Team Japan 2003

Alright, so I've noticed that there are a few missing pictures. That's alright, there are a few pictures that I haven't given you all links to. So, if you find any missing pictures, please let me know. If you know my email, please email me which one at the appropriate email address (I don't want to post it on the web). I haven't had the time to check myself, so your help would be appreciated. Thanks!

Alright, this is just plain awesome! I get to help teach an English class at a huge university, Chuo University. It's amazing! The place was huge.

Hiromi is the professor in the two classes that Lindsey and I were guests in. It was awesome! I got to write on a chalkboard and everything!

I must say though, the classrooms are very drab. We're talking about gray painted chipped concrete walls here, scuffed up tile floors and well-used table style desks. Fortunately, some of our students added alot of color to the class.

Unfortunately, all we got to do was introductions. One per person. In a class of twenty, plus two visitors and lots of questions, that's a long class. An hour and a half, actually. But it was a blast. The second class was alot better, they were all good English speakers, despiting being only freshman. The first class was all sophomores, so apparently senioritis has already set it!

Alright, here's the best picture: Chuo University English Class #2

Oh, and here's the fun part: I was asked if I had a girlfriend and got to pass Rachel's picture around class. Everyone thought she was beautiful. That's my international-superstar girl! I think that she's awesome!

So, once all of the Chuo classes were done, all I had left was one individual lesson with a new student. She was cool! Her English wasn't the best, but she has vast amount of converstation in her. We didn't even have a chance of running out of things to talk about. Oh, yeah, she has a name. I can't remember it, but I wrote it down. Let me dig that paper up.

::digs around his notebook::

Kazue Aida. It means something like "Relax Big River". Very American Indian if you ask me. But you aren't, I'm just telling you all.

Alright, so she's got her Associate degree in Dental hygene, just like my mom. And she met her boyfriend online, and he's from Kobe. Kobe is to the west of the Kyoto area. Three hours by bullet train. But she visited him during a special festival in the winter. She had an awesome picture of the lights that are used to celebrate. Kobe looks like a very beautiful place.

After all of that, I had to go home to an empty house.

But I did get to cook my own dinner! Here is what I made: Unaju Set It's teriyaki eel, teriyaki eel stomach, a "salad" (also known as chopped cucumbers and tomatoes with thousand island dressing), miso soup, and a traditional rice cake fish doohicky things (Don't ask the name, I don't know it). Either way, I'm quite proud that I can cook what was essentially instant Japanese food. It's not like I cooked the eel, it was purchased cooked. And Mrs. Hosokawa made the rice before she left for her Bible study with Sensei. I actually nearly ran into her as I was heading home from church!

Tonight we ended up going to C&C Curry. It's not Coffee & Currie like we all know and love, rather its a fastfood type curry. It was actually really good! I got to talk to Caroline a little bit. That was nice, because I had upset her the other day. I had been a little too excited about Japan and how I already knew things and how to get around. I was showy about it, and it upset her and made her feel left out. That was my fault, I should've been more concerned about my teammates. After all, this is their first time and they haven't already spent five weeks here, like I have. I'll just try to be more careful and seek to teach what a know rather than flaunting it.

Evening service went well too. Yoshie translated for us, but I was feeling daring, so I sat on the other side with a Japanese Bible that had the furigana that I can read. I was able to catch juu-ji-kan (the cross of Christ) and the Bible references. But that's about it. I looked up all of the verses later in my Bible, and it made more sense. When they say that the Japanese Bible is a different kind of Japanese, I know that they mean. Even when Sensei is talking about passages of scripture, I can't follow him. Of course, it would help to have a clue about his subject matter be for he talks, or to just plain be fluent in Japanese.

Alright, I'm a little behind here, so I'm doing this from memory on Thursday.

Wednesdays have been designated days of prayer by Tachikawa Church. So we started the day off with two songs and a short team devotion. Well, that just means Jon asked if anyone had anything to share, and I shared a bit on keeping up hope, even though we may not see any immediate results here in Japan. It's not the best morning thing, but its a start for us. At least I got through the songs today. We're trying to make it a regular thing.

