Our First Overnight Trip to Tokyo
Sydney and I drove to Tokyo with our friends (Kathleen and her daughter Sydney) to stay overnight at the military hotel, The New Sanno. It is about 1 1/2 hours from Yokosuka and we just went with the intention of scoping it out, since Brian is away for the week. It is quite a luxurious hotel and we had a lot of fun, despite the rainy weather. The pool and the good food were the highlights. But we also enjoyed walking around the neighborhood and can't wait to return for a longer--less cloudy--visit. We've already been to Tokyo Tower (like the Eiffel Tower only red and a bit taller), but we could see it clearly as we drove away from the hotel. So, stay tuned...we plan to master the Tokyo subway at some point to see "Ginza," the upscale shopping neighborhood! And many more sights!

Sydney in Japan
Back by popular demand, here are a few more photos of our girl enjoying Japan.

Unique Asian Furniture
The Yokosuka Navy Base has many bazaars at which you can find everything and anything Asian! The Navy Exchange sponsors the largest bazaar twice a year, in October and April. There are many interesting pieces of furniture in particular. In a surprising two-day sweep, we bought four pieces of furniture and have no more room in our small house for any more! But we couldn't pass up these unique finds!

Japanese Step Tansu (Tansu means "chest")
In the late 17th Century, Japanese people lived in small living spaces, usually with lofts. The main simple idea of the step tansu was to have storage as well as access to the upstairs. But the step tansu soon served another clever purpose. Since taxes were assessed on livable space, the step chests were made in 3 pieces so that they could be dismantled when needed to form a rectangular chest, concealing the stairs to the tax man. People could claim the upstairs was storage only and not livable space and therefore their taxes would be lower. Pretty ingenious! The symbol on the drawers of this tansu means "double happiness."

Antique Chinese Cabinet
This cabinet is a Chinese antique with elephant-bone ivory inlay, which is not used anymore. The Chinese calligraphy is a poem about how the cycle of life is like the four seasons. The pictures depict Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter as well.

Secretary's Desk with Hidden Bench
This desk is very simple, yet the curved lines of the desk top are definitely Asian. At first glance, this looks to be a console table. However, the lower "shelf" is separate and pulls out to make this piece a small desk and chair.

Small Bedside Table
This bedside table also has the curved lines on the table top. It has many little drawers and a couple of cabinets, but it also has two secret drawers that hide behind panels that slide out. This seemed to be a common feature of many Asian pieces of furniture we saw. I won't show you where they are and see if you can guess! And of course we had to have an Asian lamp for our new nightstand.

Kawaii! Kawaii! Cute! Cute!
Japanese people seem to love American babies, especially Sydney! It is partly her blond hair, but I think mostly her cuteness. I'm not just saying that because I'm her mother! Everywhere we go, people stop what they are saying to each other and shout out, "kawaii," (which sort of rhymes with "Hawaii", only more drawn out). This means, "cute!" She just opens her bright eyes and shines a big smile up at whoever approaches and most can't seem to resist touching her cheek and making "click" noises at her. And I can't count how many Japanese people have taken a picture of her! But what is really funny is that today they even took a candid of Brian and me. Well, the do say anyone can model in Japan!

The 30th Annual Mikoshi Parade
The Japanese believe that carrying a Mikoshi will bring good luck in the year ahead. Each neighborhood has a Mikoshi and the festival and parade serve to bring neighborhoods together. The Mikoshi is very heavy since it is made of wood and metal and at least 50 people are needed to carry each one. But by tradition, they are not weighed. Each group chants "washoy" or "saya" to keep a rhythm as they walk very slowly, bouncing up and down. The parade includes 70 Mikoshi, the last of which represents the Navy. The parade starts offbase near the Yokosuka-chuo train station and proceeds down "blue street" through the Wamble Gate, where it ends up onbase. Viewers clap as each Mikoshi goes by. A Japanese ceremony concludes the Festival.

Our Japanese Home
We live in a small 3BR house in an area of Yokosuka called Mabori Kaigan (kaigan means coast), which is on Tokyo Bay. The crowded neighborhood was created from landfill approximately 30 years ago. A sea wall was built recently to protect the area from typhoons (like hurricanes). Our house is situated a few blocks from the sea wall on a brick walking path that connects the sections of the neighborhood and its many parks.

