Kakunodate

On March 25, 2009, while out checking on missionary apartments, Pres. & Sis. Tateoka and mother & I took an hour of p-day. We went to see a samurai village in the mountains in the northwest corner of our mission near the city of Akita. Although it was a very cold, blustery day in the mountains, it was great to catch a glimpse of life in Japan from about 350 years ago. This is an iron emblem in the architecture of the gates surrounding a samurai mansion.

During this feudal period of Japan, the master lived in Akita and his samurai retired to Kakunodate when they weren't being wariors. They really lived a double life, one as a fierce fighter and one as a skilled craftsman who earned a living for himself and his family by developing a trade.

Their trades apparently were highly varied, ranging from art, to carpentry, to metal working, to farming.

Judging from their armor, they were small people, but from their reputation they were fierce fighters. If the feudal master called for war, off they went.

Their homes would have been palaces in that time period and they spent great amounts of time constructing and caring for them. Some of their descendants still live there and open them to the public. Here is one where the thatched roof is thick and highly maintained.

The yards were full of stately trees and stone decorations like this one.

They had nice utensils, home decorations, guest rooms and more, but the rooms are extremely cold during winter.

This is the spring in one of the yards, just waiting for family members to come for a drink. Even in winter it was not frozen, and the outer surface is covered with algae.

Here's the heating system - a box of sand and a container of charcoal.

Their winter boots looked inviting, but I don't think they would be very comfortable in the snow.

It was an enjoyable hour and then we went on to check on more missionary apartments. With about 40 apartments in our mission we never stay caught up.

We are really enjoying our many experiences and are still rejoicing for the baptism of Junya that was held in our ward last week end. That makes nine for the missionaries in our ward since we came. We have been making progress with the Matsune couple whose picture we posted earlier. We thought that they might be the next baptism. However, Susumu was promoted this week and they left almost immediately to move to Tokyo. We will get their address and send a referral to the Tokyo Mission as soon as we can. They are too valuable to lose. It was sad to tell them "goodbye." We went by their apartment on our way home from church and the movers were finishing loading their truck.

All in all, life is great. The gospel is such a blessing and brings such joy into the lives of those who accept it. We thank Heavenly Father many times daily for our membership in His church and for the blessing of our family. We know He is mindful of each of you and the trials you face. Trust in Him and He will take your burdens upon Him.

Moving Day!!!!

This is Junya. He is one of our favorites. He is an Eikaiwa student that has been coming for quite awhile--two years, I think. He is a very nice young man and we love working with him.

These pictures are in the old building we've been using while our building was being added on to.
Charlie is sitting in the back and Ito san is up front. Chiba kun is the young man facing front and the one going out the door is Hamamoto kyodai, the young man who's been helping us to learn Japanese. Both of them are recent converts. Chiba was baptized just before we came to Japan and Hamamoto kyodai was baptized about 6 months before.

Dad tried to take an outside picture of the building, but there is a fence very close. There are two identical buildings and the one at the far end by the bicycles is the one we used. They will be torn down and replaced by a parking lot.

This is yesterday (Saturday) which was moving day. We were moving all of our things back over to the church. That is Sister Tani waving. She is one fantastic missionary. Oh that all missionaries could be like her. The man in the yellow rain suit is our former stake president.

This is our chapel. All of the building from the little overhang by the front door, to the left, is the new addition. We got a new steeple and then a few parking spaces under the upstairs part that was added.

This is a close up of the front of the building. It is so nice to be back in our own building. We were only here 5 weeks when we were moved out. We have been attending church clear across town--about 40 minutes by car, since July 1st. So, by the time we go home from our mission, we'll have been half of the time in the Kamisugi Chapel and half of the time here in the Nagamachi Chapel. It's only 15 minutes to our chapel.

Everyone was so excited to be back today. We had a very good attendance at church. We were excited that the Matsunes came to meeting. I had invited them but wasn't sure if they'd come. In fact, Nezele told me her husband couldn't come, but they both did and stayed the whole block. After church, we had a potluck lunch and they also stayed for that. All in all, it was a great day.

Dad is feeling a little under the weather today but was determined I should post. Sorry it isn't up to his usual great stuff. We are so grateful to be here. We love being missionaries and we love the Japanese people--and all of our missionaries. This week is transfer week, so there will be changes. We've loved this group of office elders so much. It will be hard to have them change, but the new ones always end up being wonderful as well. Life is good and we thank Heavenly Father each day for His loving care of us and all of you.

This is the inside of our chapel. We are excited with the new chairs! Our old chairs were awful. The chapel will seat about 200 people.

It's beginning to feel like spring in Sendai. We took this picture today (Mar 10, 2009) overlooking the foothills that surround the south and west side of the city. The trees haven't started to leaf out yet, but the buds are swelling, the grass is starting to green in a few sheltered places, and some of the ferns in the woods are sending out the first fronds.

Many of the plants, like this varigated bush, didn't lose their leaves and now they add their color to the spring landscape. Spring in Sendai seems to be characterized by strong winds (sometimes 30 mph or more), and more freqent rain.









This is also a picture taken today of the first bulbs at the mission home to send up their flowers. This is a fun time of year as the days lengthen and the plants begin to grow. Most of the gardeners have been busy planting and small green vegetables are neatly lined up in rows. Some of them are still covered with fabric to protect them from the mild frosts that linger.

We seem to be getting busier each day. We're starting the circuit of working on missionary apartments. Hopefully we won't find too many like this. We do, however, find lots of small problems like the picture below. I'm learning to take my tools and have found a few good hardware stores where I can get parts to fix them.

The missions in Japan & Korea are going to iMOS, the internet version of mission operating system. This morning we participated in a 2 hour internet meeting held by computer managers in Salt Lake City. Ruth begins converting our mission records immediately and the finances will follow over the next several months. I'm sure that we'll still be working on this conversion when we finish our mission. We are also implementing bar-coded temple recommends in Japan and have just converted from land-line phones to cell phones during the past 2 months.

In addition to all of the office activities, we are trying to be more invloved with members and in teaching the gospel. The Haginaka family, shown here, speak English and we greatly enjoy them and other members of the ward. We are teaching 2 Eikaiwa classes each week and a few of our students are listening to the missionary discussions. One young man has a baptismal date for March 22. He knows the church is true and is struggling to give up his tobacco habit.

We located a Japanese tutor who comes weekly for a 90 minute lesson and our ability to understand and to speak is slowly improving. We look forward to the day when we can truly carry on a real conversation. We now understand what it would be like to be illiterate. Our time here is going by rapidly so we must maximize our efforts. We are enjoying our experiences and it seems that more of our work days are turning into 14 hour efforts to get things done. My health has improved dramatically since we've been here; it's better than it has been for several years. We count our blessing and truly appreciate the opportunity to serve.

We send our love and hope things are going well for all of you.

Love,

Mom & Dad (aka Ruth & Dale)