Wade Family in Japan - Summer 2017

This morning we traveled across town to Suizenji Park, a Japanese-style garden built near a shrine by an important samurai family during the Edo Period. The park is really beautiful, complete with koi-filled pond and bridges and a shrine and a tea house and carefully trimmed trees and even a grassy mound that is supposed to resemble Mt. Fuji, all nestled within the city. Near the entrance they were having a water treasure hunt where dozens of preschool kids searched the pond for balls with numbers on them that could be exchanged for prizes. It was funny to see all the kid splashing around in the formal garden pond. After watching the treasure hunt, the girls posed at the shrine's torii gates, and Lila and Isa especially loved feeding the koi, turtles, and aggressive pigeons. After Suizenji, the girls wanted a simple lunch so we got them Chinese take-out and Ang and I want to a shabu-shabu place for lunch and ate too much while taking embarrassing pictures of...

We took a train to Kumamoto at midday - the Shinkansen makes it so much faster to travel around Kyushu than it was when I was here before. Ang got a pick with her new boyfriends... a boy band that has done a lot PR for trains around this part of Japan that i recovering from a major earthquake last year. We got lunch before boarding a trolley for the trip through downtown to our apartment. The apartment is a really interesting place. I think it used to be an office in a building that has apartments on the upper floors and businesses on the bottom. They have done a really nice job making a cool living space that is plenty big enough for all of us. It's clearly our favorite Airbnb so far on this trip. The kids especially love the "yoga hammock." Walking around the shotengai - shopping streets - has brought back a million memories both of my missionary and student time in Kumamoto, and we took a bus to Kumamoto University, where the memories really hit me like a ton...

After a slow morning in the apartment, Isa decided to have her 1-on-2 date with the parents and we headed south about an hour to Omuta, the first area from my mission. Predictably, it was crazy hot and humid, but we had a nice lunch at a small restaurant near the station and then walked to the church which is on the second floor of a commercial building near the station. No one was there, but lots of memories flooded back from my first days and weeks in Japan in 1988. I remember feeling out of my comfort zone as everything was so new, but also feeling safe because of the kindness of those around me. We then walked to my old apartment which is still there and still looks just as shabby as it did almost 30 years ago... not worse, just the same. We stopped at a 7-11 for ice cream and drinks and then headed back to the station and home to Fukuoka. This evening we went back to Canal City. Ang, Amy, and I got street vendor Hakata Ramen which was good, but a little anticlimactic, and then...

I met Miho Shimada about 27 years ago and we became great friends. She has an excitement for life and it was always fun to be around her back then. She even visited my family in Utah a few years later and we had great fun catching up. Sadly, though, we lost contact until about a month ago, but we were able to reconnect and she took a day off to hang out with us and show us some Fukuoka sights today. We met her at Onojo train station, piled in her small car, and were off, first stopping at a huge shopping mall for snacks, and then driving to the far side of Shikanoshima (an island off the coast of Fukuoka connected by a bridge and peninsula) to a beautiful and fairly secluded beach. We swam in the waves and got blown around by the wind, but mostly it was nice to be together and introduce my family to Miho. She remains as kind and optimistic as ever, and I really hope we stay in closer contact from now on. There weren't any showers open when we finished swimming, so we did...

We slept in this morning and then Isa, Lila and I headed across town and up into the hills to Mo Mo Land. This is a working farm where city-folk can come experience farm life. (Mo in Japanese = Moo in English.) It was muggy which meant that we almost had the place to ourselves, but it was still fun to walk around and see the animals. The girls got to milk the cow and feed the sheep and we took sweaty selfies together. After we got back to the others, we headed out to Mojiko, the northern-most point of Kyushu, across a very narrow straight from the main island of Honshu and a spot I remember well from my mission. (Honshu is to the left of the bridge and behind it and we are standing on the edge of Kyushu.) We got there a bit late in the day and things were shutting down for the evening, but we ate Yaki-curry (baked curry rice with cheese, noodles, and crepes) and looked at the pretty harbor. We were pretty tired when we got back, and the day was not exactly...

Definite down day today. We're tired and enjoyed the AC in the apartment for much of the day with a few excursions out for groceries and such. This evening we walked to Canal City, a huge shopping mall nearby. We got there in time for a fountain show -- kinda cool if you like fountain shows, and then did some window shopping.  Fukuoka is a pretty vibrant city, and is definitely influenced more by the proximity of China and Korea. Lots of visitors come from Asia, and relatively fewer from the West make it this far from Tokyo. The girls got crepes and headed home while Ang and I ate dinner at a Korean place and splurged on a movie - Pirates of the Caribbean - which I slept through on the graduation overnight. We'll see how we feel tomorrow and decide what's next.  Only 10 days to go. 旅の時間がドンドン早くなって来るだろう。

I forced the kids out of bed early so we could head south again to Kyushu and attend the Kurume Ward where I was a missionary and have some great memories. The people there were very welcoming and arranged translators for the kids who, again, wanted to leave early but were happy, after the fact, that they stayed to make new friends. Most of the people I knew well have moved away, but I was able to talk with a few I remember well who are in this classic pic of me from 1989 -  my hair and I, in all our glory, are in the front row on the right. After church we returned to Hakata (a short ride on the Shinkansen which didn't go this far south when I lived there - 15 minutes now, about an hour back then - and checked into our next apartment, which is in a shabby building but is pretty nice inside. The Niiharas invited us to dinner back in Tosu - between Hakata and Kurume - so we met them at the station and they took us to their home out in the countryside and fed us way ...

