Seeing Eye to Eye

Note: I had an impressively long blog post set up as the next update, but my computer decided not to save it so this is version #2. I'm going to do my best to be thorough, although slightly more brief, but I will try to keep all the main content included. This post is going to be long, as it's an update from a busy two weeks, so if you're not going to read the full thing please at least read the wrap up at the end. :)

Building a storage tent for a local fisherman.

Much of the past two weeks has been devoted to building storage and army tents for Samaritan's Purse, an international relief organization. When the tsunami came more than two years ago, fishermen were hit especially hard and in a fishing community that impact is bad news for everyone. The storage sheds will give the local fishermen a place to store their fishing equipment and the army tents will give volunteers a place to stay while they work in the area. The plan for the project is to build dozens of these two types of tents all over the Oshika Peninsula near Ishinomaki, and is home to many small fishing villages that often get overlooked.

The finished army tent we built for Mr. Hiratsuka.

This army tent took a full three days to construct compared to the three or four hours it takes to set up a storage shed. But the benefit of the longer period of time was that we were able to get to know the Hiratsuka family a little bit better. Mr. Hiratsuka showed us a family photo as he told us about his children and I was a little confused because it didn't look like a typical family portrait. He explained that a photographer from the newspaper came to take pictures of people because many families lost most of their belongings, including many photographs, in the tsunami.

One of three amazing lunches we had at the Hiratsuka's home.

The food was incredible as was the company.

A Chinese outreach event. Homemade Chinese food in the foreground.

I never thought I'd be practicing Chinese worship songs in Japan, but I soon found myself learning to play some really catchy Chinese songs on guitar. There's apparently a decently sized Chinese population in the area, with people coming to Ishinomaki to work in the fish processing factories or attending international schools. A few of our volunteers made some really tasty homemade dumplings along with Chicken and a tofu dessert. 

Local children performing at a neighborhood festival.

Last year one of the Christian groups in the area held a children's festival at a small park nearby and it was such a success that some community members wanted another similar festival this year. There were game and food stands outside, and in a community room a number of local musicians performed and a group of GMT interns and myself were able to do a couple of songs as well. I ended up running the sound system for the day, which was pretty hectic and tiring but it was a lot of fun and it's always cool when random skills get put to good use.

A yakisoba food truck owner sharing his story of the tsunami with us.

After church last Sunday, the volunteers took a tour around Ishinomaki to get a better perspective of the impact of the tsunami. It was pretty hard to look at a huge expanse of weed-infested land and imagine 2,000 houses being destroyed in a short time, but that's the reality of the damage that the tsunami caused. One homeowner told us how he had to flee from the water by going up a nearby mountain which soon turned into an island with all the seawater that rushed in.

Performing at a small violin recital for the violin student of one of the GMT interns.

Later that Sunday, we hosted a violin recital for a violin student of one of our interns. The student started violin lessons before the tsunami and was set to have her debut performance, but because the tsunami came, her performance was cancelled. It's been long awaited but after almost two and a half years, the student is getting her first concert. It was a really great time. Seeing the joy on her face after the concert was so incredibly rewarding.

All of the work I've been able to be a part of while in Ishinomaki has been about spreading love in some sense, seeing what life is like for another person and loving them in that. Whether we were helping fishermen recover from a financially and physically threatening situation, serving food that reminds people of home far away, hanging out with the community at a festival, talking to locals about their experiences in the tsunami, or giving a violinist her debut performance, it has been such a joy to be among these people. That's what the theme of this month has been for me, and I'm not convinced that
that's not how the rest of life should be as well.

-Spencer

Needs no explanation, but I'll give it anyway:
The best ramen I've had in quite some time.

The gang's all here!

Heading back to the worksite after a delicious, home-cooked meal.

This one's going to be a really short post, but the rest of the PVBC team came a couple of days ago and Clark (my brother) arrived yesterday. So we're all going to be able to work alongside each other today! The work location is about an hour's drive away from where we live, on the Oshika Peninsula, in a small fishing village. I had my first day of work with the older (and wiser) men on the team yesterday, and the cooperation among the team was cool to witness. Between our youngest and oldest member there's about a 50 year age gap, and we all come from very different stages in life. I'm really looking forward to what I can learn with and from these gentlemen. :)

-Spencer

Why Music?

One of the GMT staff workers grooving out to some gospel music.

Why music? To be honest I asked myself this question fairly frequently at the beginning of my trip. It seemed like every other day, Grace Mission Tohoku hosted some kind of concert, whether it was classical music or gospel, in a temporary housing structure or under the summer sun. The team from Juilliard played at multiple temporary housing facilities and held a beautiful classical concert at a nearby church, and let's not forget the Ishinomaki Gospel Festival (because I know my tan hasn't). I wondered why we chose a lot of music-based events instead of teaching crafts or doing some other kind of activity.

