konnichiwa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This week has been super crazy and busy and also awesome!!!!!!

Before I begin, Eliza, your hair cut was super cute last week!!!!!!!!!! I'm sorry I forgot to write that in my last email. but にあいますね (it fits you well) (:

Before I forget the wonderful things of last transfer:

Black shimai and I were able to visit with some less actives and had some awesome lessons and also did a service project of scrubbing 30 year old, 5 cm thick cigarette residue off of a couple walls. hahah the woman that owned that house is one of our investigators and she was ruthless-- I think I scrubbed the same piece of wall for an entire hour. But now it's clean and beautiful and we're cleaning it up so we can have parties. She used to have family home evening with a bunch of other single members in that house (she has a few) but then she stopped. We're planning a big family home evening once we've cleaned it all up. wooo!!! she lived on the top of a huge mountain but it was really fun biking home. (:

and there were some other cool things like teaching the restoration to Yuko shimai and it was soooooooo cool because she has so much faith and she is so willing to follow God's will for her. I love teaching her so much, it's so fun. The spirit is always there because she has so much real intent and we just testify from our hearts and she's open and receptive <3 we're going to help her recognize answers to her prayers a little bit more this week. She's been really good so far and is still waiting on whether or not she should get baptized. But she's got to have real intent, meaning that she's willing to follow through with the answer that she receives. Right now she's just a little scared to talk to her family about it still. BUT.....

MY NEW COMPANION IS A RECENT CONVERT OF A YEAR AND A HALF AND HAD HANTAI PROBLEMS WITH HER MOM AND HER DANCE INSTRUCTOR and has this awesome insight and I love her to pieces. obviously the Lord knew what He was doing when He sent her here at this time, but IT'S SO COOL BEING THE THIRD PARTY AND BEING ABLE TO SEE IT! hhaha.

So I woke up at 3:55 to get to Kobe on time where we received some training from President Zinke one last time </3. I didn't bawl my eyes out this time because I was so nervous to train. hahah There were 13 missionaries in this group that just came in and 5 are sisters and most of them are australians hahaha. But! my companion is from New Zealand!!!? so she has this awesome accent that sounds british to me and she knows the hakka so I'm going to make her teach me. haha she's way way way way way way way cool and I love her to pieces and she has such an incredible story and she's amazing and SO ready to serve. she met with the missionaries for 2 years before she joined the church and kinda messed with them and threw lots of anti-mormon stuff at them and then the Spirit pricked her heart and while she was watching general conference (the one where they changed the mission age) she had this overwhelming feeling in her heart that she needed to serve a mission and she was like 'wait I'm not a member' so she started learning with pure intent and she has SO MUCH FAITH and just wants to share it with everyone in the world because it has blessed her life so much. It's super inspiring. Also she used to be a professional dancer and got offered a job as Ariel in Tokyo Disney but she quit dance so she could join the church. Her dance instructor told her she couldn't continue in his company if she joined. She's AWESOME! she reminds me of Kamber Smith back in the mitten. And I love her dearly

I'm wayyyy lucky. her name is Sister Mackenzie! The day we travelled back to wakayama we had a lesson with some less actives and the bishop and his wife in a place really far away so we had to bike a ton and she hasn't biked since she was a kid so it took a lot longer than usual but it's okay. (: haha. She didn't study japanese or anything before she entered the mission training center so she is starting with a clean slate. She has soooo much desire to learn though and we're going to work really hard and see lots of miracles. It's amazing how much the Lord will make up for us if we just do our very best. I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!

I did hit my half way point so that was a day of mourning and eating gyozas. but I was able to start learning kanji so　that was a monumental step. But I feel kinda silly studying them because I need to be studying things I'll actually use because I'm still not fluent in this language. but I kinda pick some up during meals.

The handcart trek looks suuuuuuuper awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! tell me about how it went!!!! thank you for sending me the pictures! Spencer and Jess look like real pioneers. kind of. it's weird seeing white people. they are beautiful. Also this week elder Christofferson and Sister Oscarson and Elder Stevenson and another general authority whose name I forget, addressed all of japan at a stake conference broadcast. it was soooooooooooooooooo inspired and EXACTLY what japan needed to hear. slash, Elder Stevenson and the other man spoke perfect japanese. it was way cool (:

I love you all!!!!! thank you for your prayers. don't forget family home evening and daily family scripture study and prayer. <3 something Sister Oscarson said; no matter how important school or work gets, it will never be as important as family . It was a lot more profound, but that was the jist. the principle is the same.

いつもありがとうございます！

ダニエルズ姉妹