Japan Fest 2008

Today my dad and I went to Japan Fest 2008 in Arlington Heights. It was a fun event. I wish we could had gone earlier or not work this night. We got there about 2:44pm and got home at 5:40pm. I had to work a 6:00pm. I went to the Largest Japanese Grocery Store in America afterwards called "Mitsuwa". Excellent Prices. I got a drink called "J1" (I think, thats what it says on the bottle.) Its Pomegranate w/ Aloe Juice. It's got to be one of the best drinks I have ever had. They should sell it in American Grocery Stores Too!!! I talked to a Japanese Lady at the event who gave me alot of information on kimonos and obis. I found out that guys do use a bow (A VERY GIRLISH LOOKING BOW!!!) to tie there obis. I'm still working my way into being brave enough to wear my yukata in public.

If I did not mention. My family and I will be vacationing in Tennessee on July 1st thru 6th. I can't wait. My Grandparents own a farm house in Washburn, TN on 33 acres.

Rakugo "Sit-Down Comedy"

Yesterday I went to Downtown Chicago to Volunteer for a event being hosted by City of Osaka. For those who don't know Chicago and Osaka are sister city's and this year (2008) is there 35th anniversary. The event was called "RAKUGO" which is Japanese Comedy. Read About It Here There is so much I want to share about this event. I got the e-mail address of Katsura Asakichi who is one of the Stage Proformers. He is looking forward to my e-mail because he wants to improve his english. I loved this event. I got to volunteer for this event through someone at my church named leroy who knows mami-san who was one of the organizers of this event. I was very tempted to wear my yukata to the event but I was worried that I would have the obi tied wrong since there is like NO INSTRUCTIONS ONLINE to tie an obi. There was a TV crew from a Japanese News Group in Japan interviewing people. Also there was a lady wearing a beautiful red Kimono she also had two little girls wearing kimonos. That was the first time I saw someone wearing a kimono so perfectly in person. I received a gift from the proformers it was a Japanese Fan, Notebook and Small White Bath Towel. I helped run the Will Call Table. There was this guy I think his name was something close to Mitsubishi like mishi or mushi. I wish I could remember. Well he was very nice and at one point he was pointing his fingers at me like he was saying "It all you!" or "Great Job!". I felt like he was my boss and I was his favorite employee. I think he was the person appointed by Japan to be there Cultural Ambassador. Oh, and doing the bowing when greeting or thanking someone is very addictive. I was not doing it at first but I was doing it all over afterwards.

YWAM Update

On Tuesday Barbra from YWAM got back with me and gave me two e-mail addresses for someone named Robert and Tom. Tom is the director of YWAM Asia and Rob (If I understand her correctly) lives in Japan and knows someone on staff at YWAM Japan. So far I have only got a reply from Rob and he says that he thinks I need to take a 5-6 month class at YWAM called DTS (Discipleship Training School). Not that its a bad thing. I sort of hope I don't have to because I want to get involved in IT work not field work. Also the DTS cost is ¥520,000 yen which is more then $4800.00 DOLLARS. I will need a lot of supporters to do that. My goal is to shoot for there listings on YWAM.org for either an IT in Tokyo or Website Designer in Osaka

Also today I went to a place in Mokena, Illinois called Sapporo. They serve Japanese Steak, Seafood and Sushi. I had the steak and boy it was pretty good. I got a ton of Fried Rice and some Miso Soup. I highly suggest this place.

And for those who have not been paying attention YWAM is short for "Youth With a Mission"

Rsponse from YWAM

Yesterday I received a phone call from someone at YWAM in response to my letter. She was very helpful. Like I thought she told me there is a huge need in the mission field for volunteer IT people. she also told me her husband is an Volunteer IT at YWAM in Orlando and is in a similer case to me having no official computer training. She said there is not much she can do from Orlando speaking the place I want to go is Japan. She asked if I tried contacting YWAM in Japan and I said yes. I tried 10-20 different e-mail addresses several months ago and never received an answer. She said starting Monday she will start working on the details for a short term trip for me and get back with me later next week. She told me that speaking to me she could tell that I was passionate about this. She was very interested in the fact I administer and design two websites (http://victoryreins.org and http://greenetreelinen.com). When I receive more information I will post it.

Also earlier this week (6/7/8) I attended my friend Robert Dolan's Wedding. There I met Charlie O'Connell, someone who used to go to our church when I was in youth group. He is very interested in Japan and other countries. In madder a fact he has lived in Japan for about 3/4th a year total. We talked and he told me a lot of good advice like if I get a choice of where to stay in Japan he said try to stay with a Host Family you will learn so much more about their culture. and some other great advice.

Side Note

A couple months ago I met someone at my church named Leroy and I found he has a desire for Japan as well. Well today he e-mailed me and asked if I would be interest in Volunteering for some Japanese Event........No Details on what it is about. but none the less it sounds cool.

Earlier this week I had the opportunity to talk with someone my family has known for sometime now. She is am employee for a company near me in University Park called Applied Systems. She said that if I e-mail her my resume she would personally hand it in. She said it should not be that hard to get a job in there IT as a Desktop Support. She said that someone would contact me and schedule a time for me to come in to complete a Quiz. The cool thing about the quiz is I can answer the questions I know because they grade you according to how many correct out of complete. She said one employee that got hired was stunned he got hired because he only completed half the quiz.

Well I can't wait until July and September. In July I will be going to Washburn, Tennessee where my Grand Parents on my dads side own a Farm House on 33 acres. I will be gone July 1st thru July 6th. Then in September my family and I will be going to Florida for my parents 25th anniversary and my grand parents 50th anniversary. We are having a huge party. My family jokes that if I got married this year then it would be my 25th, parents 50th and grand parents 75th anniversary in 25 years.

Well I hope I will be getting closer to going to Japan I wrote a letter this week to YWAM asking the schedule a Short Term trip for me. I talked with my best friend Luke on Sunday and it sounded like he is interested in going on a short term trip with me to Japan next year. I think that would be so cool.