Alrighty, well I may be the last person to have singed up for this June Race and am certainly the last to write my bio. My apologies as I see 48 people have look at my bio only to find it blank. This can partially be explained by my technical deficiency with computers as my Mac didn’t have the proper program to allow me to write these blogs…however, I’ve finally fixed that!
Anyway, I am 27 yrs old, graduated from USC (University of Southern California, Go Trojans) where I studies International Relations and Business, and the youngest of 3 siblings by 9 and 11 yrs. My sister who is the oldest just got married last yr and live in LA, my brother just moved to Hawaii last summer where he was born after living in LA most of his life. My parents are wonderful influences on my life. Dad always the provider and full sage advise in life and business matters. Mother more closely raised me, kept me involved in church activities and all sorts of sports growing up which has kept me physically active for most of my life. My earliest memories are going on ski trips with the family (and I still love skiing til the day), and joining AYSO soccer as soon as I was old enough to play. Later on, I got into basketball, football, baseball, roller hockey, track, Golf, and even endless ping pong battles in the garage with my brother. I think that all of these sports made me very competitive which I saw come through in my professional work life (I will discuss later in another blog), and even to the point where I can get in to board games like I was going for a gold medal if I won!
Growing up, I attended church regularly, summer church camps, and was put in Christian schools from K – High School. I’m not sure I really ever had a rebellious stage in my life during those times like many of my friends went through, but one thing all these Christian influences may have done was make my faith something that was instilled upon me from the various institutions I was involved with instead of coming to the Lord on my own. Through HS, college and my young adult years, I have begun to rediscover the Lord in a fresh and more personal way.
After graduating college, I went to work for a Medical Device company in Sales…something I had no prior experience in, seriously never sold a thing in my life, didn’t like giving presentations, a fear of public speaking. But I believe the Lord used this job to stretch me and learn new skills to make me more well rounded that would help me later in life, even on this World Race trip. Learning to be a leader, organizational skills, and no longer fearing public speaking. God uses all things for his greater purpose.
I have done several short-term missions trips since my early high school yrs, Mostly to Mexico, slums of LA, and the in college to Thailand. I have lived abroad in Spain for 6 months during college, and was able to travel fairly extensively throughout Europe (but none of the countries on our trip!) I’ve also been fortunate enough to travel with my family through some parts of Asia, and South America. The reason I share these things, is that these experiences have shaped who I am today… someone who loves to travel, experience new cultures, help those who are less fortunate in 3rd world countries, and seek adventure. So when I learned of the World Race from an old college friend who went on the WR last yr, it seemed to encompass everything I love in life. And here I am, a humble and very excited member of the June 2010 Race!
Some random facts about me:
-love the thrill of an adrenaline rush, finally got to sky-dive in Hawaii last yr!
-am 4th generation japanese/chinese American…unfortunately don’t speak either language, only Espanol
-love animals, always grew up with dogs and cats. Wanted to be an animal trainer when I was younger…like Shamu, but maybe not so much now in light of recent Shamu incident
-huge fan of the Lakers and Trojan football
-enjoy the mountains and snow more than beach and sand… but thats only if I had to pick. I like the beach just fine.
-really enjoy the theatre as in musicals, Les Miserables in my all time fav…. I can almost sing the entire thing, not well but I know the words
-forced to take piano lessons for most of grade school thru part of HS, now I wish I worked harder at it, teaching myself guitar now
Look forward to meeting you all!
God bless
Justin
