As for the G4:

It is no more. what with the "nearly deported" story coming up, i forgot to finish the epic adventures of ryan's ibook. as you may recall, i typed up an entry for this very blog on said ibook from the comfort of the donut shop (or, as they say here, the "donutsu shop"). at some point later that morning, the CD drive ate one of said compact disks. you may not be aware, but one of the distincitive features of macintosh laptops is that they pretty much actually ingest the disk. there is no little tray that slides out, you just insert the disk into the side of the technology. had there been a little tray for the disk, there would have been a little hole somewhere that i could have poked a paperclip into and it would have manually ejected the tray. instead, i had to rip open the contraption and re-dissasemble it in order to give the drive the much-needed smack to the head. it was at some point in this smacking process that the motherboard (or "mainboard", which i am convinced they call it just to spite the rest of the computing world) somehow mysteriously suffered an electrical short that pretty much renders the entire machine unusable. so, the ibook will most likely end its miserable life as some kind of a youth group illustration involving a sledgehammer. and yes, i will enjoy it.

As with most of the rest of the northern hemisphere, winter has come to tokyo. it really seemed like fall hardly had a chance. either that, or this is fall, and when winter hits i'll wish i was dead. besides the cold, winters here are really great. it's sunny pretty much every day, which is a bigger deal than you realize when you have to dry all your laundry outside. and i thought washing clothes before was a pain! i totally checked out the weather forcast for today and washed a bunch of clothes last night so i could put them out early. i suppose that makes me all growed up.

The grillfiend and i went up to takayama for the thanksgiving holiday, but we didn't actually have the "dinner" that is so popular with most people. there weren't that many people up there for the break, which was unusual. in the past, thanksgivings up there were great--6 or 7 families, tons of kids of all ages, progressive dinner that takes 3 hours and 4 houses, ending with a fire on the beach. it was still a good time, just very chill. i convinced some of the guys that were there to go swimming with me, which was, as usual, colder than i thought possible. and it turns out it's really hard to dry your butt over a fire. nelle and i got a few good beach walks in, and took some good pictures of ourselves. aren't we cute?

Life here has hit the point where my schedule is finally pretty consistent. out of the 4 weekdays that i work, i have 5 meetings with 6 kids, which takes it out of me. relating deeply to 6 HS kids is pretty hard, actually. i recently had to buy a notebook that i write notes from each meeting in, just so i can keep track of what i talked about with whom. it feels kinda weird to know deep stuff about these kids and write it in a notebook, but my memory's not what it used to be.

I've got my travel plans for Christmas all figured out, so if you want/need to hang out with me over Christmas, here's your chance! i'll be in tacoma from monday the 18th till thursday the 28th, and i'll be in portland from the 5th until the 8th. and yes, during the missing week i will be in a place referred to only as "the south", and abbreviated with the letters G and A.

**NOTICE**
the state of emergency has been moved back from chartruse to magenta. please adjust your calendars accordingly.

so, everything is fine.

the medium short version of the "incident" is that my visa expired, making me little more than an illegal immigrant in japan. i was in a tough spot-turning myself in, proper documentation in hand, and being truthful-i really did simply forget-seemed like a good choice. there are stories, however, of those who did similar things and were "held" for days, (probably not actually being held), interrogated at length (physical abuse is an assumed part of the interrogation process in japan. seriously.) and deported, and, as a kick in the crotch of an already beaten foe, banned from attempted re-entry for the next 10 years. oh, and fined 3 MILLION yen. which, even though it is yen, still amounts to 30 thousand of your earth dollars. which is a lot of money.

all these reasons and more were what was terrifying me as i waited in line, the 7th person of the day. i had weighed the variables, and opted to go in early. on the one hand, any grace that the counter-people might have would still be in long supply, but on the other there was the danger of a bad night's sleep coupled with a bad case of somnambulism, and powerless victims to take out insomniac frustration on. personally, i would fall in the second camp, but the japanese folk are notoriously effecient, so i felt it safe to assume things about the quality of their REM.

i waited until the initial line was as short as possible before i went up to wait in it, mostly because i felt that a little momentum would see to it that the trip to the counter was completed, as i would have less time to lose my nerve. i mean, at least as a fugitive in japan, i would still be in japan, right? once my turn came, i explained with abject and self-flagellatory apologies that the date of expiry had come and gone, and my inattention and inaction to it was my own horrible fault, and what could possibly be done in a situation such as this? the man behind the counter, whose job title was "checker-of-the-documents" reached for a mostly blank lined sheet of paper from a rack behind him, then paused. i had in my posession a letter i had insisted my mission organization write for me, claiming their ownership of me, their responsibility for me, and also positing that i was an upright, steadfast, and generally all-around good guy. they also, i assume (the letter being in very formal japanese, i understood very little) apologized on my behalf in much the same way that i already had. the document checker skimmed my document, and deemed it somehow the equivalent of the empty paper he had pulled out. he told me everything seemed to be in order, and gave me a number. when my number was called, i went up to the lady, explained again, she nodded and took my papers, and passport, checked that all the magic spells were intact, or whatever they do with their technologies, and told me to come back in a few weeks when my visa was done. there was one, only one, thing she did differently with me than with all others who had gone before me:

she gave me a short scolding, and told me not to forget next time.

so, while it was hell on my nerves, with the proper documentation from a reputable organization, it was in fact rather painless. but only because i don't have a phobia of being scolded. if i did, then i just might consider stowing away aboard a russian freighter a viable alternative...

things to do while waiting to go to the immigrations office and beg them not to deport you and ban your re-entry for overstaying your visa by 12 days:

1. write a blog.
2. chew gum at a furious pace
3. dress nice in hopes of impressing those-who-are-behind-the-counter

more to come soon..

Say hello to the first of the Horsemen

It’s the end of the world, folks. As I am creating this entry, I must keep telling the helpful beige-clad workers of this fine donut-based establishment that I do not, in fact, want more “coffee”. I sit and watch the busses come and go, the people come and go. As you may have guessed, what makes this entry particularly new and different is the fact that I am not writing it from the confines of my office. I have become unplugged, as it were. I have thrown off my earthly fetters and now am swimming freely wheresoever I choose, toting my new technology with me (although not actually swimming with it, of course). What makes this event so cataclysmic, so earth-shattering we must now wonder if those crazy preachers on the street corners downtown were right, is the fact that….well, there’s just no easy way to say this. I feel like I’ve become an apostate, as if my actions have damned me, and now I must look you in the eye and say this: I am typing on an iBook G4. My iBook G4.

Sit down, take a deep breath, drink some water. You’ll be over the shock in a minute.

It does not “work”, per se, however, so I feel less bad about it. I mean, it obviously works well enough for me to do what I am currently doing, but in the larger scheme of things, the “capable of still doing what it was created to do” sense, it does not work. I got it from one of my co-workers, who owned it for about a year, then it went haywire. He took it in to get it fixed by the minions at the apple store, and they did not, in fact, fix it, even though it was supposedly under warranty. They “discovered” (or planted) evidence that they computer had at one point gotten wet, which effectively and conveniently meant that they would not fix it for free. The projected cost of the repair was not dissimilar to the price of an entirely new mobile computing unit (MCU), and due to the fact that an MCU is absolutely vital to the work of said co-worker, he got himself a new one, and gave me the old one. Being the kind of person I am, I reverse-engineered it down to its constituent elements, unplugged things at random, and discovered that the wireless unit was the offending piece of hardware. Having removed it, all seems to be well. Actually, to be honest, the optical drive seems to have developed a new, disturbing habit of not ejecting my disks, which is annoying, to say the least, more so since this seems to be something that is somehow my fault, as it never did this before I subjected it to a lobotomy. So we’ll see how long it lasts. It may be that when I take it back apart in about 10 minutes I will irreversibly damage yet another piece of hardware. Once this thing works well for a few days, I’ll commit myself to it, but right now we’re still in the test phase.

