So many tears.

Well. The last pday is upon us. Just to clarify early on, no. No, I am not okay.

This past week was crazy busy. So many people were so generous and wanted to meet us for meals and such before we left so we were running around like mad women. But it was so good to get to say goodbye to so many people and spend some time with them one last time.

On Friday and Saturday we got to go help at the missions international Christmas open house and it was so fun! We got to sing and carol and talk to people about Christmas. I was happy. Real happy. I also got to see some members from Kichijoji and Hachioji so I was just grinning like a fool. But saying final goodbyes was NOT fun. Didn’t enjoy that. We were also super late for curfew because it took us much longer to get back to Yamate than we had expected. But it’s fine. We repented.

On Saturday we went back to Kichijoji to sing some more and help explain nativities to people who came. And I had seen Michiko Shimai the day before and she said she’d come back on Saturday to say final goodbyes but she thought I had left before she got to see me on Saturday so she got sooo sad. So I went and found her and she just burst into tears. My heart. I love Michiko Shimai so much. She just makes me so happy and makes me feel like I actually did do something good on my mission. I got to help her grow in the gospel and understand God and His love for her a little bit more. But saying goodbye to her was so much harder than I expected it to be. I’m not going to lie, saying goodbye to everyone here was SO much harder than saying goodbye to go on my mission.

We had the Yamate Ward Christmas party and it was way good! We had 5 eikaiwa students come and an investigator and we were like “YAAAAAS”. It was a good time. There was also a missionary who went home last Christmas but decided to come back and say hi to everyone so that was cool to see him since he was my zone leader before he went home. He’s also going to Utah State so he was like “see ya in Logan” and I was like well that’s odd and I don’t like it. Yeah. But anywho, the party was good!

Everything is coming to an end. I am not handling it well. I don’t think it’s a secret that I did NOT want to go to Japan. At all. But I am now so glad I followed God’s will for me and came. This tiny island country has a piece of my heart now and I can’t ever imagine serving anywhere but here. Everything is totally opposite of the States and our culture but it’s somehow become home. The people I have met here and the places I have been will always be special to me. I know first hand that the work in Japan can be real hard but I also know first hand that there can be so many miracles in this blessed land. I may not be a part of it as a full time missionary anymore come tomorrow evening but I know the work will move forward and the people of Japan will continue to let the gospel into their hearts and feel of His love for them.

I love you all!

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.
See ya soon.

愛しています💕
--フィッシュバーン姉妹🐟🔥

Yamate District Christmas card coming your way soon.
Also, the elders clearly don’t understand the term “funny picture”🤦🏻‍♀️

Yamate District Christmas card coming your way soon.

Yamate Ward killing it with the Christmas party group picture✌🏻 the giant white boy in the back
is the returned missionary who came back, Elder (Brother?) Spackman.

My beloved Yamauchi Shimai!! She went to the open house and I got to see her!

I can’t go home.

Why? Because the number of sister missionaries in the Tokyo South Mission is getting SOOO small and I can’t let that happen. I can’t let them close Yamate when Taylor Shimai and I go home. Nope. Sorry, fam. 

Anywho, this past week was just kind of a blur. Between getting everything ready for Ikeda Shimai to transfer and then starting the new transfer, things have been pretty busy. 

And saying goodbye to Ikeda Shimai was no fun. Just so y’all know. I miss her

Okay. Getting the “returning missionaries training” and then going back and being a normal missionary is weird and I’m not a fan. It was way good but it just feels so.. off.. they gave us “life training” and talked about sooo much good stuff and I was like “Yeah! I’m gonna do all this! In 3 weeks.. when I actually go home..” yup. President Warnick also did a training and it was super good. There were only five of us there; me, Taylor Shimai, Beck Shimai, Tanner Shimai, and Hirata Shimai. So it was super personal and way cool. After we had dinner at the mission home and ate some delicious sukiyaki. You use raw eggs. Google it. So good. Then we had a testimony meeting and everyone was crying and I just love those sisters and President and Sister Warnick and wow. Emotions. Then Taylor Shimai and got on a train around 9:15pm and got back to our apartment at 11:00pm. Let’s just say we were pooped

Fun fact: Ikeda Shimai told me I’m an egg. I’m white on the outside but yellow on the inside. I have become Nihonjin. And I am like really proud of myself but then I’m like “This was the exact thing I didn’t want to happen before coming to Japan..” conflicting emotions are going on right now. 

