News from Jessica er...uh...I mean Sister Halliday

Halliday shimai's happy birthday and a "stupid" visit to the doctor

2008-09-27T20:45:00.000-07:00

dearest family,

yes, i got your packages and they didnt hold them at the honbu which is a good
thing cuz interviews were actually zone conference and we were not informed
(kofu doesnt get informed of anything...and no one gets informed about kofu
either but more on that later)

so anyhow, i actually got the packages last p day but of course the post office
couldnt fit them in our mailbox (they tried to stuff natalees in there and it
was halfway sticking out and it amused me greatly) anyhow so they stuck a
notice in there saying that they had them and to call them so they could bring
them by when we were home.

the lame thing is, they came when we were home in the first place.
but anyhow,  i had to wait til saturday cuz on account of having to go to
hachioji for interviews we wouldnt be home all day friday but they came on
saturday and i had a grand old party opening them (slowly of course) haha. I
video taped some of it and took pictures so i will send those home when i get
the card filled up. (shouldnt take too long)

The elders were very pleased with their half of the package and powell shimai
and i dont have to go shopping for like a month now! whee! I told president hill
we were saved! (i tell him all about my food in my letters every week...its like
a gourmet cooking show...he seems to enjoy it too cuz he called me a couple
weeks ago to tell me how much my letter amused him. It was on account of my
kiwis and grapes story hehe)

anyhow, so yeah and the granola bars do stay with your forever! Its great! We
have so much more energy now and we are happy sister missionaries! yeah!

Also, the CDs are really pretty. yay! I love them! We listen to them all the
time! And the junk food is pretty much all gone. I managed to eat all the
chocolate covered raisins in one sitting and i shared the popcorn with the
district at district meeting and then gave the other one to Silvia cuz she is
pregnant and wants popcorn and its not so easy to find. I figure that has got to
be taihen, to be pregnant in a country where you cant get what you are craving.
I think it was babysitting Clarissa what made me that sympathetic to a pregnant
woman`s plight. haha.

Speaking of Sylvia, it reminds me to answer your question... I DIDNT TELL YOU
WHO THE MIYAZAKIS WERE!?!?!

how did i not tell you that!? Powell shimai and i talk about no one BUT the
miyazakis at home. And Hosaka shimai of course. (who we havent seen in like 2
weeks and we are much afflicted on account of it)

Moving on, the miyazakis are one of the brazilian families in the ward. (the
other one being the Lemes who are also very nice and i hear that Leme kyodai
is very good at barbecuing BUT i digress...) All the kids served missions cept
silvia and they all speak english, portuguese, and japanese fluently. Silvia and
Elaine are really cute and love to talk. Silvia is married to Hoshi kyodai and
they have the cutest little kid, Lukas. I actually have yet to talk to Elaine,
but Powell shimai sings her praises all through the apartment so i am excited to
talk to her someday. She served in Temple Square.

Then there is Eder and Andre kyodai who served in Fukuoka and Sendai
respectively. They both trained like 4 times on their missions, and were APs and
now that they are home hand the missionaries referrals like crazy. Which is
basically why we talk about them and Hosaka shimai all the time.

I could have sworn I told you all this. Remember? Andre trained Brittan.

Ok, moving on. Back to my birthday. (you cant get me started on the miyazakis
like that...it could go on forever) (and just so everyone knows, we are down by
the temple and a bunch of missionaries walked in...is it bad that i keep hoping
that Harris and Allen choro will walk in? Allen choro is another name that comes
up a lot in the apartment, cuz he served in Kofu and so Powell shimai knows him.
I tell her stories about him in the MTC. Hee hee. I miss Allen choro. And Harris
choro. Has anyone heard from them?!?)

OK! back to my birthday! I went to furuya kyodais restraunt on my birthday cuz
he wanted to throw me a birthday party so we invited all our investigators. Our
ONE investigator didnt come...cuz she is well...she is Tanzawa san and we dont
know what is going through her head at any given moment in time.

But Tommy and Emma came. Tommy is the elders investigator from indonesia
and Emma is his friend, she is from the Philippines. They are my favorite.
Tommy is way good! I think he will get baptized. His story is very Alma the
younger like...he converted to Christianity in prison in indonesia and really really
loves reading the bible and the book of mormon. They came to church for the
first time on my birthday and they said they will come next week too.

Emma is actually the one that referred Tommy. She was a PI from a while back
but just wanted to play with the missionaries, she had no interest in church.
Then she started coming with Tommy. (funny story about Emma...I NEVER see
her without Tommy or vice versa but she is married and has kids...she just
always hangs out with Tommy. Weird, i know. But they are both great.)

Anyhow, Emma came to gospel principles and got a migraine halfway through
relief society so she had to leave but she said she enjoyed it and wanted to
borrow the gospel principles book so we have hope in her yet!

Anyhow, they bought me nice socks for winter! Ones that go all the way up to my
thighs so they keep my legs nice and warm. And they got me some cozy slippers
and i think i want to get some for mommy cuz they are so cozy and toasty...but
they are made out of fleece and well...that never goes over well at our house
cuz they will become cat hair slippers haha.

And Phil came! He is from eikaiwa. I hear he is a former investigator and just
couldnt give up drinking so he feels really bad that he couldnt get baptized. He
comes to church and eikaiwa still though and he brings us referrals without
being asked! he is great! He bought me violets. Which...i am sorry to say, i am
slowly killing...I dont know how to keep them alive. I put them on the balcony
to get some sun and i water them...but still they are dying.  sad day!

So yeah, that was my birthday party. It was full of delicious foods and fun. I
enjoyed it. And Leiataua choro was talking to emma and he said something about
the president of the philippines and his wife with all the shoes and I nearly
choked on my water cuz i started laughing. I thought of frank de lima comedy
sketches haha. no one really understood and i forgot to ask leiataua choro if he
knew why i was laughing. heh. It was funny though.

Furuya kyodai wanted me to tell you guys that i had a good birthday party in
Japan. hee hee.

So lets see, i am going to tell you the horror story about zone conference now.
Well, in a nutshell, we thought it was just interviews so we scheduled an
appointment for 6 pm that night. The next morning we got up to catch the train
*at that lovely hour of 5am...) but we missed the train and the next train going
to hachioji that WASNT an azusa (the superfast train...that is not the
shinkansen but still expensive) didnt come for 3 hours and so we would have
been late. So we took the next azusa and made it in time for what we thought
was interviews but was in actuality a zone conference (to make up for not having
zone conference as we normally would on account of mission conference) So we
had to stay for the whole time and the only way we could make it back was to
catch ANOTHER azusa home.

Well, things we order from the honbu are given to us at zone conferences so we
had like 3 bags of lesson pamphlets etc to take home from conference and no
time to go home so we just looked like hobos. Then, the closing prayer was like
forever long and we barely made our train but with all the stuff we had we
couldnt move fast enough to catch our next train so we missed that one and had
to cancel our appointment cuz the next train didnt come for half an hour and
then it would be too late cuz the kids had to go to bed so we had to reschedule.

We already had a ticket for the train though so we caught the next train just to
try to salvage a day where we hadnt talked to ANYONE and we did talk to some
nice junior high school girls on the train...

We got off at Joei thinking we could walk to hosaka shimais to see her but with
all our baggage we couldnt have possibly made it. I dont think we could have
made it without all the bags...she lives far away from the eki. THEN of course,
wouldnt you know...it starts raining. And our bags are paper bags. So we
resigned to waiting at the eki (which is a tiny middle of no where eki) for the
next train to Kofu. We talked to one girl before the train came so it wasnt a
TOTAL waste... but by the time we got home (with our bags somehow, probably
through the graces of God, still intact despite the rain) we were DEFINITELY
ready for bed. haha.

So yeah, that was our fun adventure at zone conference. Oh yeah! and it rained
on my birthday too! That was exciting! Except i got splashed by 5 cars on the
road...gross. dirt water in my shoes. and i had forgotten half my kappa so my
skirt was soaked through. but it was a fun adventure and people do take pity on
you at the door if you are dripping wet. haha.

Today was another stupid adventure to the stupid doctors where they charged
me another stupid 50 dollars for more stupid medicine i didnt really need cuz i
still have half of my other stupid birth control pills i have yet to take. and then
they told me to come back in a month. I think next time i will just ask my district
leader for a blessing becase it is a PAIN to go to the doctor every month.  Why
cant it be like america where you fill your perscription every month instead of
talking to the doctor EVERY time you need a refill. I LOVE japan...but they are a
little bit crazy. Just a little.

So I bought cold stone to make myself feel better again and they actually sing
when you tip them here too. It was kinda funny. They sang 'a pirates life for
me' and it was quite amusing.

So yeah, there is my week. Aside from the doctor it was a good week. Eikaiwa
was last night and we made skits. Those were hilarious. My skit was about 4 of us
being stranded on a raft and trying to get to hawaii. We had to beat off sharks
with our shoes and surf back to hawaii on a tsunami.

We taught them how to share personal experiences and we had different topics.
one of the topics was an earthquake experience which ironically, I ended up
getting. I was able to trade with Andre and I got to share an experience about
one of my good friends. So I talked about making magical cookies with Ali and
watching Jane Austen movies. No one understood what Jane Austen was of
course...but oh well. I taught them the word chick flick. hee hee.

It was very amusing listening to all their experiences but we had a really good
turn out at eikaiwa last night (even if half the students were the miyazakis)
and phil brought us another referral! Whee!

Oh, and the yogurt turned out wonderfully. I had no idea how easy it was! Powell
shimai was so cute, she was walking around talking about the yogurt like it was
a child and she would go check on it every so often and pat it and talk to it.
haha!

ok, we gotta go. Love you all!

Love,
Sister Halliday

It's almost my birthday, where is the mail????

2008-09-27T20:27:00.000-07:00

dear family, 
 
no, i havent gotten the packages... but i figure that they are stockpiling them 
at the honbu and will bring them to interviews tomorrow rather than forward 
them. that is what i am banking on so yep. if they do not come i think i might 
be very depressed for teh first time in my mission... i have been checking the 
mail ever 10 minutes for the last week and have had to say that absolutely no 
one loves me anymore i have had NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO letters! Not even from brittan 
or natalee! gah! oh wait...i got one from beaufort shimai and smith choro. smith 
choro got hit by a car two weeks after he finally made it to japan...he would. 
haha. 
 
ok but nothing from outside japan. what gives??? AM I NOT CUTE!?!?! 
 
ok ok enough complaining. I have been singing the christmas cookie song from 
veggietales all day hoping it would bring mail. 
 
`oh postman! I cant wait for you to come, i just cant wait for you to come! you 
have a letter. a lovely letter...just for me for when you come, only for me for 
when you come! Because its p-day!` 
 
it goes on like that with the landlord coming to the door as well as the 
Jehovahs witnesses and finally the sokogakkai peoples... all of whom i try to 
pass chirashi to... 
 
yeah....... well it is raining today and there is nothing much for me to do but 
sit by the mailbox and pray for letters ok!?! 
 
moving on... interviews are tomorrow. which means we have to make our interview 
goals! every interview we come up with a random word and we try to get president 
hill to say it in our interview. whoever gets him to say their word wins. Last 
interview the word was `frisky` hee hee 
 
so not much has gone on this week. i got laryngitis again and so i couldnt do 
much...just kinda following my comp around for moral support. Ito kyoudai was 
making fun of me and telling me that the still small voice is only for the Holy 
Ghost and i needed a bigger voice. He said he would pray for me with faith =P 
 
We were supposed to have a barbecue at the miyazakis on sunday for my 
birthday...well...really it wasnt FOR my birthday, it was for our brazilian 
investigators with whom we cannot communicate haha...but it was on my birthday 
therefore it was FOR my birthday. says me. 
 
unfortunately the elders didnt call early enough and so now we are having it 
next week. So i have to think of something else to do for my birthday...hehe 
 
but i am excited! yay brazilian barbecue! Powell shimai says Leme kyoudai is WAY 
good at barbecueing. yum! I am a kuishinbo. which means glutton...but its a cute 
word. 
 
In other news, we went to Osada shimais on monday and helped her pick weeds. She 
said her mother in law was very impressed because normally all she sees of 
missionaries is them coming over and eating food or teaching a lesson. So to see 
us helping with the yard work was very impressive. After that she took us to see 
an old burial ground near her house. its 1500 years old. 
 
Basically its just a couple of big hills...at first they reminded me of that 
hill that Hiro transported himself to in Heroes... hehe Then they reminded me of 
where Luca Blight took his last stand against Riou in suikoden 2. Yeah...i still 
live in a fantasy world... 
 
last week we visited a less active sister in the ward, Ramos shimai. She is from 
Peru. She really likes cooking and she is going to teach us how to make 
tortillas! wheeee! she says peruvian tortillas are different from mexican 
tortillas and now i am thinking brazilian tortillas might be different too and 
maybe i can convince miyazaki shimai that she wants to teach me how to make 
those too. haha. 
 
speaking of making things, sister powell is going to teach me to make yogurt 
today! 
 
A word on Sister Powell, as i havent said much about her yet. Shes a farm girl 
from rexburg idaho. Her grandpa has a farm and she milks cows and gathers eggs 
and plants stuff and all that fun stuff! I am going to visit her someday heehee. 
 
Anyhow, she and i have pretty much the same sense of humor but i am much louder 
than her. usually the apartment is me talk talk talking and then she talks 
occasionally. 
 
Her older sister is married and she has told me all about her neice who is 3. 
The kid is a genius. When told not to hit her sister and asked `what would jesus 
do?` she replied `well, how many sisters did Jesus have?` 
 
A lot of the talk in the apartment is `powell shimais neice says the darndest 
things` 
 
Of course, all the talk about little kids has kinda turned us into little kids 
too... this morning when my alarm went off i rolled over to see that the clock 
said 6:30 and shouted `oh man!` to which powell shimai sleepily replied `swiper 
no swiping!` 
 
its a dora the explorer thing and you wouldnt understand! *hides* 
 
that pretty much all the fun and excitement. Except that Leiataua choro taught 
us a hula at eikaiwa last night. that was pretty funny. He used to teach at the 
PCC... 
 
And now i have `pearly shells` stuck in my head... 
 
Ok well, i have to write guilt letters to people today and time is pretty much 
up... thanks for the birthday messages. Aubrey...you have a 4-pack. i never want 
to hear that again. I have a dendo baby*...i dont wanna talk about it ok?!?! 
 
Love you all! have fun! Conference is coming up! are you excited!!! 
WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! 
 
Love, 
Sister halliday 

*a dendo baby is a pudgy little belly...

Saved from our own folly by a screaming obaachan!

2008-09-27T20:14:00.000-07:00

dear family,

still no call for ali huh? I guess that will put an end to my checking the mail
religiously 18 times a day to see if she wrote. dont tell me though cuz she
insists she is sending a tape when she gets her call. hopefully she wont forget
to hit record like i did haha.

and no...it will not put an end to my checking 18 times a day...if you dont have
hope, what do you have? hee hee

this week was full of hilarious experiences...and few investigators. but we are
getting close! Tanzawa san is progressing now. Shes a very VERY quiet person and
getting her to keep committments is kinda hard but from reading the progress
record the past missionaries have focused on changing her behavior and not so
much her testimony so that is what we are focusing on right now.

some people in the ward tell us she seems like she mayhave a history of abuse
but from what she tells us about home is seems like an alright place...she stays
there often enough. she doesnt tell us much so she is like a mystery and i
really have to focus on what questions i ask and what i can piece together from
her answers. powell shimai says she is being a lot more open than she used to
and i think its cuz we have got her reading the book of mormon every night.

as for solving the mystery... something terrible happened to her i am sure...
and she is on a hunt for something spiritual to give her peace. she can sit in
the chapel for hours by herself just staring...and when i asked if there was
anyplace in the world she would like to go she said france because she wants to
see the cathedrals.

shes is a very nice girl but terrified of men...(hence the ward members
assumption) and so getting her to sacrament meeting is hard. she comes to relief
society though. She just needs time i think. we are going to start teaching her
from lesson one next week.

so that is tanzawa san. our one and only progressing investigator.

on to the hilarious experience for this week.

on saturday we wanted to go to fujiyoshida to visit some members. you dont get
much contact with the missionaries when you live in the shadows of mt fuji. so
we check the train times and head to the station only to get there and realize
we dont have a map. so we had to go back and get it and that set us back an hour
because of train times.

powell shimai didnt think we should go but i insisted that we should stick to
the plan and it would be ok so we prayed again and felt ok with going. we met a
really nice girl on the way there and she really wanted to come to church. we
exchanged phone numbers and then went to catch our train.

on the train we sat down and then the girl from the street showed up and sat
with us. we talked to her for about an hour til she had to get off. she is
really cute...but she is only 17 and her dad is a buddhist preist....that spells
trouble in my opinion but we will see.

so we get to a random eki in the middle of nowhere and the train switches to go
back to kofu so we run off the train and the next train isnt coming for another
half hour. we decided to go dendo in the area and found out we were in the place
tanzawa san said she lived (she wouldnt tell the missionaries before but now we
know the neighborhood she lives in and it is close to the eki) so we decided to
play detective and find tanzawa sans house.

no luck so we returned to catch the train. we were now like 2 hours behind so we
called the member we were going to meet to let her know and then...missed the
train while we were on the phone. ayah!

long story short, we ended up missing 2 more trains before getting on one way
later than anticipated. we sat down and there was an old woman staring at us. we
smiled and she walked toward us. we were expecting her to ask to be baptized
right there but instead she starts yelling at us to get off the train.

she was pointing to the train bound for kofu and telling us to get on that one.
we were so confused. powell shimai tried to tell her we jsut came from kofu and
didnt want to go back yet but she kept saying `IKENAI YO!!!` which basically
means you cant go (by this train).

we got off cuz she scared us and as the train pulled out i noticed the
destination was not fujiyoshida but fuji. A little geography lesson for you
all... Fuji is in the NAGOYA mission.

so even though that woman had no idea where we intended to go, somehow she knew
we shouldnt be on that train. had we stayed, we would have left the mission and
been completely oblivious til it was too late. God loves us! He sent an obaachan
to save us from certain doom!

so we had to make a whole new back up plan, being so far from kofu made our
original back up plan null and void so we called hosaka shimai and she picked us
up from the eki near her house. we practiced teaching lesson three with her and
she helped us with all our japanese questions.

Of course, she wanted to feed us so we went out to house in her neighborhood
while she made dinner. Housing was hard because they were either all obaachans
and ojiichans who had been buddhist all their lives and dont wanna hear about
`krisito kyo` or they were younger families that lived in `great and spacious
buildings` (big houses...even for american houses) and certainly represented the
pride of the world =p (see lehis vision 1 nephi 8)

anyhow, we did that for about an hour and a half and then we found a neat row of
new houses that werent so big. we knocked on one door and got it shut in our
face (nicely) and then the next door there were 3 young girls and their mom all
in the genkan. they were all very cute and the mom was very nice but she said
she had no interest in religion. I jumped in with something that in english
would sound like this `my family has the same goal through this message. it
makes us strong. here is a pamphlet (family proclamation) uh....here`

in my head i am thinking `yeah. take the pamphlet. its good. i should be telling
you to read it or something but i cant remember my japanese so just take it!
PLEASE!`

apparently my inability to speak japanese made her think we could teach her kids
english. she came outside and talked to sister powell while i played with the
kids in the yard (yeah! they had a yard!). turns out the woman had grown up
jehovahs witness and felt that her experiences were pretty miserable for a child (no
matsuris or field days or birthday parties!) so she didnt want them to live like
that. she thought all christian churches were like that. we assured her this was
not the case. i like birthday parties. :)

anyhow, we are meeting her tomorrow. we are jsut teaching her kids english but
we think that she will come around soon. she was very curious as to why we were
volunteering for a year and a half and not accepting money to teach her kids.

that was pretty much our horrible day which wasnt horrible at all. its the best
day we have had this transfer! yay!

now we are trying to build up our eikaiwa. there are about 5 people that come
and they all like to go out to eat after and bash the Church. why... i dont
know. its odd but whatever. We "made" new fliers for eikaiwa. and when i say
made, i mean we totally plagiarized and copied off a bunch of fliers from another
eikaiwa. which eikaiwa? Well, the fliers have a picture of a penguin teaching
other penguins... where do you think they came from? =p

unfortunately, we ran off about 100 of them before we realized the map on the
back was a map to the church in Akita which for you who dont know is in Brittan's mission...yeaaaaaah.... that is the price we pay
for plagarism huh?

I just remember powell shimai cutting them out and then gasping and saying `THE
WHOLE THING IS DAME! (messed up) haha...the look on her face. oh man. it was priceless.

if anyone sees brittan, tell him thanks for his help with eikaiwa haha.

thanks for all the packages mom! elder morris will be very happy haha.

also, if it isnt too much to ask... powell shimais camera is broken and she goes
home next transfer (to her surprise but that is another story) so there isnt
much point in her parents buying another camera. but i told her we might have an
old one laying around somewhere that she could use if my old one isnt in use or
something? She is kinda lonely without pictures.

yeah, i am going to be a serial killer...i am on to killing my second companion.
she got a call from the honbu telling her she had to go home next transfer cuz
president hill just got his hand slapped for letting us all extend at the end of
our missions. heh. powell shimai is pretty bummed cuz you can extend if your
ministerial certificate expiry date is within 30 days of the next transfer
ending. she had had the option of extending and going home christmas eve but
that falls 31 days after her certificate runs out. she is pretty bummed...

well, that is all the news. i did get the package and thank you! unfortunately
peachy season is over...sad day! but i am excited to make grape jelly instead!

thanks for everything! love you and miss you!

