"Just Around the River Bend..."

"Life is uncharted territory. It reveals its story one moment at a time."

-Leo F. Buscaglia

Sorry, I've got Disney princesses singing in my ear right now.

First Belle, now Pocahontas.

Not that that has anything to do with anything...

{*ahem*}

Just around the corner,

and down a few streets,

there's an LDS Church building.

{A blessed miracle.}

My scriptures were taken at the train station,

gone with my tote bag.

And even though most of the members in my new ward

were hesitant to speak English to me,

they accepted my broken Japanese

with eye-crinkling grins.

And let me borrow an English quad

from the Church library.

I made a new friend

{Sayo}

and with her, came the rest of her family,

all smiles, all happiness.

Especially her grandmother,

who stands as high as my ribcage.

Her words in English,

"welcome to my house"

{she meant, "welcome to Church"}

warmed me up.

There is a sister who served in Hawaii,

who used her English skills to ask me questions like,

"Do you want to make miso?"

&

"Do you want to wear a kimono?"

And when they learned I just celebrated my birthday,

they made me a card

and gave me Japanese biscuits. ♥

The ward here is just like home;

everything is structured the same.

The only difference is the language

and the amount of members.

{There were, at best, 15-20 people in the congregation.}

I'm doing my best to fight off homesickness,

and am sharing these little adventures with you

because I wish you all were here,

experiencing them with me.

{Image via Nelson Seawright}