Triple Zone Apartment Inspection Adventures

Sometimes my heart is so full of love, it feels like it could burst and send off beautiful fireworks.  That’s the way we feel working with the missionaries, the members, and the Kagoshima community.  A few months ago our mission president and his wife asked us to visit and inspect missionary apartments in other zones.  We ended up inspecting our regular Kagoshima Zone, and Kumamoto Zones 1 and 2.  Three zones!  We really need some new senior couples to replace the ones that finished their missions and returned home.  We felt honored and thankful that the president and his wife and the Lord would trust us with this assignment.  We prayed, pondered, and mapped out how we could get it all done.  We made phone calls to seventeen apartments to tentatively line up appointments, then had to call them all back again to finalize them.  They were so good to adjust their schedules so we could accomplish this task.  Just talking on the phone we felt so much love, admiration, and appreciation for them, even before ever meeting them.  We received permission to stay in the empty Kumamoto Senior Couple’s Apartment.  We drove there after our Sunday block of meetings and spent the night.  We got up early Monday morning to go to Kumamoto Zone 1, which consisted of twenty elders and sisters.  We not only mapped it out, but also typed it all into our GPS unit.  Some apartments were more difficult to find.  They were behind buildings and down narrow streets and the GPS only got us nearby.  Somehow we did it.  The missionaries did a great job of cleaning.  They also made us feel loved and welcome.  We rewarded them with treats:  Salsa, cheese, flat tortillas, bags or Doritos, and fruit.  We went back to Kumamoto the following Sunday evening also and spent the night in preparation to inspect Kumamoto Zone 2, which consisted of fourteen elders and sisters.  These were all a lot further away, one the other side of the island of Kyushu from where we were staying.  They also adapted their schedules so we could accomplish this assignment.  We split up our Kagoshima Zone inspection visits into several days.  We also made a commitment to not miss teaching our English classes twice each week, visit our part-member and less-active families, teach Zumba, and attend our mission and district meetings and our regular Sunday meetings.  We were blessed in so many ways, but especially with safety as we drove over 2,000 kilometers (1,242 miles) much of it on unknown roads.  Our missionaries are great!

 

 

Kumamoto Stake Center is to the left and the Senior Couple Apartment is the high rise to the right.

 

Inside the Kumamoto Senior Couple's Apartment.

 

Senior Couple's Kitchen.

 

We went through a lot of toll booths and we had a lot of rain.  

 

Missionary Kitchen--nice and clean.

 

Orderly Missionary Futon and Clothes Closet.

 

Another Missionary Kitchen and Food Pantry.  They use a lot of little shelves for storage.

 

Typical view from many of the missionary apartments.

 

This costal stretch of highway had a lot of fog and these were road protectors.

 

More road fog protectors.

 

An interesting pedestrian bridge in a coastal fog.

 

Steam coming from hot springs scattered throughout the hills in Beppu and Oita.

 

We travel through a lot of long tunnels, some several kilometers long.

 

The rain is a blessing to the rice farms found along all of the highways. 

 

One of the interesting things we see along the streets on our journey. 

 

A Walk Through the Neighborhood Seeing Garages and Carports

This morning looked like minimal ash and good weather.  I took a 6:00am walk through our neighborhood.  Our area is a mixture of many older homes (a few sitting totally empty and deteriorating), a sprinkling of newer freshly built homes, a couple of gated mansions, and a few apartments.  It is interesting to see how they park their cars.  Somewhat similar to America, there are carports, actual garages, or nothing.  Japanese have a tradition of usually backing into their parking spots.  It is pretty amazing at times, how they get their cars into tiny spots.

 I have to mention the wonderful neighbors.  We are so lucky, and feel so thankful to be in this particular neighborhood.  The neighbors say hello and talk with us (Glenn), they rake leaves along the roadside edge of our yard (not being critical, just kind), give us fruits and vegetables (we also give them things), and all seem nice and family oriented.  One of them even came to our Christmas activity.  We are over 65, with many of our neighbors being our age or much older.  There are a growing number of young families with children.  It is fun to interact with them at times.  Most families have a dog, so they are out walking the dogs often.  The couple next door has two dogs. When she found out we had none, she said “So sad to not have any dogs”.

So here is a view of our neighborhood.  

 

 

 

 

You can't tell, but this is one of the huge gated mansions.

 

This one built a garage way in back, and has a nice long driveway.

 

Just a block and a half away from the mansion is this tiny ancient house, that's really kind of cute.

 

 

This is a nice snug car port, just off the road.

 

Right next to the ancient little house, this new one was built, with no car port.

 

A few houses up the road is a big Taxi station, making our neighborhood busy with taxis coming and going.  Guess it's nice if we ever need one.

 

Past the taxi station is a little green stretch (very tight for two cars and pedestrians).

 

 

A little side road off to the right shows a car port, and a mini port off to the left.

