An unexpected outing to inner city Tokyo

Earlier this year I worked on a magazine issue themed "Rest". You can check out most of the articles we published in that issue here. When we asked the missionary community in Japan for article proposals, we were overwhelmed with people wanting to write on this topic, so it's obviously something that missionaries in Japan (among others) have thought about quite a bit. 

However, when we talk to people back home, it's not often that people ask us about how we get rest on the mission field. I wonder if this isn't something that people think about until they have actually left their home country and are desperately tired? I know that when we first landed in Japan we were quite exhausted from what had gone before and I can't remember if anyone ever talked to us about pacing ourselves.

I was quite encouraged to see an article in the latest magazine that we've completed (last Saturday) that talked about mentoring people interested in long-term mission. It was an internship program that their organisation runs and one of the five main areas that this couple focus on with their interns is Staying Healthy, which includes incorporating rest into your life.

Well, I've been in Japan for over 21 years now and I've had to learn about rest. I still have lots to learn, but I've learned a few things along the way. Like: How to rest when you've got three lively young boys. How to rest when your to-do list seems enormous and overwhelming. How to rest when no one else in Japan seems to, and how to manage when just making it through a short Japanese-language church service is exhausting. How do you rest when you're very aware of the urgency of reaching Japan for Christ? And when going anywhere away from home just takes so much out of you.

I still remember our first holiday in Japan. Just following the paper map (in Japanese and pre-Navi) was exhausting. Then we needed to figure out buying groceries in a small rural town and a strange missionary holiday house (believe me, they are often stranger than the usual place you'd rent back home). On top of that, we had a lively 2 y.o. and no one but us to look after him.

Over the years we've learned different ways and means of resting and that it isn't an option, rest is essential, as is pacing ourselves. We've had to approach this missionary life more like a long-distance journey, than a sprint. But we still struggle, life and ministry have a way of being busy and both David and I are self-starters, which means that we can be quite driven. I've been trying to finish this blog post for several days. I've been wrestling with tiredness as well as drivenness. Tiredness won out yesterday morning and I rested all morning.

My busyness at work tends to ebb and flow. Thankfully I am not expected to fill out a time-card, so if work is a bit quiet, it's okay to take some time to rest. So last week many people in Japan were resting, or at least recreating, with several public holidays on the calendar. Our house, typically, looked different. Our school didn't take all the holidays, in fact only one. I had plenty of work on my to-do list, including a magazine I hoped we could finish by the end of the week to accomodate the schedule of one of our team members. So I didn't plan to take time off, merely held it as a possibility, if the opportunity arose.

Last Wednesday (a beautiful day, not unlike today), a colleague who lives over an hour away, met me halfway for the afternoon and we explored a little corner of Tokyo. I'm not really a city person, as you might know, but I do find Tokyo to be an intriguing place. Certainly a city where nature isn't completely sidelined. There's still lots of life-giving green to be found if you look.

The area we walked around is near the purple star at the top of the map.

We walked several kilometres, exploring an area around the Iidabashi station, an area just north of the Imperial Palace. That included walking along a portion of both sides of the Kanda River, a short foray along a street in the neighbourhood of Kagurazaka to find lunch, and a stroll around a famous walled garden.

I'm going to show you the afternoon through photos and captions.

Sloped street in Kagurazaka. Lots of quaint stores that beg to be explored.

It's appealing because it's not over-the-top "shiny" and commercial like some famous

areas of Tokyo. This webpage tells me some of the charm is because there's a large French 

expat community here, including a French international school.

This is one of six train lines that run through Iidabashi! Most of them are underground, thankfully. The river is the Kanda, which is only 24 km long and lies entirely within Tokyo borders. This is taken from the southern bank looking northwest away from the palace towards Shinjuku, one of several "city centres" within Tokyo. 

A bit to the left of the photo above, taking looking down the river. In the middle is a place you can fish! I'm not a fisherman, but this just seemed to be lacking any appealing atmosphere.

This is on the opposite side of the river, looking towards the Imperial Palace and the actual "city centre". Later we walked along under those trees behind the train.

More city views from the southern bank.

Who would have thought? Inner city Tokyo? Many of these trees are cherry blossoms and so would have been amazing in a different way a month ago.

Stunning huge tree.