Have y’all seen the new #LIGHTtheWORLD video? Please watch it. Also, there’s a video and an act of service for each day up until Christmas and y’all should do that too! Taylor Shimai and I have been doing it and have even planned out how we can do something for each day and included the Elders in some of them. It’s such a cool thing to see everyone working together to #LIGHTtheWORLD this Christmas season! Let me know how you’ve done it or will do it! And post it on Facebook! Let everyone see! I mean, we celebrate Christmas because of Christ so what better way to celebrate than to try and do as He did? That’s just my two cents.

Also, I forgot to write down scriptures for today.. classic me. So please do the #LIGHTtheWORLD! And read the Book of Mormon on your own I finished it again yesterday and all I can say is that it truly is another testament of our Savior and IT IS TRUE. Please read

Well. That’s it for now, I think..

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.

Love you!

愛しています

--フィッシュバーン姉妹

Last district meeting of the transfer:(

Our cute eikaiwa students💕

Transfer day! And with that, transfer 12 has begun..😱

Only in Japan would someone find a watch in a parking lot,
put it in a bag, tape it to a vending machine, and it will still be there the next day.
This country.. it’s too safe, y’all.

Recipe for real happiness:

Ingredients: 

A handful of adorable Japanese (and half Japanese) children

A few very kind and dedicated adults

A children’s hymn book

Some very impressively memorized lines and scriptures

Makes:

The most adorable primary program you ever did see

You’re welcome. Also, sorry mom but I can’t promise I won’t be coming home with a cute Japanese child as my carry on🤷🏻‍♀️. But really, we had the Yamate ward primary program yesterday and my heart just about burst. It was the best thing ever and I was so sad that there weren’t many investigators there to feel of the pure innocence of the kids and the truthfulness of their simple testimonies. It was great. Well done, Yamate Ward Primary🏻🏻

Also on the agenda this week: Thanksgiving in America! Yay! One of my favorite holidays!! Seriously, it’s the best. Eating yummy food, watching a little bit of football, a nice nap, family, and the overwhelming feeling of “I’m never going to be able to give enough thanks for all the wonderful people and things in my life”. I LOVE THANKSGIVING. I hope everyone had a great day and and will continue to “live in thanksgiving daily” Alma 34:38. As for my Thanksgiving, it was great! We got to go down to the Yokosuka Navy base and had dinner with the Peacock family. Super nice. I was talking to the wife and she said “Oh, so you went to Davis High? You might know my sister who taught there! Do you know Amber Williams?” To which I replied, “I danced with Hailey!” What a small world. Haha she was like “I’ve probably seen you dance then!” Hahaha that’s weird. She’s probably one of like maybe 4 people in the entire country of Japan that’s seen me dance in real life haha. But they were so nice and their family is adorable. They’re moving back to the States in December and will be in Kaysville for a little bit so we’re hoping we’ll be able to see each other when we’re all there. All in all, it was great and I’m adding the Peacock family to the list of things and people I'm grateful for this year. 

On Saturday we did a district blitz and focused on Christmas. So Ikeda Shimai and I took a whiteboard, wrote “Christmas quiz” on it and did some streeting while asking people what traditions they have and if they knew the true meaning of Christmas. That was probably the most effective hour of streeting I have ever done in my mission hahaha Christmas is the best! 

Today is transfer emails so that’s a little  but I’ll probably survive. And I’ll let y’all know later what’s going on with next transfer.

As for now, here’s some scriptures! Mormon 7:3,5-6, Mormon 9:6,12-13, and Ether 3:14.

I hope y’all have a great week and can see the Lord’s hand in your daily life.

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.

Love you!

愛しています

--フィッシュバーン姉妹

Soooooo guess what. 

I started with Taylor Shimai and now we’re going to end together! Yup. Taylor Shimai will be together for our last three weeks. But that also means that they’re probably going to close the Yamate Sisters when we go home:( that’s sad but I guess it’s what the Lord needs for Yamate right now!

Just thought I’d let ya know what’s going on with transfers.

Our district blitz #lighttheworld 

Fuji San🗻

One month!?!?

Yesterday (November 19th) marked two one month marks. The first one was it had been one month since Ikeda Shimai and I became companions. Yay! The second is that I leave my beautiful Japan in one month you know the meme with (I think) Kevin Hart and he’s like “She wasn’t ready!!”? Well, that’s how I feel right now. Life is just smacking me in the face and I am not ready. But it’s okay. Because that’s just life, right?

