Amysan

Its been a couple days since arriving back in Seattle.  It feels like only part of me is here.  The other part is half floating somewhere in Japan.  Thankfully, I am not too jetlagged. I sleep when it gets dark and get up when the sun comes up so that’s pretty good.    It feels odd to be back to the old route.  I feel like I suddenly have a lot more time.  I’ve taken that time to reflect on some of the things that I remember about the trip that I dont’ want to forget.

1) The ways in which God was looking out for our team.  I think there are many instances and examples of how God was protecting our team. In many ways, we probably weren’t even aware but if I sit and think of it (which I have done the past couple of days), I begin to see that God really was with us, protecting and guiding us in the right direction.  A few example :

• consider the fact that 18 foreigners travelling on Tokyo’s busy transit system during rush hour and of all the times we took the train, none of us was left behind or got lost.  This seems minor but actually it’s quite a feat.  Try it with some friends.  It’s actually harder than it seems.  I really am amazed that none of us got lost or separated from the group.  Ever.  I’m not even sure we tried that hard to stick together.
• Tokyo’s subway system is a bit complicated. There are local trains that stop at every station and express trains that stop at only major stations.  Everyday, in order to get to Nokendai, we had to take a local train because the station we wanted to get off at was a local stop that an express train would not stop for.  Our very first day, we set out and got on a local train.  We thought we were safe! None of us were really paying attention because our train was stopping at every station – we just had to wait until our station came up.  There is a US navy base located in Yokosuka, near where we live.  One of the servicemen happened to get on our train.  He noticed that we were foreigners from North America and asked us if we knew where we were going. We answered confidently that we did.  He asked us which station we were hoping to get off at.  After we told him, he let us know that we would need to switch trains at the next station as our current train would change to an express train at the next station.   We were baffled.  We had no idea that this could happen!  We were very thankful to our American friend for having introduced himself to us and made sure we were going in the right direction.  Because of him, we made it to the community center in time to set up for VBS on our first day. If we had not bumped into him, we would have missed our station completely and had to back track.  We would not have gotten to the center in time.
• Our day at the park \ picnic.  The water balloon competition was an unexpected surprise. In fact, the company that hosted the event informed us that they hold it annually at the park. We just happened to be at the right place at the right time.  Not only that but the fact that though we won the competition, we had just enough prizes to give to each of the families that was there.  Each family was able to get a prize. We didn’t have leftovers, we didn’t have to have a raffle to give them out fairly.  That was such a good feeling to be able to have just enough to give away.
• Our original schedule included ESL classes in the evening – Mon to Thursday.  I think I failed to mention that those ESL classes were a “failure” – no one showed up unfortunately.  We got together as a group to discuss what went well and what did not.  We agreed as a team that if we had people show up at the ESL class, we would have been burnt out far quicker. Instead we used that time to talk with Shirley and Kohichi about their lives in Japan and we were able to get a bigger and better picture of how God was working in their lives.  It was amazing to hear some of the stories they had to share and I think the time was needed for us to rest and recover from the day’s work.  So even though one might say it is a failure because no one showed up, it still worked out and perhaps was better for our team.
• the day we left for Tokyo, my team had shipped our luggage to the airport using a delivery service.   We had to catch a train in order to meet with the other half of our team so the delivery man took our luggage, signed the papers and we left.  We took our tour of Tokyo and Asakusa and returned to Richards home.  IN the morning, a few hours before we were to catch our bus to the airport, Shirley called Richard to inform us that the delivery service had left the receipt tags in her mailbox.  Without it, we would not be able to claim our luggage at the airport!  Richard was very calm about this. He called the delivery service and asked them what would be required as proof in order to pick up the luggage from the airport.  The service said they would need the receipt numbers and photo ID.  We thought this would be fine, except that the receipts had Shirley’s name on them.  Instead, we decided that Shirley should take a photo of the receipts, email it to Richard and then Richard could print it out. We would bring that to the airport and hope it would be enough.  We wouldn’t know until we got to the airport.  We got the airport and showed them the picture of the receipts. THey looked at us a bit funny but it worked! We didn’t have any problems with our luggage.

It seems like these are really minor things.  But if you add them all up and consider that if each of these hadn’t gone right, then it could have been a pretty horrible trip.  I’m thankful that everything went so smoothly.The Tamuras and Nakamuras. These two families have shown me that life can be different from the norm. They have showed me what it is like to live a life that chases after what is important to God and it is apparent that their hearts bleed for the things that God’s heart bleeds for. They have been so motivating and encouraging for me to see the amount of faith they have and how they are so willing to trust God in all that they do – even with their children’s futures.

2) The Nokendai team. Being a person who values and NEEDS personal space, I thought I would truly go insane from living in such close quarters with 8 strangers. It is amazing how much patience God can give to someone on a short term missions trip though!! Honestly, my teammates made this trip so much fun. No names to be mentioned here but even when things went missing, we all handled it with such grace and forgiveness. And even when we poked fun at certain people, those being made fun of allowed us to laugh at their expense and again, handled it with extra measures of grace. We worked so well as a team – we cleaned up that community center in 10 minutes flat!! We each had our own role in the team that we naturally filled. I believe that we truly operated like the body of Christ. I was so blessed to be part of this team.

3) VBS. I didn’t fully realize the extent of the communication barrier until I got to Japan. It was heart breaking for me when one of the kids ran up to me, said something in Japanese, and I was NOT able to understand what it is that they had just said. I distinctly remember that moment and realized that I would need to use other forms of communication beyond words. During arts and crafts, I had to show them what to do rather than telling them what to do. I smiled more at them hoping it would convey happy positive feelings rather than a neutral face which could be interpretted as positive or negative. While I will always remember the kids and their moms, i will never forget the moment I stopped in the middle of sharing my testimony and saw every pair of eyes on me, and every ear listening. It was so quiet I believe I could have heard a pin drop. In all the previous days at VBS, the kids were bouncing off the walls. It was during that one moment that I had their full complete attention – and this blew me away. It felt like a God moment and I will never forget it. Even in the short time we had with these kids, we developed such good friendships. I will be praying for these kids and their families that VBS has made a positive impact in their lives and that the seeds we planted will grow in good soil.

4) The Tamuras and Nakamuras. These two families have shown me that life can be different from the norm. They have showed me what it is like to live a life that chases after what is important to God and it is apparent that their hearts bleed for the things that God’s heart bleeds for. They have been so motivating and encouraging for me to see the amount of faith they have and how they are so willing to trust God in all that they do – even with their children’s futures.