The End

So. This is it. It's been exactly 27 weeks since I left home, and though there's still two more weeks till I actually arrive in Finland, this is it for Australia. I guess this day was always gonna come, and now that it's here I'm finding it hard to believe. It's like in my very first post here, when I told about how even though I spent my last day in Finland just packing and preparing for leaving I still managed to forget that I'm going. Now it's different though, as everywhere I go on the base I'm reminded of the fact that the people I've spent the last 6 months with are no longer here. Having to say goodbye to someone almost every other hour has been emotionally draining, and tears and desperation come in waves. But then again I feel like I've fell into a comatose state where I just perform the things I need to, not thinking about what's gonna happen in a few hours, when I say goodbye to this place one last time.

The last few days have been the same. But I've been surprisingly calm and able to enjoy the last moments. On thursday night we had our own MAD grad, that was full of reminiscing and just enjoying each others company. On Friday night we had our actual graduation, but there was no time for inside jokes or sharing memories as we were graduating with two other schools. It was more fun than sad, though when one of the girls in our school shared her testimony I teared up a little as I could see how much she had grown on this journey. After graduating, we all went into town to take advantage of the freedom of doing things we'd been deprived of for six months - like alcohol. None of us drank a lot, but most of us had some. It was a little strange, like a bubble that suddenly burst. Seeing people smoke and drink, the people that had reached such depths in God, it just reminded me that we can never judge. I was drinking too, and it was ok. God wasn't judging us. He was there with us. A good example of this was one of the guys who gratuated from Beach to Bush dts, Chris, wo got pretty wasted that night. But when he took a taxi to go home, as he sat down in the car he was suddenly completely sober, and during the 20 minute ride from the city to our suburb Mitchelton he brought the muslim taxi driver to the Lord. How crazy is that? Just goes to show that God is with us everywhere and as long as we let Him, He can do great things through us no matter what the circumstances are.

Since saturday things have been a lot more depressing, as people started to leave. I still don't understand that these people are gone forever. Most of them I will never see again. Apparently the relationships that you form during your 6 months of DTS are equivalent to 7 years of normal interaction... how crazy is that, to say goodbye to a friend you've known for seven years, and then never see them again. Stressful, I must say. We've created a culture here that will be extremely hard to recreate back home. So I'm in for a social culture shock, surely. Even just having my very own room again and falling asleep in total silence will be weird... I can't even imagine all the ways that I'm gonna miss Australia..

But it's still good to go home. I've been fairly optimistic about returning, though Re-Entry lectures kinda brought my expecations to a more realistic level I guess. But still, even though I am a little scared to go home, at least it's for completely different reasons than it would've been in the beginning of DTS. I have changed. And here's where I'm most gonna need grace from everyone around me. Now if ever I need your prayers to get through the next few months. Just understand that coming back will be really hard, and don't get upset if I'm not the person that I was when I left. Cos I'm not. But it's a good thing. It's a very good thing.

My ride to the airport leaves in 35 minutes, so I guess I should wrap it up. But I just want to say this: this time has been AMAZING. It's een an experience like no other. I know it's gonna be hard when I go home, but I know I have no reason to be afraid because my God is with me, and He is the same in Australia and in Finland. And I know that even if everything else fails, even if it turns out that my worldview hasn't changed, that my attitude towards serving hasn't changed, that my self-worth hasn't changed, that my ability to love my neighbour hasn't changed, I know that my relationship with God has, and that's all I need. I know that I'm His beloved child that's allowed to screw up and be incomplete, and He loves me still, because He loves me, because He loves me, and there's nothing that can separate Him from me. And that is all that matters. That is everything.

So this is it. I sincerely thank you for reading my blog and for praying for me. I'm gonna be in Finland on May 10th, so call me up and we'll go for a coffee. But please don't stop praying for me.

I love you all! And I guess I'll see you on the other side.

yours,

Sonja

Countdown

4 cold nights left in Australia... What should I say. I'm exited, sad, confused. But I've managed to come in terms with the fact that I might never come back here, and I will never see most of these people again. It's sad of course, but I don't feel like the time we have left is too short. I'm more excited to start my real life back home. But while I'm still here I might as well share about stuff that's going on at the moment.

The last two weeks or so have been very laid back. We spent a long weekend in Hervey Bay where we did outreach debrief, and just hung out. I managed to get some of my tan back, but I'm still fairly pale compared to what I was in January... Sad days. After coming back to base, this time for good, we've had a very laid back week. Musicians did some recording (hopefully I'll be able to put some stuff on myspace at some point) and everybody else was free to do whatever. This week has looked pretty much the same. Some lectures on Re-Entry (read: the shock of coming back home), and a lot of parties and reminiscing. Graduation is on Friday, FRIDAY!!! It hasn't even hit me yet, that it's the day after tomorrow. Oh well. As I was saying, it's time to move on with my life. But more about the Grad maybe in my next (and probably last) post.

All the stuff I said about myself being a changed person after outreach in the last post wasn't necessary true. In Hervey Bay my old struggles with not being noticed started and I freaked out for a little while that I'm back in the starting point, but I found a balance and managed to get a more realistic picture of the ways that I have and haven't changed during the DTS. Last week we also had 2 lectures on Strengthfinders, which is a programme that helps you understand your personality and strengths, as well as other people's. I'd done the test you're required to take even before the DTS, but the lectures made a lot more sense than just knowing my top 5 strengths. I learnt a lot about myself in just two days, and managed to understand the causes and effects of so many dysfunctionals tendencies of mine. Some of my top 10 strengths were Empathy, Communication, Strategic, Responsibility, Command, Significance and a couple more that I can't remember. It also helped to see what are not my strengths; I'm not high on Positivity and Woo (Winning Others Over)... Makes sense. Makes a lot of sense. To me. This of course makes absolutely no sense to you, and I'm sorry for being so boring... Moving on.

Our last weekend on DTS was cool. On Saturday we had our very last MAD dance party, with a 50's swing theme. It was awesome, one of the best ones we've had. I'm gonna miss those parties... On Monday we had our band's very last gig, at a Lutheran College. I didn't have high expectations but it turned out to be really good. Musically it could've been better, but the audience was amazing, these little kids even came up to ask for autographs. After the weekend we started Re-Entry lectures. Yesterday we shared some constructive feedback with our outreach teams. We had to write about each member in our team what they should 1) Keep on doing, 2) Stop doing and 3) Start doing. Sounds pretty harsh, but it was really good. I was encouraged to keep on writing songs and finding my identity and security in God instead of other people, to stop putting myself down, focusing on the negative and being self-centered in my relationships, and to start thinking about what I say before saying it and expressing myself through other arts and not just music. Sometimes you just need to hear these things straight up in-your-face style. But nobody was mean, so that was good. This weeks mostly about closure, as well as preparing for the future. Today we talked about the challenges that'll face us when we go home, how for most people it's gonna be really hard when nobody understands and how circumstance change drastically and there's little to hold on to when the storms hit us. It's serious stuff and a bad Re-entry could take years to process. I'm not too worried, but of course I don't have any clue what the enemy might have in store for me when I go back. So I'm just bracing myself anyway...

