Lost in the Tide of Okinawa?

I love Watanabe Shimai and I love Okinawa!  Through the sweat, blood (not really, no crashes this week) and tears (Japanese is hard!)  I've come to really love these people.  I'm worried about this upcoming transfer.... what if I'm not with Watanabe Shimai or not in Okinawa?  It's going to be a tough goodbye!  I can't think of a better place to be right now than serving the people of Japan.  I love it!  I'm exhausted, but I think that means I'm doing it right :)

I'm glad I'm from Washington!  I use it as a talking point all the time.  I always introduce myself and somehow they guess that I'm from America. :)  Then they ask where in American I am from.  When I say I'm from Washington they immediately talk about Seattle and Ichiro.  These people love their baseball.  I then try to be creative and relate it back to the gospel and why I'm here.  Most people think it's really interesting that I'm in Japan trying to speak their language while my family is still in the states.  They want to know why on earth I would come!  Well, I always love to share that :)  

We had a youth fireside at the beach the other day (the church as no air conditioning so it's almost better to do things outside).  I took my camera and I put it a safe distance away from the water (or so I thought)....well, the tide ate it.  I feel horrible!  Luckily, I was able to save the memory card, so I didn't lose all my pictures.  Stupid!  Well I won't do that again!  Watanabe Shimai (Sister Watanabe) said that she knows where to find cheap cameras so that is on my list of stuff to get.   So this week's pictures are a little lame, but next week will be better! :)

A lesson on "tides" :)

It's been especially hot and humid here this summer.  It's 8:40 at night and I'm sweating buckets.  When I first got here I thought it was a little weird that everyone carried around towels with them.  Well I've adopted that practice.  It is so hot!  Like nothing I've ever experienced.  A ward member was telling me that last summer they had a typhoon every other weekend.  We haven't had one yet.  I can't believe it's already p-day (Preparation Day)!  Time goes by so fast (and so slow too, whenever we bike hills, for example :).  We usually cook for ourselves, but the church members are so kind and feed us occasionally.  Once a month they put together a fruit basket for the missionaries.  It is big.  It's overwhelming how kind they are to the missionaries.  We are so lucky!

Some of the pictures I sent last week were from Asa.  It's a traditional Japanese dance.  It was really neat to go watch that.  It was held at the zoo so I got some cool pictures of bats (they are not bats like we know, they are more like flying foxes), ponies (apparently they are rare here in Japan) and fake pandas :) It was a great p-day!

Bowling on P-day!

We had an apartment check this week.  It was my first.  We cleaned a lot and then we cleaned some more.  We passed "inspection" and our reward was American cereal and cleaning supplies!  It felt like Christmas :)  We immediately ate Lucky Charms for a mid meal snack to celebrate!

Sweet rewards!

I sang for an investigator.  I sang!  I hate singing.  Actually, I despise it.  But he said that he loved hymns and I said great!  We have lots of songs that we sing at church and he wanted an example.  How could I say no?  I made him promise that he would come to church if I sang.  Well, he agreed so I was forced to sing.  I think it was a good trade off, but wow I really botched "I am a Child of God."

We had zone conference this week.  It meant that Watanabe and I navigated the bus.  I'm so glad I had her!  I would still be lost if I was by myself!  Thank goodness for companions!  It was great to travel and multi-task.  The AP's (that is missionary slang for Assistants to the President of the Fukuoka, Japan Mission - two missionaries that help the mission president and his wife oversee the other 230 missionaries in our mission) thought I was so funny because I talked to everyone.  I have no fear, but whatever comes out of my mouth is usually less than perfect Japanese.  But someday it will be perfect so I'm preparing for that day now! I found a new investigator on the bus :)  Yata!  (This means "I did it" or "Hooray")

I'm starting to make phone calls to people on my own now!  Always with Watanabe Shimai close by.  She sometimes has to translate mid conversation what is going on but I'm slowly getting better!

I absolutely love it here!  I have never worked this hard in my entire life.  I have never been so sure that God lives.  He loves us.  We went to a less active member's house the other day and talked about church.  I asked why she wasn't coming to church.  She has a really bad knee and she is in a lot of pain.  So I offered to wheel her to church.  I have never felt so much love for one person.  I knew that our Heavenly Father loved this woman so much.  Here she was in the middle of a tiny island in Japan and I just had this overwhelming feeling that she is a special daughter of our Heavenly Father, that He understands her and loves her.  That is true for all of us.  He is as close to us as our knees are to the ground.  And I really do spend a lot of time praying these days.  I need help :)  I love you family!  Be safe!  And have an incredible week!

xxooxxoo

Hawkins Shimai