Making Contact

Over the last few days we`ve been doing a lot of flyering for the International Cafes, and excitingly have received two responses (highly unusual success rate - 2 in about 500 at that stage!). We also had a slightly surreal encounter while delivering a few flyers on the way home late one evening... As Jen came to one door, it opened and an elderly man came out, apparently for his evening cigarette, and stared at the grinning apparition approaching him through the darkness in abject horror. She (quite reasonably, she feels) attempted communication, using her newly aquired Japanese words, hello, sorry, please, and thrust a flyer at him, still grinning inanely. As this failed to elicit a response, Mark tried calling up "Do you like the English language?" This did not work either, so that particular attempt was aborted...

However, we have been able to make contact with several individuals, some already known to Natania and the OMF team and some new. We had a great time at our `At Home` event last night, with about 10 students and others coming over for coffee and cake. Patriots reading this will be glad to hear that after watching several demonstrations of the beautiful and ancient Japanese art of origami (which all the girls learn from their mothers - so cool!) the Brits present responded with a paper aeroplane race, which for some reason failed to impress as might have been expected...

The English classes we`ve been to, both in the Taylors` home and in local universities, have given us great opportunities to tell people about the International Cafes. The　students at the all girls university (any Bullers girls reading this will shudder with horror at this thought) stare at us wide-eyed whenever we go into a classroom, so the novelty of being a real live English person to practise conversation with is a great basis for making contacts and inviting people to events, though it would be amazing to know enough Japanese to explain properly why we have come to Japan - at the moment we have to settle for very simple things like "I have come because I am a Christian, and I want to tell people in Japan about Jesus, so they can become Christian too, because I think this is very important." I guess we hope that as we try to live godly lives around them, that will communicate what we can` t say in Japanese!

The smaller classes at the Taylors' homes have provided better opportunities - James was able to share his testimony with a group of women to whom Elspeth teaches English, and in one of John`s classes we had a discussion about religions, and a question was asked about Japanese religions and Christian ones, so we were able to explain that the big difference was that because the Bible speaks of one creator God, with whom we can only have a relationship through trusting in Jesus, Shintoism and Buddhism cannot be right. We`re not sure how much of that was understood though!

I think I need to wrap this up as my internet time is running out... But first, two observations on Japanese culture:

• It rains a lot here, like in England, and also as in England lots of people use umbrellas. But when I came into this building, there was a little stall at the door with lots of long, thin plastic covers for umbrellas! So they don`t drip water everywhere inside! I think this is one of the cleverest things I have ever seen.
• In Japan all takeaway food is served with double the packaging you get in the UK, but they only have half the number of bins.

Do keep checking our updated prayer requests...

Sayoonara!

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