From there, it was back down to ni-kai, or second floor for the Japanese-impared. There Sensei shared a short study on the theology behind the cross. For the most part, this morning prayer meeting was a bunch of Americans, and three Japanese.

Following the service, we had a few lessons. I escaped having any today. Instead, I attempted to catch this up, and failed miserably. And I tried to write a long-delayed letter to a certain someone, but I was interrupted constantly by this rowdy bunch of kids. This was the first ever kids group lesson. Sure, there's Midori's class, but this one was meant for children only. The mother's stood by and talked about all the funny Americans while half watching their younger children who wandered around noisily.

While I was writing my letter, I overheard the ladies talking about me writing a letter in English. So I demonstrated that I could also write in Japanese. They were suddenly amazed! And as the kids' lesson ended, some of the children came up to look at my writing. Just for fun, I took to writing the Hirigana on their Romanized nametags. One of the girls was so amazed she went and got all of her friends' nametags and had me write on those too. It was cute, and I had a little fun. They were obviously having a fun time with the American who could write Japanese.

Alright, it's the big kick-off for English lessons! The opening event was Midori Mortimer's kids English class. Jessica, Tim, Jon, Caroline, and Isaiah helped act out a skit about fingers. As you can see from the pictures, they had a blast!

From there, Jessica and I did a whirlwind tour through Josui, teaching a group of older ladies then on to teaching a group of fourth graders. Jessica had a blast with the Barkman girls and I was the gaijin (Foreigner) for the boys. We had a blast! Tomo (Sensei's daughter) shared her testimony with the group before the class was over. Apparently, he interest in English was sparked by reading Peanuts comics! Isn't it a small world?

My personal favorite picture of the day: Takahashi-sensei and Honda-sensei

Oh, then after all of the Josui English Language Institute (JELI) classes, we had one TELI class (Tachikawa English Language Institute). It was the same three ladies from last year. Lindsey and I managed that class with Hiromi. We played Boggle! Awesome idea!

Oh, and that picture of Lindsey, that was taken after I dropped my camera down about four church stairs. Praise the Lord it still works!

From the gardens, we went into the Ginza District which is a well known downtown area. This place is amazing! We went by the Grand Kabuki Theater. The main attraction in Ginza this year was the Hakuhinkan Toy Park. The place was huge! We had a blast running around there. Just about everyone found something that they wanted as a souviener.

From Ginza, we took the Tokyo Subway back home.

From Asakusa, we took the our traditional boat ride down Tokyo Bay. The next stop was Hamarikyu Garden. It's still as beautiful as last year. And it's the perfect picture spot for the team photo.

Today we went to Asakusa again. This was a rerun for Tim and I, but we still enjoyed it. I found some cool gifts for Rachel and Mike. And I got a little something for myself too. It's like a Tomogachi pet, but instead of a digital image, there is a little toy that bobs in water. It's pretty cool. Mrs. Hosokawa explained the instructions to me. Apparently the toy is for ages 6 and up.

On a more serious note, I was somewhat grieved that everything was still the same. The statues still remain. People are stil stuck in their hopeless religion.

Alright, this is why I came to Japan.

Tonight at dinner, Mr. and Mrs. Hosokawa and I were talking about my day, the various meetings, and the Yakuin. The topic of the war came up, and we chatted a little about how no government can ever be perfect, that even the American and Japanese governments are imperfect. Somehow this all led into talking about what we believed. I think it started with the topic of war, when from Iraq to World War II, then over to God's soveriegnty in giving Japan a constitution that allows for the freedom of religion, because now I can come here to Japan to share the gospel, unhindered by man's laws.

Nonetheless, Mr. Hosokawa said that he thinks he may be a Christian because his parents are Christians. Other than that, he says he has no religion. I would say that he's agnostic, because it seems that he recognizes there is a God because of his wife's beliefs (Christianity)

My brain went "Hey! You can't be a Christian that way! You have to choose for yourself, you don't inherit Christ!". And then my mouth followed right after. Praise the Lord that such a topic came up. Together with Mrs. Hosokawa, we all walked through the life of Christ, the depravity of man, the need for salvation, and we had Mr. Hosokawa read the whole of the Romans' Road out of his wife's Japanese Bible.