I can't remember who said this or when, but regardless of the details it had a profound impact on my perception of music. Come to think of it I don't even remember the exact words they said, but the basic idea has stuck with me: that the beauty of music is in the creation of an atmosphere. Stories are reconstructions of what someone else has experienced, while music creates the experience itself. Don't misunderstand me though. It's a great story of change when people give testimonies of how God has worked in their life and speak about the joy and the hope that they now have, and I do think that testimony is a necessary part of telling people why God is so good. But I can't say there haven't been times when I've heard a testimony and haven't been in the right mindset to listen well, discounting certain valuable truths by thinking things like "Well, that's good for them."

The beauty of music is that it has the ability to strike people in a way that words often cannot, and usher them into a place where they can experience joy themselves rather than just hearing about it from someone who has. It's the difference between telling someone how to make a tasty cake and letting them sample a little piece of one you made. If you want to encourage them to make the cake themselves, they'll need to know the steps to make it and they'll also need to know what the end product tastes like.

View from the second floor at the gospel festival.

It's been wonderful to help people partake in the same kind of joy that I've grown to have in the past couple of years, and in a reverse sense, I've really loved the joy that I get from listening to all of the music that has been floating around all over the place.

-Spencer

Doing the best you can with what you have.

Yesterday I had the privilege of hanging out with this little lady (below) for a short while after a lunch gathering. The lunch gathering, or takidashi, was hosted by a local church and included a time for hanging out with local residents, playing bingo for prizes, and eating bento lunches. The takidashi started off as a necessary emergency response to provide people with food immediately following the tsunami, and it has since become a time for residents to hang out and talk and get a nice lunch. 

Noeru-chan!

Even with my limited Japanese, I was able to play with her for a little while as we waited for people to pack up and leave. She took my camera and took pictures of pretty much everything in the immediate vicinity. It was adorable. She also took a bunch of pictures of the trash and the bathrooms which was significantly less so, but it was a fun time nonetheless.

The rest of my day consisted of finishing up some flooring in the main house as gospel music blasted in the background. About halfway through our work, my friend Jeremy and I noticed an older man walking around the flooring we installed, as if he was inspecting it somehow. He looked our way and asked something in Tohoku-ben (or Tohoku dialect, which is conveniently very difficult to understand) and we had to shake our heads and tell him that we didn't understand. He smiled and closed his eyes with a shrug and shuffled back out the front door. A few floorboards later, I noticed him sitting alone on the retaining wall by the house and a few more after that, I saw him in the same place. The man looked over to me and waved for me to come over.

After much too much talking to figure out what he was trying to tell me, I realized he wanted to use one of our buckets that had been left on his property for a while. I said that I thought it was fine and then somehow, in a manner I don't well remember, the conversation slipped seamlessly into something more personal. I figured he was either bored or he wanted someone to talk to so I was perfectly fine with that. Between my broken Japanese and his heavily accented Tohoku-ben, we somehow ended up talking about his life and travels as a tuna fisherman, sports he used to play, and the volunteers that come in and out of the Grace Mission Tohoku house neighboring his. He asked where the volunteers came from and hopefully I said this intelligibly, but I tried to communicate that even though we come from all sorts of places around the world, we all came to Ishinomaki because we love the people here. The man nodded with what appeared to me to be understanding.

This is one of the masterpieces Noeru-chan took. My apologies for any nightmares this may cause.

In a perfect world, my Japanese would be flawless. Then again, a lot of things would be very different in a perfect world. The fact of the matter is that my communication in Japanese, at least for now (and let's hope it's only temporary), isn't quite so seamless and I'm coming to terms with that fact. As I think about it more and more though, it's encouraging to know that I can still be of some use during my process of learning the language and that I don't have to have perfect understanding of Japanese to show love for the wonderful people here.

I was thinking about connecting this example to the greater example that we don't have to be perfect to be used by God, but for now this post is much too long and my eyelids are getting a tad too droopy for my liking. 

Thanks for reading. :)

-Spencer

Reconstruction and Construction.

My view from the roof of a shed we built.

Two days ago my plans to help at the new cafe fell through so I ended up coming back to the main house to help build a storage shed. From atop the roof I had a pretty nice view of the surrounding area. There are many decently sized plots of land overgrown with weeds and grass and although it doesn't look too bad, I have to remind myself that until March 11, 2011 there were houses filling the empty space that now lies there. I took a break from screwing down boards and sat up for a second to feel the breeze (the weather was amazing yesterday) and I heard the tapping of hammers and the buzzing of drills pingponging off distant houses and across the empty plots of land.

