Fuyuko on relationships

Praise God for Fuyuko. We first met in January, and today we also met - it felt so good to see a JAPANESE friend again after a term so far of Taiwanese and Americans, and she is so honest and pretty amazing in her thoughts.

She split up with her boyfriend in Britain (she spent last year in Britain) as, she says, her feelings didn't match her actions, so she spent a lot of time wondering about if it was right before concluding that the poor guy didnt really know her and care for her real self. (Also, she didnt like him so much as all he wanted to do was go to the pub and prat about, by the sounds of it.) But with her new boyfriend it's quite different. She doesn't think about it so much, not because she has stopped being a thinker or assessor of who they are, but because he just suits her. They are able to discuss their thoughts and feelings and are more similar in personality. They sometime squabble - usually on the fourth day of five together, and every four months or so. But by and large she's happy.

She said she thinks the PROCESS of thinking through relationships is more important than the CONCLUSION. I must agree. Through the process, we discover more about ourselves, we can develop confidence in our decision-making skills (mine have far to develop still), and we can then live with our decisions in the light of why we chose those things.

Of course Fuyuko is not a Christian. Her actions not being in line with her feelings might well mean sleeping with her ex-boyfriend, despite not caring for him a great deal. She watches Sex and the City (a US sitcom popular around the world these days), and that hasn't got great messages of stable or celibate relationships before marriage. However, I do think she has developed a great way of thinking with regard to how she questions herself. Although as a Christian I'd also want to be asking God for his input in any situation, and also testing my thinkng and actions through the Bible, and also asking God to change me, I still think what she said about process and conclusion is very wise and I like most of her answers too.

For her job, she looks after two autistic children at a regular school. She wonders how best to help them. She trys to implement some changes - like music therepy. She's been thinking it's a shame they have to learn Japanese kanji, plus hiragana and katakana (writing symbols), as there are just so many. If it were English they had to learn, it would be much simpler to learn to read and write with just 27 letters or so. I dont know if the government can do anything about that, but I liked her thoughts about it.

New Life!

You might remember that while up Tokyo Tower in December I prayed for the unborn babies of three couples I treasure. Well the first, my niece Daisy, is doing fine. And the other two were both born in the last 24 hours! Here they are!

Congratulations, Jo and Chuka on the birth of Gioia, and to John and Sally for Jeremiah! (not to mention proud brothers and sisters!)

Catching up on....

I've been reminded that I haven''t written for a while. Life has been good though! Today I saw my Thai friend for the afternoon; we sat in the university cafe and studied Japanese together. On Saturday I have a BBQ with my classmates, on the river bank.

On Thursday mornings now I study the Bible in the mornings, just for an hour, but in a simplified Japanese version! It is my favourite time of the week - time in my room, with the sun coming in, at an unrushed pace. The rest of the week is filled with language learning, I have started teaching the tea ceremony lady English once a fortnight or week, seeing special people, the church prayer meeting and of course church services. Last Friday I went to an Omatsuri with Masako san. It wasnt much fun to see "God" paraded round in a box on stilts, but it was a good "cultural experience" I guess and it was nice to hang out with Masako and her son. He ate quantities of noodles and funny pasta.

My parents head to Caterham to see my brother, sister-in-law, nieces, and my auntie this week, followed by Woodbridge, Suffolk for another uncle plus a visit from my sister. I realised I carry round the world a lot of funny things when I was able to look out the contact card of a resturant in Woodbridge, and give my mum their phone number to book a meal! from Japan!

OK, thats me for now, will write again soon!

If you are English you are....

I have just been told what the world thinks of the English by my Indonesian 17-year-old neighbour. It was during a party in our house so he was speaking more freely than normal.

Apparently the English are esteemed for two things:
1/ football (my friend knew lots of english city names through their football teams)
2/ and Mr Bean (which is on TV every night in Indonesia! by the way, if anyone out there sees a Mr Bean doll in a shop, please could you buy one for him? its his No.1 wanted-item!).

But as for the English as people?
Well they are also two things:
1/ arrogant
2/ wasteful & extravagent.

I found my own example for the arrogant - I watched a hugely cringeworthy interview/TV show with Hugh Grant on Japanese TV a few weeks ago. He was awful. His jokes were arrogant, and culturally way-WAY-off-line. He was taken to a lovely Japanese restaurant, but told them the food was disgusting (his joke), and that the hostess was stupid for dropping something (his joke). His attitude seemed to be that he could snigger at Japanese customs, as no-one he knew would be watching him anyway.

My Indonesia friend had his own example of why we are extravagent and wasteful - in two words (from his mouth): Victoria Beckham. and in three more: too much money.

Now that was someone being honest... although I of course was told I was exempt ;-)

Looking Into the Face of God

Chang Kyu preached a great sermon on Sunday, about looking at God's face. He used the example that he might return home and his daughter would immediately look at his hands - what had he brought for her? He said some Christians are like that - we look at what God can give us. We look at his hands. But he said a real love relationship was to look at someone's face.

This relates to me in my relationships. Am I wanting to gaze at people's faces, admiring them for who they are, and not at how I can benefit through knowing them? I am ashamed to say I am far from that. Am I looking to do the same with God, who is wonderful?

My church (in Oxford) is great at worship - looking into the face of God. It seems to me that some of the more 'traditional churches' talk about Christ's death so much, that they are in danger of focussing on God's hands: what he can give to us, salvation being top of the list. If God hadn't sent Jesus, our faith (in a God who shows mercy and has and will redeem us) might be in vain, as we wouldn't after all be spending eternity with him, but that wouldn''t take away God's greatness. He would stil deserve to be worshipped, do you think? Not for gratitude for life,but with awe of who he is? I am not suggesting Christ's death is not central - without it I would be lost - but without it God would still be whole, although history (and His plans through it) would be very different.