WASEDA!!!!!!!!!!

We finally got to go to Waseda! An outbreak of measles had closed down their campus for the last two days, which made my team have to go to our secondary campus (Gakushuin) this week but we finally got to see and experience Waseda!

Speaking of Gakushuin, here are a few pictures from around campus. It's gorgeous!




And this is my campus team with Yusuke, who, if you've been keeping up with my emails, is the guy at Gakushuin that we've been developing a relationship with. He's interested in faith, and we've been able to share bits and pieces of what we believe. He's very hospitable and has been showing us around Gakushuin. Please pray for the opportunity to flat out share the Gospel with him, that he may come to know Christ.



My dad and grandpa's alma mater (Waseda)did not disappoint! It was a bit overwhelming at the beginning because of how huge and crowded it is, but once I got over that, I realized it's a GORGEOUS campus! It reminds me a lot of USC and maybe some East Coast Ivy League schools. Beautiful gardens,


very old buildings,


brick, statues,


lots of history. Turns out they're celebrating their 125th anniversary right now!


I went from finishing a 125th celebration at USC a year ago to this! haha.

On campus, I got to do a prayer walk and some discipleship time with my teammate Kris. It was pretty sweet! We only got to talk to a few people, but discovering the campus was quite the task on its own, so hopefully tomorrow, now that we're more acquainted with the school, we'll be able to share a lot more.

I really can't express JUST how excited I am about going to Waseda though! I felt it from the moment I walked onto the campus and imagined my dad and my grandpa (a lot younger) walking around, chattin with buddies, goin to class... Then when we were by a park, Christina looked across the path at an older Japanese woman sitting outside a cafe (oh by the way it was rainy today) and smiled at her. A minute later, the woman was right behind her, trying to talk with her. I went over to translate. The lady was just so drawn to Christina's smile that she had to come say hi. A beautiful and elegant woman dressed in a kimono (she was very obviously a higher class woman), she just kept getting more and more excited as we told her about ourselves. She has friends/family who are/were at all of the campuses our Project teams are on. She's been to San Jose (where Christina's from). She has family in Inokashira where my grandma lives. Anyway point being, she knew everything about Tokyo and insisted we exchange contact info so that she could show us around the city! Such a sweet lady! Hopefully we'll get to connect with her again. Who knows, maybe we'll get to share the gospel with an older-than-college-age person!

So it was a great DAY. Tonight, on the other hand, was tough.

It was family night so our community team decided to take us to Shinijuku to watch Pirates 3. Oh my goodness the filthiness of the area was just despicable! It's HUGE. There are neon lights everywhere, and it may look pretty. But as soon as we got out of the train station I felt very unsettled inside. It felt so... Las Vegas in all the wrong ways. It felt so incredibly worldly and empty... and then we started walking through the promenades and noticed it was SWARMING, I mean SWARMING (absolutely shamelessly completely overtly SWARMING) with male prostitutes. It was an absolutely heart-breaking and unsettling experience. All I could do was pray. Then on the way out from the movie, we walked by a Pachinko parlor and I almost cried looking in and seeing the hundreds of people lined up like livestock- without a reason to live, wasting their life away staring at silver balls falling down a maze! It was an absolutely disgusting place, and I'm glad to be out of there, but it was good because I realized just how much this country needs Jesus. The culture seems so proper, beautiful, and put together, and yet you scratch a little under the surface and you see total depravity and turmoil. Please pray.

Also, on the way back from the theater, walking to the station, Kris realized he's lost his wallet either in the theater or on the way out... His train commuter pass, his license and USCID, and money were in there. Japan usually does a pretty good job of getting lost things back to you, but we got hit hard with discouragement. It just was not a spiritually healthy place and again, I'm glad to be out of there. Please pray that Kris's wallet is found!

It's 12 past midnight (we just crossed over into Thursday) and I've been absolutely exhausted for the last four hours, so I'm going to bed. But I just wanted to share with y'all the heavy experiences of the day and night while the memories were still fresh in my memory. We've got quite a battle to fight here! I'm so excited that God's allowing me to be one of His warriors here for a while. But to fight effectively, I need to be well-rested. So good night y'all! Again, please pray!