Then I remembered all the gardens I've been seeing around the city. I don't know if it's a Japanese thing or an Ishinomaki thing, but it seems like some of the empty plots left from the tsunami are now being used to grow flowers or eggplant or peppers or other plants. Now it may be a stretch, but in this moment I saw symbolism.

The acts of reconstruction and construction involve building things up to how they should be, how they were meant to be. When I look at construction I see a provision for physical needs while gardening seems to provide for a more emotional need to create beauty and foster hope in an area that needs it. I love that the Christian ministries in the area do their best to provide for both of those types of needs, not only helping to build/renovate houses and set up tents, but also planning various events to help the community to grow closer together and support each other.

A local lunch gathering hosted by a local church, complete with coffee/tea time, bingo, and free bento lunches.

Lately I've been seeing a lot of the emotional provision at work in this city, now that much of the immediate disaster relief work has been completed, and the fruit that's been growing from it is truly a beautiful thing. I've had the great pleasure of seeing the impact music can have on the lives of the people of Ishinomaki. Yesterday, I went with a few friends to visit some older folks in the neighborhood. After one house visit, my friend played a couple of songs on her violin for the older couple. She concluded her set with a traditional Japanese folk song, a really nice one at that, and when I turned around the wife had tears in her eyes and told us that she was so moved by the song. It's so amazing to see how God's been at work in the city and it's so cool that music can play a powerful role in reaching the hearts of people.

Next week is going to be a busy week of building up, both physically and emotionally, with the rest of the men from my home church coming over and a kids festival planned for the weekend. It's going to be tiring, but so worth it.

-Spencer

Two Years Later, Plus Some Change.

It's been about two years and some change since the earthquake and tsunami hit Ishinomaki on March 11, 2011. Correction, there has been a lot of change around here. (I promise you the double meaning wasn't intended, but I like it so much that I'm leaving it in). 

If you're interested in what's been going on in Ishinomaki on a larger scale and where needs still lie, please take twenty minutes out of your day to watch this video. Looking back on the video, it's amazing to think that the various Christian organizations are so cooperative that I've worked alongside most of the people interviewed in the video although they come from different groups. 

Thanks. :)
-Spencer

14 Days in.

It's hard to imagine that two full weeks have passed already. Ever since the gospel festival finished I've been helping out in a variety of projects and each has shown me a unique perspective of Ishinomaki, some of which I may go into in later posts.

Last week I helped do some construction work at a local cafe/church that will open in a few weeks. I imagined myself standing behind the counter frothing milk for lattes and cappuccinos and such, but it was the atmosphere of the cafe that struck me. Cafe's are places for people to connect and relax and enjoy themselves, and knowing that I lent a small hand in fostering deeper relationships was encouraging to me even when my work seemed less significant than the contributions of more skilled volunteers. But the boards I helped sand were pretty smooth if I don't say so myself.

I also had the pleasure of leading worship for a networking meeting for local pastors and other people in the area. It was difficult to play and sing songs in Japanese because more syllables are often packed into the songs, but it was an uplifting experience nonetheless. The relatively tiny room was packed with some very refreshing cultural diversity though. We ate delicious, homemade Korean food, with Korean seminary students, English-speaking missionaries, and a handful of Japanese pastors and volunteers, and we sang worship songs in Japanese. It really was a beautiful example of the unity I mentioned previously.

Leading a tricultural worship set.

Last weekend was a whirlwind of fun, music, bonding, and heavy metropolitan traffic. We went to Tokyo to attend and participate in a worship and arts conference, where some of our team would share about the work that's being done in Ishinomaki through music. One of my friends shared about the Liberty Music Program, which seeks to help children learn to have hope and dream again. At the conference, we learned about all sorts of types of art and how they can be applied to the church. A group based in Ishinomaki called the Nozomi Project, had a representative share her testimony and tell about their work, which I will most certainly cover later. I snapped the picture below from a very high balcony in Tokyo.

Said photo from said balcony.

This week I helped out with construction on one of the sheds we have in the back of the main house and I had a revelation relating to the symbolism of construction. "Revelation" may be a bit of a stretch, but I thought the realization was neat. Today I spent a couple of hours working on Japanese worship songs for a prayer meeting tomorrow, which I'm pretty excited for, and then I went around with some of the other interns to visit some of the older folks in the area who may not be able to get out of their houses so much. It was so great to love on people in a really tangible way, and I'm sure it didn't hurt that we came bearing homemade Japanese sweets.

Thanks for reading. :)
-Spencer

It's been raining a ton lately, but with sunsets like this, I don't really mind.