This morning was our last church service before heading off to Japan. As the service begins next Sunday morning we’ll be taking off from the Vancouver airport and flying out over the Pacific Ocean.

This is Family Day weekend in Alberta so the focus of this morning’s service was on being part of the family of God and more specifically, on being part of the local church family. For us, this is particularly meaningful. We’ve attended the Sedgewick Church of the Nazarene for approximately 30 years. These people have been there for us through good times and bad; through times of great joy and times of loss. Living some distance from our own families as we always have, the church really has been our family. Even our children live away from home now; one in Vancouver, one in Calgary and one in Edmonton. We’re used to saying good bye to them, though not usually for this long. The church is our everyday family, the people who are involved in our day to day lives. While we’re excited about going, saying good bye to them is not easy!

A couple of women in our church are known for their fabulous cinnamon buns. After Sunday School this morning and before the church service began, the congregation gathered over coffee and cinnamon buns to wish us farewell. The Sunday School superintendent said a few words pointing out that almost everyone there had been taught by one or the other of us. I had never thought of it that way before but I’ve been teaching a young children’s Sunday School class for the past twenty-one and a half years and the adult class has grown and flourished under Richard’s leadership for many of those years. In our church, it’s often jokingly said that when you take on a job you have it for life! We aren’t indispensable, however, and have passed on the torches that we’ve carried over the years to other very capable hands.

We don’t know what God has in mind for us during our year in Japan but we do know that we’ll have a faithful church family back here at home praying for us and awaiting our return. A whole host of them surrounded us during the service as our pastor prayed for us. We also know that finding the opportunity to worship or fellowship with other believers while we’re in Japan may be difficult. It is my understanding that less than 2% of Japan’s population is Christian so the likelihood of finding a church to attend, especially one with services in English, is not very good. We have a very big God, however, and as far as we may stray from home, we’ll never be separated from him or his love.

What are we going to be doing in Japan?  We won’t be teaching in the public school system.  MIL is a private school offering classes in English as a foreign language to students of all ages. The emphasis is on practical application and conversation skills.  MIL has 2 main schools with 4 classrooms each and 8 branch schools with 2 or 3 classrooms each.  These are housed in office buildings and are all located adjacent to train lines.   We will not teach at the same location every day nor will we necessarily both teach at the same location on any particular day.

We’ll be teaching during the afternoons and evenings.  Early afternoon classes will be made up of preschool children, housewives or retired people.  The very youngest children attend class with their mothers.  Later in the afternoon we’ll teach the older children and teens who come to MIL after their regular school day is over.  In the evenings we’ll teach adult classes.  Classes tend to be small and some high school students and business people choose to take private lessons so we will also have some of those.

We’ll be teaching 5 days a week but not necessarily Monday to Friday.  Teachers at MIL generally have Sunday and one other weekday off though we may have to work occasional Sundays.  We’ve been told to expect one common day off but the second one may not be the same for both of us.

Our first few days in Japan will be orientation and will include the opportunity to observe some classes in action.  We’ll begin teaching on approximately March 1  and will be signing a one year contract.  Depending on the school’s needs and the teacher’s performance, there is often opportunity to renew for another year but we’re not looking that far ahead just yet!

I just wanted to let everyone know that I probably won’t be posting anything new for about a week as we’re leaving tomorrow morning to spend some time visiting with family and I may not have internet access. We’ll be on the farm near Barrhead with Richard’s brother and his wife for the next few days and then out to Jasper to visit my aunt who is recovering from a broken hip.

We took our names off the substitute teaching list today. With less than three weeks left before our departure, we’re going to be very busy and we’ll be back to full time employment as soon as we arrive in Japan.

We were sent our Japanese address today. I’m not sure why but that’s really got the adrenalin flowing!  Suddenly the whole adventure seems even more real, more imminent, than it did before.

When our oldest son, Matthew, who taught in Japan for two years, received our new address, he looked it up on Google maps and sent us the following message. “I’m excited to tell you that you’ll be close to Costco! It was such a lifesaver for us…affordable cereal, bagels, pancake mix and syrup, coffee, etc, etc. Having some very familiar western food was such a comfort…I’m glad to see you’ll have that too!”

We love Japanese food and I’m looking forward to the challenge of shopping in a foreign environment and learning to cook the unfamiliar but it’s also nice to know that we’ll have access to some of the more familiar foods, especially for breakfasts.

The busy weekend is over and all three performances of Arsenic and Old Lace went very well.  As always when a play comes to an end, there are feelings of exhilaration and relief.  Then exhaustion settles in and there’s also a bit of a letdown.  The cast and crew spend a great many hours together in the weeks leading up to a production and suddenly that’s over.  Some are friends and continue seeing one another regularly but others drift apart.