After all of this, he said it was hard to understand because he was tired. But praise the Lord! This is why I came to Japan. Mr. Hosokawa has never heard the gospel before, not to this extent.

Please keep Mr. Hosokawa in your prayers. Especially Wednesdays, those are our prayer days here at Tachikawa Church. Another thing to pray for is this, on the 13th, which is Mr. Hosokawa's birthday, Mrs. Hosokawa will be baptized at church.

Her baptism is all a result of last year's trip. Little did any of us know last year, but she was an unbeliever. She went to a Bible study in high school with Pastor Takahashi, and when she learned that he was pastoring a church, she decided that she'd like to see him again. And since then, she has been attending church. But we all know that doesn't make her a Christian. That's alright, because after attending church for a while, she came to salvation. She realized that she wasn't a believer and finally recognized Christ as her savior. So after last year's trip, she emailed both Missy and me asking about baptism. I suggested that she read Acts and the gospels. I told her that it wasn't a requirement for salvation, but that it was a response to salvation and a declaration made before others. And I suggested that she ask Pastor Takahashi. After all, he could explain it better in Japanese.

Shortly after this, she started a Bible study with Sensei (Pastor Takahashi, for those of you who are getting lost). Now she understands more about baptism and specially chose her husband's birthday in hopes that this would be a double encouragement for him to attend church. Also, this will be a great example of the Christian faith for him. He will see that his wife is fully commited to Christ.

So, please pray for both of the Hosokawas and this upcoming Sunday, the 13th.

The meeting with the Yakuin was our final event for the day.

In Japan, the war with Iraq is a major issue. Both the Takahashis and the Mortimers briefed us on the topic. The Yakuin were very concerned. So we had a meeting to discuss how to handle it if our homestay family brings it up.

It ended up that Isaiah and I were the only ones with opinions on war an God's soveriegnty. However, this was enough to satisfy the Yakuin. They were quite relieved to hear that we had been breifed on how to deal with anti-American sentements when traveling abroad. And the short discussion on God's soveriegnty was a plus too. Isaiah was able to quote from Japanese missions history.

After our welcome lunch, we had a Bible study. Each of us shared one a topic that the church asked us to talk about. There was also music. Fortunately, the college guys from the church led this, because I didn't have time to prepare any music. And it was packed this year!

I shared on "Encouraging Younger Christians". I had dilly-dallied between passages of scripture to use, then finally decided just to talk about my own life, and how I've seen encouragement acted out. That means, I talked about my Dad and his role in my life, and about my Christian friends in college, and their role in my life. Despite the fact that I thought Mirdori Mortimer was having difficulty translating for me, I was later informed that my way of speaking was the easiest to translate. Go figure.

Mr. and Mrs. Hosokawa and Ukiko attended the lunch and meeting. They didn't make it to church, but it was great to see them there.

Today is our first Sunday at Tachikawa Ekimae Kurisuto Kyokai! It was great! We all went early for Sunday school. Jon, Tim, Isaiah, Jessica, and myself went to the older kids' Sunday school. We had to learn a verse with them. (They learned it in Japanese, we learned it in English.) Jessica shared a very shortened version of her testimony. She was quite nervious, however I heard ii desu ne (Good job) a few times and let her know that the Japanese kids were impressed.

After Sunday school, there was service. Things have changed a little bit. Instead of singing a song with the younger kids before sending them off to class, Sensei now teaches a simplified version of the morning's sermon. This was very fun to watch. Yoshie told us afterwards, that they changed to this method of teaching because they wanted the children to be apart of the church family, even when it comes to Sunday services.

Sensei is currently going through Romans. (I think, I'm not sure if it's his habit to go topically or verse by verse. We'll see next week.) Today's study was in 12:1-2. He explained the meaning of 'Living Sacrifice'.

We were reminded that all that we are and all that we do are to be a offering to the Lord. Sensei illustrated this by having the kids write down their names and put them in the offering baskets.

So, once we go through the whole of service, we were introduced to the church body. Mr. Hidaka, who was translating the introductions, told me that because it was my second time, that I had to introduce myself in Japanese. So I did. I'm sure he was just being funny.

