well, yeah pretty sure you all know about the earthquake. so it hit friday, but the story actually starts on thursday for me. We went with a eikaiwa student and an investigator (Both named suzuki san) to this ocean museum thing, and this beach, then we took a hike to this cliff that looked over the ocean, way beautiful. i put on a few pictures of it, way fun, but then the next day the place was obliterated. we woke up early friday morning to take the train into tokyo because we had a zone conference at the mission home. it was a good conference and all, but i kinda don:t really remember what we were taught honestly. the meeting ended at about 2:30, and i was with president when the earthquake started. everyone was still in the church, and it started kinda small, nothing out of the ordinary, we`ve felt dozens of earthquakes before here, but this one didn`t stop like the rest, it just got stronger. We all filed outside of he church, and president was holding my arm, really tight acually, kinda suprising. but once we got outside, we saw cars bouncing all over the place, and the 20 story apartment building next to the mission home wobbling back and forth, while the tv antennas on top just shook vilolently, I`m really suprised none of them broke off. the quake lasted for about 2 minutes, then we all waited in a kinda field like thing, (There:s not very many open spaces in downtown tokyo) and we were there for a while. The trains were 100 percent stopped everywhere, so there was no getting home. president talked to us a few times, we ended up having to go out to dinner, and on the way found a tv store and all huddled around watching the videos of sendai. it was just insanity. with the trains stopped, thousands of people flooded the streets just walking somewhere, not really knowing where to go. we ate at mcdonads, then went back to the church, watched the otherside of heaven, then half of us slept in the ap`s apartment, and the other half and the sisters slept in the mission home. (in different rooms of course.) it was a crazy night, aftershocks every hour, our phones have this stupid earthquake warning thing that goes of randomly,and it:s a pretty scary sound, that went off twice in the night, i think i slept a total of maybe an hour.
when we woke up, some of the trains were moving, but since we live right on the eastern coast of japan, in this place called chiba. so most of the elders and shimai could get home, but we chilled at the mission home for a while, then the AP`s decided to take me andmy comp, and two sister missionaries who live kinda close to us home by car!!! the ap`s are my old companion, elder guy, (the englishman) and elder sainsbury from payson who is actually jenna sainsbury`s cousin! so we had a road trip! it was supposed to be a 2 hour ride, but the roads were so jam packed that it took us 7 hours to get to the sister`s apartment! pretty fun acually! we tried to stop for food at this one resturaunt, but they were completely out of food! so was all of the convinience stores, grocery stores, and everything! we were lucky to find a place to fill up on gas! i was helpin elder guy put gas in the van, he told me to hit unleaded, so i did, we filled up and kept going. we eventualy found a place to eat, and when we started going again the van almost didn:t start, kinda freaky, but we were moving. we got the the sister`s apartment, got them home and made sure everything was safe at about 6 pm. then the van wouldn:t start, we tried jumping it,but it wasn:t working. so after about an hour of trying to fix things elder guy said to me "that`s weird, we just filled it full of gas" then I asked "is this thing a diesel?" then guy replied with "oh blimie" classic englishman! but we had to stay in a hotel overnight, pretty fun actually.
the next morning, there was one train working, so we barley got home with our stock of bottled water and what little food we could find at the store. we got to church at 9:59, one minute before it started, it was perfect timing. actually my companion had t give a talk, so he got up, and in the middle there was a pretty big aftershock, everyones phone got the earthquake warning, and a few people even ran out, it was pretty funny, then as soon as it calmed back down my companion (over the pulpit) kinda laughed and in japanese just said "earthquake" unfortunatly not many people thought that itwas as funny as i did.
monday we had to stay in our apartment for most the day because they thought that there was going to be radiation problems from the blown up nuclear plants up in fukushima ken, but it`s ok now. I used the time to write a very detailed account of everything in my journal, what i wrote here wasn:t even a fourth of what happened, i`ll have to either copy it and mail it to you, or just tell you in person, i figure there`s going to be enough time once i get back, so i`ll go with that one.
they`re doing scheduled blackouts now, we haven:t been hit yet, they keep telling us that we will though, working is really weird right now, there`s not really any destruction here luckily, but everybody is still freaking out, so housing is not very effective, and no one is on the streets because the trains aren:t moving, they can`t get to work! well, i`ve gotta go, it`s after 9, i`ve gotta go home!
see ya, i love you all, and hopefully i`ll email next week too!
-Elder Olsen