Love,
sister halliday

Preachin' to the kiwi's

2008-09-27T20:05:00.000-07:00

Dear family, 
 
how is it that in the land of technology i am sitting here using dial up 
internet!?! this is so slow its killing me. its probably punishment for my 
pride...which i will get struck down for eventually i am sure. hee hee 
 
to answer your questions...i almost never go to the honbu except i went 
yesterday for mission conference. the honbu is a 3 hour train ride from here. 
typically we dont go to the honbu outside conferences (which are USUALLY at 
kichijoji for my zone now and of course my last zone) and if you serve in nakano 
you can go to the honbu anytime. thats it. sorry. 
 
speaking of packages, i have thought about it and compiled a list of things i 
want. they entail food and the like...specially granola bars or somthing that i 
can take with me on the road cuz powell shimai and i...despite our efforts to 
eat healthy and well cannot get our food to fill us up! veggies are great but 
dont pack any protein at all and tofu goes through you so fast that i wonder how 
on earth it gets absorbed! anyhow, we need snacks badly. maybe if someone
could teach me how to make granola bars... we ordered oatmeal from the honbu. 
 
also peanut butter is a good choice but i had to leave mine in kichijoji and the 
jar in kofu is almost out. we can order it from the honbu for 10 dollars but 
kofu is so far away we have to wait til we go in for interviews or a conference 
or something and interviews arent til the 19th! wah. kofu is so taihen in that 
respect. but hey, the apartment is crazy huge so i cant complain! even though i 
just did. haha. 
 
speaking of the kofu apartment and kofu in general...there are things that 
follow me from place to place...and some things that dont. rain is one of those 
things that doesnt. apparently in addition to arizona getting massive amounts of 
rain, it has been pouring in kichijoji since i left. mick shimai told me 
yesterday. 
 
among the things that do follow me...there was a ROACH IN THE APARTMENT
LAST WEEK!!! WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY! 
 
and by the way, that actually was a small roach in the video and this is NOT a 
fishing thing ok! 
 
anyhow, powell shimai was on the phone with the ward mission leader when she 
screamed. he is still laughing at her for that but he bought us a roach trap. i 
like ito kyoudai. he is on my ever growing list of people in kofu that are my 
favorite but hosaka shimai is still at the top! 
 
the other day we were working in ryuo and time got away from us. we had to
get back to kofu for a ward activity by six so we left our bikes at a members
house and tried the train but out here...train times are really far apart and the
next one didnt leave til 550. we had to call people coming from nirasaki to see if 
they could grab us on the way but no one was answering so we called the church 
and told the elders to send someone to pick us up at kofu eki at about 6. 
 
when we got to kofu eki we realized we didnt know who to look for or where
so we started walking around when we heard `POWERU SHIMAI!` and turned to
see hosaka shimai running...literally running to us. She is sooooo cute! hee hee.
I am so glad we have someone to save us from our own stupidity. 
 
lets see...what else. oh yeah...we got really really lost the other day in the 
grape fields. the problem with getting lost in kofu is that often if you are 
lost...you cant really proselyte til you find your way back. i ended up having 
to proselyte to kiwis...the fruits not the people. which by the way...i had no 
idea they grew on vines! crazy! 
 
luckily, the Lord blesses us at times like that, when we are really really 
ridiculously lost and i was laughing like crazy every time we took another wrong 
turn. i am not sure why...it was just one of those days when everything makes 
you laugh like crazy. it seemed to help powell shimai too from breaking down
and crying cuz we were so lost. she just looked at me like i was insane instead
and kept going. we are a good team. haha. 
 
lets see...what else is going on? i dunno. mission conference? at which i didnt 
get to see harris or allen choro cuz only half the mission went yesterday. we 
are too big dakara... 
 
man! I miss allen and harris choro! allen choro used to be here in kofu and 
powell shimai loved him so she talks about what a great elder he was and then i 
get all whiny cuz i miss my choro tachi! (by the way...powell shimai loves 
everyone...even me! haha!) 
 
mission conference was fun and i got my white handbook back after a long
lecture from mick shimai about leaving it behind haha. mick shimai`s new bean
is really cute! 
 
so mission conference. elder stevenson came. he and his wife are really nice and 
hes pretty funny. he just got released as nagoya mission president last year so 
he was just thrilled to be with missionaries again and he told us about a 
hundred times haha. 
 
last week, we went to the temple, which is about an hour from the honbu and 
about 2 from kichijoji by the way...almost 4 from kofu... cuz i had another 
stupid OBGYN appointment but i probably already ranted about that. anyhow,
we went to the distribution center after and i bought general conference on
DVD! YEAH! And some other DVDs and then on monday we made cookies for
members and watched conference cuz we are just. that. cool. YEAH! 
 
I am a nerd.but that brings me to the other things i want to beg for for my 
birthday. There is an organ CD that i want...it looks like a motab cd but its 
organ music. its at the temple but it is 20 dollars there. lame. also...i think 
that is pretty much it. yeah. 
 
speaking of my birthday. i got a card from 
grandy...i love her and appreciate the 
card...but powell shimai and i laughed at the letter for like an hour because 
grandy STILL managed to tell me to use the money that she sent me for college!
among other things haha! but i do appreciate the sum of money from her social
security check.  thank you grandy =p 
 
you are right...asians eat lots of unexpected things and cows stomach is GROSS!!!
I had forgotten that i ate it the other day until just now. I thought it was some 
weird vegetable so mick shimai and i ate it and it was all chewy and gross and 
then the waiter was like `that is tripe` when mick shimai asked. I ended up 
swallowing it whole. gross. never again. 
 
also...on the completely irrelevant side of life from missionary work, there are 
somethings in japan that just shouldnt be. we were at an investigators house the 
other day and she had the TV on and i saw it as we walked in...something 
american cuz there was a black guy on the screen. I looked away and then i
heard it... the JAG theme! what is that doing here!?!?! it isnt supposed to be!
grr. Anyhow, we made her turn off the TV so it was ok. 
 
lets see...what else? I dunno...this is the most time i have had to email in a 
long time so i am kinda just running with it.  We are going to fujiyoshida 
tomorrow! whee! to work, not climb fuji. that is an activity for next p day. or 
the next cuz i am going to the science musem on next pday! YEAH! SCIENCE!!! i
am excited! And powell shimai is a nerd like me so she wants to go too! 
 
what else? I dunno. Brianna cant marry the doctor in the video game anyhow cuz
I am going to marry  the doctor...when i get home. tell her good luck with
math *snort*. I cant relate to aubreys situation. bummer. glad i am not in america
right now. I can just come back to it when its already ruined i guess. haha. by
the way, what is  the exchange rate right now? I am curious since grandy sent me
10 dollars...no clue what to do with american money. but WHAT THE HECK
HAPPENED TO THE MONEY! IT  HAS A HUGE PURPLE 5 IN THE CORNER!!!! 
 
ok, that is it i think. we have lots of finding to do this week so pray for us 
in that! Also, we want to do more service but its really hard to find stuff here 
cuz the people are so prideful and if you ask an obaachan if you can weed her 
garden she thinks you are telling her her house is a mess and she will jump 
around doing it herself. So if anyone has any ideas at all...we want to be 
service missionaries cuz lots of people here think we just want them to come to 
church so they can pay us money. We want to serve them and teach them that
way. 
 
That is about it! Thanks! I miss you all and love you! 
 
Love, 
sister halliday

I am in Kofu and it's wonderful!

2008-09-27T19:56:00.000-07:00

dear family,

i am glad you got the box...that was a load off my mind when it was finally in
the mail.

kofu is amazing and i think my japanese is ok....or at least enough to fool
andre kyodai into thinking that i can actually speak decently so he can report
to brittan that i am doing well.

apparently brittan now has ways of spying on me...i am not sure how i like that.
though i am sure andre kyodai has better things to do than actually report on my
japanese and besides which he keeps telling me how amazing brittan was at
japanese his first transfer so i am sure if he did report, it wouldnt be a bad
report.

i am jealous of your thunderstorm. the doughnut hole followed me here. all my
companions like it but i dont. i want it to rain. it always rains at night when
i am inside and cant go outside cuz it is after curfew. grrrr.

in other news i really like the ward here. hosaka shimai is my favorite! She is
a cute little obaachan who loves to help the missionaries. My first impression
of her was at eikaiwa when we were playing `do you love your neighbor` and
every time leitaua choro went over to her she would throw her hands up in the
air and scream `noooooo` cuz she didnt want to be picked.

Pretty much everyone in kofu loves the missionaries and loves helping us out.
The Miyazakis are amazing too...though i have only actually met andre and his
brother... powell shimai talks about them so much i feel like i have met them
all! haha. apparently they always have referrals for us and if they dont they
assure us they are working on it.

we are not wanting for fruits and vegetables in kofu...everyone has a farm and
gives us food all the time. right now we have more peaches than we know what
to do with and more vegetables as well. the peaches we will make into
jam...maybe...if i dont screw it up. the vegetables...i think i will fashion
into a godzilla model cuz i am NOT eating them.

we have a goya and some okra and frankly...they terrify me. the goya looks like
a godzilla anyhow.

cooking in kofu is fun cuz i have tons of room. I made chinese chicken salad and
some other stuff from the package mom sent. my companion seems to think i am
an amazing cook. she doesnt realize that mom basically handed me everything
cuz she knows i cant cook. i did learn how to make curry pan though. yay! it will
have to wait til i come home though cuz i dont have time to wait for bread to
rise.

speaking of packages...my birthday is coming as you well know and my district
would like kingsize twix, mars bars, and snickers as well as some poptarts. if i
was still in kichijoji i am sure darner choro would have wanted tons of stuff
but my district is all...i dont know... they werent going to ask for anything
but i told them it was fine cuz you totally spoiled me in the MTC and so now i
think i can make myself popular by sharing my packages. your fault. haha.

speaking of leitaua (i totally spelled that wrong) he tried to translate my
middle name and walked around trying to figure out what i was the chief of for
like an hour before he would finally let me tell him...haha

as for me...i just like cooking. simple recipes or things with recipes on the
labels are appreciated. i am collecting them now haha. i keep them all in a
book. =p

so we have a few investigators in kofu but i havent met them cuz they are still
out of town cuz of obon. yay..... so we just ride our bikes everywhere looking
for people. there are a lot of portuguese speakers from brazil and such here...i
discovered yesterday that that makes housing kind of hard. yesterday i had to
throw what little spanish i knew together in a sentence that was mostly japanese
and a lot of sign language. i think i threw italian in there too...maybe.
anyhow, i directed her to the homepage and that was the end of that. haha.

last saturaday we went to a members house for a goodbye party thing. it was a
good opportunity to meet members before church the next day. the house was
on a farm pretty much on the border of the nagoya mission...i could have
probably waved to smith and ward choro and they would have seen.

anyhow,  the house was really pretty. it was like a cabin and there was a stream
on the property and we could sit on the roof and watch the sunset. it was way
cool! and there was lots of good food and fresh veggies cuz it was a farm.

i eat more veggies these days... i can stomach corn but i still dont like it and
usually try to swallow it whole. tomatoes are actually downright good now.... i
will not eat the okra.

lets see...what else. we found an onsen (they are ippai here cuz of fuji) while
we were tracting and it was just for soaking your feet. we are still trying to
figure out if that is within mission rules cuz we need it! haha! I discovered a
crack in the sole of my shoe the other day...but they should last and i still
have 2 other pairs of shoes. i should be good til the end of my mission.

sad news. i lost my white handbook during transfers. so not only am i walking
around a lawless heathen...i lost my ministerial certificate. I can get that
replaced but...it had PRESIDEN HINCKLEY`S SIGNATURE ON IT!

not that i dont love president monson...but i want my certificate to have
president hinckleys signature...

sad day. i also managed to lose my scriptures. my japanese set...not my english
set. i think they are hiding in a cupboard back in the kichijoji building but i
will be there next week so i will check.

speaking of next week, i will be emailing early cuz we have a huge conference on
thursday so wednesday is p-day. be aware!

ok well, i am starving and we still have to go to the temple... we had to come
to roppongi to go to the stupid OBGYN again which was pointless cuz they told me
i was fine and i was like `no i am not...if i was i wouldnt be here` so they put
me on birth control and told me to come back in a month. i dont wanna come back!
grrrrrr. least there is a cold stone creamery next door.... i can drown my
sorrows in that.

oh yes...and if you could send peanut butter and jelly...i had to leave it in
kichijoji before... thank you!

I am glad everyone is doing well and that brianna can walk like a normal person
again. that is always good. Have fun with courtney and tell her i said hi back.

Love,
Sister Halliday

ps. i got another haircut. its short...but all the damage is gone for good which
is good. it was unexpected. we went to visit a less active who owns a beauty
parlor and she wanted to play with my hair cuz well...people tend to want to do
that.

its not that much different but it is shorter. i am still getting used to it.
back to shoulder length...wowww. k a little longer than that. shampoo... i am on
my last bottle but i can get that stuff in japan. i think i am doing pretty good
on everything. thanks!

Halliday shimai gets abducted by aliens and transfers to Kofu, Japan

2008-08-20T23:02:00.000-07:00

alright family, that is enough. i will b careful what i ask for now cuz i have
about 20 emails i just had to skim. fun stuff. i think i got the bulk of it and
so yeah.

as for the OBGYN...well i am  fine aside from a small ovarian cyst what is
giving me slight pain. i am going back next week for a follow up but she says i
will be ok for now. they took blood and did exams and ultrasounds and all that.

i will explain now why it was so scary. it was like being abducted by aliens!
all speaking some funny language and poking me with stuff... then the room was
really tiny with tons of machines everywhere and this chair in the middle of the
room. picture an electric chair and that is what i was sitting in.

in america they have a normal exam table and the doctor wheels around on her
spiffy little wheely stool... in japan you sit in an electric chair which gets
raised up to the ceiling and tilts back like a dentists chair... i am telling
you...i was abducted by aliens. *shudder*

i did go to cold stone creamery after though cuz its right next to the OBGYN...
...mmmmmmmmm

so i am sure you all want to know about transfers...

the place i am going is very hot...and very pretty...and very big...and
very...inaka (translation: out in the country) hee hee

I AM GOING TO KOFU!!!

it has been completely insane since i got my transfer call on saturday...packing
and going to appointments. apparently i made a lot more friends here than i
thought cuz EVERYONE wanted to see me before i left. I was crying most of
sunday and some of monday.

Tuesday was sooooo busy. appointment after appointment after appointment...
my goodness!!! first we went to lunch with a recent convert and then to sunny
and heegeuns house to play with maps and then to mitaka to go to dinner with
api shimai and then to the church to meet naho chan, a girl we only just met
like a week ago...but she really wanted to see me before i left. it was crazy!

sunny was soooo sad i was leaving...there was a dark cloud of sadness over the
whole meeting. when she heard i was leaving she asked if i wanted some sweet
bread cuz she eats sweets when shes sad. as we were eating she said `today the
sweets arent making me happy` she is soooooooo cute! I told her it was ok, i
would come back someday. I will miss her though.　

no! i hit the stupid kana button. that was like 5 minutes wasted email time
trying to get back to english.

anyhow, i will miss her. she wanted us to go camping with her family! haha!

we taught her about the first half of the plan of salvation up to the atonement.
Something seemed to hit home with her about it (as well it should because the
Atonement is for everyone) anyhow, i hope she keeps taking lessons because she
is sooooo amazing. I love her!

I am very sad to leave kichijoji but I am very excited to be going to Kofu!

funny story though, i still havent shipped my bags to my new are so i wont have
anything except my hobo bag and what it in it. i am carrying my laundry bag with
stuff in it to my new area haha.

packing was funny but i managed to get everything into my suitcases including my
puzzles but i will be shipping stuff from kofu sometime in the near future. it
will just be stuff i never use so dont get excited. i did ship the stuff for
aubrey brianna natalee and brittan today though so it should be there soon... i
hope aubrey and brianna like it...aubrey should. the stuff is very aubreyish i
think. haha

by the way...i guess kiana was touring tokyo recently and went to the ghibli
musem! WHAAAAAAAAT!?!? all our tracting in inokashira park and i never once saw
her!?!?! that would have been TOO crazy. I might not have known what to do and
might have exploded from trying to laugh cry scream and jump up and down all at
the same time. The Lord is protecting me from such disaster.

about the olympics...its funny hearing abut them from another perspective. all
this talk about kitajima winning the 100 meter breast stroke and nothing about
america killing everyone at everything. uh...hello...you just lost...didnt
america just win? why are we talking about japan? oh yeah...we are in japan...

interesting indeed.

i cant believe no one has mr yanez!!! WHAT IS THIS!?!?!?! i am upset and i am
not going to be able to focus all day due to the injustice.

i can hear the olympics going on behind me... someone turned on the tv. america
is probably killing someone at something. haha.

anyhow, its a 3 hour train ride to kofu so i have to go. i love you all and hope
you are all doing well. and really i dont get that offended when you are late
writing...its not that huge a deal really. haha

love you!

love,
sister halliday

Sunny and Heeguen...wonderful friends

2008-08-20T22:59:00.000-07:00

dearest fambly

you had better be online right now writing to me...cuz all i have is brown choros address which, as grateful as i am for it, hardly consitutes a letter.

anyhow, it is obon and apparently the anniversary of a rather hectic couple of bombings in past years...cuz this email place is full of paper cranes, and pictures of atomic bomb victims....i totally forgot that happened around this time of year.

anyhow, i only have half an hour today so i shall get going on the happenings of this week. if i can remember what happened this week. we had dinner at the stevensons but that happens pretty regularly.

my goodness! i dont think i have anything interesting to report at all! I guess it was bound to happen...its been threatening to all summer... but previously i had a bug war to expound on and so i could fool you all into thinking life was interesting here.

before i forget, next week is transfers and so i will be emailing a day early again.

i am pretty much gone from kichijoji. that is a given. i wonder where i will go...

the weather hasnt cooled down any...the members are all kind enough to constantly tell us there is no hope of that in the near future. fantastic. haha.

we went to sunny`s house on tuesday. she is our korean investigator with her son heeguen. they are so cute and fun but their interest in the church is small right now. they are an extremely close family though and family is sooooooooo important to them. so right now we are teaching them by going to their house and helping heeguen with math and just being their friends while teaching them at the same time. we teach math for like half an hour and then have a lesson for about half an hour.

sunny loves learning and reads the book of mormon in korean and english. she knows this church is good but she doesnt know why yet. she isnt opposed to learning about it or to religion but she says it will take time. that is fine by us. as long as she keeps commitments, she will get it someday when the time is right.

she was very happy when she found out we could still be friends even if she wasnt a member. we taught her that heavenly father has a plan for us to be happy but he will never make us follow it and so we as missionaries will never make anyone follow it either. we just teach.

i absolutely love sunny and heeguen though. and their house is so cool! it is full of maps and warships and stuff. heeguen loves warships and he learned all the states from warship names haha. he loves geography and we spent a lot of time quizzing each other on capitals and stuff. their house really makes learning fun and i have been inspired! My kids are gonna be smart like heeguen and i am gonna have maps and stuff everywhere!

lets see...what else?

that is pretty much basically it. meeting with sunny was the highlight of the week thus far. she made us korean pizza called pachinke or something like that... yoo jin and didi probably know what it is. it was waaaaaaaaaaaaay good though.

did i mention that i love sunny!?

speaking of, how are my favorite koreans? I made new korean friends here but they arent yoo jin and didi. i miss them!

oh! does anyone have mr yanez this year!?!

ok that is it...sorry this is short but time is short and i cant take anymore brainwashing here...i know they are talking about the atomic bombs on the radio cuz i just heard bombing noises. funny how i dont understand...and it probably isnt brainwashing...but there is sad violin music playing now. i think i know this song...but i dont remember from there. some classical composer...maybe i heard it in a jane austen movie. i dont know. I want to take a music theory class when i go back to school.

bah. sunny`s house made me actually MISS school. what IS this!?!?!

ok i really have to go before the lady at the desk yells at me to get off!

love you all!

love,
sister halliday

ps...i know where the music is from now! Harkins! haha!

The bug wars continue and typhoon season is...disapppointing

2008-08-20T22:56:00.000-07:00

dear family,

i got the numerous post cards that you sent...every last one of them. i think i succeeded in making howe choro trunky when i showed him. mwahahahaha.

anyhow, yeah...i got bishop...err...brother?... jobe`s letter last night and my companion had to endure me writhing about the floor screaming `noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!` for about 3 minutes. She thinks i am insane.

bishop hadley huh? cant say i am that surprised. Clarissa and i were predicting that looooooong ago. =P

Poor brianna...cant sleep in. ask me if i care hee hee.

I cant belive that yoo-jin got grounded on returning home. wah. lame. how are the koreans anyhow? wahhhh! they are all juniors now! EW i am old!

brianna is such a 16 year old by the way. i liked her `its cute...like my handwriting` comment. *rolls eyes*

so how is arizona? Its hot here....and humid...and i am wet and probably smell...but everyone is the same so it doesnt really matter. its just gross. actually i am good on deoderant...i stocked up before i left the MTC so i have a whole nother stick after the one i am using runs out.

we have had some crazy weather lately...kind of. it rather reminds me of arizona actually. minus the humidity. but you know what i am talking about. clear in the morning and thunderstorms in the evening. i can see the thunderheads building up as i ride my bike and i get excited...and then it ends up like an arizona thunderstorm....dry. -_-

actually the other day it poured pretty much all day. and we got soaked again because we are dumb and thought an umbrella would suffice. my shoes wont survive typhoon season... but i figure i will just wear my black ones all through it and then send home for the extra pair once these die. Its my last typhoon season so i should be alright. whoa...weird. my last what huh? I cant belive i am saying that.

