I was made up.

My two friends and I were served our dinners last night in Kyoto cafe 'SanGatsu' by the proud mum of Kazuhiro Tsuji who has done a bit of this and that. Despite her fingers being crossed for the Oscars next month, the sashimi was very nice!

Realising over time

Another secret for you. I remember when I was six, on the eve of my seventh birthday (or it might have been on the birthday itself), - I remember being in my room, and I cried and cried by myself and to myself. Why? Because I realised that I'd never be six again, and I did like being six! Call me a thinker at that age!

And I had something similar happen to me two weeks ago. My sister had sent me a thank you card for my Christmas presents to her and her partner (very well brought up to send one!) and she ended the card by saying: 'By the time you receive this card you will be 29!' And for some reason, on re-reading that phrase, I just cried and cried.

I cried with sadness that I was now 29 - so old! no longer was I a young thing. And I cried with, I don't know what, as I remembered my same sister sending a card home for me from university, welcoming me to be 10, and then 11 (and even putting a notice in our local paper to congratulate me on being 'Legs 11'). And I remember when I turned 13 and she sent me a card saying 'Now you are a teenager!' And all through those years when she would have been younger than I am now, she bought me such wonderful Christmas and birthday presents (I remember a rucksack from Millets especially, and a Rubics Magic!), and sent me regular postcards from university in Plymouth. And I realised, not only how I had grown up, but how wonderful she was, and is, and how I'd never really spent that time with her to appreciate her and come out of my own world and let her know that. But I've also got a wonderful friend who encouraged me to say that to her. So I just did, last week, in a postcard. I delayed posting this blog post til she'd got it.

I don't know why I cried so much about that, but I have, and I did again when I wrote this.

Layers of Food, Fashion & Phonetics

If there's one thing I haven't yet mastered in Japanese culture it's layers. Student female fashion involves coat over necklace over jumber over dress over trousers. Or shorts and long boots. Many layers of different lengths, quite an assortment that in England at least (or maybe when you're just over 25), you just wouldn't think of putting together. I tried it today, not sure if I did it right or not. Then when I pick food in the unviersity cafeteria, there's lots of little dishes on offer, and I'm never sure how many I'm supposed to take to fill my gap and make up a 'normal' meal, and in which combination. And half of those on offer aren't on display, so I am always envious of those who walk away with a scrummy looking dish which i would have gobbled up if I had known it existed. Ah well, the delights of living in a foreign culture! Joy Hendry wrote a great book which I read in Oxford, likening the many layers of kimonos to present wrapping in Japan, not missing the various layers of politness esqueued in the Japanese language, to enlarge on this same topic. Over New Year, when I was given my kanji name, Yuki was telling me how a foreign friend of hers was given kanji which meant 'crazy/wild bird'. Turned out it was the same woman.

All you need is love, doo doo doo dooo

For about a year now I've been reflecting on and off on the nature of love. Being in loving relationships myself, it is pretty important; in fact very important. It's a struggle for me in some regards, to be faithful to those I care about. It's Jesus greatest commandment, and yet I feel we don't focus on it as much as other 'rules' of the Christian life. This is unbeleivable really, when you stop to think, and when you notice the love shared and given by some non-Christians. So a lot of my research has had to be private, outside of teaching my churches have offered, instead through questionnning Christian friends and reading the odd book.

This morning I came across an article on the internet, which I liked becuase it doesn't try to offer a quick answer but is more broad. I also like it as it's written by someone from a people-group in China that I have a passion for. (I'd love to see many Christian workers amongst them, and have excitment that many churches might and are being planted amoung them. They're a people I've been close to geographically - just seperated by the Tian Shan mountain range; I am thinking about praying for this region regularly.) Here's the article: http://www.rfa.org/english/uyghur/2006/05/23/uyghur_yasin/

The author, wisely I think, encourages each person to find their own defination. This nis different to most of what you read! So I took his advice and here are my conclusions, which I'm sure (and hope) will be improved on over the years, short-term and long-term:

1 Corinthians 13 has the only definition we can really go by with wholehearted endorsement I think - love is patient, kind, keeps no record of wrongs. It is expressed in actions and chosen atttitudes, not simply feelings.

It can be easily understood, or it can be pretty much inexplicable. i.e. Sometimes you can predict the kind of person you could love very easily; as my friend Beth once said to me, it's about 'preferences'. After a year of thinking about this, I think she's right; it is 'easy' to love certain people over others; some fit our 'bill' of 'sexy' or 'loveable' or 'sweet'. This especially works when it comes to both feelings and actions: perfect! But other times you can end up loving a person you wouldn't think you would, and being amazed that their differences to you are somewhat interesting and compelling. And that is allowed too! Some people end up married to those they would have predicted; others' choices are off the wall, and it might require a bit more effort to understand each other, but work well.

