Japan Day One: Sendai

Japan was so much fun and I have so many pictures that there will have to be several posts about the trip. We were able to visit 4 cities, starting with Sendai. We landed in Tokyo and right after our 11+ hour flight, we hopped on a 3 hour train ride with my parents to Sendai. We went straight to bed when we arrived at our hotel around 10:30 pm.
First thing the next morning we headed to the mission home to get Mark! We waited around for about an hour until he showed his face.

It was great to see him again. Seemed like a long time had passed and like it was yesterday we said goodbye all at the same time.

We had to check and see if he had grown any on his mission...he is cheating in this pic and standing on his tippy toes.

After a nice meeting with Mark's Mission president and his wife and all the Zone Leaders (I think that is who they were. ;) We headed out for some lunch with our helpful chauffeur, Moma (I probably spelled that wrong.)

Monma took us to Kapasushi (no idea how to spell that either ha.) Mark gave my parents a quick lesson in chopstick use.

This place was pretty cool because the food just went past your table on a little conveyor belt and if you wanted something, you just took the plate off and ate it. If you wanted to special order something, you did it with that screen in the back and a little train zipped it out to you.

See how quickly my dad learned to use chopsticks? haha! This might be one of my favorite pictures.

It was fun trying some new things and enjoying some things we already had experienced before. A "waitress" would come by your table when you were finished and count the plates on your table. It was approximately $1 a plate and there were 2 pieces of sushi to a plate....too bad this wasn't all of the plates. :)

My parents weren't excited about trying the raw stuff, but they gave it a shot. Needless to say, this wasn't their favorite place to eat. :)

After lunch we went to the church and were able to witness a baptism. It was a unique opportunity for all of us.

Saying goodbye to Monma as he dropped us off at our hotel.

Our day wasn't over yet though...we still had a baseball game to go to! We headed out and got to the eki (again I don't know what this word is really supposed to be, but it means train station...I think.) Justin realized we would probably need the baseball tickets, so we all waited while he ran back to get them.

Here he comes!

Here is where we officially got to make Mark feel like a tourist. He had tried to avoid looking like a tourist his whole mission, and now he wasn't able to avoid it. :)

The game was very cool. It started off pretty entertaining when the Eagles coach (an American who doesn't speak Japanese) gave a demonstration on how the runner couldn't have been safe when his catcher was laying on home plate.

Whichever team was up to bat had their fans chanting and making noise non-stop. The Eagles were the home team and unfortunately lost by one after making a great run for the win in the 9th. The people around us, enjoyed listening to us talk (according to Mark. Luckily he could understand them and they weren't saying mean things about us.;) When Justin got excited and would cheer loudly, some drunk men behind us and some older women in front of us would give us high fives. They seemed to be getting quite the kick out of us.

The atmosphere at the game was very similar to a game in the states, but it was a little strange to see people enjoying plates of sushi instead of hot dogs and peanuts.

Another cool thing the fans did, was blow up this weird balloons, do a cheer, and then let the whistling balloons go. It was a pretty cool site to see. Plus, I think it woke my parents up a bit. ;)

We were definitely ready for bed when the game was over.