Speaking of lasts...my companion got her death letter recently and she made ME open it. so now her death is on my hands.

Lets see...I am trying to think of what happened this week but all the days are becoming one. We go out. we contact people. and like Harris choro says...they talk to us for about 5 seconds before running away. =P

Speaking of Harris choro, when you write him back tell him I miss him terribly in the most missionary appropriate way. And can someone get me the address of the Australia Adalaides mission. )i dont think i spelled that right... Anyhow, brown choro needs a letter.

lalalala...anything interesting happen this week? Oh! we went to a matsuri last night! it was so much fun! we just stopped by to see the dancing on the way to visit a member.

This week we had a new investigator come to church. Saran. She is from mongolia and her parents joined the church in mongolia so she found the church in Shibuya and from there was referred to us. She is really cute! We will start teaching her this sunday!

Also on sunday, (which was fast sunday and I am an idiot and didnt drink water and nearly died but that is a different story) we had dinner at the Humphreys. We took Momi, the girl that we met at Musashino that took us to her english class, and we had family home evening over there. After we left momi chan decided to start taking lessons ^_^

So yeah...about sunday...well we didnt know the guidelines for drinking on fast sunday and we kept telling ourselves `we dont really NEED it yet...we can make it a little longer`

long story short, we got to the humphreys and drowned in our glasses at dinner. Darner choro laughed at us cuz we are so stupid and we got sick from drinking so much so fast. The next day I had to trick my body into absorbing water by sucking on ice and drinking a little at a time (which I actually wouldnt have known to do had I not babysat Clarissa when she had morning sickness =P)

Anyhow, next fast sunday we will drink water...

Lets see...what else happened? We are teaching a family now. Sunny and Heeguen. They are eikaiwa students, a mother and her son. Sunny also wants to bring her husband but he works late so we havent met with him yet. They are Korean and lately, Sunny has been thinking a lot about God and she says she has a lot of things that she feels like she cant do right now so she wants help. We planned to just teach the first two principles of lesson 1 along with restoration, prayer, and Book of Mormon. (lesson 1 is so full of so many things that its hard to teach all at once to people who have no concept of God yet) but we ended up teaching the entire lesson cuz that was just the way it ended up. We arent sure why...the only thing we can think of is that they needed to hear all of lesson 1. We will probably never know. but we meet them again this week ^_^

In other news, who wants to hear about my pains and afflictions!?!

I have the chicken pox. You thought you could only get them once...but nooooooooooo... they lied!

ok...I dont have the chicken pox. I just have so many stupid mosquito bites I LOOK like I have chicken pox!

Yesterday we were visiting a member and there was a bush by her door. My companion brushed it on her way by and out came a CLOUD of mosquitos. Of course...we were at the door talking to a member...so there was nothing we could do except stand there and get eaten!

I think that now...when I read about Adam and Eve and the earth being `cursed for their sake` I will always think of mosquitos -_-

ok! on that happy note! That is really all I have this week. Hey! Eguchi and Watanabe shimai just walked in! They are my two favoritist shimai! Anyhow, I must go. We are in Hiroo, just went to the temple, and now we much take the train and fight our way through shinjuku eki. oh the fun times!

Take care and have fun...at school and stuff...tell brianna to suck it up! =p

Love,
Halliday shimai

Halliday shimai visits Kofu...

2008-07-30T22:05:00.000-07:00

Dear family,

well, this week was somewhat less bug filled and more exciting than last. we got another new investigator, eriko san who is really sweet and pure. i just worry about how much of her is actually there because she stares blankly past you when you talk to her and just nods her head with a huge smile on her face. but she is cute at any rate.

i actually wasnt there for her lesson cuz i was in kofu where it was raining! I saw mount fuji!!! wooooooooow!

yup. i went on exchanges cuz hardle shimai needed to get out of kofu and really wanted to do an exchange and the kichijoji sisters are the closest to kofu. so monday morning we caught the train and rode out 2 hours to meet the kofu sisters halfway and switch companions. i went to kofu with powell shimai.

the train ride was soooooooo pretty! the city disappeared and there was nothing but trees and rivers and mist everywhere!

kofu is somewhat less populated than kichijoji. people are actually home when you go housing! kofu is famous for peaches and grapes so i ate a lot of peaches in the one day i was there. at one point one of the members saw us at the 7-11 and pulled her car over and came running over to us bearing two very large and delicious peaches.

the exchange was rather uneventful because on both ends most of the appointments cancelled but i met their investigator yuriko chan who is super cute. she designed her house herself and it is huge! it looked like a cabin in america!

that night we went to dinner at a members house because it was the district leaders birthday and they just had a baptism last sunday so they were all celebrating. the member owns a retraunt so there was lots of food and lots of people.

i met a guy from kenya who is going to be running in the olympics! i dont remember his name though...and i dont know what country he is running for either lol. sorry. i am a failure.

anyhow, at the dinner party thing there was a guy at the other end of the table who looked strangely familiar but i couldnt figure out why.

at the end of the night he told me to say hi to niiyama marie shimai from the kichijoji ward because he had served with her in sendai. of course my ears perk up at the mention of the sendai mission so i asked if he knew brittan.

he was brittan`s TRAINER! THAT is why he looked so familiar...cuz i have seen pictures of him!

so yeah, that was exciting.

so anyhow, kofu was pretty. i rode my bike without fear of running into anyone! of course...i ran into a pole instead. hardle shimai needs to get her bike checked out...her brakes dont work nearly as well as they should...and the gears slip and basically i thought i might die the whole time i was riding.

i hate mountain bikes too. they are not designed for skirts =p

the next morning we got up, studied a little, and headed to the train station so we could switch back. but we missed our train so we had to take the express train in order to get back in time cuz the kofu sisters had interviews at noon. the express train was pretty nice but it ate up all my moneys. bah. oh well.

i played the game that me and tara played when we took the shinkansen to kyoto. the one where we take pictures out the window of the train and see who can get the clearest picture. well, with my advanced knowledge of cameras i was able to stop even the closest thing to the train at ISO 1600 hehe. powell shimai listened patiently as i explained why that was. i am such a nerd.

anyhow, i have lots of pretty pictures which i will send home. which reminds me...i bought stuffs for aubrey and brianna...but shipping will be like 50 dollars. i didnt account for that. plus i have to send brittan and natalees birthday gifts...and i need to keep 100 dollars with me for emergency funds... just a heads up on the moneys i will need.

i am hoping i can get darner choro to take my packages with him to fussa and mail them from the base and then it will only be shipping from san francisco....but the odds of me convincing him of that are probably not in my favor.

on tuesday night, after i got home from kofu, we went to the uchimuras house for dinner. we taught the girls about the atonement. there are 3 girls and they are all way fun. they loooove kingdome hearts and naruto. yuuki is the oldest and most talkative, the two younger ones are very shy. ai, the middle girl, is reaaaaaaaally shy.

mcmurtrey shimai says that when i was sharing my experience with the Atonement and social anxiety, Ai was really listening intently. I wouldnt know cuz as if to prove my point, i was fighting the urge to look at the floor when i talked. haha!

anyhow, after dinner, ai chan showed us her drawings. she is really good! but she wont let you tell her that. it embarasses her! she gave me one of the drawings though!

they are such a fun and cute family. I cant wait til i see them again! they are all going to girls camp today. oooooooooooh. japanese girls camp. i hear it sucks cuz its so humid haha.

anyhow, that is about all the exciting news for the week. its not so funny...but its new! its nice not to have to grasp at and expound on random events to make an interesting letter haha!

i am so happy everyone is getting their patriarchal blessings! and that yosemite was good! I talked to how choro about that and he said he has made the half dome hike twice and is jealous of dad being able to do it right now haha.

and the post cards will get here. darner choro saw them in the honbu yesterday when he was there. why he didnt just pick them up for me i dont know...

love,
jessica

It's HOT! And the roach war continues...

2008-07-30T22:02:00.000-07:00

Dear family,

i hope you are enjoying yosemite. i think that is where you are now.

it is really really hot here. its not so humid today...which is good.

it was another one of those `just make it to p-day` weeks. we dendo from ice cream place to ice cream place or from convient store to convenient store. one of the recent converts we have been meeting with suggested we dendo in department stores. my answer was `if only` =p

so lets see... what happened this week? I got eaten by mosquitos, kept up the apartment vigil (so far so good), and nearly ate myself into a coma. that pretty much sums up the day. all our appointments flaked on us and didnt show. oh wait...one showed up... i lied.

all in all it was a pretty good week. thursday was the height of the cockraoch war and i must say we came out on top. i have a video of the final kill...though as usual, its not as cool as it seemed at the time. i missed all the times were were tearing our apartment apart chasing the suckers this way and that. just imagine two sisters missionaries, gross and sweaty and tired from being out all day, frantically trying to kill a roach and so moving every shelf, table, etc away from the wall as it runs behind and underneath things. all this is done while screaming and you get the idea.

well, thursday night the kofu sisters came to stay and when we got home a stupid roach detekita`d (came out) and skittered accross the floor right over my foot. KIMOCHI WARUI!!!! (gross)

so we fought to kill it but it vanished behind the fridge! bummer!

so the kofu sisters arrive and we are doing our best to keep things under control. just before bed, i was telling hardle shimai the sad tale of our fight and how it got away. it was the big one that got away... roach hunting is like fishing...huh who knew.

anyhow, all of a sudden she screams and shes like `ITS BEHIND YOU!!!`

I think `that is NOT funny...this is SERIOUS!` but i turn around and its RIGHT THERE ON THE WALL!!!!

suddenly 4 sisters are screaming and running everywhere. powell shimai is running around saying `i cant see! i took my contacts out!` so i lent her my glasses, and then I couldnt see. we are all running into eachother cuz the apartment is so semai (narrow) and we are probably irking the neighbors as we pound the walls with anything we can find.

finally, it falls off the wall and...GOES BACK UNDER THE FRIDGE!

we decide to close the kitchen off and go to sleep so we turn out the lights and we are all praying and all of a sudden hardle shimai screams, I HEARD IT! ITS HERE!!! I HEARD IT!!!`

prayers forgotte, we all spring once more into action...this time a little more unified. hardle shimai and her supersonic hearing keep track of the bug, i flip on the light, mcmurtrey shimai grabs a phonebook, and powell shimai...still cant see.

hardle shimai shouts directions at mcmurtrey shimai who proceeds to swing at the devilish creature with the phone book. one hit and it runs under the dresser. of course, pride cometh before the fall and it detekita`s into the wide open where mcmurtrey shimai hits it and nails it. its stunned but begins moving again. 2 or three more hits and its down for the count! before it can revive itself we gather it in tissues and flush it down the toilet.

YAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

we havent seen one since. we killed one outside the apartment and i put its carcass on a stick as a warning to other bugs.

we are still on the look out though.

anyhow, back to mission life. Zone conference was the next day. it was pretty much amazing as it always is. that is just how zone conference works. as we were leaving we ran into president hill. ok...we can kill roaches...but we cant look president hill in the eyes for too long. trust me. that is just hard. haha. but it did my best as he shook my hand and then he told me that i was adjusting well to the mission and that i get friskier and friskier every zone conference.

i couldnt look him in the eyes anymore without laughing...i looked at my companion with a look that said `did the mission president just say `frisky`?` We ended up laughing about that all the way to bus stop.

lets see...what else happened?

aside from nearly eating myself into a coma. not much. yesterday was nagata choros birthday so we went to lunch at tabehodai. we ate sukiyaki and between me, darner, and black choro we ate 15 trays of meat. dont ask me why i thought i needed to force myself to keep up with the elders...i dont know. *shakes head* and i didnt learn either because darner choro started talking about the ten burger challenge at mcdonalds and now i wanna try! i am so stupid.

after lunch we had about 4 hours and then we went to sizzler for nagata choros birthday because the inagaki family wanted to take us there. first i ate curry and a couple of plates of fruit then my steak came. (medium rare of course) so I HAD to finish that. then i was so hot i needed a salad and more fruit. and despite the fact that mom sent me nacho stuff, i had to make myself some nachos too. then i had to have ice cream. (this is where i wonder what is wrong with me) after ice cream i was feeling pretty sick...but howe choro kept telling me i was a baby and couldnt handle another ice cream. so...i ate another one! I dont know why...i had already out eaten Howe choro...but i did it anyhow.

now you probably think this has a terrible end...like i threw up or something...

but now. instead i just dendoed home and then proceeded to eat chocolate cake and almond roca...all the while wondering why i was eating...

this morning i was very hungry... =p i remind me of the very hungry catepillar. next thing you know i will wrap myself in a coccoon and turn into a butterfly! wont that be exciting!

in the random news, i saw a rat this week. it was outside the apartment. i wanted to keep it but my companion wouldnt let me. i dont think the white handbook would let me either...and a wild rat isnt as cute as my rats...but i dont have my rats now do i?

it jsut lives outside the apartment with the toad that scares me every night when i come home cuz he blends into the wall. *shrug*

thank you for the packages and the letters and pictures. are more pics coming? you mentioned more than were in the letter.

i laughed so hard when you started talking about peepin bayds...and my comp thinks i am insane now cuz its the second time i have laughed out loud for no apparent reason. she might check me into a mental hospital soon. one of the other times i was at inokashira park and some guy was playing a didgeridoo and i thought of brittan`s dad writing one note songs on his didgeridoo at home and i just started laughing and couldnt stop and yeah....i hope they have email at the mental hospital...

oh yeah, and no, we arent teaching motoi chan anymore. she decided she didnt want to commit herself to one way of thinking...*sigh* she still comes to sports night though. so maybe some day...

the daigakus are still in exam mode so we are still waiting for when we can start meeting with the daigakuseis...

that is pretty much it. oh, and there was an earthquake last night and i actually woke up for it. kichijoji still hasnt had the huge earthquake that i know is coming. and i know its coming cuz my companion and i both pray independently for freak earthquakes and weather. our poor area... =p

well that is all for this week! love you all! have fun!

Love,
sister halliday

ps. sorry, i forgot that we have p day a day early on transfer week. it will be like that every six weeks usually.

Halliday shimai and the "Great War"

2008-07-17T02:05:00.000-07:00

dear family,

the humidity has gotten to my brain and its turned to mush. i couldn't think of a better subject.

this week was hard. it was full of nothing but white days (days when you don't have anything scheduled) and so it was all riding our bikes all over the area (which thankfully is one of the smaller areas in the Tokyo mission) and finding people. People found? zero. Seeds planted? about 5 billion or so. =p

It was so humid and hot this week that we had to make it our goal just to make it to P-day. Which we did. I think that might be our goal for the rest of the summer =p We rode by the community pool the other day and we both nearly toppled off our bikes =p

Thankfully, the little obaachans in our wards have been keeping us supplied with watermelon which we hack into every night when we come home. =p

The days are pretty empty lately because all our investigators are college students and right now they are all taking final exams...and then returning to their hometowns until the end of natsu yasumi... (they are all centered around Fukushima (not even our mission) and Nagasaki (also not even our mission -_-)

So we play the waiting and finding game. We tried to go to Koganei park yesterday but that was determined to be an Elders park as most of the people are guys playing sports. We are trying to schedule practice lessons with the members during the noonish hours of the day just to get out of the sun. Of course...its Tokyo. Who is home during the noonish hours of the day?

We have had some success with the young mothers though.

Today we went to lunch with Namazuda shimai, an obaachan in kichijoji ward. She is sooooooooooooo cute! the restaraunt we went to served coffee with lunch and she told the waitress that we couldn't drink coffee cuz we were Christian and that we were missionaries and she should listen to us if she wanted to know where she came from before she was born. It was sooooo cute and funny.

As we were leaving we were talking to the waitress and namazuda shimai came out and told her that we taught an English class so she better come =p Then she hopped out into the road to help another obaachan cross the road and then told HER to listen to the missionaries too.

Maybe they ought to start sending Japanese obaachans out on missions =p

This week, though finding was difficult, was not without its laughs. The other day I watched my companion ride head on into a bush because she was looking at a bird. The humidity must have brought the crazies out too cuz there are always old men dancing outside the train stations =p

On the downside, we are engaged in a great war at home. It began with ants and has escalated into a full scale world war. They sent in the air force last week. Every night we kill about 100 flying ants and wake up to find more dead as they entered the apartment and crossed the bug killer line.

Of course, immune to the bug killer are the insect form of the Marines... which would be COCKROACHES! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!

I HATE COCKROACHES! THEY ARE SO GROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSS!

And we don't have little ones either. NO. The church has tiny ones that run all of the place. THAT I could handle. nope. THEY ARE HUGE!!! Like the length of my index finger and big and fat and black and last night we discovered they they FLY!!! NO WHERE IS SAFE!

We killed one outside the apartment the other night (we had to step on on about 30 times before it finally died) and then last night I was about to go take a shower and I was talking to my companion when I saw him! He was sitting at eye level cleverly blending in with the paint on the door jam! He took me by surprise and I screamed and ran to the other end of the house. McMurtrey Shimai grabbed a shoe and we tried to smash him. That was when we discovered he had air force training when he flew at my FACE!!!

I cleverly dodged (thanks to my training these past 2 transfers in the ways of Dodge ball) and rammed him once again with the shoe but his exterior armor protected him again (perhaps the armed forces should study the cockroach)

When we thought we had killed him we went away to relax. We came back an hour later to dispose of the dead and he was limping away!!! WHAT IS THIS!?!? I grabbed a tissue and flushed him down the toilet.

2 killed and hopefully that is the last one. We have had 2 other sightings in the apartment previously but we hope that those two sightings were all the same cockroach. I cant sleep at night for fear that he will crawl across my face. Its is soooooooooo GROSS! and you are probably laughing at us but its not funny I tell you!!!

Well, that is really all. I am sad that you will have to put Lucy down... and I miss the other ratties. v.v And the cats

And I wouldn't worry too much about Brittan...he should be used to riding his bike =p

Til next week I shall continue protecting the apartment! And look forward to the letters and boxes. I do have another memory card to send and will send it shortly.

I am sure that Harris choro will enjoy his package...as well as Allen choro as they have been transferred to the same apartment. They are kicking it in Chiba together which I hear is the best area in the mission.

Unfortunately...I will not see them at zone taikai. Just howe choro...but i talk to him every day so its not that cool. Plus I am mad at him and all the other elders in the zone and refuse to talk to them til...I dunno. but seriously. Today they all took a zone trip to the zoo and where are the shimai? doing nothing fun! stupid elders.

`we are taking a zone trip to the zoo tomorrow so...`
`are!?! uh...are the shimai not part of the zone!?!`
`oh....uhhhhh.... wanna go to the zoo?`
`NO YOU JERKS!`

ok it wasn't that heated...but we are still not speaking to them. -_-

Ok I am really going. Promise.

Love you all!

Love,
Sister Halliday

Tani san is a new member and miracles are happening in Kichijoji

2008-07-10T12:46:00.000-07:00

dear family,

another week and another empty mailbox. i hope you are all on vacation and not just a bunch of bums. hee hee. i cant remember when you said you would be on vacation so i am giving you the benefit of the doubt.

speaking of vacations, i need pictures of yosemite because japanese people are fascinated by it and when i talk about it they always want to see pictures. i also need pictures of run of the mill american things...they are absolutely fascinated by everything. I just need pictures. all the pictures i have to show people are like one of my family, some of the temple, and a bunch of the mtc. i need pictures of aubrey doing pole vault, dad with the scouts, me and my friends, maybe a couple of brianna and the koreans (if she can choose from so many of them haha). and so on. thanks!

ok, onto the happenings of this week. this week the humidity hit really hard. i stepped out of the apartment and immediately started gasping for breath. =p it was really really humid and hot. not miserable though...i could handle it ok and i was being a missionary. how could anything have been miserable? =P

This week started off amazingly with Tani san`s baptism! actually it was amazing before that even. That morning a guy walked into the church looking for elder howe. he had talked with the elders earlier that morning but it was his first time in the church. he is from peru and way cool. but the coolest thing is that when everyone was bearing testimonies in sacrament meeting, he got up and bore his testimony of how he felt just being in the church for the first time! the elders are teaching him now. his name is carlos. keep him in your prayers!

speaking of testimonies, in sacrament meeting for suginami (that was kichijoji before) during testimony meeting i found myself on the stand bearing MY testimony fully willingly in Japanese. I must say, I only got through with help from God cuz i only stumbled once!

oh! and of course! Yasutani shimai was there!!! wheeeeeeeeeeee! (side note, there is a costco near her house in sapporo and she bought me a huge thing of almond roca! wheeeeeeeeeee!)

so then we had tani san`s baptism. Holt choro performed the ordinance after much begging. (he refused to do it at first...he was trying to be all noble and let the younger missionaries do it). He was really nervous and we didnt really know why. come to find out, that was the first time he had actually performed a baptism. haha. but he did just fine and we only had to baptize her once!

When we asked Tani san (now tani shimai) what her favorite part of the day was she said that the actual ordinance was amazing and that I bore my testimony. ^_^

later that day we went to the stevensons for dinner. there were so many people there cuz holt choro was leaving and well...the stevensons have a huge family and they love having missionaries over so they invited the whole district and the APs. It was so fun! My favorite part was that we had lots of watermelon! wheeeeeeeee!

Monday was another good day. We managed to reach our daily goal in getting 10 conversations (a conversation is when you testify and leave them with something...usually a flyer) Conversations are usually really difficult cuz a lot of people once they hear `church` run away saying `im buddhist` and sometimes the conversations we do get are pretty bimio and just said AS they are running away. haha. but all our conversations were good conversations that day.