Needless to say, for all those that are wondering, while it is nice to be able to work out of the office, there are more than a few things that this machine does and doesn’t do that drive me nuts. In fact, as yet, there is nothing that my MCU does that deeply impresses me, apart from the fact that it is mobile. But, beggar that I am, I cannot be a chooser.

All at once, now!

Now, i realize that in the past, i've spent many days, and many posts, on stress camp, and this year will be no different. except that by no different, i mean shorter, and more interesting. first, the general info, then the stories.

In spite of the fact that the forcast called for pouring rain the whole time, it only rained at night, leaving us hiking in overcast, or sometimes fog. the rain would typically start just after we had finished cooking the food over our real, actually-made-from-collected-wood fire. so we would eat fast and go to bed. it only rained the very last day on our way into camp, and it was really pouring. the kids were very greatful that it hadn't rained like that while we were out. the first day we hiked about 3.7km in about 4:30, the next day we hiked for 13.7km in 13 hours, the 3rd day we went 7.6km in about 8:00, and the last day we did 12.7km in 6 hours (6km were on a level road). for the first time in my experience ever, we had a fire every night and hot food for supper! this year was my first time ever to eat one of the meals (hobo dinner) in spite of the fact that this was my fourth time on stress camp. i had 9 kids in my group; 4 girls: Milda, Emiko, Courtney, and Meg K., and 5 guys: Tyler C., Mark H., Eiji, Donnie S., and Yohan K. somewhat unfortunately for him, tyler decided on the 2nd day that the knee that he had surgury on last year was not doing well enough to take him all the way to camp, so i called in and had him picked up. we all tried our best to convince ourselves that it was his loss...but i think most of the kids were jealous. everyone was really great- very service oriented, helping eachother with difficult tasks, encouraging eachother on difficult sections of trail, giving up food and water for other people, etc. it's really wonderful to be able to see that side of kids, to know there really is more to them than the "cool" people they try and pass themselves of as in school.

For the first time in my stress camp career my group was not the first one in! usually i get worried that the last hike will take a long time, so i always end up getting the kids up and going too early. this year would have been no different, but they decided to walk the last 6km to camp on the road rather than take the train, which is what i had been expecting and (not so) secretly hoping they would want to do.

So, now for stories. the first day was pretty normal, and we found a great spot to camp about an hour before dark. we only got lost once, and the leaders figured it out within a half-hour, so no harm done there. we were being shadowed by another group- they hiked up to our lunch spot just as we were leaving it. the plan was for them to give us a 30 minute head-start, but we never saw them again. the next night we heard from another group that they had met up with them earlier, and they were about 3 hours in front of us... turns out they took the same wrong turn that we did, but they didn't figure it out! so, they ended up on a road, and took it for hours, ending up in front of us. bizare.

The next day we had to have tyler picked up, and the guy that met us ("uncle" bob) told us of a great spot to camp, and a little shortcut to get there, so we decided to head for it. we ended up hiking for about 5 hours past dark, with empty stomachs and increasingly bad moods--the last kilometer of the hike is all stairs. as we were about at the top, i thought i heard something, so i told everyone to stand still and shut up. nothing....then we all heard it--a very loud gaijin laugh coming through the woods from the general direction of our planned camp spot. sure enough, another group had gotten there first--hours ago, in fact. not only that, but the only other good spot had been nabbed by the group that was initially behind us, leaving me with 8 disgruntled, frustrated, and hungry kids. they handled it well, though. we ended up all cramming in a little rest-hut, which we wrapped with our flysheets to keep the rain and wind out. very cozy.

The next day, in spite of the fact that i had promised the kids a shorter hike on day 3 in exchange for a 13-hour hike on day 2, and because i knew that there was only 2 good campspots between where we were and our goal and the other 2 groups would probably get them (i was right, i found out later), we hiked well out away from the other groups- 6 hours due west, when our goal was about 5 hours due south (don't tell the kids! they don't know we were that close!). that night we stayed in a hut that i stayed at last year with the stress camp group. last year, when it was pouring rain, the kids were dancing with joy when we found the hut. this year the kids were highly doubtful when i told them we'd be staying in the hut. it's not much to look at- the corrugated metal roof has rusted through in a few parts, the wood is all old and rotten, etc.- but it's still "inside".

The last day we are supposed to get in between 9 and noon. the last hike down from the hut the takes about 4 and a half hours, and it takes an hour to break camp...so i ended up getting the kids up at 3:15am. they, of course, don't know what time it is, but they did know that it was dark, and cold, and they certainly didn't want to get up. that whole trail is downhill, which can be pretty treacherous in the rain, especially if you're sleep deprived. we got to the train station at about 9, and the kids, assuming, it turns out, that when i said we were 3 stations away i meant we were like 30 minutes away, in spite of the fact that they had maps, and also in spite of my attempts to convince them of the distance, the kids, as i was saying, chose to walk to camp on their own 2 feet. i understand the mentality, but it turns out that a 10 minute train ride translates into a 2-hour walk in the pouring rain, which nobody enjoyed. but we got back to camp and had curry rice and a blazingly hot ofuro, and all was good.

We also had good conversation. the name "stress camp" implies that the purpose of the experience is to stress the kids out, which imlies that stress is implicitly good, which i don't really think that it is. there's no point to have stress just to have stress! it's a chance for the kids to try out their leadership abilities, their teamwork, and to see how much they can serve eachother and encourage eachother when they no longer feel like doing it. so we talked about goals and expectations, frustrations and dissapointments, leadership and followership, and stuff like that. the goal is that they will be able to take broad, general, principles and apply them to real life back at school and home, rather than only thinking of that stuff when they are in the exact context that they learned it in. in other words, it's my job to see that they learn stuff, and teach them how to transfer it to "normal" life. this was the first year i tried really hard to do that, and i feel good about it. i've got different ideas for next year, but for a first try, i'm pretty happy about it.

alive'd! and survive'd! and all my kids survived too! well, i did have to get one sent home, but for non-emergency reasons. more stuff to come tomorrow. but all's well.

It's that time of the year, folks!

ARE

YOU

READY

TO

STRESS CAMP?!

the short answer, is no. well, yes and no. mentally i'm prepared, and that's a fact. i'm excited to go, but i think that shows more that i'm delusional and have a short memory than anything else. every year after stress camp, i wonder what would have posessed me to lead such a thing, and i have serious doubts about doing it again. but by the time october rolls around, all i remember is that it rained a little, and we were exhausted.

if memory serves me, it poured last time, we hiked for 14 hours straight, we slept in puddles on the trail, and upon returning i was so exhausted i slept at 6pm the night i returned and didn't wake up until about 10am the next morning. but i do remember that it was a great time, the kids were awesome, and i learned a ton about me and developed some real, lasting friendships. so there's that.

stress camp starts tomorrow, which means that i should really be home eating and looking over my "must pack" list that is somewhere. if i don't have something at this point, i'm basically stuck without it, since it's 7pm the night before, so i'm not really in a rush. as per usual, the forcast is rain for the next 4 days straight. at some point i expect to become bitter and cynical about this, but right now i'm excited to try out my newest rain gear, and see how warm i stay at night in my new sleeping bag (thanks, cam!). since i've been working in japan i've gone on 4 long hikes: stress camp twice (4 days) summer death hike of '05 (5 days), and summer fun hike of '06 (3 days). every single time, without exception, it has rained. the only variance is the amount or type of rain- 2 were raging typhoons, and 2 were just bad weather. the forcast for the next 4 days has gotten progressively worse- from partly cloudy monday and a clear week, to what it is now- 4 days of solid, unrelenting, rain.

well, as i learned from calvin and hobbes, this sounds suspiciously like an attempt to build character...


pray.