Only 4 nights left... The last few days have been very stressful because of the volcano incident in Europe; I wasn't sure if I'd be able to fly into UK or not. But now most countries have opened their airspace, so as long as there won't be another eruption or a plane crash down cos of the ash, I should be good. Right now life feels like just waiting. A lot of stuff that I do is like the last time I'm doing it. Last dance party, last gig, last page of workbook, last community cleanup, last work duty(WOHOO), last last last. I'm sure the pressure of waisting valuable hanging out time by sleeping or blogging or packing or whatever will hit me at some point. It seems like everything except time has slowed down. Nothing's happening. It's like we're all just waiting, yet hoping that it would never end...

Oh well. We don't have to wait for long. Cos it will end. In two days. Please keep praying for my flight to be fine on Sunday. And pray for our school so that we could enjoy and make the most out of our last days together. Thank you!

Back in Oz

Ever since we found out our outreach teams at the end of week 4 many of us had been wondering what it will be like when everybody gets back. Will it be awkward, will it be joyful, indifferent, or what? Some of my fears came true, some didn't. I was afraid I'd sort of fall back into feeling disconnected from everyone and just start to fade away, especially when I was the only student girl in my team, and hadn't really managed to build rock solid relationships with the guys who ended up disappearing once the other teams arrived. But I realised that I just had to decide not to let the feeling of not fitting in to take over me but to walk in the opposite spirit and stand against the awkwardness. So I chose to fight and I ended up finding the person who I'd become on outreach. Feels like that sad timid girl that had taken over me around christmas is now gone and I'm actually starting to be myself again. It's awesome.

We had a couple of days of just relaxing and hanging out. It was weird being back at the base - it felt like I hadn't been gone at all, yet at the same time it felt like I had been gone for years. The February schools (Beach to buch dts, sports dts and Frontiers dts) had invaded the base and my old room was now full of people I didn't know, and our old classroom was now used by the Frontiers dts. We didn't even have a chance to get back into the routine as we were sent to the town of Toowomba for our last little step into missions - Easterfest.

Easterfest is the largest Christian music festival in Australia, and all the schools available from our base (excluding the schools that were still on outreach) were helping out as volunteers. All of us were still exhausted from outreach, and having heard only horror stories of last year's rainy and muddy festival, none of us were too excited to go. I had absolutely zero motivation for this last crusade, but was truly surprised by the experience in the end. It ended up being the most gorgeous weekend the festival had seen in years. And the jobs I got were easy and the teams were sweet. The food was amazing. Worst part of the weekend were the nights, as the temperature dropped down quite a bit, and my superthin sleepingbag was pretty useless. Getting barely 6 hours of sleep, working 9 hours a day, I was pretty nackered afterwards. And I also didn't shower for 5 days, which I think is my personal record during the dts. I didn't really get to see any of the bands that I wanted to, and wasn't bothered to go see the once I could've. I did see a little bit of sanctus real, but I didn't really like them. I did see the guys from Hawk Nelson in person, though not on stage. I said "excuse me" to one of them, as he was blocking my way in the music store. I'm so cool! The headline artists weren't really that good anyway. I did see a couple of artists on the smaller stages, and I thought they were actually better than the ones on mainstage. But in the end it wasn't about the music at all. What made Easterfest so great for me were the randomest times when I got to witness things like a 3-metre teddy bear being pulled up to a tree ( I have pictures) or random guys playing guitar for us while we were just sitting by the gates checking people's wristbands. And most of all discovering my confidence again. Even though I hadn't showered in 5 days, hadn't slept more than 6 hours each night for just as long, I still felt beautiful and confident in who I was, and I still had the strentgh to push all the way till 2am the last night, as we were taking down the chai tent. It was an awesome experience, and really showed me how much outreach had taught me.

Coming back from Easterfest on Monday we were even more exhausted. We were going to go to Harvey Bay on tuesday, but it got postponed till Thursday, which was really good. We had 2 extra days to just relax and hang out, and that's basicly all that we've been doing - absolutely nothing. Now we have ahead of us a week of debrief with the MAD school, it'll be good to have entire school in one place once again. We'll be sharing stories of outreach and also ust processing the stuff that's been going on for the last week. It's gonna be good, Im sure.

Now it's getting late and I still need to pack up all my earthly posessions on this side of the world before going to bed, so it'd better be going then. Keep me in your prayers still, especially as the Re-entry depression is lurking at my door trying to get in. See you in a week!

The rest of Japan

For the last 9 days we spent in Kioto we did not have an internet connection, hence this late update. However, I'm now going to tell you everything that's ever happened to me, so it should take a jolly good while for you to read this post. I hope you'll make it all the way to the end...

In Kioto we stayed at a church athat had just moved to a new building a week earlier, and we had the priviledge to be the first guests there. The place was pretty amazing, though the thought of going back to sleeping on a futon on the floor after having a real bed didn't sound all that appealing to me and Jess at first. But it was all good in the end. The shower was by far the best one yet (apart from the showers at the Japanese bathhouse we went to a couple of times), and I spoilt myself a little by taking a long shower every morning. The church also fed us, though maybe a little too much. Some meals were better than others, but my absolute favourite was breakfast. Bacon and eggs every morning... Good times. So yeah, the church was more than hospitable to us and I bet we all gained weight, sadly. The church had a fairwell party for us on thursday evening at a Korean barbeque restaurant, and they practically forcefed us all till the point where I could've easily allowed myself to shove fingers down my throat and vomit, just because I was so full it was painful. But the food was amazing, and I didn't exactly fight back when they offered me more. Amazing top quality beef that we got to grill ourselves, heaps and heaps of it. Having been deprived of real meat for 4 months I couldn't help myself... I also tasted cow's tongue!! It was really good actually. With lemon. Ha.

Now to more serious life issues. I learnt a lot during this last week, all the way till the very last night. One of the things I struggled with was respecting my authorities in times when I felt like they weren't being just. One of our leaders had told us a while earlier that we had overbudgeted and had thousand of dollars left over. All of us were excited to hear that we'd be getting hundreds of dollars back after or during outreach. As the time went on, however, our leaders said we might have to spend it all on outreach, because the base in Brisbane has a policy that none of the outreach money will be refunded, it all goes to the base. So for a while we though we could just get a couple hundred for spending money and get rid of it. Not all of us were happy about that, cos we could still really use the money after DTS. Once we arrived to Kioto we still thought we could use the money to buy souvenirs, but our leaders told us that that's not gonna happen either. They'd mailed the base and asked about the money, and the base had told them that it sould not be spent on anything that the budget doesn't include. Realising finally that I would lose hundreds of dollars was a tough cookie for me to swallow. I wanted to fight for my money, saying that I had not signed a consent for this (which I may have, actually) and the base has no right to take it etc. etc. But God stopped me and said it isn't right for me to go against the authorities like that. It may or may not be just, but it isn't my job to force things the way I think they should be. I realised that my bitching wasn't gonna change the situation, instead it was just making things tense between me and the leaders. So I decided to release it to God, knowing that He'll always give me the money I need, and that right now it's my time to bless the base with my money isntead of holding this against them.

