We put the Tea in Toyota

Hey our eager followers!!

So we have been slightly rebelious lately and have not posted anything for a while. Sorry I am sure that dissapointed all of you. But , do not worry this post will be extra long. So I think we left you with Tuesday night, how we walked to the disappointing Jusco and then we came back to the church and decorated it with paper chains and balloons, it looked very classy.

So, on wednesday was the first day of kids club and let me tell you those balloons were a hit. It is funny to watch how amused children are by balloons they like looking through them, and watching them float and hitting them, balloons are just loads of fun! So basically the kids were super great and yeah thats it. Duck duck goose was a big hit I must say, we defss played it for a solid half hour. So yeah, they learned how to say what their names were and whether they liked or didn't like certain animals and colors... at least, we tried to teach them. We learned that Japanese kids can make a baseball game out of wadded up paper scraps and house slippers and that they don't care if you can't speak Japanese as long as you are willing to play with them and soak them with water balloons.

Kid's Club lasted through Thursday and Friday, then Saturday we had a day off... so what do you think we did???? Walk to Jusco, of course!! Yes, that's right. We did it again, but this time, we took a new route to a different one, which ended up being way closer and way better. Before I get into that story I will tell you about our friday its luisa ps. So friday we went for dinner with these two amazing girls! They were 21 and were close friends. We actually didn`t know them before this dinner so it could have been really awkward BUT it wasn`t. Akina and Asami picked us up and took us to a nice dinner. Im sure your dying to know how them met right? Well in high school they were parteners on the athletic tennis table team. Yes pretty great we thought so too. ANYWAYS It was good time some good laughs great pair those two! Anyways I want to tell you about what we did after! So we went for ice cream at Baskin Robbins and had a long, indirect discussion about what to do that night... we were tossing around the idea of going bowling, but with one innocent question about an onsen, suddenly we were headed to the public baths.

Let me tell you a little about the onsen here in Japan. Japanese society is very interesting in that they value modesty so much in normal life, but they are totally okay with public baths and being completely naked in front of each other. Men and women go to different areas, you rent a couple of (really small) towels, and you strip down in the locker room and you go out into the bath area. First you sit down at a little booth and shower off, washing everything. Then once you're clean, you can go sit around in any of the baths that you want. There was a huge warm pool, and jet baths and a silk bath, and a shallow pool you could lie down in, and personal round tubs, and a cold bath, and a big warm pool with a TV... some of them were inside, some were outside and all of them were great. That's right, we tried pretty much all of them. We even sweated inside the sauna a little bit, just to try it. And all with two girls that we'd barely met and a whole lot of Japanese women that we didn't know from Eve (reference to Eve made on purpose). But honestly, we all loved it after we got over the initial awkwardness. Onsens are awesome and we're fans of getting a few back in North America... but our culture values privacy way too much to ever allow it, so I guess we'll just have to come back to Japan for them!

Anyways the walk to Jusco was a lot more fun for everyone, especially Kiara, who talked about Hilary Duff the whole way. Apparently she's cool again and who needs Hannah Montana when you have Hilary Duff? (Luisa loves Hannah Montanan and seriously shes way better but kiara likes Hilary) That was the basic conclusion we arrived at, I think. Anyways, Jusco was great this time around and we finally got it out of our system. Then on the way home, it started to pour rain!! Luckily for us, there was a dollar store close by, so we ran in and bought umbrellas for the rest of the way. Then that night, we were picked up and taken to shop again at a mall in a nearby city... unfortunately, we were all shopped out for that day, so we didn't enjoy the stores as much as we would've otherwise, BUT there was definitely a Coldstone in the mall and we definitely got some ice cream, which was sooooo good. Also, Japanese Coldstone employees rock, because THEY SING TO YOU WHILE THEY MAKE YOUR ICE CREAM! How amazing is that? We took a video.

