My students brought us this fruit as a hostess gift. There is no way to "out-give" a Japanese friend. This gift was a lovely surprise and very welcome. The tangerines here are the best I have ever eaten. The other large orange fruits are persimmons ans the box contains a Japanese melon. YUM!

Thanksgiving 2007

On Thanksgiving Day we invited my English students to the house for a traditional Southern Thanksgiving dinner. Most had never seen a turkey cooked whole...in fact, a few had never eaten turkey because it is very expensive here. They all grabbed their cell phones to take pictures as soon as they walked in. The turkey was huge. We bought a 26 lb.one because these people, to be so little, can really eat. This is a picture of my Thursday night class. (l to r) Hanayo,Seizu, Mikoko, Tomai, and Kaori.



For my Friday night class, we had 9 people show up. How did that happen when I only have 4 students? They brought friends and family which made our holiday away from our own family more special They brought friends and. These pictures are the Friday night group. (l to r) Mitsuyo, Seizu, Tetsukazu and his wife, Yoko, and Megumi.





Tomiko and Komiko are going back for seconds. I was really glad they liked the food. I warned them ahead of time we were only serving American and would be using forks and knives-no hashi (chopsticks). They thought that was funny.





Takashi and Tomomi are the newly weds. I was honored to be invited to their wedding and will post pictures of that wonderful event later. They are both very cute and sweet, and the wedding was amazing!

Girl's Festival

Every year during the first week in March, the Japanese people have a big festival to celebrate their daughters. Having wonderful daughters and the Precious Little One, I wanted to take part in all the festivities. This is me after spending at least 45 minutes getting dressed in kimono. The ladies with me were my "dressers". No way you could do this alone!


I am standing by the traditional hina doll display so important in the Festival. The top 2 dolls are the emperor and empress. Below are the servants...ladies-in-waiting, grooms, etc. and each display has a plum and peach tree. They are beautiful and can get very expensive. Components of the display are bought each year at festival time...usually by the grandparents.

onsen

Our last stop of the day was to an onsen. This one was a natural, hot spring fed bath. The water was silky and full of minerals and I felt great after a long soak. All of the ladies just jump in naked, so I followed protocol and was surprised that I was not even embarrassed. Contrary to what Hollywood would have you believe, perfect bodies are exceedingly rare! Of course, I could only take pictures OUTSIDE. LOL

The most wonderful part of the whole day was observing the magnificence that is Mt Fiji-san from the onsen. This picture does not begin to reveal the awesome view of this beautiful natural attraction.

temple

This is a temple in Ezan City. We passed it on our way to the strawberry farm so we decided to stop. This is Ayako and me in front of the temple.

Another view of the temple.

Guess people the world over want peace. I know it is MY prayer!

Great trip with Ayako

On Monday, my friend Ayako and Gel, a friend from here on base, took a trip to a strawberry farm in the Yamanashi Perfecture. This is northwest of us and in the moountains. The day was gorgeous, though windy, but the wind blew all of the junk out of of the air, so it was on of the clearest days I have seen here. This area is known as the "fruit basin " of Japan. the whole area is devoted to growing fruit...grapes, plums, cherries, peaches and of course, strawberries. the strawberries were the only fruit ready to pick this early in the year. The pictures will show that the strawberries are grown in pipes hanging from the ceiling of a hot house. The plants are placed in holes in plastic which covers the soil in the tubes. them, as the fruit forms, the berries actually hang down and never really touch the soil. For a fee yo can pick and eat all you can hold, then for another small fee you can have them packed to take home. They are the yummiest, sweetest strawberries I have ever tasted.

wedding pictures

Champagne corks flying over the Mississippi!

This is a picture of the bride and groom. Tears of joy, of course!

new entries...about time, don't you think?