When it comes to ministry, we didn't really feel like we were doing much. The only time we shared a testimony was on the very first night we came, when we all had to share something without any time to prepare. But it was fine, we all managed to BS our way through it. But after that we mostly just did english classes for kids, which basicly meant playing with them. We really felt a spirit of control and pride over the church, as we weren't allowed to really do our own thing. The sanctuary of the church was off the limits whenever there wasn't a meeting, so even when we wanted to worship just as a team during our free time, we were forced to do so in a stairway, cos nowhere else was ok for them. It was sort of like we were some kind of trophys that they kept on a shelf till it was time to show us around. But we did our best to obey them, and we did have a good time. One day we went to this church's prayer house in the mountains and had a time of worship there. After we'd finished Koji came to me and told me I'd been praying in Japanese. I was so amazed. I knew I could pray in tongues, but to actually have someone there who'd understand. Apparently I had said "I'm gonna open the door, so please help me, please". Jess had also been singing "open up the door" while worshipping and prayed for something cool to happen. It was crazy. And the next day as we had worship in the stairway we all felt like God wanted to open a door in that church. We just didn't know how to help Him...

So it all came crashing down on friday night. The church had a prayer meeting from 9 till 11 in the evening, but they gave us the option to rest instead, if we needed. We as westerners understood it as a free night, so we decided to spend our last evening in Japan having fun at a Karaoke bar. So we all dressed up and left, and when we came back we were confronted by the church. They accused us of all sorts of things, but mostly they were upset because we'd offended them by not attending the meeting. We apologized. They told us we'd offended God by going out instead of attending the church meeting, and because we'd worn better clothes to karaoke than what we did to church. We didn't say anything to that cos we didn't agree. They attacked Koji for being Japanese yet so offensive, like chewing gum while playing worship in front of the church, and for not being a better guide for us to the Japanese culture. They blamed Koji for every single little mistake we'd made. We could not understand. And some of us tried to share our hearts about what we felt like God had showed us about the church, like spirit of fear, pride and control, but they would not listen to us. We realised we should've kept our mouths shut as it only added to the flame that was trying to burn us alive. It went on for hours, and it was like straight from a nightmare. I still don't understand what these people wanted from us. We apologized and apologized and apologized, but they would not forgive. At half past one, after interrupting them while they were throwing stones at Koji, and we begged to just leave in peace, we finally ended the conversation with the church. Our team then had a time of prayer to just break off anything that might've come upon us from this incident. But I was actually surprised how calm I was. I did not cry during or after the confrontation, I wasn't even scared. Of course it was unpleasant, but in my heart I knew these people couldn't touch me. I knew there was no condemnation for me, and that these people could refuse to forgive us but that in the end it would only hurt themselves. In a way I was actually happy it all happened, cos I could see how I really was able to stand firm in God even in a dark situation like that.

The same conversation happened the next morning, when the church decided to address the same issues we'd talked about already. It didn't matter. There seemed to be nothing we could say to these people to make it ok. It only left a bitter taste to our mouths from the whole trip, and we were so happy to arrive to the airport and shake the dust of that country off of our feet. I felt sad that it ad to end like this, but God had warned us in advance that Kioto was gonna be the hardest. We survived, and now all we can do is leave it to God. I hope the church will eventually forgive us, I would hate that this might've affected the oportunity for the future Ywam teams to visit this church... But like I said, it's up to God to heal it.

All in all I feel like the outreach was about discovering new depths within myself and getting back to the road I was supposed to be walking since the start of the DTS. For me it never ended up being about ministry as much as it was about personal growth. I learnt a lot about relationships with people (especially with guys) and God. But I also learnt that the foundation that I came here to build cannot be built by just the things we learn. It builds itself through application, as I put in practice the things I now understand. Now I'm back at the base, the first MAD girl to arrive, and it feels as if I never even left. There's still 4 more weeks till I leave this country again, and I'm looking forward to seeing what life will look like when I step into a plane the next time.

A place to rest

So on March 9th we packed up our bags and left for another church in Osaka. It's actually the home church of one our team members, which for him was a little creepy, seeing his family and all. But he doesn't seem to mind too much. And it really comes in handy to have a local in the team.

The atmosphere in this church has been totally different from the previous one. We feel so loved and appreciated, and we're also the only ones sleeping in the church so it doesn't feel like people are watching us all the time. We're doing pretty much everything together as a team which makes such a difference, and I feel like we're actually a family now, not just a bunch of people put together for a period of time. We've been doing a lot of meetings, sharing testimonies, preaching and leading worship. And it's been great to see the people getting refreshed in the spirit, and I just hope it would last. Anywhere we go it seems like there is such a hunger and desire for more of God, but nobody to show them how it's done. And even though most of our team members are 19 years old, these people respect us so much as their spiritual leaders for the day.

I don't know how to describe it other than just restful. This place is for me feels like somewhere I can just breathe and relax and enjoy all that God is blessing us with. We still have busy schedules, actually it's the busyest time so far in a way, but I still feel more peaceful than ever before on this outreach.

And like I said, the team's getting really close now that we're really doing stuff together. There's still a lot to be patient about and the dynamincs change all the time, but at least for my part I'm having less trouble with feeling left out or whatever. On monday we went to Universal Studios Japan, which was pretty cool, though it started raining and my shoes got soaked. Most of the time we just stood in lines, queueing for rides that weren't all that exciting, but it was still fun. And Afterwards we went to the Hard Rock Cafe to have dinner, which was totally worth the 3000yen I spent. Amazing food.

The food's really starting to become a problem. I have gained about 8 kilos since I came to Australia, and all this deep fried stuff isn't really helping. I'm afraid I'm either gonna gain another 10 kilos when I go back home just cos I'll binge on comfort snacks because I miss Australia, or I'll develop some sort of an eating disorder and struglle with that for the next 10 years. Or maybe it'll naturally go away when I change back into my healthy Finnish diet. But still, I feel really fat most of the time yet it's hard to stop eating when I'm hungry, and all the places we go to eat are really unhealthy. IT SUCKS. I'm just praying to God that he wont let me get any fatter than this...

Anyway, back to God. I don't know what He's up to at the moment, but something Ronnie spoke at the first meeting we did here really seems to apply to this season of our outreach. It was the story of the poor widow who gave one single coin as an offering, cos it was all she had. And like that widow, we don't have a lot to offer. None of us really have a lot of life experience, or wisdom that comes from that exprience, most of us have never seen a miracle or even seen a person getting saved. So really, what do we have to offer? But the little we have, that's what we'll bring to the table, trusting that maybe next time there'll be more to give. The first meeting we did I was sitting at the back of the room, just looking around during worship, and I saw this deaf guy singing in sign language. I felt really bad for him that he couldn't hear the music, and of course I thought about praying for him. But having never seen anyone getting healed (well I have but my they were stuff like hurting ankle etc. and my cynicism tells me it wasnt really a miracle) I was pretty reluctant to go. But I remembered this conversation with this awesome lady back at the previous church about healings and stuff. She told me it's not about what we can or cannot do, how much faith we have or how loud we yell our prayer. There is no formula to healing. It's God and God alone who works or doesn't work us, and all we're meant to do is to pray for sick people and lay hands on them. But I still didn't wanna do it. Yet inside me there was a burning that I knew I couldn't just ignore, and I'd be so dissapointed in myself if I didn't go. And that's what God eventually whispered in my ear; it's not for the deaf guy, it's for me. So I went and prayed with such a passion that I cried. And I cried after I'd prayed for him. He didn't get healed but I believe something in me changed. I guess after praying for my skin (twice, actually) with our entire school back in Brisbane and not seeing the results I stopped wanting to pray for healing cos it most likely resulted in embarrasment and confusion rather than healing. I didn't want to feel like I had to make excuses for God, and though I've never doubted His ability to heal people or even raise the dead, I just thought he's never do it through or to me. But as I put my fears aside and offered the little that I had, I know a piece of that fear or cynicism broke off. And I'll try to keep walking in that still, just offering the last coin I have in the hopes of receiving something bigger the next time.