I have also concluded that love is more about what is in you/the person doing the loving: the love capability that is there, than about the recipient/the beloved/you. (their/our behaviour or 'deservedness'). Occasionally we don't get any feedback from someone we choose to love (I'm thinking of a Chinese lady living in England who i loved out of choice for a long time - playing badminton every week, visiting, with little love given back), but it completes and fulfills us to love anyway, and we can do it through the Spirit of God living in us if we follow Jesus (and now i am lucky that this friend emails me sometimes and has helped me in the past.)

I hate to say it, as being part of my generation I feel shy of committment: but the Bible talks about making committment, and God is a God of covenants all through his relationship with people... from Abraham to Hagar .... So somewhere in there is that. Always being there. About it being a foundation below and above the behaviour of the other person, an attitude that loves anyway.

I'd love to hear what others think of you have anything constructive to share. You can leave a comment.

I've also recently come a sitauion where a couple was dropped by a working-team as the relationship wasn't fulfilling original expectations. The teaching underlying this is that if love/friendship/working-relationship isn't working, or produces a bad reaction in you, then we should move on. Jesus also teaches his missionaries to shake the dust off their shoes in places where they're not welcome. Does this also mean where people are not interested in finding out more about God? I struggle with both of these things, although I do think each case should be examined on it's own and different conclusions can result. What do you think? is this reasonable?

My main Japanese language teacher is desperate to find a man to be with, preferably very handsome. A lot of our class examples feature this topic - in a stupid amount in my view.(My other Japanese teacher simply loves Mick Jaeguer of the Rolling Stones, so she is satisfied in singleness.)

This article on the web was written a couple of years ago, but it struck a lot of resonance in me from meeting and talking to people here. So here, have an insider view of Japanese romantic culture today!

5 things you didn't know about me

There's a quiz going round the blog-world, and I've been tagged. So here is my offering of:

Five things you didn't know about me:

1. I have a mole on my left leg, which my brother and sister used to call 'Doctor Bock'.

2. I am distantly related to Princess Diana, according to my uncle Patrick when he did our family tree.

3. I have a different uncle who lives in Cape Town.

4. I have a godson called Samuel, who lives in Bradworthy Post Office and Village Stores near the Devon/Cornwall border, and is in pre-school. It was one of the best feelings ever after I was asked to be his godmother. I was glowing for at least a month, and still count it a privelege.

5. I played tennis for Devon when I was 12. Also at that age I used to have nosebleeds every day; I remember even having to stop in the middle of tennis matches! I reached Wimbledon when I was 22 - as a security guard outside Court 1! Nevertheless I walked amongst the stars, went weak at the knees on seeing Tim Henman, and chatted to Venus and Serena Williams's dad, when he was too nervous to watch them play!

I realise that three of these are about how I relate to other people. Maybe I am secretly Indian or something, then again maybe simply female. This is now my turn to tag five people. But instead I simply tag anyone who read this and wants reveal your real self to this current world.

New Year

Well language school has started again and it's back to seeing the same people on a daily basis (like all of us all over the world in our respective jobs, I know!) Today it's sunny and not too cold here, although colder than Britain from what I hear.

I finally passed a kanji test! I had to retake one that I didn't pass first time, and when you know the answers second time round it is so much easier! I have a few new year's resolutions - like to walk home from school (pushing my bike), so that I can spend that 30 minutes with God and praying for people I know here. I see the benefits of a disciplined life, from two of my co-workers here. And I also see that it crops up in the Bible - the apostle Paul praises churches for this.

I had a slight falling out with my 'team leaders' here, but I think that has now been resolved, although we could probably chat more about it if they were open to that. I thought they were (already) my team leaders, but I found out (a bit late!) that actually while I am on 'language study', I am part of their church but not actually part of the team. This wasn't the original issue we were discussing, but when this came up it suddenly seemed more dominant in my mind. So now I really want to concentrate on language as that is my main focus!

I had an enjoayble birthday last Monday. The night before, I invited most of my female friends out to dinner, and just two came, but it was a very jolly and fun time. My friend Mirabelle (from France) made me laugh a lot, and Yuki (from Kyoto) was very easy company. The day itself I met up with Mikiko and family for a day walking round the city and eating lunch out... I even enjoyed Dutch waffles for afternoon tea in a department store cafe! I must remember that one and go again!

A new name

When foreigners go and live in Africa, often, if they are lucky, they are given a new name by the local tribal chief, or the villagers. That custom seems far from Japan's technological and economic reputation, but still, this new year I was given a new name - in kanji.

The characters themselves spell out Henrietta Louise Dudgeon, but the thing with kanji is that there are lots of characters with the same pronounciations, so the fun thing for parents is to pick the ones they like the meaning of, or the look of. And my friend's brother-in-law decided I needed to join this club! So now I have a name which in kanji means:

Henrietta (4 characters!), meaning:

Having many hometowns
Being fruitful

Louise (3 characters!), meaning:

Wild boar (this new year's animal)
A sky-blue colour

Dudgeon (3 characters!), meaning:

Making direction
Giving love through religion
Beauty and pureness

My friend's are just being kind, but still, I hope it's a prophecy for me!