Odawara Hosts a World Competition?

Monday, September 23, 2019

こんにちは!

We're back to a normal P-Day this week! The weather's been cooler because of a typhoon that passed by somewhere but didn't actually hit us (though we did get some rain), though it was pretty hot this morning... I'm hoping it cools back down again soon 

Spiritual Stuff:

On Saturday (Friday in the US ), the first episode in the Book of Mormon Videos series was released. Ogata姉妹 and I watched it as soon as we saw it was up and were absolutely amazed. These videos are going to be an excellent resource, not only for teaching people but also for individuals in their own study. There are some things you can't really get a feel for when reading a book like the Book of Mormon, such as the feelings and thoughts of the people talked about, and even just the first video helped me get to know the ancient characters a bit better. It helped me feel for them as real, imperfect human beings just like the rest of us. They have been that all along, but reading about something and seeing it is a bit different. I know that through these vidoes, people will be able to better understand both the stories written in the scriptures and the doctrine written in them. We are eagerly looking forward to the next one, and I hope all of you are as well!

Daily Life/Fun Stories:

A few weeks ago we started doing a second 英会話 (eikaiwa= our free English class) because we had some new students who were not at the English Connect 2 level like the rest of the students. Over the past couple weeks we've had several students from the English Connect 2 side of the room come over to the English Connect 1 side of the room until there was barely anybody for the 長老たち to teach... I'm guessing the very high level of the ones who were left kind of scared them off... So now we have a lot more students in a tiny corner of the room and I'm the teacher because Ogata姉妹 is also a student, but it's so much fun!

On Saturday morning (and a bit of the afternoon), we helped out at the nursing home we usually volunteer at on Fridays because they had a 秋祭り (aki matsuri= Fall Festival). Ogata姉妹 and I were assigned to the old fashioned candy shop, where all the candy was ¥10-¥30 (about 10-30 cents). The kids absolutely loved it and it was adorable.

]'\;[Last Wednesday after 英会話 one of our students invited us, along with the branch mission leader who's another student, to go see what seemed to be a mapping competition held at Odawara Castle... We had absolutely no idea what that entailed, but we agreed. We decided that we didn't need to buy tickets and would be fine standing. That Friday he showed up to モルモン書クラス (morumon sho kurasu= Book of Mormon class), gave us the times and showed us the flyer, which said something about projection and mapping... He then said he had to go and left before class started. He showed up again when we were playing ping pong after the class ended and gave us all the tickets that he had gone and bought for us. He refused to let us pay him back.

The mapping competition was on Saturday night, so we met up beforehand and walked to Odawara Castle together. The image I had in my head was a bunch of old people watching a projection of a mapping competition of some sort... That was completely wrong. For one, there were hundreds, if not thousands, of people there and it was a really good thing we had tickets. For another, it was not a mapping competition like I was picturing, as in literal maps. I can't describe it in words, to be honest.

It turned out to be the One Minute Projection Mapping Competition 2019, held every year all over the world, and this year it happened to be at Odawara Castle. 43 countries were represented in what was apparently a world competition. If you want to know a little bit of what it was like, you can look up the teaser on YouTube, though it probably doesn't do it justice. One of the coolest, if not the coolest, things I've ever seen.

Along with the projection mapping, one of the coolest things I've ever seen was the 和太鼓 (wadaiko) performance beforehand, which is Japanese drumming. The group was a local highschool club founded over 30 years ago that competes at the national level, and they were fantastic. Also, the giant drum (literally the biggest I've ever seen), yelling, and synchronized moving made for the best drumming performance I've ever seen (sorry Spencerport Drumline).

New Foods:

-natto... For those of you who know what that is, I probably don't even have to explain what kind of experience that was.

-nimono (handmade by our branch mission leader)

-rakkyou

-a bunch of Filipino foods I don't know the names of, made by a ward member

-Japanese fried rice (basically the same as normal fried rice)

-fried chicken onigiri

-tapioca strawberry milk (they don't call it bubble tea here, they call it tapioca ______). And yes, it was literally milk with crushed strawberries and tapioca pearls and it was delicious.

About the Pictures:

• I can't believe it took me this long to get my hands on boba...
• Couldn't believe how awesome the competition was.
• We love our Relief Society President. And how she makes extra food for us when she makes some for a person we're teaching.
• Just look at this cute little guy.

• Just, you know, casually admiring the view while waiting for our train.
• My 愛する同僚 (aisuru douryou= beloved companion) mixing me some natto...
• More pictures of last week's rice harvesting!

愛してます!

-スナ一姉妹