I'm getting really tired so I'm gonna leave it there. Hopefully the next post will be sooner than later. Keep us in your prayers and send me mail cos I haven't really heard about anything that's going on back home!! Arigato.

Lovers in Japan, Osaka remix

So I realise I probably shouldn't post anything on this blog when I'm upset, cos it always ends up sounding far worse than it actually is. So I apologize for dramatizing a lot of the stuff that has been happening. It's really not that bad. And God is doing stuff, just not really what I was expecting...

Our team is again alive and well, after a couple of powerful worship sessions and some family fun time I felt a lot better(awesome worship, good teaching by this random Philippino, fake italian food and a karaoke room!). It's not that there never was a problem with unity, I'm sure there was and it makes sense, of course the enemy would attack our relationships first. But it's all about what you do with it. Sometimes it only takes some corporate God time. And we're all learning to love each other even when we're sick and tired of the same faces.

So on Friday night we had church in an informal cafe setting which was awesome. God was powerfully present and I felt so refreshed after three very dry weeks. And later I was journalling and going through my thoughts along the dts and what God had been saying to me. And I asked God what the whole dts has been about and what has God really been working on, cos it feels like I'm missing out on something when I compare my journey to some others'. And He said that it was always about relationships. All the time He wanted to bring me to a place where despite my circumstance or past experiences I would know who I am and stand confident in the middle of the crap this world throws at me in relationships. To learn patience, forgiveness, unselfishness, unconditional love. But I was so busy looking for revelations that I missed this one. And it's ridiculous how much it all makes sense as I read back to what I've been writing down throughout the school. Especially in times when it was such a struggle to hear Him, it was usually when I was looking in the wrong place. So really I should've always been asking "what's going on?" I'm pretty sure that's a question He'll always answer...

Now understanding that what God wanted me to to learn from this experience was how to handle relationships in a world where every single person will disappoint you, really takes the pressure off of doing "ministry" here in Japan. I'm learning so much about unconditional love, and about my relationship patterns. And as I keep working this stuff out with God and these secrets about my life for the past 10 years keep unfolding, and as I start to realize how deeply screwed up I am I begin to understand how great God's love and grace is for me, and how He's the only one who can solve this mess. It's rather exciting though to a lot of people I might sound like a retard. I think at this age we all are still retards when it comes to relationships. Some people just have been blessed with a little less backstabbing, loneliness and hard work than others, so they don't have to think about it so much. I always looked at those people and couldn't understand what they had that I didn't, that made people come to them instead of them having to pursue others. And then God reminded me of all the people I've turned away because they weren't "my type". To be honest, I've given up on so many people because they simply didn't seem all that interesting to me. Yesterday as I asked God about this, He really quite bluntly listed out stuff that I tend to do and some of it was pretty full on, though everything so true. Yet none of it was accusing. He simply answered my question, like father gives His honest opinion to a child who wants to hear it.

And man, have I felt such love coming from Him for the last couple of days. Even now as I'm writing this and listening to Kari Jobe I can just feel Him. AAaargh! Like you wouldn't believe. I don't even care if people think I'm an idiot. I don't even care if I go home and fail miserably in my attempts to put any of this into action. My God has brought me this far and even though for 4 months I've been acting like a retard whining to Him about why I can't hear Him (when I wasn't really listening) He's still with me and He still keeps turning my head towards the right direction...

Crazy how things can change once you shut up and start to listen, and I mean really LISTEN, not just try to hear what you want to hear. God is good all the time and I can't wait to see what He's gonna do next... (like the lecture phase, outreach seems to have its season as well...) Anyway, thanks for all the prayers, don't let them stop here just because I'm all happy all of a sudden..

In Comparison?

Our first 5 days in Osaka have been somewhat different to Tokyo, yet surprisingly similar. It's warmer here, a really nice spring weather, and the church we're staying at is massive, providing us with plenty of comfortability. We have a fairly busy schedule, and we mostly work in teams of two or four, which means we don't really get to do stuff as a team, which is becoming a problem as we go on... We help out with the different ministries the church has, such as preschool, english lessons, cafés and whatnot. Though it feels like all we're actually doing is cleaning the church and handing out fliers at the train station nearby. But I guess we're hear to bless and help the church, so I'll try to have a good attitude about it all.

And it isn't the programme that's becoming a problem. It's everything outside of it. What we do with our freetime. Obviously internet is accessible everywhere, and with 4 laptops in the team, half the team spend their free time in a vegetative state on facebook. Some less than others, some definitely too much. And even though we hardly do any of the ministry stuff together, nobody seems too keen oon correcting that during the times we have free. I don't want to sound like I'm the only one who cares, tbh I haven't even addressed the rest of the team about it, partially because I don't know what to tell them or ask them, and because I feel like I'm just a big hypocrite trying to convict them of something that I'm guilty of as well. The team unity, that was one the things we really wanted to put effort into, seems to be forgotten, we've even started to be really rude to each other. Some of the stuff these guys say to me makes me wanna hit them hard and go home, though I know they don't mean to be mean. I guess we're all struggling with our expectations and the reality of this outreach, with not doing anything that would have an effect on these people, with having to conform to the ways of the church here that's really quite different of what we've just discovered that a church should be like. And in that frustration it's easy to forget to love each other, because we think we're the only ones struggling. So short little comments said out of impatience and without really thinking, bounce off the walls and come back as the meanest things. I know I do this too and it's really hard to stop and think before saying stuff. And even harder is to confront someone. I'm still figuring that one out.

So obviously this is not the healthiest situation an outreach team could be. And as I read about what the other teams are doing I'm filled with guilt and shame - we should be casting out demons and healing the sick too! What's wrong with us? Why are we sitting on our asses, having really crappy attitudes towards each other and the work we're doing for the church? And even if the stuff the curch wants us to do doesn't really feel like it's efficient, why don't we do something in addition to that on our free time? I'm filled with these questions more and more as the days go by and we're getting more and more apathetic and tired.

Now it's more than chrystal clear that this is all spiritual warfare. Loneliness, apathy and tiredness were the three main things that the Japan team suffered last year. And that's exactly what's happening here. But as much as we've learnt about spiritual warfare on DTS, in Brisbane there really wasn't any real need to practice it. Now that we're actually facing the problem I don't even know what to do about it. Heart attitude and communication is a good place to start I guess. Maybe it's not about saving souls in Japan and seeing miracles happen daily. Maybe it's about learning to fight the circumstance in a place that's very similar to our homes. And there is no sense in comparing us to the other teams, because Japan is just too different for that.

So keep us in your prayers and especially pray for the unity of this team! Hopefully next time I'll have happier things to share about :)

Shitai koto suru

This week was a little busyer, I guess... We've been doing a lot of worship, mostly in this youth group thing with international kids. English speaking people, Praise The Lord. Worship seems to be our main area of ministry here, and it's cool, though so far we haven't had many opportunities to play as a full band, most of the time it's just Josh and Isaac with a guitar and a djembe.