After that, it was upstairs for our welcome lunch and trivia game! That was a blast! Everyone was quite surprised with some of the trivia about Jessica, Isaiah, and Tim. You'd think that by now they'd know that Tim was hena gaijin (weird foreigner).

Tonight, the Hosokawa's (all three of them), took me to dinner. We went to Dohton Buri. There we had okonomi-yaki, which is a bunch of Japanese foodstuffs cooked like a pancake. It's rather excellent, but I filled up on it very quick. We also had hand-made crepes. Oh, mind you, we had to cook this all ourselves on a hotplate built into the table. I was surprised that I could wrap a crepe so easily with chopsticks. But, they were one-bite crepes, so it was pretty easy.

Today, we thought we would go to the gym to play badmiton and ping-pong with some of the youth from the church. However, we needed indoor shoes. Since they didn't carry David's size (Size 15 US) we decided that trying to buy some wasn't worth the trouble. Instead, we opted to go without shoes and wade in the Tama River (Tamagawa). That area was quite beautiful. Plus, we had a fun time, just hanging out with ourselves, Hiromi, and Shin. Shin doesn't speak every much English at all. Last year (Kyo-nen), he was on the fringe at Tachikawa Church, but it appears that he's becoming much more involved.

So, Shin looked like he was left out, and I decided to give my Japanese (Nihon-go) a run for it's money. We were able to talk for quite a bit, and I think it helped him feel a bit more appreciated.

Here's my schedule for the week:

Sunday (nichiyoobi): Sunday school, church service, Lunch with the church. Then the team will lead a two hour Bible study, followed by an hour meeting with the Yakuin (Church Elders).
Monday (getsuyoobi): Tourism trip with Sensei, but he hasn't chosen where yet.
Tuesday (kaiyoobi): English lessons, Jessica and I will go to Josui Church to help teach there. And just about everyone has an individual lesson that night.
Wednesday (suiyoobi): Day of the week for prayer, Morning prayer meeting, afternoon English lessons with kids, meeting with Sensei, evening prayer service.
Thursday (mokuyoobi): Team goes to Kamakura with Tachikawa Church ladies group, but Hiromi, Lindsey, and myself will go to Chuo University to teach English there. (This is awesome! I get to teach English at a Japanese University! Amazing! Sugoi!)
Friday (kinyoobi): Late afternoon English lesson, and two evening lessons.
Saturday (doyoobi): Pass out flyers at Josui Church.

Today was mostly meetings. I ended up getting to Tachikawa Church at about 9:30AM. Unfortunately, none of the malls opened until 10AM. So, I opted to just read a bit and listen to music. I went around the church to see if I noticed anything different. A few things in the church have changed. I did notice quite a few things in Tachikawa that changed, like some construction from last year that finally finished.

Our meetings were with the team, meaning all of us Americans, Sensei, Yoshie, Christ Mortimer, and Hiromi. We went over just about everything. Cultural issues with homestays. Things like, don't open the fridge. Don't waste anything! Then things like teaching English, and our schedule for the week. I'll put that up here, but currently I don't have it with me.

We also planned to go to Coffee & Curry for lunch, but there were too many of us. Instead, we went to a Chinese restaurant in Granduo Mall. It was great! Except for when Tim tried to cut this ball thing in fourths for some of us guys to split. Instead of cutting the food in half, he broke the chopstick in half. Chris Mortimer got a great picture of in on his cell phone. (Yes, cell phones are cameras here!)

Then, we returned to the church for continued meetings.

I wasn't sure what time Mrs. Hosokawa would be home tonight, so I went to the Mortimer's in the meantime. I though Mrs. Hosokawa would be home late because her shift started at noon. But, it ended up that she was home at 6:30PM. I'll have to be more careful and ask when the Hosokawas come home. Then I'll know when I have to be home. I'm so clueless.

But, we're home now, and enjoying some Yaki Tori, or Japanese fried chicken. Oishii desu ne!

Well, 9 hours of sleep did me good. I hope that the others are managing well. Let's see if I can remember where everyone is staying.

