Final Post Sayoonara

I can't believe tomorrow morning I will be packing my bags one last time and heading home! This has been the experience of a lifetime, I will be returning a changed person. As I strolled through the Japanese gardens one last time, comtemplating the thousand-year-old stone pillars standing in stark contrast to the high rise buildings, and the moat separating the hotel from the highway, which once surrounded the Edo castle that stood on these grounds, I realized that this is a metaphor for Japan itself.

This is a country known both for it's rich history and traditions, and for it's technological advances. These are a people at once deeply entrenched in their Shinto and Buddist beliefs and yet fully embracing the future in commerce, educational trends, and politics.

This morning, as the sun burned off the early mists, Mount Fuji appeared outside my hotel window. Just now, the sun set directly behind it, perhaps the most amazing thing I have ever witnessed. I will be happy to get home, but Japan will always live on in my heart.

To Hell and Back--Written Oct 26

Our last night in Unzen was spent in "Hell" at Kyushu Hotel, a traditional ryokan at a sulfur spring. The hotel was shrouded in a sulfur mist, which was beautiful and romantic, but stunk like rotten eggs! They call it hell because the sulfur boils out of the ground in pools and is very hot. As soon as we got there, several of us dropped our bags and went to a pottery store down the street, but it looked closed. There was no one in the shop and the lights were turned down. We walked back to the hotel, dejected, but Jill was determined, and asked to front desk to call and ask the shop to open for us! Turns out they were open after all, so the hotel piled us in a van and drove us back. We made it worth the shop’s time! The pottery was beautiful, and we kind of cleaned them out!
We were supposed to be back for dinner at 6:30, but it was more like 6:50 by the time we made it. Everyone was waiting for us in their yukata! That’s ok, we plopped down anyway. This was a traditional Japanese dinner, with special dishes from the area. The first course was a delicious salad with tuna sashimi and squid. Then we had some raw food on a fondue type of thing with a leaf for cooking on. The food cooked by the time the candle burned out, then we were supposed to eat it, but it all tasted like leaf to me. The next courses consisted of various fish and rice products, but my stomach is still not up to snuff, so I kind of picked at them. Some were good, some slimy, salty or crunchy, and all very different from American food.
The highlight of the evening was a karaoke machine! Someone needed to be the brave first singer, so I let my vast Rock Band experience lead the way. I got up and sang "I Will Survive" in honor of surviving my sick week in Unzen. After my icebreaker, others got up and sang, too, and I joined a few friends in singing an old Madonna song towards to end.
As I write this, I am at the airport waiting for the plane back to Tokyo.

Soccer at last!! Written Oct 26

Just when I was thinking soccer was going to be out of the question, I got to see a game afterall! It turns out the the mom in my host family teaches at the school that is the high school national champions, and they had a game the morning that I was leaving Unzen. We went to the game, in the rain, before they had to return me to city hall.

Although it was a high school game, the level of play was impressive--Kunimi High School had some great moves! They have had players go straight from their team to the pros in the past, and I can see why.

It was really interesting to listen to the cheers-they even had their own drum-and also to be the only non-Japanese person there. I got to talk to some of the team members at half-time...unfortunately the only MLS team they could name was the Galaxy. There's no accounting for taste!

Home Sweet Home--written Oct. 25

I left with my home-stay family at ten o’clock this morning. Ke, the father, Muchiko, the mother, Toshiko, the grandmother, and two kids, Ryu, their son and Naogo, Muchi’s niece. We set out to go to Kumimoto, the neighboring prefecture, to see a park and a castle. We drove for about 45 minutes, stopping for lunch at a noodle place where I had fried chicken, a delicious coleslaw sort of thing, and some of Toshi’s ramen. It was all good, although the chicken is not breast meat and kind of gristly, and best of all, I was able to eat one piece of chicken and quite a bit of the salad and a few bites of noodles! I was hardly even in pain afterwards. We had to take a ferry, a new experience for me, to Kumimoto, then drive another 45 minutes or so.
The park, Suizenji Jojuen Garden, was gorgeous, very scenic, and we took lots of pictures. Ryu warmed up to me after lunch and was pretty silly, but Nao stayed quiet. Toshi is a bit of an Americanophile, and speaks pretty good English. She was really excited to have a chance to talk to an American!
From there, Toshi and I took the kids on a street car to Kumamoto Castle, and Ke and Muchi took the car and met us there. The castle was huge and very traditional. I have not read the info about it yet, but I have it, so I will. A funny thing there was that a bunch of Chinese and Korean boys asked me to take a picture with them! What a weird world! Of course, I didn’t see a ninja until I was right upon him, but I managed to subdue him, anyway.
From there, we finally went to their house. Several of the male teachers from Obama High School joined us for dinner, which was take out sushi. Luckily, one of them was an English teacher! They left at about 9:00, I took a bath, and went to bed on the futon that they provided for me upstairs.

