Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1
Vietnam
Chapter 2
New Home
in Kofu
Chapter 3
Hong Kong
China,
&
Korea
Chapter 4
Yamanashi
Chapter 5
Society
Chapter 6
Hospital
Chapter 7
Nikko
Chapter 8
Holiday
Greetings
Chapter 9
Culture
Chapter 10
Holiday
Trip:
Kansai
&
Kyushu
Chapter 11
Mores
Chapter 12
Hankos
& Brush-
writing
Chapter13
Friends
Chapter 14
Festivities
Chapter 15
Okinawa
&
Nagasaki
Chapter 16
Hong Kong
&
Australia
Chapter 17
Special
People
&
Events
Chapter 18
Coming
to
Japan
Chapter 19
Letter to
Editor
Chapter 20
Teaching
English
Chapter 21 Hamamatsu
Chapter 22
Women's
Relation-
ships
Chapter 23
Reflections
on
Education
Chapter 24
Nephews'
Visit
Chapter 25
Thailand,
Korea
&
Home
Chapter 26
Taking
Stock
Chapter 24
Our Nephews' Visit
July 8, 1996
Dear Sally and Jack,
Your sons are going to write you a letter under pressure from their aunt. (I am being mean to them already.) They are doing fine and are beginning to get caught up on their sleep. We were especially glad to see them after their ordeal with the flight. Having to stay overnight alone in Minnesota because their original flight was cancelled was traumatic for all of us, I think. When they arrived at Narita airport, they both looked like zombies, but said that they were never that worried or scared, and they were well taken care of by the airline personnel.
Since then they have slept a lot both at night and on trains, so that does not seem to be a problem. We wish we would have been able to wait an extra day before taking them to Kyoto and Nara, but when we made the reservations for the train, we had no idea that they would arrive a whole day late. We felt badly that they couldn't have some more time to adjust to the time schedule before sightseeing. We think they are on Japan time now, since they slept all night last night, after going to bed about 11:00 p.m. and getting up at 8:00 or so. That is the first time they were on a normal schedule of sleeping here.
Now I will turn this over to Jonathan.
On Friday, our train was canceled because of heavy rains in Shizuoka, where we were supposed to ride the bullet train (Shinkansen) to Kyoto. Instead, we had to take a local train to Fuji, which took by itself three hours because of all the stops (47) it made on the way, and then switch on to another local train there that would take us to Shizuoka, letting us get there about an hour later than we would have arrived in Kyoto if everything had gone smoothly. Then we were forced to take the sleeper train to Kyoto and finally checked in at our hotel at 4 am instead of our planned 9:30.
While in Kyoto, we went to Nara to see a Buddhist temple (the largest wooden building in the world with an ancient Buddha) and a Shinto shrine the first day, then saw another Buddhist temple, two Shinto shrines, and a castle back in Kyoto the second day. We did get to ride the bullet train back to Shizuoka safely and took the express back to Kofu without any trouble, though, so it didn't turn out as bad as it sounds.
The only other things of interest happened earlier on Friday. We went to a singing competition at Eiwa that morning, where most of the students were too shy to talk to Ben and me, even when Aunt Marie and Uncle Tom introduced them to us. Then we walked to Mrs. Ogawa's house where we took part in a tea ceremony and then had calligraphy lessons. The calligraphy lesson was fun.
Just to let you know, Mom, we are actually stranded in the Philippines at Manila Airport. I lost my passport, wallet, travelers cheques, and (what was the other thing we weren't supposed to lose- oh yeah) my rail pass. My check-in luggage is now in the bottom of the ocean with our 747. And Dad- I wrote in a different font just to annoy you.
