A fun night out

Last night we stepped of our comfort zone (which is: staying quietly at home on a Friday night and going to bed at a usual time). Instead, on the eve of our 28th wedding anniversary, we went out on a Friday night and had fun. 

Start of the women's 200m.

It's five years since the Tokyo Olympics were supposed to happen and four years since they did and we sat at home in Tokyo watching events happen in our own city that we had had tickets for! Last night we went to the National Stadium (the main Olympic stadium—22 km from our place) to watch a session of the World Athletics Championships.

It was a lot of fun. I feared that part of it might be slow, but they kept us entertained for five hours! I only left my seat once. At times it was hard to know where to look. At one point there was women's javelin, women's decathlon shot put (both of which were down our end of the stadium) and some 800m and 5,000m races all happening at the same time, during which the male triple jumpers were also warming up. So much going on and so impressively organised. I love going to orchestral concerts because they are visually an absolute feast, and this was the same, so many things to watch.

When you are at an event like this in person there are so many things you can see that don't get shown on TV, like how they get the javelins and shots back to the athletes (remote cars for the former and a ramp for the latter). There was also a cool dude on a motorised unicycle on the track taking video of the runners in the back straight (the video you'll be seeing on TV). The choreography that went into putting out and removing the hurdles was also impressive.

The weather was also gorgeous. Finally the fiercely hot and humid Tokyo summer is in the past and we've entered into delightful early autumn. It was neither hot nor cold last night, even as we walked home at midnight.

A lot of the 58,000 people in the stadium were Japanese; you could tell that merely from the noise when their athletes were introduced or competing. We discovered that the reigning female World Champion in javelin is Japanese and we watched her strive last night to qualify for the finals in the competition to defend her crown. She didn't qualify, unfortunately, but she was well cheered for by the crowd.

This was early in the evening when 
the stands weren't so full, by the end
of the session at 10.30 there weren't
many spare seats near us.

But it was an international event and there were many foreigners too. Many more than we are used to seeing. Later, when we got on a train to go home, I watched a Japanese guy, probably on his way home from a work event, look in amazement at the large influx of people onto his train, many of whom were talking (not something common on trains), and not all in Japanese. He was sitting in front of where I was standing and craning his neck to see if he could tell which station we'd all gotten on at (he'd probably been napping). 

I'd not been looking forward to the trip home. I've had some very uncomfortable, overly crowded experiences late at night on Tokyo trains (and some not so great ones getting home from sporting events in Brisbane too). This wasn't so bad, though getting out of the stadium was a tad confusing, when the route we'd taken to get in was closed. The staff redirected us along different routes, largely by shouting at us in Japanese through hand-held speaker horns. But once we found the station, it was okay and many passengers got off our train fairly quickly and I ended up having a seat for much of the trip home, which was a good thing because I was definitely drooping at 11.45 on a Friday night!

Enjoying where we live

Despite having lived here for 20 years I think it's only just dawning on me that I live in this nation's capital! And that a lot of cool international-type things happen here. To those who see Japan as a travel destination, a place to see the sights and do the fun things, it might seem weird. But we live in Japan, we're not on holidays here and, like most people in the place they live, we don't do much tourism. 

And also, when we first arrived in Tokyo we had three boys under seven, and for a long time we just hunkered down and did what needed to be done. Rarely did we venture out to events that weren't part of our immediate circle. We didn't have the energy to go to events or take the family out for travel adventures. Most of our outings were, in the early years, to parks, and later (since 2010), many of our Saturdays were consumed by interschool sport.

But on the other hand, some people might also find it weird that missionaries do any tourism at all. Before we came to Japan we were given some excellent advice about missionary life. We were told to try to be as present as you can, where you are; to enjoy things you couldn't do elsewhere. That doesn't mean we love everything about Japan and only eat Japanese food, but it does mean that we'll happily enjoy an international event like the World Athletics Championships when they come to town. By the way, it also means that we rarely eat Japanese food in Australia, and we do our best to enjoy being present in Australia too.

We'd also been advised by a psychologist, as we approached having all our kids leave home, that we should spend more time enjoying ourselves! We're a pretty good team, but fun hasn't always been easy to do. I'd like to think that we've made some progress on that front in the last couple of years. And last night surely qualifies!

Enjoying some exciting days

It’s been two weeks since I last wrote here. Where did that time go? 

