March 2, 2014 Letter

0800 Hours the West Pacific

ohisashiburi desu! (its been a while)

So I always have these moments of genius through out the week when I think of something fun to write home about. Then when I sit down I go, "did I actually write that 2 months ago or just think about it in my head"... so if I repeat my self I apologize in advance.

 

Culture Point:

Thank you. There are lots of different ways to say thank you in Japanese all depending on the situation and how polite you want to me:

domo-  thanks (Almost off hand, you can say domo to mean almost anything)

arigato-thanks (A good deal stronger than domo)

arigato gozaimasu-thank you (Most widely used by far. You say it much more than in English, if you are bowing you are probably saying this; I say it probably 100 times a day not even exaggerating)

domo arigato gozaimase- thank you so much (Also widely used; a bit more polite)

And then of course just like English there are 100 other ways to show gratitude but you don't need those. A cool fact about the word thank you in Japanese is that it did not really exist until the Portuguese came! Their thank you "abrigato" or something hard to pronounce got taken and used! We have a connection to our mission languages Dad!

 

Fun Food Fact:

The Japanese elder in our apartment is super awesome! He makes the weirdest breakfasts in the world. It's weird to everyone, Japanese and Americans alike. But I am confessing my sin here because I judged it before I ate it. I now have eaten it and will be eating it once a week probably from now on. It is a piece of toast covered with peanut butter (they do have peanut butter here just super expensive) then you slather honey all over the peanut butter. Then you steam an egg, put tons of salt and pepper on the egg and then put it on the honey. Then you stuff. Kind of messy but pretty good. ;-)

 

Spiritual Thought:

There is a sister in the military ward here that said something that I want to kind of steal and add on to. The thought is about crickets, grasshoppers, locusts... whatever you call them. Two experiences with them:

1. The pioneer settlers in the late 1800's had an experience where their crops were getting eaten by them and they were terrified and prayed to God to have them taken away.

2. The Japanese people in and after world war two were hurting bad for food. That same creature came and they were so thankful and ate them because they were healthy and safe to eat.

Same bug, both hungry people, one taken as a plague one taken as manna.

 

Now I have no idea if the bugs in America were actually poisonous or if you cant preserve them long enough to make up for the crop damage and I don't really think it matters that much. But, do I Elder Law see my crickets as plague or manna. I think its pretty easy for a lot of people to have the faith that there is in fact a God and that He is all powerful and good. It's the next step of humbling ourselves enough to be able to trust Him and His all powerful control. If we can master that we will only be receiving manna, not because its any easier to eat or do, but because there is no fear we will be blessed. 2 Nephi 9:39 (page 76 in the Book of Mormon) "...Remember to be carnally minded is death, and to be spiritually minded is life eternal". 

 

Funny Story:

I consider myself 1/4 Mexican because from the age of 4-12 I spent more than half of my time at the home of a wonderful family that's moma was Mexican and they pretty much became my other parents. So I ate the chili pepper many a time, had my fair share of hot salsa, and from that background I went into the world and always choose the hottest sauce when the question was asked. I ate the "hottest" curry at the Indian curry restaurant and it was super hot but I did not cry. I tell you this so you understand I am no ketchup on my taco kinda guy.

 

There is a small country in South East Asia where their babies suck on habaneros for binkies and the 3 year olds can breath fire. Thai. We made this good friend on the street that is from Thailand and works with his sister at their restaurant and he invited us there. We went and I ate the hottest curry I have ever eaten! It doesn't feel like hot after the third bite, it feels like you are chewing on needles...  but we love him so we went back! We got things on the menu with lots or vegetables and no spicy and it was sooo good! Which made us get confident again.. ahh perhaps just the curry is spicy then... so we ordered these noodles. There is 5 levels of spicy, the curry that killed us was a 4, so we went with a 2.

 

The plate is lade below us: shrimp, crap, squid, vegetables, and noodles all tumbled together in a beautiful concoction of Thai gourmet cooking. Then my eyes start to burn... oh no... three bites in I am grabbing for my water. It was at least twice as hot as the curry, easily the hottest dish I have ever eaten, and huge! So we just start on a mission that has no hope... my lips were like swollen and blood red half way through (should have got a picture). Then the sister comes over and starts chatting with us (she is like a 45 year old mom that knows English, Thai, Chinese, Japanese, and something I had never heard of) and she sees the tears rolling down our faces. She asks if it is hot, and we kindly explain that her brother must have played another joke on us and given us a 5 this time because it is the hottest thing we have ever eaten. Then she says she made it!! It's not that funny of a story but just be careful if you ever go to a Thai place.

 

Love each other for me!

Law Choro