Michael's Good Experience: One year! And Happy birthday dad!!!‏

Dear Family,

Well hello everybody! Long time no talk right? Well this week has been a week of miracles! First just as a quick announcement I've been in Japan for over a year now!! How crazy is that! That also means that I only have ten months left... It's going way fast! I've been pretty busy this week so it barely seemed like I reached a year but hey, it was good! So now I'll dive right in to the report of miracles!

This week we had a couple events, for example, as you already know, temple Pday. But also we had zone meeting and district meeting. Then we had weekly planning and a visit to the Larsen family for dinner. Then more weekly planning and basketball with a member’s son. Another huge miracle, there was a baptism here for Suzuki Kyoudai! And he received the Holy Ghost already. So that's way cool! Then ward council and church, and today we went to a place called Sakuragichou and went to eat at the Hard Rock Cafe followed by going to some cool stores there! Then in all that extra time we went finding those wonderful prepared souls that are out there. So that's pretty much a list of everything. But now I'll talk about a few of them now in more detail.

At the Larsen's for dinner, we had some flipping delicious Chinese food because Sister Larsen is Chinese, well Taiwanese. So that was way good and Elder Carlini and I gave a message on Liahonas in our lives, for example the scriptures, or as in Makenna's farewell talk "the Holy Ghost"! (She emailed me the talk she wrote) So it was a cool time. We dendo in a lot of the same places from day to day so we spent a good bit of time near the church and at the Oceanside parks there. It was way cool! It's getting pretty chilly now though so I might need to go get a nice warm coat soon, but the sweatshirt makes studies nice and comfy. Thanks mom! I guess it all kind of leads up to Saturday though. On Saturday we went visiting a potential investigator of ours and on the way met the craziest old couple ever, they said hello to us before we said konichiwa to them which is impressive in Japan. Then they kept going off on random stuff and the husband was singing Michael Jackson songs half the time but hey they may be at church next week so we'll see. At least we had a blast talking to them! Then later that day we had a lesson with the one and only Aoki San who came to church last week! The bishop and his wife actually moved their temple time just to come to be there for the lesson which was great because it went really well. We were able to teach the whole restoration and he basically just listened and absorbed everything said, he really liked it and even had prayed this last week. So now he has the Book of Mormon and has started to read that. He came to church yesterday as well, technically if he wanted to he could be baptized any time now as long as we could teach him everything. He's pretty busy this week so I don't know about meeting but he'll be at church next week! So that was our big thing on Saturday but then immediately after that Suzuki had his baptism and now he is a member of the church! It was a way cool baptism, and I even got to say the closing prayer at his request.

Yesterday at church we had Aoki and a new investigator we found a week, or two ago after Elder Yamashita's thing, Mass San, came and we did a lesson with him at the church too so now he's almost into official lessons. The real miracle there is that because we didn't teach the restoration we hadn't quite gotten to the Book of Mormon but after church some members were talking with him and gave him one for us and gave him a commitment to read. It was way cool! Miracles!

Another miracle for the week though, and this one is more funny I now I think. So this month money for me has been a little tight, I'm not really sure where it all went but it was pretty tight. So today we ate at Hard Rock Cafe which was going to bring me to some serious lack of money until next week, but some members came in while we were eating and ate with their family then paid for us too, so I still have money, thank goodness for the Sorensen family! Now I don't have to stress with money! They are the best!

Some other fun things from today were that we got to go to... The Pokémon Center! It's a real thing, and it's a way cool store! It has everything Pokémon you could imagine. I bought some Japanese cards there... So that was cool! We also took some cool pictures by Landmark Tower that I'll be sending home! Yep so that was my week pretty much! Also it was way cool to hear that Makenna used the story she asked me to send her in her farewell talk! It was cool stuff to read, so it's been a fun week! This next week will be cool too! Can't wait to see how everyone's doing! I guess for now though I will wish everyone a great week! And for my weekly admonition: let's make sure we don't forget our prayers, especially the ones where we get to really kneel down and talk with Heavenly Father, they can make or break any day I've found. So everyone, pray lots! I love you!

Love,

Elder Gailey

P.s. Get feeling better mom and Morgan and everyone who is getting sick over there! It's important! Also I'm on the lookout for my boxes! I'll keep you posted there! You're the best! And dad, the only new food I've had recently is called shabu shabu, and it's basically where they have a pot of water and sauce (it's separated in the middle) and it's boiling like crazy and you grab some raw meat and cook it in there then dip it in sauce and eat it, it's delicious! You would really like it!

P.p.s. This Saturday is transfer calls so I'll find out if I'm staying or going before next weeks email! Aaaaaaannnnnnnndddddd it's dad’s birthday on Sunday!!!! So HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!! I'm sorry I don't have anything sent to you! Maybe I can get something in a Christmas package! But I love you dad!!! Have a great birthday!!

Elder Gailey and Elder Terry at LandmarkTower