Monday, June 25, 2012

June 20, 2012

Christine sent us this letter. I felt it was appropriate to share with everyone. :)


Konichiwa mina-san!
I really should not be writing you this letter but im so excited i had to share!!
You guys know our District has been teaching a kyudosha named nakajo-san, ne? Well, on Douyobi (Saturday) Fukinighto-choro gave him a Mormon-sho to read. They asked him to read Moroni 10 and pray about it. Nakajo-san said he would, demo he didn't really. Long-shimai and I asked him if he'd read any of the Book of Mormon yesterday (look @ me speaking english! :P) and he said he read a little, but he didn't know if he believed it. I explained that Mormon-sho contains the words of God and Prophets wrote it. Nakajo-san loves the prophet. He watched General Conference and felt the spirit when President Monson spoke. We asked him to continue to read and pray about Mormon-sho and promised if he did he'd learn it was true. He said he'd try.
Today! We asked him if he'd read any more. He said he had read Moroni 10. We asked how he felt about it and he said "i think it might be true." (in Nihongo of course) AHH! I was so excited! Then, ten no Otosama (Heavenly Father) put words in my mouth. :P We invited him to church this Sunday. I totally expexted him to say no. Instead, he said yes! He asked what time and said he'd come! :) Then he realized he might still be in New Mexico with his Tomodachi (friend), demo he promised that if he was, hed go to church with his friend! Kakoi, ne?
Its awesome to watch Nakajo-san progress like this. Anyway, just a quick update for you all! The church is true, dang it! :) I LOVE YOU!
Love,
Grosland-shimai

Im so proud of her! :) Lovely girl, destined to do incredible things. Keep writing her! Keep her and Long-shimai in your prayers! Thank you for all your support!
Much Love,
Sara Grosland

Saturday, June 23, 2012

Week One

Konichiwa family! I'm sorry, I only get 29 minutes and 20 seconds now on this computer so I'm going to type as fast as possible. This week has been amazing.  I'm hoping you guys have all been getting my letters.  I won't really have enough time to be able to tell you all about what's going on here through email because I just don't have that much time.  It's ridiculous!  Luckily, we have snail mail so you guys can still hear from me.  :-)  One trick to let me have more time to write you all... Send me an email in a word document. I can open a word document, close My LDS mail and take as much time as I want writing you all emails in Word.  Obviously that won't work this time, but for future reference.  That would be awesome.
 Honestly, I'm not entirely sure what to tell you all!  Most of what I want to say I've been writing in my Snail Mail letters.  I hope you guys are getting those and reading them.  I feel like I'm writing them constantly.  Whenever I have free time that's what I do is write you all.
 Okay, random stories for you for the rest of the 21 minutes I have...
 First off, I went to the Health Clinic today to see if they had anything to help with my blisters.  They're really really bad.  I wish I could send you pictures, but (OH YEAH!  This is important) I can't actually upload any picutres on here.  I don't have the stuff to be able to do that.  The only way you'll be able to see any picutres I take is for me to send you my camera's memory card with all the pictures on it so you can look at them.  I'll probably do that once my camera is full of pictures and I can't get anymore.  The Health Clinic gave me some more moleskin (That's another thing I need a TON of if you can send me more) with holes in it so I don't keep ripping off the new skin...  Sara, brilliant idea with the hocky tape.  If you can find that, I'd love some!  Hopefully what the Health Clinic gave me will help, but I'll have to let you know.
My District is freaking awesome.  There are 4 companionships total in our district.  Our District Leader is Smart-choro.  He's an awesome District Leader.  At first when he was asked to be DL I wasn't sure, but now I totally see why Heavenly Father wanted him as our first DL.  Smart-choro has 2 other doryo named Carter-choro and Williams-choro.  They've nicknamed themselves The Triforce-Chorotachi!  Hahahaha!  Only nerds get called to Japan.  It's awesome.  x)  Long-shimai and I call ourselves The Ichiban-shimaitachi (lit. Number One Sisters!).  Then there's also McKnight-Choro and Fukino-choro who call themselves Fukinighto-chorotachi.  The only other companionship in our District are Wooden-Choro and Lee-Choro.  They're still working on a name for themselves.  We only came up with these names to make it easier to talk about each other.  For example, instead having to ask where each individual choro is, we can just say "Triforce-chorotachi wa doko desu ka?"  It's just a lot easier... and fun.  :P
 Studying has been very difficult.  Nihongo is a very difficult language to learn... Very difficult.  Luckily, I now know why Heavenly Father didn't want me to get into the MTC any sooner than I did.  If I had, I wouldn't be Long-shimai's doryo!  She needs me.  The fact that I took those classes of Japanese has helped so much in studying.  Long-shimai didn't know ANY Nihongo before she got here so she's been finding it helpful to have me here to help her understand.  It's weird how quickly she and I have become friends.  :-)  I already feel like I could tell her pretty much anything.  Every night we have to have something called companionship inventory.  During that, we have to talk about our relationship and what we can do to improve.  So far, every night we've just said "uhmm... We're awesome?  And we need to work on not liking each other so much so that we'll focus better!" xD  We get so easily distracted.  It's ridiculous.  We'll go off on tangents constantly.  I love her!  She's like my 3 month older sister.  x)  Oh PS, I'm senior companion.  It was chosen by alphabetical inspiration.  ;)
 10 minutes... AHHHH!
The MTC has been amazing.  The spirit is SO strong here.  Everywhere you go you hear people singing hymns, praying, speaking foreign languages, testifying... There's not a moment that goes by that you don't feel the spirit.  I love it so much.  I've been introduced to so many people and, again, it's crazy how we've all bonded so quickly.
The other amazing thing is Nakajo-san.  We've been teaching him for a few days now.  It's SO difficult to teach in Japanese!  I have so much that I wish I could say to Nakajo-san, but I just don't know how!  Pray for me to be able to say what I want to say!
 I now have roughly 7 minutes to tell you about my amazing experience last night.  I was laying in bed trying to force myself to fall asleep.  We have this hour called "Revelation Hour" and during that I kept thinking about the fact that I was here.  The fact that I was in the MTC being a missionary.  I was thinking about why I was here and praying to know that this was really where Heavenly Father needs me and not just me thinking it was.  I've never felt the spirit so strongly.  Heavenly Father told me that he's proud of me, and that I am where he needs me.  I KNOW that that's true.  I know this is where I'm needed.  I just pray that I can make him and you guys proud.  :-)
 Please keep praying for Long-shimai and I!  We could use all the prayers we can get!  And please keep writing me! Whether through email (Which I can only check on tuesdays) or snail mail (Which I can read every day!!).  You know how missionaries always tell you that they love getting letters?  You really don't know how true that is until you're on a mission.  Seriously, whenever ANYONE get's a letter it's like Christmas.  :-)  We get excited over each other's letters!  4 minutes!!!
Write me write me write me!  :P  I love you all.  I know this church is true.  I know it!  :-)  Remind me in my next email to tell you about "Christmas at the MTC".   (OH!  And I met Elaine S. Dalton and Sheri Dew!!  AMAZING! )
Kay, I"ve really gotta go.  I love you!  I'll talk to you again soon!
-Christine Grosland

How this is gonna work: I think...

Hello! My name is Sara. I am Sister Grosland's younger sister. She is in the MTC right now, and I believe she is planning on sending weekly e-mails for everyone to read to update everyone on her mission and how things are going. I know she would love it if you would email her or write her a letter. If you want to email her, go ahead and send the email to Saramg312@gmail.com and I will make sure she gets it. If you want to write her, her address is:
Sister Christine Marie Grosland
MTC Mailbox 159
JPN-TOK 0827
2005 N. 900 E. 
Provo, UT 84604-1793
If you dont want to write a big ol' letter for her and just wanna say a little somethin somethin, then just comment on one of these blog posts saying "This is for Christine:" and then your message. End with your full name and I will send her what you said. Thank you so much for your love and prayers. We love you all! Please write her!
-Sara