So, i was at Takayama for a total of almost 4 weeks...not a bad way to spend my august, if i do say so. i was there long enough to have a ton of fun, but also sit around doing nothing for vast stretches at a time. by the end of it, i was itching to get back to work in hot old tokyo...well, maybe the itching was from the poison ivy that i am not in fact, immune to.

Highlights from tak include:
-cliff diving
-fire making
-cake eating
-friend chatting
-scrabbling
-jet skiing
-life saving
-munchkin-ing
-light housing
-girlfriend cuddling
-neice playing
-weed whacking
-gutter cleaning
-mom's food eating
-adventure hiking
-sibling arguing (and winning)
-long family talking
-laughing
-potato gunning (well, attempting)



etc. etc. it was really awesome to get to hang out for a long time (about 2 weeks straight) with nelle- we were actually both staying in the same people's house for a while (thanks foxwells!). then the family came and nelle left, and i moved over to my cabin, and had good quality family time with mom, dad, doug, brent, and ro, as well as dougs wife candice and their 2 daughters, keira and kalista (haha, doug doesn't have boys!)

now i am back at work, and the family scattered the globe- ro to korea, dad manila, brent to canada, doug and mom back to america. so, the family is represented in 5 countries within 3 days of all being in the same one. go international family!

I have now posted photo's from my little takayama adventunre onto my electronic photograph collections website, or EPCW for short, where you can peruse to your pleasure. there are some pretty awesome ones in there, to be honest.

IN OTHER NEWS
There was an electrical storm here a few days ago that was about the coolest thing i've ever been through in my life! and i've been through a few things, let me tell you! at about 3am it started raining so hard that the sound of the rain woke me up. then the lightning started, and i immediately ran to my window, so as to facilitate seeing--and perhaps being hit by--the lightning as closely as possible. at no time in my life have i heard thunder from more than 1 lightning strike at a time- until tonight. there was an average- an average- of 1 flash of lightning every 3 seconds. all of the thunder was within 5 seconds of me, so the thunder was constant, just in varying intensities. and awesome. there were a lot of times, a LOT, that i swear lightning hit across the street somewhere.

All things considered, it was a lot like i would imagine the end times or something. i mean, it was straight out of some eco-disaster, end-of-the-world movie. wind blasting, rain coming down in sheets, lightning and thunder constantly, flash flooding...i was almost waiting for an earthquake or something. that would have been the icing on the cake, and i would have been praying to Jesus to take me home.

As far as work stuff goes, if you guys like to pray (to Jesus, that is) i'd sure appreciate prayers for the youth ministry here. i've been trying to collect/coerce high school leaders for the middle school group, but what with one thing and another, i'm looking at 3 (very qualified and awesome) leaders, where last year i had 5, and the year before that i had 10 (although, i think things went better with the 5 than with the 10). i'm not really that worried about this, as i've been praying all summer fairly faithfully and quite intentionally that God will do His thing with the group and He'll work it so the right kids are in...but, to be honest, 3 people are not capable of being 4 or 5, and with middle school, crowd control becomes an issue. so, if you think of it, feel free to ask God to help me out, or help me know who is waiting to be asked that i've been ignoring. etc.

well, all day i've been too lazy to really eat, and now that's starting to be a problem. off, to solutions!

And sliding in at the just-under-2-month mark, we have... a blog! it will probably be a while before i blog again, for reasons that i'll go in to shortly, so i figured it couldn't hurt to spend a little time on the ol' compy.

First, in brief, what i've been up to.

CAJ graduation was on the 9th of june, and for the rest of june, i was basically a bum. nelle's twin brothers had just graduated, and they were only in japan for 2 weeks, so we all hung out and were basically completely irresponsible. they are huge soccer fans as well, so we were staying up till midnight to watch the first of the world cup games, and then passing out during the second, which started at four, then stumbling home in the wee hours of the morning.

I put together another hike, much like i did last summer, but this time there were 5 fateful travelers (including me and nelle), we were only out for 3 days instead of 5, and there was very little in the way of getting lost or nearly dying. this was the first hike where we had far more time than we actually needed to hike the distance we were faced with, and the supplies to match the generous timeframe, so when the second day dawned crappy and rainy, we hiked till lunch, then quit for the day. both nights we were in spacious and roomy "huts"- there was no heat or electricity or anything, but the windows were defiantly double pane storm glass, and there was definitely jugs of water. i did have a tent that i brought, and i would have used it outside just to use it, since it was a birthday present and as yet untested, but there was a problem with wildlife. at both huts, on both nights, we were totally surrounded by deer. now, i'm a fairly manly man, as anyone could tell you, but these deer were fearless, and would sort of surround any hapless hiker wandering off to relieve themselves in the woods. most of the time they stayed out of the range of the flashlights, which was not that great, thanks to the thick fog, but i had my headlamp, which made the 15 pairs of eyes reflect back at me out of the darkness. so, i opted to sleep indoors. for those that are interested in our route, we took the seibu-sen to chichibu, changed to the chichibu tetsudou-sen, and went to mitsumineguchi. from there we caught a bus to the bottom of a cable car, conveniently out of order. we went basically due south to kumotori yama, which is where we spent our first night. this is also where we spent our second night on the "death hike" of aught-five. we then turned our faces toward the rising sun, and hiked easterly the rest of the time, finishing at okutama station.

A little over a week later, i summitted mt. fuji, again with nelle, but this time with 2 other 20-something guys from church. as with everything, it was something of an epic adventure. as this was not "my" hike, but one that i joined by invitation, i was under the impression that some of the details, like where exactly we were to start hiking from, were taken care of. the plan was to start up fuji in the wee hours of the night and time our summit to match the rising of the sun as perfectly as possible. this is a fairly typical method, and the one that i have used on both of my previous summit experiences. we were a little mystified that there were almost no other cars in the parking lot, but we were all itching to get on the mountain, so we thought about it as little as possible. In fact, for the majority of the time, we saw almost nobody else, which is a little strange on one of perhaps the most commercialised mountain in the world. but the path was before us, the night was balmy, the night sky clear, and the moon providing all the light we needed to hike. it was beautiful. it became increasingly evident that we were not on the trail we thought we were, however. i mean, we were on fuji, and going up, so we were getting to where we wanted to go, but there are supposed to be stations all the way up the mountain that sell beer, juice, water, a bed for the night, canned oxygen, etc., and no matter how far we hiked we didn't see anything except closed, locked, and barb-wired huts, or a few posts and some foundation that testified that that hut had at one point seen better days. after 5 hours of hiking, which is how long it should have taken if we had started from the right point, the sun was rising, so we stopped and admired it. at this point, i was wearing: longjohns, hiking pants, snowboard pants, polypro longsleeved shirt, polypro t-shirt, northface fleece, arc teryx shell, and a woolen hat. and i was freezing. my phalanges were all turning white, and i was shivering uncontrollably. what's with that? but, sunrise revived me somewhat, although it took a good hour before i could start stripping my layers. as we got higher, the lack of atmosphere did it's insidious work, and i developed a crippling headache, which increased exponentially if i did anything to raise my heartrate. good thing i was climbing the tallest peak in japan. but, plodding on, we made it to the summit a scant 3 hours after our sunrise experience. we even climbed around the crater to make it to the proper tallest spot- 3776 meters up. we discovered after talking to some fellow hikers, that we had inadvertently gone up one of the longest possible routes, a route that pretty much nobody used anymore. going down, however, was an amazing experience. they use medium-large CAT type machinery to get workers and supplies to the top, and we were able to follow a track pretty much all the way down. the road zigzagged all over at first, but then headed pretty much straight down. it was about 20 feet wide, and made of gravel about 4 feet deep. you just point yourself downhill and try not to go so fast that your body outspeeds your feet. there was one small incident that involved me (of course) clipping the top of a gravel mogul with my foot, the result being that i pulled a beautiful frontal whiplash maneuver and began descending on my face, but no permanent harm was done. that spectacle was actually captured on tape, and i'll see what i can do to make it universally viewable.

