Service With the Oyster Fishermen

The church has been so helpful to many of the fishing Co-ops who lost their ability to earn a living when the tsunami hit their villages.  The co-op we helped today was one we helped last year also and we saw then the total distruction of their buisness both physically and in their faces and eyes.  Today we was new life breathed into their business mostly because of the church.  We saw thousands of new ropes, buckets, many new computers (7 or 8 ) for their office, a row of port-o-potties that are clean and nice, new boats & trucks.  The humanitarian fund we as members of the church donate to is really working and a life saver to many in Japan.

 Waiting at NHK (Television Station) for our bus to arrive to take us to the seashore where the fishing village is located. (2 1/2 hour ride)   Elders Akiyama and Elkins.

 Sisters Chikamori, Kitade and Tada.

 Sisters Asato, Kimura and Yoshida

 Sisters Collins and Oman

 Elders Elkins, Oikawa, Holbrook and Akiyama (back)

 The missionaries love to see each other on these service trips.  They always greet each other with a hug which is quite amazing considering most Japanese don't hug each other as a general rule.

 We ate lunch (bentos or box lunch) in a break room used by the fishermen.

Sisters Yoshida, Asato, Kimura and Oman.

 Elders Yoneda, Tanaka, Ikeda, and Bro So (soon to be baptized member from China)

and Sisters Asato and Kimura.

 Sisters Furukawa and Yoshikawa, Yoshida eating their bento lunch.

 These are some of the newly donated ropes by the church to the fishermen. They are attached to a machine that loosens the twist of the ropes.

 The Sakamotos and Gary are placing a shell with oyster eggs attached into the twisted rope.

 This picture is of the shells that were previously attached to a long metal rod and placed in the ocean where eggs of oysters attached themselves.  This load was just pulled out of the ocean.  We unstrung all of these shells and placed them in buckets (see the picture above of Gary placing the shells in the rope).

 A close-up of the shell being placed into the twists of the rope.  The ropes are then twisted again to secure to shells.  The ropes are then taken out to the ocean and dropped in where they will stay for about two years before they are harvested full of oysters.  We were told about 50 oysters can grow on one shell.

 Some of our group of Missionary Helping Hands with the fishermen.

We become good friends with those we work with.

 Pictures taken on the bus ride home along the seashore.  This is such a beautiful area.  It is hard to believe it has had so much devistation in the last 1.5 years.

 This huge tank held oil before the tsunami when it was pushed to this spot and crumpled like a piece of tinfoil.  There was talk in the community of Ishinomaki of leaving it there as a reminder of the disaster but I believe they have decided to remove it.  It has become quite a popular site.

I was thrilled to see this welcome sign of rebuilding some of the homes destroyed.  There is hope again in the lives of the people.

KORIYAMA DISTRICT CONFERENCE

Three faithful sisters in the Koriyama District

after the Saturday Night session of Conference.

These are the Yaginuma brothers.  Their father is the District Clerk.  Their mom is a very sweet lady who is deaf.  Her husband or friends in the Branch do JSL for her every meeting she attends.  Gary has become good friends to these boys encouraging them to be good Priesthood holders.

Sister Ogawa was baptized about the time we came to Japan.  She recently went to the Temple for the first time and had a wonderful experience.  She has many family names ready to take to the temple.  Gary asked her to bear her testimony of the Temple in the Saturday night meeting of conference.  She is a sweetheat.  Every time I see her, she hands me an origami rose in a different color of paper.  I'm getting to have quite a colorful rose garden.

This is the two year old son of Pres and Sis. Matsumura, District President. 

Isn't he adorable.

We ate lunch with Pres and Sis Matsumura at the church.  He is a school teacher who works many long hours.  She is the daughter of Elder & Sister Aoyagi of the Area Presidency.  She was a young girl when her Father was the Mission President in Sendai.   We love this family.