Sunday, we were out of our house from ten fifteen straight until two in the morning... it was ridiculously busy. We went to church and were part of the service, singing Kid's Club songs with the kids and sharing our testimonies. Then we had lunch at the church and said goodbye to everyone. Then we left to go to karaoke with Suellen and Susan from church--- which was super fun! Then we went to a church member's family member's house to dress in yukatas (summer kimonos) to go to the festival in Toyota... which we immediately went to. It was so crowded downtown, so we didn't stay long. THEN we went to park and walk to see the fireworks down in a field-type of place, and THEN it started to pour down rain, again! So we got soaked in the yukatas, didn't see the fireworks, and went back to Jusco to buy some other clothes so we could go back to the onsen to relax, which turned out not happening... instead we were driven 40 minutes out to a game center in our awful mismatched outfits (Allison's was definitely the worst) where we played video games, ping pong, and took pictures until it was time to leave. Finally, we got to go back home and sleep...

Monday was sort of boring, blog-wise... we packed up, did laundry, hung it out to dry, walked to the post office, and cleaned the house. After we slept in, of course. It was sort of depressing, knowing it was our last day in Toyota, where we've had such great memories. We'll miss the people at that church, and all of those great kids.

now we are in Fujigaoka its great we just spent the two hours playing video games with our host family pretty great oh and we went to a tea ceremony and dressed in Kimono which were so pretty!! Kiara got a wedding one pretty awesome. We had some sweets again... not as bad pretty deece but cool thing was we got to do the whole serving tea to others like hardcore tea master even though we werent perfect kind of cool! anyways we stayed up way to late playing video games and we are kind of in love with this family. Its great.

WELL it night time

ps kiara`s eyes are like the sunshine so we are told!

well peace out Tea time

LOVE

LUISA and crew yo
(even though i just finished this blog)

Breakin' the yoke in YOKohama

Okay, so we have a few days to catch up all you eager followers up on. Let us begin our journey of the past few days on Saturday. The day after Friday. Okay, so on Saturday we had a luncheon at the church in Yokohama. The point was to give the attendees a chance to speak English with native speakers and share our testimonies in small ways. We showed pictures from home-- great fun! Many of you reading this were probably talked about that day. We met some cool people, we played some games with English, and answered a lot of questions about our cultures and homes. AFTER, we went to the park and played with little kidlets. Megumina-oka church has been going to this park once a month for ten years, playing with the local kids and sharing a little gospel message with them, inviting them to their church. So we helped out this weekend and played with bubbles-- which I think we enjoyed more then they did-- to attract the local kids. Then we did a skit which ended up being kind of over their heads and had to be explained in detail... so that sort of flopped. But a few kids ended up being interested and came back to the church with us later to see where it was and eat some snacks.

That night, we took the subway to a church member's apartment for dinner and to watch the fireworks for the summer festival in Tokyo. That's right. We watched fireworks for an hour and a half in TOKYO! It was awesome. The next morning was church. I was super brave and shared my testimony in front of church. Then we all got up to do the "special music" together. Let's just say that it was really special... our guitarist was fabulous... we hoped that our bright smiles made up for our less-than-professional voices. At least we tried... After church, we had another luncheon with young adults and university students. It was really fun to talk with them about what they like to do, and they asked a lot of questions about Canada and the States. Leaving Yokohama that afternoon was hard; we all talked about what we'd learned that weekend on the shinkansen (bullet train) back to Nagoya.

Megumina-oka is the only MB church for the whole Tokyo-Yokohama area, a church with about 40-50 members with over 28 million people living in that area. Our eyes were opened to the overwhelming need for missionaries in that area in particular, but Japan as a whole, too. Less than one percent of the population of Japan is Christian!!! We sat and talked about how we realized our missions trip is different than if we had gone to a developing country. Japan's looked at as a rich country, not really needing people to come help because they aren't poor. But actually, they are impoverished spiritually. In Tokyo, there's at least one suicide everyday. In poor countries, people are hopeless because they have nothing. These people are hopeless because they have nothing but a life focused on work and being successful. Our mission here is clearly focused on the people and evangelism, we realized.