Then we made our way to Koishikawa Korakuen Garden. I'm guessing that some of you have been to a Japanese garden overseas, but in my experience it's a little different in Japan, not that I've been to that many in either place. The biggest difference would be the age. Japanese gardens/parks in Japan, the sort you walk around and admire the ponds, etc., are old. The trees are mature and there's a lot of history embedded in the park. This one is nearly 400 years old.

The English brochure says it was originally built by the founder of the Mito branch of Tokugawa clan (a powerful clan in the Edo period, 1603 to 1868). It is a circuit style garden with ponds and manmade hills centering on the pond. Like many things from Japanese history, it has Chinese influences. It has two special designations: Special Historic Site and the Special Place of Scenic Beauty. Part of this status is the recognition that it is a valuable property that has survived the Great Kanto Earthquake and war damage as well as progressing urbanisation.

Luminescent new-spring leaves.

You can see a hill and winding path behind me in this picture. These small hills and circular paths make the garden seem larger than it actually is. There's no one spot where you can see all the garden.

There's no escaping that this is a garden surrounded by a high-density city. The ambience was tempered by the noise of a neighbouring amusement park rollercoaster and a concert in the adjacent Tokyo Dome. Not to mention it was hard to keep the buildings out of some photos, but here I really liked the reflection in the pond.

You've made it this far: well done! This day was not my typical idea of a rest day, but I did come away feeling filled up and refreshed. I got to hang out with a friend and talk about the various things going on in our lives, I got to see a tiny bit more of this amazing city, including some beautiful green and even amazing man-made structures (though a tree will usually trump a building for me).

New adventure: Japanese driver's licence

Tomorrow our 19 y.o. starts on a journey that we know little about: getting a Japanese driver's licence from scratch. He's taking a gap year after high school and is not sure about what he wants to do after that. 

One thing he can do now to prepare for the future is get a driver's licence, and because Japan and Australia have a cosy mutual relationship over driver's licences, arriving back in Australia with a Japanese licence is a distinct advantage (especially when you don't have parents living in the same country as you). He'll be able to get an Australian licence without doing 100 hours of driving or taking a test. It'll mostly just be a paperwork challenge (translation of licence included).

However, getting a licence in Japan bears only a vague resemblance to what we've seen his older brother do in Australia. And so we walk alongside him and learn together. Here is the chart the school has given him. 

It seems as though most of the learning will happen at the school, we're unclear as to whether he'll do any "learner driving" with us at all. Having been a little bit involved with our eldest in "getting his driving hours in", I think this method, though expensive, will definitely be good for our stress levels (and probably our relationship with him too). 

An integral part of the process is 26 lectures, which is not something done in Australia. I guess it's good to learn these separately from the stress of actually driving? Perhaps safer?

The other advantage is that they coach you specifically for the test, so there is little chance of failure, apparently!

We're thankful for God's provision of the finances to do this, because we didn't budget for it and it definitely wouldn't fit in a usual missionary budget.

We really feel like, even after 22 years of this parenting journey, that we're still feeling our way along. There have been so many unexpected challenges and there's no map, especially within the missionary life. And even more so with transitioning young adults to independent post-school life. At times it's agonising and it certainly drives us to our knees pretty much on a daily basis.

On the edge of ordinary on the medical scene

Looking at July and August, all I've written about on this blog is holidays and camping! Anyone would think I've done nothing else. I actually only had 16 official days of holidays in those two months. Since we got back from holidays in mid July I've been at my desk most of each work day (aside from those two days of camping a couple of weeks back). It's always a challenging time of year to work, although as the boys grow older it's become much less of a problem. They are no longer running around the house during their holidays, demanding my attention at random times, so I've got a lot more headspace to devote to work.

David went back to work officially on Monday, so this week is looking more like business as usual, except that I've got two big boys sleeping away much of the day (yes, they are pretty nocturnal at the moment). When I say "officially", David's actually been in and out of school many days in the last fortnight. And he's been on his computer doing email and other admin things for a period most days, not to mention three Zoom meetings/training with OMF last week. Plus, he's been working on a project of digitalising a portion of his work that has existed on index cards that have been collected by dozens of teachers over the last few decades. So, I've not been alone in working at home here!