In school colours

Wrestling again

I've been at two wrestling tournaments in the last two weeks! The first was a single, but long day with a lot of wrestling and three or four hours of travel.

The second, the first four days of this week, were spent away with the school’s current wrestling team as a female chaperone and fan. Also as the wife of the team driver. I’d thought my days attending such events were over, but was grateful for an official reason to indulge again. It’s a sport that can really get under your skin and, yes, this event pretty much confirms that we’ve got the bug. And we saw a lot of wrestling. The days were long, I estimate we spent about 30 hours in the gym where the three-day tournament was hosted, with 300 or more other people. The sport itself is pretty quiet but spectators and coaches can make a lot of noise!

The first 60 to 90 minutes of the days in the gym started quietly as we were often the first school to arrive. It was a time that they had warm-ups and meetings, so I pulled out my computer and got what work done that I could. But once the wrestling started I inevitably found it much harder to concentrate and, having already dealt with the “lower hanging fruit” of my to-do list for work, gave up trying to achieve much more. Editing and writing take a fair bit of concentration and I was concerned that I’d probably make errors I’d later regret!

This was one of my favourite moments of the
tournament (it's a screenshot from a video I
took for the wrestler's mum). An unexpected but
vital victory in the finals of the duals.

Of course accompanying the team means you’re pretty much on from breakfast time to after dinner. They were long day, but not as emotionally draining as when our own kids were doing it, though I can’t claim to be tear-less for the whole event! We know how much these kids put into training and it’s amazing to watch and encourage and walk alongside them, especially through an emotionally gruelling three-day event.

What was particularly amazing to watch again was the value of a good team. I’ve seen it before: individuals performing above what you think they can do because they have the higher goal of wrestling for the team. The team aspect of this particular event was really on a different level for our guys, and they pulled together so well. Everyone’s contribution was meaningful, even one point made a difference (each bout they could contribute up to 5 points to the team’s total, it depended on if and how they won or even lost a bout). The end result for the semifinal and final came down to just 2 or 3 points difference between the teams!

The US Army base is situated on towards the
south-western border of the Kanto plain, and
has a pretty nice mountain view. Blue sky
like this also thrills my Aussie heart.

The guys achieved what no other CAJ wrestling team has achieved: won both portions of the competition. The team got the highest number of points in the individual portion of the competition and then also won the team-portion (duals).

We had another surprise when we arrived home on Wednesday night: a bunch of teachers and their kids were waiting for us in the car park with pop-out streamers and a big sign: Champs. So fun!

Both working (and matching in
wrestling team hoodies)

The other wonderful part of this whole event was doing it with David. This whole learning to live without kids at home after being married 27 years includes a lot of choosing to do things together. And this is a shared interest, so it was lots of fun.

Ah, but I’m raving on about wrestling before and most of you couldn’t care less about that!

Other exciting stuff

It's been a great week all round. A couple of "big ideas" I've been working on are starting to gain traction (running a small writers retreat for our mission and taking an international trip to meet up with others doing social media within our organisation). It's taken months of patient work to network, get permissions, and gather information, but I'm excited to see movement.

After some quiet weeks at work, I've also hit a busy time with the magazine: 23 edited articles to check with authors before shooting them off to our designer. They've all landed on my desk in the last 10 days or so!

But I love this kind of busyness. I've mentioned before that I struggle with the changes in pace that come with my work. Sometimes they are predictable, but day-to-day sometimes not so much. A couple of weeks back I started the week waiting on a lot of people to get back to me, and then on the Wednesday it all started pouring in!

However, I'm tired. I ended last week with a cold and then jumped straight into four days of what was like a busy school camp. We got back around 8pm Wednesday and straight back into work on Thursday. I'm very much looking forward to a quiet, restful Saturday tomorrow.

Wedding week (the short version)

On Saturday our eldest son got married. I have not been as close to a wedding since my own 27 years ago. It was a very special experience! 

We flew to Cairns (far north Queensland) on New Year's Day. It was a red-eye flight (this seems to be the most common flight from Japan to Australia, we haven't flown anything else in 20 years of flying from Japan to Queensland). We're getting too old for overnight flights! We arrived at our accommodation as the sun came up and slept most of the morning and into the afternoon. We slept again that night and drove four hours south to Townsville the next day.

Townsville is a coastal city of around 200,000 people. We've driven through there once, and had lunch there once. It was new territory! Our first meal in the city was with our son and his fiancé. Such joy! It's been six months since we saw him and this was just the fourth time to see them in person together.

