Touchdown in Tokyo: The Journey Begins!

Day 1 & 2
Christchurch > Kanazawa

After a very early start and a truly ideal travel day, we landed in Narita, Tokyo. Three of us managed to snag a whole row to ourselves on the plane, but Yvonne scored even better — she prayed and had a great conversation with her seat neighbour.

We taught Finn how to use chopsticks over dinner in Narita, then headed to bed early. On Wednesday morning, we took the train into Tokyo and enjoyed a few beautiful hours navigating the busy stations, finding good coffee, an excellent lunch, and having fun, friendly interactions with locals along the way. Yvonne’s Japanese has already proven to be a game changer!

 From there, we hopped on the bullet train to Kanazawa to meet Robin & Yoko White, our Wesleyan missionary hosts. (Click here to read about their manga ministry.) After many Zoom calls, it was a joy to finally meet in person! Yoko kindly helped us sort out train tickets for the next few days. We explored a bit of Kanazawa before sharing a phenomenal shabu-shabu meal — all-you-can-eat, cooked right at the table. We’re so grateful for Robin & Yoko’s thoughtful planning and look forward to spending time with them, their church, and their ministry here.

Hannah’s ankle is holding up really well — she’s so thankful for all the prayers, as it’s been noticeably less painful.

 It’s been fun watching the team come together — we’ve already got a clear navigator, a food-finder, a translator, and a deep conversationalist. We’ll let you figure out who’s who!

Read Robin & Yoko’s ministry blog here
Check out an article about their ministry here