We do as much of our medical care as we
can in Japanese, but for some things we 
really need English service providers for.
We're thankful for the doctor near this
station who has been caring for one of our
sons over the last 2 ½ years.

In addition to that, we've been doing a few medical things. I wanted to write a bit about one of them—a visit to a dermatologist.

When you live in your home country you don't think about how the medical things that happen there are (sometimes) specific to your country. Of course you might think about how accessing medical care in another language is hard (and it is!), but I've got a different type of example you might not have thought about.

Skin cancer isn't common here

Australia has the highest rate of skin cancer in the world for men (not women, though we're close to the top of the list). Japan is not even in the top 20 countries in this list. But Japan is third on the list for stomach cancer and Australia doesn't feature in the top 20. (This data is from here.) 

These are interesting statistics, but the rubber hits the ground when you are not living in your home country. In Australia skin cancer is high on the list of things that your local GP will check if you ask them to (and in fact we've been told that the average Australian GP is better informed about skin cancer than the average dermatologist in Japan). Plus, there are many easily accessible skin cancer clinics that will give you a regular full body check. By contrast, in Japan, there aren't such clinics. And at annual government-funded medicals in Japan, they check for bowel and stomach cancer, but skin cancer isn't on the radar.

It just so happens that my husband has a family medical history (and now a personal history) of skin cancer, and so this is definitely on our radar as he gets older. I'm very grateful, therefore, that we live in one of the largest metropolises in the world. It's possible to find unusual services, like a doctor who has read up on skin cancer in Australia and is willing to "colour outside the lines" with foreign patients who have different skin and had different environment growing up to most of the Japanese population. It's not covered by our Japanese health insurance, but it's an awful lot cheaper and easier than going to Australia. It really is another example of how we live "on the edge of ordinary".

And life continues on...

Aside from all that, we're living pretty quiet lives here and trying not to be too stressed by the news of what's going on in the rest of the world. The pandemic is raging in Japan (between 15,000 and 20,000 new cases a day in the last few days, around 5,000 of those in Tokyo) and we're doing essentials, but otherwise at home. We're thankful that Japan is working hard to vaccinate—nearly 50% of the population has had one jab, that's 60 million people since they began in mid February. Maybe by summer next year Australia will welcome us back for a couple of months without requiring us to quarantine in a hotel at our own expense?

School (CAJ) starts the new school year for students from next Tuesday. I'm still coming to grips with the fact that we'll only have one at school this year. We're not sure what the year will look like for our middle son, but we're glad we have the means to be able to support him at this transition time of life, to give him a chance to figure things out.

Summer 2021 camping trip

This time last week we'd just driven about 45km west-north-west to camp for the second time this year. And indeed the fifth time during this pandemic! I'm so thankful we've been able to continue doing this. It's such a life-giving activity for us. I read a short article recently about seven types of rest. The author listed physical, mental, sensory, creative, emotional, social, and spiritual. I think camping touches most of these areas for us. And it's been especially valuable to camp with the same friends each of these five times. That's given me a social opportunity that has been significantly lacking in these last 18 months. (If you're interested in the article, it's here.)

The campground's name, Seseragi, means small stream or babbling brook. Indeed, the campsite was centred around a gorgeous stream (called Iruma River), perfect for a summer camp. The water was clear, running over a rocky bed, and mostly shallow, indeed we walked several hundred metres in the stream both directions from where we were camped. The adults and kids had so much fun in it, ranging from sitting with our feet in it, to skimming rocks, building rock towers, and even jumping into places that were deeper.

Camping at this time of year can be really hot. So we worked hard to find somewhere close to water where we could cool off (and had showers). I was so relieved to find that our campsite was shaded most of the day too. So, though it was hot and humid, it was easy to cool off, and we had a great view. As you can see in the following photo, our three tents were facing the stream, and the fourth "structure" the common area/kitchen, also faced onto the stream. Gorgeous!

One small downside was this cute, but not easy-to-walk-on bridge. We had to park on the other side of the stream and carry all our gear across. We were thankful for the three strong teenage boys in our group!

Sunset from the first night. We were in a valley, as you usually are when you camp near a stream in the mountains of Japan. So we could only catch small glimpses.

The below photo was just a little downstream from our tents where I went to sit on a boulder on my own and read on Friday afternoon. You can vaguely see our tents on the left of the photo.