(and his Aunt Marie who asked him not to mess around with the format on the computer)
Marie:
One thing that Jonathan didn't tell you about is that the Japanese fellow travelers were wonderful to us with all of our traveling problems on Friday. They spent a great deal of effort and concern, and inconvenience, to help us get to where we needed to go. A group of businessmen took us under their wings, secured our tickets for us and called our hotel in Kyoto to tell them we would be very late!. It seemed like a bit of a nightmare at the time, but hope it will end up being an adventure for the boys to talk about later on, especially the part about sleeping on the upper berths in the sleeping car. Both of them handled the situation very well, slept through most of it, and didn't seem even a little bit concerned. However, we must have changed our plans a half dozen times or more, so they were confused a lot, as we were also!
Ben was quite excited about riding the Shinkansen and hopefully got some good pictures of it. He also has been eager to try everything Japanese that he can: food, (sometimes yucky); lighting incense at temples and shrines, as well as washing his hands in a cleansing ceremony before approaching the temples; drinking internationally known special water at one of the most famous temples in Japan (Kyomizu); writing calligraphy with his right hand (because it is the way it is done in Japan), etc. So far he has learned to write Ben in kanji, Benjamin in katakana, and fire in kanji (not my idea). And he is not shy about asking for the price of things or trying to communicate even though the person may not speak any English. He really pleased the Ogawas when he asked for seconds on the ceremonial green tea, and he quickly learned to say "arigato gozaimasu" (thank you very much) with a nice Japanese bow in stores and for friends.
Early on Ben asked us if he could taste sashimi (raw fish) and sushi, so we bought both of them for him. He tried all of it but wasn't crazy about the experience. He has had more than his share of rice balls. He can't stand seaweed, and neither can we. He actually likes the dried octopus (which we don't like) and has had plenty of different kinds of Japanese sweets with mixed reviews.
Jonathan has not been so adventurous with any of the cultural or food experiences, but does like yaki soba (one of our favorite dishes, which our friends tell us is really Chinese and not Japanese -- you've had it at our place a couple of times.) They both like donburi, something else you have had at our place. While food continues to be an adventure, since the boys came we are eating at the local McDonald's more than we did the rest of the year.
The boys got so much attention on Friday that they were overwhelmed. Jonathan told me that his head was tired and he was numb, even though his body wasn't tired. I am certain they never had that kind of intense attention before, (and sometimes it is even difficult for us to handle the bending over backwards that people do to try to show us a good time).
Many Eiwa students wanted to meet them, and wanted to find out all about them. The students were caught between their intense curiosity about Jonathan and Ben and their shyness at meeting two American teenaged boys. That and their uncertainty about using their English may have accounted for some of the questions. One student asked them if they liked Japanese girls and Ben nicely responded, "That's a personal question."
Mrs. Ogawa, her mother-in-law, two friends, a woman student, and three Eiwa students welcomed Jonathan and Ben with a tea ceremony. There were the ceremonies of greetings, introductions and gift giving followed by the whole ritual of the tea-making, serving and drinking. Even though everyone was looking at the boys throughout the ceremony to see how they were reacting, they both did very well and were appropriately gracious. The tea ceremony was held in the formal tatami room of Mrs. Ogawa's mother-in-law's house instead of in the studio.The boys couldn't appreciate the significance of that since it was their first time for everything. I had only been there once before, and that was for a brief moment.
Mrs. Ogawa's father-in-law was a quite famous local calligrapher who traveled to Europe, China, and the U.S. as a representative of Japanese calligraphers, as well as teaching at Eiwa. (Often we learn about these things indirectly because our friends are too modest to tell us. We found out about the late Mr. Ogawa's fame, when we went to a Kabuki museum a couple of weeks ago and saw his works displayed. Then Mr. Nakayama filled us in. We are always humbled when something like that happens, and those people have treated us as if we are special!)
We think the boys will appreciate their experiences here even more in the years to come. They can't possibly process all of it now, or understand the richness of the culture, but may be taking in more than we realize. Ben asks a lot of questions about human elements and is very interested and sensitive to people's feelings and what is appropriate. (This morning we were on a walk and he asked me about a deaf woman who was very friendly to us. I explained how we had learned to communicate with her and help her overcome her fear of us. He genuinely seemed interested and was taking it in.) Jonathan is excellent at using simple English in communication with people who are trying to learn English, and is concerned about not hurting people's feelings when dealing with them directly.
