Lost in Translation

I think my Japanese might be improving a little. I'm starting to understand most if not all conversations, and the other day a member from Shibuya called me to ask me a question and there was much complimenting of my Japanese in the phone call. "When you were in Shibuya your Japanese was good, but it sounded a bit...childish, I suppose is the word. It's so refined now!"

Which makes me a little embarrassed and wondering what my Japanese must have been like back then, but I feel much better about it now. I can't personally really feel any difference...but there clearly is one.

I still am bad at reading kanji. I need to kick that study back into gear, as soon as I have cleaned my desk. I have FAR too much stuff. I want to get good at writing kanji and also being able to read out loud. I am still at the stage where I can recognize and understand kanji but I am not always great at readings yet -- with the exception of common names. I can read those no problem.

One thing that still fascinates me is that while my ability to speak and understand Japanese may be improving, there are still some things that I don't understand. These miscommunications are still lost in translation. Take humor, for example. People used to laugh at my humor when I was not trying to be funny, but didn't understand my jokes. Now people tend to laugh when I AM trying to be funny, although my jokes are still rather simple. I'm getting used to that, and I suspect that when I return to English someday in the distant future I will be utterly not-funny for a while.

But far beyond humor is the cultural differences. I will share an example. The other day my companion and I had biked out to Goi, one of the most inaka (countryside) places in our area, meaning that the buildings were only 2-3 stories tall and the color green was occasionally visible between all the Pachinko parlors. There we went to visit a member who has been struggling lately. We tried to catch her at home, but her kids told us she had already headed off to work. We trundled over to the store where she worked and found it relatively quickly. She works for a small meat stand, about as long and wide as a pickup truck. The line of customers was out the door and chatting gaily on the road while the employees hastily filled orders. We decided to wait for it to calm down a bit (all the customers were men) and watched on the other side of the road for a moment.

One of the orders seemed to call for chicken because the owner, a small tough woman, stepped over to the side of the store with a large bag (it was the size of a pillowcase) of chicken breasts. She then began to beat the bag of chicken against the sidewalk in order to break up the pieces. She then reached in, with her bare hand, and grabbed a few pieces, which she held against her not-exactly-clean apron to carry back into the store, put into a bag, and give to the customer. All this passed without comment, although my brain fused in several places as I cringed through the whole process. I kept thinking back to all the food training and cooking classes I had taken, and I had lost count of how many rules were just broken -- not to mention the chicken and sausage were not immediately put back in the fridge but were left as open bags outside. I am not sure how long they remained that way as we left a while later, but remember this is a hot summer, and it had not yet cooled down for the evening.

The next day we had a meeting with our Ward Mission Leader and reported that we had met with this Sister, albeit briefly, at her work. I also made a small comment that I didn't think I would be able to buy meat from that store. Both my companion and the Ward Mission Leader looked at me, confused. I explained what I had seen, although I messed up at first and said "dirt" instead of "sidewalk." The Leader was quite surprised, but my companion figured out what I had meant and explained that the bag beating was on the sidewalk, not on dirt.

"Oh!" said the Mission Leader, looking relieved, "Well, that's all right, then."

I blinked, "It is? I mean, it's sidewalk. That bag doubtlessly got some holes from the beating and dragging around."

He waved his hand at me, trying to reassure me, "I know things are different in America. I've had some American companions, but it's okay. We do things a little differently here. That's completely normal."

"Ah," replied I and dropped the conversation. I suppose the germs in Japan are too polite to hop onto the chicken.

Really, I understand that there are some cultural differences, and I am totally okay with the idea of "different doesn't mean wrong." There are a lot of things about Japan that just wouldn't fly in America (public bath houses, for example, which would be the equivalent of a swimming pool without suits), but that doesn't make them wrong, just different.

But when it comes to health concerns I admit I can be a little picky.

And I think I shall be a bit more selective of where I do my shopping.

All else is well in Japan, and thanks as always for reading! Have a great week everyone!

Congratulations to D for the birth of a beautiful wonderful new child, and I am so happy to be an aunt once again! Please check out one of my siblings blogs for more details. I am sure there are plenty to be had.

[Note from Shana: I will have info on my blog after this Friday when I can get some good pictures! But Jenny is a beautiful and healthy redhead, and everyone is doing well.]

久しぶり！ Long time no see!

Sorry for the lack of posting lately, it's been fun out here in the field. We've been a little busy--not with appointments back to back, but with appointments that are FAR apart distance-wise and they kept creeping into our preparation day (today), so we haven't actually had a day of rest in about a month. Bleah. We corrected that and took a day off properly today, but due to a few miscalculations it's now the afternoon and I am just writing this to let you all know I am not dead before we set off to do some missionary work this evening.

