War Memorial

It was 3 weeks ago that these pictures were taken, but they are important to finish off the Okinawa story. For mor info check the previous post, Tokashiki.


I was the only one that want a picture taken at the memorial. I agreed that maybe a smiling shoot of me wasn't appropriate so I had Cheryl take a picture of me looking at the memorial. Have to say not my best side, I saw it and wondered who that fat old man was.

Sunday

We were at the Okinawa Gospel Family Church on Sunday for my birthday, Kenji is again taking pictures.

Akiko sensei asked us to sing a special so Alina and I sang Chris Tomlin's new arrangement of Amazing Grace, My Chains are Gone. For our first attempt at singing together we did pretty good, and the old ladies in the church were asking when we were going to make a CD. Who knows, right. I mean we do have the album art.

And of course at the end of the service they called me up front and Pastor Kinjo prayed for me, they usually pray for all the people that have birthdays that month and being that mine was that day they made sure they did it for me. Actuall part of why i posted this picture is so you can see the new shirt that I bought at Mango House on Kokusai Dori. I had boghten a shirt there last year and went back to see if they had anything interesting. The in the shop recognized me and I ended up buying this shirt with an eisa drummer on the front and the back. I really like it even though I probably paid too much, but what the hey it was my birthday present to myself.

After the service they had a simple meal and at the end they had a birthday pie for me, bananna cream. This was definately a first for me.

They had asked earlier how old I was I am assuming for the candles, but obviously they didn't have enough or there just wasn't enough room on the pie. It was very good.

So I think that about wraps up all my adventures in Okinawa. I can't wait to go back again, I think that it would be a good long weekend escape.

首里城

These are four rather random pictures that don't really tie together, But I'll try to get a story out of them.

Above are the Okinawan court dancers.
Below is the throne room of the castle. Again very unlike Japanese architect.

There is an Anglican Church right outside the gates of the castle, and in the court yard hung this bell. The interesting thing about it is that it is very much like a bell that you would hanging outside a Japanese shirne, with the only exception that it has a cross on it. You can't see it clearly in the picture but the clasps at the top are dragons, I'm surprised to see them showing up there. Often times the dragon is seen by some Christians as evil or the devil.

Down the street from the castle is a cloth dying store that specializes in "Bingata", a typical Okinawan style print. It is very beautiful but also very expensive. This is the same place that I made my shirt with the choral print last year.

Finally a picture from Alina of the brushes they use in dying the fabric. They use stencils to make the pattern that are rotated over and over on the long piece of cloth. The detail is amazing and very intricate I can only image the amt of time goes into dying one of these pieces. As we were going down stairs I overheard a lady asking the price of one of their kimonos which only had the intricate design on the bottom of the kimono. It was just a little over ¥600,000. I'll let you do the math the yen is at ¥120 to the dollar right now.

Shuri Jo 2

As we stepped into the entrance they were having a live performance of some traditional Okinawan Court music. It was very interesting, we only saw the last performance though. That was ok though because we were sort of pressed for time.

This is the main hall of the Castle. Very different from anything Japanese much more Chinese in style.

Lots of vibrant colors and motifs.

One of the Shi Sa that guards the entrance. I had seen a shirt that had this on it that I almost bought but I wasn't quite sure what some people would think about it.

It was not as vibrant red as I remember, maybe because it was raining and overcast, but still very beautiful. They have been doing work making restorations and improvements. There was a section behind this main building where they had restored the living quarters. This part although did look very Japanese.

Shuri Castle

On Sunday after church we headed out to Shuri Castle. I have been there three times now. It is a nice attraction and a world heritage site.

Shin, Alina, and Randee at one of the entrance gates.

Did someone say, "Let's Vogue"?

Looking down on the outer wall.

Okinawa

Well all things do come to an end and on Sat. after a really hurried shopping excursion along Kokusai dori, we were back to the airport to send the Barton's and Abby off. As we came into the airport Bernie this manequin and said look there's Mike, so I made them take my picture. Artisic camera work by Alina.


The other thing that we had to do was try to change Alina's flight to Monday so she could enjoy some more time on the island, and spend the day with me on my birthday. The picture below was actually taken on the 2nd day on the way to the place that we stayed, but just imagine how happy we were that she could stay 2 more days. She ended up staying the longest of all of us.

More fun on the Beach

Back to the beach, well at least back to talking about the beach. Here we are with the tennis guys again. Kenji again took this picture.

Part of the activites available at the beach was riding on these big boats with glass bottoms down the middle so you could row out and see the choral. It was kind of fun, and I was assigned the job of steering.

Unfortunately the boat that we rode was not this nice one but just a plain white one. This boat is another place where Okinawa shares similarities with Taiwan, and given that is is closer to Taiwan than Japan it is not hard to see why.

Tokashiki

I knew nothing about the island that I would be visiting in Okinawa before I left. It is one of the islands in the Keruma island chain about 45 minutes away from the main island of Okinawa. The retreat center that we stayed at was previously a US missle base up until 1972 when Okinawa was returned to Japan. But the most interesting thing or maybe I should say shocking thing I learned about the island is written about below.

