Courtney's journals

Fri July 2, 2004

Coming up in this entry: games with the kids, bike ridin, calm before the storm

9:51pm JST

Again.. late. Kinda annoying that I keep "summing things up" every night rather than writing while I go. I guess in Mutsu in 1998 I was always on a train or in a bus going somewhere.

Today:

• We had the weekly meeting at 8:45
• Visited the Kaminoyama Senior's club weekly meeting with Ito-sensei where we sang Amazing Grace for them, gave a testimony, and answered their questions about Christianity over breakfast (one old fellow mostly just laughed at us)
• then went to the church to play with the daycare kids for the birthday party thing... we played games like duck duck goose, red light green light, and blob tag and ate lunch with the kids, then brought out our scary pinata and played that and then "pin the tail on the donkey" - both went over great with the kids. The girls (mostly Yuuri) made nametag origami for us, which we drew on :)
• Laurel and I then rode the 2 silver bikes back to the house (they had been left at the church overnight) - fun ride!
• Moe and I took the other 2 bikes to the bike shop and had air put in the tires :) they did it for free, how nice!
• We followed Noriko (who drove) on bikes to the Aoki's house (up a huge hill augh!) and talked about English classes there tomorrow (our first of the summer)... o_o it's kind of scary to think about but I prayed that God would take away my fear - and I already feel kinda better. I think I just get apphrehensive about things before they happen.
• Afterward we hung out at the house for awhile, laughing about our trip thus far, then walked down to the street the Kamin is on and went into a bunch of little shops. I had a Japanese conversation (kind of... more broken Japanese than not) with the teapot shop lady; told her I was studying Japanese and when we were going back to America in August. Found a classy boutique where Moe and I bought traditional fans (scented with flowers), and a COOL kimono store where we all bought handkerchiefs, I got toe socks, Moe got a bag and an apron, and Jeri got a baby kimono for her sister's lil kid :)
• We stopped by the foot onsen on the way back and put our feet in the water for awhile... then back to the house. Talked about our upcoming classes
• Ito-sensei picked us up at 7:15 and we went to the older ladies' "Sunflower" Bible study. Sang a hymn for them and read a passage. Laurel gave her testimony and then we had sweet bean (anko) cakes :)
• Back at the house we had a short team meeting.
• time to sleep.... tomorrow, English class o_O

Oh, one other thing - the church's fire escape is a big slide!! Ito-sensei said they all practice going down it twice a year! :)