I decided towards the end of the school year that in spite of the fact that many of the middle schoolers would be gone over the summer, i would keep JAM going for the month of july. having now been through every sunday in the month of july, i must say that i am glad that i went with what i believe God wanted me to do. there were anywhere from 8 to 18 kids, depending on the week, and as for leaders, there were as few as 2- me and nelle- and as many as 6- alumni that used to to JAM back in the day, high schoolers that were in town and wanted to help out, etc. i gave 4 of the talks, and nelle gave one. every single sunday, with the exception of this last one, was cloudy, a little rainy, and muggy, so we had to play games inside, which seems like such a waste. the weather cooperated for this last one, though, and we were finally able to play water games, much to everyone's delight.

Now that JAM is done for the summer, i've got this week still in tokyo, during which i'm attempting to get my legal japanese motorcycle license, and pay bills, and generally take care of odds and ends, then i'm off to takayama, the missionary vacaction spot on the ocean, for a pastoral retreat. my plan for the summer was to be up there the following week with various members of my family, so after the retreat ends, i've chosen to stay there, bumming around with other families, until my own comes up there and we start our family vacation proper. there'll be very little to no internet up there, so as much as it'll break my heart and yours, blogging might be difficult, to say the least. after that, i go back to my apartment and my church and my ministry, and begin- can it be? - my third year of youth pastoring. crazy.

Impossible mission

Status: Accomplished

For the last few months...like 6, i've been joyously and completely illegally careening around the streets of tokyo in my little car. i decided that the time had come, something must be done about this. i began to ask around, and found that it is indeed possible for me to get my american driving license "transferred" to a japanese one, provided i jumped through all the little hoops that japan seems to love so much. SO MUCH. i, the asker, was encouraged by the not-too-difficult sounding hoops the askee was telling me about. show up, take a written "test"- 10 true/false, and in english, no less- take a driving test, take a picture, get a license. no problem!

Not so, my friends, not so. in japan, they have these imaginary boundaries that liniate between "prefectures", which act and sound and smell much like the american version of "states". on a side note, in the near future i will further explore the very real possibility that these lines were created by putting a GPS tracker on the back of a drunk dog. while driving down the same road in a straight line, it is possible to leave saitama prefecture, thereby entering tokyo prefecture, then enter saitama again, then enter tokyo a final time. again, this is all while driving in a straight line. i am not making this up. *edit*- that link expired somehow...

At any rate, were i to have gotten the gumption to get this all taken care of while living in tokyo prefecture, all would be well. it would have been a pain to get my address transferred and to register at the city hall, but it would have enabled me to engage with a much more "forigner friendly" licensing center. not to mention one that was not on the other side of creation. but, since i did not get this all taken care of until the very last minute (my american license expired on the 4th, and you can't get an expired license transferred now, can you?) i would now have to deal with the dreaded saitama licensing center. i now know that this place is somewhat infamous in the american crowd for being impossibly difficult- far, FAR more difficult than its tokyo brother. it is also, as previously mentioned, very far away geographically speaking as well. not only that, but it was very highly reccomended that i bring a translator- which seems silly. if they're going to have a process to transfer foreign licenses, it seems they'd make it at least somewhat possible to do on one's own, especially with a degree of japanese under one's belt. however, at one point in my day, a nice-ish japanese man instructed us for well-nigh an hour on how to drive on the test course, all in japanese. and not just any japanese, but some of the most difficult, formal japanese that there is, to the point that not only was unable to understand the vocabulary, i was hardpressed to have any idea whatsoever as to even the subject he was talking about. let it be said that translators are not needed for the one in tokyo.

My translator and i got to the center at 8:30 in the morning, on monday, my day off. in order to accomplish this feat, we had to leave at 6:30 in the morning. this is a travesty. there are about 14 forms that i needed to bring with me (american license, official translation of said license, alien registration card, passport, proof of residence in america, etc.) all of which i had. or so i thought. as of 30 days ago, they started "cracking down" on a form that up to this point had been deemed "nice, but redundant". it now seems the powers-that-be had decided that redundancy is good as a hobby, on rice, on a boat, on a coat, in a car, both near and far...you get the picture. so this form was no longer negotiable. they had not bothered to tell anyone this, of course. this form took me about 30 seconds to get from my city hall- about long enough to write my address out. can a form this easy to obtain really be all that important? survey says: no.

That was the only hiccup in our carefully laid plans. by the time we had gone all the way back across saitama, spent 30 seconds getting the form, and getting back, it was about 1:30. i managed to take the written test and pass, although they never bother to tell you what your score is. if you get at least 7 out of ten, you go to the next hoop. if you didn't they send you home. it was at this point that the instructor talked at us for almost an hour in very technical japanese about what would be required to pass the driving portion of the test. becuase nobody on the real streets actually follows any of their rules, they have a 10-ish acre driving course, complete with traffic lights, train crossings, crosswalks, and even some of those rediculously tiny japanese roads.

This driving test was one of those tests where you are required to know exactly what the tester is looking for, and do it, in order to pass. it has very little to do with driving in the "real world", and very much to do with them having as much power over you as they want. for all that, my tester was a fairly nice man, and i did do my very best to pretend like i thought his way was the best way, but he still failed me. as far as i could tell, you get 1 freebie. make 2 mistakes, and you're out. i know what my first mistake was (not stopping far enough back from the stop line), but i'm not really sure what got me my second "batsu". maybe not being japanese enough. or at all.

So, i returned to the dreaded konosu licensing center this very last thursday to re-take my driving test. i showed up early, like they said i should, even though i had an appointment, i then sat around for 2 hours, which was 1 hour after my appointment. i then took the test, and passed it without a single mistake! (well, i did turn the wipers on instead of the blinkers, but it seems there wasn't a slot for that on his paper). all the "passers" were then herded from place to place, seemingly at random, for undisclosed amounts of time and for unknown reasons. i suspect that even though we had passed the test, they still wanted to break our wills. but, 6 hours after i walked in to take a 5 minute driving test, i walked out with my license. and nobody can take that away from me.

As long as they can't catch me, that is...

Pre Post-script:

For the few of you that know or care about my upcoming birthday (i really don't care about it that much myself. maybe it's an old thing), know that i'm going to be at tak, so if you try anything, i may or may not know about it. that is all.