For those of you who may not be aware, missionaries have one preparation day, or "p-day" every week. In Tokyo it's Tuesday but the day varies from mission to mission. This is the day we do our laundry, get haircuts, shop for food, etc. If we want to go to a museum or zoo or something we would do it on p-day. P-day is from 11:00am until 6:00pm; we still study for 3 hours in the morning and we still do missionary work in the evening.

Lately we've been having some great success in meeting new people who are interested in learning more about the Gospel and the church. We have a lot of mini appointments set for this/next week so I hope it all works out. We also met with a member who feels all the members of the ward should go on splits with the missionaries and do finding (knocking on doors, calling out to people in the street, etc.) at least once a month. She has even provided a potential schedule. It was amazing. We also have a baptismal date set. Yes, I am rather excited.

We have been very busy lately, which makes me feel a little sorry for my dear bean-chan! This new missionary is working really hard and doing her best to keep up, but every time we have a chance to sit down for a few minutes she falls asleep! She's sleeping right now. I think missionary work must be really exhausting. I'm tired all the time, but that's just...I'm ALWAYS tired when I wake up early in the mornings regardless of when I go to sleep. I've been like this my whole mission. I don't fall asleep during the day, though, and I have enough energy to last me until 10:30. I guess you really do get used to the work! :)

We went clothing shopping today. Lucky me, I found some nice blouses on sale for $5! Well, for 500 yen, and I guess that means $7, huh? How IS the economy doing in America, anyway? Am I going to be able to get a job when I get back? The moral of the story is I have 2 new blouses and I am very happy about it.

Well, that's about it for this week. Time is flying by WAY too fast! Love you all, talk to you again soon!

A quick update

Sorry for the lack of update last week. I was planning to sit down and really grind out an awesome post this week but I just realized I forgot the peanut butter. I remembered to bring all the lesson materials but I forgot we were making cookies too so I forgot the peanut butter. Now we have to run back and get it.

The peanut butter and the lesson are for a wonderful family we are teaching. They got baptized shortly before I came into the area, and they are just fantastic. I am excited because the kids have a lot of questions to answer this time, and answering questions (or rather helping people answer their own questions) is one of my favorite things to do.

It is so HOT this week! It's nigh unbearable! I cannot wait for September. The simple act of stepping outside covers the body in sweat, and once you are actually out on your bike for a while you feel ready to collapse. Seriously, it's bad this week. I do not like summer.

We had a lot of miracles this week. We had a hearing-impaired couple chase us down the street and ask us for a pamphlet so that they could come to church. They saw us as we walked past them in the train station (we can't proselyte in or near train stations) and chased us down. That doesn't happen very often. I remembered enough sign language to communicate with them, but all the missionaries spent the weekend frantically studying to prepare for meeting them again. I now have enough vocabulary to give the first lesson in sign language, and I learned the name of our church and how to do Joseph's Smith First Vision. Huzzah! It was fun and I remembered a lot of my dormant signing in the process. Japanese Sign language is really similar but often involves kanji in their signs...

There is a less active who won't meet with us. We got her back by weeding her garden. Take that!

...She then meekly opened the door and invited us in. Wasn't really our plan (is it weird that I miss weeding?) but we didn't object. I was really glad to finally meet with her.

That is about all I can think of. Love you all verra' verra' much and I will talk to you again next week!

Oh, and I am a little behind in replying to letters. I am sorry. Sit tight, I will get to it, but it may take another week -- I am so exhausted that after this lesson I think I am going to sleep.

Love you all, so grateful to be here, the gospel is SO true!

TRANSFERS!

Well, transfers happened on Monday. Greetings from Nakano! Nakano is home of the Japan Tokyo Mission Headquarters. It is surrounded by Assistants to the President, Secretaries, and I am sitting in the HQ writing on one of the office machines. It is a very different atmosphere.

I have not, however, transferred to Nakano. I will go back to my awesome area, Chiba, tomorrow. My dear, darling Japanese companion has left. I shall miss her! But I don't have much time to think about it because I will see my new companion tomorrow. Today I am in limbo (hence Nakano).

Why am I in limbo, you ask? Why didn't I meet my companion at transfers? That's because my companion was still at the MTC.

I guess I am a trainer now! I am very nervous and very excited. Mostly nervous, but mostly excited.

I don't have a lot of stories to share today, but I have seen a lot of miracles. I am really tired, really nervous, and really counting down the minutes until tomorrow though, so I am not in the right frame of mind to write blog posts.

Anyone with any advice for training? I have no idea how NOT to totally ruin this poor bean...I will simply have to do my best not to, I guess.

Happy Birthday Mom!

Happy birthday, Mom! I hope that you will look back on the enormous amount of stress I gave you with fondness.