What a week!!!

 

These last few days have been crazy!!!!! There is so much to tell but I would rather not make you read a novel of a post to get an idea of how awesome of an experience this is. So I am going to do what I did in a previous post and give you the high lights of the last week. I also have been working on the other Exodus 16 series but keep getting side tracked by research articles… and then when I am ready to come back to writing it is already late at night… I will finish though and get it up here by the end of the week.

Oh yes! If you are having trouble commenting on the blog do me a favor and send me your comment in an email and I will post it up there! (hieb.jah@gmail.com) Thanks!!!

So from last week Wednesday:

02/22/2012

This was an exciting day! Mainly because class went well but more importantly because I got to learn some magic!!!! I have a student who actually had actually made initial contact through the Jaspersens. He became an English student with in the first week of me being here. We have some pretty awesome classes/hanging out time. Besides the magic I found out that he is skilled in two martial arts and won first place two years in a row in Miyagi Prefecture for bodybuilding. Now you may ask, “what do you mean?” What I mean is that when this guy was 30 years old he was a gorilla. He maxed out on his bench, squat and dead lift for a total of 600KG, which converts to somewhere around 1322.77357311. I mean that is pretty impressive. Now if you saw him today… it’s a little different story. He explained his size this way: “I deflated”. 

 

02/23/2012:

Thursday night. My first Toastmaster’s meeting ever! I won best Table topic of the evening!!! And got a pencil to prove it! I heard three speeches about the day of the Tsunami… it was really quite interesting. We were in a very emotionally secure environment for the people speaking, which allowed for some extremely emotional speeches. Until this evening I had very little understanding of the thoughts and emotions that some one would have been thinking. Tonight gave me an even better understanding of how to communicate with some one who has been through this natural disaster. The information I was privileged to hear I would never have expected. I could tell you about it but to be honest that would not be fair to the people who used tonight as more of a group counseling session than a speech club. So I am not going to give you detail but I am going to post another article about this night in about two days.

02/24/2012:

The fun part of this day was in the evening. As tradition I treat myself to meeting new people by going to the Temporary restraints every Friday evening for dinner… This Friday was no different. I walked into a new restaurant. I struggled through the ordering process (because my reading is still bad and there are no pictures). I ended up asking him to surprise me! The owner asked me what the LECC was…he saw my fleece that has the logo on it… Thank goodness for branding and marketing!! I obviously struggled through explaining this…until (dun dun dun duuunnnnn) a young chap walked in and said, “Hey what’s up! Who are you? (In English) turns out this young chap was my age and was Japanese but had rocked out a year in California and spoke English like a native. He also was a wormer employee of the rastaurant I was sitting in. He now became my translator/friend. This turned into meeting two other guys that were there that also spoke some English. These guys were cameramen for a Japanese news station. In the end we had a pretty awesome evening talking about God, food, some new Japanese dance comparable to the cupid shuffle (I will teach it to any one who wants to learn), and the fish market. The night ended with me agreeing to meet my new friends at 5:00AM the next morning at the fish market to watch some sharks and gigantic tuna come in to port. Pretty awesome… we are pretty much best friends now.

02/25/2012:

Kesennuma Horumon (pig intestine)

THIS WAS THE BIG DAY!!!! This day definitely fits the criteria for top five days in Japan. It might even take the whole cake! Today the center was open for a few hours. But because of the snow all of my English classes canceled… but happened next was a million times better. I had been invited to a toastmasters meeting where clubs from around Japan were coming to Kesennuma to encourage the people of Kesennuma. I decided to go ahead and grab on to that opportunity. It ended up being a trip not even Bob Marley could match. We had a few minor hiccups but this is the very fast version of the night: had a super Japanese meal including raw shark brain (kind of sweet tasting), Kesennuma Horumon (fried pig intestine, a Kesennuma specialty), amazing emotional speeches in English and Japanese, I met and befriended a Buddhist Zen Monk! (He is going to let me come to his temple that he is in charge of and have a look around!!!! Pretty stoked about that! Ooo and he has email… who would have thought?), Laughing, crying, more eating, pictures, a rainbow colored wig, many many toasts, more laughing, more crying, giving a speech at the end of the night to wrap up the event…making people cry…making people laugh. The end… or so I thought J

The number of connections made for the LECC through this event was priceless. The amount of support and appreciation received tonight was incredible. God blessed the LECC center in more ways than any of us could believe. This made me extra excited for the month to come. The blessings just keep coming… now we need to make sure that we effectively and efficiently use those blessings!