Though the many hours that I’ve been putting into drama lately have come to an end, I’m definitely not at a loss for things to do.  I’m continuing to pack up the household and at this rate, we’re going to be living a very minimalist lifestyle soon!  Of course, that will be good practice for Japan where we’ll be living in a very small apartment furnished with only the basics.

As I pack up our belongings, I realize more and more that it isn’t going to be them that I miss.  It’s going to be people.  I’ve already said a few of my good-byes and there will be many more but I just keep reminding myself that I’m coming back again!

My very busy weekend begins with a full dress rehearsal of Arsenic and Old Lace this evening. It’s been a long and bumpy road getting here but I think we’re ready! We’re doing dinner theatre performances tomorrow and Saturday evenings followed by an afternoon matinee on Sunday.

Flagstaff Players is a small community theatre group that puts on one major production a year. A small core group of people are instrumental in seeing that everything that needs to happen happens but it’s definitely a team effort involving the entire cast and a small production crew. This year, in addition to my stint as interim director and taking over a lead role midway through rehearsals, I’ve also provided a few costumes and props, helped paint the set and been in charge of ticket sales!

Putting on a play is a lot of work but it’s worth it all when the lights go up, the play begins and I feel the audience respond. What a rush! I’m essentially a very shy person but when I’m onstage, I get to be someone else and it is so much fun!

Just in case those who saw last year’s performance are wondering, there will be no jungle girl costume this year! I’m playing the role of a little old lady; a very crazy little old lady.

Today I started packing away the things we won’t need between now and leaving for Japan. It will seem odd to see empty spaces where our things have always been but the job will be much easier if I do it a little at a time. I emptied the china cabinet today as there was nothing in there that I can’t get along without. I also cleared out a cabinet in the livingroom. It didn’t take long for me to begin to realize how much stuff we have and how much work it’s going to be to pack it all up! We really are a society that thrives on excess. Perhaps learning to live in a much smaller space with much less stuff will be a valuable exercise for Richard and I.

Our working visas arrived in today’s mail, exactly one month before our departure date! That’s the final piece of paperwork clearing the way for us to go as planned. On the visas we are designated as Specialists in Humanities/International. Pretty impressive sounding considering that we’ll actually be working as teachers of conversational English!

On another note, I’m feeling much better today. The back has improved significantly and the arms, though still feeling a little bruised, are also better.

This evening I feel a bit like I’ve been run over by a truck!  Richard and I each had four needles today; two in each arm.  Vaccinations aren’t necessary for travel to Japan but, because we want to spend our vacation periods exploring Southeast Asia, they’re a recommended precautionary measure.   We’re now well on the way to being protected against typhoid and hepatitis A and B as well as tetanus, diphtheria and influenza.   We have to have a second hepatitis injection just before we leave Canada and hopefully, a third one in Japan six months from now.  Malaria is another concern in some of the areas that we hope to visit but since there isn’t a vaccine available we’ll have to look into getting antimalarial medications in Japan.

We have three main holiday periods to look forward to during our year in Japan.  The first, called Golden Week is eight days in length and falls at the beginning of May.  We’ll have the second one, a nine day Summer Vacation,  during the first half of August.  Winter Vacation, much like our Canadian Christmas holiday, is approximately two weeks in length and begins on Dec. 23.   In addition to these longer breaks, we’ll have a number of days off throughout the year for various national holidays.

We haven’t planned exactly how we’ll make use of our vacation periods yet but Korea, Thailand and Cambodia are high on our list of places to visit and Hong Kong is an absolute must.

I hurt my back during my weight lifting workout today.   I was lowering a 90 pound barbell to the floor the same way I’ve done a million times before, being careful to use my legs and not my back, when I felt something in my lower back snap.  I knew right away it was bad news!  Hopefully it’s just a temporary setback though and not something serious.  I took some muscle relaxants which seem to have helped somewhat.  I could take more in an hour or so but the first ones made me feel kind of dozy and I have drama rehearsal this evening so I’ll avoid them until afterward if I can.

I also had my first bone density test today.  Since I consume large amounts of milk and weight bearing exercise is supposed to be great for your bones, I don’t expect any problems but I’m at an age where it should be checked.

We’re going to miss our treadmill and our free weights when we’re in Japan but we’ll probably make up for the lack of a regular exercise program with the amount of walking we’ll be doing and we’re also hoping to pick up a couple of used bikes at a reasonable price so we should manage to keep in shape.