In other news, this week started off really hard with a lot of rejection and feeling like I just wasn’t doing what I had been called to do. It was rough. But then things turned around. We have an eikaiwa student who I LOVE and she has been pretty shy about church things but has slowly (VERY slowly) opened up. About a month ago we were able to give her a Book of Mormon and then this week when we followed up on if she had been reading it she said she had! Yay!! It may take some time with her but I feel like she could really truly accept the gospel one day. We were also able to give a copy of the Book of Mormon to a cute girl we met on the street and she was super happy to take it. That was such a good moment for me. Of course I’ve done it before and it felt good but that day it was exactly what I needed to feel like I really was doing my best and even though it doesn’t always turn out exactly how we want it to, if we are patient and keep pushing on we can and will see success in one way or another. (Wow, run on sentence much? Sorry to all of my former English teachers..) 

Another cool miracle we saw this week was with our investigator that we’ve been doing half English, half gospel lessons with. After we said the opening prayer she said “I can learn English on my own but I can’t learn about church things on my own. Is it okay if we just spend the whole hour from here on out to talk about church things?” Um... YES! It was great. Seriously. It made Ikeda Shimai and I so happy but at first we were kind of like “what do we do! We weren’t prepared for this!” Because we were so shocked haha. 

Saturday was craaaazy. We met with one of Jenny Shimai’s friends daughters and just talked with her for a little bit. She has a lot of different things she believes and is still looking for exactly what it is she believes but was waaay open about talking about religion and things like that. I am not sure if we’ll be able to actually teach her but I’m praying that we may be able to spark enough interest in her to have at least one lesson to help her really feel the spirit testify of the truthfulness of this message. She’s super cool, though. I like her. After that we hurried back to the church and helped at an English speech contest that was actually sponsored by Utah Valley University. A member of our mission Presidency was like the head dude of it all so he asked us to come so the participants could practice talking to native speakers. It was pretty cool. And one girl even went up to Ikeda Shimai and asked her first about religion (because the announcers were all church members and very open about us being missionaries haha). Whaaat? So cool. Then we hurried to a members house and got to meet with her and help her come up with her own mission plan. Super busy but a super good day. 

Also, to end the week on a fabulous note, one of the American members in the ward invited us over for Thanksgiving dinner last night! Yaaaaaas! It’s just him and his mom and they don’t eat meat so they gave the missionaries all the left over turkey and you can bet I’m making turkey sandwiches for days now. And the stuffing. He gave me left over stuffing. Bless Brother Oba’s heart. But really, we’re so blessed to have great members who are so kind to us. I love them. And it just makes me want to work harder to serve them!

Scriptures! Yay! 3 Nephi 27:20, 30-31, and Mormon 2:12. Please read and enjoy and think about our Savior and His Atonement

Have a great week, everyone!!

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.

Love you!

愛しています

--フィッシュバーン姉妹

We went and met Jenny Shimai and one of her friends and there were these quilts on the wall.
So I immediately thought of grandma Dixie and then thought “mom would love this!”
So I took a picture.

Then Jenny Shimai was like “this one
is American! Stand in front of it!
Give me your iPad!” So that
picture happened.

We walked past this Christmas tree and
she was like “where’s your iPad! Go sit!”
Then Ikeda Shimai was like “this is
so embarrassing!” Because there were
toooooons of people watching us..
yeah.. but it’s cool.

A nice selfie of Ikeda Shimai and I waiting to meet new friends😊

*Shakes head*

Yesterday we went to the train station right by the Yokohama baseball stadium and as we were walking there were SO many people wearing orange and blue. I was like "what is this? Some one explain." So then we got closer to the stadium and turns out there was a football game that night! Yaaaaaas. Love me some football! So everyone was doing some nice pregaming and having fun and whatnot and I was just happy to know that while it's football season in America, it's football season in Japan as well. I even met a nice lady named Sister Stance from Hawaii who is living in Japan because her husband coaches football for a college here. Woot woot! But here comes the *shakes head* part. Ikeda Shimai asked me the difference between rugby and football and I was dumbfounded. She then later asked me if football was the one with all the pads and helmets🤦🏻‍♀️ I told her she needs to come visit me up in Logan and I'll take her to a football game to teach her the true joys in life (that is not including the gospel because that's the real joy in life but like ya know, football is pretty great).