I have a tip for all those youth pastors out there, struggling to find a way to gain renown on the school campus nearest to you. this single, revolutionary idea has created and developed more of my relationships with high schoolers than any other single idea. i'll write a book about this someday, but for now, i'm content sharing my brainchild in this small, backwater arena. get ready and strap yourselves down, cuz this is gonna rock your world.


Date a teacher.

Seriously, guys. i hung out on campus anyways, just in general, but now all these kids want to be my friends because i'm their teachers' boyfriend, and my relationship with their english teacher is an easy, safe, and fun topic of conversation. also, due to my association with her, i am invited not only to attend, but also be involved in, various student body activities. most recently, there was a mid-evil themed banquet, and the ladyfriend and i were asked to be the "king and queen". decrees were issued, knighthood bestowed, much merrymaking was had, and i am now in about 2,000 pictures- some of just the queen and i, or of various groups that thronged our thrones wanting their pictures with the royalty. all you youth pastors out there looking for a way to get known on the campus of a school take note!


In other news, just last sunday was the JAM end-of-the-year party. this is to celebrate the end of the school year, as well as to give the 5th graders a chance to come for their first time. it's a 4-hour long event, with pretty much no down time, which means it's a challenge for the leaders- we have to be thinking at least 1 event in advance so that everything will be ready when the kids are. we played all our favorite games, we had a time of worship, we had 8 costco pizzas, we had a sharing time, and we ended with capture the flag. this is only the 2nd time i've done this event (it's a once-a-year thing), and since the average weekly attendance has been less than last year, i felt pretty confident that this years' party would be about the same as last years- about 35 people total, which last year meant about 25 kids. this year, we had about 40 kids, and less leaders than i had last year. PANIC!! especially considering that i, and i alone, was in charge of a total of over 50 middle and high school kids. we had a great time, though.

My leaders really showed what they were made of- they totally stepped up and made sure that everything was running smoothly, that the kids were having fun and being impacted relationally. there were about a thousand details that were taken care of, and all i had to do was pull someone aside and give quick directions, and they'd get it done, even if i'd been unclear, or they had to be creative or change a few things to get it to work. basically, they are awesome.

If i may digress for a moment, i feel really sorry for any youth pastor that doesn't think that HS kids are capable of being responsible, role modelling, leaders. obviously, not all of them are (i certainly wasn't when i was a teen), but it's just amazing to see them step up to the responsibilities given them. it's not all cheese and crackers all the time, but i've found that if you trust the kids, they will prove that they are trustworthy. if you give them responsibiliy, they will prove themselves responsible. either that, or they'll go down in flames! because of that, there is more risk running a youth group with teens as the main leaders, as well as more work on my part, but i consider them to be my primary ministry, and i'm convinced the middle school group is way better with high school leaders. i mean, come on. i'm old (almost 26!), and i don't see the MS kids much in the course of a normal day. So, Incandescence- I salute you: Blake, Emily, Maika, Josiah, and Amanda. you are proof that quality wins over quantity, every time.

Back to the party. rather than have a single person give the "message", we chose to each prepare testimonies, and invite the kids to share anything they learned from God, or ways that they grew, through the year. it was a little awkward for a while, and i worried that none of the kids would speak out, but once the dam broke (a tiny 5th grader was actually the first to go), they started lining up. very little is as encouraging as hearing the kids sharing. they talked about some obscure illustration from a talk during the year, and how it revolutionized their walk with God. they talked about how they grew in their morning small groups we orgainzed for them. one 6th grader shared, at the point of tears, how he had been reading how Timothy was telling people to be like him, since he was like Christ, and he wanted to encourage us- HE wanted to encourage US- and tell us that he wants to be like us because we are like Christ. i required all the leaders to go, too, and it was amazing to hear them put their own words and personal application on lessons, ideas, and talks that God has used me to put into their lives- ideas of spiritual disciplines, servant leadership, trust. it's humbling, and also scary, to see how i really do affect and teach them. don't get me wrong- i'm not trying to brag about what a great youth pastor i am. usually, in fact, i feel i'm doing a second-rate job. but this really showed me that God really can, and does, use me.

Here's some evidence of the JAM party. for the capture the flag game at the end, we used glowsticks to differentiate between the teams, since we played at night. made for some awesome pictures, and turns out that to middle school kids, glowsticks are hard currency, man. they might have been happier if we'd just passed out glowsticks and let them play with them for an hour, rather than use them to play a game. either way, it made for some pretty awesome photographic opportunities:

Party Foul!

In this business, it's a widely-held belief that one has a responsibility to share a certain amount of information within a certain amount of time- say, a month, lest the readers lose control of themselves, and...i dunno...hack every bit of private information i have. imagine a pit of velociraptors needing to be thrown chunks of meat every once in a while. that's you. however, at this point, it's probably nearer to reality to imagine those raptors who have survived the "alive-esque" feeding frenzy, in which their appetites were turned on eachother in a survival-of-the-fittest-free-for-all, collapsed sideways, panting out their last breaths, needing some kind of nourishment to survive.

wow.

Many, or only perhaps some, of you are aware that in the later days of march, i spent some time in thailand. important, funny, and painful things happened in those days, things that bear sharing. as such, in spite of our current chronological distance from those events, they will be our starting point. i apologize in advance to those of you who may recognize the following passages from emails that may or may not have been written to you.

The plan was for me to meet up with my girlfriend- hearafter referred to as "nelle"- her twin brothers Josiah and Isaac, and their cousin Jordan- hereafter referred to as "the boys"- in bangkok. the boys had been in thailand for a week or so at that point on their senior class trip, with nelle as a chaperone. they had paid to have their return date moved back a week, which would allow them to "party" in thailand over spring break, which i was to join them for. it bears mentioning that this whole thing was nelle's idea.

So i flew standby to bangkok, which was not in any way risky. the plane was roughly half full, which i knew, so i wasn't nervous or anything. i slept most of the way (of course) and landed in bangkok at like 11-something pm. i was almost to customs when i realized that i had made a newbie mistake- i'd left my envelope full of baht- almost $100 worth- in the seat pocket in front of me. CRAP! so i tried to go back, but they wouldn't let me. i talked to some people, who were sort of helpful-ish, but i basically had no hopes, especially when they asked what was in the white envelope and i told them that it was 2800 baht...so, beating myself up the whole time, i went through everything and got all the right stamps and forms filled out. on my way out, juuuuuust before i took the last step out from the customs area, a lady ran up to me and told me that they'd found my envelope! yay! if i would just take a seat, someone was bringing it up shortly. like 20 minutes shortly...but when it came, they asked me to count and make sure it was all there, and it was! so my faith in thai folk was restored.

Nelle and the boys had been kicking around bangkok for a full day before i came around, so they had everything figured out for the night, as well as for the next day. we crammed in a taxi to get to the area of the hostel, and pretty much just crashed for the night- it was well after 1 when we got there, and they were all exhausted. i stared at the ceiling for a long time...

In order to get where we were going, we had to take a bus to the ferry terminal, which was to have taken 7 hours, not including, apparently, stop-and-still-stopped-and-we're-almost-moving traffic in downtown bangkok. when we finally got to the ferry terminal, it was hard to remember a time in my life that i wasn't on that bus...it seemed to take an eternity. the spaciousness and fresh-ish air of the ferry was welcome relief. the island we were headed to has been misleadingly labeled "koh chang", meaning something to the extent of "elephant island". it was an island, and there were elephants, but only a few here and there, chained in stalls. i was assuming they made up the majority of the life on the island. nevertheless, it was pretty awesome.

