Growing up in the midwest, "cruising" had nothing to do with boats, and everything to doing with driving aimlessly around with your friends, preferably at night or the wee hours of the morning.

Well, ya' live long enough and anything can happen. Took my first cruise this past Monday, on the good ship "Bianca," and travelled hither and yon on Lake Biwa -- the largest lake in all Japan!

'Course, I didn't have Aileen with me, so that was a bummer. (She was with our church on its first ever retreat, which I missed.) And I wasn't there to kick up my heels and snooze on a deck chair in the summer sun. The rest of the TV crew and I were there to shoot a concert, interview and evangelistic message. LifeLine is broadcast in the Lake Biwa area, and the cruise was co-sponsored by PBA and the church group in Shiga Prefecture that sponsors the broadcast there.

The four of us got to the dock with two vans full of TV and PA gear at 6:30 in the morning to load into the boat, and at 9:30 p.m., finished packing the gear out of the boat and back into the vans.

And in between was a three ring circus!

The boat had three large meeting/conference rooms, and the churches created a program that used them to the max! We had professional accordion concerts, southern gospel choirs, a classic concert and a gospel singer solo concert. There were 5 or 6 Bible messages, a kids' program and a drama team. The place was hopping. One meeting in the morning, three in the afternoon, and two at night -- in each of the three rooms. So, that's like, what, 18 different events in one day?!

This was another of the LifeLine 20th anniversary "Thanks Giving" events. Down towards the middle of Japan, in an area called Kansai -- and the cultural differences from Tokyo were very evident. Much less uptight, "It'll work out!" "Hey, let's have fun!" -- a little more, well, America-like than I'm used to here in Tokyo. No one got seasick, the footage looks okay (I've been feeding it into the computers for editing this week.) and the audio was fine -- the engines weren't nearly as loud as I feared they might be.

And even amidst the three ring chaos, there were plenty of times to reflect on what God has done through 20 years LifeLine broadcasts. PTL.


The Bianca! (Not exactly the Queen Elizabeth, but, hey, it's a real live cruise ship!



The Skippers. No Gilligans on this crew -- made all ports on time and got back home safe and sound.


Boarding the Bianca. Stairs? No gang plank? I'm terribly disappointed....



The Bianca's rear deck. (Okay, I don't think it's really called a rear deck -- how about one of you nautical types leave a comment to straighten me out!)




Accordion Concert by Manabu Hiyama. Has studied in Italy, won all kinds of awards -- and played 4 concerts in one day on a cruise ship on Lake Biwa, Japan!



This guy was a mixed bag -- I think there were as many wee ones that ran away screaming in terror as there were who hung around to get a balloon!




LifeLine host, Rev. Hirooki Sekine, kicking off a meeting.



Rev. Murakami, PBA board chairman, bringing a message from the Word.


Gospel Choir



Evening Concert