Hot and muggy again today on Miyajima, so we beat the heat by seeing the shrine early,  then playing in the cool stream that runs through Momijidani Park,  then wading out to the torii gate at low tide,  then swimming in the ocean on the other side of the island. We all wish we had enough money to spend more time here. Some highlights were finding a starfish, playing with hermit crabs, and coming around a bend to witness a reenactment of Basho's most famous haiku. We all love Miyajima! 古池や、蛙飛び込む、水の音   🐸

It's been hard to keep up with writing the last few days as we've traveled a bit more frequently. Today, we left fairly early and made it to Otsu station with about 3 minutes before our first train. Then, our big yogurt drink fell off a bag and splattered all over my computer bag. It was momentary chaos as we tried to clean up and get everyone on a crowded train. We made it and took the Shinkansen south to Fukuyama, then a smaller train along the cost of the inland sea to Mihara, then an even smaller train to Tadanoumi station where we caught a short ferry to..... BUNNY ISLAND!  The island is actually called Okunoshima, and is most famous for being the place where Japan's chemical weapons were developed in WWII.  The reason the wade girls and I wanted to visit the island, though, is that there are hundreds of fluffy bunnies that roam it's shores in search of visitors with vegetables. We had our bags so we kept it simple and fed the few dozen little guys who w...

We travel south tomorrow and should have quite a long day of adventures, so we took it easy today. After sleeping In, Amy stayed behind with Isa and Lila while Meg came into Kyoto with mom and dad.  I had never been to Kamigamo Shrine, so we took a bus across town to it and it was a really nice counterpoint to the more famous - and therefore busy - shrines and temples in Kyoto. There were very few others at Kamigamo, and we strolled the beautiful grounds up against the northern hills of the city. This shrine has a main hall but my favorite parts were the many smaller sub-shrines all over the grounds. There is also a stream that runs through the shrine and today there was a kindergarten group there splashing in the water and looking for bugs to catch.  There is something remarkable about the deep red paint of Shinto gates and temples contrasted against the even deeper greens of the surrounding hills covered in ancient trees. It just feels like Japan to me.  ...

This morning we finally went into Kyoto itself and arrived in time to be one of the first groups up to the monkey park in Arashiyama where 120 or so "wild" monkeys live on the mountain but come down for food and photo opps each day. It is pretty cool to see them up close and watch them run around and carry babies and wrestle with each other. There is a hut at the top of the hike where you can go in and feed the monkeys who stick their hands through the chain link fencing in the windows. It makes me wonder who is observing whom. We got lunch in Arashiyama and then took a small train and a bus to Kinkakuji (Golden Pavilion) so the kids could see some Kyoto culture. I'm glad we haven't done a famous-temple-death-march with them, though. If they ever come back when they're a bit older, they'll know the basics but will have lots of cool stuff still to see. Ang and the older two went home for a break, and the younger two and I went back to Om...

Today we hopped a Shinkansen and headed south to Himeji Castle. It's probably the best example of a feudal castle in Japan and it towers over the city impressively. I've been 3-4 times before, but it was fun to see the kids perk up when they saw the castle, and even though it's really hot and humid right now, they climbed the many steep flights of stairs and explored the castle's nooks and crannies. Waterford's Class IV castle project made it more interesting for the girls who could compare it to the ones they studied. We took it easy after returning home - well, if you call a trip to the laundromat to do a week's worth of laundry for the six of us taking it easy. It rained really hard while we were doing the laundry and it briefly cooled things off. ６人の旅人の洗濯は大したもんだ。

Back in 1989, 3 months or so into my mission, I got to know Chikako in Kurume. I am embarrassed to admit that I don't remember all the details of those months anymore (I think partly because I couldn't speak much Japanese yet so I was lost in translation most of the time), but I helped to teach her and she was baptized. Then I transferred to another town and lost contact pretty quickly -- I really wish we had had the internet back then... it makes it a lot easier not to lose contact. Soon after we arrived in Japan with the school trip, a missionary roommate from back then posted a picture with Chikako and me and some other Kurume members and missionaries. I replied and Chikako replied, and we reconnected. She was available today as it is a national holiday (Umi no Hi - "Marine or Ocean Day") so we took a train south to Wakayama (near where she lives now) this morning and met Chikako and her husband at the train station. We ate a tasty lunch and caught up a bit ...

