Moving to Tokyo means becoming an athlete

So, tonight my goal is rapidity. It's been a long day, as you will soon hear, and then you will justify me.

But first, a story from yesterday. I went to the evening girls Bible study, and as we were starting, I got a phone call (actually, it took a minute for me to figure out it was my phone). I excused myself, and it was the director from the YMCA. He was calling because a new class opened up and he wanted me to co-teach it, which is what they typically do for elementary students, as Mark told me today. Funny enough, it starts next week.

But, anyway, we set up some of the particulars. I was glad to confirm that it was his sincerity he was showing the other day in wanting to give me classes, but was unaware of the situation that I had originally been set up for. And, it's a foot in the door, for later on.

But, what's really cool is that a week ago (or so?), when we were sitting down to do planning, we had originally set one station for Tuesday evenings for street performance, and the one where the Y is for Friday evenings. As we were having our Fuse meeting on Tuesday afternoon, we decided to switch the stations on the days because they wanted us to get in early on Friday nights so we could get good sleep and prepare for Saturdays (which are long in and of itself).

So, what's really cool is that I'll now be teaching at the station on the same day that the team does street performances. What's even more interesting is that when my class gets done is right when they arrive at the station, so I can take the five minute walk on over and meet them there.

Awesome, no? The girls were super excited to hear about it.

But, today, I became a Tokyo-ite. I got up early, had a relaxing morning, and then, realized that I had left a couple of minutes later than I had originally planned (and I do mean like 5 minutes), and so I ran all the way to the station. I quickly went through the gates, putting my card to the machine, ran up the myriad of stairs, and as I was crossing the overpass to go down to platform, I looked out the window to see that... whoosh, there was leaving my train.

So, anyway, I had to take a local train and then catch the express at another station, and I was a few minutes late... but oh. Had I made it 45 seconds earlier to catch my first train! I also realized that my watch was 2 minutes faster than the train station's clock, so I set mine to it. No more missing my train!

When I got to the station, now like 9:40am by this time, we did prayer walking for almost an hour and then did self-study Japanese class for a long two hours. After that, Debbie and Amy and I went to a university to meet some contacts that they had made. It is a really hard university to be make contacts in, but after a long time, we had the opportunity to go back. It was okay. I wouldn't say great, but I also wouldn't say it was terrible.

When we left there, I came back to my home station and it was now like 2:20 in the afternoon. I had planned to meet this girl, Chitose, at the station to hang out. She came to the Fuse last Saturday and we had a good talk. She's really sweet, and she contacted me to get together. She offered to take me to two different places, and if I wanted, to show me around the two towns that I spend most time in. She was super kind about it (in fact, I found out later that before we went out, she had called the city hall to see about getting me a map of it in English. But alas, no English).

So, the place that I wanted to go was called Ikuta park. It's about a 10 minute bike ride or so from my house (which we had to stop, because I desperately needed other shoes). There was a slight uphill slope most of the way there, and then you have a small, but somewhat steep hill to BIKE up before parking the bike. Oh schnikies. I was shot by the time we got there... and I forgot to mention that at one point, I had put my foot down to kinda help with stopping/not crashing into random people, objects or other things on my obstactle course, and my shoe came off. So, I had to park my bike and go back and get my shoe... Oh my.

Anyway, the park was really pretty and the Japanese know how to do pretty. They're pretty awesome. So, then we decided that we were going to go to the observation tower... by climbing a mountain of stairs. Literally, we climbed up the mountain by stairs. I was beginning to consider that any chocolate consumed today would be amply made up for it in all the activities of the day.

We looked around, and of course, with the Shinjuku skyline in the distance and the tops of the cherry blossom trees at waist length to you, it can't help but be beautiful. There's really no use in trying to explain it-- I'll try to post pictures tomorrow (I think I may have a couple of free hours).

So, down the mountain we went, and walked around with our bikes for a while and later rode for a bit, she showed me the best places to shop for what. She had really thought about this. I also had the opportunity to kinda feel her out on where she stood about Jesus. I think she needs more time before I do an evangelistic based life group with her. But I didn't hold back from inviting her and I'm sure we'll be hanging out again soon.

By the time I made it home (which I was frozen, and she had also shown me the library of town and which sheets to use to sign up for it)-- it was 6pm. I was super tired, and so sat down to have a bit of dinner and at 7- arrived at Hannah and Amy's house for her to show me how they do the team calendar online.

I had planned to stay for a short time, but we ended up watching some shows on youtube and then chitchatting and painting our nails and finally at 11 after 10, I decided it was time to come home.

And here I am, slouched down and leaning to one side on my couch in a sweat shirt, jeans and slippers, with my laptop bringing the current news to you!! :) It was a good day, and I don't think you could say it was unproductive. But I do have to say that I'm glad tomorrow isn't so full with high-impact activities!

Tomorrow I go for the material to my class and to fill out paperwork, I guess. Mark called today to offer his assistance if I need any while there... The afternoon I have relatively free, and then prayer, dinner together, life group and greeting the newest member of the Fuse team at the bus station!! :) We might do street performances after that, but I'm not sure yet.

Well, that's all for tonight folks, I'm going to sleep now! Hurrah!