Speedbumps...

TEAM PIC FROM BRIEFING!!!


So it's been more than three days since we arrived in Tokyo, and we feel very much settled down now, but some of you may already know, it was NOT an easy trip getting down here. We've been talking on our team about how exciting it is for us right now because it seems that the enemy really doesn't want us to be here. We kept experiencing speed bump after speed bump on our road to Tokyo, but through each one, the Lord provided crazy blessings and, PRAISE GOD!, we're here. Here's a recap of some of the hurdles God carried us through from our last few days in America to our arrival in Tokyo.

First, there was the financial hole we were in. I arrived at briefing in Costa Mesa on Tuesday afternoon, and that evening during our team time, our team leaders (Greg and Megan) told us that as a team, we were still needing $15,000!!!! $15,000! I mean, raising $5020 individually was a pretty crazy task, but after feeling collectively like we exhausted all our resources, it seemed like an impossible task for us to raise $15,000. But silly us, God was taking care of us. Since we wanted everyone to make it to Tokyo, we all worked hard to raise more money to cover for everyone's deficit (I was actually still about $360 in the hole). In less than 24 hours, our friends and family had committed more than $7500 and the deficit was sliced in half. We rejoiced and confessed that our faith had been weak. We thanked God for bringing us together as a team through allowing us to ALL fall on our knees and give it all up to Him. Over the next day, money still kept on coming in, though not as drastically. On Thursday afternoon, two of our teammates owed $5000 together, and it seemed they would have to go home the next day. But in the four hours between our team leaders talking to them about the possibility of going home and our last team time later that evening, God provided for the $5000 and then some! We were officially over the amount we needed! Can you believe it? By the grace of God, fifteen college students were able to raise over $75,000!

Second, our teammate David could not find his passport on Friday morning. We eventually decided he had probably packed it in his suitcase, and so we left for the airport. We got to the airport and David and I sat down in the terminal and started seaching through his belongings. Nothing. Greg called Vanguard to see if we had left it there. Nothing. I called Tracy and Sarah, my friends who had visited whom David had ridden to and from In-N-Out with the night before, to see if he had left his passport in their car. Nothing. I called In-N-Out. Nothing. Then Greg got a hold of the Crusade office and they found out that David had left his passport on their copy machine! Three girls from the staff immediately grabbed it and drove it up to us from Irvine! David was going to Japan too!

We arrived at Narita around 6pm after a VERY pleasant flight that had just one patch of intense turbulence. I mean intense. People screaming all over the place. It was fun! Really. But I digress. We all got together before going through immigration and went through together. But when we got through to the other side, we realized one our teammates, Maria, was missing. We freaked out because we couldn't find her anywhere. Eventually we found out that because she has a Malaysian passport, she needed a Visa to get in that none of the rest of us needed. She got pulled in to the office where the people very courteously had her fill out a Visa application. Maria made it through!

Greg and one of the guys working for Crusade here longterm went to buy our train tickets into the city. Our tickets were in our hands two minutes before the train departed, so we RAN! And we made it :-) But then a few minutes later, I heard my name from the back and my team was calling me over to translate what the conductor was saying to them. It turns out that Greg and Joe had left all seventeen of our passports at the airport train station! By this point, we all laughed at the absurdity of our trip so far. But Japanese culture pulled through, and when we got to Tokyo Eki (Station) a station manager was waiting for us and contacted Narita Station who had people bring our passports to us- in fact, they volunteered to bring it all the way to Koenji Station where our apartments were!

Honestly, it's ridiculous how many obstacles we had to go through to get here, but we know that the Lord wants us here. I'm sure He has big plans for us, and that's why the enemy is trying to stop our work. Just keep us in your prayers, please. :-D

-gen

Meet the team!

Here's a little profile of everyone I'm working with here, now with pictures!
First, our directors:

Greg Triplett

Graduated from UCSB, has been Campus Director at USC for the last three years. Led Tokyo Summer Project last year. One of my apartment mates.