In the morning, I helped Toshi make miso soup and fix several other small dishes for breakfast. I really learned a lot about Japanese cooking. After that, we set out for a museum and then to city hall to take a bus to the next stop.

Having a family for a night was nice, but I really miss my real one!

Kunimi Junior High School--Oct. 23

Today was the big day--visiting middle schoolers! This school is actually 7th through 9th grade, but the feel is the same is Warner in a lot of ways. We started out the day with a school assembly to introduce us and for the kids to show off their talents. Schools in Japan have lots of afterschool clubs, so we got to see three of them perform. The first was the Kendo club, which is a form of martial arts. One of the girls who demonstrated is the national champion for her age group. It was really impressive.

Next was...the soccer team! Kunimi Middle and High Schools are both national champions in soccer, kids come from all over to attend here just to play soccer. My kind of school! After the soccer demo, the drum club, on kunimi drums played for us. It was fantastic; the drums are large and loud and really moving.

After that, we observed classes, and I got to do calligraphy again; I also got to teach the English class a new word. I was just standing in the back observing, and the teacher went to use a thumbtack, but she didn't know the English word, so I told her and wrote it on the board. Always a teacher, I guess!

I ate lunch with a 7th grade class, and talked to a couple of boys. By talked, I mean we tried to find a few things that we could each say to each other. They were both really nice boys, though. I felt bad that I couldn't really eat anything; every bite of food causes pretty severe stomach cramps. I think a burger would help!

Once again, we watched the students clean the school, then later, after we talked to the teachers for a while, we watched the club activities after school. I was feeling pretty lousy by this time, but I went and watched the English class practice a play they were going to perform, called "Peach Boy". I think this is a Japanese folk tale.

Hospital-ity--Written Oct. 23

So today I got more than your normal experience in Japan. I finally had to go to the hospital and figure out what was wrong with me. As soon as we got back from the junior high, Harumi (our guide and interpreter) and I set off for the ER. She had called ahead and explained the situation, so they were ready for a non-Japanese speaking patient. The nurse first commented on my height, then asked Harumi a bunch of questions and Harumi asked me. Some of them were fairly personal and embarrassing (Ronnie, think of your favorite Scrubs song) , then she played a game of which pokes hurt worst. It turned out the pokes in my lower right side abdomen won the contest, so they all thought it might be my appendix! Yikes! Major surgery in a foreign country!
They did a CT scan, which involved a lot of pantomime on everyone’s part, and it turned out that they were wrong. Whew!! They said that my intestines were not working well, due to stress.
Really?
What stress have I been under lately??
And they gave me a powder to "balance out my intestines." I’m sure something was lost in the translation there. They told me to try to eat something with the powder, so I came back to the hotel and got a tiny carton of Hagen Daz out of the vending machine for dinner. I only ate about a third of it, but I downed the powder with a glass of water, then finally got to try the baths! But that’s another story…
I think I might just live through this experience, after all!

On Wednesday, we visited Aino Elementary School in Unzen. We got there early and watched the students arrive at school. There were no busses and no parents dropped their kids off. The students all walk to school for the surrounding area or take the city bus. Most of the kids played on the playground before school began.

In many places in Japan, instead of the students moving from one room to another, the students stay put and the teachers move. The students even eat lunch in their rooms, and the lunches are prepared for them; they do not go to a cafeteria or bring a lunch from home. Everyone eats the same lunch.

