a good christmas
here is my journal entry from christmas in japan. my journal writing style was always quite matter of fact, so it perhaps sounds a bit dry, but this day really meant a lot to me. i still look back on it fondly:
“So Christmas Eve was a pretty normal day. At Eikaiwa we tried to get people into the Christmas mood, but no one cared, and there were only seven of them, so it wasn’t too good. Then, because I felt like we needed some Japanese Christmas, we ran to a convenience store and bought some hot chocolate and a Christmas cake (white cake with strawberries) for $12 (they know how to get an income here!). Then, after we dropped off the gifts my mother sent for the Watanabe family1 (apparently they heard me running away and they could recognize my footsteps. Hmm), we went home, heated our chocolate, lit the candles on the cake, and then to the candle light we read Luke 2 and sang Silent night, after which we ate. Not a bad Christmas Eve celebration. The next morning was my phone call with home, which went fine. Everyone sounded happy. Then we went up to the elderly people’s home in Kuroiso, that we went to last time, for a Christmas party. That was a lot of fun and I got to sing to everyone again. After we got home from that and Elder Superti bought a calling card for his call home, we went to another elderly home (one at which Nogami shimai works) we had the same thing (I sang again). We split up and sat at tables to help people, and I was with three women in wheel chairs, who were all very genki and lively. They got Christmas gifts, each of which had a scarf in it. I asked if they wanted to wear it, and they said yes, so I put them on for them. While I was doing that, I got the feeling I would see those women again and they would thank me for that. Interesting. After the party, we dropped off a bunch of bags of candy to people, shared a scripture, and sang. We had a ton of people, so we were quite rushed, but we got done in just 5 minutes overtime. It was a busy Christmas, but I think I got a lot more out of it than one at home with lots of presents and food. Good times.”
i hadn’t remembered the scarf part until i reread this entry this morning. it made me smile.
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this was a poor brazilian family that had recently been baptized. my mom sent hats and gloves for us to give to them as secret santas ↩︎