Earlier in the afternoon David brought a chair down into the stream for me (the bank between our tents and the stream was steep and a bit slippery). It was especially lovely to sit with my feet in running water. Which says a lot about the temperature and humidity. Most of the year in Tokyo I am trying to keep my feet warm!

My view of my feet while reading on my Kindle.

This solitary tree was across from our campsite. Lovely shape!

We knew a typhoon was forecast for Saturday night and that we might not be able to stay for our planned three nights (they hadn't let us pay for three nights when we arrived). So we packed a lot into Friday. It was definitely "seize the day" time. 

Mid afternoon we drove to a local dam (Arima Dam) that is often seen by the school's year 11 students when they do their "Wilderness Trek". It was so hot, though, so we didn't stay long. But long enough to take some photos from the dam wall. This is just such a typical "rural Japan" photo! Mountains occupy over 80% of this nation.

We were in for a surprise at the dam, courtesy of social media and a good friend. I'd posted a photo of our campsite on Facebook the day before, and unusually, had included the name of the campsite. Hazel, a Scottish friend (middle of photo below), saw it and as she was in the area visiting family she decided to see if she could seek us out. She arrived at the campsite just after we'd left for the dam, but it so happened that the lady who runs the campsite had seen us leaving and asked us where we were going (she has discount vouchers for a local hot spring and wanted to make sure we weren't going there without the vouchers). So when Hazel arrived, the campsite lady was able to tell Hazel where we'd gone. Amazing! 

I usually see Hazel several times a year at missionary women's gatherings, but that hasn't been happening in the last 18 months. The last time I saw her was in March in a Zoom meeting with about 70 other people. To see her in person was so special. She also knows Renee (left in the photo) and Mark, our camping buddies, from their first stint in Japan when they were stationed here with the US military. 

This is the other direction from the dam wall.

Mark brought two of his bikes to camp and he and one of the teenagers, who's also a biking fanatic, rode to and from the dam. Here we waited, on our way home, at a very long red light!

To give you an idea of our location, the campsite occupied this "triangle" of land. The parking area was where the green "pin" is at the top of the map and we camped about where the "a"of "Iruma" is. All the land was more than a metre above the river, with fairly steep banks, but obviously the forecast of a typhoon coming through was a concern. These typhoons can deliver large amounts of rain in a short period (it's not unusual to hear forecasts of 80-100mm an hr). So this wasn't a smart place to be if the typhoon did hit. Not to mention the possibility of tree branches breaking, nor the idea of packing up in heavy rain and carting everything over a slippery bridge. So, we negotiated a deal to stay till after lunch on Saturday and then went home 20 hrs early. 

Our "Plan B" kept the camping vibe going just a little longer. The BBQ we'd planned for that evening, we had at our friends' house and then we enjoyed a movie night (something we wouldn't have done camping). Then the two friends of our youngest, who'd been camping with us, slept the night at our house. 

It's only the second time we've been "evicted" from a campsite by a typhoon in ten years. Though we did leave another campsite very early after being dumped on by a storm at 3.30 a.m.. And only one camping plan has been cancelled in 10 years. That wasn't due to a typhoon, but merely cold, rainy weather in spring, plus it had been a bold, audacious plan with several families and lots of kids. That's not to say we haven't had rain at other times while camping, just not to the point of needing to abandon the trip.

Last week I wrote here about how this is 10 years of camping for us in Japan. I've just now looked at the map and determined we've now camped in 30 different campsites! Some of them more than once, so probably we've set up at a campsite about 40 times. Here's the map where I've been keeping track of the campsites. What an adventure! And it's not over yet. Clearly we've got some work to do in northern and western Honshu, not to mention Kyushu and Shikoku (the other two of Japan's four main islands).

Celebrating 10 years of camping in Japan

 I realised this afternoon that last week was the 10 year anniversary of our very first Japan camping trip (which was actually our first camping trip on our own). I wrote a blog post about that first camping trip: http://mmuser.blogspot.com/2011/07/our-camping-adventure.html

It’s fascinating to look back and remember the journey. Our boys were 6, 8, and 12 on that first trip and they loved it (though were thoroughly exhausted by it). Opinions have changed over the years and only two still enjoy camping.

