Birthday Party # 1 - The Massive Train Excursion

Today's Tokyo Adventure is brought to you by the letter T, for the massive amount of train tickets used and bought today to get to all the places I had to go and lines I had to switch over to get home.

The plan started about a week ago. Abigail, a classmate and one of the first people I met in class whom I became friends with, had noticed I was in a rather depressive funk. I was away from home, unsure about whether to stay in Intensive II or not (I left, obviously. She remained, Godspeed, Abigail!) missing Michael and generally feeling blue about being unable to go home for my birthday or Christmas. So, she offered to plan a small day out for the two of us the week before my birthday (as on my birthday I intend to have a huge shindig that she might miss due to it being on a Sunday and conflicting with Church).

So the itinerary was as such: go to church with Abigail, go back to her home stay apartment, and dinner and a movie.

Now, I'm apprehensive about churches on general principle. I've had my whole lifetime's worth of bad experiences involving organized religion, and so there is a severe, severe feeling of distrust in any sort of hierarchical structure pertaining to spiritual matters for me. The last church I was a regular attendee of spawned some really bad memories which hurt me. That, plus having attended a private Christian school where the administrators often turned a blind eye to bullying and played favorites...yeah, not hard to see why I was weary.

Much like the last time I went to church with Abigail (and the time before that was with my Mom last Mother's Day), I pretty much felt indifferent. But the sermon's message about, "What is the one thing you would want from God?" and the story of Solomon's asking to be a better ruler got me thinking. What would be the one thing I'd really want from God? Or at all, in life really?

All that I really want, and have wanted, is love. I want to feel loved and to be able to love myself so that I am able to love others. The lack of love I received from those who oftentimes called themselves "Christians" is what hurt me probably more than anything else, and to this day, still makes me weary of being around other Christians as a whole.

As much as I hate to admit it, I broke down. So many negative memories and feelings, ones that I have clung to, came bubbling back to the surface. I grew up in the church, and with the childlike innocence, I held onto my beliefs until they could no longer sustain me. Then somewhere along the line, I just gave up.

I might not consider myself a Christian by any stretch of the imagination, but I am at the very least taking steps to reconcile my negative feelings toward the church so I can move toward a path of healing myself from the pain in the past. Also got a bilingual copy of the New Testament, so here's to improving my Japanese, one scripture at a time.

Anywho, enough about churches...

After that, we headed back to Abigail's homestay, and I introduced her to pictures of the Michael, and she envied his hair. His lovely, lovely, hair ;) We talked about a lot of things, and then her homestay mother (Junko) and father (whose name escapes me) made this amazing dinner for me. Abigail had been phishing for my favorite foods and so I was treated to a creamy carbonara pasta (so, so, so, good), homemade pizza (dough and all!), salad, and a strange yogurt like confection.

But what really got me, more than anything else, was the fact that Abigail made a birthday cake for me. And it was hella delicious. Dark chocolate, with chunks, strawberry frosting and white chocolate chips. It was so delicious, I even brought a little bit back to the dorm with me to enjoy tomorrow. And I was then gifted with a little stationary set, the first volume of Toradora, and a little plushie of one of the NHK news channels (the little pink birdie). It was more than I was ever expecting and really, I think I have found a true friend in Abigail because no one, in my life, has known me for such a short time and gone to such lengths to be there for me.

Her birthday is eight days after mine, which means I better start fishing for her favorite color so I can go get my knitting on.

Stay tuned for next week's birthday party: drunken all-nighter karaoke!