New Things

 

Blogger is still giving me server errors whenever I upload pictures! So, sorry--I am posting what I can!

This week in Japan is Golden Week, a day off on Friday and then the following week has a string of national holidays on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. (Yes, that is not actually a week. We are all confused about this.) We have managed to get the whole week off, though, and we have been enjoying it and experiencing new things!
Including:

--a Gospel Choir concert in Takamatsu on Friday. Our friend Miwa sings in a gospel choir, so we went to support her. They sang "Yes, Jesus Loves Me" and other songs in English. I always get a kick out of the fact that all the music I hear here is in English! We went to dinner the other night, and they played Justin Bieber the whole time!

--A barbecue with a local friend who was displaced by the earthquake and moved to the countryside (yep, we live in the countryside). She is from Aomori prefecture and served us their local specialties, sea urchin rice and senbei soup--both very yummy!

--The Ehime Science Museum--This has the world's largest planetarium!. It also has the robotic dinosaurs shown in the picture with Cash above. It is a huge museum full of really cool hands-on displays. We had a blast!

--Our branch's day camp, which was fun. There were about 8 American missionaries there, and lots of booths of activities. I spent the whole time snacking, of course. They had kakigori--yummy!

--Another barbecue! Our student had a barbecue at her house yesterday. I finally tried fugu (blowfish). I had been hesitant, because I had read this beforehand:
"Poisonous parts vary among different kinds of fugu, and only licensed cooks are allowed to prepare them. One must have special skills and knowledge to be licensed. Because of the strict regulations, the number of deaths is decreasing but is still reported."
Peer pressure! Our student's husband has a license to prepare fugu and had caught a bunch fresh that morning. Not bad, just chewy!

We have a few more days off, but the recent earthquakes have made us kind of hesitant to travel north. Maybe I will take the other days off to figure out how to get Blogger to upload my pictures!