The weekend was a quiet one, but I did get started on something I'd been pondering ever since they got engaged in late August: what was I going to wear to this summer wedding? I haven't been in a place where I could buy summer clothes, so this had had to wait (almost every girlfriend was asking me...). I had three friends on quick-dial to give me advice from change-room photos and I found a dress quickly in a most unexpected place. Our future daughter-in-law recommended a second-hand shop close to where we were staying and she was right, they had a large selection of classier outfits for amazing prices. 

On Sunday we had the joy of worshipping with the soon-to-be-married couple and meeting some of their precious church family.

Scrambling over rocks at Magnetic Island.

Monday we put on our tourist hats and caught the ferry out to Magnetic Island with our son. It was interesting to see an island I grew up knowing the name of, but never had any idea exactly where it was or what it looked like. It wasn't as touristy as I'd expected. The buses also didn't run as often as we'd expected them to, so we got stranded for a while in the middle of the day. Lots of "shoulda's" but it all turned out in the end. The day ended back in Townsville with a casual meal with our son and his fiancé. We lingered a long time in conversation after the meal, it was a night we didn't really want to end. We've not spent much in-person time with our new daughter-in-law, but we're growing to love her!

Tuesday was quiet. We took a walk along the Ross River, and also did a little more shopping, and I found low-priced accessories to go with my dress.

Wednesday was a work day and the start of the influx of the rest of our family into Townsville. We helped decorate the church for Saturday. David worked on chair-shifting and high-strung auditorium decorations. I ironed tablecloths and curtains for several hours. My parents arrived mid-morning in their motorhome (yes, the one we drove around Tassie) and helped out for a bit too. It was tiring, but a great day to meet more of the young couple's biological and church family.

Thursday we met my own mother-in-law and then late at night welcomed our younger two sons at the airport. We also had coffee with the senior pastor of the church—he and his wife have a special part to play in the story of the young couple, so it was good to have a brief time with him.

Friday was the day for meals and hospitality. We had breakfast as a family of six for the first time: us, our three sons, and soon to be daughter-in-law. I'm glad for the advice from an older friend to lock in this event. Then we hung out with our younger sons for the rest of the day. Took them shopping, had lunch, and played host to another wedding guest. Dinner was a BYO picnic on The Strand (park on the coast in the centre of the city) with our wider family who had joined us in Townsville by then. It was also a worthwhile time to spend together before things got a bit more formal the next day.

Saturday morning was quiet, thankfully, and then the wedding at 3, coffee with family and friends at a nearby coffee shop while we waited for the couple to return from their photoshoot, and reception at 6.30.

That's a short one-sentence paragraph! It was a beautiful, simple, God-honouring ceremony. I was nervous beforehand, but didn't cry. David, however, lost it twice—once while the bride was walking up the aisle and again as he prayed on the platform for the newly married couple.

The Bridal table at the reception. 

There were lots of family photos afterwards: thankfully all inside in air conditioning. I definitely underestimated how busy it would be. I didn't have a pocket, so kept having to give my phone to others. And I didn't take many photos, but did get a few special ones, including a selfie with the bride and groom.

We left at 5 for a local coffee shop with family and a couple of friends. While we were gone key people transformed the church into a reception venue with stunning fairy lights surrounding a dance floor. This was no small feat—the church is a former gym, complete with exposed steel beams and basketball hoops. But it was gorgeous. I'm looking forward to seeing more photos from others; again I didn't take many.

The most unexpected element of the evening was the dancing. First of all, I ended up dancing with my son after their first dance. The song they were dancing to repeated, so on the spur of the moment he grabbed me and she got her father. No practice...just shuffling around together and saying precious things. But later the dancing got a lot more wild, including the Macarena! Most of the guests ended up dancing, and for the first time in my life I was on a dance floor with both my sisters (and my mum shooting evidence). It was a lot of fun after all the serious planning and logistics.

It's no secret to those who know me well that I love a good, deep conversation. One of the best conversations I had the whole week was on the day after the wedding. I had some things that needed to get to our son and daughter-in-law's house before we left the city (and country), and ended up giving them to the pastor's wife. We had a very special, short conversation before the service which will continue to give me a lot of joy. Our son is far from us, but, as well as a beautiful new wife, he has people nearby who love him and understand him well.

We're now back in Japan, after a day and a half of travel, but like Mary, the mother of Jesus, I have many things to treasure and ponder in my heart (Luke 2:19).

