Yumi in Med. School

     By God's grace and to our happy surprise, in March Yumi was accepted into the six year M.D. program at the Toyama University medical school.  The entrance competition was very competitive, with few students being admitted (as Yumi, was) without two or three years of intensive prep. school study. Her year of study in North America undoubtedly helped her a lot in a similar way, as her ability in English improved a lot during that time. (She was a high school senior for two years, one year in Maine and the second year here in Japan.) Her university classes started a couple weeks ago on April 8th. 

     Thankfully for her dad and mom Toyama Univeristy is a national university with much lower tuition costs per year than medical schools in the U.S., such being on a par with normal state universities like the University of Maine. Still six years is a long time, and there will be two years of internship after that. This first year will probably be the easiest. An inheritance from Jon's mom makes this all possible financially, as we certainly could not pay for her tuition (as well as Amy's at Chiba Univeristy) from our missionary salary. 

     In other happy news, Yumi was baptized on Easter Sunday, having saved that great event until after the year long entrance exam struggle had ended. Her desire is to serve the Lord as a doctor wherever He may lead her in the future. As we have seen over the years Christian medical doctors can have a tremendous testimony and impact in highly vertical Japanese society. Moreover, Yumi also signed up for two optional foreign language courses this first year as she realizes the Lord may also eventually want her to serve somewhere else around the world.