To top it all off, the continuing saga of our trip to the local daigaku.

We have started meeting with the people that came to eikaiwa. On Monday we had 3 lessons. One didnt show, but the other two are our newest investigators! They want to hear more!

The last one we met with, Risa-chan, asked the question EVERY missionary loves to hear... `where are we before we are born?` ^__________^ She also wants to come to church!

The downside is that since they are college students, neither of them live in our area...they travel for school....but Risa lives in Tokorozawa which is in our stake and there are no sisters there so we will probably be able to continue teaching her. The first one we met with, Aya-chan, will probably have to be passed to other sisters later because she lives in Chiba (about 2 hours by train from us)

Yesterday we met with 3 other students but they all came together so its hard to tell who has interest and who doesn`t because no one wants to say anything in front of their friends. We still have hope they all will have interest. At any rate, it was a good lesson and if nothing else, WE felt the spirit =P

Today we are meeting with 3 more people all in a row from 5:00 til 8:00. I will be sooooooooo tired by the end of today! But we will have 3 new investigators! One of the girls we are meeting with today is really cute. She`s a very sensitive person. She told us she doesnt like the word `gaijin` because it separates us and we all live in Japan right now. But more than that, she told us she REALLY wants to know about the purpose of life and true happiness and then, she wants to tell other people about it!

Its a continuing miracle and it gets better every day! We are sooo excited!

That is pretty much it for the week. Wish us luck or better yet, pray for us! And in the meantime, help the missionaries out when you can! We all need the ward members badly!!!

Hope you had fun on your vacation...or if you havent gone i hope you have fun.

Love,
Sister Halliday

PS. I didnt transfer, I`m still in Kichijoji! Yatta!

Tani san is getting baptized!!

2008-07-10T12:42:00.000-07:00

dear family,

tis me again. i cant remember when you said you were going on vacation but i guess that is where you are now as there was no letter in the inbox.

this week we saw many new people from our trip to the daigaku. there are at least 7 new people coming to eikaiwa tonight that we know of and we hope there will be plenty more.

it STILL hasnt rained and i am getting impatient. i dont like the sun and i frequently wish it would go away and never come back. but its out and its shining...i think it likes to spite me.

lets see, what happened this week. we had a lot of appointments for eikaiwa interviews which was a welcome relief from the many hours upon hours of finding in the sun which refuses to go away.

in other news, i am rather turning out to be like mommy... i have taken to experimenting in the kitchen frequently (whenever i have time) which is probably not a good thing since i really have no knowledge of how ingredients interact with each other like mommy does. of course...i cant read books about it cuz its not in the missionary approved library and well...even if they were they would all be in kanji.

i have decided that kanji is just a big memorization game. when i was learning to read i remember i had a list of about 25 sight words...japanese people have a list of about...2500...or more =p

but i memorize them little by little. i can now read the word for `parking lot` which doesnt help me at all as i do not drive.

i dont know what else has happened lately that is particularly exciting. just long hours of riding my bike in the sun...which despite what my companion thinks...is NOT that hot. and its not really that humid either...but it doesnt stop her from turning on every fan in the house and turning the air conditioner down to 50 degrees farenheight. (i never could spell that word) =p

lets see...exciting things. i got in a bike accident yesterday. its really not that bad. the streets are narrow and so some guy tried to pass me and our handlebars collided. my hand now has several broken blood vessels and is a beautiful shade of black and blue and green...and is covered in princess bandaids which i frequently take the time to admire =p. but nothing is broken or sprained so life goes on. its really fun actually.

oh duh! i cant believe i forgot! Tani san had her interview last sunday for baptism and she passed! she is getting baptized this sunday! and yasutani shimai is coming! sunday is going to be soooooooo wonderful! I can hardly wait!

Today we are going shopping at a new grocery store because the store we usually go to doesnt have enough variety for me...so i told my companion my creativity is being supressed and we need to go somewhere else. i think she thinks i am weird...or is frustrated with me cuz i couldnt think of categories this morning for playing jeopardy in eikaiwa but i need to go to a new store to buy different foods... but you try thinking of random categories for jeopardy in such a broad subject as `everything` without coming up with lame topics like colors and animals. its hard! I am still thinking.

well, that is all for this week. you better be on vacation or you will be in trouble for not writing! =p

love,
sister halliday

ps. i got a letter from the primary. its now hanging on the wall by my desk...quite possibly my favorite letter i have gotten on my mission thus far. ^_^

A lot can happen in one week...Prayers and Ice Cream = Success!

2008-06-25T23:38:00.000-07:00

dear family,

what do you mean it is hard to find accomodations for 6? isnt that about the normal size of our family anyhow?

well, this is the lamest rainy season i have ever seen to abruptly change the subject. its raining today...kinda. i call it satans rain cuz its more of a mist that you dont think could get you wet but really it slowly soaks you and you dont notice til too late. anyhow, but this is the first time it has rained in like a week and a half. what the lame???

as for your question about puzzles...they are ghibli puzzles and disney puzzles of course. what else? but i intend to send them home instead of keeping them cuz i gots no time as a missionary. hee hee.

apparently my package isnt collecting food so much as its getting eaten...*cough*aubrey*cough cough*

speaking of my package... Tani san is getting baptized! She told us that she really wants the Holy Ghost and so she now has a date set for the 6th of July. She still has a way to go but she has recently shown a great deal of improvement and determination to keep the commandments. please keep her in your prayers!

that brings me to my next exciting tid bit of information...

SISTER YASUTANI SHIMAI IS COMING TO VISIT!!!

she is coming for tani san`s baptism and just to see people before she goes back to Hawaii. I`m so happy!!! ^_^

Lets see, events for this week. Well, it was tiring to say the least. we had to walk everywhere cuz i lost the key to my bike and had to wait for a new one to get ordered. but God must have realized how much we wanted to find people when he saw us walk halfway across the area just to go to a daigaku.

the first person we talked to at the daigaku was really interested in english class. in fact, she was so interested that she took us to the cafeteria to meet her friends. then she took us to the teacher`s offices to meet all the american english teachers...then she took us to her english class and introduced us to her classmates and her teacher. THEN her teacher let us explain our purpose and invite people to eikaiwa AND she gave us her business card and wants us to come back and help out in class. It was CRAZY!!!

oh yes...that reminds me. we also met another girl who was an exchange student in america. she went to prom and we kinda talked about that. we have an appointment with her in a couple weeks and she is bringing her prom pictures and so i kinda need mine. (my junior prom pictures...no one on earth is allowed to see my senior prom pics) anyhow, if someone could find those and send them? I think i gave away all the wallets but the big one is in the frame on my tv. there may be a wallet size in my old wallet too if you can find it... but that would be fantastic!

ok let`s see, what else?　crap.　I　hit　ｔｈｅ　stupid kana button and now its trying to type in hiragana.

ok fixed it. that was a waste of 5 minutes.

ok well, there isnt a whole lot else that happened this week. no rain and finding lots of people to come to eikaiwa and of course a baptismal date. There has been a drought of investigators in kichijoji lately...i think they are all up in akita listening to brittan and then telling him they are coming back to tokyo tomorrow and declining the offer to meet with us. ah summer...what fun. but good things come to those who wait so we are still working and praying and praying and working and eating ice cream but working while we do that. =p

that is about it for this week! oh... have fun trying to arrange transportation and vacations!

Love,
sister halliday

ps. i got my bike key back. i am sooooooo happy!

Halliday shimai + Pday + Japanese toy stores = $$$$

2008-06-19T22:54:00.000-07:00

dear family. first of all, i can only withdraw money in 100 dollar increments so yeah. second...my comp likes shopping..kind of...so we go every p day and i got a little crazy with the jigsaw puzzles. they are like 25 each but i couldnt help buying them. sorry. i am obsessed. i would say i wont go to the toy store today but that would be lying.

putting me in a japanese toy store is like putting a kid in a candy shop...only its putting me in a japanese toy store. hee hee

speaking of candy...i might die. PLEASE dont say you put chocolate into my package. we are on a chocolate fast to help tani san quit coffee. (so far it has only worked halfway as she didnt drink coffee last week...but bought tea instead and then went drinking...WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!)

anyhow, sweets paradise is now completely painful for me...and ironically we went twice last week. *sigh*

sorry i didnt write last week. the email place was closed. grrrrrr. so yeah. and we were out ALL day with a less active member so i had no time to write. if i had known it would be closed i would have written a letter in the morning before we went out. sorry. and i felt bad cuz it was fathers day the next sunday so i will write daddy a letter today. promise!

things in kichijoji are pretty much the same. no investigators but we have some potentials. (aside from tani and motoi). one of the potentials we met in the park. it was a mom and her 3 year old daughter. we talked to them a little and played with the little girl. we gave them our apartment phone number and then she literally handed us her contact info. email and phone and address. we didnt even ask!

that was a week ago about. then last night she called! we are going to call her back today. yaaay.

lets see, since i havent written for 2 weeks i dont know what i talked about already. oh yeah...i guess i didnt tell you about our weather...hehehe

well, one day last week i checked the weather. (if you call 177 it gives you the weather report and i am obsessed with it) and it said it would rain tons. well, it was cloudy so we took our rain suits and went out but then it cleared up and we were like `so much for that`. we went to the park and i saw clouds gathering again so i took the top half of my suit and we went contacting. well at the precise moment that we were farthest from our bikes (at inokashira park) it starts dumping. with no warning at all! because we were under the trees i was able to put my coat on but my comp didnt have anything so we ran. it was no use. we were soaked through in seconds. then the lighting and thunder came. boom crack!

i am not stupid...i know what it means when there is no time between lightning and thunder. i screamed and tried to hide under mcmurtrey shimais backpack.

we rode home quickly (praying that we would not die in a flash flood or get hit by lightning) and changed clothes...and then went out again (when it was safer) to continue working. it was hilarious really... next time i will listen to the weather report and believe it.

we had zone conference. (ps yes i did see harris at new missionary conference and he hasnt changed a bit...still shook my hand with his eyes shut and dropped it in .0005 seconds...the dork. haha) anyhow, zone conference was amazing. we talked about the Atonement so of course how could it not be good.

we had to watch a safety video on bikes cuz a sister went home last transfer with a broken jaw cuz she flipped off her bike. (she used the front brakes on a hill...) i wont lie...i enjoy safety videos. they are pleasantly cheesy.

monday was interviews. i learned something very interesting. apparently kichijoji and suginami are the hardest areas in the mission owing to the fact that they are still upset about losing the mission home when the missions combined. who knew...i thought they were very good wards...and i told the president it was a good idea to put me here then since i couldnt be jaded and say they were hard wards haha. but my poor comp is having a hard time cuz her last area was really good and this is her first time being senior... looks like we have our work cut out for us!

please make sure you all help out the missionaries in the ward! its super super super important!

oh yeah! that reminds me. a tongan family moved into kichijoji recently. the husband plays on the national rugby team here so he is gone frequently but the mom wants to feed us all the time (of course) YAY!!! I DONT HAVE TO COOK!!!

not that i ever do. i live off instant curry...heheh

that is all. oh yeah, and i got chopsticks for grandy too dont worry.

and i want to get yukata for aubrey and brianna i think...they run at about 50...let me know.

anyhow, that is it. time is almost out! thanks for everything!!!

Love,
Sister Halliday

The second apartment on the right and straight on til...10:30

2008-06-10T19:17:00.000-07:00

dear family,

yeah...i had the peter pan song stuck in my head the other day. the second star to the right one. dont ask me how, i wasnt being wamp (short for wanpaku...meaning naughty) and watching disney movies...i dont even LIKE that movie. but whatever. i changed the words to make them missionary appropriate.

speaking of missionary appropriate. sometimes when i am riding my bike, trailing after my companion my mind wanders to things that arent exactly missionary work. like `i wonder what its like to get hit by a car...johnson shimai got hit once. and mr cullen always talked about getting hit. i wanna get hit at least once so i can say i did. not hard...just so i can say i got hit by a car...`

then a car comes out of nowhere and nearly hits me and i think `JUST KIDDING!!!` and ride faster. Then i can hear God chuckle and say `that`s what i THOUGHT sister halliday. now get back to work.

that was your random tidbit for today. enjoy it. hee hee

so sometimes i have time to read all my emails and sometimes i dont. last week was a short week. this week i have an hour (now 45 minutes) anyhow, usually i just skim the emails and write like crazy and there were a lot of emails this week for whatever reason.

congratulations on the job brianna! and more importantly the patriarchal blessing! I got mine in august too! (ps...someone wanna send me another copy of my blessing...mine is missing a paragraph i noticed)

so sean and tim dropped by huh. i assume niether is even close to marriage. tell them to get a move on. they are supposed to be married before i get home and i come home in a year. (logically, being mormon, they could probably wait til the week before i come home and still meet the deadline...)

lets see. i miss my trainer! but me and mcmurtrey shimai are getting along well. we are so alike that it was hard at first because we have exactly the same strengths mostly. yasutani shimai and i were more balanced. but despite a slow start we`ve gotten going and we arent stopping.

we have been visiting members to get to know the ward better and we are focusing on getting the young women strengthened. a lot of young women go on missions in japan because people dont get married for a long time here so we take them out to work with us sometimes. its way fun!

saturday we have new missionary conference! I can see harris choro! and howe choro! not that I dont see howe choro everyday PLUS talk to him on the phone everynight. but yeah. our district is way fun.

k so we had some funny experiences this week. on tuesday we went to visit a referral from the MTC. we get to the house and there is a large sign in arabic outside. we ring the doorbell and a lady with a muslim head covering comes to the door. we are like `ok...um....`

so she invites us in and we talk to her a little. she studied at Snow college for a few years and knows a bit about mormons. She is married to an Islam priest and so has converted to Islam. She lives with her father in law...who is almost completely deaf.

They both want to read the book of mormon. So my companion starts to explain about it and she has to yell for the guy to hear her...that is interesting enough, but then he says `why are you telling me all this, i know it already. i just wanna read the book of mormon`

We were like `oooooook....here you go. enjoy`

he told us Obama said to read it? whaaaat? like the guy running for president?! what? What is going on!?! he either said obama or osama. and the day osama wants to read the book of mormon is the day the world ends i am quite sure. course...he might cause the end of the world without reading the book of mormon too.

by the way, i hear hilary is dropping out of the race? that was chotto kankenai (not relevant) but that is what i hear?

anyhow, next funny experience.

yesterday was mcmurtrey shimai`s birthday so we went to lunch as a district. we heard ALL darner choro`s funny stories about crazy people. he must pray for crazies at night cuz he has a billion stories.

anyhow, after, we went to work and we were talking to this girl when this guy pulls up on a bike and starts talking in english. we tried to ignore him but eventually i had to humor him while my companion tried to keep the girl from running away. finally, he decided to leave but he shook our hands and kissed them!

EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW! I GOT KISSED BY A CRAZY GUY!!!! EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!

I had to go wash my hands after that. EWWWWWWWWWWW!

that is pretty much it for crazy stories.

We met a lady yesterday who we gave a book of mormon to. She was nice but she didnt want to hear lessons or anything. she was about to leave and I thought about telling her simply that our message was that we are God`s children and he loves us and wants to help us. So he gave us prophets and the Book of Mormon, which contains the prophets words. but i didnt know when to say it...

she was about to leave when she stopped and asked `you are doing this because you really believe it is true?`

we told her of course and then I said what I was going to say. She took the book of mormon and said she would try to read it.

we didnt get her contact information, but i really think she will try to read. and maybe she`ll meet with missionaries later. she lives in saitama anyhow. not in our area...

speaking of saitama...

Jyo Unmi MOVED to saitama! NOT FAIR!!! I WANTED TO TEACH HER!!!!! I dont even think there are sisters IN saitama! ugh. we have to pass her to the Elders. *sigh*

Oh well, moving forward. We still call her sometimes.

That is it for this week.

Thanks for all the letters and information about what is going on! congratulations again brianna! What is Aubrey up to? is she still helping coach?

Til next week!,

Love,
Halliday shimai

ps. brianna would have a heart attack here. there are like 7 shoe stores all in a row and all with wall to wall shoes. there are so many that they dont even have them out in pairs and there is no space between them. =p

oh yeah, i need aunt sheris address cuz i have chopsticks for them.

Halliday shimai ate NATTO! Brave soul!

2008-05-28T21:29:00.000-07:00

dear everyone,
i wouldnt know if dad cant spell or that he has spiritual messages cuz i dont have time to read if i want to write...and there is sooooooooo much to write this week and no time at all.

i will start with jyo unmi. thats her name. shes...like the other koreans, keeps suspiciously dodging coming to church. sound familiar? i have a hunch i have seen this problem before in other koreans. *cough*

anyhow, she did come to the testimony meeting for dying missionaries on monday though and she said something that sounded like she said she could identify with one of the elder's testimonies. then she said something that sounded like her dad would hit her for going to other churches? i dunno... i just heard me, hit, and dad all in the same sentence. but i can't understand japanese well enough to say that that is actually what she said and my comp was up on the stand dying so she couldnt help. grrrrrrr. so thats jyo unmi.

[Once again, dying in missionary speak means leaving the mission field or ending your mission...for example, Halliday shimai is set to die on July 30, 2009]

now for motoi chan. we taught her about temples and she was absolutely fascinated with the temple magazine, so i bought her one at the temple when i went on tuesday. but she's got exams this week and can't meet! waaaah! she came to church though and stayed for all 3 hours! improvement! yaaaaaaaaay!

ok, so sunday. we went to the saito house for dinner. and brother saito dared me to eat natto...and sister saito was telling me it was ok not to eat it, but then doying choro had to say he would buy me a gatcha gatcha if i ate it...so i did.

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeew! it was so gross!!!

but really i have a feeling it was mental...like if you gave it to me and i didn't know it was natto...i might have eaten it. or maybe its cuz i didn't have enough of it to really remember the taste...just the gagging. i dunno. but anyhow, yeah.

but i really like the saito family. they are just like all of you! so fun!

monday, we went to the honbu [mission home] to kill my companion. waaaaaaaaah! i think the hardest part of it was that i was in a temporary threesome til today (tranfers) and this threesome consisted of me, nagase shimai (also a bean) [greenbean denotes a new missionary] and hardle shimai (2 transfers). we are all new!!! it was so scary not to have a companion who knew what she was doing!

but we did it. and we found tons of people. my immense knowledge of the train routes (i study them for language study...along with the maps) came in handy as an australian guy asked me something about the local train and the rapid train and blah and then he started talking about the mormons with us. he has a wonderful view of the church thus far, he says our missionaries are always so happy and well dressed and friendly. so we are doing our jobs apparently. he took a joseph smith pamphlet and had a lot of interest in the pioneers. unfortunately, he didn't want to meet with the elders but we told him when church was and everything good sisters are supposed to do. yay! we gave out another book of mormon to a lady on the train but she lives in ikebukuro (not in our area)

found lots of people but no appointments! augh!!! oh well

so still on monday, i saw brown choro at the honbu ... he is back in australia by now... he got sick and is serving in australia where he can see doctors. something about heart problems. *sigh*

still no sign of harris choro. hes directly opposite from my side of the mission.

tuesday was hard, we walked all day cuz we were in kichijoji but didn't have enough bikes. and hardle shimai is CRAZY! we had to beg her to stop for lunch and we didn't even get to stop for dinner. we ate at 10 back at the apartment.

but we found lots of people again that day so it was a good day. and we went to the temple because president hill was in a good mood and so he said we could go. we were in the same session as the dying missionaries and so i got to see yasutani shimai again and meet her family!!! wheeeeeeeeee!

last night the takasaki sisters stayed with us so they didnt have to get up at 4 to meet at the kichijoji eki [train station] at the appointed time for transfers. 5 sisters in our apartment. it was fun lemme tell ya. we played tetris with the futons. hee hee.

(PS since this is my apartment, i got to play mommy and take care of everyone and show them how to use the shower and i washed the dishes and made breakfast in the morning. it was fun!)

today i met my new comp. sister mcmurtrey from ohio. shes way nice and genki [fine, cool]. its her first time being senior comp...so we are both learning. the mission is so young now! our new district leader is howe choro and hes only in his 3rd transfer. he is co senior with nagata choro also in his 3rd transfer.

then there is holt choro...who dies this transfer. old man. hee hee.

but yeah, this will be a fun transfer! as this is howe choros home ward, the whole ward is excited. i cant wait!

thats about it. phew! just in time too! well, i love and miss you all! tell John i say hi and sorry i never wrote! im a loser. thats all. *shrug*

Love,
halliday shimai

ps. is kiana home!?! does anyone know!?!

Can I have more money?

