Erik and Yoko's Yokohama Tour Service

Since we turned down the offer for Erik to teach in China, we have seen an influx of teaching opportunities for Erik. This week he started a long term sub. It will last 2 months and is 3 days a week. He also acquired a new private student that he meets once a week. On top of this, he will be teaching 2 all day classes (one in June and one in August) for Japan's second largest steel company. The Lord is truly blessing us. This increase in income is coming at a prefect time as it will provide for our plane tickets back to the U.S. Also, the long term sub teaching does not fall on days that Erik has his Japanese classes. God sure is good to us!

Last Monday we had the opportunity to give 10 college students from the U.S. a tour of Yokohama. These students are from Embry Riddle Aeronautical University and are in Japan for a summer study program. We have this connection with ERAU since they have a campus in Prescott, and the professor that heads up this Japan program, we know from church. If you came to our wedding, he is the Japanese man who did the translating during the reception. We had a good time in Yokohama. Yoko did a great job getting us all on the correct trains and translating anything the students couldn't read. The 10 students we had were great. There were no attitude problems; nobody got lost; and they all were happy to try food they were unfamiliar with at a Japanese restaurant we went to for lunch. We went up to the top of Landmark Tower; it provided a great view of the Yokohama area. We had hoped to take the students to the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Museum , but it is closed every Monday. So, in place of that, we let the students loose in a local mall.

In our last post we mentioned that we would be going out to eat for our anniversary. We did that and had a great meal. It was a buffet, and we took full advantage of that. We hope to get a link up for the restaurant so keep an eye out for that in our "What and Where We've Eaten Recently" section. Below is an "anniversary picture" we took to mark our two years of marriage. Aren't we cute in the matching shirts. FYI, that wasn't Erik's idea : )

Going to Work in China!!!!

Since our last post was two weeks ago, you'd think we'd have something to write about and a matter of fact, we do. Before we get to those details though, we are doing well. Yoko had 4 days off from work due to the Golden Week national holiday. She spent time with her mom and put in some good time working on her web site. When that is completed, we will let you know.
Now to the highlights, let's start with Friday, the 1st, at 10:00 am. Erik received a call from the English language school he subs for with the offer to go teach in Shanghai, China for at least a month starting on the 4th. Since it was to start so soon, we had to make a decision quickly. After some discussion and prayer, we decided to decline the offer for a number of reasons, the main one being that we will be seeing a friend from Arizona on the 17th and 18th of this month.
Tuesday, the 5th, was our 2 year anniversary. We had plans for the day, but due to it being a national holiday, Children's Day, and some scheduling conflicts, we didn't get to do all we wanted to do that day. As a result, we are celebrating our anniversary over a week or so. Tuesday the 12th we will go out for our anniversary dinner. Today, Saturday, we ate tiramisu and took anniversary pictures at a near by park.
Wednesday, the 6th, found Erik in Tokyo washing dishes at Kick Back Cafe; this is the cafe our church owns. Yoko stayed home so that Erik would not be able to depend on her. This was Erik's first time to take the 2 hour train ride (with 3 transfers) to our church/cafe by himself. Thanks be to God, he got there without too much difficulty and was on time. The day spent washing dishes was enjoyable despite the piles of dishes due to it being a very busy day for the cafe. Erik's prayer was that he wouldn't break anything, and again, thanks to God, he didn't. A few dishes were dropped, but nothing broke. Erik stayed for the Wednesday night service, stayed the night with some guys from the church and then came back home Thursday morning. Thursday morning was again spent on the train this time with the hordes of people heading to work (Click for a video of what it is like. I was already on the train so I didn't actually get pushed. Don't want to do that again. Japanese people are nice, but I don't need to be that close to anyone other than Yoko).
So those are a few of the highlights from the past two weeks.