Half Way Done!!! July 17th 2012

Yep! On Friday my MTC experience will be half way done. That will be a BEAUTIFUL moment in my life. I can hardly wait! Everyone says the last half goes a lot faster. Man, I hope they are right. I feel like I've been here for 6 months! On Friday my companion and I have come up with a special celebration for our half way mark. I am so excited I can hardly stand it! We have turned every aspect of our day into...a song! Our life is going to be a musical. We told our Choro Tachi (Elders) that they should be prepared for the awesomeness that will happen. We haven't told them what it is yet, but they are waiting in great anticipation. I will try to send home recordings of some of the songs.

Our Tuesday night devotional was given by Robert R. Steuter. He is an emeritus 70. He talked a lot about words and their significance. And how they can help us understand the meanings of concepts. He went really deep into a lot of Latin and most of it went over my head, but he did say a quote that I like from Elder Ballard. He said, "The mission field is where the Lord will see how we do...He will examine us." I just loved that quote! It made me think about what I wanted to show the Lord. I want to show Him that I am capable and so excited to share His gospel. I want Him to know that I am truly devoted to Him.

On Thursday we were teaching one of our "investigators"/teachers. He is this 64 year old man who has a huge problem with the word of wisdom, (which is a very common problem in Japan) and when we taught it to him, his face was hilarious! I was laughing, he didn't understand why. But it was fun because we told him to dump out all of the beer he already had. He said he would drink that, and then keep the word of wisdom. We told him he couldn't and that he had to dump it out ima (or immediately). We pretended to take the alcohol and dump it down the sink. I loved it. For some reason, I felt the Spirit during that part of our lesson. I'm sure I will have crazy stories of people and their issues with the word of wisdom. I'm excited to see what they will be!

On Friday my companion and I attempted to only speak Japanese. Oh dear. I really have a LONG ways to go! We did pretty good through the whole morning (I didn't talk a whole lot), but by dinner we were sliding back into English. It's so hard to tell stories and have real conversations with just Japanese. I don't even know how to set up the sentence!

On Saturday we taught at the TRC again. It is one of my favorite times of the week. We taught 2 different RM's who had served in Japan. The 2nd guy we taught told us this crazy story about how his mom got pregnant while he was in the MTC. It was all in Japanese, and I actually understood it!  I was dying though. I thought it was so funny! But seriously mom, please don't do that. :-)

After his crazy story we were talking about revelation through the Book of Mormon, as we asked him to share an experience when he received revelation the Spirit was so strong! He was a little teary eyed, and even though I only understood about 10 words that he said, I could tell that it had deeply touched him. I realized 2 things.  1: The Spirit can testify of truth, even if you don't understand the words that are being spoken to you. And 2: Spiritual experiences can still frequently happen to those of us, who already have a testimony.

On Sunday we had a little adventure. For Relief Society we had a District President's wife (They are like the Stake Presidents of the MTC) speak to us about being lady like. She glided around the stage showing us how to walk, sit, eat and speak. It was a little over the top. I felt like I was at Princess training school. We were told the way to stand and even the way to wear make up! She told us all to wear lipstick so that when we're talking,  people will look at our mouth instead of our nose. I don't care where someone looks as long as they are listening to what I am saying. I'm not going to wear lipstick. That's not happening.

After Relief Society they handed out make up to everyone. Apparently we look pretty bad as sister missionaries....

I played a musical number with my companion and another Shimai on Sunday. I played the Flute, Sister Hansen played the cello, and Sister Belnap played the violin.

All of the Japanese (going to Japan) missionaries who got here before us left on Monday! I was so jealous! One day that will be me. I am so excited!

Well, there are the angry red letters again!

I love you all!   -Dobson Shimai

"Thanks for the Chocolate Covered Pomegrantes"

"...but they're all gone" :(