We visited classes for a while, and we watched the 5th graders harvest rice that they had planted earlier this school year, then we were each assigned a classroom to eat lunch with. I had lunch with a second grade class. They were very cute and very kind to me, they made me some beautiful origami pictures. After that, we watched as the kids cleaned the school...you heard me right! Then, at the end of the day, there was an assembly where the kids showed off some of their skills in dance and drumming.

All in all, it was an adorable day. Unfortunately, I was feeling pretty sick still. You can see that I had a mask on in some of the pictures, because I wasn't sure what was wrong with me, and that's what people do here to make sure they don't sread illness.

After school, I went back to the hotel and slept most of the afternoon and all of the night. No hot springs for me again today!

Wakarimasen!

Photos: Shibuya photos, shibuya video, kyoto bike photo
Of course I knew that Japan was one of the most densely populated places in the world, but until I experienced it a few times, that didn’t really sink in. We went to the Shibuya district of Tokyo because we read that it was the busiest intersection in Tokyo, but the sheer mass of humanity was incredible! Everywhere we looked, there were people. You couldn’t walk down the sidewalk without being jostled and dodging people. And yet, never did I feel threatened or unsafe.
In Kyoto, in the Gion district, where the Geisha live and work, I saw the same thing. People everywhere, bikes everywhere, cars everywhere, driving down these narrow streets barely wide enough to not scrape the mirrors on the walls of the buildings. Although I was told that most people here speak at least some English, my favorite phrase has become : Sumimasen, Ego ga hanishimas ka? (Excuse me, do you speak English?) usually met by a smile and a shake of the head. Thank goodness I took the time to learn a few phrases!

The last week update

Ok, so it's been a tough but fun and educational week! Since I last wrote, I got on a bus from Nagasaki City and rode to Unzen, a tiny city in the mountains of Nagasaki prefecture (which is like a state). We stayed at a spa hotel there, complete with a hot spring for baths. Unfortunately, on Monday, the first day there, I got quite sick. I missed a tour of the area and a few meetings on Tuesday, then felt kind of better on Wednesday, so I was able to go to the elementary school that we visited. I will pick up from there with more that I wrote, but couldn't post. Here are some pictures from Unzen.

Breakfast of Champions

Our day in Kyoto started with a search for breakfast. Max (my son) told me to be sure to check out the pastry shops. We found a shop by the JR (train) station. It was full of beautiful pastries! Everything from jellyrolls to croissants to savory (meat and cheese) rolls was available.
I chose a roll with some kind of meat, something that looked like cheese but wasn’t, something else that looked like cheese but I think was mayonnaise, and nori (seaweed) strips. No breakfast of mine is complete without coffee, so we found a vending machine that serves hot coffee in a can. Because it is rude to walk around and eat here, we went to wait by our train and eat. It was delicious!
We took the JR to the Golden Pavilion, a very famous temple that is covered in gold! The area is filled with shrines and amazing gardens. Because it was Saturday, the crowds were pretty fierce, but we managed to see a lot, buy a lot, and eat a lot.
From there, we caught a bus to Ryojani (???) shrine, where there is a Zen rock garden (something I have always wanted to see) and the coolest thing here was that a Buddhist monk walked by on his way to some kind of service. I took a short video of this, which is on my MIA hard drive. By the time we were done touring this, we were getting pretty tired and hungry, so we wandered off to find some lunch. That was an amazing experience! See my entry: Mama always said life is like a bento box for this story.

Too Many Bags!

So on Friday, I packed a small bag to go to Kyoto for the night, left a medium bag in my room for the night, and packed a big bag to stay in Tokyo for the week. Then on Saturday night, I unpacked the small bag and repacked it for Nagasaki, put more stuff in the big bag to stay in Tokyo, and packed the meduim bag to put on a truck to meet me in Unzen in a few days. Still following me? I have packed and unpacked way too many bags over the last three days. So that's why...all of my pictures seem to be on their way to Unzen, where there is no internet access for a week. At least that's where I hope I put my external hard drive!
I'm really sorry, tired, and confused. I will post more pictures next week, when I get back to somewhere with access. Unless somehow there is an internet cafe somewhere where I can send a few.
I'll write as soon as I can!

