1 November 2004

Time continues flying -- I've been here for over a MONTH. Lots of stories to tell. 

HOWEVER, I haven't time to give you the update you deserve this morning -- I'm in a rush to get out the door. But I need to inform you that I'm fairly certain I'll be moving today and/or tomorrow, which means I may NOT be online at all for a while. 

I have no idea how long it will take to get a computer and my own internet connection in my new place, but of course I'm anxious to do it -- I haven't actually spoken to my family in WEEKS. I can't really afford phone calls and such, so we just use video chatting -- which is better anyway, duh. But I'll need a new computer to do it (this one can't handle it, apparently), and of course the requisite internet connection. 

Anyway... Here's hoping that doesn't take another few weeks... 

Please be patient if you need to contact me, I'll do my best to stay in touch and maybe try to at least READ my e-mails, if possible. 

19 November 2004

Quite a while since my last update, sorry. 

I have moved into an apartment, and despite the surplus of bugs and deficit of furniture, it's quite fine, thank you. Oh, it's a little warm for me -- the sun beats into that side of the building all day, which leads me to expect some "cozy" summer days to come, you can imagine. And yes, the dirt and grime are worth mentioning -- apparently my landlord's idea of "cleaning up the place for you" doesn't include actually touching any surfaces -- I mean, they surely must have used the "New Age" cleaning method, whereby they just wave their hands in the air inches above every dirty surface, "cleaning" away the "dirty vibes"... They CERTAINLY didn't use any water or soap, that's for sure. 

Oh, and the shower. It's clean, I should say, and there's hot water, thank heavens. But that thing has more clogs than an Appalachian hoe-down. Seriously -- if drain clogs were people, my shower would be China. I've spent something like $30 on chemicals and a plunger trying to clear that crazy suds hole, but so far it's a risky, day-to-day business. 

But honestly, I'm just making jokes -- get it?!? -- all in all, I'm terribly grateful to God for all He's provided. I am not hungry (yet), and I'm not cold (yet). So I'm quite fine and there's no need for you guys to worry at all about me. 

What I do NOT have, however, is a connection to the internet -- so the only way I can connect is to bring a laptop over to the church (where I'm at now) and hook it up here and furiously type as long as I can before I have to pack it up and head back home. I've tried to do that every few days, but it's not always possible, and I have heard from several of you that your e-mails to me came bouncing back -- sorry. It's gonna be that way for a while. 

Thing is, we are all set to install a connection, and it should be a good connection, too -- but they (the company) can't do it until the landlord (he of the "Dirty Vibes" fame) gives his permission for them to drill a small hole in the wall. You may wonder why a small hole in a bug-filled apartment would be a problem. You may wonder why the landlord of a building with something like 20 people living in it is utterly and completely unreachable for weeks on end. You may wonder why, if Japan is so modern and cosmopolitan, getting a stupid internet connection would be so much trouble anyway. You may even start to ask things like, "Can't a poor lonely brother just get a simple internet connection without waiting for months?!?"

But if you wonder those things, you are wasting your time. Because, no permission from dirty-vibes man, no hole... no hole, no internet... 

So please join me in a moment of prayer for my hole. 

... (pause)...

Now, I think I want to say that the transition to life here has gone quite well, considering I just moved to a whole new country. I mean, think about that -- just up and moved to a whole new place in one day. Wake up living in one country-culture-language, go to bed living in another. 

But I suppose some people have been given a "gift" for doing that -- and thank heavens I seem to be one of those poor saps, ha ha. 

No, really, I've shed plenty of tears in recent weeks (though I pray I've hidden it well enough that no one here even suspects it)... but all things considered, God has just made this one of the easiest transitions I could imagine. 

I do miss Hong Kong, though.

And I miss pizza. Let me fill you in on something -- in HK, I could just pick up the phone, and by the wonders of modernity (and multilingual operators) I could have a hot pizza in my mitts within an hour. Dude, they bring it TO you!!! I mean, seriously -- pizza, see? but they DELIVER it!!... What will they think of next?!?!?

But not in Japan. OH, they've got pizza places. I have about 4 pounds of paper in the form of flyers advertising pizza delivery places -- seriously, maybe 30 or 40 flyers. But I can't order from a single one. Why? LANGUAGE, dude. That's where they've got you. 

And you know what they do? They have the most amazing pizza flyer photographers in the world. I mean, these pizza photographers are PROFESSIONALS, yo! They can make a cracker with tree bark and parmesan flakes look like a dang "chicago-style pizza pie" -- and you'd be like, "Whoa! How can I order me up some of that cracker-crusted, tree-bark pizza?!?" They are so GOOD at making these pizzas look mouth-wateringly, dare I say "flyer-lickingly" good... 