Megan Mumey

Graduated from USC in 06. I worked with her on LEAD team for a while. Now she's an intern at the Regional office in Irvine. Is engaged!

My Apartment Mates:

Greg Triplett.

Kirs Fortin.

USC. Sophomore going on Junior. From Simi Valley. Fine Arts Major. Half Honduran! Cool, quiet guy. Didn't know him much at all back at SC, and now he's in the other bedroom of our apartment with Greg.

Beau Wirick.

USC. Junior going on Senior. From Fountain Valley. Business Major. My roommate at briefing is now my roommate here. We sleep on futons that are about an inch apart from each other. We're also gonna be roommates at school this year. Leading a campus team with Heather. Actor, seen regularly on Raising Dad, with guest appearances on The Office, 7th Heaven, Arrested Develpment, etc. You could say we're pretty good friends ;)

My Campus Team (Our team is working at Gakushuin and Waseda, which is the alma mater of my dad and grandpa):

My campus co-leader Christina Carey.

USC. Froshie going on Sophomore. From San Jose. International Relations Major. A sweet sweet girl on fire for the LORD, it was a conversation with her on Valentine's Day that got me to turn in an application and decide to go. We're similar in some ways, VERY different in others, and we're complementing each other a lot as co-leaders.

Cherie Fontanilla.

NC State. Froshie going on Sophomore. From Raleigh. Business Major. Another sweetheart, she's filipino, with the coolest Southern accent EVER! It makes us all melt.

Kris Fortin.

Russell Champoux.

Lawrence Tech. Sophomore going on Junior. From the state that looks like a hand. Computer Science Major. LOVES Japanese culture and seems to know a heck of a lot about it. Connects well with Japanese students.

The rest of the guys:
David Burkett.

Purdue. Sophomore going on Junior. From Fort Wayne, IN. Computer Stuff Major. Came on Project to Tokyo last year. Speaks some Japanese. I've already had the nighttime outside-on-the-porch convo with him. haha. Similar backgroud, in a lot of ways.

Bo Cox.

UTenn. Sophomore going on Junior. From Atlanta, GA. Geography Major. Speaks some Japanese. We have a Bo and a Beau! Bo's actually name is Conrad. UBER outgoing guy who loves Japan and plays the mandolin. Reminds me a lot of rolly and flex mixed together.

Joseph Benson.

USC. Sophomore going on Junior. From Simi Valley. Electrical Engineering Major. I've known him for a while now but haven't gotten to KNOW him. Woot for Project. Quiet but smart guy who's every contribution usually means something.

Steve Crockett.

USC. Sophomore going on Junior. From Dallas/Austin. Civil Engineering Major. One of my little lambdas. "daywalker" and I have been pretty close for a while, having gone on THREE trips to Mississippi together to do relief work. He's leading one of the campus teams with Sarah.

Chad Moseley.

USC. Junior going on Senior. From La Crescenta. Accounting Major. Applied to Project kind of on a whim. Made it. Had no exposure to or interest in a Tokyo project but here he is! pumped and ready to go! Another one you could say I'm somewhat close to. ;)

The rest of the girls:
Maria Bo.

Cal. Sophomore going on Junior. From Pleasanton. English Lit and Linguistincs Major. Shines with the joy of God's salvation. Speaks Japanese. Pumped to be here. Has a heart for the people here.

Sarah Kelley.

USC. Junior going on Senior. From San Diego. Stage Management Major. Just turned 24 on the 24th! Leading a campus team with Steve. God definitely wants her here. He blessed us all through her struggles with support raising.

Kristin Oketani.

USC. Freshman going on Sophomore. From Hawaii. Business Major. VERY laid back and Hawaiiain. Sweet girl who loves the Lord with everything. Japanese American, who's discovering more and more roots to her culture.

Heather Brainerd.

USC. Sophomore going on Junior. From Dallas. History Major. One of the reasons why I applied to Project. Leading a campus team with Beau. A very maternal woman of God who takes good care of everyone. You could say we're somewhat close ;)

So there you go!
See you soon!