It's been a lot of change!

A week and a half ago I came down with a cold that David had already had for a week. We’re both still recovering, though each day our symptoms are receding further. We both have chronic asthma that is well controlled, but at times like these, it's in our face and limiting our capacity; both of us have lingering coughs. I went to the doctor last week to get my regular asthma meds and he thought I had sinusitis too, so fun times and lots of tissues. 

A friend captured the proposal
from a distance (only our son
knew the photographer was there)

Last weekend I had very limited energy, but nonetheless we had an exciting weekend: on the Saturday (24th) our eldest son asked his girlfriend to marry him and she said yes! So we’ve been digesting that news and gradually telling people. I started this blog in 2010 when he was only 10 years old. It’s hard to believe that we’re now already at another new stage of parenting: getting ready to welcome in a daughter-in-law! (And we’re only just starting to get used to having no kids at home in Japan.) Of course, we’re not in the same country as them, so we’re now planning a trip to Australia in January to help them celebrate their wedding. 

Every now and then I'm amazed at how much change has gone on in these last few months:

• our younger two sons moved out and that has precipitated many big and small changes that we're still adjusting to
• we moved countries, again
• we moved to Japan without children for the first time (and yes, this warrants its own bullet point)
• after a year of both of us based at home and not working regular hours, David's working outside the home again, 8–5 Monday to Friday, and I'm at my desk at home for many of those hours too
• we've downsized into a small apartment and small car
• I'm learning to cook again in a smaller kitchen with a smaller space for storing ingredients
• our eldest son has made a lot of changes in his life in the last couple of months, and believe it or not that is taking a bit to adjust to in our thinking
• our middle son, who has been unemployed since leaving school in June 2021, has a job, a licence, and a car, and continues to surprise us as to what he's able to achieve
• we are adjusting to the idea of having a future daughter-in-law whose name we know!
• we're planning an unexpected short trip to Australia for a wedding in January.

There are a few other things, including changes in the two teams I work with in Japan, but I'll leave the list as it is.

That list makes me feel tired! It partly explains why we got sick and it's taken so long to recover. It helps me to remember to be gracious to myself when I'm feeling wobbly or weak, and that transition of this magnitude takes time to recover from.

But aside from that, there is so much to be thankful for in the above list and we're amazed at God's provision, his leading, and his care for us and our children.

Day 53: day in Melbourne

On our whole day in Melbourne we walked a couple of kilometres to the train. We ended up walking nearly nine kilometres this day. We actually did a lot of walking during April, during the month we walked an average of 4.4 kilometres a day, a couple of kilometres more than we usually walk, so walking a couple of ks to the train wasn't a big deal.

We've only been to Melbourne a few times in our lives. One of those times was during our honeymoon, where we also visited the MCG and Australian Sports Museum. I like to joke that I nearly lost David there last time! There's a tonne of information and if you're interested in sport and history you can easily spend hours there.

We left the caravan park early, leaving plenty of time for things to go wrong, but nothing did, so we ended up getting to the stadium way too early for the tour we were booked on. So we took a walk through the local area. Wikipedia says this about the area: 

It is considered to be Australia's "premier sports precinct" and regularly hosts some of the biggest domestic and international sporting events, including the AFL Grand Final (Australian rules football), Australian Open (tennis), and the Boxing Day Test (cricket). The venues have also previously hosted the 1956 Summer Olympics and the 2006 Commonwealth Games.

Rowing on the Yarra

It's clearly also an entertainment location. Taylor Swift performed at the MCG three times in February, each were sell-outs (96,000 people). The day we were there we saw lines of people (mostly young women) who had obviously spent part or all of the night waiting in line to get into a concert at another venue in the precinct. A security staff member told us it was a concert by former member of One Direction, Niall Horan.

Victorians love their sport and this precinct
is well equipped to handle tens of thousands
of people. There are several large train
stations nearby, not to mention trams.

We walked as far as the Yarra River and discovered another sporting event underway. It was a university rowing regatta.

We've watched cricket matches at the MCG many times in our lives. It was great to see it again in person, though it was all set up for AFL matches (they had three on that weekend, one each night).

The commentators have an amazing view (obviously).

This is an amazing tapestry made to celebrate the
150th anniversary of the MCG in 2003. It's
seven metres long and two metres high. Absolutely
stunning in its detail.