Our house is 25 years old, but was thoroughly renovated before we moved in. New hardwood floors, new kitchen, new bathroom/tub, etc. People tell us the houses are very cold in the winter, but supposedly insulation was added to ours during the renovation, so we will see!

The houses have front gates with doorbells outside the gate and small yards. The entry or "genkan" is the area where you must remove your shoes (our lease actually required it!)

In a Japanese bathroom, there is a shower room, with a deep tub. You must wash in the shower and only soak in the tub (no soap)! The tub has a digital control where you dial in the temperature in Celcius and program how full it should fill at the touch of a button. And then you press a "circulate" button and the temperature is maintained throughout the bath. It's heavenly! The Japanese custom is that each person shares the daily bath water, which is why you enter it already clean. So the circulation feature allows you to reheat the water later if baths are taken at different times during the day.

Houses have "Western toilets," although public places often have Japanese style toilets, which are basically holes in the ground (...like in Italy, Mom!) And being an island, Japan is very concerned about conservation of resources, such as water. The toilet has a faucet above the water tank so that when flushed, clean water starts to pour out the faucet (for hand washing) and then the dirty water washes down into the tank to fill the toilet on the next flush. Very smart!

The kitchen is also different, although the Navy provides some American amenities, such as a full size refrigerator (Japanese friges are smaller) and a small gas range. Many Japanese homes only have fish grills under the counter, sort of the size of a toaster oven. Ours does not have this. There is also a "hatch" in the floor for dry storage, and much less cabinet space in general.

Some houses have rooms with tatami, or straw mat flooring, traditionally used for sleeping. Ours does not. The futon (just the cushion, not with the frames we think of) would be laid out at bedtime and folded and put away in large closets in the morning. Our dining room and Sydney's room were once tatami rooms, and they still have the rice paper (shoji) screens that are often in tatami rooms.

For heating and cooling, there is usually an electric a/c and heating unit in the wall of each room. There are also gas hookups in each room for the use of gas heaters, which we are told will be more economical for heat than the electric room units.

Overall, our house is familiar and comfortable enough to be our home for 3 years. Come visit!

A "Mount Fuji" Day!

The weather in Yokosuka during the summer was similar to mid-Atlantic states, but a whole lot more hazy and humid. Finally, after 3 months here we experienced a beautiful "Mount Fuji" day--meaning it cooled off to lower 70's and we could see Mt. Fuji from our neighborhood. We live 3 small blocks from this sea wall and even though Mt. Fuji is about a 3-hour drive from Yokosuka we could even see that there was a small amount of snow coating the summit.

The Inappropriate Use of Chopsticks

In Japan, if you like eating as much as Brian and I do, you find a way to get food (even rice or soup) into your mouth when all you're given is chopsticks. It may not be pretty, but as long as it's effective, right?

Sort of. Soon after venturing offbase to restaurants, we became painfully aware that Japanese nationals tend to watch us to see how we "gaijin" use our chopsticks! They are making sure we do not violate these chopsticks rules of etiquette:

1. Never pass food from chopsticks to chopsticks because this is a ceremonial gesture used during cremation services.
2. Never stand chopsticks straight up in rice bowl because this gesture is used when making food offerings to the dead.
3. Never spear food with chopsticks because this is considered impolite.

Other than that, we hold our chopsticks however we feel comfortable. And more importantly, whichever way leaves us satiated at the end of the meal. We may stick out as Americans, but at least we don't seem to be offending anyone!

Welcome to my Japan blog!
It's hard to believe Brian, Sydney (our little Buddha) and I arrived over 3 months ago. It has gone by quickly! We have so much more to see and learn about Japan. And since we just received our household goods 3 weeks ago, it seems like we haven't been settled until recently. We've almost found a spot for all of our belongings, even without much storage space in our Japanese home. We just had to purchase some furniture at our first onbase bazaar, which was very fun! So far we love living offbase and we are really happy to be in Japan in general. But we do miss our family and friends. So, I thought I'd start a blog to share our experiences, along with some photos of course. Stay tuned for some stories and random thoughts...