Monday we helped Nozomi with the Kids Event for her English school. Moose. Okay, so due to popular demand I Kiara am going to take over post writing. Okay so the event at the school was lovely, before it began we met Wendy, who was pretty much the coolest 28 year old I have ever met. She had a great Jurassic Park hat, which really made me take her more seriously. So, the event began and 40 some kids came strolling in. We sang songs with them, made crafts with them, did a skit, said a story...and played simon says, but Lu went so fast that the poor non english speaking kids got so confused... so mean. Then we played some games outside, which was a good time. By the way Japanese girls take their dodge ball very seriously, they don't stand back they are intense and put their game faces on. It was a little intimidating, I was out in the first 2 minutes, it was a little upsetting. Okay, so it was a good time and the children were cute and great and awesome. Then we went out to dinner with all the people who volunteered for the kids event. We had these interesting sea food pancake things... they were not like anything I had before, the pancakes were alright but we got to make our own cotton candy and shaved ice.. that was sooooo much more exciting. Okay, I just thought I would tell you about that dinner since we like to talk about food so much.

So we were dropped of in Toyota last night. We are back home it is sooo exciting. We slept in till around 11:00 today and I was pretty pleased about that. Then we had a short meeting with Mariko about all that we will be doing in Toyota. Then after that we went to the I-Mall. We ate ice cream, I got maple wall nut, I was pretty pleased with that. Then, we got some groceries... but I am not going to go in depth of all that we bought. But I will tell you this we bought Calpis, which is a drink and Mariko told us what it sounded like, that cracked me up a little bit. I think you guys can use your brains and figure out what it means. By the way I like drinking Calpis, Calpis tastes really good. When we got back we needed a refreshment and we thought Calpis would really quench our thirst. Then we went on a journey, a long eventful life rendering crazy wonderful blash kazoom bam distasteful JOURNEY. Lu will take it from here, ennjoy!!!

SO, this long eventful life rendering crazy wonderful blash kazoom bam distasteful JOURNEY was to ... our favorite store JUSCO!! WHICH WAS SUCH A DISSAPOINTMENt. At first. we walked about an hour just to get there! all alone to Japan yea were rebels. So that was a blast and haft not going to lie. We got there finally after crossing the Golden Arches; going over a big bridge; past the toyota stadium and over a fence which allison didn't like but it was such a smart idea! she still doesn't think so. So as we crossed the street at the big crab castle we saw the big JUSCO sign and got real excited! To our dissapointment it wasn't a big one and their was not much there. It got so upsetting that we had to eat our sorrow away with McDicks. and more ice cream, yea we were way happier and ended up getting alot more after that point. Including awesome watch me and kiara purchured, you should see them they are pretty ballin. Evenually we left and walked ALL the way back after walking ALL the way there and doing ALL the shopping that we did. It was ALL around a good time! On the way home we talked about movies so I could probably tell you all about two movies I've never seen!

ANYWAYS so we still had to decorate the chruch for tomorrow when we got back. Which was around nine, and there were people there! We hustled over as fast and we could just to do it. we did it. It looks great. So now we are writing this way over tiered so i will just say some great points from tonight just to end this off.

"tricky ricky"

"high buns"

"FINGURES FINGURE FINGURE"

sorry excuse Luisa, she doesn't know how to spell finger... It is late

"grounded"

"put your feet up"

"YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL"

"One slap to many"

"No I dont want no scrubs"

"Peter pan invented Wendy.. true story"

"Real"

"lets G-O go pal"

Okay, so there are some mildly funny jokes. But it is rather late here and I am hearing some random sounds in this empty church, which I'm not going to lie, is a little sketchy. So we are going to B-counce of Bzounce. Or go away. Bye

Written by the some what talented,

Karabou, Al Pal and Tlulu bear

Tokyo Drift

Hi from Yokohama/Tokyo!