This is the distinctive suit Cathy wore
when she won the 400 m gold 
in Sydney.

After a 45 min tour of the stadium we gave ourselves over to exploring the huge Australian Sports Museum. It was wonderful. I discovered exhibits about Cathy Freeman, an Australian athlete who won gold at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 in the 400 m. She's in the Australia Sport Hall of Fame. I've got a story about her that I don't think I've shared here—it's not exactly relevant to my everyday life. (This is my memory, I'm not sure how accurate it is.) She is practically the same age as me and in our last three years of high school we were attending schools in the same town. I was a little bit of an athlete at the time and represented our school in the 4x100 m. We ran in the same race for our schools, though I'm almost certain we weren't in the same leg. I wasn't the fastest at our school, so I think I was running second or third leg of the relay and she would have been their last runner. We had the Australian Junior Long Jump Champion in our team (my friend) who I'm pretty sure ran our last leg. I don't know which school won...it would be nice to think we did, but I suspect that Cathy outran everyone. She won gold and silver at the Commonwealth and Olympic Games in the next few years after all. Anyway, it's a fun story and I even got to tell it to one or two of the staff at the museum!

We decided to head home when we still had a little bit of energy to walk to the train and from the train to the caravan park. It was a fun day that we're glad we took the time do. Cricket, especially, is a shared interest of ours that we love to indulge in together. I think it's important to invest in these shared interests, especially as our years of investing daily in our boys are over ("daily" being the key word here, we're still part of their lives, just not so intensely).

The next day we really got going on our journey home. Over the next five days we drove about 1,600 km to get home, stopping along the way to take in a few sights. I'm going to condense those days into just three posts, so as not to prolong the end of this journey too much!

Was it worth it?

We've had a pretty calm, "normal" week and have started to have the head space to look back and process the last few months. It's easy to look back with regret. 

Home assignment is required by our mission, though how and when you do it is a negotiable thing. So we look at the last six months and start to think: "Did we do the right thing? Did we make the right choices?"

The fact is that there is no good way to do home assignment. It means a lot of disruption in the missionaries' lives. When those missionaries have children at school, that disruption is bigger. If they are teenagers, the disruption escalates to a high level. If those children are settled and the missionaries are established in good-fit ministries, then it seems so unnecessary to volunteer for this amount of disruption.

The other side, though, is that our mission relies on missionaries coming "home" to give a field-side perspective to their mobilisation efforts. People at churches we visit repeatedly say how good it is to see us face-to-face and that that makes a big difference for them.

So, at this point you ask: was it worth the effort? I can't answer that question, though I know we've paid a significant cost as a family to do this home assignment. I also know that there are a few benefits we gained. Here are some tangible ones:

• we went through a crisis in late November that made us, and various related parties, look carefully at our calling to Japan—the result of that was great confirmation that we are indeed in the right place doing the things God has called us to
• home assignment triggered us to get some help for one family member who had been struggling for some time
• we were able to see our extended family members face-to-face and get a feel for how things were going for them: the benefit of that on relationships with them is immeasurable, but definitely not negative
• we also reconnected more deeply with our home church and as a result see the start of changes there with regards to involvement in mission
• I was able to address a slow-burning issue with a psychologist and find remarkable answers that will help me stay this journey long-term
• we got to spend time with our eldest son and witness first hand that his transition to Australia has gone remarkably well (and got to help him on the way to a drivers licence)

There are a variety of benefits that are more difficult to discern, including how this will affect our younger two boys' abilities to transition to Australia after they graduate from high school.

But one, very tangible, result, was a realisation that we can do regular dates now. Many Fridays we dropped our son off to youth group and then went to a local restaurant (and played Scrabble). Our boys are quite old enough to manage a meal on their own (often left-overs). Last night we had our first date-for-no-special-occasion in Japan. I can't remember the last time we did such a thing, and it was great, especially being able to indulge in a spontaneity that has just not been possible for nearly 20 years! We have home assignment to thank for this. Possibly not something our mission leaders had in mind, but I'll take it.

A coffee-flavoured cake called an Opera Cake!

My decaf coffee (8pm at night) came with this dollhouse-sized jug of cream!

Two are better than one

Today is our 20th wedding anniversary. I'm glad we celebrated back in August by going away, but today we're just in the midst of everything and there's not much room for celebration. 

