A Jammed July

July has come and come and gone and passed us by. Finals have been completed, and students and teachers are enjoying vacation.

Finals went well. This was my first time to create and grade exams -- quite a challenge, but my time at Wheaton prepared me well and I was able to complete everything in time. Between proctoring other exams, and planning and grading my exams, finals week was packed!

The world's largest suspension bridge, which leads to Awaji Island!

After finals, the school summer camp was a welcome relief. The middle and high school students, along with most of the secondary teachers, went to Awaji Island. We stayed at a local youth camp, which had guidelines for everything, down to the folding of the sheets when we left! All in all, everyone seemed to have a great time, enjoying the beach, swimming, smashing a watermelon (a Japanese summer tradition) and relaxing after a long semester of classes.

Catching umi-hotaru (sea fireflies) with the middle school students at night.

Breaking a watermelon at the beach. (Yes, they ate it afterwards!)

What else has been happening?

• A week after we returned from the summer camp, I led a camp to prepare students for the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). I learned a lot more about the test as I helped prepare my students with strategies, advanced planning and lots of practice.
• I rode the night bus up to Sendai, in the northern part of Japan to spend some vacation time with Caitlin and her family. We are staying in a cabin on a cliff next to the sea, in Takayama, where missionaries have stayed for over a hundred years!

Please pray for the following, both for myself and Japan:

• Praise God that my first trimester teaching went well! I was able to keep up with new experiences in grading, planning and teaching to help my students progress in their English studies.
• Praise God for protection during KIUA's summer camp as well as traveling to Takayama.
• Please pray for wisdom and knowledge for my summer projects, including planning for classes this fall, researching new textbooks for my classes and writing up a new scope and sequence for my classes from the previous program.
• Please continue to pray for the Japanese affected by the tsunami. While it has been a year since the disaster and much progress has been made, the scars remain. Pray for the people who have been affected and lost family members, pray for the environmental impact and above all, please pray for the healing work of the gospel to be furthered in Japan.

Thank you for your support of God's work in Japan!

A Jumbled June

June in Kyotanabe has brought with it true Japanese summer weather: rain, heat, and bugs. It has also brought other Japanese traditions with it, like Sports Day.

Sports Day (Undoukai) is a major event in the Japanese school year. The students are divided into teams, each led by a teacher, who then complete in various athletic events. At KIUA, our Sports Day included the entirety of the middle and high school. We all took the bus and some vans (one of them broke down) to the local gym where we spent the day competing in events such as tug of war, relays, beach flag and dodgeball. I was the teacher/"supervisor" of the Black team (see photo). It was a great day of connecting with my students, encouraging them to not give up and cheering them on. And to top it all off, we won!

We won!

What else has been happening?

• I took the bullet train up to Tokyo two weeks ago and got to spend the weekend getting to know Caitlin's family (see photo) a little bit better.
• With the help of my gracious Japanese friends, I finally got the internet in my apartment and automatic bill paying set up.
• I administered one part of the TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) to my EFL students on June 26th. All of the high school and middle school ESL students at KIUA are required to take this test, unless they have received a high score previously. This is n important test for my students, as the results determine what English class they will be placed in and affect future college entry scores.
• I am now preparing for the end of the semester. My exams are on July 11th. All of them!

Meet my fiance's family (from left to right): Kim, Michael, and Anneke.

Please remember these requests in your prayers:

• Praise God for a good experience connecting with my students during Sports Day! Pray that I will be able to connect with and serve my more challenging students.
• Praise God that I have almost made it through my first semester at KIUA! Pray for energy for me and concentration for my students as we face exams and near summer vacation (July 16-September 5).
• Pray for safe travels for staff and students over the summer vacation, including my trip to northern Japan (in the tsunami-affected region) with Caitlin's family. 

Thank you for your support of God's work in Japan!

The Merry Month of May

KIU Academy is now in full swing! My classes are going well, and I am slowly but surely getting the hang of planning and grading (making the switch from learning the concepts behind teaching to putting them into practice on a full-time basis). Not to mention getting used to lesson planning and grading on a regular basis. KIU Academy is an exciting ministry to be a part of, and I strive to carry our missional vision out in my classroom.

Adjusting to life in Kyotanabe is proving to be both a joy and a challenge. I have moved into my Japanese-style apartment, and have found a grocery store on my way to work where I do most of my shopping. It's very convenient to live so close to work and have easy access to all the necessities! I love Japanese culture, food and the people; all of them have been a blessing in my time here so far. However, some of the differences between the US and Japan are still hard to get used to, especially not being able to read labels.

