Monday, September 13, 2004

Taga Church

Yesterday morning I went to the Taga church. It was so wonderful to finally get to meet all of the people I had heard so much about from my friends. And they had been expecting me there! A couple of my friends had forewarned them that I would be coming to Japan soon. I went to a bilingual class that Judith teaches which is going through the book of Mark. Judith teaches in Japanese, then someone translates. It was a very good class. For the sermon, Mr. Seito gave us all a copy of the sermon translated into English-- he went to Oklahoma Christian University, too! As did the minister, Sugao. And there is a man there who went to OC, majored in TEFL and Vocational ministry, and was involved in the international ministry at MRCC-- basically my twin! :) His name is Jun and he is really neat. I was introduced to the church at the end of the serve, and once again asked to say a few words (I told you it was a popular thing to do in Japan!). I told them that I was very honored to be worshipping with them after hearing so many wonderful things about the congregation. I even found out that they had had me and my move to Japan on their prayer list for several weeks. That means so much!
After church a group of us went to eat, and I had a plate of spaghetti that could have fed 4 people. Of course I couldn't eat it all, but it was good. Just a lot. Then I took a train to Mito and found my way to the church building for EBC. One of the teachers was going to be late, so I filled in for her until she got there then sat in the rest of the class. It was good but challenging, because of the four students there were 3 very different levels of language ability. Thankfully another teacher stepped in who spoke Japanese, so she was able to clarify things for us. The worship service was a wonderful singing service. It's always good practice in reading hiragana to sing the songs in English then Japanese. A couple of us talked about perhaps traveling somewhere this weekend-- I will keep you updated on that.
Today I checked out prices for tickets home this Christmas, and they're really not as high as I would have imagined. I can get home and back to Japan for almost half as much as it cost me to get here on a one way ticket. I haven't decided yet where I want to fly into-- OKC, Little Rock, DFW, or maybe even T-town. I didn't check the prices for Txk. Hmm... I should have. I also finished up preparations on my little "get to know Ann" activity that I will 19 times over in the next week and a half. 19 times for 19 classes. 30+ students per class. Whew. :)
Alina made dinner tonight for us ALTs, and we sat around and talked for hours. It was great to get to know all of them better. The more I get to know them, the more I like them and think we are going to work together very well.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ann-san,
I'm so glad that you made it to Taga church. In case you didn't know it was me who told everyone that you were coming! By the way,didn't you mean that Judith teaches in English and someone translates into Japanese?

I also want to tell you how proud I am of you going to Japanese language class. Once you learn how to read hiragana,katakana,and some kanji your life will become easier. Ganbatte!

Please tell everyone at Taga church hello for me and tell them I love them and miss them very much!

Sayonara,
Rick

Anonymous said...

It's that time again! Time for Nina to catch up on her Ann! In this episode, Nina tells Ann to fly into DFW so I can meet her there!

Much love,
Nina