However, in the midst of the everyday, was an encouragement. This morning, as we usually do, we read the Bible together using the Our Daily Bread (ODB) notes. Today's short reading was Ecclesiastes 4:9-10: 

Two are better than one . . . . If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. Ecclesiastes 4:9–10

The short ODB article today referenced the 2016 Olympics where two 5,000m athletes helped one another when they collided. A picture of mutual encouragement that many across the world saw.

Though the notes didn't mention marriage, but that is of course where our minds went. How many times have one of us helped the other throughout these last 20 years! Our marriage is very much a team event, we wouldn't have made it this far if it had not been for a strong mutual commitment to one another. 

I'm so thankful. We're not perfect and neither of us is very romantic, but I'm grateful and content with what we do have.

My unusual week

I've had a full, but unusual week. Aside from Tuesday morning, this is the first time I've sat at my desk all week.

Monday 

Almost all of the Japan Harvest magazine team was present for our meeting,
one key member joined us for six hours continuously on Skype!

Annual planning meeting for Japan Harvest magazine. Eleven of us (writers, editors, and advertising director/administration assistant/translator/office manager) gathered for the day. As I anticipated in my last post, it was an exciting day. It isn't easy to make decisions when there are that many people in a meeting, but we made progress in some areas.

What I always appreciate is hearing these people's passion for the magazine. They aren't doing this because they have to. It's not just a job to them, they own the mission. There is a genuine desire to do the best we can to support the mission community in Japan.

We made some progress in planning for my home assignment. We mostly need more editors from early next year, so that's something we're praying for. We also need an additional proofreader, but not because of my home assignment, because our excellent proofreader has taken on another job, so has less time than he used to have.

Tuesday
After lunch David and I took off for the Hakone area. It was a milestone adventure. Our goal was to celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary (about six weeks early, but at a much more convenient time). It's the first time we've gone away overnight on our own for ten years (for pleasure, perhaps we've done it once or twice for work). 

This time, with a fairly responsible 18 y.o. in the house and everyone on holidays, we decided to leave the boys on their own. We left a safety net, with friends just down the road. The boys had dinner with them on both of the nights we were away. All went smoothly on that front.

Our accomodation, built on the side of a mountain.

We stayed at a modern Japanese-style hot spring hotel. It was small, only nine rooms. There were men's and women's baths as well as a private shower/tub in each room. Or should I say, "outside" each room: it was on the balcony!

Our room was at the top on in the middle of the photo.
Green viewing from all angles!

It's a mountainous area and our little abode was built on a slope, indeed, only one or two rooms per level. So peaceful. But not just the hotel, the fact that we had no one else to consult about anything. No one to console, or cajole, or manipulate connive to execute a plan. So blissful.

Our personal Japanese hot tub and shower (on the right).
You clean up before you hop in the tub.

We live up near the yellow star and were staying at
the red "pin".

Japanese-style breakfast. Rice, fish, miso soup and seaweed.
With a cold, slightly boiled egg and small accompaniments.

Wednesday
After a Japanese-style breakfast at our lodgings we hiked up the road (aka the side of a mountain) for a kilometre to get to the rope-way that would take us to the local lake. Neither of us are mountain hikers and you surely could tell!

The view from the rope-way was wonderful and well worth the trip. We headed over the top of a ridge (and saw an area where sulphur fumes bubble to the surface of this active volcano) and down to Lake Ashi. We were deposited on its shore and caught a ferry to the other end of the lake where we found a variety of touristy things: shops, museums, and more shops.

From the ropeway down to Lake Ashi. This is part of what seems to have been a huge volcano
or several volcanoes long ago. The lake is a caldron lake, like the one we camped at in July, but
nowhere near as deep (max depth about 45m).

We went and learnt about the history of the area as a major security checkpoint for 250 years. It was a place that the main road (Tōkaido) between Edo (modern day Tokyo), Yokohama, Nagoya, Kyoto, and Osaka to the west (there were four other roads, but this was the busiest) passed through. Guarded by inhospitable mountains all around, it was hard to travel through this area without going past this checkpoint. What were they checking for? Arms going into Edo and women leaving. Apparently the shogun kept the wives of various area lords captive in Edo. It was a way to ensure that the lords behaved themselves and visited regularly.

Looking out one of the checkpoint gates from inside.

My wonderful husband with our noodle lunch.

We enjoyed a traditional cold-noodle lunch then shaved ice (it was a hot day). And then, after some souvenir shopping, we sipped ice coffee/cocoa while waiting for the next ferry. 

