Thinking about Mongolia

I am thinking of Mongolia. Today, I received photos and material from my visit to Mongolia. Also, I spent one afternoon two days ago with a person I met in Mongolia. I pray that each of the pastors I met would continue to receive blessings and guidance from the Lord.


It is winter now in Mongolia. Today, it was 21F (-6C) in Ulaanbaatar.



Which season do you most enjoy?


Which season of life are you in right now?

My Wish List

I don't know how to put my Amazon Wish list on my side bar. So, I tried inside my post...



I hope this will connect you to my wish list....

You are not obligated to give me anything....

At the same time, I won't stop you for buying books for me.....

Four Years...

This is from 2002. When I first visited Sri Lanka, Sanath was both the participant of the session and the translator. We became friends.






This is from last week. He translated for me again. Four years have past since we first met. Have we changed?



How have you changed over the last four years?

I'm back for awhile!

I am back in Tokyo. I went to my baseball team practice. It's been more than one month since I last threw a baseball. I wear a Texas A&M http://www.tamu.edu/ T-shirt and a cap for my practice. I only visited the university once.

My international travel is over for this year. I will be in Japan the rest of 2006.

My Brothers?

Yesterday, I visited one of my Sri Lankan friends' camp ground called "Ape Kadella". Ape Kadella means "Our Nest." There are sewing training center, orphanage, church planting center, conference hall and the farm. On the farm, there are many pigs. The farm workers said I have the same skin color as those pigs. They said they are my brothers!!! We laughed a lot together.

The seminar went well. We really laughed a lot this week. The translators were both former participants of the training program and I first met them in 2002 when I visited and taught a session. It is always fun to see people again and catch up with them.

I am leaving Sri Lanka at 1:00am tonight.

Sri Lanka

Here I am in Sri Lanka. This is my third trip to this country. The first one was 2002, then 2004. Right after the 2004 visit, the Tsunami that hit many countries also hit this country. The hotel I stayed then and I am staying right now is also hit by it. It looks quite different. The lives of the people are no longer the same.

I am here to serve national pastors for four days session. I am sharing about the leadership and church planting. Tomorrow, the national pastors are coming. I am looking forward to getting to know new people. Also, there will be friends from before.

This country is also a country of elephants. They have an orphanage for elephants.

Leaving for Sri Lanka

I am leaving for Sri Lanka tomorrow.



I just found out that it has been one week since I came back from Thailand.



It seems like just one night.



My wife took a picture of me resting for a week.



I am leaving for Sri Lanka tomorrow morning.

Memory of Chiang Mai

I gave a tip to an elephant!!













His name is DoDo!













It was fun!!!

Thinking about NY

It's been two weeks since I came back from NY. We went to Ground Zero after we saw the Statue of Liberty. Five years has past since the tragedy. The world seems to be very different since that time. Everything has changed. We met people who lost loved ones and friends. Someone said that everybody is connected to everything that happens on this earth within six degrees of relationships. I wish that we were all connected with only blessings not tragedies.

How are you connected?

In Tokyo recovering

I am back in Tokyo. Though it is November, the weather seems very mild. The time difference is only 2 hours between Tokyo and Chiang Mai so, I don't have to recover from jet lag. However, my body and mind are tired and need recovery. I am taking things slowly. I slept longer yesterday and didn't do much. Growing up as a Japanese man, I didn't learn to rest very well. I always felt guilty when I rest. Over the years, I have started learning how to rest.

Do you need rest now? How do you rest?

Leaving Chiang Mai

I finished 5 days of Coaching Training and am heading back to Tokyo. This year is the 60th anniversary of the King's ascension. People in Thai are encouraged to wear yellow shirts on Monday for the King and blue shirts on Fiday for the Queen. I happened to wear a blue shirt on Friday. I don't know how these colors were picked for them.

What color do you think best reflects who you are?

Chiang Mai

I am now in Chiang Mai. I wanted to write more about NY and Boston but now I feel like I need to write about Thailand. I am not good at writing on the way. Talking comes much easier than writing. Listening is much easiler that reading for me to understand something. How about you?

But, certain processes only comes when you write and certain people can hear me only when I write. So, I want to write more.