and asked us for a recommendation of a place to read. Jo shimai said that the whole time she's been here that investigator never kept the commitments so it was huge that she read! We are seeing what the scriptures call a softening of the heart through the spirit in action! It's so amazing! I love being a missionary!

Today we're going to go see penguins! 

Hope you all have a great week!

Love,

Murray shimai

It`s cold again.

Well that was fast. The cold has returned. But no snow yet haha. Although we did see yuki mushi yesterday. They are bugs that come out before it's going to get freezing and snow. Yay! 

Oh ya, so I transferred! I'm still by the ocean though so it's still the same chilly weather :) I'm in an area called Muroran! My companions name is Jo shimai! She's really awesome and really funny. It's way hisashiburi having a Japanese companion and having to speak Japanese 24/7 but it's really fun. And it's fun to teach her funny english. I taught her 'wet willy' the other day and she said it was gross haha. But we get along really great and the members here are so cool so I'm excited for this transfer. It's so amazing every time I go to a new area or a new ward how fast everyone loves you and you love them. It hurts to leave your old area but it's so awesome to be able to make more new friendships. Love really is the center of Christ's gospel! 

And I love being a missionary!!! Missionary work is so fun and so full of miracles! Sorry this is really short but ya, I'll write more next week!

Love you all!

Murray shimai

Bus ride to Sapporo

This is a picture of all of my companions minus Nanjo shimai and Baker shimai.

It's a little chill

Hey everyone! So it's turned a bit chilly here and leaves are already covering the ground! But this past week was pretty fun. We had a ward activity and we drove about 40 minutes to an area called Akan and we dug up potatoes! imahori! It was way fun. And now we have a TON of potatoes in our apartment. Sure the americans will love all the potatoes, mashed potatoes everyday right? haha. No. No more potatoes. Everyday we eat potatoes. On top of rice haha. I've been Japanified and I can't help it. But it was fun. Also we met some really awesome investigators who the Elders passed to us. They said whenever they try to visit them they're never home or super busy but when we went with them we were able to see all of them and to talk with them haha. Yes, sister power. 

Ummmmmm,,,,,,,I can't remember......... Today the family that comes to english class took us on another road trip! It was beautiful! You should all come to Hokkaido to play because wow. It's gorgeous. 

Oh I just remembered one of our miracles from last week. We had an appointment to teach an after-baptism lesson and we took a sister from the ward with us and when we showed up the recent convert's friend was there as well! She's not a member and we'd met her twice before but hadn't been able to see her for more than a month! She had called that morning and said she was coming just when we did! So we were able to teach her as well with a member there. It was really awesome. 

Sorry this guy is short. I'm sending pictures so enjoy!

Murray shimai

Hokkaido is famous for the redheaded cranes and Kushiro is their home. In winter tons of them come here to live. 

We stopped at a Japanese garden along the drive.

The leaves here are like a crazy neon color! It's so beautiful!

The famous green algae balls. We went to their homeland. They only grow in this lake. 

This is a different lake.

P-day pictures that were posted to Facebook by Kanno Yuji.

After service treat!