Obon festival at Ebisu

Here is the Obon festival at Ebisu which was more commercialized and fancier than the one we attended last week.  It was also very, very crowded.  My understanding is that the Obon festival has something to do with remembering the dead ancestors of the people. You can see that this was set up with three levels; the top level had the drummers, the second level, the really good dancers, and the third level were just ordinary people dancing, some dressed up and some not.

 ( I hesitate to send too many of our pictures because you might think we are just playing all the time.  This was just a couple of hours that we spent there on Saturday night.)

Here are some of the ordinary people dancing at street level.

Here are some of the drummers up on top.

Here's some of the food they were cooking and selling.  You had to have been there to see the sights, the crush of people, and to smell all of the aromas of cooking food.



Here they are cooking cabbage to put with the noodles they make.

And more cooking

You just can't get a good idea about just how many people were there

This baby had the right idea

more cooking

Here are more of the people there, although later, the festival pretty much ended abruptly when it began to downpour rain.  Unfortunately, we forgot our umbrella and got soaked.  The people are always very orderly and quiet and polite even when they are in big masses of people, though.

Here are some sweet little boys at the festival

Anyone for food?

Here's Elder Chandler grabbing a bite of noodles and cabbage and red ginger and beef while walking.  We finally found a place to sit down, thanks to a nice Japanese man who set up some chairs for us.  A very nice Japanese lady wanted to know about my badge and what we were doing.  Unfortunately, I wasn't able to communicate very much with her.  I have some pass along cards telling about the church that I will bring with me next time.  However, we are taking a few Japanese lessons here from a sister in the office, so I'm hoping to learn to communicate a little better next time.

Nothing better than a little squid on a stick.  I think we'll have to try that next time, at least I think that one of us will.  Would you like to guess if it will be me?  NOT! ( More adventures later.)

The Obon Festival

Last week we went to the Obon festival and here are two girls dressed especially for the festival in kimonos. 



Some of the booths at the festival

Some of the dressed up girls at the festival



Eating teriyaki chicken and edmame beans roasted in the shells

E

Here was some sumo wrestling that the little boys were doing in a contest

Some of the dancers at the festival.  I liked the little one the best



Elder Chandler eating a fish shaped pastry

at the festival

Pizza hut delivery

Fire Engine ready for action at the festival if needed.  (Yes the engine is very small)

This picture was added in wrong order but this was after about four subway rides when we arrived at Kichijoji where the festival was being held.  This is a big mall where they even have a Seiyu store (Wal-Mart.)  We didn't have time to check it out and we wished we lived closer to this area as the prices for everything are much more reasonable there.

Some of the dancers at the Obone festival

The drummers and dancers.  You had to be there to capture the sounds, smells, and movement.  I have a short video but I can't figure out how to load it on the blog.  Someone please tell me how and I'll add it.

Our Office

Welcome to the 7th floor of the Asia North Area Tokyo office. 
Some people say the whole building inside looks like a miniature
version of the Church office building in Salt Lake City.

Here's the Area President's executive secretary.  Does he look familiar?

A view of his office walls

And another view

A view of the Minato-ku area of Tokyo from his office

Here he is hard at work

Notice the family picture on his desk.  Does that family look familiar?



 I work with three wonderful secretaries who are helping me tremendously!

Their names are Yayoi Tonomi, Emi Mesada, and Faith Watabe.

The other person in the back with the blonde hair is another senior missionary, the area doctor's wife.  As you can see we are working hard and it isn't all play here.  We are enjoying very much our work here in Tokyo.

Our Humble Home

             Welcome to our humble apartment; here is our entryway!

The Kitchen

                                         

Our living and dining room

                                         

And, finally, the bedroom.

                                       

                                    We live in the Minato-ku area of Tokyo

Here's Elder Chandler on one of our early morning walks over-looking the area where we live and work.  We also do exercises in the park a few mornings a week with some of the locals and missionaries.  The exercises are called Ragio Taison which are very good stretching and fitness exercises.



There are lots of overhead power lines everywhere.  Elder Chandler pays particular attention to these.

Roppongi hills, an office and hotel (The Grand Hyatt) complex near our area.

Here's another look at the Roppongil Hills area.

We hope that from this you have been able to understand more about where we live and work.

Ueano Park

                                After working hard all week at the office and beginning

                                to figure out what are assignments are, we took a short

                                trip on Saturday to the Ueano section of Tokyo to see a

                                museum there and to check out the Sushi..

                                                           The Samurai Warriors

                                                           A very old wooden Buddha

                                                    

                                                          Walking in the city

                             We found some watermelon so we didn't miss home as much.

                                      Eating Sushi; notice the rotating sushi selections.

                                  Leaving to go get back on the very clean subway system
                                  to go back to our apartment.  Sayonara!