It was a roller coaster week this week. With loosing my trainer and gaining a japanese companion.
So on Monday as you all know I got the call I was dreading. Elder henderson was transferring! We had become such good friends and we're doing so well together progressing the work in this small branch. So Monday and Tuesday were sad days packing, getting me ready to take over the area and getting ready to send him off to the freezing cold of naguoka. On Monday we went to this place about 30 minutes south of our apartment by train to this hill. We rode a gondalough to the top of the mountain then took photos and started the walk down and around the mountain. On this mountain there is the worlds biggest collection of these little statues! There is 1500 of them and it took 1 master and his 27 apprentices 19 years to make them all! Also on this mountain there are lots of temples and big statues. We saw the biggest buddah statue in Japan it's 33 meters tall and calves out of one price of stone!
Tuesday was spent saying goodbye to people and using that opportunity to teach lessons we taught so many lessons through saying goodbye to people :). Henderson shared a scripture that was relevant to them ad committed them to do something to strengthen their faith, whatever he felt they needed most. So sad but from that we have seen some great results.
Wednesday morning we dropped Henderson, Smith and Richards off at the station and said good bye :( sad to see them go they are all such amazing people. Then me and Hebert san went to the apartment cleaned it made it nice an pretty for our new companions haha. This is when the nerves started to kick in, thinking about getting a japanese companion, I was thinking maybe he speaks no English, maybe I won't understand him, maybe we won't be able to communicate well :/ so we headed to the train station and waited for them. Firstly ricks Choro turned up on time so we helped him with his bags and waited for my companion who was meant to be on that train but had obviously missed it. Luckily he was on the next train so we didn't have to wait very long.
We straight away hit it off! And he speaks a decent amount of English, enough to communicate in English and I speak enough japanese to communicate in japanese so we both just speak a bit of a mix haha. I try and speak everything in japanese and if there is something I can't say I will say it in English or a few words in English cause I don't know them words. But it's so much fun. I love speaking another language it's so much fun!!! The first month of learning sucks but now it's getting more and more fun cause I can actually talk to people! Japanese is way harder then English to learn! English is the second hardest language to learn. I can guarantee English isn't as hard, there are so many exceptions in Japanese and so much conjugating and words with thousands of meanings or kanji that can be read 20 different ways! It's crazy!
Since Kondo Choro has got here I have had to take over and make all of the decisions and take the lead in everything including finding situations. It has made me learn a lot more a lot quicker! Kondo is amazing! I love him he is an awesome missionary an awesome friend, funny and just amazing!!!
Thursday we had weekly planning which was fun I explained heaps of the members and investigators in Japanese and what we are trying to do to help certain people. It was hard in Japanese but so fun :) love speaking japanese!
Friday was good we had our eikaiwa (English class) Christmas party, we had lots of fun made hot chocolate and had biscuits and snacks :) talked about the real meaning of Christmas and had heaps of fun!
Saturday was the ward Christmas carols and talent show which was really cool all the missionaries sang songs, my companion played the guitar and sang, the half American kids done handstands, back ten and cool gymnastics, elder ricks done magic lots of other cool performances. Then we had 20 minutes between that and when we needed to leave for MIyasaki Shimai's Christmas concert so we decided to go dendo! It was so cool we only talked to two people and they were both really cool. The first person is studying the bible and wants to learn about our church so we are meeting on the 31st of December. The other guy met missionaries on the train and says he wants to come to English class.after that we went to a concert which one of the members were performing in. It cost $50 per person and included a 2.5 hour concert and a silver service dinner! But we got free tickets from her! The food was amazing!!! I love most of japanese food just don't like sushi cause they soak it in this weird bitter dressing There was 2 non Mormons sitting at the table and there was like 5 bottles of wine and other alcoholic beverages so we gave it all to them hahaha they were so confused hahah. But it was so cool! They were singing all of these really old songs and they were all dressed up. I felt like I was in the 40's it was so fun and I was trying to figure out the lyrics because they were all in Japanese and everything was translating weirdly like "I was in severe pain that night but the stars healed me the loving stars healed me." That is the direct translation from japanese to English..... Weird songs. They were mostly old style music or opera.
Sunday we had church we were expecting 8 investigators at church but only 4 came. But it was still great! Takashi brought his mum to church but she understands less japanese than me so she didn't understand much.... But it was cool that she came!!! Ukari and one of her kids came to church today! I was so happy when they came :) I love thier little family they are all so amazing and adorable.
I don't know what we're doing for Christmas but we will probably do a mix between Japanese Christmas and western Christmas. Japanese Christmas is usually eating a Christmas cake and kfc or fried chicken habana the kfc part sounds almost like New Zealand Christmas ;)
I love Japan and love the japanese people so much they are so adorable!!!! They are so cute when they speak English they add the letters like giva mea the ballu instead of give me the ball or pleasu instead of please. Love Japan it's amazing!!!! Wouldn't want to serve anywhere else!