2008-05-14T22:40:00.000-07:00

ha. ok well...yeah i kinda do need it. i went to get my hair cut today and ended up getting a straight perm so that my hair doesnt go poofy all the time as it tend to do and is very annoying. it was 150 dollars. sorry! but i got my dictionary and it was only 200...so yeah...

well...this week there isnt much to talk about since i talked to you on monday. district meeting was great and i don't feel so wanpaku [lazy] for talking for an hour and a half to you all anymore cuz darner choro talked for 3 and a half hours. between him and holt choro`s trunkiness, they make an interesting companionship. holt choro keeps asking for all my friends phone numbers (the girls) cuz he goes home in 8 weeks and he lives in arizona. what a dorkface. =p

lets see...this week has been full of finding...with few results. winter came back here too...i wore like 5 layers of clothes the last two days and it was raining a fair amount. so streeting wasn't effective...and no one was home. i concluded they were all hiding in the department stores. *shrug* i bet if i had gone in there i would have found tara. hee hee.

anyhow, we have a new investigator, jyo mei...i think her name is...shes korean. shes way cute and fun. but thats about all i can say til we meet her again later today.

thats really all the news. sorry its short and lame...

love,
sister halliday

Pterodactyls in the park

2008-05-07T22:39:00.000-07:00

well hello again all!

i still dont like japanese keyboards...but maybe by the time i get home i will be used to them.

anyhow, this week a lot happened so i will try to get it all in my email.

first off...WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT!?! A TEMPLE IN GILBERT!?!?! why was i not informed?! I heard it second hand from elder darner who was told by his mother. that is crazy! and another one in thatcher!? what happened to arizona after i left?!

ok moving on.

i myself just returned from the temple. ^_^

it was tons of fun! we are only allowed to go once per transfer and today was the day we chose. all of the shimai that i came into the field with were there so it was a grand reunion...since you know...we havent seen each other in 3 whole weeks =p

but yeah. no allen, brown, or harris choro though. i really miss harris choro. where is that kid?! i cant even remember where he was assigned. oh well. he probaby saw howe choro at his zone conference...maybe...and is probably baptizing his 6th investigator by now so he has no time for silly things like p day.

speaking of howe choro, i am in his home ward that he grew up in when he lived here. how about that. small world.

anyhow the temple was amazing. the pictures are one hundred percent photoshopped cuz there are power lines all over the place. but its still pretty and SO quiet, even though its in the middle of the city.

i have pictures to send home by the way. sorry its taken so long. i keep having to print copies out for people and gone are the days of my missionary discount at the bookstore. it costs a lot to print pictures now. *sigh*

k moving on. this week.

this week we had SO many lessons. on tuesday we had 4 lessons plus we still had to go out proselyting. lessons are far more tiring than proselyting. we committed tanii san to baptism but the date is still shaky. she is really having a problem with some of the committments but the point of committing her to baptism wasnt to get a baptism but to keep her moving forward. she wants to get baptised but always its `i will get baptized someday`.

no. that is not how it works. sorry.

she is still really struggling though so we are keeping the date on the down low and only informing the necessary authorities because she is very afraid she wont make it. so just pray for her k?

as for our lost less active...still no news. but she is progressing. she has gone from atheism to she 70 percent belives in God. we have taught her all the lessons so far and she is doing well. she prayed with us in our lesson last night and it was a very good prayer. before she was very shy and if she prayed for us at all it was like my prayers. short and sweet and often she never asked for anything. last night she asked for help with her studies...so she has much improved in pretty much every aspect.

we want her to come to the shibuya institute so she can start making friends with members her age but she still is scared. she is like me...and goodness know i wouldnt want to go to the shibuya institute even if the missionaries were with me. do you KNOW how many people are in shibuya!?! so we are trying to figure out what to do.

she hasnt been to church but we belive that she would come if she could...she has cram school every weekend. *sigh* the life of a japanese teen. they are going to die. all of them.

but long story short we have much hope for Motoi chan.

our other lessons were with new investigators. monday was interviews and that took up most of our day. we went to the park for some finding but everyone was too busy for us. the last lady we talked to was very nice and listened to us. we started (and by we i mean sister yasutani) started to introduce joseph smith and before sister yasutani started to recite the first vision, i thought to ask her if she belived prayers could be answered. (back up...she belives in god already. score!) anyhow, so i asked and she said no. then sister yasutani goes into the first vision and i notice that its completely silent. so i payed closer attention to the surroundings and noticed that sure enough, just as she finished with `kare ni kikinasai to iwareta` people started walking by again and making noise.

sister yasutani hadnt noticed any of this of course and probably neither did the lady we were talking to (satokawa san) but we were able to set another appointment to see her the next morning.

her lesson went well and we committed her to pray and read the book of mormon. once again i felt compelled to ask her about prayers and once again she said she didnt believe her prayers would be answered so we assgined her to read enos and pray. we meet again with her tomorrow.

tuesday...yeah we are back on tuesday again. after all our lessons we had about 10 minutes to proselyte before we met with a recent convert for her weekly lesson so we went out around the church and at the very last second we found a sweet girl who was willing to hear us and meet with us again for a lesson. yay!

tuesday was a good day but alas...there must be opposition in all things and we had to let one of our investigators go... Midori kawa san. the old woman who came to church on the day of zone conference. i dont know if i talked about her or not. anyhow, this was our third lesson and she kept making excuses not to take the book of mormon and its always difficult to set an appointment with her. so finally, i told her that our message came from the book of mormon and that if she couldnt commit to read it, we couldnt help her.

she said she wanted to learn from us but didnt think she could keep commitments because her mind was elsewhere.

we had to let her go and we are still sad because of it. we sometimes feel like maybe we could have kept her and maybe someday she would have taken the book of mormon but its too late now because she never would give us solid contact info so we may never see her again. but she has our number and the church meeting times so, if she is prepared and we made a mistake, the Lord will lead her back to where she can learn. thats all we can do really.

it was really hard though because she is such a sweet lady. shes 60 but full of life and energy. she always gives us cards and candies when she sees us... we really will miss her. v.v

moving on. wednesday was mostly finding. we tried a new park...the pterodactyl park. so called because the elders are always going on about a pterodactyl that lives there. they say it is dangerous and not to be trifled with but of course that always piques our curiosity. so we located the park and went yesterday. its a beautiful park and much quieter than inokashira park so the people are all very relaxed and nice.

we found the pterodactyl...which is actual some kind of goose that someone abandoned at the park about 3 years ago and now everyone that goes there takes care of it. its not dangerous at all...its cute and nice...but loud. we actually talked to the lady that takes care of it most of the time. she loves animals and owns a rabbit hotel because rabbits are her favorite animal. she is very friendly and is our newest contact! we are meeting with her early next week. elder darner tells me we are forbidden to teach her because she is the pterodactyls owner and so she must be dangerous too...but elder darner is a dork face. =p

also, i got my hand sucked on by the koi yesterday as well...which all the japanese kids though was the most fun ever. it was a very fun day yesterday. and conveniently enough there is a christian womens college near the park so we will be going back often.

that is my week. soooooo busy! now for the small things that people will probably find amusing.

i have been here for 3 weeks and have eaten curry udon 7 times. lucky for me my comp loves noodles.

sister yasutani wants to come visit arizona cuz of all the stories i have told her about our family and our house. the sheer size of our house is fascinating to her. hee hee. i also promised her that if she comes to visit we can take a road trip together cuz she likes road trips but none of her friends can ever go. i told her i am an expert at making time for road trips in my ever so busy schedule. =p

i got asked out by a japanese guy today...that was awkward. actually he sent his american friend to talk to me cuz he was apparently too shy...but in the end we got a referral for the elders so as awkward as it was, it worked out.

yes, i love my mamachari and i am so happy that i can bring it home!

today i got packed onto the train like a sardine. i was tempted to lift my feet up and hang there...but then i realized that i am too tall for that to actually work. yay rush hour!

oh yes! there was an earthquake last night. it was pretty long i am told. it was just enough to wake me up but i didnt know why i woke up until sister yasutani told me this afternoon. *points to herself* beanchan...that pretty much equals heavy sleeper =p

today i bought a pair of socks that say `i want mail please!` hee hee

and finally, the moment you have all been waiting for...phone calls!

this sunday is mothers day so you can call me! 042-252-6936 is our number. call at 6pm sunday night and it will be 10am monday morning here. (thanks brittan for figuring out the time difference and setting up an easy calling schedule for me =p i am a cheater ^_^)

mom i am sure you can figure out how to call...i dont know.

gotta go!

love,
halliday shimai

Halliday shimai can speak Japanese... but apparently can't speak English...

2008-04-30T22:36:00.000-07:00

hello everyone!

i am actually emailing on p-day/ fancy that.

i hate golden week cuz its just a week of festivals and everything is closed and that means no mail. waaaaaaah. i am melting in despair.

anyhow, this week was a good week because we had zone conference!!!so i got to see allen and brown choro! its only been 2 weeks but i miss them tons!!!

harris choro is in another zone so i didnt see him. bummer.

i saw hardle shimai and adams shimai though. they were my mtc senpai. hardle shimai and her comp slept over at our apt cuz the conference was here in kichijoji and their area is 2 and a half hours away. it was so much fun! i didnt know you had sleep overs on missions! hee hee

next tuesday is interviews too. what fun! i love interviews...dunno why. but brittan told me to always look forward to interviews so i am. i would have anyhow though. i always got mad in the mtc when i got cheated out of an interview cuz larose choro had 45 minute interviews.

anyhow, things are going pretty well here in kichijoji. yesterday was a bad day for finding...and i learned how horrible my conversational skills are in english...least i have an excuse for them to suck in japanese. but we were at the park and i saw a girl who looked not japanese so i just walked up and abruptly said `where are you from`. i didnt manage to salvage the conversation later on either cuz she was a missionary and then suddenly i really didnt know what to say. oh well. we had a good laugh about it later.

we had amazing lessons this week. no baptismal dates...but still good lessons. i wanted to set a date with tanii san but soon after the lesson started it became apparent that her faith isnt steady enough. so we committed her to read alma 7 and ponder what the saviors atonement means for her personally. if all goes well we will set a date with her next time we meet...which i think is tonight if she comes to eikaiwa...

we taught the law of chastity to rie chan on tuesday. that was really hard! but shes been keeping the word of wisdom faithfully for a while now and reading and praying and we spent time getting her to recognize how shes been blessed through that even though she didn:t know why she was doing it when she started. the law of chastity was still a big shock to her...she lives with her boyfriend so we knew it was going to be a hard lesson. but she accepted the challenge and is now working on the situation. phew!

motoi chans lesson was interesting. we got quite a big shock in that one. motoi chan is sweet and she keeps her commitments but she keeps them hesitantly. we studied ether 2 and 3 last night and talked about stretching our faith and we taught her how to pray more meaningfully. (praying with an answer in mind and then asking if its right). the concept made sense to her and so she accepted our challenge to try to make her prayers more meaningful. then we brought up baptism and she told us her mom told her she was already a member of this church. we were all three very surprised and couldnt figure out how motoi chan could have forgotten being baptized...but it is possible i guess as her mom is currently classified as a former investigator. she could be a lost less active...we have to look into it more.

but at any rate...motoi chan still doesnt see the importance of baptism so we are working on that whether shes a member or not. heh.

so that is pretty much it. and my time is up again. sorry its so short. but thats pretty much my week anyhow. lesson. i like lessons. they are quite enjoyable...much more so than housing. wah.

hope you are all doing well!!!

Love,
Sister Jessica Biscuit

Japanese keyboards...Grrrrrr!!!

2008-04-28T22:25:00.000-07:00

Dear people at home,

I forgot how much i hate Japanese keyboards. i`m not going to capitalize anything cuz i keep turning the kanji on. grrrrrrrrrrr.

k i have 30 minutes still...double grr. and its really hard to type with this keyboard cover on. germiphobes...

anyhow, so things are going well here in japan. there are a lot of people in my area which is kichijoji. i sent my mission map home so you can find it.

this is the first time i have had to do email since i got here but i sent a letter today so it'll explain.

i hope you sent pictures of emily amelia beckstead in the mail cuz i told you i cannot open attachments from my email.

gah. what to say? too much to say for not having emailed for so long.

my trainer is yasutani shimai. she's small and cute. this is her last transfer so she is leaving me soon. sad day!!!

i love kichijoji. but its so busy that riding my bike is always scary. bikes here follow no kinds of laws, they can go anywhere in any direction they please. its scary cuz i try to follow american traffic laws like riding with traffic (on the proper side of the road of course) but no one else follows those laws.

there is a very pretty park here that is our favorite place to go streeting. [missionary speak for street contacting] housing is less effective here cuz no one is home from like 9am til about 10 at night. [housing is missionary speak for door knocking]

we have 3 progressing investigators. Motoi chan is the first. she is really sweet and really shy but shes a good person. she keeps her commitments and has progressed from atheism to what she calls "half believing". I call it believing but not knowing it. so we are working on that. we are going to have her make a decision about baptism and then pray about that decision instead of just baptism in general.

Our next investigator is tanii san. she is 40 and has a friend who is mormon who lives in utah. i don't think she was a referral though, they just found her through streeting. anyhow, she wants to be pure and has seen 2 baptisms now and recognizes that the people are pure when they are baptized...but still wont get baptized. what the heck!?

We are working on developing her testimony of the atonement now.

Then there is rie chan. shes super cute and sweet too and is keeping her commitments as well. we are moving towards baptism quickly with her. next is the law of chastity...which could throw a wrench in things cuz she lives with her boyfriend.

i think that's basically it. this last p day we went to the Ghibli museum! WHEE!!! I LOVE GHIBLI!!!!!!!!! and conveniently enough the musem is 10 minutes from our apt.

I love my bike. I got a mamachari which the elders make fun of me for but its WAY better than a mountain bike. If its still alive in a year i wanna ship it home. can i? pweeeeeeeaase?!?

yeah...time flies indeed. I am coming up fast on 6 months. (my official release date is july 21 in case anyone cares) and yeah...brittan has 2 transfers left and i think kiana is coming home this transfer...or the same transfer as brittan. and natalee is trainer already! wah!

I don't wanna be trainer. i don't even wanna be senior. i can barely keep track of my bike helmet! (which i faithfully wear)

tomorrow is zone conference! I hope some of my choro tachi are in my zone! I miss them! My senpai, sister hardle is coming to sleep over at our house tonight so they don:t have to get up at 3 to make it to zone conference. (its here in kichijoji conveniently so we don:t have to get up early)

yay! sleepover! and in bed at 10:30! =p

Ok! I have to go! We have to go pick hardle shimai and her comp up at the eki. [train station]

sorry its short but such is life. I didn't think we would get in to email til next p day cuz this place is always crazy busy or closed. but here we are!

PS. mom, i need recipes cuz we have cooking class on saturdays. send them asap please! thanks!

Love,
halliday shimai

First letter from JAPAN! Halliday shimai is in Kichijoji

2008-04-24T23:06:00.000-07:00

I'm alive. I'm OK. I know that you haven't heard from me for a while. There's only 1 place here to do email and it's closed like for the next MONTH! If I'd known that was going to happen I would have waited last P day for a computer. (There are only 4 computers and it's the only approved place in the zone -_-)
So, I think that you heard from President Hill...I am here and I am safe (if you don't count the fact that riding a bike here is like driving in LA) and I have got my new trainer.
My trainer is Yasutani shimai. She is from Sapporo and speaks English very well because she spent 3 years at BYU Hawaii. Yasutani shimai is also only four and a half feet tall. :P
Unfortunately she is "dying" this transfer so I will never see my trainer again. :(
[DYING IS MISSIONARY SPEAK FOR ENDING YOUR MISSION, NOT ENDING YOUR LIFE]
I will also get the fun job of orienting my next senior companion with this area (which will be interesting because I only know 4 places here) and I will get to familiarize my comp with the investigators, PLUS, I will get to do all of the phone calls until said new companion has met all of the investigators or they will wonder who the heck is calling them! WAH!
So, my first area is Kichijoji. There are tons of people here so it is one of the smallest areas in the Mission by radius. We have two progressing investigators. We had four but one is having parental approval issues and the other one just got "lost"...she just answers the phone every now and then and we suspect that she is more interested in converting us.
So, our first investigator is Motoi chan. She is really shy but really sweet. When we first met her she did not believe in God at all but gas now progressed to the point where she says that she "half believes". Personally, I think that she believes just fine because she keeps all of the commitments that we give her...we just have to get her to recognize that she believes. We have gotten to the point where we have her thinking about baptism and she has been to church once, twice and this Sunday makes thrice.
Our second investigator is Tanii san. She has been a long progressing investigator, has been to two baptisms and recognizes how pure a person is after baptism. Tanii san wants to be like that but doesn't think she can be baptized yet. -_-
Tanii san doesn't always read the Book of Mormon, so we are still working on that issue. Right now we are focusing on developing her testimony of the Atonement. Unfortunately, as with any investigator who makes any progress at all...something has come up and she has been too busy to see us for like a week. She still answers the phone when we call though.
The investigator wit the parental issues is Erica. She is 19 but she has developmental issues. Even though she will be an adult in November, she will probably always live with her parents. Her mind is fully developed however and she understands everything. She loves everyone (especially her missionaries) and always wants to meet with us. We have taught her everything but now that baptism is part of the picture, her Mom is not happy and we have not seen her for a week now.
We have 4 new investigators, two of which show a lot of promise. We teach one of them lesson 1 today, so we will see...
Our favorite place to go finding is Inokashira Park. It's a huge park with all kinds of people (and dogs). People there aren't as busy as people on the streets, so they listen more. I have taught about 12 lessons and have talked to probably at least 100 new people so far. Two of the lessons I did on my own. In the Tokyo Mission we have to teach every principle to a member by the end of our missions. When we do it we get recognized at the next Zone Conference. It helps us and it builds relationships with the members. We have all of our mission to do it, but Yasutani shimai and I are working hard to finish before the next transfer. (Well...for me to finish..she has done it twice already)
Let's see... what else? I miss my choro tachi :(
Zone Conference is next week so maybe I will see someone. My District now is fun though. Our District Leader is Elder Doying and our Zone Leaders are Elder Holt (he was in Brittan's MTC Zone...I know this cuz I got a letter from Brittan and for some odd reason, it ended up at the Elder's Apartment, so I was heavily interrogated before I got my letter -_-) and Elder Darner who is from Mesa. (Darner Chrysler/Jeep...that Darner) I have actually met more people from Mesa here in Japan, than in the MTC. Random.
Oh! My first day here we had English class. The Elders were late so I had to teach the advanced class until they got there. Basically, I killed time with self introductions. :P
On P- Day we went to the Ghibli museum!! Wheeee!! It was so fun!! I got to see all of the pretty concept art and animation cels and animation reels. I have seen DVD extras about the extensive process of animation but seeing it first hand was insane. 30 seconds of film is like 25 feet long! They also had a room that exhibited how to make stationary objects seem like they were moving...it reminded me of my stupid high school physics project...and then I heard Brittan saying "physics is everywhere" and then I remembered he needed to die.
That's pretty much it.
Mom, we do a cooking class every other Saturday and we need yummy recipes.(fairly simple but not too much) If you could email those and send hard copies, it would be much appreciated. Plus...I have to cook for myself now. That's it! And I have to speak in Sacrament this Sunday and I have to speak in Primary on Mother's Day.

Love, Halliday shimai

Halliday Shimai is in Japan!!

2008-04-20T11:14:00.000-07:00

Well, this is a post from Mom. Jessica flew out of Salt lake on the morning of April 15, 2008 via Los Angeles to Tokyo, Japan. We probably won't hear from her for a couple of weeks until she settles in to her new area and gets accustomed to all of those things that an active missionary needs to do. We have been warned by the Mission Home that safe places to send email in Tokyo are becoming harder to find and so Halliday shimai's emails may become intermittent. I will keep you posted. In the meantime, HALLIDAY SHIMAI IS IN JAPAN!

Only ONE WEEK to go and counting!!

2008-04-08T07:52:00.000-07:00

Ok gotta make this fast..my goodness...I'll be glad to have an hour for email when I get to the field. But sometimes Brittan gets only half an hour so I dunno. I'll just be optimistic.

First off, in answer to earlier questions. Ward choro is just as concerned about Smith choro as Brown is about Allen...but he's not as cute about it. He's offered to give him like 5 blessings in the last 2 weeks. Unfortunately people from Utah (like my companion) are stubborn, doctor fearing people. So long story short...he never got a blessing and he never went to the doctor.

Well, yesterday I was sick of it so, being the shimai that I am...I went down to the health center and MADE an appointment for Smith choro and Ward choro MADE him keep it.

So he leaves at 2 and at 3 he's not back. At 4 he's not back. We take Beaufort shimai to the health center at 4:20 cuz she sprained her foot and lo and behold there is Ward choro. about an hour later we find smith and ward choro in the bookstore and Smith choro...drum roll please...

Has Pneumonia and is being delayed a week.

Serves the dork right for not listening to everyone 2 weeks ago....but I still feel bad for him. I'm not gonna lie. That REALLY sucks.

Actually at the current moment I'm fasting...is it legal to fast for like 3 different purposes cuz I am. One of them is me...I figure I'll have more time to pack if I don't eat =P

So let's see...what else? GAH! I always forget my letters so in the half hour I have with the little red clock ticking in the corner I can never remember what's going on!

That is sad that a missionary got beat up in Mesa. Gosh some people are stupid. *shakes head*

I wrote you all a letter conference weekend and have a package to mail you all. You'll probably get several packages but only one is really for you. the rest is my stuff. I have to send it in several packages because the bookstore is retarded and doesn't carry boxes...so I have to work off of what gets left laying around the Residence Hall. -_-

Seriously...

Oh, I can't believe you all slept through conference! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!?!?! That was probably the most amazing conference ever! And the entire first session was directed at YOU. Seriously...There were red letters over all the speakers heads that said "Halliday family, pay attention" ( Family says: WE DIDN'T SLEEP THROUGH THE WHOLE THING!! HONEST!!)

For me the most amazing part of conference was the sustaining of President Monson of course. When they had everyone stand in their individual capacities and they had the Elders Quorum members stand up, everyone around me stood up excitedly.

I looked around at the faces of all my elders and in that moment if I ever had a doubt the church was true it would have been gone. There was literally a light shining in the faces of each one of them and a look in their eyes that told me that they knew they were sustaining a Prophet of God and that they knew exactly why they were there on a mission. They all excitedly, but reverently raised their hands and I was soooooooo proud of them. Those were MY elders! They were adorable!