On wednesday we went to this one YWAM lady's prayer room in this really dodgy part of town to worship for a couple of hours. It was awesome, we played for three hours straight, after which the lady showed us a really cheap sushi bar nearby. I was so excited to get sushi, cos so far we hadn't had any during our time in Japan. The plates were a 100yen each, and I ate like ten of them... But to my surprise real sushi isn't that great :O Though it was cheap and Koji said it wasn't that great, it still was supposedly better than the "fake" sushi we had in Brisbane. I thought the fake stuff was better than this... Just goes to show what an amateur I am when it comes to Cuisine Japonaise... After stuffing ourselves with sushi we went to this international youth meeting and led worship, just like the previous wednesday. It was awesome and we really enjoyed to meet these kids. These meetings are organised for kids who go to a christian international school, and they call it HI.B.A., though I have no clue of what it stands for. It's basicly a non-charismatic thing, but they work closely with YWAM (at least in Tokyo) which can be very charismatic, and it was just awesome to see that it is possible for christians with different backgrounds and theology to work together and make it work! It's mostly to the credit of mr. David McDaniel, who's the leader of YWAM Tokyo and one of the most awesome people I've met. He's such a down to earth guy with a really good theology and a strong relationship with God, and he's funny as hell. God sure has a sense of humor when he puts a loud, large American to work in Japan. But I guess that's exactly what this country needs... God knows the best.

On thursday we had another Hi.B.A meeing with a little different crowd, and this time we actually had a full band (no drumkit though, and no vocals). Again it was a lot of fun. These kids are so joyful and welcoming and they seemed very encouraged by us. Working with these kids has been exactly what we came here for. It's been awesome, though I wish we could stick with them for a little longer to build real friendships with them. Meeting people once or twice and then adding them on facebook, yet never talking to them again, is kinda sad. I feel like we would have so much more to offer them but again time works against us... Maybe later, if I ever return.

On Friday we had our first and only gig in Tokyo as Fresh Out Of. We'd sent out fliers and advertised, but nowhere near enuf, as it turned out. The concert was at this tiny church, and we managed to make it look pretty cool, but in the end only a handful of people showed up, none of them actually outside our "circles". I was a little bummed in the beginning, as I'd expected at least some of the Hi.B.A kids to show up. But in the end we just played for the crowd that was there and had a good time. It wasn't that bad, yet I was still wondering what was God's point in all of this. He didn't answer, but I did get a verse the next day, proverbs 20:24; The Lord guides our steps, so why try to understand everything along the way?" (or something like that, I don't have my Bible here...). It just made me smile and really comforted me about the whole two weeks that we've been here and haven't done much. God sees the bigger picture, our job is to have a good attitude about the tiny picture that we can see.

On saturday we had a full day, beginning with homeless ministry at 7am. This time the sun was out and it wasn't that cold, so I actually enjoyed it. From there we continued to this new-ish suburb about an hour away from Shibuya, where we did some prayer walking for a sister Church of the Tokyo Baptist Church. I didn't have high expectations for it, but it was pretty nice with the sun shining. Me and Josh walked with one of the pastors of the church, and ended up praying more for the Church they're building there rather than the actual area. After lunch we did another round at a shopping mall there. Josh had his guitar and after walking around the mall for a while I just felt like we should go sit down outside the mall and jam. So we found this nice bench next to a hairsalon, right were the people coming from the train station entered the mall. We got to play for a good 30 minutes, just jamming and improvising worshipsongs, as well as singing some ready songs. I was a little worried the hairdressers in the salon would get annoyed but turned out that they actually really liked us playing there. Four of them came outside to say hello and fortunately the pastor happened to be there to translate for us. It was awesome to be able to bless the salon and even though we didn't speak a word about Jesus to them at least we were building relationships, and I think that's way more important. A lot of people passed us by and smiled and looked back and some kids even came straight up to us to just stare at us as we played. It was awesome. After about 35 minutes this guard came to tell us to stop because we were"noise pollution". It didn't really matter cos we had to go home anyway, I just felt sorry for the guy who obviously took his job way too seriously...In the evening we had our last Hi.B.A. in Yokohama. We led worship and shared a testimony and Ronnie did a little teaching that was really good though the time run out. Sad day for him, for he was really excited about it.

Our last evening in Tokyo we had a barbecue at the McDaniel's house. Real meat, it was so good. And after eating we just hung out and listned to music and talked for hours. It was so relaxed and nice, a truly awesome ending to our time in Tokyo. Now it's time to move on to Osaka, which apparently will be like going to another country. I have no idea what our schedule will look like, but I know there's gonna be less white people and more awkward moments with everything lost in translation... Anyway, keep us in your prayers etc. etc.

Tokyo draft

Now I hope that nobody's angry at me for not telling stories about Japan sooner, there is a very valid reason for that. And I'm still sticking to my once-a-week routine, so it's all good.

Anyway... we arrived in Tokyo on Monday evening after a decent 9-hour flight, during which we got no food or TV... I didn't mind really, I was able to sleep through most of it, which I found very impressive. So we had our first meal on Japanese soil at the airport, in McDonald's, right next to a sushi restaurant... I mean come on! We're in Japan for goodness sake! However, getting food fast seemed to be priority over fine dining, so we went for the easiest choice. The meal was followed by an hour of traveling by train to Senzoku where our home for the 2 weeks is. It was about 11PM by the time we got to the Senzoku station where Derick, our host and fellow YWAMer welcomed us and took us to the house. The house is decent size, basically a narrowish two storey house with a big kitchen, a sitting room and a bathroom and a toilet downstairs, and 4 bedrooms upstairs (plus Derick's room which is basically a little closet). You can fit about 20 people to live in this house as all the floorspace is reserved for futons. Me and Jess had a deal to kneel down to open the sliding doors as the Japanese do, having to kneel down and get up again about 10 times a day. It worked out for a day, till it got too cold... Anyway, after getting to the house we all just crashed. It was freesing cold at night but luckily there were some extra blankets in the cupboard in our room, or else I think I would've died...

So the first morning was rather pleasant. Sun was out and though we had nothing to eat for breakfast everybody seemed very refreshed and happy. Derick took us to a grocery store which was an adventure in itself. The Japanese sell the weirdest food. The veggie and fruit section was tiny, instead hey had a never ending selection of nuudles, rice, fish, bacon etc. Lots of weird dried stuff, like fish and squid and mushrooms and stuff. So many times we found something dodgy-lookin and had to get Koji to tell us what the heck it was, cos obviously we didn't understand what it said on the wrapper... After lunch (noodles) the director of YWAM Tokyo, David McDaniel, came by to get to know us and talk a little about Japan. He's an amazing dude, one of the funniest guys I've ever met. In the evening we went to a Ywam meeting in senzoku. There weren't that many people but it was still nice.