It's pretty incredible thinking about the opportunities that we've been given... we're going on a tour of the gorgeous country of Japan as we travel around to different MB churches that we're serving with. Today we took the shinkansen (bullet train) from Nagoya to Shin-Yokohama, where we met Pastor Fuwa and Keiko, another church member. When we went out to the parking area, they had to give the attendant their parking ticket. We sat in a little waiting room until she told us we could go out there, and when we walked through the door, the van was waiting on a little platform, all ready for us... it was so cool! It doesn't sound cool, but it really was and I wish I could make you understand exactly how awesome that moment was for us. After a good lunch of fried pork and rice, we settled into the living area of the Megumino-oka Church. All three of us are in the one bedroom with air conditioning... good thing we're friends already! We spent this afternoon and evening taking the metro into Tokyo with Keiko. We went to the Imperial Palace and met the Emperor of Japan! He gave us a tour of the palace and he has dark hair and dark eyes, in case you were wondering................. just kidding! The Palace was closed for tours by the time we arrived and the security would never have let us near the Emperor anyways. But the grounds were beautiful, full of cherry trees and green lawns that went on forever.

Then we went to the Times Square of Tokyo... Shibuya. There were tons of stores and tons of lights and thousands of people and there we were, in our wrinkled sweaty traveling clothes, feeling crumpled and very unfashionable. However, it was cool to walk around and see the heart of the city. We sat down for dinner at a chic little restaurant which handily had everything on the menu translated into English and served such cultural delicacies as caesar salad and seafood pizza. Once in a while, it's nice to find some familiar food after trying so many new Japanese foods, just to remind our stomachs of home a little bit. Coming back to Yokohama on a very crowded metro train, we bought some bread for breakfast at the Little Mermaid bakery across from the station, then had a meeting with the church members about what we'll get to do with them this weekend. We'll be doing a lot of free talking in English with all ages, singing, doing our drimes, and... dun dun dun... lots of testimony sharing. So do pray for courage for us in the slightly unnerving area of public speaking.

So yeah, that was today! I'll rewind a little and catch you all up on what we've been up to between the last post and now: Wednesday was Doris's last day with us (so sad-- and a little scary!) and it was a pretty unplanned day for most of the morning and afternoon... so we had a good chance to rest, process, and reflect on everything that had been happening. In the evening, Su and Susan, two girls from the Toyota church came to pick us up and drive us to Nagoya. We all had ice cream at Baskin Robbins together-- a little taste of home in a scoop of Jamoca Oreo-- and then said goodbye to Doris at the metro. Not going to lie, it was hard to see her walk away, not only as a friend we've made over the past week, but also as our intercessor in a culture where all we know how to say is "Thank you" and "I'm from America/Canada." But hanging out with Su and Susan that night was really fun... we shopped, of course, then sang very loudly and attempted to dance in the van on the way to Brazilian pizza. My moves were the best, as always... LIE! Luckily, I was in the back of the van, so it was a voluntary choice for Kiara and Luisa to turn around and witness the sad state of affairs that my dancing ability is in. I had a good time, though... anyways, pizza was good and we learned how to say "Thank you" in Portuguese. Also, on the way home, we had another failed attempt at shopping at Jusco... we'll keep trying though, because those bargains on clothes cannot evade us forever.

Thursday, Nozomi picked us up at nine and drove us to Seto, a center for pottery crafting in the area. We walked across half of the town, looking at different pottery shops and we even visited a pottery workshop where we saw the process in action. Kiara and Luisa were ready to eat an ice cream bar by the time we left... I wanted to paint a vase. They got their wish. I didn't. We got back to the church in time for one ice cream bar before leaving to catch the school kids to pass out flyers for the Toyota Church summer kid's club next week. We were driving down the road to the school when suddenly we rounded a corner and saw a flood of little yellow hats already bobbing down the sidewalk... the kids had already been released from school!!! Inoue-san peeled into a side street, threw the car into park, and shoved the flyers at us as we raced out of the car, chasing the innocent little kids up the street. We were smiling and trying to be friendly, but I'm wondering if we came off a little strong. Some kids ran away from Luisa and a lot of the ones I approached averted their eyes and walked a little faster... I have no idea why, though. Kids love being chased up sidewalks by foreign visitors to their country, right? No really though, a lot of them were really cute and excited to say "Hello" and use their English... and they started reading the flyers as soon as we gave them out, talking with their friends, so we're praying that many of them will sign up to come next week.