ZONE CONFERENCES AGAIN IN JUNE

We picked up the Area Doctors and their wives in Aomori on Monday evening and we went to dinner together in the hotel where we stayed.  As we were standing by the elevators, a nice lady carrying an instrament case came and, as usual, Gary struck up a conversation with her and asked her about her instrament.  She and some others were practicing to perform at a wedding later in the week and she invited us to listen to them practice.  The instrament is called a Shamisen and have an old, traditional sound to them.  It was fun to sit on the tatami mats with them and take in some ancient culture. 

This instrament is called a Shakuhachi and is akin to a recorder.

The gentleman let Gary and some of the others try playing it.  It is very difficult to play.  The mouthpiece is not like a recorder-it is one you blow into, maybe like a flute. 

Tuesday morning we arrived at the church to the Zone singing and ready for the Zone picture.

The entire Aomori Zone had purple ties and purple blouses.  They also had little pins of Mori (a tree) they all were wearing and they gave us pins to wear also.  We were impressed at the tight unity we felt in that zone.  This picture is Elder Ishida, a Zone Leader, giving Gary his pin.

The Aomori Zone with Dr and Sister Donahoe and Dr and Sister Landro. Also the Hirosaki Branch President joined us.

Gary teaching and training on the Book of Mormon.

Elders Squire, Yamamoto, Juchau and Taylor

Elders Saunders, Mead, Brown and Merkley.

Wednesday was the Morioka Zone Conference.

Niigata Zone

Special musical number by Elders Page, Oikawa and Elkins.  Elder Nation at the piano.

Sisters Landro and Donahoe. (Sister Landro is a great-granddaughter of Joseph F. Smith.)

We have recently been made aware of a tradition in Japan called Radio Taiso (excercise).  Starting as little children, all Japanese people learned to do this routine.  Every morning at 6:30 on the radio and TV, the music starts and people stand up and do this 3-4 minutes of excercise.  I invited all the Japanese missionaries to come up front and lead the group as a way to get the blood flowing and keep sleep at bay in the middle of the afternoon.  I think everyone loved it.  We will make this a tradition at all of our Zone Conferences and Leadership Training meetings that go on all day.

Mogi time!

Sendai Zone

Special Musical number with Sisters Tada, Yoshikawa & Kimura,

Elders Takase, Robbins, Ruefenacht & Sanders

Sister Kitade, Elders Hirao, Christensen, Everett & Takei.

The Relief Society in Izumi provided lunch of Taco Salad.  (They wanted to do something the American missionaries would like.)  Sister Asato loving her lunch.

Aren't they a cute bunch of Shimai?

Sister Yoshida earned the Almo O. Taylor Award and was given her pin in Zone Conference.

PICNIC IN THE LIVING ROOM

Sister Furukawa (cook) and Sister Yusa (housekeeper) have been lifesavers to me since coming to Japan.  Sister Yusa comes once a week and washes the sheets of any beds that have been slept in and cleans all the bathrooms (all 5 of them) plus vacuum and dusting.  Sister Furukawa is a big help a couple of times a month-especially at Zone Leader Council and Transfer Week.  She speaks fluent English so we have become great friends and I can ask her any question and get an answer that I can understand.  She is a faithful member of the church and works at the Temple every month in Tokyo.   We have been concerned for Sister Yusa who joined the church about 20 years ago but fell away quickly.    Sister Furukawa and I planned a picnic with the husbands for the 6 of us hoping that would be a way to meet Sister Yusa's husband (also a member) and build a relationship with him and her.  The day of the picnic, it rained and the two husband could not come at the last minute.  So we decided to have an indoor picnic on the living room floor.

Sis. Furukawa

Sister Yusa

The food was yummy.  Sandwiches, slaw salad, fruit, melon drink, and cheesecake.

Gary felt like he had his harem being the only man with three women.  He was a good sport.

Cheesecake

We learned that Sis Yusa has been baptized into the Catholic church and a protestant church since she joined our church, tho she is not active in any church.  She has worked at the Mission Home for 10 years and all the Mission President's wives have tried to reactivate her in many ways but she isn't interested~tho polite.  I'll bet non of them had a picnic on the livingroom floor!!