Monday, October 3, 2011

I arrived!

My goodness it hass been a long few days but oh has it been worth it. So quick run of things. As you would have expected since I am writing this email now, I did eventually make it to this place. The flights went well. Its funny to see all of the random members on my flights and in LAX that would run me down seeing my name tag and talk to me. I`ll be perfectly honest, I was kinda surprised with the flight over from LAX to Tokyo. It wasn`t that bad. I slept for a few hours but not a whole lot. Studied some (personal and language study). All that good stuff. Lets see. Landing and getting out of the airport was possibly the most terrifying thing of my life (well I thought). However I was not detained by customs or any of that and it actually almost felt like there was no security at all. After wandering Narita for about 30 minutes I finally found my bus and was off to the airport. You truly learn the bare minimum with these people of how to talk. However all went there well. Anyway. It was pretty lonely but super nice and I felt super weird being alone. Woke up the next morning went to the domestic terminal which had no english speakers it seemed. Got on this tiny plane. Finally built up the courage to talk to the person next to me on the plane (happened to be the one american) and he snorted, looked at my nametag, and then went back to his newspaper! Yep, I`m on a mission. Ha. Anyway. Landed and go to get my luggage and I see them! President Rasmussen, his wife, and the assistants to the president. I`ve never been so excited to see people in suits in my life! We took a picture there.

Talked about some of the devastation and then took about a 30 minute ride back to the Homebu (mission home). It was kinda funny. Instead of him telling me to speak japanese he was having his assistant practice his English on me. It was a pretty fun trip ending up with the assistants (1 nihonjin and 1 raised by nihonjin) convincing the president to try nato (fermented soybeans) which means I got to try them. Oh joy. It actually wasn't bad. We had dinner with all these people and my new doryo! I think you may have been sent a picture of him. He is a native. His English is good. Not perfect but very good. He is basically one of the coolest Elders I have ever met. He is always so happy and telling a joke but also is really into the work (well it seems that way at least we haven:t really done anything yet). Anyway. Some fun stuff.

Gotta keep it short because we are biking to our first appointment a mogi (roll play with a member) in a few minutes! Talk about baptism by fire! Tomorrow we do service in the morning and then head to my area. The area is named Aizuwakamatsu. Famous for ramen (noodles (also my doryo is a self proclaimed expert of ramen so that is even cooler!)) Anyway, our p-days are Mondays so probably won:t hear from me until then but yeah. I'm alive. This place is crazy but I'm super excited. Love you all and peace out.

Elder Carter

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