The lake was beautiful and very calm, it hardly felt like we were on the water at all.

Our plan was to go back on the rope-way (we had return tickets), but it closed due to excess fumes, so instead we had to catch a couple of buses.


Oh the bliss of a cool shower on our private balcony when we returned, all hot and sticky! Then another meal, just the two of us. Just as we're not used to going away on our own, we're also not used to multiple meals on our own or out at restaurants. After just a day of it we were craving more veggies and less carbs!

Thursday
After another Japanese breakfast we headed on our way home, via another lake. We were in no rush to go home, so we drove to the afore mentioned area atop the local ridge with its sulphur fumes. It was open and we wandered around there in a museum for a bit. Learning more about the geography of the area. There wasn't much to see outside, because a fog or low-cloud had descended over the whole area, I'm thankful for the photos I snapped from the rope-way the day before.

The steam emerging out of the volcano. The smell of sulphur was quite strong.
This is where the area sources its hot water for a huge hot springs (onsen) industry.

I love this little sign at the information/ticket window.

I was amazed throughout our couple of days posing as tourists at how much English was available and how many spoke in English to us. This museum was no different, there was a lot of information on the exhibits in English. This really is a different Japan to the one we live in, in our everyday lives.


After this we took a side-trip to another lake, Yamanaka, for lunch and then headed back to Tokyo, stopping for coffee/hot cocoa at a road-side parking area for afternoon tea.

All in all it was a leisurely day and the end of a delightful couple of days away. I could do it again in a heartbeat, though you quickly realise how expensive it is to eat out every meal! Camping takes more energy, but it is much more economical.

Precious gifts

I'm feeling tired and unproductive today. There's lots to do (two magazines currently in production for example), but I'm struggling to concentrate. A friend told me last week to be kind to myself and that grief is a tricky thing. Good advice for this season. But not easy for this hyperactive, busy, slightly obsessively introspective and conscientious person to take. 

Team Marshall! Even pizza making is a team event. I make the
base and David usually does the topping.

I did have a prearranged appointment for a massage this afternoon, so that's been a good excuse to get out of the house and relax. Now I sit in a bakery with a coffee and type this on my little phone (at least the first draft)!

I'm trying to prioritise the most urgent things. I bemoaned my grubby floors yesterday and my husband kindly said, "Forget about it, the day your slippers stick to the floor instead of your foot is the day you should worry about that."

Here's another suggestion from a friend. (Edited by a
thoughtful teen.)

So the most urgent is my criteria. And one "urgent" thing is staying afloat myself as the only parent present here till Sunday. 

God has graciously given me a precious gift. Tomorrow begins an annual event that I look forward to every year in Japan. It was something I had to potentially let go of to let David go to his father's funeral. But God's given it back to me. 

The event is a women's retreat, but not just any retreat, it's a retreat full of friends who are doing the same as me: ministering in Japan, most of them with Japan as a home-away-from-home. I accepted last Thursday that I might not be able to go. But mentioned it to the two ladies in my writing group (we regularly share prayer requests with one another). One of them specifically prayed that there would be a way I could get to this retreat, knowing it is a vital part of helping me to stay "healthy" spiritually as well as emotionally. 

The next day I got an email from a family at CAJ who also have three boys. They offered to have our boys for the duration of the retreat! The remaining piece of the puzzle was for the boys to agree to this. I knew one of them would be reluctant, but after raising it first with him and then with them all we agreed on a compromise: that I would be able to go for one night. 

David and I are a team, a tight knit team. It is hard to be apart, especially at a time like this. Being able to go and spend time with friends and in the Word at this time is so precious it is hard for me to type this without tears. I'm so thankful for this selfless gift and answer to the prayer of a friend I've never met (she lives in Florida). 

There are more precious gifts:

• someone to look after our youngest son while I take the middle one to the orthodontist on Friday afternoon,
• financial gifts to help cover travel costs,
• friends who I had text/Facetime conversations with on Thursday and Friday,
• a friend and colleague of my husband's who drove him to the airport yesterday,
• my parents who have decided to drive all day tomorrow to get to the funeral,
• health for all (not to be taken for granted, it is flu season here, and David and I have been jumping in and out of winter and summer during February, and
• multiple emails and messages from colleagues, friends, prayer supporters.

"Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share." (2 Tim. 6:17-18, NIV) 


Praise God for his good and precious gifts.

"He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? (Rom 8:32, NIV)