火曜日。

I am increasingly thankful for the people in my life - both past and present and those still working their way into a permanent place in my heart.  I am as close to carefree as I've ever been, and it's not because I have nothing to worry about.  I'm not even saying that I don't still feel stress, but I feel my life is rich in new experiences (though I fail in my attempt of some) and wonderful people who challenge and uplift me.  I am overwhelmed, and a bit awestruck, by the love of God.

I'm curious to see what the next few weeks hold.  A few things have changed as of late and will require a shifting of my schedule into more intentional patterns.  I want to prepare myself for the new term, which will start in April.  My Japanese classes will start again, and students will again be regularly going to campus and so will I.  It's difficult for me to learn how to maximize my time, but I am tired of letting hours slip by after I return to my room with little productivity.  There are things I want to accomplish for myself, but I also really want to soak up each moment and keep from living in "future tense." I don't want to miss this adventure while it is still happening!

Sorry, folks. Nothing truly profound today.  I've just really felt blessed lately, and I've run across some new opportunities to grow and spend time with the Lord that I'm really excited about.  Please pray for us as we prepare for the 2011 Chi Alpha Training weekend - March 11-12 - we have friends coming from different places across Japan, and also just for the Todai and Waseda campuses as we continue to minister there!

Until.
Amanda

Web-Image...金曜日。

"Kanzakura"
Shinjuku-gyoen, February 23, 2011

I can't wait for the Japanese cherry blossom season! These are "Taiwan cherry" trees 

in Shinjuku park.  It was really beautiful!

火曜日。

Well, hello there!

This weekend was super busy, but it was so great! I attended a Chi Alpha friend's wedding in Yokohama on Saturday and, in addition to our regular services, attended a really special baptism service on Sunday afternoon.  Five people were baptized, two of which were personal friends of mine - and it was just such a blessing to hear them give their testimonies about how God has changed their lives and why they were choosing to get baptized.  Praise God!

I'm a little at a loss as to what I should write about today.  I get these really awesome ideas throughout the week (ie, weird things I experience in Japan, the number of people, just downright diary entry of each moment that has passed from the last post...etc...), but I'm not feeling it today.  I've had two cups of coffee and I finished checking the English website for our office...and now I feel like writing...but what?

Last night I attended Waseda University's 190th orchestra performance at the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Space.  I'd never been to a symphony orchestra performance before, and I was awestruck by how visually compelling it was.  The synchronization of the different sections, the movement that gave birth to sound - to art - it was a beautiful thing.

During Wagner's Götterdämmerung, the final piece Waseda's symphony orchestra presented, looking down on the orchestra, I could clearly see the numerous musicians with differing musical talent, playing different notes and making different sounds, moving in different ways.  Moreover, I could see that each sound - each movement - the very breathes taken by each member - were actively being chosen or taken specifically for the accomplishment of this singular work of art under the direction of one man: the conductor.  He kept the different parts in unison, he quieted the strings in favor of the winds when needed and vice versa - he called forth the loud crash of a symbol, the beat of a drum, and stilled them in practically the same effort.  He directed the sound into correct channels, into proper volumes and tempos.  Although the crescendo of one instrument might overpower the underlying notes of another for a time, the music would not be the same without both strains, and the role could change at a moment's notice.  We need the crescendos and the diminuendos, the quick and mellow tempos, the shifting of responsibility in carrying a piece, the various sounds and methods of producing them - and eyes that instinctively follow and trust the conductor's hands - in order to deliver the number in the manner for which it was composed: in such a way that all are touched and changed in a way by the sight and sound of it.

 ^{1 Corinthians 12:12-27}

Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many. 

Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it.

Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.

Until.
Amanda

Web-Image 水曜日。

I saw this today...

(Salvador Dalí. Paranoiac Woman-Horse (Invisible Sleeping Woman, Lion, Horse). 1930)

and a Jackson Pollock, and a ton of other well-known surrealists,
at the Surrealisme exhibition I went to today here...

(National Art Center of Tokyo - Roppongi, Tokyo)

after I met with a Waseda University friend that I haven't 

been able to catch up with since last summer!

(and then I finished two units for of my Global Uni course...)

Today, you rocked.

Until.

Amanda