What else has been going on?

• I have enjoyed getting to know my fellow teachers and my students, and I'm beginning to feel like a part of the community. The students have settled down from the excitement of beginning a new school year, and now the challenge is to keep them motivated. 
• I got engaged on May 17! My fantastic fiance, Caitlin Essenburg (see sidebar), graduated from Redeemer University College this spring with a degree in social work and theology. She will be spending the next year living with her parents in Tokyo while she serves with CRASH Japan, a Christian earthquake relief organization ministering to those affected by the May 11 triple disaster. We plan to get married in the summer of 2013, after which she will join me in Kyotonabe. 
• May has come and gone and preparations are in full swing for Sports Day on June 23rd and the TOEFL Test (Test of English as a Foreign Language) on June 26th. Please keep my students in your prayers as they will be very busy this next month. 

This month, please keep these prayer requests in mind:

• Praise God for the kindness of my fellow teachers a successful first month at KIU Academy! Pray that I will be able to reach my students and be a positive influence in their lives. 
• Pray that I will continue to adjust to life in Japan and to full-time teaching. 
• Praise God for my engagement! Pray that wedding plans will go smoothly and that our long-distance engagement doesn't add complications. 

Starting things off in April

Hello friends and family,

Greetings from Kyotanabe, Japan! It has been really busy here with classes starting up, so I have waited till now to post this. God blessed me with a ticket and a visa so that I was able to make it in time before the school year started!

Things have been going well. I have moved into my new apartment and have started to get acquainted with the city. Teaching is challenging, but I have been enjoying it.

Right when I got here I suffered from hay fever. In Japan, many people have to deal with allergies around this time of year. Another unfortunate health problem I have had to deal with is that of my back deciding to spasm. I had to go to the local clinic to receive electroshock therapy in order for my muscles to relax. I also got stretches that will allow my back to relax after sitting and working on lesson plans for long periods, and am doing much better.

I also had the opportunity to go and listen to Akira Sato, a pastor from Fukushima, the area with the nuclear reactor that was hit by the earthquake and tsunami. His church was within the evacuation zone, meaning none of the members of his church are able to return home. Please remember to keep those affected by the earthquake and tsunami in your prayers, since the disaster still affects many of the Japanese people.

Thank you all for your prayer and support and if you ever want to drop me a line, I would be more than happy to hear from you!

Capture the flag

Sports Fest might have been hard, but capture the flag made up for it big time. Capture the flag in Japan is a little bit different from the old favorite. First off, there are no safe zones; if you're tagged anywhere in bounds, you go to jail. Tagging is a bit different too. You tag someone by hitting them with a sock filled with flour. Interesting eh? The jail is three minutes long and then you're off. The flags are similar, we used plastic bottles with glow sticks inside. One on each side of the field was to be protected by the teams and the third flag was hidden somewhere in between. The fighting was fierce on both sides and after the first victory, the other team requested a rematch. The next game was incredible competition and in the final minute, our team captured three of the flags to bring us to total victory. Victory was very sweet, especially after the crushing defeat at sports fest and also because I helped to bring in one of the final flags.

Sports camp!

I'm going to be honest and say this first: Sports Fest was hard for me. If you know me then you might be wondering "But Thomas, don't you like sports?" Why yes, yes I do, however two days of sports when I'm tired, in a foreign country and barely understand the language and my team loses a whole lot makes me irritable. Don't get me wrong, I did have fun (in retrospect) but it was hard to go through each game while losing terribly each time. We played sports in the morning, ate lunch and then played again in the afternoon. The evenings were meeting times for the students in Japanese, so the summer workers had our own Bible study/meeting.


My team was great though, even if some of them didn't speak that much English, they tried their best and were very helpful and tried hard in the sports. We just weren't as good in some of the sports and the rest of the teams. I suppose that just made our victories all the sweeter, as rare as they were. In the end, we came out second to last and got some kind of prize for being the second losers, an energy drink that had bits of snake in it, or something. Looking back, it was a good time and the food was great, but losing was hard. Fun stuff.

A big ol waterfall.

One thing that I like to do is go hiking. Luckily, we got to do just that. After securing the release of Carl the Cockroach in an emtpy lot near Mochizuki, we were on our way to Ume Gashima, the plum waterfall. We endured a beautiful climb over rickety rope ladders and steep slopes and were treated to a beautiful view of a very large thundering waterfall. This is not the waterfall, but a picture of another gorgeous river flowing over a cliff.