We didn't have a place to stay lined up for the night or anything, so we went to the cheapest area of beach (all the price brackets sort of stick together), and started asking on one end of this long stretch of beach until we found a place. we ended up with 2 rooms. well, except by "rooms" i mean "huts". the huts were not that big, and the "mattresses" were made of styrofoam, so they weren't the most comfortable things in the world, and the roof of mine leaked in the pounding thunderstorms that were not uncommon. i slept with josiah in one bed, and nelle, isaac, and jordan slept in the other one.

The beach right in front of where we were was crap- all rocks and slime, but 2 resorts up, the beach was really nice, all white sand and palm trees. the water was the warmest ever- the popular consensus was that it was swimming in spit, although i championed the "swimming in urine" parallel . it was almost too warm; it was so hot outside that cold water would have been a relief! that particular resort also had our shower- we'd sneak over to their beach shower at night with soap and stuff and clean up a bit- between the humidity, sweat, saltwater, and sunscreen, we were quite greasy.

Our main source of entertainment was our scooters. between the 5 of us we rented 4, so me and nelle were together for all but like 20 minutes when one of the boys let her drive theirs. the roads there were incredible- i'd be braking as hard as i could going down, and i was barely managing to be slow enough to be safe. going up we'd end up in 1st gear going slower than we would if we were walking. it was great! it was so fun to be riding around in our swimsuits at like 60kph, no helmets, just cruising, enjoying the wind and the scenery. except that i crashed....


We ate out for every meal, and on this particular morning we were looking for the place that we had lunched at the day before. i was in front with nelle, and the boys were behind us somewhere. there's pretty much only one road that goes around this island, so it's not like you can really get lost... we came around a sweeping turn, and i saw that the restaurant we were looking for was on our left. i slowed down really quick, and tried to turn into their driveway...and totally wiped out. there was some dirt on the road, and if i'd been going straight when i slowed down we'd have been fine, but the tire lost traction when i swerved... it's a little hard to explain in type. i landed straight on my elbow, which is no picnic standing still, let alone moving forwards at 30kph. my left leg was also between the scooter and the road as we slid down the road.

But, sadly for me, nelle was much worse off. her elbow was bleeding some and the side of her leg was bleeding some, but her knee was the worst. in one spot there was a laceration about the size of a nickle, and then next to it was a divot the size of a quarter. it was as if someone had just popped a chunk out of her leg with a tool of some sort. i'd guess it was a rock or something- it wasn't really big, but it was deep enough to be a big deal. i, of course, felt like the world's biggest idiot- not only did i crash due to my own stupidity, which is pretty bad considering i've taken motorcycle safety classes and routinely drive a real motorcycle around, but my girlfriend got hurt worse than i did. unforgivable! the people in the restaurant rushed out to help us and gave us cotton and some anti-bacterial stuff, and some bottled water. she ended up going to a clinic at my insistence, where the doctor put a needlessly large wrap on it and forbade swimming.

Before i left, i realized that to survive in the tropics i would need sunscreen. i borrowed some, but it ended up being completely ineffectual. it was quite old, and i believe fairly strongly that it in fact magnified the ultra violet rays. i was probably the most burnt i've ever been in my life. i peeled all the way down to my wrists. my forehead and chest were mysteriously super-burnt (you know, when skin takes this purple-ish shade), but i realized that it was from riding around on the scooters. sunscreen before swimming has become second nature, but there were hours of riding when i didn't think to put anything on (sunscreen, that is). i was burnt all the way to my hairline- the wind blew my hair back off my face. pretty funny stuff.

Our days there were filled with aimless wandering and pages from "make-your-own-adventure" books. we drove to beaches, swam, drove to other beaches, swam there... the one of the boys ran his scooter out of gas twice, we climbed trees, we went on a "hike" to a "waterfall" (neither of those things deserve those titles). the last night we were there me and nelle treated the boys to supper- told them to eat as much of whatever as they wanted. we ate for the duration of a full-length movie, and the bill came to about $30. we sat around and did nothing, we trespassed, we got in trouble for trespassing, we enjoyed eachother's company. we relaxed.

The plane home was rough. the flight left at 6:30am, and the clock we had was mysteriously an hour fast, so i got to the airport at like 4am. the flight was really really really really full, and my "travel agent" told me that there was very little chance i'd make it out on my first try. so i ended up at the gate, just waiting. finally they printed me a boarding pass and let me on. wahoo! ...then someone came and kicked me off. CRAP! they made me sit back in the boarding area while they undid all the immigrations stuff and whatever, then i noticed that the people they were paging on the PA was for my flight. 2 people had checked in, but had somehow gotten lost between the check-in counter and the gate-being strip-searched, no doubt. in the end, they gave me my passport back and told me that i was a very lucky person. i was thanking them profusely when they cut me off and said "sir, you must go NOW. RUN!" i didn't even get a boarding pass- they just radioed the flight attendants and told them my seat number. i fell asleep before takeoff, and was awake for like 30 minutes out of the 5 hour flight.

I have an online photo album that i've uploaded about half of my thailand pics to, as well as the ones from cam's wedding, actually. this is the site free for your perusal. i'll also put a more permanent link to it on that sidebar over there, and i'll post a little note when i upload newer and cooler pictures.

There. survive on that for a while. i've decided that, since i seem to be incapable of posting with greater frequency, my goal will be to post whenever i feel like the guilt is almost to the point of being overwhelming. unfortunately for you, this time it was over a month....


ps- let me know if you prefer the pics the way they are here, that is, as links, or if you prefer to see the actual photos in the actual content of the actual blog

Now that i am almost fully recovered, i feel it's time to get a real update out there. So, hold on to your giblets, cuz here i go!

Well over a month ago, we here at Kurume Bible Fellowship had my second ever middle school retreat. some of you may recall my writings of the one last year. i had high expectations of this years' retreat, as last years was one of the highest highlights of my life. i was not disappointed. 25 kids signed up, (which, if i may say, is precisely the number that i had predicted) but only 24 kids were able to come (much to the chagrin of my ability to prognosticate), where last year 18 kids came. and where last year i think 7 leaders were in attendance, this year we were down to 5, including me. so, more kids+fewer leaders=disaster? nope. my leaders were awesome. too awesome, in fact. one of the things that i've been pushing a lot this year is that i minister to my leaders, and they minister to the kids (within reason, of course. i do love the middle school kids as well). so we divided up the 24 kids between the 4 high school leaders, and those were the teams for the big games as well as their small groups for devotions and discussion times. each leader was also in charge of giving one of the 4 talks. i did games and led the worship, and my plan was to also be running around like a madman picking up pieces that had been dropped.

The problem was, almost nothing got dropped- where last year i had about 15 minutes to myself the whole 3-day retreat, this time i had too much time to myself. i'd just wander around, looking for something to do, or someone to help...but the leaders had taken care of everything and were more than competent in their positions. i realize, of course, that this is awesome, and i've been blessed with awesome leaders, and it's good that i get out of the way and let them lead- really lead, prove to them that i trust them- but it's still kinda sad for me. i missed getting to know the middle school kids!

We had tons of fun- great conversations in the bath (gender-specific, of course. but still, how much would that not be at all ok in america?!), huge snow battles, tubing at ridiculously dangerous speeds, snowshoeing, playing dodgeball with marshmallows...pretty much what you'd expect from a middle school retreat!