Last year’s summer camp

Camping also looks a lot different with older teenagers. For starters, camping just with us is too boring, so for the last couple of years we’ve been including their friends, and that’s added another fun dimension.

For the first five years or so, we mostly just camped as a family, but since then we’ve camped a lot with others, particularly one family who lives close to us. It’s been fun to share the camping fun with them, and share the meal-preparation (and clean-up) side with them too. And camping with Americans also means S’mores!

This last 18 months of pandemic I’ve had very little opportunity to spend face-to-face time with people outside my family. Camping has been one way to stay connected to at least a couple of our friends.

In those ten years we’ve also done two camping tours. We toured Hokkaido and also the central part of Honshu (as far south/west as Kyoto and Wakayama Prefecture). Both times we camped continuously for about two weeks, but only staying in each campsite one to three nights. David and I loved those trips, the boys, not so much.

I probably should stop and count how many camping trips we’ve been on, but we’re in the midst of preparing for another one tomorrow, so I’ll leave that for another day. 

The main reason we began camping ten years ago was a realisation that we’d been in Japan for ten years already and seen very little of this beautiful country. It’s not easy to see Japan on a budget with a family, but camping was one way to do it. We’re also more small-town/country kids than we are big-city kids, and we’re not particularly into tourism or shopping, so exploring Japan’s countryside was appealing. 

You might think that we are great outdoorsy people. We are not. Both David and I burn easily and don’t particularly love hiking. I was pondering earlier this year why camping has been so appealing to us (besides being able to see different parts of Japan and to get out of the city) and I think it’s partly because both of us love problem solving. Camping is full of opportunities to problem solve and we enjoy the challenge. We’ve also found that camping so fully occupies your mind that just a few days away can feel like many more, so it’s actually a pretty efficient way to take a break.

Anyway, if you’ve followed my blog for any length of time you will know about our camping trips. We’re excited about embarking on another one tomorrow, but we’re hoping that it will be cooler at the campsite than it is here (the car’s thermometer read 35 degrees C when parked in the shade at 5pm this afternoon, and the humidity was something like 80%). We’re camping near a stream, so hopefully we’ll be able to cool off pretty easily.

Splendid spring ride

I am pondering another deep post, but it's not fully written yet. In the meantime, I want to share with you some joy from my "romp" in the park today.

It's been my joy to ride to this park, and I've been doing it now for five-and-a-half years and am still so happy I made that discovery back in 2015.I haven't ridden there as often as I thought I might, but it's always worthwhile. Because I work from home, it's always good to get out, even to buy groceries. That's been even more the case in the last 13 months than in the past: I'm rarely getting out of the house during the day (aside from groceries and medical appointments). David and I are walking about three times a week, but that's usually after dark.

This time is my favourite time of year in Tokyo (April-May), the weather is often temperate and there are many, many flowers out. 

This is a small community garden I discovered last year. It was bursting with blooms.

Just outside one of the entrances to the park is a large business/home that flies a set of enormous carp flags at this time of year. It's for a traditional celebration of Children's Day in early May.

Entering the park at this time of year always takes my breath away. We don't live in as much of a concrete jungle as many imagine, but the overwhelming vibrancy of new green leaves as you enter the park gets me every time. Photos don't really capture the experience very well, unfortunately.

This park is full of wonderful mature trees like this.

I read a book for an hour with this view. It was delightfully serene much of the time. Thankfully I was pretty much ready to leave when the grass cutters started up nearby.

A particular attraction at this time in the year is the wisteria. We've got neighbours who have some of this hanging over several metres of their fence, but this is another level higher!

More trees!

On the way home I stopped at a fruit and veg store close to our station and took a road I don't normally travel. I found these radiant Bush lilies, that apparently love the shade (the road is between multi-storey buildings and doesn't get much sun).

This is all a part of a deliberate attempt to not just get exercise and enjoy the beautiful weather but do what Paul exhorted the Philippians to do:

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. (ch. 4 vs 8 , ESV).

 

Thoughts from Tokyo

So, things are a-changing. And rather rapidly. We've been watching this Corona virus for weeks now. Our mission has been sending us updates since January (our mission works in many Asian countries, so makes sense). We've seen colleagues in other countries have schools shut down, have borders closed, and other measures. Now it's happening in our backyard.

Meanwhile, Spring is on its way in!