I honestly don't even remember the order of the rest of the stuff that has happened this week. It isn't much so I guess it doesn't matter. Sometime on wednesday the heaters in our house run out of kerosine. The temperature outside being less than 5 degrees, and the house having no isolation, the temperature indoors dropped down quite remarkably and it ended up beeing colder than inside our fridge... This went on till today when Derick finally went and bought some kerosine (usually this one dude comes and fills the heaters, but apparently he was unable to come this time...) So now the one in the kitchen works, which now feels like frikkin luxury. Coming from 35 degrees in Oz to 5 degrees was not a pleasant experience. Feeling frozen down to my bones even just staying inside the house made me very reluctant to go anywhere outside it. But we did our best to do something every day even though our schedule has been almost empty. On wednesday we led worship at this youth meeting which was very nice. The youth seemed very grateful for our different kind of worship than what they're used to. One guy came up to Josh to thank him and said he hadn't been to a worship session like that in years. It was good to feel like we were actually doing something useful after a day of loitering in town. We went to Shibuya, which is one of the big stations in Tokyo. We found a H&M, the largest one I've ever seen (on the outside, it was like a massive skyscraper), and on the inside it looked more like zara than H&M. But it was expensive. I could pretty much tell what garments would've been 10 or 20 euros in Finland, here they were 10-5 euros more expensive. And I didn't really need any more clothes (or so I thought at the time).

After the H&M experience we started lookin for a place to eat lunch in. Now trying to find a cheap lunch restaurant for 8 people in Tokyo at lunchtime is NOT an easy task. After wandering back and forth, being cold and tired and hungry, I was about to snap at anyone who came too close. I was very close to punching Nick in the face for making stupid comments about me. Finally we managed to find a place, though the servings were so expensive that we had to share a dish between two people. But it ended up being just enough and we all left for home happy and fed.

Thursday and friday we had nothing to do, which was hard for me cos of the nagging voice in my head that keeps saying that we're wasting time. I'm sure it's not the Holy Spirit cos He'd never be so mean. But it's hard when you know you're on a mission and fell like all the other teams are probably being all creative and seeing God move in magnificent ways, while we're just sitting in a pile trying to keep warm. I know comparing is a dangerous path to go and I'm trying my best to avoid it. And hopefully the weather will get better, and our schedule busyer.

Despite the fact that we had no scheduled activity for thu or fri we still did our best to do something. On Thursday we went to see the Meiji Shrine. It was pretty creepy going to a place that we knew as heavily spiritual. I didn't really feel it too bad, though I did sense some kind of heaviness over the place. Mostly I think I was just freakin out because I knew that there were demons all over the place, rather than because I felt them. Some of our guys, however, felt chest pain and whatnot, and Jess wouldn't even enter the main shrine. I kept praying in tongues the whole time, maybe that's why I didn't feel anything... From the Shrine we continued to the famous Yoyogi park right next to the shrine. We prayed over the place where we knew we'd be playing on sunday. It was all good fun despite the cold and the rain and I felt like our team got a little closer. In the evening we watched tropic thunder and ate weird Japanese snacks while trying to stay warm under our blankets in a room colder than our fridge.

On friday we were a little more puzzled about what to do. In the morning we played with ideas but none of them seemed to work, so we waited till lunch, after which we went to Sibuya with a couple of guitars and a djembe. Me and Jess went to starbucks while the guys tried busking on the side of the station. 15 minutes later they came to us saying that the cops had told them not to play there or anywhere else in Shibuya. So they went to look for another place while me and Jess stayed in starbucks. about a half an hour later the guys came back again. They hadn't really found a place to play at, but some girls had asked them to be topless models at Abercombie&Fitch. The guys's self-esteem weas through the rough, though I'm pretty sure that anyone who's tall and white and lives in Tokyo will be asked to that job... so anyway we went home for dinner (amazing homecooked okonomiyaki) and then early to bed cos on saturday we had to wake up early.

So today, saturday, we woke up at 5:30 so that we'd be at Yoyogi park in time for the homeless ministry that a local church runs. There were about 50 homeless people already waiting when we came. The church had an abundance of food to give this time, but first they had a service for the homeless before giving out the food. I didn't really like this kind of ministry, forcing hungry people to listen to a message before they can get food. But we tried to go along with it and it wasn't too bad. Steven gave a cool testimony and we helped to give out hot drinks to the people. It was zero degrees and raining this weird icy snow, and I towards the end I thought I was gonna die, I was so cold. But we went to McDonald's to have breakfast and melt a little. After going to this printing place to print out fliers about our gig(on friday) and buying more clothes for ronnie we left for home, where we found the heater in the kitchen working! A happy happy happy surprise.

So this is how we're doing atm. Tbh I'm really struggling with not having any "real outreach stuff" to do, though I don't even know what that means. I guess I still have no clue whatsoever about what the heck I'm actually here for. We seem to be falling slowly into this weird coma where everyone uses all their energy to stay warm and nobody's being creative, including me. It's hard, it's really hard, and it's definitely a part of spiritual warfare against us. I just don't know how to fight the cold that seems to drain all life force out of me. If you have any creative ideas on what we could do with our time or how we could fight this ever growing apathy, please let us know. Fortunately next week seems to have a little more content to it, so it should be all good. Keep us in your prayers, pray especially for warm weather!! Arigato.

The End Of This Season

So I realise that I didn't update my blog last week, and to be honest at the moment I'm sturggling with it as well, so I apologize for a lot of misspelling and weird sentences that are in this post...

So these last two weeks have been basicly prepping us for outreach which begins on monday. First we had a couple people from the base staff to share with us about just basic stuff, like speaking in public, sharing a testimony, behaving in another culture, and to our great delight, two demonstrations of how to use a squattie potty. We also had to drink a cup of indian salty butter tea, which was pretty disgusting. The more we've been going over these things, the more I'm happy that I'm going to Japan.

This week we had a brasilian guy teaching about missions. It was like the perfect ending to the 12 week lecture phase. He was very down to earth and solid in what he said, bringing evangelism to a whole new level, that actually sounded like it would appeal to people. Now I'm not an evangelist, in fact it's something i hate to do, to go share the gospel with someone. Mainly because I feel like nobody wants to listen to me. And maybe nobody does, just because usually the gospel is so poorly presented. But Pablo looked into how people were saved in Jesus' time, and how Jesus never really evangelised anyone. He gave us some really good Dos and Don'ts when we are sharing the gospel. I just realised that I'm not meant to share it with words, cos nobody does want to listen. Nobody listens. So rather than talk, I should listen. It's not about changing people, it's about loving them for who they are. It's not about bringing them to my God, it's about showing that God is already there. It's not about increasing the number of people who go to church, it's about people finding a deep relationship with God. And seldom does telling someone that they're going to hell help anyone.

So I'm really pumped to go to Japan, though it's gonna be hard because of the spiritual nature of the country. I don't really know what our job description is even gonna look like. In tokyo hopefully we'll be able to play a lot. But as far as I know in Osaka and Kyoto we're mostly just gonna be helping the churches and being an encouragement and a blessing to them. It's deifinitely gonna be intresting. The spiritual warfare is already happening, and not just in our team but the whole school. There's tiredness, illness, confusion, and all sorts of things. I myself am feeling like all my mind is just a blur and it's hard to catch a thought, especially during quiet time when I'm trying to listen to God. Annoying, but nothing that prayer wouldn't conquer.

So keep us in your prayers, pray especially for unity in our team and communication. I'll be sure to keep you posted! Sayonara!

A God outside the Box

So after my nervous breakdown last week things have gotten a bit better. I don't know if it was your prayers or just the nature of this school, but either way there's no need to worry, no one's giving up here.