Not long after that came Cam and Deidre's wedding. it was awesome to me how much the wedding really seemed to be a celebration that was being put on for the benefit of others, including the people involved, as opposed to the typical american idea of a wedding- that is, that it's the bride's day, the one day where she gets to be a princess, so she is justified in being as horrible and selfish as she wants. i dislike that. a lot. but this one wasn't like that at all! in fact, i eventually had to start asking deidre specifically how she wanted stuff, including me, to look, and she just said "do whatever you think would work best. i trust you." how cool is that?! needless to say, if any reservations had been in my mind, which, incidentally, they weren't, all of them would have been dispelled in that moment. go, deidre, and start the revolution!
It was a little stressful for me, as the best man with the most experience in weddingal-type things (as mentioned earlier, me and youngest brother brent shared the title of "best man"), and there were a few moments of frustration on my part directed towards one or more members of my family, (and by "a few" in mean "a lot". sorry about that, guys. i don't really know why i was kinda edgy. thanks for loving me anyways! at least, i assume...) but when all was said and done, the whole thing made me look forward to getting married myself someday- specifically the part about driving away and leaving the bridal party to spend the next 3 hours cleaning up the mess.

Highlights from the bachelor party include (but are not limited to): a "The Life of Cami" quiz, which i shamelessly stole from a bachelor party i attended once. "ringing in" was done by throwing soggy sponges at cami, and score was kept on cami's naked chest using a sharpie. i believe team "right nipple" ended up with the victory. from there we went to a second-hand clothing store, where each member of the party bought an article of "clothing" for cami to wear. from there we had a bite to eat at baha fresh, which was followed by a few rollicking rounds at the bowling alley. good times were had by all. or at least, by most.






Here's a few good photos from the wedding:




1. Ro and Brent strutting
2. Getting Psyched
3.The kiss
4. Remembering to breathe


Following the wedding, i was back in japan for a whopping 5 days before i left for thailand, where i adventured for 6 days. i have many stories from those epic days, including ones pertaining to crashing scooters and visiting a clinic as a result, but those will wait for another day. or week. mostly i don't want to overwhelm your stuggling senses with too much information and eye candy all at once. check back before too long for Part 3 of "Ryan's March of insanity: Koh Chang" it'll be worth it!

ONWARD!

so 2 mondays ago, i flew to americatown to be in brother cami's wedding. 1 monday ago i flew away from the dreadful americatown back to the land of sushi and aforementioned heated toilet seats. this monday (today, in case you were wondering) i'm flying out to thailand. 3 mondays in a row! that's gotta be some kind of record!

I'll be in thailand until saturday (hopefully only until saturday- the flights out look horrible) with no overtly altruistic motives- just having fun and hanging out with some people- all very cool and one very cute. maybe when i get back, and have a normal week without any international air travel i'll post my thoughts and experiences from cam's wedding, which were multiplicitous, as well as some stories and photos from the JAM middle school retreat, which was now almost a month ago. but i think i'm excused in the meantime.

















and speaking of heated toilet seats, here's cami's reaction when he got one from me!

You guys don't even know how much i should be working right now instead of doing this. so this'll be real short. i'm putting a pic of me and the ladyfriend on here, so you guys (and parents) stop whining at me. you know who you are!

Here's the breakdown of Ryan's whirlwind west coast tour:
Monday: I'll be arriving (assuming flights, etc. work out) in seatac
Tuesday i'll be up in canada getting brent,
Wednesday i'll be going to portland with him,
Thursday i'll be in charge of cami's bachelor party,
Friday is the wedding rehearsal,
Saturday is the wedding,
Sunday i'm going back up to tacoma, and
Monday i'm leaving back for japan, and arriving back here tuesday.

All i can say is that if it's this crazy just to get to a wedding and be a best man, actually getting married (NOTE: not that i'm planning to any time soon!) must really suck. props to cami for being willing to put himself through this for deidre.

Aaaaaand, one more thing- a cry for help. in a stunning political maneuver, me and brent are both best men for cami, and as such are both in charge of the bachelor party. i need some ideas (at least moderately clean) for bachelor partying. if it was me, i'd say we just rent out a sento and sit around chatting. and maybe watching movies or something. but, in a nation of homophobes, that doesn't really seem to fly. so any other ideas would be great.

Yes, my life in Japan continues. Highlights include:

Figuring out that not only does my cell phone know the weather, i can detailed weather reports, complete with those nifty rain-radar (raindar?) things, and the hour-by-hour forcast. I'm reminded of the simpsons episode in which they vacation in japan- they are discussing where to eat supper and homer comes out of the bathroom and says "the toilet recommended a place called americatown". not only does my toilet not recommend anything, it lacks the ability to provide me with even the most basic, inalienable right of sitting on a pre-warmed seat. clearly the management has dropped the ball.

I now live in a home. my home, to be precise. it may not be that big, or that warm, of have much food in the fridge, but it's home. quite exciting, actually. i have a fridge, a toaster, a microwave/oven, a washing machine, a bed, a couch, and a stereo that were given to me. in fact, the only appliancy type thing i had to buy was a stove, and that was only about $40 used, instead of the $100 they are new. but, hey, it makes fire, and fire makes coffee, so what do i care? it does feel a little strange to have all these things where i once owned pretty much only what i could carry on my back. if i were to leave the country next week, i would have to spend hundreds of dollars to throw away all my furniture, i'd have to give away my car and motorcycle, and computers...the more i think about it, the more things i realize i have. it's a little burdensome, actually. in some ways i envy brent, who is currently living the minimalist life, but i guess i'm content knowing that i lived that way, and i have the capacity to do so again, if i so wish. it is somewhat comforting to be in charge of my own destiny, as much as any Christian is, i suppose...

I went snowboarding about a week ago, and, i must say, i was awesome. i mean IT was awesome... this was my second experience trying to board instead of skiing, which i have done far more times. my first shot at boarding was some years ago, and it was pretty much the worst experience of my life. i went with my siblings doug and ro, and they were gracious enough, although i eventually told them to pursure their own pleasures rather than follow my excruciatingly slow progress. we were somewhere around mt. hood, and it hadn't snowed in probably about a week. the sun had done it's insidious work, and there was probably close to an inch of solid ice over the snow. the overall result was that the entire mountain was about as soft as a parking lot. there was no "carving", in fact, there was no turning or control of any sort. i was not about to let rock-solid "snow" and complete lack of experience stop me from trying some of the most daunting courses the mountian had to offer, however. as the day wore on, my world became more and more consumed with burning pain. i'm fairly certain that during my worst fall, on what was to be my last run, and which took place over the span of about a hundred meters, i dislocated my hip, relocating it at some point before my body came to a stop. there is no way to prove this, of course, but there was definately a grinding pop from where i assume my hip-joint to be. i paid for my overzealousness for the next three weeks, limping about like i had been trampled by a bull. a bull elephant, that is...

But, i digress. this experience was much much better. the snow was not exactly fresh, and falling at high speeds definately caused pain, but it was still fairly good, and during lunch it started to snow big ol' fat flakes, and by the end of the day there wasa good coupla inches of the really soft stuff. i fell only a few times, and only one or two of those were spectacular. the cost of the day, with freeway tolls, gas, boot rentals, lift ticket, and lunch, came to about $55, which i would consider to be resonable even for american standards. i may even go again before the season is up. the board that i was using now belongs to me, and i can't help but feel that it is now somehow my responsibility to go snowboarding with it.