So recently we've been housing till our little feet can't handle it anymore because there's sooo many tourists in Yamate that it's hard to find people for us to actually teach here. Well. We hadn't been that successful but decided that sometimes these things take time so we kept at it. AND GUESS WHAT!? We met a super nice girl and talked about families with her and when we asked if we could come back SHE WAS SO NICE AND SAID OF COURSE AND I COULD HAVE CRIED. Pretty happy about that, not going to lie haha. We tried to visit her again last night but she wasn't home.. so we're going again tomorrow because she needs the gospel! Everyone needs the gospel!

Also, my BFF Jenny Shimai has been on a roll with the referrals. She had us over for lunch this past week to meet three of her friends again (we had previously met them) and then on Friday nights we do a Book of Mormon study class and she shows up with this lady from Israel and we're just like "what the heck!? Where does she find these people!?" So that was fun. I am not so sure the nice lady from Israel has interest in learning from us but she was super nice and accepted a copy of the Book of Mormon so that's good! Hopefully she'll read it and realize that Jesus really is the Messiah and He loves her sooo much and then she'll be like "I need to meet those girls again!" Fingers crossed.

When we went to Jenny Shimai's for lunch with her friends I was able to tell them about the Book of Mormon and share my testimony of it in ENGLISH and oh man. It's been such a long time since I've done that and it was so crazy. Of course I love sharing my testimony in Japanese but I still feel slightly limited on my ability to fully express my feelings on it so getting to do it in English was amazing. As I was testifying I felt the spirit so strong and I KNEW that those words I was saying were true. The Book of Mormon truly is a blessing and a gift from God because He loves us and He continues to guide us today. With that being said..

This week for scriptures (because I remembered!!) you just get an entire chapter to read because I read it this past week and I think it became one of my new favorites. It's 3 Nephi 17. Nothing beats the words of our Lord and Savior, right? Jesus is the best😊

Well, I hope you all have a great week and see your own little miracles!

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy (by the way, because Japanese people don't really understand sarcasm we've been told to not use it AT ALL and I'm just like "oh, no. I'm in trouble." Halp.).

Love you!
愛しています💕

--フィッシュバーン姉妹🐟🔥

Ikeda Shimai and I played with the photo booth app last night so please enjoy.

I'm the worst and haven't taken any pictures.. but I did take one while we were walking.

Well..

My original title to this email was "which will get to America first? Me or the package I just sent?" Buuuut post office Japanese is much different than my every day Japanese and I ended up paying much more than I should have and my package will arrive in 3-5 business days. Oops. Well fam, enjoy the chopsticks and fans (those aren't actually for you.. I have other things for you still in Japan😊).

Anywho. I'm also a loser who forgot to write down the scriptures I wanted to share with you AGAIN. SO SORRY. But, I have almost finished the New Testament and let me just say that while I love the Bible and think it is fantastic, I'm SO glad we have the Book of Mormon to help us understand Christ's teachings better. Wow. Revelation is killing me. That's some tough stuff. Anywho, please read the Book of Mormon on your own😀

This week we did a lot of finding with no luck.. kind of sad.. BUT my bff Jenny Shimai called us and said she set up two appointments with some of her friends for us to teach them the plan of salvation!! Yay! So we taught one a little bit at her apartment and she said she'll read the pamphlet and accepted a Book of Mormon but right now doesn't have a tooon of interest so we'll just keep being her friend and share good messages with her to hopefully spark her interest. After that we went to lunch with two of Jenny Shimai's other friends. They were so cute! We got to teach them the plan of salvation too and one seems to have interest so hopefully we'll be able to meet with her again soon and teach her more:) yay for members being great and introducing us to their friends!! Member missionary work is the best!

Honestly, that was my week. Haha super exciting, right? But really. Being a missionary is great and I love it and even though people don't always have interest it's so cool getting to talk to them about God with them and maybe helping them start to think about all that He's done for them. SO COOL.

I hope you all have a great week!

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.

Love you!
愛しています💕

--フィッシュバーン姉妹🐟🔥

When we went to lunch with Jenny Shimai, she took us up to
the 70th floor of this hotel and made us take pictures
hahaha but you can't see my cute Ikeda Shimai very well🙁

The hills even have stairs. The Yamate life is a life meant for
someone who is in shape. But I think my breathing is slowly getting
less heavy every time I go up a new hill! Yay! Just kidding, it's not
that bad haha

We went to a park and there were real life fall leaves on the
ground so I made Ikeda Shimai take a selfie with me with the leaves in
the background.

Once upon a time..

There were typhoons every weekend in Japan. The end.

Don't worry, they're not stopping me. They are stopping our investigators from coming to church so that's a bit bothersome. Darn typhoons. This is what I get for doing rain dances back when I was in Hachiōji. I've made a mistake and I regret it. Oh no.

Anywho. This week was pretty good! Basically all we've done is housing because whenever we try to street here we just find a lot of tourists.. and while they need the gospel too, our ward mission leader has asked us not to do that.. sooo we house. All the time. We haven't found very many people that will listen to us quite yet but we're going to keep on keeping on and doing what we can to find our friends.

Zone conference this week was suuuper good. It was all the missionaries from the stake so it was huge. Oh, there's a new bean chan here in the Yokohama stake that I went to high school with! He actually did moonlight my senior year when he was a sophomore! We were in the same dance. His name is Sam Low and at first I didn't realize it was him and then he said my name and it all clicked and his trainer (who was in my MTC zone) was like "do you two know each other..?" Haha it was kind of funny. Go Darts!💛 but yes, zone conference was way good. We talked a lot about working with members and helping them be missionaries themselves. Which reminds me, did y'all know that the brethren have asked all members to study Preach My Gospel? Well, they have. So I challenge all of you to start studying it! Plus, I forgot to write down my scriptures for this week so instead of reading the scriptures I normally send, read part of PMG. You can find it for free on the gospel library app😊

I don't know what else to say... so I guess I'll end this weeks email there. Short and sweet, I guess?

Well..

Have a good week!

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.

Love you!
愛してます💕

--フィッシュバーン姉妹🐟🔥

These are from lunch today! We went to Sakuragicho which is basically what everyone thinks of when they hear "Yokohama". Soooo pretty. I'll definitely be going back there one day and being the biggest tourist ever. Also, the wind today was trying to help us be more Vogue but that definitely didn't happen.

11!? ELEVEN!? Gross.

I'm so old. I am an old woman missionary, or as they like to say in Japanese, I am an obaachan. Seriously. Wow. I can't believe that I am now transfer 11. Where the heck has the time gone? 分かりません。

First of all, I want the world to know that I love Rodriguez Shimai and I miss her so much and I cannot wait for Wednesday because it's Zone Conference and since we're in the same zone still I'll get to see her. My life has not been the same since she left me. I may or may not have started crying after the nice man came to get her luggage for her on Wednesday. I also may or may not have told her that she cannot leave me. Well, sadly she didn't listen to her senior companion and now I miss her so much.

But it's okay. Because now I have Ikeda Shimai and she is wonderful. She is from Nagoya and worked as an occupational therapist before coming on her mission. She's 25 and soooo nice. Also, she loves chocolate just as much as I do so we get along swimmingly. She wants to learn English but doesn't think she's good so we mainly speak Japanese together. Which is cool because then I get to learn more from her but I also want to help her with her English so we're trying to find a nice balance haha.

It has been raining nonstop for like a week now. I feel like I'm in a rainforest. So. Much. Rain. So because of that, finding people to talk to us has been kind of hard buuuuut we've been able to do a lot of housing so I mean, there are pros and cons to all sides haha.

Speaking of rain, the big typhoon that just came through didn't manage to kill me or kick me out of Japan just yet but it did manage to keep all missionaries inside until this morning. So we did a lot of studying and phone contacting yesterday. 'Twas a party, let me tell ya.

We only had one lesson this past week and it was good but she just can't get over the fact that her religion was "chosen for [her]" (her words, not mine) because her father is the one that takes care of a religious shrine. So we're struggling with that because she keeps almost all of her commitments and really wants to learn but like, won't get baptized. Uhh.. yeah. We're in a pickle right now trying to help her overcome this little (big) hurdle of hers.

This weeks scriptures are Alma 58:10-11, Alma 62:48-50, Helaman 3:8, Revelation 1:8, and Revelation 3:10. Please read and enjoy the word of God😊

Well, I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week!

Stay safe. Stay classy. Stay sassy.

愛しています💕

--フィッシュバーン姉妹🐟🔥

Our beloved Jenny Shimai who has taken to
being the missionary mom. I. Love. Her.

We had dinner with the elders before eikaiwa at this super American burger place and wow. Delicious. I love Japanese food but man, I REALLY love America.

Rodriguez Shimai💙

Two of our cute eikaiwa students,
Sakiko San and Asami San

Ikeda Shimai!