Ladies frist: Joy was the first to leave last night. She'll be at the Satayama's. They speak no English, and only Mrs. Satayama is a Christian. Mr. Satayama was very hard on her when she became a Christian, but he came to Gospel Night last year, which is a HUGE step, thanks to Christi's prodding and the Lord's will. Lindsey was next, she's staying at Hiromi's. Hiromi has a great famialy, but I think also is the only believer. Lindsey should have fun there. That's where Amanda stayed last year. Then there's Jessica and Caroline, they're both staying with the Mortimer's. (I think. Jessica for sure.) Just about everyone stayed at the Mortimer's last year. They're the missionaries that we worth with in Japan.

Alright, guys turn. Tim and Isaiah will be at Mrs. Omura's. Tim stayed there last year. Mrs. Omura has been both a widow and a Christian for years. She also has excellent English, so good, that she teaches English lessons. David and Jon will be at the Takahashi's. No problem there, they're the pastor's family. Then, lastly, I'm staying with the Hosokawas! Here's a few pictures of my room and view from the window.

Alright, it's just about breakfast time. I've been up since 6:45AM for no reason. I just couldn't sleep in, considering I don't have to be at church until 11AM. Sensei will most likely take us to Cofee & Curry, just like last year. It's the best place to get curry in Japan! Until then, I'll probably go window shopping, since I haven't gotten my money changed. Thank God, I have enough left over Yen from last year for the monorail ticket.

Well Mrs. Hosokawa picked me up at the bus stop after we all got dinner. It just started raining so she called her mother-in-law to pick us up at one of the earlier stations. That way we could get my suitcase home without getting soaked in the rain. Both Nobuko and Ukiko were glad to see me. We had a fun time taking in Japanese and English on the trip home.

Unfortunately, Mr. Hosokawa didn't get home until late, so I'll have to wait until morning to see him.

My room at the Hosokawa's

Finally, our destination in Japan. It was a long, two hour bus ride, but we're here now with all our luggage. Well, almost all our luggage. Tim grabbed the wrong suitcase at the airport. So currently, he has no additional clothes or his travel money. Yoshie was able to work with the airport bus driver to find out a solution. Tim's bag was left at the airport with Korean Air, but the other gentleman, who's bag Tim had, has to be paid 5000 Yen to settle down about his missing bag. So after bags are traded and Tim pays 5000 Yen things will be as they should. This is rather frustrating. So please keep this in your prayers.

Speaking of frustrating, I broke my watch. It's not a big problem (and it's not my camera, at least!) but it's a little frustrating.

We're here! Stood in line for about 45 minuites to get through immigration, but no hassles this year. We knew what form we needed before we even go there. That definitely helped. However, something quite unplanned happened.

Alright, a foriegn film, and Japanese at that. This was definitly the winner of the three. Here, we have a government official investigating bizzared resurrections. Apparently, if people make an ardent wish for their loved ones to return, they suddenly do! And the ressurected ones have no clue what's going on. This sounds qutie bizzare, and it is, but it made for an excellent movie, if not slightly depressing, for the resurrected ones must eventually return. Yomigaei was rated PG13, for what reason, I do not know. It was perfectly clean. Perhaps the whole situation would just be too intense for kids. But this movie gets two thumbs up.

I though I'd make this a little interesting and put in some reviews of the in-flight movies.

The first of these was "Kangaroo Jack". Thumbs down, definitely. It was rated PG for some humor, which might've well been PG13. There were a few jokes worth hearing, but some of them were just uncalled for. Now let's talk about plot. An American boy finds out his dad is a mobster, because his best friend just did a 'job' for him and screwd up. So, now they both have to deliver $50,000 to some guy in the middle of Australia. Little to they know, they'd be paying for their own execution. However, during their travels they discover that they're carrying mob money. Then while traveling, they hit a kangaroo. So for fun they decide to put the 'lucky jaket' on it. But kangaroo is just fine and gets up and hopps off carrying the money in one of the jaket pockets. Ensue chase scenes, etc. That's the whole movie. Amazingly enough, the movie really isn't about a talking kangaroo as one would expect.

36000 feet and a few thousand more miles to go. Checking our bags went well. No problems there. The most bizzare thing was that they assigned our seats when we checked in. So Tim had to check in separately in order to change his return flight. (He's staying longer in Japan to meet his girlfriend's (Chie's) parents. So he ended up in row 36 while the rest of us sat two by two somewhere near row 50.