Missionary Moments

So time is marching on and it is now 3 months since Jakob left for Provo and nearly a month into his time in Japan. This is some of what he has shared with us over the past 2 weeks....

 

Second week in Japan.

... most of this week we have done tracting, or housing and streeting. "Dendo-ing" is another term (Dendo is "mission" or something similar in Japanese). It usually consists of stopping people when we ride past... or walking up to speaker boxes (which every house has) and trying to get a few words in ... The speaker boxers are nick named "kekko boxes" Kekko being a japanese word for "I'm good, thanks." .... last night we were out dendo-ing in an area ... and some old lady yelled at us from across the street, we went over and she was super excited to see two "american handsome boy" and immediately shoved two bags of sweet bread stuff in our hands... we tried to say we were okay, thankyou, but she was just super nice and excitable, we ended up talking to her for like half an hour just on the street, and she was really eager to meet again. Not like most Japanese people who are more reserved. 

Wednesday night was Eikaiwa class (english class) and before that I kept asking Greenburg choro to go through it with me, to kinda give me a run through. He was like "okay, it's super fun" and then didn't.  We got to Wednesday night, 5 minutes before it started and he's like, oh I'd better explain... and then everyone started showing up, and I'm teaching a class of Japanese people, by myself, with no idea what to do. Thankfully I teach the intermediate level English class. It has 6 people a family of 4, and older lady and an older man who used to be an English teacher,..... It was a good evening.

I've almost been taken out a few times on the Bike. It's a really nice bike, and Elder Greenburg likes to ride fast, I try and keep up with him, or I'd be lost. The streets are narrow and traffic is pretty hectic, .... Two fast missionaries on fully geared mountain bikes are quite unusual, and we go a lot faster than everything else. ...

There are a lot of cultural customs I'm meant to be trying to follow, which I'm learning. Like how to take your shoes off and put them on in other houses, bowing. I'm excused because I'm a gaijin a lot of the time, but it isn't too  hard to keep track of it.

During lessons and things I'm usually pretty quiet. Although I know almost everything that Greenburg choro is saying, and half to almost nothing (depending on age) of what the Investigator is saying, I'm not confident enough yet to just talk, especially as talking back is a lot harder than listening. When tracting we try to go 50/50. I'm happy to knock on doors or kekko box people and talk, but I'm still hesitant when stopping people in the street,....

The area where our flat is is a bit slummy, but the apartment block itself is really nice. It's like that all over, new nice buildings, amongst older, worn down buildings, with every second one being a restaurant or little shop of some kind. .... just more like if you squeezed all of Launceston into about three or four blocks.

.... so after almost two weeks I'm doing fine. Happy to be serving. It's hard but doable....

Elder Greenburg and Elder Rowlings on the first day they met.

 Third Week

 ... The ward had a big meal thing after (church on Sunday). That was really nice, for us and the investigators especially. You have these paper cups with a cold soy sauce/fishy watery soup, which is really nice (maybe kecap manis or something??) and these massive bowls of cold noodles, plus lots of toppings like rice bubbles (fish flavoured. not cereal) , prawns, onions etc. You dump a whole heap of it in your cup of soup stuff and then eat it, then go back for more, and more. So delicious.　Ｗe were so full. Then the Stake presidents wife invited us for dinner again, so 3 hours later we had another huge meal. I'm so used to having only two meals a day with Elder Greenburg (Breakfast and a largish late lunch) that it was almost too much, but so oishii(delicious). Had octopus unknowingly for the first time too. .... Food is great (most of the time) here in Japan. We've bought some nato to have some time (fermented beans), which is infamous everywhere. But you can't say you've lived in Japan without trying it....

 Tracting was pretty good this week all in all.

Probably the most annoying thing when tracting is Mosquitoes, in Japan they are simply called 'Ka'. Always around 6pm they come out. I have bites all over my face and arms, and legs even (they get through pants somehow). Elder Greenburg seems to escape being bitten almost altogether, and when he does, he doesn't get red lumps. Which is weird, because I'm the one wearing insect repellent...

Communicating in the language is coming along slower than at the MTC I feel, simply because I don't get much time to just practice, I can only really say memorized phrases or answer a direct question. Indirect questions and actually teaching are still beyond me. My understanding is increasing hugely though, simply listening all the time is good. I'm getting a bit frustrated with pronouncing the ra ri ru re ro sounds, you need to like roll the r and make it sound like an L or D sorta thing. My mouth is just not capable of doing it right. Apparently my Australian accent is too heavy...? Or so I've been told. Safest bet right now, Greenburg says, is just to say la li lu le lo instead, and it's easier to understand...

Elder Rowlings on his second day in Japan

Elder Rowlings with his mission president and his wife: President and Sister Zinke.