It's Olá, not Hola

Olá!

Shop Star Brazil

I figured since this was the last week of my second transfer, I should probably write hola the way they do in Portuguese. :) Sorry for lying to all of you for the past 3 months! It was just too fun.

However, it's all good because transfer calls came today and guess what? I'm TRANSFERRING!!!!! Never saw that one coming! This Wednesday I will be going to my new area in Urayasu and I will once again be speaking Japanese! I'm excited to meet my new companion and get to work. I won't be training, but I will be in the same area as Akagi Choro (from my MTC district), Kooeyman Choro (who I knew in the MTC, he is a transfer behind me) and Tokyo Disneyland (although we aren't allowed to go there).

I have loved my time in Oizumi and I am grateful for everything I have learned. It has been an amazing experience and I have met so many amazing people. They have truly changed me and I know that I have become a better missionary because of these people. I am grateful for all they have taught me!

Now let's talk about what happened this week because it was a crazy one!

Visiting one of our investigators.
She was sick so she insisted we be protected.

First of all, I am no longer a trainee!!! I have finished my training! Isn't that crazy? I have been in the mission field 2 transfers, 12 weeks.  I learned so much and I really think that it helped me become a much better missionary.

On Tuesday, we went all the way to Tokyo for the combined Mission Conference with Elder Bednar and the Tokyo South Mission. We woke up extra early to be there 3 hours early, so we were seated right in front. It was an amazing conference! The whole 3 hours was a question and answer and we were able to learn from Elder Bednar and from each other. I had the chance to stand up and share a little thought at the end and it was so amazing. The Spirit in the room was so strong and I learned so much.

The main things that I learned were that we really need to listen to our investigators and that we need to constantly be building our faith so that we can help others build their faith. Faith is something that I have been focusing on a lot these past few weeks and I feel like as a result, my faith has gotten so much stronger. One thing that Elder Bednar taught us was to take a question we have and read the Book of Mormon with that question in mind, marking everything that answers that question. When you finish, write a page about what you learned and put it in the book. He talked about that in the MTC, so I tried it and it was a great experience. One thing he added this time was that once you did it 1 time, do it again, and see what else you notice. I really liked that and so I am going to implement it in my Book of Mormon study. I really have a testimony that the Book of Mormon answers every question we have. There are answers on every page if you are willing to look for them.

Outside the Mission Home
at the Mission Conference.

The whole conference was amazing and I was able to see a few of my Kohai, as well as Elder Handly and Sister Morris who were in my ward in BYU and are serving in the Tokyo South Mission. We had to run out of the conference to catch our train back home so I wasn't able to talk to them, but it was so nice to see them.

We got home and only had time to go visit one person before Ping Pong, so we went to visit Sayuri and the greatest miracle happened! She took our challenge to heart and prayed to know what path she should go on, if baptism was right for her. On Tuesday night, after already having an amazingly spiritual day with Elder Bednar, she just told us "Sisters! I have a desire to be baptized!" It was the greatest news ever! And she wanted to be baptized this Sunday!

Unfortunately, she wasn't able to be baptized this Sunday. Throughout the week, we worked with her to receive parental permission.  Now she has permission from both parents, and she is excited to receive baptism this Sunday. We are so excited for her! She has an amazingly strong testimony that is just so inspirational. Her testimony has grown in leaps and bounds since we started teaching her and it has been truly an honor to teach her and watch her grow.

Dinner with Camilla

This week we also had the chance to meet with a less-active named Noriko. She actually lives in Maebashi and has been meeting with the Takasaki Sisters, but she works in Ota sometimes and loves the Oizumi sisters, so she takes us out to dinner every now and then. She is so sweet and she has the cutest little boys! We had a really great time talking with her and seeing how she is. One funny story was that at the end of dinner she kept saying "We have to get dessert. We can't leave until we have dessert. You can't say you are too full for dessert." Well we couldn't really argue with that and she was very adamant about dessert. There was no way we could tell her about our sugar fast, so we just looked at the menu. It all looked so good! Oh it was so tempting, luckily they had a "healthy" dessert option and I just looked at it and was like, oh that works! It was chia seed yogurt with fruit. Yogurt and fruit were both on our OK list, so we both got it (and then Noriko decided it looked good so she got it too) and it ended up being so good. Yay for healthy, sugar fast decisions!

Saturday was an interesting day. We had so many people we needed to visit, we were afraid we wouldn't make it to all of them. We didn't need to fear though because no one was home. We had so much extra time, we decided to call PI's and we were able to find 2 new investigators! Yay!

Halloween cake from Adriana.

That night we had the Halloween Party in Kiryu. We managed to get rides for all the youth in Oizumi and we were able to go and have a really good time. There was a haunted tunnel and at first everyone was terrified of going into it, so Sister Pourre and I led the way. After that first time, all the girls went through it like 10 times and then they decided to be a part of the haunted tunnel and scare others. It was so funny to watch!

There were also piñatas and Adriana made an amazing cake. It was a really fun night, and I think it really helped the youth to bond more. Next week is the Kumagaya Halloween Party, hopefully they have fun at that too. Sadly, I won't be there :(

At the Halloween Party

As for today, it was transfer calls, so we just kind of sat and ate breakfast/studied all morning as we anxiously waited for the call. We honestly had no idea what was going to happen and it was such a shock to me that I was going to Urayasu. After I got the call, I spent the rest of study time packing. It has been crazy, and I'm sad to say goodbye to everyone, but I'm also excited to see what is next.

I have seen a lot of miracles this last transfer in Oizumi and it has been amazing. I think the sugar fast helped with that. We finished the sugar fast after church yesterday and ate a lot of sugar...so good...but I think I learned some important lessons. It wasn't the actual "not eating sugar" part of the sugar fast that helped us see miracles, it was the fact that we worked even harder because we weren't eating sugar. We promised Heavenly Father that we wouldn't eat sugar so that we could see miracles, and so we worked even harder to find and teach people that would be ready to receive baptism, and as a result we found Sayuri. Not eating sugar was so hard, but I am really proud of us. I feel like our companionship unity increased and we were really able to see some amazing miracles in OIzumi.

Oizumi will always hold a special place in my heart. It was where I was "born" and it was a place where I really grew a lot. I will miss it! Thank you Oizumi!

See you all next week, from Urayasu!

ブラクラ姉妹
Black Shimai