Nagasaki Peace Museum

Today I am in Nagasaki City, Nagasaki. As I'm sure you know, Nagasaki was the second city to be hit by an atom bomb, three days after Hiroshima. In this city of 240,000 people, about 74,000 were killed and 75,000 more injured. We went to the memorial and museum this afternoon when we arrived here. I have been to World War Two museums and memorials in the US lots of times, and many of my uncles served in the war. So it was interesting to hear from the other side of the conflict. This city's entire identity is wrapped up in the tragedy that happened here 53 years ago. Everyone who lived here at the time was either killed, injured, or lost someone they loved. The memorial was a sad reminder of what war does to the world. As a survivor of Hiroshima said to us a few days ago, it is all of humanity's crime, not just one nation.

These pictures are from the memorial.

The tall red brick one is part of a Catholic church that was destroyed by the blast.

This was one of the only pieces remaining standing.

The large statue is at the center of the memorial.

The Japanese sometimes believe that if you fold a thousand oragami cranes (birds), your wish will come true. The colorful strands in one picture are strings of cranes made by people wishing for peace. One teacher in my group brought a thousand cranes that students at her school made and left them at the memorial.

The picture of the tall black monolith is a memorial built at ground zero. That is the spot the bomb directly exploded over. In the background you can see cement rings radiating out; those show how the heat and radiation spread out over the city.

In another, the cement lines in the grass are the actual foundation of a prison that was entirely vaporized because it was right at ground zero.

The sculpture is one of many memorials dedicated by countries around the world.

Plastic Food

We arrived in Kyoto by the Shinkansen, or bullet train, at about 10:00 Friday night. We found our hotel, due to my mad Japanese skills, and checked in. Then we went to find food. There was a small restaurant across the street that had, like most restaurants, plastic food in the window.

Did I mention this yet? Most restaurants have a large window out front with very realistic looking plastic models of their dishes, which is handy for those of us who don't read or speak the language. So we went in, and it was a vending machine place. We chose our meals, but couldn't figure out how to make the machine go; this was when we began to discover that Kyoto was not as bilingual as Tokyo. We stood around until a guy walked in, and we intently watched what he did, then copied it.

We ended up with delicious food, so far everything I have eaten has been great, and we decided that this is an idea that we need to export to the US. Plastic food and vending machine restaurants are the future!

After we ate, we wandered around a little and went into an am/pm, which is a lot like a 7/11 here. After buying munchies and drinks for the big walk tomorrow, we went back to the hotel for some much-needed rest.

Mama Always Said Life is Like a Bento Box

You never know what you get 'til you look inside!

Yesterday was Kyoto, the former capitol of Japan. The city is full of ancient shrines and temples. It is also where the geisha district is, and that was my proirity for the day. I ended up going to Kyoto with four other people, some of them pretty close friends by now, others who I barely knew before yesterday. We started out in the morning with a planned route to see as much as possible, but some of us decided to linger a little longer in a few places, so the group broke up. Those of us who decided to linger ended up having the most amazing experience I have had so far.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but I got a little lost in Kyoto. I know, hard to believe, but true. We wandered down a little street looking for a bus to take us to the next shrine, and we happened upon a little resturant. Since it was lunch time, and there were pictures of sushi in the window, we stopped to look.

The owner of the resturant, a tiny, old woman, came out and welcomed us. We tried to communicate, and I was able to tell her that we were American, and to comment on the weather (E otenke desu ne? or something like that) and to order us some sushi. Luckily, my language skills make up for my lack of direction skills!

We sat down in this tiny resturant, only 4 tables, and the lady brought out some origami dolls she had made and gave us each one. Then she showed us a newspaper samuri had she had made. She sat down by us and brought out her origami and kirigami supplies and started folding and cutting paper. She madea grasshopper, and dress and some other things and gave them to us. Then she showed us how to make the samuri hat (guess what we will do when I get back, students??) All of this with no language! The lunch was amazing, fresh sushi! But the experience was more than I can tell you! What a sweet, simple, lady she was, and so kind to us!