NOTE: Since I didn’t have access to a computer very often during my spring break, I just wrote down most of what happened each day, so here’s how my trip to Okagaki went. 🙂

3/23/10

I was so nervous about making this trip that I woke up at 5:30 to make sure I had everything together, though my train was leaving at 8. I checked the bus schedule again: first bus leaving at 6:30. I was up there at 6, just to be sure. Getting on the bus at 6:30, it was 15 minutes to the train station because of the crazy traffic (I should have expected the city to be crowded so early in the morning… this is Japan), but then the train to Yodoyabashi didn’t come until 7. Another 20 minutes on the crowded train, then I had to take the subway to Shin-Osaka to get to the Shinkansen (bullet train) station. Of course I had no idea where this was, but luckily I saw a nice-looking woman with a suitcase with two kids and asked if she was going to the Shinkansen too, so she showed me the way! Friendly Japanese people always make my day. 🙂 By the grace of God I made it with 5 minutes to spare, and then I was off. 2 hours later, Kokura.

It’s so weird seeing the Yokomines again! In a good way, of course, but 4 years ago seems both so far away and not that long ago. Aya’s gotten taller, as expected, but overall looks the same. Papa looks the same too, and kept commenting on how I’ve thinned out and gotten prettier, lol. He was also full of questions: “Do you smoke?” “Are you getting married soon?” “How did you lose that weight?” It turns out a lot of things have changed though. Papa, who used to light a cigarette about 5+ times a day, says he’s quit for 3 years now. He’s also retired from piloting, but has another job inspecting people’s electrical wiring. He says it’s not fun, but it pays well, and that seems clear: the Yokomines have a brand new car, a new washer/dryer, a plasma tv and a new living room table (with a heater underneath…). Yes, at first glance a lot of things seem to have changed. Aya is about to start high school, and Mama is slowly but surely becoming a master at Sumi-e (Chinese brush painting). Everything seems so nice for them!

I can’t say I did much today — they bought me McDonalds after picking me up from the station, we looked around a shopping center for a magazine Aya wanted, and then came home. I had a crazy Okinawan orange (a cross between a grapefruit and an actual orange), went for a walk with Aya and her dog Jam, in the rain, and came back to watch a lot of tv. Aya and I also fell asleep around 4 under the heated blanket table; the blanket has the table top sitting on it, and underneath is a pad to put your feet. The heater, which is adjusted from a connected panel, hangs down from beneath the table. Because Japanese houses have about zero insolation, they get very cold in winter and very warm in summer, so basically you don’t want to move from this heater-blanket ever.

Papa made me gyoza around dinner time (I guess they’re like dumplings?) while he ate squid, which still had its big old eyes staring up at you. When Mama got home from work later, she made us taco rice, which I’m told is also from Okinawa. When I first heard about “taco rice,” I thought they meant “tako” as in the Japanese word for “octopus,” so I was about to politely decline, but taco rice does actually come from the concept of tacos. It’s rice with lettuce, tomato, taco meat, cheese, and salsa on top, and it’s delicious. I’m guessing the Okinawans invented it because of all the Americans there and our love for Tex Mex, lol.

I also gave them the souvenirs from Kyoto I bought them, sugary pickled plums and “cherry blossom flavored” pastries with sweet bean paste inside. I hope they liked them enough.

Well, it’s going to be a fun and interesting week! 🙂