02/26/2012:

I had another superb set of English classes lined up for the day! The “Lions Chaser” was first up and this proved to be a very educational couple of hours as we talked about the origins of Buddhism and some difficult beliefs of Christianity mixed in with some talk about food and family. This was followed with a little adventure through Kesennuma for the yearly festival that takes place by the harbor… pretty awesome. They made the Guinness book of world record largest apple pie! And yes I bought some and ate it… Amazing!!!

This was later followed by a surprise revisit from “the Lion Chaser” who brought me a slice of heaven… chocolate pie that his sister baked. I am pretty sure he comes from a family of dessert makers… because this was better than the apple pie!

08/27/2012:

The center was closed today. It is closed every Monday to A. give me a chance to run errands B. to have a break C. to hand out fliers if available. 

This Monday was spent doing a little of each. In the morning I did some errands and then in the afternoon I decided to go check out Oshima Island because I had heard so much about it. The ferry ride was fun!!! I walked a few parts of the island. Saw some beaches that were pretty awesome… found some gigantic star fish… tried to find the temp housing units but was not so successful…climbed the island’s mountain for a view of the sunset… When I returned to Kesennuma later that evening I decided to go to the temporary restaurants for dinner. I went to the same place I had gone with the toastmasters crew a few days prior. When I walked in the door the owner’s of the shop said “JESSE!!!! You came back!!! We had so much fun with you! How long are you in Kesennuma for? (In Japanese)!!! The temporary restaurant owners pretty much all know me and most of them have the center’s flier hanging up in the shop. This particular restaurant actually has a picture of me pinned up on the wall!!! If you ever make it to Kesennuma go check it out!!!

02/28/2012:

Pastor Nadaira and Pastor Nakamoto arrived today around 2:00PM! They surprised me with some presents of quilts and five huge boxes of clothes!!! I was not expecting this at all so this will be nice to have something extra to do during down time. These clothes will prove to be quite interesting as well I am sure.

02/29/2012:

Today was interesting… I have to switch hotels because the one I have been in is full for the next two days… I will move back in on the 2^nd of March. As I left, the hotel staff told me they were eagerly waiting for my return! It is nice to be missed J! I went with Pastor Nadaira and Pastor Nakamoto to hand out quilts to people in the destruction zone. This proved to be a very interesting experience…

In the afternoon we went to the “home depot” here in Kesennuma to get a pole to hang the clothes that the pastor’s had brought with them. While we were there a man came up to me and started speaking in English. He asked, “What church are you with” This question was likely prompted because I was wearing a fleece that had the LECC logo on it. There are four of these fleeces. Pastor David Habben and his family paid for these fleeces to be embroidered. We recognized there was a need for some branding and marketing so this was one of the minor steps that were taken…Good thing!!! Turns out the man was the project coordinator for Samaritan’s Purse. This is actually a really awesome organization. Turns out they have been here since August and are building houses for those who lost theirs. They hope to have built over 120 houses in the Kesennuma area before April. AWESOME!!!! Anyway we talked for a while and I am going to be heading over to their center to see what is going down and maybe utilize my slightly rusty carpentry skills for a day or two.

So there you have it folks! Kesennuma is working hard!!! the anniversary of the Tsunami is just around the corner! Today marks my half way point. I return on March 31st to Milwaukee. Its going fast! I still have to get in a lil winter camping!!!

Enjoy your weekends!