I think I know how mommies feel now =P

Then I got to stand up and I felt that same light within me and it felt like I was gonna explode! Then I got to stand WITH them and I've never been so proud in my life. I love all my elders and I've never met better young men.

Speaking of, Elder Harris wants to know why you haven't written him...he's kinda bummed =P

We got real flight plans on Friday. I leave at 5am. My flight from SLC leaves at 8:30 and I have only a 2 hour layover in LA. I have no idea how calling home works...honestly. They haven't addressed the issue yet. I know that Brittan called from San Francisco...and Natalee called from SLC...(probably cuz SF was her last stop =P) So I don't know. Is it possible to camp out by the phone? My flight from LA leaves at 11:30 (your time of course cuz daylight savings....) so I guess the earliest I'll call is 4am =P and the latest I'll call is 11:30) I'll try to get info to you as soon as I can but I don't know what's going on! Grrrr.

Speaking of flight plans, the April fool's joke went off AMAZINGLY and all the choro tachi want us dead. I'm sending the memory cards with the package. I used 2 2 gig cards cuz its all video =P Enjoy. Oh, and remember what I told you about the Canon software on the computer and the lagging video. So try to use the canon software somehow.

Wow, I'm going to Japan in exactly a week. Crazy. We have so much to do. We're doing laundry right now and then haircuts and packing. (oh boy) I'm not taking my coat...mail it to me in the field. I'm pretty tough now. It snowed yesterday and I was walking around in short sleeves. (I love the new shirts by the way! but I need white undershirts for some of them cuz they're a little see through. just white cap sleeve shirts from down east basics are fine)

Oh man, I'm so excited...but I'm really gonna miss my choro. I can't write Allen, brown, Howe, or Harris choro in the field cuz they're in my mission. I'll write everyone else though.

I was really surprised. Ward choro is really concerned about never seeing any of us again. I told him he couldn't get rid of me that easily...just ask Brittan. His face brightened up after that. It's true too...no one gets rid of me. =P

Ward choro is a really sweet kid. He just doesn't show it much...but I think of all the choro, he's the most loyal. He's awesome. Ok well...they're all awesome. I LOVE THEM ALL!!!

Well, I gotta go. time's up!

Miss you, can't wait to talk to you!!!

Love,
Biscuit shimai

FLIGHT PLANS!

2008-04-06T22:29:00.000-07:00

I GOT MY FLIGHT PLANS!
'Bout time. Seriously. I knew I'd leave the MTC but until you have flight plans there is no way out. I am sitting here listening to EFY music, wishing I could sing along...but I can't because I have laryngitis! Of all the cruel twists of fate! -_-
I got some freak chest cold or something on Tuesday night. My sinuses weren't packed up or anything but my throat was killing me and it hurt from my neck to the middle of my chest. They did a strep test but it was negative. The doctor was concerned though that it was already in my chest (my chest was kinda tight and my cough came from my chest). So he gave me some mega antibiotics and told me no gym for a week -_- and no talking for three days. Today is the first day that I am allowed to talk but I can't sing cuz my voice sucks. The sad thing? It's conference today! That means hymns and prelude hymns all day! WAH! :(
So, let's see. Obviously I got your package. Thanks for the shirts! I lub them :) And those were REALLY good gummy bears! Oh yes, and April Fool's went wonderfully. I am sending the memory cards so that you can see. Enjoy. Some of the videos are better than others.
Oh yes. I'll call the home phone but as of now, I don't know when I'll get to call home. I think they will tell us more later... but it might be the Sunday before I leave... *shrug*
We report to the travel office at 5am, our plane leaves SLC at 8:25am and we only have a 2 hour layover in LA...
Everyone going to Fukuoka, Hiroshima, Nagoya, Sendai or Sapporo is flying out the day before us and they are going through San Francisco on JAL. What do we get? DELTA! 'Scuse me while I go pout in a corner. -_-
So what else is there to talk about? Flight plans are pretty much the hot topic now. I am excited to be a solo sister for a while! My companions will be Brown and Allen choro and Harris choro by default because his comp is already gone. So, my travel companions will be those three and me. WOOT! I get to hang out with the Elders and they can't tell me to go away! Actually, they never do anyhow. Have I mentioned that I love my Elders?
Today was the coolest experience of my life. We just got back from the first session of conference and when they called the Elders Quorums to stand and sustain President Monson as the prophet, they all (literally) jumped out of their seats with smiles on their faces and their hands shot excitedly in to the air. I have never known a better group of young men in my life. I am so, so, sooooo proud of them. Conference was AMAZING of course. Fastest two hours of my life. Quite obviously the theme was family in this session, but it was so easily applied to missionary work. I learned tons. I'd tell you about it but there is honestly too much to tell.
Ok, that's really all you are going to get out of me! I need to study before the sisters meeting. (so much for partying during Priesthood session)

Halliday shimai is burning up the phone lines and getting revenge on the choro tachi

2008-04-01T07:10:00.000-07:00

WAAAAAAAAAAH! CLARISSA IS A MOMMY!!!! YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!

I am sad sugar is going to die soon...but really, I thought it had happened long ago... poor doggie. v.v

Ok so there is much to tell and much to respond to so let's see how far I get.

First off...I have like no time to write letters! All my letters to friends are short. And if her letters to Tim are really longer than mine to him then that girl won't live to come off her mission now that I think about it because she only writes me like half a page every month. GRRRR. I write like 9 every p-day and I still have to study and stuff.

So biggest news of all. Last night in the RC I made 33 calls and of those 33 at least 9 people picked up. The first one did NOT help my case at all as they kept laughing at me and thinking I was their daughter playing an april fool's joke. They were old people from Florida...now I think I see why there was such a problem with the votes in Florida back in 2000...

But oh well. Smith choro...being the bossy district leader that he is told me that I had to talk to at least 3 people or he wouldn't let me log off. Logically, I don't know how he really could have prevented me from doing so but I like him so I listen to him. *shrug*

Speaking of smith choro...the elders all found out yesterday that I'm the oldest one in the district (only by a week mind you but they never give Webb Shimai crap -_-) So they keep telling me how old I am and when they contact me during practices they ask me about Adam and Eve. Jerks -_-

They are all lucky I love them. =P

Let's see...what else. Oh yeah. Our classroom moved on Friday. We're now on the 5th floor of 18M as if that means anything to anyone. It means 5 flights of stairs 5 times a day for us...plus the 4 to our residence hall. We can actually see our residence from our classroom building.

The biggest bummer about the new classroom is that there are no windows. However, there are very large windows in the hallway and on Sunday we all gathered there for personal study to watch the snow fall. =P

Yes...it snowed on Sunday. It was quite the surprise but it was also quite enjoyable. We walked to the temple anyhow with Harris, Ward, and Sugihara choro.

Did I mention I love my elders? =P

Oh yes...Smith and Allen choro were quite sick this week. We shimai tried to get Smith choro to go to the doctor but HE WON'T LISTEN. Stupid stubborn district leader!

I think he's got bronchitis...

But he's feeling better he says and I must admit he sounds a little better. *shrug*

Allen choro got lots of sleep and sounds tons better. He's got a wonderful companion who doesn't want him to die. Apparently Brown choro kept telling him not to die all night and Brown choro is pretty adamant about telling Allen choro to go home and sleep. Allen choro is not as stubborn as Smith choro...who is right behind me now actually. Where did he come from!?

Anyhow moving on what else is going on here? Ah yes. Today is april fools day and we shimai have a trick we're going to play. We borrowed flight plans from someone in our residence hall and we're photocopying them today and we're going to put them in the mailbox. Since flight plans are supposed to come anytime this week I'm sure everyone will get excited...over the whole lot of nothing. =P

Yes...shimai are evil. ^_^

We don't do nearly as much as the elders do in their residence hall. Last night they built a fort (which I suppose is well within the rules and we could do too...but most of what the elders do usually isn't so within the rules as you can probably guess) But we shimai can have fun too!

Oh! Brittan has a baptism coming up on Saturday! They met this guy, Sato-san, Last monday, and the lessons went SO well they had him committed the following Sunday! I know this isn't Brittan's email but seeing as how I'm going to Japan in like 2 weeks its VERY exciting!

Speaking of leaving. No I haven't thought about packing. Do you think I HAVE that kind of time? There's a reason we get next p-day set aside for packing...which by the way means I won't be writing letters. But hey, in 2 weeks I'll get to call you! How cool will that be?! Are you excited? you better be. I think I'll probably call mom's phone and it could potentially be early in the morning so make sure you answer. I'll let you know more details when I can...I don't know exactly how calling home works yet.

I think that's all. All I can think of for now anyways. I'll look through my journal today and write anything I may have forgotten. I'm on page 100 in my journal already! whee!

Oh yes...and if anyone sees Dallin, tell him I say happy birthday. I know its late but what can you do when you can only write on P-day. I don't have his address anyhow and HE hasn't sent me a letter... (which is probably why I dont' have his address)

Well, that's that! I gotta go write to Clarissa now! WHEE!!! I'M SO EXCITED!!! *dances*

Oh wait...dancing isn't allowed in the MTC.

Love,
Halliday shimai

Phone calls! Halliday shimai makes phone calls! Wow, she's terrified of making phone calls...

2008-03-25T07:21:00.000-07:00

Dear Fambly,

Yes, Clarissa is almost a mommy...I think that I think about that at least once a day. I have only gotten one letter from Clarissa here though *cough cough* and it was at the beginning of my stay here so yeah.

The new shimai are doing swimmingly. We've gone from flashlights at 10:31 to complete silence from 10:15 to 10:30. Sometimes its a little sad being a shimai...you're more expected to keep the rules than the elders and you KNOW they're in their residence halls having sleep overs. (yeah...the elders dragged all their mattresses into one room the other night and had a sleep over. needless to say...they were completely useless the next day.)

K, I don't know WHAT is up with the postal service. It sucks and I don't understand it at all. I'm glad Aubrey finally got my letter cuz I got the letter on Friday that told me to send her one and I was like "I wrote one two weeks ago!!!"

And now you tell me Yoo Jin didn't get one?!? AUGH! I sent Yoo Jin one at the same time as Didi! Someone please explain that! And comfort her and tell her I still love her please.

I got a letter from Natalee this week. I think that girl only writes when she has pictures she can send. lame!

So my choro tachi absolutely love you mommy. Larose choro is silly and thinks that you are now in competition with his mom...I think what he hasn't realized is that for every package he's gotten I've gotten like 3 and they're for the district...and he never shares his. I think he's made the connection between food and popularity though.

Am I ashamed of buying my popularity? No. hee hee.

Harris choro loved the letter and I think he's planning on writing back today actually. Apparently Sullivan choro now thinks he should write because he was personified on the front of the letter. My choro tachi are weird man.

I still love Smith choro to death. But he can't be my favorite anymore because there are too many other choro tachi to choose from. Ward choro has been on the list for a while now...he's been really nice and he totally saved my butt on Sunday when Larose choro imformed me at the last minute that he never practiced his piano and didn't want to play in Sacrament.

No one in our branch can play without practicing a little...there's just no one like that here. (the Mormon moms have been neglecting their duty) Anyhow, Ward choro offered to play even though he hadn't practiced. Which reminds me...I need to inform Allen choro its his turn to play this week.

Easter here really wasn't that different. Weird huh? The janitor in our building set up an easter egg hunt for us on Saturday...but surprisingly on Sunday, none of the talks changed. I think the atonement was mentioned like once...and then once in our individual interviews with the Branch Presidency. *shakes head*

The weather however was BEAUTIFUL and we shimai went up to the temple for a walk. We ended up whining about the field not being open cuz we're tired of the gym but every time I think about it, I think of Elder VanLeishout (Brittan's old comp)... "THE FIELD WILL NOT OPEN! THEY SAY IT WILL BUT IT WON'T! IT'S A LIIIIIIIIIIE!"

So I guess flight plans actually aren't coming until next Wednesday. Grrrrr. What the lame!? Oh well. *sigh* I'm so ready to get out of here. Not that I don't love it here but I've seen the same food rotation like 6 times! ugh! (thanks for the soup by the way. it helps muchly)

I've decided I'm going to be totally lost when I get to Japan anyhow so if I went tomorrow I probably wouldn't miss the last 2 weeks here anyways =P

Oh yes, so we got a new choro in our district. Sugihara choro. He was in a threesome...and since Howe choro left early, we had a threesome in our district and Sugihara choro is leaving early so it all worked out I guess. It's definitely an adjustment having him in here though. We're all really laid back and he's pretty serious. He's really fun when he wants to be...but sometimes he just doesn't understand the things we say. Can't think of any examples right off...but he's just not as laid back. Still, we all like him and he's fluent of course so people can stop asking me questions I don't know the answer to. (seriously...why do they ask me anyhow? Ward choro is better than me)

Let's see, oh! The big news of the day.

We went to the RC last night and I made 4 phone calls! No one actually answered and Williams choro says they don't count...but they do and he can just go to the celestial kingdom.

I made one, and Smith choro wouldn't let me log off until I had done one more. So then I did one grudgingly and he wouldn't let me log off again. And again! I ended up logging off when he was distracted...since it was past time anyhow. He says I have to do eight next week. Stupid district leader.

But really I love him of course.

I love all my choro tachi! They're so amazing! We've already made plans to go houseboating on Lake Powell when we come home. It'll be weird though cuz we'll probably all keep calling each other Elder and Sister and the girls will probably claim one half of the house boat and the elders take the other. And we'll probably all wake up at 6:30 for personal study and set aside half an hour for swimming...and probably begin and end with a prayer...if we even dare go swimming...the devil might get us =P

Yeah...oh well.

Anyhow, the shimai are in a different district but our same zone. The kohai all get their own districts cuz it would throw everyone off if half your district left for Japan. And no. Perkins shimai is leaving with her group. Not ours. I think she was just confused when we talked to her.

Well, I have two minutes left so I better go!

One more thing for future reference. When you take things off the SD card, if you used the canon software from my camera, the videos won't lag. That of course depends though on if you can use the other canon camera to upload the pic cuz it won't work without a canon camera. I don't know if that one even works anymore.

Anyhow! Gotta go!

I miss you all! really really!

oh and dad. you're gonna laugh at this...but I've been wanting to go fishing for like a week now

bye!

Halliday shimai is humbled...well sort of!

2008-03-18T11:06:00.000-07:00

Dear Fambly

Lots to write and I wanna TRY to respond to your many questions mom so lets get started.

Harris Choro isn't our district leader anymore, it's Smith choro now...and I'll probably start gushing about how much I love Smith choro in a little bit here but I'll try to refrain for now.

Also, yes, our TRC lessons are in Japanese now and I'm not gonna lie...they suck. It's not as bad as Brittan made it sound...he made it sound like we'd never be able to do it. But I'm of course better at Japanese than he was anyhow so yeah. He sucks.

Anyhow, this week we began teaching lesson two in Japanese. That's a pretty intense lesson. So many new vocab words like "reikai" (spirit world) and "fukkatsu" (ressurection)

I'm sorry the weather in Arizona got cold again.

No wait...I'm not. You know WHY?

CUZ IT FLIPPING SNOWED HERE ON SUNDAY!!!!

Here I had hope MAYBE the fields were gonna open cuz I'm getting tired of the gym...and it snows. Elder VanLieshout was right...the fields will never open. (that was brittan's old comp by the way)

Speaking of Brittan's comps...Elder VanLieshout just got tranferred and Brittan's new comp is none other than Elder Stokes, who happens to be Elder Brown's best friend...or as he says "best mate" cuz he's an aussie.

But yeah....that's pretty crazy and Brittan was pretty excited about it. but this letter isn't about Brittan...it's about ME.

Harris choro reminds me of Brittan too by the way.

Moving on. Harris Choro...he would like you to write him. Because he's a dork and he's jealous of my cute and brightly colored envelopes. I say if you write him...spray the letter with febreeze or something too cuz he was also complaining that the other elders get scented letters. =P

The MTC is just as amazing as it was before and always will be. You should know that by now. My Japanese is going pretty well and my teaching is coming along.

One bad thing about starting out ahead in Japanese is that no one really cares if you improve... Everyone sings Webb Shimai's praises and then they are like "oh..and Sister Halliday...well yeah....she can speak...like always" grrrrrrrrrr. =P

Seriously, Bro Farnsworth yesterday told Smith and Ward choro how great Webb shimai is doing and then told them "And Sister Halliday can speak like always" I was like "AUGH! WHY EVEN MENTION ME!?!?!"

I'm ok actually...I don't care. I'm glad Webb shimai is improving.

Ok I can't do it anymore...I'm going to gush about Smith choro again. I do it every night when I get home. I walk in and I'm like "I LOVE SMITH CHORO!!! HE'S AMAZING!!!" ...and then everyone laughs at me. But seriously! The kid is amazing!'

He's a GREAT district leader and he takes his calling very seriously. I love how much concern he shows for EVERYONE in the district.

Teaching has been pretty hard for me and contacting even worse cuz I freeze at the door so I asked him for a blessing the other day. He gave me a hard time about my middle name at first but he gave me a blessing all the same =P

Things have been much better. It's still WAY scary to talk to people but I can do it somewhat easier.

Smith choro wrote my middle name down too and has it taped to his planner. He studies it every night during language study. haha. I'm telling you, the kid is AMAZING.

He calls me mom all the time and tries to delegate upon me the responsibility of planning activities (like what time we're going to the temple). When I do it he tells the district and then says "thanks mom" =P

He's a good kid and I'm glad he's going to Nagoya and not Tokyo so I can still write him.

So today we're fasting. It's really hard to fast on P-day I've discovered and it's only 7:45! Aiyah...

But its for a good purpose. Larose choro found out yesterday that he might not go to Japan cuz he had to have that surgery on his butt. (I mentioned it on the tape but I don't know if you could understand at all) Anyhow, he's officially off a bike for two years and as we all know...Japan kinda revolves around bikes...

He's pretty upset and says that if he can't go to Japan he's going home. We all decided yesterday to have a district fast for him so that's what we're doing. I think it'll be good for all of us because this is probably one of the most intense things we've fasted for in our lives and for me at least...its the first time I've fasted not on Sunday. (probably not the last I'm sure)

Anyhow, keep him in your prayers.

K that's really all. I have about 5 minutes for some housecleaning items...

Kaban brand ichigo milk pretzels are WAY better than Pocky and cheaper too...with more per pack. Brittan sent me some for girls/white day and they are amazing! I believe they have them at Lee Lee so try them out.

I got the books yesterday and they're so amazingly fun! My Japanese is getting better already!

I got the letters from Aubrey's primary class. I'd like to write everyone back but I might not have time. We'll see. I'm writing a general primary letter today though.

Oh...and mom...you mentioned that my bangs looked like they had been cut by a beaver...k. embarrassing story time!

So two weeks ago we're in our room on P-day and Sis Beaufort is cutting HER bangs and I decide MINE are way too long. So I decide to cut them...

Well, I cut them a little short but I was like "Not TOO bad..."

Ummm...the ELDERS asked if I got a haircut. You KNOW it's bad when the Elders notice... *shakes head*

So yeah...I learned my lesson...or maybe not. I wasn't gonna put my name on the appointment list at the hair salon and wait two weeks just for my bangs.

They've grown out and they look ok now...aside from looking like a beaver cut them apparently. Thanks mom -_-

K well that's it. Enjoy the amazing Arizona weather!!!

Love,
Sister Halliday

Halliday Shimai, Musical Peacemaker and Volleyball Demon

2008-03-11T20:35:00.000-07:00

Hello again family!

Well, I tried to write a list of what I wanted to talk about today but I left in the classroom. blah -_-

So I'm winging it again!

Let's see, first off, I'm SORRY I didn't get time to write a real letter yesterday. I wrote one for Aubrey and its going into the mail today along with a tape and my memory card so look forward to that. I hope you can make sense of the tape because I recorded it over like a period of 3 weeks. and the speed changes randomly too...sorry.

Anyhow, last p-day we went to do sealings in the temple. I've never done sealings (as any of you might know) but it was amazing! I loved every second of it. And we had the nicest old couple helping out. She couldn't kneel for too long but she held out as long as she could so that we missionaries could do as many names as we could. (we're only allowed to be children of course) We got to see a couple of husband wife sealings too. It was amaaaaaaaazing! I'm so excited for...a year and a half from now. or more. However long it takes me to get married. I thought of Clarissa and Jacob and how they're going to have a family in like....less than a month...or about a month. Anyhow it was sooooo exciting. I'm all growed up!

Tuesday night was a VERY eventful night. Since we got done with the temple early, the shimai went to dinner BEFORE choir so between choir and the devotional we had extra time and went back to our room. We returned a little bit late to the devotional and they were already singing prelude hymns.

I walked in, looking at my feet so I didn't trip down the stairs...and everyone stood up suddenly. I was like "whaaa...." So I looked up and Elder Holland was walking into the room.

He chastised us for stopping singing and we all laughed and continued.

Elder Holland is AMAZING!!! He is sooooooooooooooo funny you wouldn't even believe! He was comparing missionaries to super heroes and he was up on the stand pretending to be flying around. It was hilarious.

He gave an amazing talk about our purpose as missionaries and the purpose of Preach My Gospel. After his talk I don't see what ANY missionary would have to fear about inadequacy. But that's just me. Beaufort shimai and I were talking the other day about how so many people can get so many things out of a talk and its crazy. That's why devotional review is always so fun, because you can talk to your district about what you all got out of the talk and its all different.

