Kobe!

Kobe!
This is Kobe, Japan.

Monday, April 9, 2012

9 April 2012 Otsu Japan

Week 92
Mission Log
 
Aloha from Kyoto, Japan!  Wasn`t General Conference the best!?!  I thought that it was wonderful.  I only was able to watch four of the five in English.  Everyone has to travel to the stake center in order to watch General Conference here.  The stake center is in down town Kyoto (the next prefecture over).  We had to take a train and then a bus, but we got there alright and had a wonderful conference.  After Priesthood session ended, we stayed the night in Kyoto with the Elders that are working there.  Then, we watched Sunday`s sessions.  They were all really good.  The Saturday morning session I had to watch in Japanese.  We had a family of five that is investigating the church come, and I went in to watch it with them.  It would have been nice to have been able to just let them sit with some members and form relationships with them, but basically nobody comes to the Saturday sessions of Conference here.  There were probably about as many English speakers as there were Japanese speakers on Saturday, and only the missionaries are English speakers.  It was kind of fun to watch one of them in Japanese.  I could understand everything just fine, so long as I was paying good attention, but when I wrote notes or was thinking about the investigators that were there, I didn`t really pick up what was being said.  I`m going to have to work harder on my Japanese.  After they left, I went upstairs and watched the afternoon session in English with all the other missionaries.  We also had an investigator come on Sunday, but there are plenty of members there on Sunday.  So, we just had him sit with some members and watched it in English. 
 
It got pretty hot today.  I have no idea what temperature it was, but I was wishing that we could take our suit coats off.  Usually some time soon after Conference, the mission president will announce that we don`t have to wear our suit coats around anymore.  That announcement hasn`t come yet. 
 
I`ve pretty much been in Kyoto for the last week straight, and had no time to work here in Otsu.  I went up there on Tuesday night and conducted a companion exchange with the missionaries in Fushimi.  That went through Wednesday.  On Thursday, we had interviews with the mission president in Kyoto.  That was pretty fun.  We just talked about my investigators and then did a quick temple recommend interview.  I now have a Japanese recommend.  On Friday I had District Leader Council in Kyoto.  Then, on Saturday and Sunday we watched general conference there.  Even today, on our preparation day, we went up to a famous temple in Kyoto.  It is called Kiyomizudera.  It`s a very beautiful place, and all of the cherry blossoms are blooming now, so it was a lot of fun.  Pretty much everyone in the mission went there today.  I even talked to the President and his wife there.  It`s just the place to be when the cherry blossoms are out.  I took a bunch of cool pictures. 
 
Nobody celebrates Easter in Japan.  Even the members half the time won`t know when it is.  It isn`t written on the calendar or anything.  I have to get going now.  Talk to you next week.  Bye. 
 
-Elder Isaac Swift

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