This is a photo of Emily's companion, Sister Kristi McMurtrey. The Japanese people have difficulty pronouncing "McMurtrey" and "McMahan" so these missionaries go by Miku Shimai and Maku Shimai!Miku Shimai is from Ohio. She recently graduated from BYU with a degree in Math Education.
Excerpt from Maku Shimai's email dated 1-8-09
The food in Japan is AWESOME! For Shogatsu, the new year, we had, on average 2.5 meals with members per day for about two weeks. The Kanagawa ward had a sign-up sheet so we went with Elders Matsuhashi and Clark to those meal appointments because that's their ward. (Remember, we sisters go to two wards). I got to have traditional shogatsu food on New Year's day. It was served in three wooden 10 by 10 or so boxes, with a variety of things to grab with your chopsticks. You then took it with chopsticks and put it on your plate.......... yes, chopsticks! Needless to say they can be tricky at times. Matsuhashi Choro, on two occasions that I can recall, had to, while I was trying to grab it, come and help me. Also, there's this thing called mochi. It is rice that's pounded so much it's a cross between glue and marshmallow. I've had it with ice cream in the middle and then with some fruit paste in the middle. You can also have it more solid and then put it in soup and it gets melty. I personally like it plain. What else... I had raw octopus, or squid, whatever it was. It was frozen and whole. The lady cut it and then put it on the table. It was purple with the tentacles on the outside and on the inside it was white and like jicama but tasted fishy. It was rather crunchy, I supposed because it was cold. It was good! Everyone loves vegetable juice here. You buy it in what would be equivalent to an American juice box. And there's lots of vending machinges, except it's not soda. My doryo (companion) got a warm lemonade out of one. I haven't paid too much attention but you can get a variety outta those things. Going back to the dinners... we had, one day, a meal at 12, 3, and 6. It was crazy! We went to the dinner appointments with the Elders. Clark Choro is from Palmyra. He reminds me of Eric Anderson, the actor. He likes to make movies. Matsuhashi Choro is from Japan, but where I forgot. His Wnglish it super duper good.
Church is........all in Japanese. More and more I can hear individual words though so I supposed that's getting somewhere. I really like the young single adults. Last night we had sports night with them. We missionaries went. We played volleyball. So scary! You know me and sports and my lack of motivation in them. Ha! It was fun though. Cold but fun. We played at a middle school by the Kikuna eki ( train station). So your hands kinda hurt cause it was cold. I tossed a football with Elder Holmes for a bit. That was totally fun!!
Yes, we really sleep on the floor. I feel it will be very strange when I sleep on a bed again. I like the futons because we have two big blankets. They are really light but the kind where there is filling. It is super easy to make your bed in the morning. I suppose that's a plus. All you do is fold it in thirds and it takes about 5 seconds. Our only heater is in our sleeping room. I made a map of our apartment and I bought stamps today so hopefully I can get that mailed. I wrote the letter last week actually but we didn't have stamps. The stationary is really kawaii (cute). When sisters go home, the leave behind stuff like clothes or anything else really. So I stole some leftover flashcards that had grammer principles already on them (bonus!!!) and some stationary.
Yup we really take our shoes off all the time. We went to the temple today and we didn't tak
e our shoes off because you didn't need to. It felt so weird. When we go to anyone's house we always take our shoes off. One family had slippers that we put on.Speaking of feet, my toes get like ice cubes occasionally. Every day I wear a pair of socks and then the wool tights and believe it or not sometimes it likes I've been walking around in the snow all day, my toes get so cold. Other times it's okay though.
The bike I bought is the brand Giant. I have a light on the front. I always set it to blink. Plus it snaps off and that's a bonus if I need to see the lock on my bike because it's a dial lock. I have a basket on the back and that is totally saving me. You end up carrying lots of stuff as a missionary. I always have a Japanese Book of Mormon (from the apartment, paperback) and an English Book of Mormon, my camera, pamphlets, the missionary handbook, hymnal, planner, pens and misc stuff. It manages to get heavy. I think I'm getting better at making it light.
We eat rice and spam rolled up in nori (that seaweed paper--my favorite!) at our apartment sometimes. Sis. Miku made homemade miso soup once. It was so good. I really like rice and curry. It's like a super duper duper thick curry flavored soup with big chunks of carrots and meat and then the other half of your plate is rice. They have MANY different flavors of Kit Kat Candy Bars in Japan. It's really cool. I dont't know why they don't have them in America. Miku Shimai showed me her collection. She has one of those big plastic bags pretty much full! It reminds me of Berty Bott's Every Flavored Beans.
One of the ward members said he'd put in a word with the bishopric that I'm a pianist. We just had zone taikai (zone conference) and I got to play! It was awesome. I even played a few of those arrangements that I like. Zone conference was awesome. It was two ward togething, held at our building because that's where the zone leaders are. So, while it may have been a long travel for the others, it was a 5 minute bike ride for us! Woo-hoo!
Right now, we're teaching this man who is an "eternal investigator"...two years! Miku Shimai and I were super lucky because we got President Hill to come to our lesson with him. It was only the second time (or first, I dont't remember) that had happened to Miku shimai and this is her last transfer! Pres. Hill was amazing. He said I did a good job of paying attention even though I don't know the language! He said some beanchans (greenies) will totally zone out or do something distracting.
I like the apartment; it's really cozy. And I like biking. Dendo (contacting) is still a bit scary. I do lead though, go in front of my comp and stop people. I like to initiate conversation but the actual having one is just still so intimidating. My brain works so hard to understand and turns off at the same time. It is hard to jump in the conversation if I don't know what they're talking about.
Every day when we come home we guess how many letters we will get. I got your "dearelder" and the card! Yeah! Thanks!
We took a train to Shibuya, where the temple is, this morning. It was the morning rush. You were touching people on all sides AND... there were the pushers! It's true. They didn't have to push really, but it was still packed sometimes. They were saying stuff like (I'm assuing because I dont' know that my Japanese is right) "Alright, everyone keep it moving!"
Tonight we'll teach our English class and guess what... they do singing! They have a lesson and then you can split to play cames or do singing. We do a hymn. I chose For the Beauty of the Earth beause the parts are simple and the song subject is easy for non-members to understand.
The Japanese people have a hard time reading romanji so guess what.... we need to learn to write hiragana and katakana. Man, and coming into the mission I thought all we did was speak!!!!!! And here we are reading the ENTIRE Book of Mormon in characters. I feel like I'm standing at the end of a tunnel with this language and I can't see the other side!!!!!!!!
So--like I said we went to the temple. It's in Shibuya. There are a lot of caucasians in this part of town. It's so weird to me because in Kanagawa I've seen, maybe 4 caucasians the entire time! Shibuya reminds me of New York. It is very fancy and very pretty. The temple was fun because it reminded me that the gospel is true wherever you go! We went to an English session so we didn't have to use headsets. Sometimes I think-- man, if these people take the time to learn English, surely I can learn Japanese!!!
Until next time,
Ai shite imasu!
Mcmahan Shimai
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