After such a spiritually loaded week it was weird to dive into this one, as it felt like we'd entered a whole other world. We had a guest speaker from New Zealand sharing us about his views on life as a christian, especially a christian artist. Patrick Dodson talked about relationships, how they affect our identity, how our identity affects our creativity and how our creativity can change the world. It was very down to earth and in a way very unspiritual, but even more challenging that way. He had so many good points about our generation and the disaster we're running towards if we don't change our 'shopping mentality' and start growing up.

One of the things he said that really stroke a chord in me was that we shouldn't get too caught up in asking God what we're supposed to do. Instead of waiting forever for a sign from heaven about whether I should go to university or staff a dts I should just go ahead and do whichever I want more. God will bless any way we go as long as it doesn't go directly against Him and His good will for us. But we get too caught up in following his perfect plan that we actually stop moving, cos He's not giving us a sign. I knew I had this problem when I was thinking about what's gonna happen after dts. Should I travel around Australia, should I go to Soul Survivor Holland, should I go straight back home, should I this, should I that, God tell me what is your divine plan! Like He cares what happens during those few weeks after I graduate. He gave me the ability to choose for myself, to want things and act according to it. So I' m free to choose, as long as I don't choose something absolutely stupid... I believe he's still gonna warn me if I'm going to do something really idiotic. So choosing for myself doesn't mean that I can do ANYthing. It just means that I don't have to ask for His permission in everything. Just like children need to grow up at somepoint and start taking responsibility for themselves, so does God want us to look after ourselves in a way. I don't know if this makes any sense to you :D

Patrick also had some really good points about being a christian artist. He was verbally slapping our faces with some of the stuff he said, but it was good, it woke us up. Like realising that it takes 10 years to be good at something unless you're like really really really talented. And even then it takes like 5 years. But our generation is so used to this so called shopping mentality, where we push a button and we get what we want. We've stopped creating, because the pressure to be as good as the best is too depressing. But there's no competition in being excellent. Nobody has to be as good at something as someone else is, but everybody can be excellent in what they do, cos everybody's different. When jealousy and selfishness enter the picture, that's when the pressure comes, which often leads to giving up or selling out. It takes 10 000 hours of diligent practice till you're actually good at something. But with the shopping mentality we usually quit after 500 hours, if we're not making decent progress. That was basically me when it comes to almost everything I do. If I'm not good or at least decent in the very beginning I can't be bothered do continue practicing. Like with the guitar, after learning like 10 cords, enuf to write songs, I stopped learning more cos I wasn't bothered to make the effort. And I didn't even take lessons to have someone make me practice. I was just too damn lazy.

So Patick's teaching was very, very inspiring. Pretty much all of us got some ideas on what to do with our lives. I only shared like a tiny portion of all the good stuff we learnt this week, but if you're intrested in hearing more, go to http://www.patrickdodson.net/ and listen to some of his stuff. It's pretty controversial but frikkin awesome.

And like I said, the teaching this week was like the opposite to the one we had last week. It truly went from full on spiritual hippie fest to down to earth, practical everyday life. Just goes to show that we really cannot put God in a box. It's gonna take a while to process these two weeks and learn how to take them both and turn it into a balanced christian life that's somewhere in between those two. And like Patrick said, a lot has happened and will happen during dts, but we're not gonna change before we actually apply these things in our own lives.

So what else... Life's pretty good, it's still frikkin hot here (30-35 degrees C) and I can't wait to go to Japan to stop swetting! Only two weeks left! Our team still needs altogether about 2000 dollars, so if you could pray that God provide us with the money in time, that'd be great. Cheers!

Faith Activated

Realising that I haven't even been in Australia for 3 months yet brings a little consolation to this confusion that I seem to be living in at the moment. Yet as our outreach is only 3 weeks away it feels like we're coming closer to the end. And I guess in a way it is true. It's never gonna be like this ever again once we leave. Just like the 1st 4 weeks here, before our first little outreach in Byron Bay, were their own chapter, every few weeks we're entering a new season in this school. Coming back from Airlie us as a school have definitely entered a new era.

This week we continued on spiritual warfare, watched a couple of Dean Sherman videos, then a couple with Jack Deere and again some with Steve Thompson. I guess learning about spiritual warfare made us even more of a target than before and a lot of us have struggled with spiritual attacks. But we've managed to fight a lot of it pretty successfully; for example a lot of reconciliation happened in our band as God convicted us of forgetting Him and His authority in the band. We hadn't even realised how distanced we'd become as a band from each other and God. So we repented and talked things through and instead of rehearsing our songs we had worship time for hours, just us 5. So at least that part of the Devil's plan was ruined.

On the other hand this week has been really good as opposed to the time we we're gone from the base. During those 2 and a half weeks almost everyone of us felt distanced from God and had a hard time connecting with Him, but coming back to the base and under the spiritual atmosphere which is a lot lighter here has enabled us to feel more close to Him once again. Which is good but a little confusing. Am I really that easily affected by my surroundings? Shouldn't I be able to connect with my heavenly Father despite my circumstance?

The whole week we've been building up our faith and reaching out. I've worshipped for hours and hours this week seeking His presence, and it all was building up towards friday night when we had a big worship night. We all had great expectations. After hearing about all these things that exist in the spiritual rhelm, after being encouraged by Steve Thompson, saying that Christ is in us and in Him we have been given all authority on earth, after fasting all day in aticipation of this night we were all so pumped up and ready to worship.

And for the second time on dts this happens: I begin to worship with a flaming desire in my heart to meet with my God, I worship with such a passion and I do connect, for a tiny moment - an then it's gone. Nothing. Something attacked me and I felt how I was slipping away and I just sank with this thing all over me. And other's prayed for me and it did leave but I still couldn't reconnect. We had ministry time but despite the level of faith in the room we didn't see too much happen. In my heart I felt like something was squeezing it. I didn't understand. I still don't.

I love my God. I do. And He's proven himself to me more than plenty of times, but I still feel like there is a heavy cloud of confusion hanging over this place, over me. I still believe He can do all things, I really do, but I don't understand why He won't work through us, through me. And I am sick and tired of apologizing for Him. Sick and tired of focusing on what He did not do. I want to boast in Christ, be proud of my Father who can do ALL things. But if I don't see these things happen though I walk in the faith that I have, what am I supposed to think?

So pray for me, pray for us. Because this school is on the edge of either a breakthrough or breaking apart. We have no idea where we're at or what God's doing in us. It's something quite divine, the ways He's been leading us, and I believe He will raise us up even though it feels to me now like we're gonna die spiritually if nothing happens. So pray for us. Pray that we'd have clarity once again and that God would show us what all of this means. Hopefully before outreach...

Just another fortnight

So about two and a half weeks ago our school left for Sunshine Coast to spend Christmas there. I left earlier in a van that took 15 people there first. It was me, two other girls and all the guys in our school. Once we arrived we came to realize that the place we were staying in for a week wasn't really the most modern facility. All the girls would sleep in a room with bunkbeds for all 24 of us, but little space for all our luggage. The guys would sleep upstairs on hardwoodfloor. The place used rainwater and supposedly had two full tanks ready for us to use, but we'd still have to conserve water. It wasn't too bad, though I had a lot of trouble to get myself into a christmas mood. The afternoon we arrived, however, the guys cheered us up by killing to bushturkeys. Together about 10 of us took the feathers out, gutted them and prepared them to be cooked. It was an experience like no other, and as gross as the gutting part was, it was still pretty frikkin amazing. We never ended up cooking the turkeys ourselves, though I think I heard someone saying that the suspicious looking meat in our pasta was the turkey. Who knows...