Japan's Prime Minister made a surprise announcement yesterday, recommending that schools shut down until the end of the school year in a couple of weeks.

Of course, that's a red flag to society: if the top political leader thinks schools should be shut, then things seem very serious. So lots of other things are shutting or being cancelled too. And people are stocking up in the shops. 

I usually shop on Fridays, and today sought out the toilet-paper aisle to test my theory: that toilet paper is the litmus test in Japan for "panic buying". People in Australia might stock up on bread and milk but in Japan it's toilet paper! We saw the same in 2011. I learnt from that time, though, and keep a stock of the stuff in our house. I also learnt from previous flu epidemics here to keep a stock of masks in our house. I've also got other staple supplies—we live in the land of earthquakes, it makes sense to be prepared!

Comparison with March 2011

Which brings me to what my brain was doing at 5am this morning: comparing this event with the aftermath of the triple disaster in March 2011.

This event brings that experience to mind, not just because of the shopping and school shutting—yes, our school is shutting. We're looking down the barrel of three weeks of distance education. I know the teachers will try hard . . . but I'm not so sure about the students. I'm prepared to be surprised. Thankfully they've had today to lay out their expectations for the students. I've just received an email suggesting students start work at 8.30, not sleep in. That's helpful!

But 2011 comes to mind for deeper reasons. I think it's the fear. The disaster, if you don't recall, went like this: earthquake which caused several giant tsunamis that inundated a nuclear power plant north of Tokyo. There was a lot of fear at that time. Lots of people struggled with overwhelming anxiety and stress. Lots of foreigners evacuated Japan. It got to be that every time I looked at social media or checked email, another of our friends or colleagues had left (and the kicker was—without saying goodbye).

So instantly we see how this virus situation is very different, but also similar. There has been warning—today they've had time at school to prepare—and evacuation isn't a great option at this point. We aren't getting constant aftershocks that disturb our sleep and rock our emotions. We aren't wondering if there's going to be another one soon. We aren't labouring under the realisation that many thousands have already lost their lives suddenly.

However, the fear is there and the misinformation (or merely exaggeration) is being freely shared. 

This is what I created yesterday to go with the basic update
on OMF Japan's social media

Another similar factor is that it can be stressful to talk to other people. Everyone, I've discovered, has a different threshold in this sort of situation. Some immediately go into "panic" mode, others are more laid back; some research every morsel they can find, some like to speculate about what the politicians aren't telling us. In some ways it's easier just to stay at home and stay off social media.

But I'm a social media manager, so the latter is hard! Yesterday I had to do what I've been avoiding, and face this straight on, researching facts and putting together an update post for our mission. It didn't come out as scary as I thought it would (although the conspiracy theorists will be quick to tell me that we aren't being told everything).

How I'm doing

I've found it hard to concentrate today, that's another common feature with 2011. With such turmoil, it is hard to focus, and focus is what I need to do to keep up with the deadlines that keep marching across my desk. That's going to be challenging in the coming weeks too with the rest of my family at home, in "my" office.

I also must say that I'm relieved that, at this point, the two big events next week that I've been looking forward to are still going ahead: a two-day women's retreat and a writer's retreat next weekend. The latter I've put quite a bit of work into organising and it made me feel very uncomfortable earlier this week to consider that that might not be possible.

It was also reassuring to go out this morning and do a simple thing like get a hair cut. That simple act, seeing real people doing ordinary things, was very grounding and encouraging. 

But ultimately I need to ground myself in the eternal reality. That our times are in God's hands. That he is not surprised by anything that's going on here. And that ultimately, whatever changes come our way, he never changes.

5 

5 Yes, my soul, find rest in God;

    my hope comes from him.

6 Truly he is my rock and my salvation;

    he is my fortress, I will not be shaken.

7 My salvation and my honor depend on God[c];

    he is my mighty rock, my refuge.

8 Trust in him at all times, you people;

    pour out your hearts to him,

    for God is our refuge. (Psalm 62 NIV)

Looking like an idiot

I've been doing some heavy editing recently and my head is a bit heavy. I think writing a little today might be something of an antidote. Besides, I've got a good story to tell you...

I saw an article today called "Four rarely mentioned (but essential) missionary qualities". These were the qualities:

1. A sense of adventure
2. A sense of humour
3. A willingness to look like an idiot
4. A high tolerance for ambiguity

Generic photo, not from Japan...those number plates are wrong.