That night, we were slightly lame and walked to McDonald's for dinner. The only adventurous thing that happened there was that Luisa ordered a double cheeseburger on accident when she only wanted a regular one... and we were all too scared (or lazy) to try and ask for ketchup for the fries. It was a good bonding time and fellowship over fast food. Luisa falling off of her chair has been the shining moment of glory for our team so far, in terms of embarrassing stories... but today I had a moment that came kind of close. We were driving to the church in Yokohama with Fuwa-sensei and Keiko and I was trying to explain what we had done the day before, looking at pottery in Seto. However, at that particular second, the exact name of the town skipped out of my brain and I grabbed a word that sounded right... So the pastor and Keiko are listening politely to my story until I say, "Yesterday Nozomi took us to 'sake' in the morning." Keiko whirls around in her seat and says, "Sake?!" And I'm nodding obliviously until Kiara corrects things by saying "Seto... we went to Seto." Which is when I remember that sake is Japanese wine and I realize that I've basically said that we went to get drunk the previous day. Not the best first impression ever, but I think we've recovered from it as the day has gone on.

That should bring you up to date on team news to this point, so I will wish all of you lovely followers good night from all of us here in the Land of the Rising Sun. Good night and may the love of God be stitched into everything you do.

Allison, avec Luisa & Kiara

Turning Japanese?!?

Hey Followers... o gee,

Okay, so since our last post we have partaken in a few Japanese activities. Sunday we went to church and met a bunch of members at the luncheon afterwords. Thankfully a good amount of them could speak English... well not a good amount but enough... anyways so because of that we got to know them better. They have been really kind and found ways to fill up our time during orientation. After church we went shopping and talked with Nozomi, who we will be working with at her English school in a weekish. A major purchase me and Luisa bought while shopping were Yukatas,, which are summer kimonos.

Monday, we had a long meeting (3 hours) that was a little boring (well Allison doesn't think so, but I do). The meeting was just about what we will be doing at the different churches we will be visiting. One thing that was pretty hilarious that happened at the meeting was Luisa fell off her chair while a serious conversation was going on. Everyone ignored it, but me and Allison laughed and laughed, it was ridiculously awkard... which made it even more AMAZING. Okay, so moving on after the meeting we went to Asuke the "nature". It was really cool, it was like this old fashioned japenese village, it was surrounded by trees and little mountains. It was legit GORGEOUS. oh and there was a little fast moving river there that we almost fell in because of slippery rocks. Then we went out to dinner and ate 2 desserts, because we could and one soy ice cream so thats healthy so it doesn't count. Then something horrific happened while were sleeping that night. THERE WAS AN EARTH QUAKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We barely made it out alive. Just kidding we found out about it the next morning and apparently it only lasted 2 secounds and apparently that happens alot in Toyota so whatever, we were still in an earth quake.

TODAY, was a pretty decent day... I wouldn't lie to you. In the morning we prepared for our ministry; planning games, songs, practicing drimes... it was a good time. Then, a couple ladies from church took us to the art museum in Toyota. It was pretty cool and deep... so I didn't get it... but Allison did. Then we went tea ceremony there. There was pretty little sweet shaped like a flower. It looked gorgeous but it was filled with red bean paste and tasted DISGUSTING.. I seriously almost puked because we had to finish all of it.. like really i could barely hold it back. But then things got better.... we went shopping!!!!!! The clothes in Japan were amazing and we had a great time shopping .. oh and the clothes are pretty affordable here so that made it even better. Then the two ladies who took us out got us these cute little gifts.. they were little japanese bags and cute barrettes... it was very much so enjoyed. THEN we went out to eat and it was CRAZYNESS. We went to a little restaurant that only seated us and we had our own cheff who cooked infornt of us its was sweet. So first he fried up some vegetables for us and it was good. But then he moved to crustations.... i have to say i dont enjoy eating shrimp legs.. but the meat was good. Then we had squid and scallaps which were both good. However, things went south when he whipped out the full fish eyes scales... everything!!!!!!!!! It was so nastyi could taste eyes and brains.. not fun, but we ate it... ik wasnt happy about it though. Then he killed eel infront of us... i have a video. He gauged out the eyes and cut him up and decapeted it... traumatizing much? yes. Then he fried up the spine and we ate it.. it tasted like bacon and then he fried up the meat and it was good. but the skin was on it so that freaked me out a little.. but thats okay. So yeah moving on then we had a calligraphy class and it was fun. We all suck but thats okay, no one who wasn't Japanese could tell. We learnt how to write our names in Japanese calligraphy which was great. So yeah thats all i need to say for now.

