Kappa Zushi

Kindness Parking 

At our new ¥100 sushi store.  Hmm... I'm sure they don't really mean concrete floor....

It is a normal sushi-go-round, but if you order, a Shinkansen train comes out with your stuff on it. 

I love the Japanese 'sweet' potato... it has a candy glaze on it... Ha!  

This is our stack of plates when we were all done!  ¥100 plus ¥5 tax, each plate.

And here's the train....

Fire and Water Birthday Party

We are lucky that William has a classmate who he's become friends with.  His family are wonderful people, and we have been blessed having them as friends.  He helps train folks in the Navy for how to respond to disasters.   

On a ship, you attack a fire.  On land, firefighters can wait until it's burned down, or is less dangerous.   

Their command was having their summer family picnic. so they piggy-backed the birthday party onto it! 

They got to hold the hoses! 

My favorite fire fighter! 

Hose brigade! 

William was in kindergarten with this guy's daughter. 

This is Warren (birthday boy) with the funnest type of water!  :)

They had a pinata for all of the kids at the summer party.  That is a fire fighter's protected head cover turned backward. 

Matt was smart, and as soon as it started to break, he hauled it up and shook out the rest!

I just love the kid scramble to get the goodies! 

Then, a door opened, and a ton of water balloons rolled out, and the fight was on!!! 

Okay, so there is a facility to train on holes in ships.  The kids LOVED it!

They had a ton of fun pounding in the chucks to stop the water flow.

And then they'd start the jets from another hole... one was perfect for surfing on!  :)

Here are all the pipes from the outside.  It was a FANTASTIC birthday party!!!

Sprained Wrist

When we returned from Aomori, we dropped off Hallie and the kids, and William stayed behind while we returned the van to base.

We got a call on the way home that William had fallen out of a tree.

This is how he got bandaged up.  He was hurt enough that it ended up needing a real splint from the doctors.

He had a hard time doing some swimming things.  We ended up missing the social event that night.

Notice how he's not even paying attention?  Well, he loves the TinTin books.  I love them because they use big words, and it is fun to read for a kid.  He has the whole collection except 2 books, that he was able to check out of the library!  :)

Mother's Day Presentation at School (MAY DAY!)

 Okay, so I finally downloaded my phone's camera, and I totally forgot to blog about this!

 For mother's day, the kids dressed up (William insisted on suit jacket and tie) and invited us for muffins that they made.

 William was the program's narrator.

They did a 'reading theatre' from a cute picture book.

Mabori Beach with the Anthony's

Our local beach at Mabori, Hashirimizu, is easy to get to, and has parking.  In years past, it was cheap.  But, since there is a natural springs (mizu means water), folks come and fill water bottles.  So, they started charging a fortune to bring your car in.  Oh well.  It was worth it!

This is Dougie, blowing up an inflatable. 

The rest of the boys, Ian, Stefan (funny face, huh?), William and Matthew (another Puget neighbor friend). 

You can see that there's a float line out there, so no boats will come in. 

Ian.  Dougie still blowing up the inflatable, and William starting to build a sand castle. 

Here's my little helper.  Yes, these were my phone pics... this one is also a phone pic, but from Hallie's iPhone.  I love how I look like I'm frowning when I'm concentrating.

 Hallie and I had a drink, so we had to wait for her husband to get off work and ride his bicycle to come and drive us home!  :)  I stayed under my umbrella as a happy camper.

 The beach was pretty vacant.  I mean, what do you expect when you charge so much to park?  Notice the bridge to the jetty in the distance.

Matthew doing is own thing.

For those of you worried about tsunami, Mabori (where we live, and this beach is) is facing north.  We are totally protected from the Pacific Ocean by a land mass.  High waters could come in the straight behind, but wouldn't directly hit us.  You can tell this by the afternoon light here.

What a pleasant day with Hallie!

Aomori Nebuta Festival

Aomori City was pretty.  We found parking easily.  And my, what big cones they have!

We'd heard of the locals all dressing up, so Hallie and I decided to buy ourselves some.

I love the big red boy on the backs of the 'haneto' costume.

These ladies helped dress Hallie.  What you can't see, are all the small bells you have on, so that you jingle every time you take a bouncing step.

There are several entrance points for the nebuta floats.  These guys didn't dip down enough in front when going under a street light.

And it schmucked up the hand.  Japanese limbo fail.

When it was time for the people to go sit on the street (we were on on of the corners, where the nebuta had to turn, so people could sit on the street, directly in front of the parade coming), the Japanese crush and rush was the worst I've ever seen the Japanese act.

Here's my little one.  Stefan and he got a pretty good view.  Tim and I stayed to the side and watched Ian, and still got good shots, without having to dash, trying to take all our cardboard seats, water bottles, etc. with us.  :)

I won't be able to tell you which characters these are, but some of them are brave warriors.  This one is fighting a tiger.  

The size of these things are limited to width of streets, and height of street signs.

Originally made from bamboo and lit with lanterns, they are now wire lit with lightbulbs.

Some show these gods or warriors fighting mythical creatures.  This is 3-D.  That fire is away from everything else.

The drums are really impressive.

Some show Kabuki actors.  All I get from the sign is Capital north (kanji) ka nebuta  Kanji-kanji-kanji

And if you're wearing the haneto, you are supposed to be in the parade.  Folks say, "ra-sera-sera." Which I was told is what the Nebuta, or Gods say.

Again, these lightning bolts are jutting out.   So impressive!

These are corporate sponsored.  This one is Dydo Drink sponsored (katakana is easy to read!)

The detail, even in the cloth design on these is fantastic.

And then there are the BIG drums!

Warriors fighting?

More creatures.

They had only a few comical ones.  Sponge Bob and Tom and Jerry, the 2 cartoons William collects and watches!  How fun!  They were much smaller than the big character ones.

Again, all those folks in the outfits!  Who knew we should be in the parade?!?

I wish I knew what some of these legends or stories were.

I know these are devils...

that's a samurai and dragon,

...and this is Tengu, a long-nosed goblin.

If you ever get the chance to go to Aomori City August 5-7, GO TO THIS FESTIVAL!  It is overly crowded, but amazing.  I've never seen anything to the size and magnitude of this.  

We have MANY more pictures, and I'm efforting a video.