I'm not sure if I have all of these, but having stuck around for nearly 20 years, perhaps I do?

Let's see if I can dig out some examples, but I'm going to change the order:

A high tolerance for ambiguity
This is huge in Japan. Not just that we're in a culture where we don't understand many things, but the language and culture itself is full of ambiguity. In Japan people often learn by observation, rather than being explicitly told what to do. Living as a foreigner in this land that is multiplied many times. My observational skills are far better than they used to be, simply because that's often all I've got to make it through a situation. 

When we have visitors, they often ask many questions and we often don't have good-enough answers for them. We can't seek answers to all the questions that arise from what we don't know: we simply don't have the energy or time to do that. So instead we learn what we need to do our business and live our lives, and most of the rest has to just be left to one side.

Sense of adventure
I wouldn't characterise myself as someone particularly adventurous in the traditional sense of the work. I'm am not a big risk-taker. But from where you stand, what I do might look like an adventure, though it doesn't feel like it. However, I think probably our camping reveals our sense of adventure. Wading into the world of wrestling as we have is probably an adventure that many wouldn't care for. Travelling Tokyo trains can be an adventure...that's true!

A sense of humour
Missionary life (and life with teens) can get quite serious. But the willingness to laugh at oneself and at the odd things going on around you is pretty important. I guess one example of that is seeing interesting English or a funny meme or video. I do love to laugh and am happy to do so at myself. Most of the time I'm happy to tell the stories of when I've messed up, and have a laugh.

A willingness to look like an idiot
This is connected to the one above. I guess I often look like an idiot here, whether willingly, I'm not sure! It's common to not know what the protocol is for this or that. Or to get into trouble because you can't read something fast enough. 

This happened to me just last Friday. I drove with a friend to our "local" Costco, about an hour away. It's usually a stressful trip because it involves negotiating around a crowded shop with a large trolley, spending lots of money, and takes a good part of a day. But last Friday another layer of difficulty was added. In fact, it felt like I was in an international airport—there were so many things I needed to keep track of. 
A. My membership card: which was needed to get in, as well as to buy my groceries. 
B. My receipt for groceries: as they check this at the exit.
C. My receipt for the whole pizzas I bought at the restaurant: so I could collect them once they were made.
The above is usual, it was the fourth and fifth that threw me over the edge:
D. Car park ticket: the car park is usually free, but this time they had the gates activated and we had to take a ticket to get in. I presented it at the cashier when I bought my groceries where I got E.
E. Another car park ticket: I had no idea what this was for, but it seemed important and had an all-important stamp on it, so I put it in my purse.

After lugging the full over-sized trolley back to the van and loading everything into it, we joined the line to get out of the car park. There isn't usually a line, so it was strange and frustrating.

When we got to the boom gate there were three buttons on the machine, two yellow and one red. Plus two slots: one for the ticket, and one for money. We'd been waiting about ten minutes to get here and knew that the people behind us were also probably frustrated. So there was time pressure. 

I couldn't quickly read anything on the ticket machine. So I thrust one of the two car park tickets into the slot. It told me I owed them ¥1,000 (about AU$13.60). I wasn't about to pay that! I'd just spent hundreds of dollars buying groceries and the sign at the entry said that entitled me to three hours free parking . . . so I pushed another button and the ticket came out and I tried the other ticket. Then the display told me I owed them ¥6,000. I then pushed another button, in fact I probably pushed all of them one after the other, over and over . . . I can't remember now.

There was no obvious call button, and no staff member lurking nearby. The car behind me started to beep his horn, but didn't back up to let me unblock the single exit lane.

I am so glad my friend was there. Her presence helped calm me, but my cool was pretty much gone. Finally, two men approached our van, one on either side. They told us you had to put both tickets into the machine. Bingo: the boom gate rose and there was great relief all round. Belted into my car, I couldn't bow deeply in apology to those stuck behind us, but I wanted to.

I can't say that I was willing to look like an idiot. In fact I hate looking like one. But I find it easier to cope with that in Japan than in Australia. My white skin betrays me time and time again. But it does give me an excuse to mess up on occasion. I'm not sure the men who helped us would have been so patient with a woman who looked Japanese. 

