One of the great ironies of living in Tokyo is that so many feel lonely, while at the same time being surrounded by people in the largest metropolitan area on the planet.
When we chose to attend The Naganuma School for Japanese language studies, we knew that for a few years we would be committing nearly every day to language acquisition efforts for long-term work with churches in Japan. We have tried our best to be present and connect with those who God brings into our lives. Over the last year and a half, we have enjoyed getting to know our classmates who come from nations around the world.
We’ve had lunches and dinners with individual classmates, but the vision of hosting the whole class in our home finally became a reality. While classmates brought along desserts and drinks, we provided a burrito bar for the main course. We enjoyed sharing our American version of burritos with our classmates, some of whom were eating burritos for the first time and requested burrito rolling instruction.
Over our meal, we sat around the living room and in a strange mix of Japanese and English (common among internationals in Japan), we shared stories from our time studying together, spoke of our future goals in Japan or in our home countries, and celebrated recent successes with one another.
With all of our differences in nationality, backgrounds, and life experiences, we came together in our commonality of studying Japanese and living life as internationals in Japan, and it felt like beloved community. We've been so thankful for our classmates who have become friends and have been the presence of Christ to us, and we are grateful for the opportunity to open our home and be the hands and feet of Christ to them.
- Carson and Laura Foushee, CBF field personnel in Japan