On Tuesday 7.1 and Wednesday 7.2, most of our group went to the future location of Harvest Chapel to do some much-needed practical work. Because the location is legally classified as farm land, we have to grow crops there in order to maintain use of the land, making Harvest Chapel a very fitting name indeed. We had quite a bit of work to do, as the field was overgrown with weeds and garbage. Through a combination of old-fashioned weed-pulling and Mr. Ghent's weedcutter, we succeeded in clearing out most of the field and threw the weeds into heaps for burning at a future date. Adrian and Deborah quickly proved adept at weed-clearing, but the rest of us worked our hardest as well. With a rotor tiller we chopped up the dry, hard ground to prepare it for planting, and by Wednesday, we were ready to plant some crops. Throughout our hands-on work at Harvest Chapel, we attracted stares from many Japanese passing by; a large group of foreigners farming in northern Japan is not an everyday sight! With any luck, we managed to get a little early publicity for the upcoming chapel before the land had even been officially bought.
We started with squash transplanted from the garden behind Itayanagi Chapel, but the farm-experienced Mortley family provided some corn that was planted as well. We finished our first planting with the help of a church member who actually assisted in buying the land for us in the first place. He provided some fresh tomato plants that transplanted near the back of the field to save passerbys the temptation of stealing their fruit. We finished up by watering, and in only a two-day span, had transformed the weed and garbage-ridden field into fertile soil for a new crop! Hopefully God will do the same with the people of south Hirosaki and make Tsugaru Gospel Church's latest endeavor a success!
- Kyle
Before & after pictures:
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