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.

Misawa Air Base

My dad was with the 323rd Inf. Co H, 81st 'Wildcat Division.'  A great website is Military Rootsweb Ancestry, Allen Family site once there, click on the Army History of Wildcat Division, and you can load each page that has the history of the Wildcat Division.

After capturing Angaur Island, helping 'clean up the enemy' on Peleliu Island in the Palau Islands, dad went to New Caledonia to recover from a Japanese grenade wound.  They went to Leyte, Philippines for more training to attack Japan via a shore landing before Japan surrendered.  Then, they went to Aomori City, Japan to 'occupy and keep the peace.'  Dad wrote letters home wondering why we were there.  The people were quiet and peaceful.

The closest base is Misawa.

It is an air base, and was where much of the relief aid to Japan was routed through after the earthquake and tsunami, since roads from the south were impassible.

I'll bet the fog got him ready to be in Washington state after returning!

The area is beautiful and lush.

And here I am, following in dad's footsteps.  My first 'other language' was Japanese.  Dad taught us to count to 10 in Japanese.  I still use the old words for four and seven from time-to-time.  In the afternoon, we headed to Aomori City for the festival.

You tube has some good History Channel clips.  Pacific Lost, Evidence Peleliu in 2 and 5th episodes has some footage of the 81st.  Dad's purple heart burned in their house fire, long before I was born.

I have been to Hiroshima, and Tim has been to Nagasaki.  I feel deep sorrow for the innocent lives of women and children lost there.  My dad spoke how the Japanese would fight to the last man on these islands.  If he'd have had to do one more fight, I don't know if I'd be in this picture.  I feel I owe a debt to those women and children.

Akita Kanto Festival

There was a food festival area (with beer) and then we went and found a place on the street.  Our butts were tired.  Thankfully, the local convenience store had these lovely cardboard seats.  It made a hexagon, and the way it folded in supported my weight!  We folded them up and took them with us to the next festival!  Too cool!  Recyclable seats!

So the folks walk a bit, stop, and put on a show.  This happens several times, only once did we get caught by the drummers and musicians.  Usually we got a great show!  This is a shoulder hold. 

The moon was out, and we got some magical shots.  About 1,200, of which we are only sharing a few!  :)

You can tell that sometimes the lanterns go out.

Tim's favorite set of kanto.  It is actually pronounced Kantoh, or Kantou.  Hold that last 'Oh' longer.

This is the view looking down the street.  So amazing and lovely.

Sometimes Japanglish just cracks us up.

The butt hold has got to be tricky.  If a performer's lanterns start to tilt too badly, another will come and take it away from then, using their hands to steady it and begin again.

It was enchanting to watch.

They're trying to re-light a lantern.

Obviously, this lantern set of kanto fell.  But it shows you that it is real candle fire inside these puppies!

Between performances, they try to set things up again.  This is a small one, for these little boys.

But others are big.

Sometimes they get really close together and bump.  One looked like it might fall on us.  We wondered if there'd ever been a fire of these.

At the end, everyone can go into the street and take a picture.

We all grouped up to take a pic.  There we are, me, Hallie, Ian, Stefan (Tim on camera).

This lady was all dressed up and spoke excellent English.  She wanted a picture of us.  Ian, Hallie, William, her, Stefan, me.... hey, where's Dougie?!?

Yep, asleep on the sidewalk!  He woke up after a few flashes catching him in the act.  :)