Love you all and hope you have an amazing Christmas. Miss you guys and I miss the warm weather and the Christmas atmosphere. And steak I definitely miss steak!!! Hahahah speaking of steak one of our amazing friends ukari and the three half American kids made me roast beef mmmmm
Byeeeeee :) 愛してるよ
So on Monday as you all know I got the call I was dreading. Elder henderson was transferring! We had become such good friends and we're doing so well together progressing the work in this small branch. So Monday and Tuesday were sad days packing, getting me ready to take over the area and getting ready to send him off to the freezing cold of naguoka. On Monday we went to this place about 30 minutes south of our apartment by train to this hill. We rode a gondalough to the top of the mountain then took photos and started the walk down and around the mountain. On this mountain there is the worlds biggest collection of these little statues! There is 1500 of them and it took 1 master and his 27 apprentices 19 years to make them all! Also on this mountain there are lots of temples and big statues. We saw the biggest buddah statue in Japan it's 33 meters tall and calves out of one price of stone!
Tuesday was spent saying goodbye to people and using that opportunity to teach lessons we taught so many lessons through saying goodbye to people :). Henderson shared a scripture that was relevant to them ad committed them to do something to strengthen their faith, whatever he felt they needed most. So sad but from that we have seen some great results.
Wednesday morning we dropped Henderson, Smith and Richards off at the station and said good bye :( sad to see them go they are all such amazing people. Then me and Hebert san went to the apartment cleaned it made it nice an pretty for our new companions haha. This is when the nerves started to kick in, thinking about getting a japanese companion, I was thinking maybe he speaks no English, maybe I won't understand him, maybe we won't be able to communicate well :/ so we headed to the train station and waited for them. Firstly ricks Choro turned up on time so we helped him with his bags and waited for my companion who was meant to be on that train but had obviously missed it. Luckily he was on the next train so we didn't have to wait very long.
We straight away hit it off! And he speaks a decent amount of English, enough to communicate in English and I speak enough japanese to communicate in japanese so we both just speak a bit of a mix haha. I try and speak everything in japanese and if there is something I can't say I will say it in English or a few words in English cause I don't know them words. But it's so much fun. I love speaking another language it's so much fun!!! The first month of learning sucks but now it's getting more and more fun cause I can actually talk to people! Japanese is way harder then English to learn! English is the second hardest language to learn. I can guarantee English isn't as hard, there are so many exceptions in Japanese and so much conjugating and words with thousands of meanings or kanji that can be read 20 different ways! It's crazy!
Since Kondo Choro has got here I have had to take over and make all of the decisions and take the lead in everything including finding situations. It has made me learn a lot more a lot quicker! Kondo is amazing! I love him he is an awesome missionary an awesome friend, funny and just amazing!!!
Thursday we had weekly planning which was fun I explained heaps of the members and investigators in Japanese and what we are trying to do to help certain people. It was hard in Japanese but so fun :) love speaking japanese!
Friday was good we had our eikaiwa (English class) Christmas party, we had lots of fun made hot chocolate and had biscuits and snacks :) talked about the real meaning of Christmas and had heaps of fun!
Saturday was the ward Christmas carols and talent show which was really cool all the missionaries sang songs, my companion played the guitar and sang, the half American kids done handstands, back ten and cool gymnastics, elder ricks done magic lots of other cool performances. Then we had 20 minutes between that and when we needed to leave for MIyasaki Shimai's Christmas concert so we decided to go dendo! It was so cool we only talked to two people and they were both really cool. The first person is studying the bible and wants to learn about our church so we are meeting on the 31st of December. The other guy met missionaries on the train and says he wants to come to English class.after that we went to a concert which one of the members were performing in. It cost $50 per person and included a 2.5 hour concert and a silver service dinner! But we got free tickets from her! The food was amazing!!! I love most of japanese food just don't like sushi cause they soak it in this weird bitter dressing There was 2 non Mormons sitting at the table and there was like 5 bottles of wine and other alcoholic beverages so we gave it all to them hahaha they were so confused hahah. But it was so cool! They were singing all of these really old songs and they were all dressed up. I felt like I was in the 40's it was so fun and I was trying to figure out the lyrics because they were all in Japanese and everything was translating weirdly like "I was in severe pain that night but the stars healed me the loving stars healed me." That is the direct translation from japanese to English..... Weird songs. They were mostly old style music or opera.
Sunday we had church we were expecting 8 investigators at church but only 4 came. But it was still great! Takashi brought his mum to church but she understands less japanese than me so she didn't understand much.... But it was cool that she came!!! Ukari and one of her kids came to church today! I was so happy when they came :) I love thier little family they are all so amazing and adorable.
I don't know what we're doing for Christmas but we will probably do a mix between Japanese Christmas and western Christmas. Japanese Christmas is usually eating a Christmas cake and kfc or fried chicken habana the kfc part sounds almost like New Zealand Christmas ;)
I love Japan and love the japanese people so much they are so adorable!!!! They are so cute when they speak English they add the letters like giva mea the ballu instead of give me the ball or pleasu instead of please. Love Japan it's amazing!!!! Wouldn't want to serve anywhere else!
Love you all and hope you have an amazing Christmas. Miss you guys and I miss the warm weather and the Christmas atmosphere. And steak I definitely miss steak!!! Hahahah speaking of steak one of our amazing friends ukari and the three half American kids made me roast beef mmmmm
Byeeeeee :) 愛してるよ