That week was pretty chill, we had some lectures on spiritual warfare but Noah didn't want to stress us too much over the holidays, and we were all too tired to listen anyway. We did a couple of trips to these beatiful creeks where we went cliffjumping from 3 to 10 metres, and took showers in a waterfall. We also hiked up a small mountain where we could see the whole coastline of Sunshine coast. Christmas eve wasn't a special day cos the emphasis here was pretty much on the American christmas. But in the evening I called my family, and it was really good to hear their voice for the first time since I arrived in Australia. It was also the first time I've been homesick since I came. And it all got worse the next morning. I woke up on Christmas day to go to the toilet only to find out that we'd run out of water. This meant that we'd have no showers, no toilets nor water for cooking or washing the dishes. The guys had to go into town to get us water for cooking a christmas dinner while the rest of us - especially the girls - were wondering how to survive without toilets.

Eventually it wasn't quite as bad as it could've been. We'd wash our dishes in a small creek next to the cabin, and there were toilets at a park about 5-10 minutes walk away. The problem with the toilets was that there were no lights, so going to the toilet after 7 would mean navigating in the darkness... But it was still better than diggin a hole in the forest... Showers were arranged with trips to the waterfalls where we truly became one with the nature. On boxing day I walked to a nearby waterfall with two other girls to wash our hair. It was about a 20-30 min hike down to the pond, and we got there while we still had daylight. The hike back, however, we did in complete darkness. We could barely see the path and the whole time I was just praying that I wouldn't get any leeches. Good news were that my prayers were answered; I didn't get any leeches. But I did hit my pinky toe on a rock and tore my toenail. Fortunately we were by the toilets so that I could rinse my toe with fresh water, but it was still pretty bad.

On 27th we left Sunny Coast and head for Airlie Beach. After cleaning up the place (which btw was a pretty disgusting job) we finally bid fairwell to the place and drove 8 hours to Rockhamptons were we stayed for one night at a camping site. Sleeping with 3 people in a tent that's meant for 2 people, on gravel without a sleeping mat was not a pleasant experience, but washing our dishes in an actually clean kitchen made up for it. From Rockhamptons we continued 8 more hours to Airlie Beach, where we had a tiny bit of time to settle down (I was sleeping on a carpeted garage floor with 11 other girls, whereas almost all the rest of the school had airconditioned accomodation with real beds or at least mattresses) before we were thrown into full on evangelism action. The whole week we made free chai tea for hundreds of people in this big tent with a very cosy atmosphere. We had live music playing and a carpeted floor area with cushions and little tables. It was really nice and a really good enviroment to just talk to people about life and faith and whatnot. After my evangelism experiences in Byron Bay I wasn't really excited about this week, but God really proved himself to me in the ways he led me into good converstations, especially when I wasn't trying. It was a very tiring week as we had such a tight schedule, having about 6 hours of sleep everynight and not really having any time to just relax. Fortunately the weather wasn't too hot and at least we had enuf food. And the evenings were definitely worth the trouble as we really saw God move and touch people's lives. We also got to do all kinds of random stuff, like picking up coconuts on the beach and due to a great group effort finnally getting to actually eat them. We collected shells on the beach and made necklaces out of flowers. Unfortunately due to all the jellyfish in the ocean we couldn't swim on the beach, but there was a manmade beach right next to us that we took advantage of as often as possible. Our band got to play on new year's eve and afterwards we'd all go outside the tent to watch the fireworks. Even though I really missed home I felt really blessed to start the new year with these people in this amazing country.

The last night of that hectic week our band was playing again. The gig was way better than the first one and I felt really good afterwards. I tried to strike up a conversation with a group of girls from Brisbane but it just wouldn't take off so I decided to go hang out by the side of the tent. I stood there for a while till this young girl who was sitting outside the tent smoking asked me if I was the girl who was just singing on stage. I went to her and we started talking and the conversation just took off. I told her what we were doing with the tent and that I was a christian and she was really intrested. Her friend joined the conversation and we started talking about relationships, sex and marriage and they were just absolutely amazed by my view on that stuff. We were joined by two of their friends and I ended up talking to them for the rest of the night, for about 3 hours. It was really cool how I got to share my lack of experience with boys as a testimony, a thing that I'd never actually thought of as an actual testimony. The girls were just absolutely stunned by my values and the strength that I had in believing in them. The guys were more resentful but they were listening. At the end of the night the first girl asked me to pray for her, which was cool cos I didn't push it on her, she actually asked for it. After praying for her the other girl thought it was so beautiful that she wanted prayer as well. So I prayed for her as well. And we talked a little more about how they had had the worst start to a new year and how I'd been exactly what they needed. The whole conversation was like the perfect ending to a good week. It was so good to see God lead the conversation and open all the doors when I wasn't trying at all. And to hear that the reason these people were in the tent was because they'd hear our band play from outside and came to listen to us. It was so encouraging to see that God did use our music even when we weren't singing about Jesus. There were some good conversations in addition to this one, but this one was definitely the best one and it still brings a smile on my face when I think about it. God is good, all the time!

On tuesday we had the chance to go to the great barrier reef, one of the seven wonders of the world. I hadn't had any money since we came to Airlie, but I knew I had to go, so I borrowed the 120 dollars needed and went. And it was frikkin amazing. After about a 2 hour long boat ride we came to the side of this island where we had a chance go snorkling. It was a little scary due to the fact that it was the stinger season and the water was like infested with jellywish that would kill you if you got stung by one. But we all wore stingersuits that covered like 95% of our body, and nobody got stung. Also getting used to a snorkle took a while, the first 15 minutes I just felt like I was drowning. But after getting rid of the fear of drowning and the fear of jellyfish it was absolutely amazing. I didn't see any Nemos but I did see a couple of Doris and some of the other fish in the tank at the dentist's office whose names I don't remember. I saw huge fish and colorful fish and all kinds of coral. I only saw a couple of jellyfish but they were scary :( After the reef we went to a place called the Whitehaven beach, which is one of the top 10 beached in the world. The sand was almost pure silicon, white and soft and amazing. It's the only place in the world where you can find that kind of sand. We still had to wear our stingersuits in the water, which resulted in some cool promo pictures that can later on be found on facebook. Some guys saw stingrays and sharks and dolphins, I didn't :( I did see a sea turtle once we went back on the boat. The whole day was such an amazing experience, worth a lot more than 120 dollars I think...

Yesterday we left back for home, but we'd only made it half an hour outside of Airlie when the other trailor broke, forcing us to load the bus and the van with all the luggage that was on it. The van had to stay behind to wait till the trailor was fixed, but fortunately the bus was able to keep going. However we had to fit most of the luggage in the bus, so there was little space left for the students to sit. Somehow 25 of us managed to make it all the way down to Rockhamptons where we spent the night again, this time in slightly more comfortable conditions. 8 more hours of driving today, and we finally arrived back home. My backpack is still in the van though, so for now I'm left with almost none of my posessions. But I don't complain, I'm home and that's what matters.

I hope I didn't forget anything too important. It was a lot of information to remember anyway...