We followed google maps over a couple of hills to the Otsu Ward building this morning and arrived dripping with sweat. Both that feeling and the feelings I had attending the small ward really reminded me of he congregations I got to know as a missionary. Small church buildings where every space is multi-purpose and people are really kind and welcoming. I still have great memories of playing with little kids and joking with teenagers and feeling the joy that comes from serving each other. The girls weren't excited to stay for the whole time, but we convinced them and they all had fun making new friends and finding ways to communicate with each other. I stayed with Isa and Lila to interpret and we had a great lesson with 3 other Japanese kids their age and an excellent teacher. After church we had down time that lasted the rest of the evening because there was a big thunderstorm that was quite a show and, thankfully, cooled things off a bit. Oh, and we were out of food so we orde...

It rained hard at about 4:00 am and it woke me up.  I snoozed a bit more but eventually decided to get up and explore the town. It was a quiet Saturday morning as I walked down toward the lake and I passed joggers and dog walkers but hardly any cars. It was already obnoxiously hot and humid at 6:00 am. Lake Biwa is really pretty in the morning light... it's easy to see why it's the subject of lots of classical stories and poems and travelogues. I'm surprised that I hadn't ever taken the 10 minute train from Kyoto to see it before. I'm here this time only because we rented an airbnb place that happened to be in Otsu. After breakfast in the apartment, we talked about plans for the day and decided it was a great day for a swim. We took the train around the lake to a small town called Omi Maiko that has a beach that's popular for swimming. The beach has coarse but pretty sand and beautiful Japanese pine trees that come within a few meters of the water. There...

We've left Tokyo after 24 days - I've never been there for that long before. It was a good start to the trip and we made some great memories. The kids have been pretty great overall, but one drawback to starting the trip like we did is that now that we're getting to what I think is the really good stuff, they're a bit tired and homesick. What they really want is to see their dogs. It'll be really interesting to see how they rally now that we're traveling more. It will definitely be important to build in down-time and to try not to see every temple in Kyoto. We dropped bags at our apartment in Otsu, a few minutes east of Kyoto on the shores of Lake Biwa. We'll explore Otsu and Biwako tomorrow, but this afternoon we had to kill several hours before we could fully check in so we took the train to Nara to see the Daibutsu (big Buddha statue) at Todaiji. The kids really loved the tame deer that are everywhere and had fun feeding them deer biscuits and taking ...

Amy, Meg and I spent some time in the Tokyo Temple this morning - with ice cream afterwards. It was a nice, calming way to start the day, and we met several very kind temple workers who helped us, including one who is a military liaison missionary for Yokota Air Base and lived in Fussa, where I was born.  This afternoon we got rail passes for the rest of our journey - hard to believe we have just three weeks - and then headed toward the Studio Ghibli Museum, with a short stop at Kichijoji Station where Chieko met us for farewells - complete with brownies she baked. She really has been remarkably kind and hospitable to us even though we just met three weeks ago. I hope she'll visit us sometime so we can attempt to repay part of her kindness to us.  The excitement of the day came when we arrived at the museum and I was told that the paper ticket reservation I got a month ago when the school trip first arrived in Japan was invalid because I had read it wrong and failed to ...

There's a town called Kuki, about 50 minutes north of Tokyo, that has had a festival every July 12th and 18th since 1783 where each neighborhood in town pulls a float around town during the day and then they put about 500 Japanese lanterns on each float and come together at night next to the station in front of thousands of onlookers. They floats are super heavy and have wooden wheels that don't turn, so they have to be hoisted around corners by 20+ sweaty men. Others climb the outside like spidermen to keep all the candles lit  and several more play drums and flutes inside the floats. There were also some old men with each float who watched the wheels very closely to make sure none were about to collapse. We lucked out and got front row seats (on buckets we found at a the 100 yen store - not bad to have front row seats for $5.50) and we happened to choose a spot right where the floats turned as they made the loop around the station parking lot. The first float look...

This morning we headed to the Edo-Tokyo Museum which tracks the history of the city from it's days as the feudal capitol (Edo) from 1600-1870 to the modern city before and after WWII. We had a nice English speaking guide who guided us through and made it fun for the kids (but they got sick of walking). Then, we found a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant where the main floor was full, so they put us on the 3rd floor all by ourselves... yummy! The kids wanted to go home for a rest at this point, and they have been following us all over the Tokyo subway system so we let them take the train home to our apartment by themselves and Angela and I went to Tokyo Dome City, a small amusement park. We didn't do much amusment-ing, but did splurge for a ride on the "Tokyo Panic Cruise" attraction which was a 3D "ride" where you flew around Tokyo following some cartoon characters while the car bumped and spun around - I bravely managed not to puke.  We...