Things have been quiet this week but we're getting 2 new shimai tomorrow! We're so excited! We already made their beds and wrote them notes telling them welcome and we're picking them up to take them to dinner tomorrow night too. (the cafeteria is INSANE on wednesdays)

The relations between the Korean missionaries and Japanese missionaries have been strained lately. It's some grudge that carries over from gym. The Shimai are getting really worked up over it. I feel like a hippie always telling the choro-tachi to be nice and love the Koreans.

The Korean missionaries are all VERY nice...which I'm sad to say surprised me too because they're all ball hogs in the gym and I must say I didn't like them much either =P

But we tried this week to focus on improving our relationships and now we're greeting each other in the halls in Korean and they're speaking Japanese. It's great. The Elders are all so nice. And I finally have their respect in the gym so they set the ball to me and I spike it...or attempt to. And all that good stuff. It's fantastic!

As my first act as music coordinator I devised a plan to sing Called to Serve as a zone every saturday night after closing activities. We usually do that so I went over to zone 27 (the other japanese zone) and invited them. They gladly accepted.

Well that wasn't enough for me...so behind the choro-tachi's back, I went and invited the Koreans to join us too. They weren't happy about that but luckily they didn't say anything.

Well, if it didn't affect anyone else, it affected us shimai. We couldn't stop smiling....it was hard to sing we were smiling so big. There were so many voices!!!

This week I'm mixing it up. I'm having us all sing in our mission language the first verse and then second verse in english so we're all unified. I'm also going upstairs to recruit the cambodian and laotian missionaries. We WILL have the whole building singing before I leave.

So let's see. That's all I can remember of the amazing stuff. But let me tell you...it was AMAZING!

Embarrassing stories? Well Larose choro has been wanting to meet Farnsworth Sensei for weeks now so to tease him I started telling him stuff like "Farnsworth Sensei has eyes that are so blue they can pierce your soul"

Well... Long story short...Larose choro told him and I had an appointment with farnsworth sensei last night. I was embarrassed to go. *shakes head*

Everything was daijoubu though.

Let's see what else? I'm always doing something dumb at some point or another. The other night the elders were knocking on the classroom window. I couldn't see because of the reflection on the window so I got up to look outside and apparently Harris choro had his butt in the window. That caused the choro tachi to laugh for about 10 minutes. -_-

Speaking of Harris choro. He's jealous of my brightly colored letters and wants one too. I don't think he actually expects that you would send one but if anyone is ever bored...Elder Harris likes my brightly colored envelopes. =P

Oh, and you can tell the bishop that this week it has been my goal to say thank you to every employee here. Let me tell you...the cafeteria worker who is emptying the trash can gets very surprised when you walk by and say thank you. Kinda sad actually.

I LOVE it here!!! The weather has been so nice and we're having a picnic today! Curry for everyone! (Brittan sent me some instant curry and rice so I have enough to share with my shimai!) YAAAAAAAAAY Picnics!

We're also eating dinner at the temple cafeteria cuz we're sick of the MTC food...even though its PROBABLY the same but its not packed with protien for those going to places like Africa where they'll lose weight. -_- *has gained 10 pounds officially*

The field isn't open yet but I have faith that it will open soon. And then we can play SAND volleyball! and Ultimate frisbee! And we can get our butts kicked by they Brazilians in soccer! YAY!

Well, I've got 2 minutes so I gotta wrap up! I miss you all and the aminals too! And Mesa! .....cept maybe not the temp. It's pretty nice here.

and Jacob...if you're reading this. Happy late birthday!!!

Love,
Sister Halliday

Ha Ha! Halliday Shimai is the MUSIC COORDINATOR!

2008-03-04T20:04:00.000-08:00

Hello family. It's me again. I'm sure you are not surprised. hee hee

Well this week has been CRAZY and I hope that I can remember all the stuff that happened when I have a timer counting me down in the corner there.

First off, I got a letter from TIM!!! It was so exciting! He's coming home soon he says so I don't need his address anymore...if I ever even asked for it.

Let's see...oh and mom I got your letter. Thanks for the concern but really I'm fine... When I say something makes me want to cry I don't mean literally. Well, except for the guy in the RC but that was cuz we were sad for HIM.

Speaking of the RC. Last night we talked to a guy who wanted to know what made our church different from others. Easy question right?

Yeah cept he phrased it like this, "Why mormonism?"

I was like "duhhhhhhhhh....why not?"

No, I didn't really say that but such an ambiguous question deserves an ambiguous answer. It kinda reminded me of a speaker we had at a fireside when I first got here. He was talking about how easy it was to share the Gospel and he said that often times he just asks people if they are members of the church and when they say no he asks "Why not?"

Pretty simple? Yeah... don't think I'll be going and doing that lol.

Well, yesterday Webb shimai and I had to make the long trek to the BYU health center. That's the third time we've been there and I'm seriously starting to wonder WHAT on earth the health center here CAN do if they keep sending us there!

We're getting used to seeing people without nametags now since we go there so often haha.

We get bored sitting around and waiting there so we practice our contacting on all the BYU students sitting in there. It's kind of amusing, specially since they don't speak Japanese and here we are rattling off Japanese that probably isn't even correct. =P

You're probably wondering why we go to the health center so often. It's not that big of a deal really. First it was cuz webb shimai and I had colds...then it was cuz I had a sty that was apparently "caused by stress". Yeah...no one could figure that one out cuz I'm the most laid back of everyone in my room. And then this last time I had to go pick up a perscription for a sleep aid cuz with so much Japanese being crammed into my head all day I can't sleep at night cuz it's buzzing around in there and I just lay awake ALL night making sentences.

It helps my Japanese....but not really my body haha

So anyhow I took the medicine last night and I was out. It was soooo nice to sleep through the night.

Our Senpai left this morning. We only have 3 girls in our room now. Weirdness. It's really quiet but we've already claimed the empty closets. haha.

Howe choro and Osterloh Shimai left with them because they are fluent already. So Beaufort shimai is our new companion.

She wanted to stay with her district though so she's a "solo" sister now which means that she either has to be with at least 2 elders or 1 sister at any given time. So basically the whole zone has to watch out for her. It's really fun actually.

I'm excited to have a new companion, Beaufort Shimai is so full of energy and happy all the time. She also laughs sooooo easily. It's hilarious.

Oh yeah, and Webb shimai is fine. When I got your letter mom it was a little late as letters usually are. Usually I fix problems that I write about...hmmm...about the day I write them.

We had companionship inventory and I mentioned to her what was bothering me. I know that's usually a bad idea with girls but I'm also not really that much of a girl and I tend to handle my problems more like a guy would. But anyhow, together we agreed to stop saying "hate" and it's been REALLY great.

the district helped inadvertantly as well because they decided it would be funny to be overly positive instead of negative so now when we want to say "I hate you go die" we say "I HOPE YOU GO TO THE CELESTIAL KINGDOM AND LIVE HAPPILY WITH YOUR FAMILY"

It's actually really funny. And don't worry, I don't want to tell anyone "I hate you go die" really...except when Smith choro is making faces at us while we're trying to teach. =P

Speaking of Smith choro, he's the new district leader because after 6 weeks everything gets changed around.

HE'S SOOOOOOOO good! Yesterday he was there helping Larose choro plan instead of telling him to plan from across the room. I was like "Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww! SMITH CHORO! YOU'RE SO CUTE!"

but I didn't say that cuz elders don't like being called cute =P

But really, he's doing really well. I'm so excited for him.

Speaking of rearranging leadership...with the senpai leaving they had to call new zone leaders and a new coordinating sister.

I'm not the new coordinating sister =P Which kinda made me sad cuz I wanted to see what went on in Branch council. =P

I am however, music coordinator.

WHAT THE HECK!?! I think God is sitting up there saying "Let's give Sister Halliday all the music callings possible. It'll be HILARIOUS!"

Actually music coordinator isn't that bad. I just get to pick the hymns and arrange musical numbers. This is probably what I get for proclaiming that I love singing the hymns and all that. =P

I played the piano on Sunday...so I have officially done everything in sacrament except bless and pass the sacrament...which isn't gonna happen. =P

Yeah...playing the piano... umm...the pianos here don't play themselves... IT WAS SOOOOOOOO HARD!!!! I basically screwed up like every verse. But oh well. *shrug* life goes on. I didn't freak out when I screwed up though. I was like "Yeah...well, I did the best I could and you all know how to sing apparently so if there wasn't piano for half the song you people did fine =P"

Ummm...I know you need more pics. I'll send my SD card home soon. I have to print off pics for everyone first. I'll try to do that today but p-day is usually crowded.

Anyhow, I have 2 minutes so I have to send this off. Thanks for all your letters!!!

Love,
Halliday shimai

Halliday shimai interprets Isaiah (YIKES!) and finds her path a bit thorny...

2008-02-26T20:29:00.000-08:00

Hello again!

Ok first off... I did write you a letter mommy. Unfortunately we can only write on P-day and that ends at 6...and I have choir at 5...so I only half finished it. I'm finishing it today.

I did get the package and was so happy about the curry and the soup. And the cookies! And the elders loved the gummies. Allen Choro loved the koala cookies as well...and as I threw them to him howe choro intercepted them. Allen choro said it was a good thing he did that too otherwise he might have just run over and hugged me.

Allen Choro is so cute haha. He's the kind of elder who clearly follows the old saying "the way to a man's heart is through his stomach"

He eats like 3 plates at every meal and if you give him food he loves you forever...he literally has tried to hug me on more than one occasion. (on valentines day I gave chocolate to all the elders in my district cuz that's what girls do on valentines day in Japan)

Anyhow so yeah. The package was well recieved.

Let's see what else.

Last night I talked to a guy on chat about 2nd nephi 7. I had to go through it verse by verse and help him interpret it. DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT IS!?!?!

THAT'S ISAIAH!!!

Yeah. it was hard. hard hard. But it was pretty fun. We talked for about an hour and a half. At the end of the discussion I tried to commit him to reading King Benjamin's address. He told me not to go "missionary" on him and I was like "uh....what else am I supposed to do? I'm a missionary"

Long story short though, he never directly committed to reading and I don't know if he will. He says that he took Moroni's promise and nothing happened. I wanted to cry! I wanted to talk to him face to face or something...cuz that's just not possible...you don't just not get an answer. *sigh*

Oh well, there's only so much one can do from behind a computer. But It was pretty sad.

Oh! last night on the way to the referral center, I looked at the mountains and the sun was setting and the mountains were all orangey. I was like "WAH! ALPENGLOW! WHERE'S MY CAMERA!!!" I didn't have it cuz we're technically only allowed to take pictures on p-day and sunday so I ran back to my classroom with my poor companion trying to keep up with me. I didn't run TOO fast cuz I have to stay within sight and hearing of her...but I ran as fast as I could. I grabbed my camera and got back outside and it was nearly gone! I wanted to cry while Sister Webb sat there wondering what on earth I was so worked up about.

I took a quick picture but the FLASH went off!! grrrrrr. I'm carrying my camera with me EVERYWHERE from now on. -_-

Yay for spring! I swear that everyday I'm here the days get more beautiful. Sunday was the BEST. It was cold and foggy and we got a mix of rain and snow. Sister Webb thinks I'm insane cuz she sees snow all the time but oh well. I think she needs to take the time to look around her instead of just at her feet. I think she's missing out on a lot of things. :(

Unfortunately, she's taken to using kind of an angry tone when she tells me that I'm weird which makes me think she's getting angry at me. Not that it matters so much in the long run cuz I'm happy and I'm happy to look at all the pretty weather and stuffs. But she's getting slowly more and more discouraged in class and she's taking it out on me I feel.

I'm not sure what to do at the current moment but keep smiling and hope it rubs off but she's become REALLY negative lately. The bummer thing is that I remember being that negative and everytime she says "That's disgusting" or "I HATE that" I have to mentally kick MYSELF and wonder HOW on earth ANYONE ever put up with me. -_-

Our companionship is suffering a little from it too because as she shuts down she won't listen anymore. I've been praying but I'm really not sure what to do. But Fujioka sensei is noticing it too...he mentioned it to me last week.

Despite all that, we taught together in the TRC (training resource center) last week and it was amazing! We worked together really well and we used TONS of scriptures to explain things...I think we did better at asking questions too but we still got told we needed to do that more. Anyhow, it was an amazing lesson and I talked half the time like I should have instead of freezing after the first point! I committed him to reading 2nd Nephi 2...or was it Alma 7...I don't even remember. They're both equally good. Anyhow and at the end...I got him to commit to baptism! Yay!

Granted...baptism in the TRC is NOTHING like Japan...we're teaching RM's in there....of course they'll commit. =P

Speaking of Japan. We went to the TEC (teaching evaluation center) the other day to practice contacting on Bro. Farnsworth. First off the man has the most INTENSE blue eyes ever created....when we were introducing ourselves It went somehting like this

"I'm bro farnsworth...I served in Sendai...blah blah blah"
Me: mmhmmmm.....
"So introduce yourselves"
Me: "I'm Sister Halliday...I...like...video games?" (couldn't think of much else cuz his eyes were so intense

So now I look like a loser who only likes video games. Oh well!

Farnsworth Sensei was pretty hard to practice contacting with though! He pretended to be an old japanese woman and when we started talking about God he was like
"I don't believe in the American God"

I was like "I HAVEN'T PRACTICED THIS!!! WHAT DO I DO!?!??!?!"

So basically we got the door shut in our faces...I really have to get better at teaching non christians. *sigh* =P

It was fun though. I enjoyed it lots!

Well, time is up. Get better cuz the flu is no good.

It's sunny here today...I'm pretty sad...I'm still not a huge fan of the sun. Specially when it reflects off the snow.

oh yeah! We took a zone trip to the temple on sunday! Cuz all our Senpai are leaving next week. Crazy no? I'm gonna be Senpai in a week! Then I'll be going to Japan!

I'M NOT READY!!! I WANT TO STAY IN A CONTROLLED ENVIRONMENT LONGER!!!

Ok well now I'm really done. So I'll finish up here. Tell my ratties hi! And that is sooooo cute that Bit plays catch. aw...I miss Bitty bit... v.v

Is the dog dead yet? Tell her hi for me too if she's not, and the other cats too!

Love,
Halliday Shimai

Halliday shimai writes her sister Brianna a letter...hoping she will get one back!

2008-02-24T16:54:00.000-08:00

Dear Brianna,

Thank you for your letter! It was so exciting! Well, yeah...anyhow...

I’m totally drawing a blank here on what to write...I wrote it all in the family email. I’m eating breakfast now. Exciting huh? I put your picture on the wall by my bed. Everyone keeps asking, “who’s that girl” and I’m like”...duuuuuh...what’s the Japanese word for little sister again? Oh yeah! Watashi no imoutou” and they are like “hontou?! Kirei desu ne!” (Really?! She’s pretty isn’t she?) I took a picture of my bed so you can see it later.

That is great that you want to serve a mission! You’ve got more time to save for one than I did. :P Before you serve though, I would recommend getting your Patriarchal Blessing you slacker! Unless you already have...and I missed that announcement...But seriously, you should get it. It helps more when you are young rather than when you are older.

So, let’s see here. Anything else? Every time I write a letter I draw a blank on what to say. How’s school? I heard you’re reading A Tale of Two Cities? I’m sorry. That book sucks. Don’t worry, I will be over soon and then you can get Mr. Yanez and never be sick of English again! ^_ ^

Tell Ms. Jackson that I said “Hi” and that A Tale of Two Cities is “still lame” =P

She will probably say, “Jessica didn’t even read it...” which is mostly true cuz I am lazy.

How are Yoo Jin and DiDi doing? I miss silly Asians! Now all I have are silly white boys. Not as good. Oh! I know what I can tell you! You will have to share this with the rest of the family.

Last Tuesday I got the most RANDOM letter. It was a Dear Elder.com letter from a Mieko Takahashi. She lives in Tokyo and attends the Senzokuiken ward of the Tokyo stake. She found my facebook page and found out that I was going to Tokyo and was in the MTC now...so she wrote to me! She said that she had some friends in the MTC now too. One was a sister Vivian Giang, going to Temple Square.

Now there are 2000 missionaries here and running into people happens occasionally but not very often...’specially people you don’t really know. Well that night at choir I ran into Sister Giang! It was completely insane! I hope that I get to serve in the Senzokuiken ward so that I can meet Mieko. That would be the coolest!

Well, that’s really all that I’ve got. I’m sending you a picture of my district that Elder Smith drew. It’s fun stuff. Make sure you save it cuz I wanna see it when I get home.

Thanks again for your letter,

Love Halliday shimai

MISSIONARIES LOVE LETTERS! To insure that, Halliday Shimai writes her Daddy!

2008-02-24T15:26:00.000-08:00

Dear Dad

Thanks for the letter! Whee!

I am glad you are all proud of me. Don’t worry about the RC. It’s not really all that bad. 10 minutes after the incident happened, I was laughing about it. It’s hard to get discouraged here since the spirit is so strong, there’s not much what can drive it away. (One month in Utah and she’s starting to sound...ummm. Utahn?) And there are others in my district that are having a harder time than me, so I’m really fine. Plus, I have 8 more weeks in a controlled environment. There’d be serious issues if I gave up in such a safe environment =P.

Actually, I think that teaching is harder than the RC but mostly on account of boys are dumb. =P (What is happening to her grammar?) We had to teach Elder Harris and Elder Howe the plan of salvation yesterday and it was impossible.

Elder Harris starts off: “Here’s our situation. We met at a park...at a fountain in the park... no...at a bathroom in the park...

Howe: “That sounds dirty.”

Harris: “Well bathrooms usually are...but it was a clean situation! Totally MTC appropriate”

Howe: “My wife died...it’s just me and my son.”

Harris: “I miss my mom soooooo much! *cries*

Howe: "I know son."

And, yeah, where are Webb Shimai and I in all of this? On the ground laughing. Stupid boys. I never hate them until after practice, when I realize that I’ve learned nothing. - _ -
But really, I love my Elders and we are slowly working on getting them to grow up. They really are better than they were, I promise!

Guess what? In choir we are singing Army of Helaman. The tenors get the melody cuz we are just that awesome, but besides that, we’re singing with a children’s chorus. YAY! Little kids! It’s gonna be so fun! We are doing laundry now, or rather Webb shimai is doing laundry. I don’t have laundry cuz I stick to the “if it doesn’t look dirty and doesn’t smell dirty, it’s not dirty” rule. So I only do laundry every other week. It’s freezing cold here, so sweating isn’t a problem.

Speaking of cold, I’m used to it finally. I’ve actually gone out of the room without a coat and survived! The snow has mostly melted, so that means it’ll snow again randomly in keeping with Provo weather patterns. Let’s see...anything else? I guess not. There is but I don’t write with my journal in front of me. I should but I don’t. Thanks again for the letter! Missionaries love letters! Yesiree!

Love Halliday shimai (written in Japanese)

The week in which Halliday Shimai gives a talk in Japanese, joins MTC choir as a tenor and then gets sick

2008-02-19T09:28:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

You can write emails....I will just print them up and read them later.

Anyhow, now for the news of this week. Every week we have to write a talk and random people have to give it. This week we had to write it in Japanese. Mine basically sucked...it said "baptism" at the beginning of every sentence. Of course... so did everyone else's. If we didn't have to give them at sacrament, we were gonna have to give them to the branch presidency. The branch presidency probably lived to regret that decree since all of our talks sounded the same.

Well we get to sacrament and...you guessed it. "The talks today will be given by Sister Halliday and Elder "we don't really remember his name cuz I was laughing at the irony"

So yeah. I gived a talk entirely in Japanese. It sucked basically but that's ok cuz I gave it. I'm gonna look at that talk in a year and laugh my head off cuz its so lame. =P

So I'm unlearning everything you taught me growing up. I don't feel awkward when the Elders take my trays anymore. In fact...its almost expected. Bro Tong introduced a new concept to the boys on Sunday. Standing up when sisters enter the room.

Yeah my district doesn't get it. I can stand in the doorway all I want...they'll just give me blank looks. =P

The other day I was going to sit down to lunch and Elder Young (one of the zone leaders) actually pulled my chair out for me. I almost stared at the chair like..."what am I supposed to do now?" cuz that's never happened before. Webb Shimai and I were thoroughly impressed.

Speaking of Elders being nice...there is this one Elder here who is my absolute favorite (I have a new one every week I think). This week it's Elder Kobayashi.

He's from Brazil and doesn't speak English very well. He's going to Nagoya I think. Anyhow he's learning Japanese with English on the side since everyone here speaks English. Yeah...moving on. He's half black and half Japanese and I promise you...God didn't make a more beautiful person. Seriously...

Anyways. The other day he stopped me in the cafeteria and said "promise me something. promise me you'll never take off your glasses"

IT WAS SOOOOOOOO CUTE!!!!

Probably cuz he can't really speak English...cuz if Elder Williams or something said that I'd be like "yeah duh....cuz if I did I'd be blind dorkface"

But anyhow, it was adorable. The elders probably wouldn't like me calling them adorable but they're 3 years my junior so that's what they get.

The Krispy Kreme's were a huge hit. Elder Allen was so happy to get donuts. Thanks!

Oh! Did you get my SD card? I'm worrying cuz I feel like my letters are going nowhere. Seriously. I've gotten nothing from Brittan and my letters from Natalee have been really far apart and in the first one she asked for my address so I sent it to her and the second letter she sent didn't have my new address on it anyhow. Suspicious? I think so.

Course...it is Natalee.

I did get letters from Julie and Ali and Eric and Brianna and dad and of course mom. I'll try hard to respond to everyone today. I don't have to do laundry today so that'll save time. but I do have choir.

