The Adventure Begins...

Where to even begin, it has been a whirlwind of days since I left the student center on October 17th. Five days later and I am finally about to give ya'll an update. :]

Day 1: We left around noon to head to airport and we left MSP early in the afternoon. Our first stop/layover was in Denver, CO and from there, we left to LAX. First stayed the night in California at a Comfort Inn and a group of us walked over to a Mexican Restaurant, which was delicious! We all split up into five to a room and my room (Alicia, Kristy, Mai Kia, and Mary) had a wonderful time of bonding. :]

Day 2: We left late the next morning to head to the airport and in the afternoon we began our long flight on Singapore airlines. I cannot even explain to you how luxurious the flight was. They gave us warm/hot rolled up washcloths in the beginning to freshen us up and the amount of food and entertainment available was a huge blessing. 10.5 hours later, we landed in Tokyo.
It was hard to stay awake and take in the landing because I decided to not sleep, but it was still beautiful. After we arrived and were all through customs and whatnot, we were picked up by Janet Brown, who works with mission trips here and proceeded to spend the next 12 hours on our trip to Shiogama, with a five hour truck stop to sleep.

Day 3: We arrived around 8:30 a.m. (Japan time) and stopped to have breakfast at...McDonalds. A nice  taste of home to start our initiation. We then drove over to Shiogama Bible Church, where we are staying, for some initiation time and were able to have the afternoon off the rest. Afterwards, we all had an amaaazing experience of going to various host families who fed us authentic Japanese food. Culturally, the Japanese do not normally host people, even other Japanese so this was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that was so much fun.

Day 4-5: We practiced our Gospel music and sang one of our songs during the regular church service here and had another day off and a group of us walked down to the pier and a mall that were about 30 minutes away (there's a picture on my Facebook). That took up most of the day and we came back and had supper and some debrief time.
Today, we practiced our music for a few hours in the morning and then walked to the train station and spent the day in Sendai. Needless to say, it has been a wonderful experience and I am constantly comparing American culture with Japanese culture.

I love you all. Thank you so much for everything. The amount of prayers has been such a blessing and the support from strangers we have met along the way has been sweet to experience. We're about to eat supper together--some good 'ol spaghetti :]

Until next time...

-whitney

A few firsts:
1. I have officially been confused as to how to flush a toilet.
2. I have experienced 2 earthquakes, and felt one.
3. I have never tasted such delicious apple juice.
4. I have officially posted my first blog.

A passage that I came across on one of my flights over...

"...that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith--that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen." -Ephesians 3:16-21