The following excerpt is taken from;

In Kerama Retto, "Island Chain between Happiness and Good," the Japanese tradition of self-destruction emerged horribly in the last acts of soldiers and civilians trapped in the hills. Camping for the night of 28 March a mile from the north tip of Tokashiki, troops of the 306th heard explosions and screams of pain in the distance. In the morning they found a small valley littered with more than 150 dead and dying Japanese, most of them civilians. Fathers had systematically throttled each member of their families and then disemboweled themselves with knives or hand grenades. Under one blanket lay a father, two small children, a grandfather, and a grandmother, all strangled by cloth ropes. Soldiers and medics did what they could. The natives, who had been told that the invading "barbarians" would kill and rape, watched with amazement as the Americans provided food and medical care; an old man who had killed his daughter wept in bitter remorse.

The last day that we were on the island we were to gather at the spot of these mass suicides that happened on the island. The correct figure of the deaths on this island by mass suicide is really 317. Because of the rain our whole group didn't go to the site but Pastor Kinjo did give us a lecture on what happened on this island and two others in the chain. If you have seen the movie "Letters from Iwojima" this is what the military did to themselves at the end of the movie, blew themselves up with hand grenades. The difference here was that the mass suicides were orchestrated by the secret army, and inflicted on themselves and civilians. Some of the information that we got was from a survivor of the incident. Another Pastor Kinjo who was 16 at the time, had to assist in the death of his mother and sister who were injured in the blasts but not killed. The people were so afraid that the American army would come raping and killing all that were on the island, that they choose suicide. Most of their actions were prompted by rumors that others had done the same thing on other islands.

This is rather a gloomy post but to stand at the place were this happened was even more chilling. It is no wonder the people in Okinawa are some of the most adamant in calling for peace.

Day at the Beach

On Friday we went to the beach and this is what awaited us. The sand on the beach was the nicest I have ever seen and the color of the ocean was just beautiful.

Believe it or not this picture was taken by Kenji, it actually turned out better than the one that I took of the group. My picture didn't have as much of the ocean and was more centered on the people.

We met this group the first evening at the place we were staying. I had to announce our group and I told everyone that Rachelle was looking for a boyfriend, when their group introduced themselves they said the guy in the pink trunks was also looking for a girlfriend, they waved at each other and Rachelle was too embarrassed. We met them at the beach and of course had to have a group pic. I would have liked to hung out with them they seemed like a lot of fun.

The Many Faces of Kenji

Kenji, quickly became our friend, and for that fact anybody's friend. He was so funny, so full of life, abounding in energy, and many different interesting faces. Don't have a picture of his most interesting face one that can only be described as his Tyrannosaurus Rex face. Like I said it seemed that he migrated to us foreigners, for who know what reason, but he will talk to anyone, and anyone who he talks to is immediately captivated with his charisma.
Now remember he is five! And at the same time he is talking to us foreigners and half of the time we are speaking in English and he seemed to not be bothered but just jump into the conversation. Half the time I think he knew what we were talking about. Sometimes he pretended to speak in English, but other times he would ask how to say something in English, or we would teach him little phrases that he would use and then be overjoyed when he used it and people understood him. It was very interesting. I wish I had students as motivated as him.

Okinawa Day One

On the spur of the moment last Wed. I decided to join my friends and go to Okinawa. Well actually I realized on Monday that my week had been freed up and I really didn't give much thought in going to Okinawa because I figured that there was no way I would be able to get a flight there and back at the last minute. I had checked earlier and it looked very unlikely. Well when I got to work on Wed. I thought I would just check, and low and behold there were seats available, so I snapped them up made a few calls and the wheels were set in motion.

I made a quick run by my house to hurriedly pack then I was off to the airport. As it turned out I had booked the same flight as the Bartons, Alina, Abbey, Rachelle, and the Sakata sisters.

Pastor Kinjo picked us up at the airport loaded us all in his van and off to his church to spend the night. I was excited to be able to get away for all of Golden Week, even though it meant skipping out on my drum camp that I had planned to go for one day. It is probably for the better, I wasn't really looking forward to a whole day of torture.

I was the only one that had grabbed a sandwich at the airport and wasn't completely starved, but when we got to the church, Mrs. Asato had a meal ready for us. She is a great cook and this is one of her ministries, cooking for church occasions. She took care of us while we stayed at the church. The food was really good with a very Okinawa family home cooking feel.

The next morning we waited around the church for the other members to gather and then we headed off to the port to catch a 1:00 ferry to Tokashiki island. Alina spent most of the morning taking crazy pictures with my camera. Below is one of her "portraits", if you don't know already it is Abbey and Alina.

Golden Week

Well I'm 49. Last night I had a nice birthday dinner at the "Cowboy Steak House" in Okinawa. the trip was a last minute decision, but one that I'm glad I made, and probably very lucky that I actually got tickets. We had cheese burgers, and they were fantastic. I got home last night about midnight, I have the pictures uploaded to my computer but I will take some time the next few days posting my adventures in Okinawa.