Yeah! I'm in the MTC choir! We sang Joseph Smith's First Prayer last week and we're singing Army of Helaman this week. On Sunday's we're allowed to record us singing on our tape recorders so I'll have to do that for you.

I'm in the Tenor section. The boys all look at me funny when I sit down and the elders from my district tell me to go away =P It looks really funny when I'm this splotch of color in the midst of all the dark suit coats I must admit. =P

I LOVE SINGING though! I sing like ALL the time here. It probably drives sister Webb nuts (she somehow miraculously doesn't like church music at all) but oh well.

I got a Japanese children's songbook and I sing from it all the time.

Things are going alright here at the MTC. The only time I hate having a companion is times when it involves getting dressed or going to the bathroom because girls take FOREVER to do ANYTHING. What is wrong with them? Seriously...

I've decided that having extra time in the morning to get ready is like having a bigger purse. The bigger purse you get, the more stuff you put in it. The more time you have...the more they'll find other things to do... -_-

Oh well. I get to sit and eat teddy grahams so I can't really complain.

The RC went better this week. We talked to a Jewish Rabbi and invited him to come to church. He accepted.

I'm not on the phones right now...only chats. Every time I get up the nerve to do phones...I lose it again as soon as someone else's phone rings. It's kinda funny actually.

We did well at the TRC this week I think. At least, I didn't freeze up after the first principle. Last time I froze after God is our Loving Heavenly Father and Sis Webb had to take over.

The only thing we need to work on is transitions, going slower cuz Sis Webb rushes from point to point, and talking over each other. (which comes from Sis Webb rushing from point to point). And I need to work on getting started. lol. I always make her start. =P

Oh. funny story in the last 5 minutes.

Sis Webb and I were sick this week. I had a sinus infection and she had an ear infection which went down into her throat. Of course we got sick when the health center was closed so we had to go to the front desk and they sent us to the BYU health clinic. We walk down there (which is off mission boundaries) and its CLOSED! LAME! total waste of time

So we come back and Sis Webb is REALLY sick, so we go to the room to sleep and I insist she see a doctor but there are none and cuz of presidents day, today is the earliest they're open. I went out to see if there was anything in the vending machine to make her feel better and she went out to get a drink. We locked ourselves out of the room and I had no shoes! So we had to borrow some from some sisters down the hall and go get Sis Hardle.

We're all better now...yay. Now that the doctor is open. stupid doctor. -_-

Oh well.

Anyhow, times up!

I'll get to the paper letters after breakfast! Talk to you next week!!

Love,
Halliday Shimai

Another week and I'm still alive

2008-02-12T07:12:00.000-08:00

Hello family!

Well, I only have 29 minutes now so I haven't read your many emails. I'll pri nt them out after this and read them and hopefully respond via real mail...cuz everyone loves real mail! Cept that would cause mom to go to the mailbox and see all the crap in there. bummer.

So let's see, this week was somewhat less eventful than last week, oweing to the lack of a fire. =P

The food here is still good and I am not sick of ambrosia salad yet. The only thing is that the spaghetti is gross, but that's it.

Let's see. I haven't gotten much mail still, the elders get more mail than me. WHAT THE CRAP!?!?! Explain this to me please?

I got a letter from Eric yesterday though. That was pretty happy. I only got letter number 2 though and he says he sent number 1 at the same time. Weird. Maybe I'll get it today.

So that's enough about mail I don't get. Oh wait. I got your letter mom! The picture of the slug made me laugh. I'm sorry you have crap to write on at home. I took all my cute stuff. Not that I've used it...I still need Aunt Shareen's address so that I can thank her for that binder. It's amazing! And all my roomates are jealous of it.

I also got the package and the elders and my roommates all love me now. I gave all the koala cookies to the elders...but I ran out and Allen choro didn't get any. v.v

Thanks for the tape recorder and the scrubby thing. I'll use it as soon as I find time to take a shower....you have no idea how hard that is. I'm living on the idea of body spray and deoderant...and then if my hair starts to look gross then I take a shower. Otherwise I just don't have the time.

Let's see, So the events of this past week. We had our first TRC visit. That's when we get to teach the lesson to an "investigator"....who is usually a BYU student who's volunteering. That went....badly. I totally froze after "our heavenly father loves us" (and if you look at chapter 3 in PMG that's the FIRST section) and Webb Shimai talked for the whole lesson. Blah. We totally had that lesson down too!

We have TRC again this week...hopefully it will go better.

The japanese went well....we had to introduce ourselves and our purpose to someone in a park. It wasn't too hard but my companion froze on that part.... do we need to work on some things? I say yes.

So after the TRC I was pretty upset but I got over it quickly. It's only my first week...er second. or whatever.

Last P-day we went to the temple. YAY TEMPLE! The provo temple is a lot prettier inside than out. =P

We had a devotional on the life of President Hinckley that night too...It was amazing. Then we all sang "we thank thee o God for a prophet" It was really really powerful. I couldn't sing cuz I was crying.

Let's see whatelse...I should have really organized my thoughts before I wrote this cuz that timer in the corner is making me tense and scattering my thoughts.

I'm sending an SD card home today so you can see pictures and movies of my crazy district. I love them all. Smith Choro is hilarious and brightens my day. He always goes out of his way to say hi to us shimai...which is cool cuz its hard for us to assimilate into the group. All the guys room together and the girls well...we don't. So we often get left behind. I'm always yelling at them "HEY! DISTRICT MEANS FAMILY AND FAMILY MEANS NO ONE GETS LEFT BEHIND....SO GET BACK HERE!!!"

On sunday we had someone from the primary general presidency come speak to us. It was a really fun relief society cuz we sang primary songs the whole time. The lesson was about children and how we can teach the gospel through them. It made me really miss the primary but I already told the Primary that I think...assuming Bishop read my postcard to them.

I love singing hymns and children's songs. It's so much fun to be in the gym with all the missionaries singing as loud as I can.

So, did you all get to hear the letter I send Bishop? I hope you all enjoyed it. (the letters I've yet to read are probably talking about that so I'll not talk about it further here)

So Aubrey has a calling in primary. You are soooooooooo lucky Aubrey. You are going to LOVE it. The kids are such a blessing to the ward you guys don't even know. (trust me...it's been 3 weeks since I've seen a small child)

But seriously...When we're told we should become as little children just look at the primary kids and you'll know exactly why. There is no faith like the faith of a child.

Which faith I seem to be lacking. Heh...*looks away* Hey look! A bird!

Yeah...so we went to the RC last night and we're on chats which isn't so bad...cept Ward choro got some crazy nut who was trying to tell him that God's body is imperfect because his legs bend the same way as ours and physics proves that's not the most efficient way to bend...I dunno. Our chat...people...were pretty easy. We had a Catholic who felt kinda empty in his religion and so was asking how we knew ours was true. Webb shimai and I were like "YAY! We can answer this question!"

But we're also on inbound calls...and the minute my phone rang I FREAKED. Like I didn't even answer it...I just started crying and my face was completely white and I was breathing really hard. Webb Shimai didn't know what to do cuz she was on a call too and here I was like...dying. So I tried to get the teacher's attention but I missed the call. He was really nice about it and took me off calls entirely...but my whole district saw. =/

They haven't said anything yet...and I actually started joking about it back in the classroom so people didn't worry too much. But yeah...basically it was pretty bad. I said a verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry long prayer last night lemme tell ya..

Ok well times up and I have to print out my emails so I can respond to you so I love you all and say hi to Yoo jin and didi for me! I miss them!!! Give them a hug for me!!!

Love,
Halliday Shimai

Greetings from the MTC!

2008-02-05T06:55:00.000-08:00

Dear family,

it's me! ummm....I can't remember what I was gonna say cuz there's a little red clock counting me down. grrrrrrrr.

let's start with the food shall we?

I actually like the food here. It's really good! And surprisingly I haven't needed the enzymes! wheee! could be cuz I eat spinach at like every meal...don't tell anyone though. And I eat that wonderful ambrosia salad at EVERY meal. MMMMMMMMMMMM

k that's the food. moving on. There are 6 girls in our residence. 2 senpai (girls that have already been here 6 weeks) and 4 kohai (the new girls) I'm companions with Webb shimai (japanese for sister). She's really nice and we get along great. Even when I lose stuff...which is only HALF my fault because the MTC doesn't account for girls not having pockets and they don't let us carry our bags around. dumb? I think so. So I think I've lost about eveything including my blue card, which I mailed last week. It's probably in Sendai now if you guys haven't gotten it.

Let's see, what else? ummm.... oh yeah. recently I've lost my debit card. AUGH! so frustrating! I think this is God trying me since I'm not struggling with the Japanese like everyone else. Anyhow so mom, if you could kindly cancel that for me and send me a new one ASAP that would be WONDERFUL. thanks!

My district is awesome. We all have a lot of fun together...but study time is still a little bit rough as we're still getting used to disciplining ourselves.

Webb shimai and I went to the temple last week and it snowed on us. A lot. And the wind was blowing and I was crying about how cold it was cuz it was. My companion is just fooled by Satan's trickery and doesn't think it's cold. (She's from Layton)

I've got some pictures which brings me to my next item of business. I need new SD cards. Are those coming? I'm not out yet but I will be soon.

I would also like someone to print out my lightining picture that I took. It's on my Hard drive in my pictures>jessica>lightning I believe. No one here knows what a monsoon is. They keep getting typhoon and monsoon mixed up. And my companion is under the mistaken impression that Utah gets monsoons. Kinda like they're gonna get a huge earthquake soon right?

Anyhow also, there are some extra new years cards in my room in the folder in the top shelf of my desk. if you could cut one out and send it to me. I wanna stick it up on the wall in my residence.

speaking of residences...you ready for the excitement?

On sunday night we went to bed at 10:30 like always. At 11 the fire alarms went off. My companion and I ran into the hall and saw smoke so she ran off while I ran into the room to tell the other girls who either (miraculously) slept through it, or were taking their sweet time about things. anyhow, I was the last one out and I lost my companion...and not having my glasses I was also blind. It was really scary...but I found Adams shimai (my senpai) and grabbed her backpack. We all found everyone else in the gym so I was with my companion again thank goodness.

The gym was full of worried sisters. And sisters who decided since they were in the gym they may as well play basketball....

The tongan sisters were in a corner singing. Which was really calming and beautiful.

Long story short it ended up only being a bag of burned popcorn and we were allowed back in an hour later. But I'd like to know who can't cook popcorn to that extent. It was REALLY bad.

So let's see, what else. Well, gym time is a nice time to relax. We sit in class for like 10 hours a day...it gets really annoying and my butt is literally bruised from it.

anyhow, I usually do stretches, run a few laps, use the bikes, push ups, pull ups, and sit ups. I don't take part in the sports because mormons have this amazing ability to make everything a violent contact sport. Including 4 square. Brown choro got a split lip from it last gym period.

Oh yeah, Brown choro is our Aussie. He's hilarious. And he's always telling us we're weird and we speak wrong or spell things wrong. Everyone tries to mock his accent but they can't do it. He however, can pull off a perfect American accent. It's crazy.

Well, time is winding down. I've got about 10 minutes left. I'm surprised I got through so much. If there are typos its cuz I was typing so fast. But I can't think of much else.

Except that I haven't gotten any mail. You guys are all failures! Tell my friends that too. Except Nata....Sister Rowley. She sent me mail. But everyone else is a failure! take that!

Ok well I think it's time to wrap this up. Oh yeah. There is NO time to get ready in the morning here. No time between 6:30 and 7 to take a shower so I don't. I do it at night but there's not much time then either. luckily when I get up and my hair is bent it looks like I styled it. But taking showers in short is a pain cuz I don't have time to fix my hair. I think I'm just gonna have to deal with looking ugly for a year and a half. *shrug*

K that's all. I kinda miss home but not really too much. I love it here!

Love,
Halliday Shimai

PS send my lichee and kiwi gummies. Webb shimai is a deprived child and needs to try them. Thanks a bunch!

First Letter! WOOT!

2008-02-04T16:49:00.000-08:00

Dear Everyone at home,
It's 3:30 on Wednesday and I've already adjusted fairly well. The Sisters in my residence are very nice. Sister Webb is my companion, she is from Layton, Utah. Sister Osterloh and Sister Beaufort are from Sandy and Utah (?) respectively. It seems that I am the only poor soul that is not accustomed to the cold weather.

Ok, so of course it's been busy. Busy, BUSY, BUSY! But anyone could have figured that out. It's 9:15 pm now and I have about an hour to write. Minus whenever Sister Webb is ready to go take her shower. We have agreed that getting up at 6:30 am and class at 7 means... no time for showers.

Sisters Osterloh and Beaufort are both very talkative. I was unpacking with Sister Beaufort and we talked easily. Sister Webb is very nice too, but quiet. I keep trying to talk to her, but it is coming slowly. Oh well, my conversation skills were lacking anyhow. Sister Osterloh and Sister Beaufort seem as though they have known each other forever. It's amusing.

Our Senpai (Senior Sisters) in our room are Sister Adams and Sister Hardle. They are nice too and if you ask me, have the enthusiasm of cheerleaders. A lot of Sisters are like that. It is taking some getting used to. Sister Adams mom is from Hawaii!

Our Branch President is President Vancherie. I like him almost as much as Bishop Jobe so far. Brothers Smith and Tong are his Counselors. Sister Tong reminds me of Grandy. A short Asian woman who loves giving hugs and telling you that she loves you.

We got the tour of the MTC today. Oh! My mailbox is actually #202. I think your card said #204. Sister Osterloh has #204, so if you send stuff it will still get to me. Funny story... Sister Beaufort was actually called to the Hawaii Mission to speak Japanese but... her call got changed to Hiroshima 2 weeks ago. All of us Sisters are going to different missions in Japan. Sister Osterloh is going to Fukuoka and Sister Webb is going to Kobe. Poor thing, she seems so lost. She is the only girl going to Kobe in our Branch.

Most of the Elders are going to Tokyo and Sister Hardle and Sister Adams are going to Tokyo also. No one for Sendai yet. Bummer for Brittan, or I think I should call him Elder Dopp now...
Anyhow, bummer for him.

Let's see... the food isn't bad actually. We've had roast beef and mashed potatoes and jello and pineapple. I ate almost all of it, even the carrots! They have BYU Creamery ice cream every Wed and Sun. too. Yay! Ice Cream!!

Here are some numbers for you. 307 missionaries reported today and the bulk of them are going to Japan. I think that number is somewhere around 50, 8 of whom are from Brazil. Arizona provided the most missionaries aside from Utah. The Mission President says to remember that Utah was actually the 5th choice for the Church headquarters.=P

On my way through all of the stuff, before I got my room, I met an Elder going to Tokyo and a Sister from Queen Creek. It was fun and she has been the only one to sympathize with me about the freezing weather. =P It is really fun walking around and hearing so many languages being spoken. Everyone greets each other in their mission language. Mandarin is thus far the most amusing to hear.

My goodness! It is already 10:05! We were supposed to have time to write letters but our Senpai are so excited to have us here that we have been interrupted many times by visiting Districts and choruses of "Called to Serve" in Japanese. P- day is on Tuesdays and apparently Email time is at 7 am! We get 30 minutes. Look for an Email next week! Oh! I forgot, I am Senior Companion... not that it means anything, but yeah, I am. Well, it's 10:11 pm and I have prayer. As senior companion I suppose I had better say it. Then I gotta review my schedule and go to bed. Class tomorrow! I am beginning to wonder when I will have time to write in my journal. Even the missionaries run on "Mormon Standard Time" and all of our meetings have been late! Night!

Love Sister Halliday

P.S. I am already feeling the blessings of being here. Today, though I should have been petrified, I have not been. The Lord can do anything with a willing heart.
Ether 12:27 "I will make weak things become strong unto them"
I will be a talker yet!

I just got rid of one kid...yay? I MISS HER! WAH!

2008-01-31T21:05:00.000-08:00

Well, it has officially been 24 hours since Halliday Shimai went through the doors of the MTC. Sometime at approximately 6:30 am this morning she probably threw her alarm clock across the room and muttered to herself "WHAT THE HECK WAS I THINKING???"
From now on, all of her posts will be taken from the email that Halliday Shimai sends home, and will be posted here by her Mom. Hope that you enjoy her adventures and learning experiences in the MTC and in Japan! See Ya!

OOPS!!!

2008-01-29T23:04:00.000-08:00

Whoops! Me again! I report tomorrow afternoon! OH MY GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOODNESS!!!!

Anyhow, I made a mistake on my mission home address. I forgot the zip code and you kinda need that. So here's the address again.

Sister Jessica Meeauilikakaniokealii Halliday
Japan Tokyo Mission
4-25-12 Nishi Ochiai
Shinjuku-ku
Tokyo-to 161-0031
JAPAN

Anyhow...I'd like it to be known that my parents are horrible companions and keep trying to leave me alone =P

Anyhow, the trip up here to Provo was crazy long. We hit snow around Flagstaff and hit some black ice on the Rez....it gave us all quite a scare, but my daddy is a good driver and handled that pretty well. The roads were icy all the way to the I-15. And it was soooooooo cold! Around 7:30am it was -18 degrees out!

Since the roads were so icy we couldn't go more than about 40 MPH the whole way to the 15 so it was a looooooooong trip. My back STILL hurts.

We finished up my mission shopping and dropped by the BYU bookstore for a little bit. Then we went to the MTC to check the information desk just to make sure we knew what we're doing tomorrow. Which we don't. Or at least I don't. I just know I walked into the lobby and I was like "I shouldn't be here....this is a forbidden place....there's ELDERS here!"

Yeah...I should probably get over my fear of Elders now. I'm gonna have to be stuck in the MTC with them for a long time.

Let's see. It's snowing up here. It's been snowing pretty much since about 4:30. I am NOT looking forward to the trek to the temple on P-days.

Tonight we went to dinner with Clarissa and Jacob and a bunch of my family that I apparently knew when I was a baby? And my dad's old college roommate Robert and his family that live up here too. It was cool. We all talked pretty easy.

Clarissa is getting roundy! hee hee. It's cute. ^_^

Let's see...that's really all for Utah now. I'm so stuffed. We went to Olive Garden and I ate lots of salad and breadsticks.

There were lots of missionaries there eating their last meal. I bet every nice-ish restaurant is busy on Tuesdays in Provo. =P

Now I must head off to bed. Tomorrow I'll be in the MTC and my parents will be updating this for me. So long and see you in a year and a half!!!

Love,
Halliday Shimai

HELLO!

2008-01-27T23:43:00.000-08:00

It's ME! only...not me! I'm Sister Halliday now! Whee! But this is the only entry I'll be making on my own. From here on out this blog is gonna be updated by my parents. My mom is gonna post my emails here for all to take a gander at and see what I'm up to. She'll also post pictures when I send pictures home for your viewing pleasure. Oh boy!

So ummm...I guess I could write something of substance here now. I was set apart tonight at 7:30. It was pretty long cuz President Reeder likes to talk...and he likes to make other people talk too. But its ok cuz he actually has interesting things to say. He talked about Aaron and Moses. Did you know Aaron and Moses were companions? Like missionaries!?! Never thought about that.

Ok um...I'm a little giddy I thinks.

It was a pretty weird day all around. First, it was raining all day. In Arizona!!! Then sacrament was pretty empty even though my friends filled like 4 rows. It's cuz a FREAK flu hit and everyone was sick. Even the bishop! Sad day...but then he couldn't stop me from talking about video games in my talk. meheheheh.

Oh! but my grandy and my aunt came to hear me talk! That was a very happy thing indeed!

Then my open house was really hot. I had to open many windows cuz too many people were breathing all at once. not to mention kids running around. They get pretty toasty pretty fast those kids. =P

Anyhow, it was nice. I got to see a lot of the people I wanted to say bye to which is good cuz its hard to say goodbye to an entire ward. I'm gonna miss it...the ward I mean.

Anyhow so then President Reeder came over to set me apart and my phone was going off like crazy and I'm thinking "what the random!? they should know I'm getting set apart...I just kicked them out!" But we went through the setting apart and I only cried um.... k like every time someone spoke.

I don't really remember what was said though...cuz when it was over my dad checked my phone and told us that the Prophet had died...and I was too busy crying and everything kinda flew out of my head. So sorry...no details for you. Sister Cole had us sing "We thank thee o God for a Prophet" though. I was too busy crying to sing but it was nice anyhow. Even if my family can't sing...but they kept in tune I think. I was really really sad cuz President Hinckley was prophet since ever I KNEW there was a prophet. Well, knew as in understood what a prophet was.

And I was sad cuz I wanted to see conference in the MTC and see President Hinckley there. But at least he's with his wife. He missed her an awful lot. And don't worry. I love President Monson too...but he's too tall to ever be a cute little old man. *sigh*

So then I opened presents and my aunt Shareen made me the most wonderful stationary set. It's just PERFECT so I can write you all letters!

That's pretty much it. Tomorrow we leave for Utah and I get to see Clarissa and Jacob! YAAAAAY! And a bunch of strange relations I've never met. Oh joy.

That's all! I got to get to bed now. It's WAY past 10:30!!!

Love always,
Je...Halliday Shimai (that's sister halliday in Japanese)

PS. If you want to write, here's how:

MTC: (for use February 2008- April 7th 2008)

Sister Jessica M. Halliday
MTC Mailbox #202
JPN-TOK 0415
2005 N. 900 E.
Provo, UT 84604-1793

Mission Home: (for use April 7th-July 2009)

Sister Jessica Meeauilikakaniokealii Halliday
Japan Tokyo Mission
4-25-12 Nishi Ochiai
Shinjuku-ku
Tokyo-to 161-0031
JAPAN