It seems to be about time to add some new things to my much neglected tour thru Japan. Of course I have not been touring too much lately due to all the problems with my foot. As soon as I can get around more easily, Japan better watch out, because I plan to leave no stone unturned! lol In the meantime, I will add some pictures of things that you might find interesting. Carlos arrived in Japan on the 28th of February so has been here slightly over a year. Emily and J got married in Baton Rouge on the 15th of March so I didn't get into Japan until the last of March. The wedding was perfect...just parents who all love the newlyweds tremendously and we had an absolutely wonderful day. I have been working as a substitute in all the schools here on base (2 elementary and 1 middle and 1 high school). In the beginning, I was just subbing for the nurse at West Elementary when the regular nurse had to return to the states for some eye surgery...now, they think I can "cover all bases". lol Just finished a 3 day stint for the band teacher which was a hoot. By the end of the day today, the kids had me directing and counting time. Not a student had the nerve to turn me loose with his/her instrument, however. That was just as well. I have also been teaching some paper arts classes at the Arts and Crafts center and that is a whole lot of fun. After so many years of putting my art on hold, I am now trying to play catchup. My last endeavor to soak up this Japanese culture is through teaching English classes to several Japanese men and women. My Friday class meets at our house and the folks just love visiting American homes. We surely have a great time as the students are wonderful and they learn a little English and I learn a little Japanese. Enjoy the pictures that have been added and add comments as you wish. Hugs to everyone for now and we would love to see each of you.
Kathy
twotenstudio.com is a wonderful art link for anyone interested


This was taken on the flight line at Yokota last June. Every year, the base hosts a "friendship day" when people from all the neighboring towns can come on base, tour planes, listen to live music, and eat all kinds of foof. There are car and motorcycle shows, art work displays and thousands of people turn out. The lines just to tour the planes numbered in the hundreds.


This is a traditional Japanese garden here Yotota. These gardens can be found tucked in all kinds of nooks and crannys here. Of course all of the work is done by Japanese gardeners.

First attempt

I have always wanted to try to design a web page but this seemed much more managable. We have been out in a neighboring town eating "Screaming Sushi" and that fish must have motivated me. Anyway, here we go. The picture above was taken at a rest area on our bus trip to the Niiharu Craft Village. The trip was great, but it was very cold. After the Gulf Coast, the cold felt good.

i

Where we live...Yokota Air Base, Japan

This is a street here on base. The trees and flowers are really beautiful and the healthiest looking I have ever seen anywhere. As you can tell these old trees form a complete canopy over the street.

The shoppette is like a 7-11 plus they rent movies. When I first got here and didn't have my driver's license, this place was a life saver. It is only about a block from our apartment but I had to learn not to buy the heavy things all on one day. It is amazing how heavy a couple of bottles of water and a gallon of milk can get when you're walking.



The fire department for our area of the base is directly next to the shoppette
and across the street from our apartment. It makes us feel safe except we are on
from our apartment. It makes us feel safe except
the ninth floor. Hope we never have to jump!

This is our apartment building...
Tsumai House. We just call it 3006. We live on the top floor on the right side. Our living room balcony faces the flight line and there is really a pretty view when the weather is clear. The small balcony on the far right is smaller but when the weather is real clear (and I haven't seen that too much since we've been here) we can see the mountain range.






This was my first cast...red and black
striped. Just because it looked cool
didn't make me enjoy it.


This was #2. Maybe I thought the green
was a cool, spring color. WRONG! A hot,
humid climate is on place to have to wear a cast.
Right, Emily?

toy cars

There is very little area for parking in Japan. The streets are about 5 feet wide and those are the 2 lane streets! Most of the Japanese people drive small, energy efficient cars because they are easy to park and less expensive to drive. Of course, there are some SUVs but you hardly ever see a big truck. They are mostly used for commercial reasons. There are lots of bicycles, motorcycles, and scooters. The scooters are really fancy and quite expensive, but you see them everywhere. Carlos brought his motorcycle and is taking his driving course to get his motorcycle license today and I've been riding my bike a lot.

This is my favorite. They are in metallic pastels. Real cute!

I love this one.







There tiny "suvs" are real popular.






This is our car. Just can't do better than a Honda.