In other news, this weekend will see the culmination of a few months of increasingly panicked work- the JAM retreat. There are 24 or 25 MS kids signed up, which is pretty much excatly how many i predicted there would be (someone, quick, pat me on the back!), however, there are only 4 leaders, not including myself, to lead them- 2 guys and 2 gals. last year i had 6 leaders going, and we had 18 kids come, and even at that ratio things would get crazy pretty easily. that said, however, last years JAm retreat was one of the best experiences i ever had- matched only y stress camp. looking back at my career as a youth pastor, those 2 events are the ones that hold the most meaning and joy for me. needless to say, i am excited. nervous too, of course- so much can and probably will go wrong; it did last year- but i really love these kids, and i can't wait to spend 3 days with them.

And, to answer your unspoken question, me and nelle are doing great. she really is a fantastic person, and we are remarkably similar in rediculous ways. this valentines day was only the second i've ever had as a dating man, and i admit, i was at a loss as to what to do. then i started thinking about it, and came to the conclusion that culture has no right to tell me how and when to like the one that i like. so, i boycotted valentines day. i'll display my affection to my girlifriend when and how i like, thank you. i confessed these thoughts to nelle the day before, and discovered that we were of one opinion on the matter. it was quite fun to answer "nothing" when people asked with a glint in their eye what i did for valentines day, or what i recieved from my "special someone" (to quote parents as a whole). spite, my friend!

No pic with this post; my desktop is acting up- i'm actually staring at the blue screen of death right now- and all my photos are on there. not to mention all my youth ministry stuff, including stuff for the JAM retreat...crap.

Update on the apartment:

So you know that key i got? the one that was clearly not gold, even though it cost more than cocaine? the one right down there?

wrong one.

That's right- not only did i get a non-gold key for almost $3,000, it was worthless to me. if you look really closely at the little sticker on the key, you can see that it has the letter "B", the letter "I" and a 3-digit number. that number is supposed to be a 103, but the helpful little man downtown, in his enthusiasm, grabbed the wrong key for me. actually, i definitely could have made my money back on the key, since it was for the apartment directly above mine. a little late-night tiptoe, a little trip to the pawn shop, and i'd have all that money back! stupid integrity...

So i had my dad call their office for me, and they confirmed that they had given me the wrong key, but there was a key in the mailbox, which i now had the code to, and i was free to use that one in the interim. later that night, probably about nine, nelle and i went over to "break in" and have a look around- my first real look inside that particular apartment. we had been there for no more than 5 mintues when the doorbell rang. i was a little apprehensive, thinking perhaps that it was a member of the neighborhood watch informing us that they had called the police, but it was in fact a representative from the realtors office, and he had come by to get the wrong key from me, and to chitchat about the apartment a little. now, exactly how he knew that i was there, or what he was doing around there at 9:something pm, i am not certain. it did give credence to my long-standing suspicion that i live in a giant dome, everyone watches me on TV, and every interaction i have with people is scripted. seriously- how did he know i was there? how did he know that i would be there? creeeeeeepy.

in other news- my newest hottest hairstyle:

yes, i had just recently woken up, and no, i wasn't hungover.

The single most expensive thing i have bought in my life. I paid almost $3,000 for this one ounce piece of metal, which would have made sense if it were made of something called rhodium, or if it was made of solid cocaine and was in bermuda, both of which sell for about $3000/ounce. if i had wanted to, i could have taken the same amount of money (¥307,050, in case you're curious) and bought a key made of solid gold four times bigger than the one that i have, which is made from some lame, non-gold material. i move in to my new apartment on the first of the month. i'm sure once i'm there for a while i'll become much less cynical about the whole thing.

As i was considering the content of this blog, i was struck by the contrast between what i write here and what my littlest brother brent writes here, in his blog. i focus more on history of events, somehow self-deluded into thinking that i have throngs of adoring fans that want to know what fills the hours of my days. brent writes more about...i dunno. funny things, i guess. he somehow has the ability to take a seemingly innocuous event and turn it into pure comedy. the thing is, i just don't have the patience for that, as you, as a member of the throng, starving for a scrap of my life thrown from the table of my last month, can doubtless believe rather easily. i seem to have little patience even for a sterile, soul-less accounting of my days. but, like it or not, here it goes!

I flew back to the americas on or around the 15th of december. i flew standby, which is infinitely cheaper (and by infinitely i mean about 60%), and also infinitely more stressful. even the book i was pretending to read could not fully capture my attention as i watched the holders-of-tickets file past, and i silently willed them to be stricken with the pox, or the plague, or simply a "burning in the bosom" that this was not the flight for them. it didn't seem to work, as i was left in the boarding area with the other seat-jackals, willing to walk over a path of broken and bleeding bodies, capitalizing on the misfortune of others, doing whatever it would take to get that seat. and i did, albeit in cattle. but, a seat is a seat, and i promptly fell quite soundly asleep in it for the vast majority of the flight. the fact that i was in an exit row and had about 12 feet of legroom was an added bonus.

Hanging out in USA (ooh-sah) was...well, it was good to see old friends. this was the hardest i ever tried to hang out with people i knew from back in the day (sorry it didn't work out, xeryl). and, by and large, it was a positive experience. i'll admit, it got a little exhausting when i'd hang out with friend #1 at a coffee shop from 1-6, then meet friend #2 for supper at a bar and stay there till midnight. i felt a little like people expected me to be a comedian or something, entertaining them with my late-night radio-show voice, sharing my "taaaaales from the orient". hanging out with the fam was great, of course, except that many of them (doug and candice and cami...) weren't around for nearly long enough. but, i guess i'll take what i can get at this point. i got to see my niece, who is now 66% older than she was last time i hung out with her. i even got to see my finance-in-law for like...15 minutes. we were in the presence of each other for longer than that, but she was pretty much glued to the computer screen obsessing over what to register for at various places. i'm sorta surprised more girls don't get married just for the stuff. i mean, who has the strength to turn away from stainless steel icecream dishes, salad bowl sets, and veggie platters just cuz they aren't in "love"? i know i was inspired...

And then i came home. probably one of the biggest things i realized during my brief hiatus was how much i really love my life here. life's really frustrating when i'm up to my goatee in it, when every week has new frustrations, and i never feel like i'm getting any better at it, when i'm reminded by the kids that life is all about them, and whatever i was doing can stop because now the center of the universe has arrived, and deserves my attention (cynical? perhaps.) but when i leave, when i'm back in the parents' house, being told when i can or can't go meet friends because i have to use the family car, and other people need it for something they had planned last week, when i go to bed realizing that i have accomplished nothing today, i realize just how good i really have it here. when i got back, i was itching to get back to my life, my job, my office, my relationships. don't take it personally, family. i loved being with you. i loved eating meals and praying and talking and laughing. i loved putting up the Christmas lights, i loved the food (i especially loved that), i loved beating you up, i loved hiking with you, i even loved fighting with you, even though i was always right. but i definitely felt a lack of purpose, a lack of meaning to my life. i encourage all of you who don't have it to get on the ball and find it. personally, i think it's all about putting yourself in a position of Christian leadership, a position where you are building deep, personal relationships with people to whom you can teach and model Jesus. which is probably why i like being in youth ministry.

In other news, a little over a week ago i started dating a very awesome girl. she's been here teaching since before i came, and, to be honest, i've sorta had a thing for her for a while. and now that it's worked out, i feel like the most fortunate of men. it's fun when kids don't know that it's all official and they try and tease me about her- when i freely admit my feelings for her, their eyes get all big and they freak out and get all excited. then i break it to them gently that i actually don't need their help setting us up, seeing as how we're already dating, and they deflate slightly. i love that i get to mess with kids' brains as part of my job!

as post-scripts to my blogs, i'm hoping to get into the habit of posting humorous, interesting, awesome, or otherwise noteworth pictures. here's a fun one: