Growing Fruit and Relationships
As many of you know, we have been trying to have each of our English students over for a meal this year. This past week, we had two ladies from Colby’s beginner class in for lunch, Mrs. Masuda (one of the church ladies) and Mrs. Kimura. They wanted to eat something ‘American’ and so we made them taco salad (I know, it’s actually Mexican, but when you stop and think about it, what IS American food anyway?). Being the custom here in Japan to bring a gift of some sort when you visit someone, Mrs. Kimura brought us a yogurt cake (yes, a yogurt cake!) and Mrs. Masuda brought us a whole watermelon.
Our lunch with Mrs. Masuda (left) and Mrs. Kimura (right).
The reason I mention that a whole watermelon was brought is because that is viewed as quite a gift. That same good-sized watermelon that you can buy in your local grocery store for about $3 to $5 is sold here in Japan for around $20 to $25!
That was one reason why we wanted to grow our own garden this summer is because fruit and vegetables are just generally more expensive here in Japan. This is possibly due to a number of them being imported, but also could be due to the Japanese penchant for beautiful, blemish-free produce they like to give as gifts. At any rate, with as little rain as we’ve gotten and how hot it has been, it is looking like we may still have to buy our produce instead of grow it.
Even though we aren’t doing so well at growing vegetables and fruit, our main desire is to grow relationships. Please pray that our relationship with Mrs. Kimura would grow as she has invited us to her house for dinner. Pray for opportunities to share about Christ with her and her husband.