 

Beautiful, but narrow street. Notice the concrete garage on the right, just past the mossy wall.

 

This is also a new home with no garage or car port.

 

This is a nice garage, with a door that is never closed.

 

This is our neighbor's car cubby, underneath their home.

 

Another car cubby, and the narrow driveway goes up and makes a zigzag.  notice the mirror in the orange pole.  They have mirrors all over our neighborhood, and various places around town.

 

Left to right, small car port, no garage, and cubby.

 

Steep driveway on the right.

 

Cute orange mailbox on the left.  The road curves where that car is, and becomes one of the steepest roads.  You can't tell from photos how steep and narrow these roads are.

 

Some interesting covered and uncovered front porches to their houses. Notice the potted plants lining the one on the right.

 

This is one of the deserted deteriorating homes.  Weeds and flowers are grown over the walkway to the front door.  In its day it was probably beautiful.

 

Last but not least, is an interesting large home.  Even though we feel very safe here, for one reason or another, this owner must not feel safe, and put barbed wire completely surrounding the home. We will have to make friends with them someday, so they will know that they don't have to be afraid of us.

 

We feel very thankful and lucky to feel so safe.  Again, the other evening I had to walk home alone from church at 9:00pm. so Glenn to take a carload of people to town.  I'm not wild to have to walk alone, but at least I feel safe.  Japan, and Kagoshima City are a great place to live.

 

The Day the Sun Darkened

Thursday April 23, 2015 Glenn and I were making a quick run to A-Price, a local store, to buy some American food ( like a large ranch dressing, some Doritos for a taco salad, a big bag of grated cheddar cheese, and some other miscellaneous groceries).  On our way we noticed a huge volcanic explosion.  We stopped by Dolphin Port, where the local ferries dock, to take some pictures.  It was so intriguing to see the plume of ash move closer and closer towards us.  While by the water we also lingered awhile and took pictures of a group of jelly fish and man-of-wars, and talked to a fisherman sitting on the dock.  We continued taking pictures of the plume as it crept towards us.  It gradually got more and more dark overhead.  At A-Price Glenn sat in the car with the windows down while I shopped.  The ash blocked the sun and darkened the sky as if it were going to storm, then ash started to “rain.”  Glenn quickly rolled up the car windows and I quickly ran from the store to load groceries in the trunk.  I could feel ash in my eyes, even though I had glasses on.  Once in the car we dusted ash granules of our clothes.  From there we drove 30-45 minutes away to a small rural village to find someone’s house who we had been asked by a member to visit.  Pedestrians and bikers were holding newspapers and little towels over their heads, eyes, noses and mouths.  The ash dust whipped up and billowed on the roads.  It was over in two hours, but the road dust lingered a day or so longer.  The volcanic bursts are various sizes, but are pretty constant.  It is in a very active phase.  Yes, we feel a little nervous, but anywhere people live there are potential dangers.  We just try to be observant, use good judgement in our actions, and trust the Lord will guide and help us.  By the way, we never could find the lady’s house, but met four different sets of people while asking for directions.  I fell in love with each set, especially the old farmer and his wife.  Maybe we’ll go back and visit them when we try to find this lady’s house next time.   

 

Watching the movement of the plume.

 

Billowing ash on the highway.

 

 

Man-of-War

 

 

Jelly Fish

 

Living Here is a Blast; or More About the Volcano

It is so interesting living next to a volcano.  Every morning we look out the window to see which way the ash is blowing.  We hope that it is blowing out to sea, but several times a week it blows toward us, leaving a thin (sometimes thick) layer of ash on cars, plants, roads, etc. It’s like tiny gritty bits of glass.  People often wear medical face masks because of it.  I picked up a couple of chunks volcanic rocks, and got a glass sliver in my finger.  Note to self: wear work gloves.
 

We looked up some facts, and in general, the volcano erupts once every 4 to 24 hours.

In the 1970’s it erupted once a day.

In the 1980’s one or two per day, with volcanic bombs, some damage to cars and houses.

In 1995 there were long pauses, several days between explosions.

2000 to 2005 were 150 to 200 eruptions per year.

2006 to 2010 erupting between one to five day intervals. 

2015 March 16, one plume rose 14,000 ft. above the crater.

2015 March 18, ten eruptions

2015 March 27, 14 eruptions, one plume rose about 13,000 ft., and is in a very active phase.

Any country has challenging environmental things, such as tornados, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanos, etc.  The important thing is to be alert and aware of our surroundings.  Our church has encouraged us to have an emergency preparedness backpack with some money, food, change of clothes, first aid kit that we can grab and run, if necessary.  We are also encouraged to have a good storage supply of water and nonperishable food.  “If ye are prepared, ye shall not fear”.  (D&C 30:30) This gives us great comfort.  Aren’t we all in the Lord’s hands wherever we are anyway?  We will trust Him.

Here are some of our favorite photos of the volcano: