Week Thirty-seven.

Mina san! (Everyone!)
Okay I am going to start by answering all your questions. Yes I still play the piano every so often. Speaking of which, you should send me some piano music! There is a book in the piano book stack that is says like seminary songs on the cover or something and it is cream colored. You should send that! I actually played the piano in sacrament meeting yesterday. The missionaries and some investigators sang together and I was the accompianist. I played "A Childs Prayer" from the childrens songbook.
We always get to watch conference a week later than when it actually happened so next Saturday and Sunday are the big days! While the Japanese are watching a session in Japanese, the English speakers are in a different room watching the other session in English. So usually I watch the afternoon session first while the Japanese are watching the morning session. Then we switch.
I am almost positive I can skype here! There are lots of members that have skype in Akita so I will be sure to set that up. When is Mothers Day anyways?
Dad! I hope you get feeling good! I suppose we should be thankful for everything, the bad and the good because God gives it to us. I think of King Ben in Mosiah and how he talked about just being grateful for everything and still being in debt to God. So might as well be thankful for your sicknesses too, ne! Also the garden and bees look so good. I love that you are so gardeny. And that you have bees. Me and Sister Morgan talk about Scotland a lot because she has ancestors from there as well. I told her you play the pipes and she was impressed. She is getting her tin whistle sent to her in a package so we will have fun listening to the little Scottish tunes she plays ha ha.
You sound like you are SO busy with travelling these next few months! Good luck to Paigey and her pregnancy! When is she due? How is baby Oliver doing?
Thank you for all the emails and birthday wishes! Can you believe that I will be turning 21? Mom! I grew up!
I received your package but I am saving to open it on Friday on my birthday so I had the other sisters in my apartment take off the customs thing on the package so I couldnt see what was inside. I really really want to open it but I have been waiting! I got a birthday card and a short letter from Kay Grandma and Jesse Grandpa. It was good to hear from them. Grandma told me in her letter that she was going to come visit you guys in Texas. Grandma if you are reading this, thanks for the money and card! I love you!
On my birthday we have plans to do 3 hours of handing out flyers for a new english conversation class that we are starting up in the northern area of Akita then we are going to teach english that night so it is going to be a LONG day. 3 hours of handing out flyers! Im gonna die. I will maybe have a tiny party that night from like 10 until bed time at 10:30 or something when I open my present. It should be good!
This week lots of our appointments got cancelled so we didnt have as much success as we hoped. But we were able to meet with Yurie chan our only true investigator that we meet with regularly. Shes 20 and really smart. At first she only wanted to learn about the church because she likes studying and was interested in all sorts of religions but yesterday she came to church and told us that she felt the SPIRIT and that she wants to come to general conference next week! Sister Tuttle and I have been praying that she would have a change of heart. We knew that it would only be through the spirit that she would change, and its happening! She really loves music so we are learning that she is able to feel the spirit a lot easier when we sing in lessons or at church. I really really hope I can be a good enough missionary for the spirit to help me when I teach! Honestly my Japanese probably still doesnt make sense and I cant express myself the way I want to and I can only understand her maybe 50 percent of the time so I really really need the spirit.
Yesterday Sister Tuttle and I had a really  busy schedule. We had plans to visit a family in our branch named the Yokoyama`s and also we wanted to visit the less active Tanaka Shimai but we didnt have enough time to visit both so we decided to pray to know who it is God really needed us to visit. So we went over and knelt down on the tatami (tatami is like small woven strands of bamboo or something that all bedrooms have in Japan.) and I said a prayer. I asked God specifically about each appointment and after each time I asked we both sat in silence and waited for an answer. After the prayer we decided that we felt the spirit after both names that we mentioned and so we decided "well, I guess if God wants us to visit both people then we will just skip dinner and break our fast when we have time later tonight." And then we went out on our bikes in the WORST wind ever. It was piercing cold and started to snow a little even. But we were determined to visit these people! We went to Tanaka Shimai house first and she wasnt home but we left a message in her post... then we decided to visit some friends we made in a barber shop that lived close by but when we visited the deaf husband answered the door but the wife was sleeping so we wrote a message for her when she woke up. I only know a little tiny bit of Japanese sign language so I couldnt really talk to him very much unfortunately. I wanted to though! Then we went to the Yokoyamas and since it was just a surprise visit it really caught Sister Yokoyama off guard. We shared a short easter message and talked a little bit but nothing spectacular happened and we didnt have an amazing experience. So why would we feel that we were supposed to visit these people if we saw no success? I dont know. But I do know that faith is really important. Even though we didnt see the results we were hoping for, I still have faith that Christ is my Savior. I still have faith that God is my Father. And I still have faith that he will send His spirit to guide me and my companion. Its important to ask God in prayer for what it is we want, but it is more important to have the faith to say "but if not" and then remain faithful. So Im glad that we had an opportunity to prove our faith yesterday!

Today is P day! We are going to the zoo today! I will send pictures next week of the zoo. Thank you everyone for your birthday wishes, prayers, and thoughts!
Aishiteimasu.
Love, Robertson Shimai

Pictures!!

Me and some elders from my doki! Doki means the group of people that I came to Japan with.
Elder Bethea, Elder Olsen, Me, Elder Poff, and Elder Hoskyns
We took this at Zone Meeting.

And by we I mean "I"!

I dont really know what I am doing. I think I was laughing at my district leader who was trying to change a flat tire. He is the cutest! He is a tiny little Japanese guy.  I love him! The tall guy next to me is Elder Earl.