Alright I'm totally messing with you. The second part didn't happen, but I got you to open up my email did I not?
Wow! I'm finally in Japan and I don't even know what to say. I guess I'll just give a break down since last Monday.
My area is SHINKOTONI!!!!!
I get to stay in Sapporo! The only urban part of my whole mission! The success is a little higher in Sapporo than other parts of Hokkaido so I'm stoked. My apartment used to be used for 4 people, but my area got split in half, so now it's just my and my companion in this huge apartment. One of the best apartments in the whole mission.
Basically, we got up way early Monday morning and rode out to the airport. I started to freak out after I landed in Tokyo. Maybe because all the signs are in Kanji (weird looking alphabet) and I couldn't read anything. Plus, no one speaks English so rechecking my bags and getting past security was an adventure. The 11 hour flight went by pretty dang slow as a missionary. You can't do anything other than just read. Anyway, we ended up getting to Sapporo at 10:30ish because of a delay. I just sat in the Tokyo airport crying my eyes out. Not really, but on the inside I was. We still had an hour ride to the mission home from Sapporo, so we actually got to the mission home around 12. Finally settled in bed at 1! Getting up early was dang hard, I'll tell you that much.
We got to meet our trainers the next day and mine is Elder Birch. He's so sick!!! From Hawaii, loves sports, extremely fluent in Japanese, went to BYU for a year before the mission. We have a ton in common. Hes also the DL, super considerate and helps me out a ton. The only thing I don't like is how much he puts me on the spot and doesn't help me. I don't like it now because I don't know squat, but I know it will help me a lot in the long run.
The actual first day in the field was way rough. I've been borrowing another elder's bike for a week now and I haven't biked since I was 8. No joke. So, to be short, I died. On top of that it was pouring out!! And on top of that, our bike ride from our apartment to the church is about 40-45 minutes. Yep, I'm going to lose a ton of weight up these first 12 weeks of training. Even with the amount of food I'm eating
here
Man so much happened, but it's hard to keep this short with the hour at I have.
My first day out, we did housing (going house to house, you all know the people who knock on your doors). Funny story: my second house, the person answered their little sound box (the almost never open up their
doors, so we speak through these sound boxes). I say "genki desuka? (How are you?) and they immediately hang up. Apparently in Japan, people want to know who you are first so they can decide if they want to talk to you or not. Yep, lessened learned.
We also teamed up with the sister missionaries, Sister Barr and Sister Mori, to teach this old guy. His Japanese is notorious for not being clear. He really slurs what he says and in all honesty I didn't
understand more than 3% of what he said. Oh well! I better get used to it.
We teach an English class called Eikaiwa and it is so cool. Watching people struggle in English like I do in my Japanese. I really relate to the people, even though only two people came this last week.
Sunday was awesome. The ward is pretty small 40-50 members, but everyone is always smiling. I bore my testimony in Japanese because it was fast Sunday, and everyone complimented me saying "your Japanese is so great!" Which in Japan means: you're Japanese is awful, but I'll compliment you anyway.
We had dinner later that night at a member's house and again I didn't understand more than 3-5% of what was being said. Everyone understand though that I'm new, so they're pretty nice about it
Anyway, I have more to say, but no time so I'll do my best to give more detail next week
Hope everyone is doing great.
Love you all!
Elder Scheidt
愛してます
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