But THEN you know what they do?!? After they have the JPPG (the Japanese Pizza Photographers Guild) take these amazing photos of pizzas, and after they stick those photos all over a flyer that just makes you hungry when you even see that thing sticking out of your mailbox -- after they do all that, THEN they put this little box on there. And see, they KNOW that when you see that flyer, you're gonna be thinking to yourself, "Whoa! How can I get me some of that?!?" -- and so they put this box on there, and they put these words -- real big like, and in another color (maybe bright orange or fluorescent red), and in ENGLISH -- and it says this:

"How to order:"

And it's all big there, so you can't miss it, see? And as your hungry, pizza-lusting eyes range over that flyer, they alight on that single phrase -- a whole mess of pizza photos and scratchy writing you can't read, but you see THAT, right? -- and for that micro-second in which only the human mind (or God) can actually process information, you think, in a flash of unmitigated joy, "OH, wait!!! They have the instructions on how to order!!"

But the instructions are in JAPANESE. 

The title phrase "How to order" is the only English on the whole stupid flyer!!!

And so your heart drops, and your hope fades -- because you can't READ Japanese, you dolt! And you try to stop it, but there's that little bit of saliva that drips on the paper... that, and a salty little tear... and, your dreams dashed, you slowly add the flyer to your pizza photos collection, a.k.a., the "pizza place flyer stack"... 

Anyway, I am jonesin' for pizza in a most-unflatteringly desperate way. I hope to find a way to order pizza and have it delivered to me. There, I said it. 

But until that happens, I'm just wasting my time. Because, no way to call and talk to the place, no way to order... no way to order, no pizza... 

So -- please join me in a moment of prayer for my pizza jones.

... (pause)...

Which brings me to mention something, actually, because the reason I've got pizza so much on my mind tonight is that I actually had some pizza this afternoon. Not enough to kill my pizza jones, mind you, but just enough to whet my pizza whistle, so to speak.

You see, Satoh has started a new "thing" over at Atsugi Naval Air Base -- I call it a "thing" because the idea is that it's supposed to be a Japanese-language Bible study or worship or whatever, but we haven't quite figured out exactly WHAT it's gonna be yet. 

But he asked me to go along, and I'm excited to do it, I surely am, and so far it seems like it's a genuine opportunity to connect with some of the Japanese people living and/or working on base. The chaplains (or one in particular, I should say) felt like the Japanese living and working on base needed some kind of group or gathering NOT in English, but Japanese. 

Point being, we went today for our second meeting, and we ended up grabbing some lunch at Parcheezi's, the base pizza place. 

It almost hurt me, it was so good. 

This wasn't some crap pizza out of a duffle bag. They didn't ship this over to Japan on the USS Frozen Pizza. No. As far as I could tell, they really MADE that stuff. I mean, I'm sure the dough came in a can, okay... but it was cheesy, and "pepperoni-y" (be sure you say that with FIVE syllables), and anyway, it probably wasn't really any good at all, now that I think about it, but I've wanted pizza so much that I loved it. I was SO wanting to go back and get a whole pizza to take home... Like, "Sailor! I'm an American citizen, and I order you to make me a Thanksgiving pizza that will make me cry!"... And he'd be like, "Aye, aye, sir!" -- and then I'd saunter out the front gate, right past security, with one greasy, pizza-shaped box under one arm -- and a Bible under the other.

But that was just my DREAM of what I was gonna do, as I sat there mildly daydreaming during the Japanese discussion about "Advent" that Satoh was leading.

. . .

Anywhoo, I've sat here tonight longer than I should have. I have MUCH work to do, and I need to get going. But I just wanted to finally give you a quick update on the general feel of things, and to reiterate the problems I'm having with internet connections, so you'll understand why I might not update often or even answer your e-mails for quite a long time... At this rate it might really be WEEKS before we get anything sorted out. 

Take care, and I honestly do appreciate your prayers and thoughts for my safety and emotional well-being as I continue to adjust to a whole new life... It's not easy, and I'm as lonely as I've ever been in my whole life -- but I have many new friends and co-workers, and thanks to God for that. May everything we do go to HIS glory and not our own...   

21 November 2004

"Hello, Amerika-jins! We are rock star -- we rock YOU!!!"

(seriously -- they WILL)

22 November 2004

Hard at work on securing pizza. Meaning REAL pizza, not frozen or otherwise preserved with chemicals or plastics or frozeries.

[frozeries = "things which cause something to be frozen"]

More news as situation develops...

23 November 2004

Now here's a little ditty sent in by Miss GIGI DAY, in Nawlb'ny, Indianer.*

(*Nawlb'ny is sometimes referred to as "New Albany" by revenuers and city folk)

Thanks, Miss Gigi, your FREE t-shirt is in the MALL... where you can pick it up after selecting it, taking it to the cash register, and submitting your t-shirt collection fee (usually about $15-$20)...