BYE Y'ALL

xoxoKiara (with help from Luisa and Allison)

Konichiwa Japan!!

We are here in Japan! Our flights went well and never got lost in the airports... We went from Winnipeg to Chicago, then to Tokyo. That flight was 12 hours it was okay because we mainly slept! We had two meals with chopsticks so that made us feel like we were almost there. It was super exciting when we were coming in to Japan but our landing was shaky. We got on our next plane fine and the flight over Mount Fuji was beautiful. Mr. and Mrs. Abe picked us up from the airport and took us out for our first meal.. SUSHI. Which was surprisingly good, there was cool conveyor belt and a hot water tap for our macha tea. The chef there told us we were beautiful and wanted us to come back everyday! We are slowly getting use to the chopsticks we're getting there. We are staying in a amazing home beside the Toyota Church. We were greeted by sweet Japanese ladies who gave us a tour of the church. Then we went to bed eight pm never felt so late. This morning we started orientation with Doris. We had breakfst together, a devotional and shared our faith stories. After, we walked up the street to the 100yen store WHICH IS AMAZING. Then we bought groceries for lunch and the next day. Beside all the Japanese characters it wasn't that different just a few more fish. We walked back, cooked and mixed some noodles, vegetables, egg, crab, and ham for lunch. This evening, Doris's friend is coming to go out to dinner with us, so we'll see what kind of restaurant experience we'll get this time!

Sayonara for now!

Luisa with Kiara & Allison

Spiritual Warfare & Square Dancing

Since the first day, we've already had lots of fun experiences before we've even left for Japan. Friday, we learned a new drama to perform for the Japanese churches and shot off a few fireworks at night to celebrate both Canada Day and Independence Day... both national anthems were sung rather poorly, but with enthusiasm. Saturday we continued with our sessions and dramas, then buttoned up our plaid shirts and pulled on our boots for an evening of square dancing. That might sound hard or old-school, but it was the funnest thing ever! Our caller was hired for only two hours, but he was so disappointed when we had to quit after three and a half hours of dancing. Today's morning session was really thought provoking, talking about spiritual warfare and gave us a lot to pray about for our ministry in Japan and our own daily lives. The afternoon was a good chance to relax when we all went out river rafting, aka floating on intertubes and dinghies down the Roseau River. The rest of this week will be spent learning more specifics on Japanese culture and the ministry tasks we'll start preparing for... so expect more on that later!

Love to all,
Allison, with Kiara and Luisa

First Day!

So, Today we met....Allison picked up Luisa and I and we visited the Forks. We showed Allison around the Forks we ate burgers and drank smoothies and altogether had a lovely time. Oh and Luisa wanted me to say that we took our first team picture at the top of that building at the Forks. Then we strutted * Luisa wanted me to say that word* to the "finger" bridge. If you don't know what that is it is the bridge that has a restaurant with a finger on top. Anyways, we had a lovely ride to Gretna and appreciated our lovely prarie land and the big skys alot. We also had some team bonding and spoke some Spanish, Luisa is really starting to pick up spanish her favourite phrase is "yo no se", which for all you English speaking people means "I don't know".

We soon arrived in Gretna and Allison and I go a handi cap room, so its really big and it makes us feel special. Luisa's roomate moved out unfortunately so she is now alone, but that is okay. We then ate supper and met other participants. There are 6 other teams. There are two teams travelling to The Democratic Republic of Congo, there are two teams travelling to Mexico, a team going to Brazil and a team going to Lithuania. altogether there is just about thirty participants, so it is a pretty small group. We had our first session tonight and first team meeting and after spending a whole day together we can still stand each other, which is a good sign. Oh and by the way our vocabulary currently exists of these words ; sophisticated, vocabulary, fit and legit! Okay so that's good.

Bye

Peace to All

Kiara. with help from Allison and Luisa