Week 11 in Chikushino

There are sometimes throughout my mission so far that I've just kind
of stood back and realized how blessed I am. How amazing this
opportunity that I have been given is and how much more I need to
appreciate what I have as a missionary. This week has been so hard but
also so wonderful! Lately nobody has been listening to us. We barely
open our mouths and people immediately say no, not interested. It's
sometimes hard to go day after day with hearing that and not feeling
very successful. Me and my companion had to do some evaluating in our
companionship and in our dendo and we tried our best to fix everything
that we felt we could improve on, and then as soon as we did that we
started seeing amazing things happening! People not only listened to
us, but set up appointments for us to come back, we started feeling
better during dendo, and we just had a better attitude in general.
It's such a testimony to me that when we let ourselves get in a rut,
we don't get very far. But when we take the time to notice what rut
we've gotten into it and change to try and do better, amazing things
happen. Changing and growing is so important in Gods plan. I'm so
grateful that we get to learn and grow so much from hard trials and
that I know everything will work out as long as we follow Jesus Christ
and the example He has set for us.These past couple of days have been
amazing! Not to mention the fact that we got to hear from Elder
Quentin L Cook yesterday! We got to shake his hand and he spoke to us.
It was such a great experience. He said a couple things that I was
really grateful for and that I needed to hear, which is always
wonderful. And because an apostle came to our mission, it was a whole
mission wide conference so I got to see so many of my friends!
This week we went to see a doctor again for my companions back. He
told her in very broken English.. "This is old lady problem. You are
young. Why you have old lady problem?" Basically missions break your
body haha. But it's nice to know that the Lord has our backs. We've
been blessed multiple times that even though we might have health
problems that we will be able to continue and work and we will be
blessed so much. It was something that Elder Cook said to us
yesterday. My companion was grateful to hear that. Her back has been
hurting quite a bit.
Anyway! I hope everything is going well back in America! Love you
guys! Thanks for your support and emails :) it's always so fun to hear
from you!
Love,
Sister White
A lot of of random pictures with the shimaitachi and some friends from
other areas in our mission

Week 10 in Chikushino

Okay, I'm goi to start from the beginning of the week and go on from
there because sometimes it's just easier that way.
Monday- we went shopping and I got some summer clothes, thank heavens
for H&M and for a little store called GU where everything is beautiful
and cheap. Japanese people know how to look cute for not a lot of
money. Way excited about that :) also on Monday, our recent convert
got her first priesthood blessing! She was having a little bit of a
hard time at work, and so we asked her if she wanted one and she said
yes, and had the elders come over. It was so awesome, they left and
she said she felt the spirit so strong, like it washed completely over
her. I love seeing experiences like that happen. It's such a wonderful
feeling!
Tuesday- we went to the hospital for my companions back. She is still
having a lot of pain and so we ended up going with a member for. Our
ward to help translate for us. It went really well! Japanese people go
to the hospital for literally every little thing so they have a great
system. It went really smooth although it did take quite a while. We
ended up going to a rehabilitation specialist and he kind of fixed her
back. She says it feels a lot better recently. We are going back again
tomorrow so hopefully it will just continue to get better! We also had
a way fun relief society activity that night! Our less active from
Korea taught the relief society how to make Korean food and we all ate
it together afterwards. It was so perfect because she made a lot of
friends and everyone was so nice to her and so grateful for sharing
her recipes.
Wednesday- was pretty normal. We dendo'ed when my companions back
wasn't hurting. We decided to go visit a less active but she said she
was busy, so we ended up talking to her 17 year old son who said he
really wants to come to church, but he has marching band on Sunday's
and can't come. Schools here. Ugh.
Thursday- we just weekly planned and left to meet the STL's for junkai.
Friday- I junkai'ed with Sato Shimai! She was my STL in my last area
too so this was the second time I've been out with her. She's an
amazing missionary, and it was fun to be with a nihonjin all day and
speak Japanese all day. It's fun for me to be able to see how far my
Japanese has come since the last time I junkai'ed with her. We also
ended up bumping into 3 members on the street that day, which never
happens! It was way good.
Saturday- we did a day full of children's English classes and the that
night we had a cookie night, where we made cookies and played games!
We had a couple way fun families come who aren't members, so it was so
awesome and we just had a blast.
Sunday- was such a good day! My companions back felt way good today,
so we were able to dendo all day and we got to talk to so many people!
Although nothing crazy exciting happened, it was a way good day :)
Monday- we had interviews with president Egan which are always fun!
And the we went and ate ramen in Fukuoka.
I have some random pictures of flowers, riding on the train and eating
hamburgers. Enjoy :)

Notice the guy in the back. So good.
What we usually do on the train. Talk to you next week!

Week 9 in Chikushino

Okay, so there really isn't much to talk about this week. My companion
has been having pretty bad back pain lately, so kaicho has banned us
to our apartment for like 3 days. And the other days we have been only
going out for very small amounts of time. We have called a lot of
former investigators and potential investigators, and we have a couple
of pretty good potential investigators now, so that's been way
awesome. It's cool to see that even though we can't dendo normally, we
can still find people to teach. We did get out a couple times though!
Once we went to a members house for dinner which was so fun. We made
"samurai helmets" out of paper, which was was fun and ate a lot of
amazing food. Anyway, that is all for today :) hope everyone is having
a good week!

Week 8 in Chikushino

Hello!

Why are the weeks going by so fast! I swear I was just emailing you.

We had zone conference this week which was so very fun. I got to see s

lot of my way good friends. And I got to see the ocean for the first

time since I've been in Japan. It was way pretty, but also raining

like crazy so I didn't take a picture.

On Friday, we were riding our bike back from weekly planning when we

went over a bump and my bike basket flew off of my bike. It was so

funny and so random. I didn't notice at first until my companion

yelled at me. Also, another highlight of this week is that a convini

here started selling onigiri for a dollar. So, basically the best

thing ever, I'm addicted.

The highlight of the week is that my companion is slowly dying. Her

back has been hurting her for a while but recently it's gotten so bad

so can't bike or walk for a very long time, so she went to the

emergency room yesterday (she was going to go to a regular doctor, but

this week is a huge holiday in Japan called golden week. It's

basically when everything shuts down and everyone goes on vacation) so

only the emergency room was open. She went with another sister in our

apartment who is Japanese to help translate all the medical terms so I

went on splits with Jespersen Shimai!! Crazy fun. She came to Japan

with me and we were in the MTC together so we had a blast together. I

love having her in my apartment. It took the other Shimai 5 hours at

the ER and finally they came back with some icy hot pads for her back.

We were going to go to the temple this morning, but Egan Kaicho didn't

think it would be good for her back, so we decided to play card games

and order pizza at the apartment (which is good because it is raining

like nuts outside!!) it'll be a fun Pday :) enjoy some pictures!

 Splits with Jespersen Shimai

 We found this random cabin in the middle of this huge city. It was literally the most random thing I've ever seen. It had a whole bunch of fake animals in it. Haha can you find the sheep?

 I love my apartment

 🏽this is what taking the train in Japan looks like. On a very unbusy afternoon

And finally a zone picture :) 

This is someone's nameplate. I laughed so hard. Bye!!