Today they are going to help me teach English to children at the YMCA and tomorrow they will go to Eiwa to visit Tom's classes to be interviewed by the students. This week we are hoping to take them to aikido practice. The sumo tournament started and will be on television every day for two weeks. They will have another calligraphy lesson, we hope to take them to Mt. Fuji and to Matsumoto castle, as well as showing them things around Kofu. So we will be very busy.
But don't worry. They are getting plenty of sleep and they are not starving, although they certainly are not eating like they eat at home.
Several days later --
The boys and Tom went to an aikido class with Mr. Kawabe. Later, Mr. Kawabe volunteered to let the boys come to his kendo class at school and to teach them a little bit about kendo. When they were done with the kendo instruction, everyone knelt on the floor and volunteered to talk about their kendo experience. Mr. Kawabe explained to Ben and Jonathan that kendo and aikido are based on a mind and spirit connection. When taking part in these martial arts, the mind is to be free so that intuitive behavior can take over. One is not to think, but to enter into an attitude of non-thinking, and in that regard it is meditative. I don't know if Ben and Jonathan understood the import of Mr. Kawabe's message, but I think they gained a sense of his deep and gentle spirit.
Kendo is a form of fencing which combines physical activity with meditation. It is very popular with all ages and both sexes in Japan. Mr. Kawabe explained to the boys that the ancient movements of kendo form the basis for the movements in aikido. "aikido" means "the way of the power of compassion" (ai = love/compassion; ki = energy/power; do = way of). There are no offensive moves in aikido. It's based on a philosophy of avoiding conflict and, only if necessary, subduing your opponent. Students are trained to use one's opponent's energy against him and are taught how to bring him under control with a variety of painful grips and holds. The contrast to the western philosophy of confrontation and strength versus strength is striking. Schools of aikido and karate are known to dismiss students who have initiated fights outside of the classroom.
Mr. Nakayama took all of us to Mr. Fuji and he and Tom took the boys to Shosenkyo to fish. Ben and Jonathan learned a good lesson in Japanese friendship before they went fishing. Mr. Nakayama did not have a fishing pole and, rather than return home, he went to the nearby home of a friend who unhesitatingly lent him an expensive telescoping rod for he and the boys to use.
Hisae and her family closed the shop for a whole day to take all of us to Matsumoto castle. Hisae's aunt, a nurse, also took off a day of work to drive the second car, as we could not all fit in the Marumo's van. It was the second time the Marumos had closed their shop for the day to take us on a trip.
Earlier, they spent an entire day showing us all sorts of wonderful sights, including Kiyosato, where there is an experimental farm. It was developed by Dr. Paul Rush, the man who introduced American football to Japan and worked extensively in developing the YMCA in Japan.. He was originally from Ohio but spent many years in Japan. His life is a testimony to positive US-Japanese relations. Kiyosato is a popular tourist spot for the Japanese because the farm atmosphere is unique and they can see cows and eat home-made ice cream. However, our favorite site on that trip was a new Shinto shrine and we enjoyed the countryside views in outer areas of Yamanashi and Nagano prefectures.
When Jonathan and Ben are not otherwise occupied, Hisae and Kaoru are spending lots of time with them. They want to do anything they can for them and teach everything they can about Japan. One of the boys' most enjoyable experiences was learning to fold paper cranes. People are impressed that Ben had learned the story of "1,000 paper cranes," prior to coming to Japan. The story's connection to Hiroshima makes it important in the recent history of Japan.
We know that in the days ahead there will be more adventures for the boys. We are happy that we can give them some Japanese experiences. We hope they will have memories to last a lifetime and that Japan will hold a special place in their hearts.
Love,
Marie