Our foreignness got us off the hook, but in Australia it doesn't. Every time we go back we get odd looks at one time or another when we reveal our "foreignness" with a "stupid" question or lack of understanding of a situation. Our white skins don't save us there, nor do our Australian accents!

But back to those four characteristics. I don't know that I'd be known by any of them, except perhaps the humour. However, we have had to grow in each of the others. An ongoing sense of call, a strong desire to make an eternal difference, meaningful work we're gifted in doing, and a dogged stubborn streak has meant that we've stuck around.

Crowded trains: more complex than you imagine

These last nine days my husband has again been in hospital. He had surgery last Wednesday for a skin graft over the area that they excised due to suspect skin cancer in September. His hospital is in Shinjuku, one of Tokyo's main city centres.

I've visited on five occasions so far, the final time will be tomorrow when he's (hopefully) discharged. The journey is an hour via two to four trains—often standing—and involves numerous flights of stairs and walking about 1.5 km. I love going to see him, but the journey really takes it out of me. 

Most of the trains I've been on have been okay, but on Monday I stayed for dinner and came home around 7.30pm. The first train I hopped on was not a fun experience. 

My first clue it was going to be difficult was when the train arrived and no one got off. It already looked full. But people in the line in front of me literally pushed their way in and I had little choice but to push in too (the next train was unlikely to be less crowded). The lady in this photo could have been me. I had to check to make sure neither of the bags I was carrying were protruding into the space where the door was going to shut.

But that was only the start of the "fun". Standing jammed in like that is technically fine as long as either:

1. the people getting out at the next stop are next to the doors, or 

2. everyone is getting out at the same stop.

But that is rarely the case in an inner-city line where there are lots of intersecting train lines (it was a different experience I described here when I headed into the city from the suburbs and almost everyone was headed for the end of the line in the city). So at the next stop I got "spewed" out onto the platform while the train disgorged itself of people who were buried deep inside and needed to exit. 

Then we repeated the previous action of pushing our way back on, except that this time I got to be buried deeper inside. Which is not necessarily better. 

Thankfully, though I am only 157cm high, Japanese people aren't as tall as Australians on average, and I usually get some air, but still, being jammed such as your body is touching four or five other people is not fun. You can end up in very awkward situations. I've had my hands jammed to my sides, so I couldn't reach my face, been stuck behind a lady whose long hair swept over my face and tickled my nose, and most commonly, had someone's elbow or shoulder or hip pocking into me. I am thankful that I've never experienced wandering hands, but in a situation like this, it does not surprise me that women are harassed.

Here is a photo I took the other day at a quiet moment on my way into the hospital mid-afternoon. This is the standard layout of seats on a Tokyo commuter train. In a crowded train there is usually three lines of people standing down the middle between the people sitting down and then a tonne squeezed into that small area near the door. That's where I got stuck on Monday.

The aforementioned cycle of "shoving into the train—travelling one station—people disgorging—people pushing back on the train" happened eight times in my journey of 16 minutes. I only got pushed out onto the platform once, but it was a great relief to get off the train finally and change lines to a train where I wasn't squished up against strangers nor having strangers pushed past me or pushing me so they could get onto the train. For a nation that can be characterised by generally "no touching" and "not being a bother to others", this pushing-shoving experience is quite strange.

It is all quite quiet too. Quiet enough for me to hear someone exclaim, "There's a foreigner here" when I first got on.

The other strange thing about it is how orderly this is (there are even arrows in the stations to help modulate the flow of foot traffic). Lining up, pushing on, jiggling around so we all fit, pushing off again. There's generally a quiet sense of order and no rudeness (though I have experienced rudeness beyond the general shoving required). Certainly being aware of people around you and doing your best not to take up more space than you have to is part of it. It is routine for people to wear backpacks on their fronts to take up less room.

What's interesting to note is that the culture of orderliness and taking care of others as best they can in such crowded situations on trains has spilled over into the use of elevators. My husband is in a 19-floor hospital and the elevators are very busy. They aren't as crowded as trains, but we've seen the same practice of people close to the door hopping off the elevator if someone behind them needs to exit.

Needless to say, I am glad that I don't have to commute every day in conditions like these. I will also be very happy to have my husband home again and not have to visit him in hospital again soon!