Kinpozan (the Mountain)

So today I took the two oldest to climb a mountain.  The Mrs. stayed home with the snotty little one (not his personality, he is just very mucusy [not to be mistaken with couscousy, a tendency to be a little dry and flavourless]).

So we three set off on a little winter adventure.  As we drove south grey clouds were skudding across the sky.  Trees bent and strained as I tried to keep the car on the road.  Perhaps I was too preoccupied with the weather as we missed our turn.  A pleasant gas station attendant was more than happy to point out the error in our ways.  "Way back there" would probably be the closest translation.  So after doubling back we found the right turn (it should have been a left) and started up the mountain.  One more double back later and we had reached the parking lot at the top.  Totally empty.  We walked up to the temple and passed this tree.

We call trees like this "mother trees".   It has never been overtly discussed but when hiking we are almost always on the lookout for Mother trees.  We really enjoy finding them.

The view from the top was really beautiful.  This is the sea of Japan side.  If you look way to the right that is where I do most of my fishing with the father in law. 

There were little shrines all over the place.  Some religious discussion but very muted.

This shrine had a big sign posted just before it.  The basic mythology is that a boy who loved fishing went out one day and drowned.  His mother climbed the mountain to pray for her son.  This cave was the place where she prayed.  Since that day, her tears have continued to drop from the roof of the cave. I wondered if they drop in during the dry season.  That is if there is a dry season.

Next we went to a cool lookout and managed to take a timed shot.  Yeah me, I got in the picture.  This is the Kinko wan bay side.  On a good day the crater of Sakurajima would be spewing ash from right between the kids heads. 

After much tramping around, we headed back down the mountain and went for noodles. 

Then as usual we found a cool park to play at before heading home.

Todays big win was bringing home some omiyage (treats from a trip) for mom.  It was a long adventure and there wasn't actually all that much hiking but we had fun.  Probably the last hike of 2010.  Hopefully 2011 will be full of adventure too.

Best wishes to all for an exciting, adventurous and fulfilling 2011.

Youii Otoshi wo Mukaete Kudasai.

At least half cooked

The raw men we ran into today were actually quite well cooked. We lunched at a noodle shop and enjoyed some nice bowls of ramen with some rice balls and gyoza on the side. We also were afforded the warming companionship of one o' my sisters. Easily worth the price of admission. We then got to check out her new digs. I am sure she will work her way up to a window in record time. Its just her way.After lunch we went to the park at the Mount Pleasant Community center. I really like days like that. Middle of the work week and I am walking around without a care in the world. Like the run I went on this morning. I love seeing people doing their jobs while I don't do mine. Or the other people not doing jobs. Are they indepedently wealthy? Are they out of work? Living off their parents? Maybe they have night jobs and just get to enjoy that part of the day. Anyways we had a nice time at the park. At one point a shark bit off the lower half of my leg. My daughter ingeniously used some glue to glue it back on. It turns out that it is special glue. She told me the blood could still get through. There is some serious detail being added to our imaginative play these days.

Post park we headed back to my mom's. Who we are currently sponging off of her for our weekend. On the way we stopped to pick up fixings for tomorrow nights Japanese curry dinner. As the kids were both asleep I managed to catch a few winks in the front seat while listening to CBC. The wife did the leg work and headed in for the groceries. I don't know how long we slept in the car but the program had changed and the wife looked apologetic when she arrived back at the car. Who cares, I am on vacation.

Dinner was the same as last night with the wonderful addition of Nachos and guacamole, also there were fresh veggies with humus. Tack on a bottle of red wine and some discussion about life and its variety and we had a great night.

I am not kidding by the way when I say there will be pictures. There will be eventually.

(two days later) Okay I lied. I never managed to take a picture of the spaghetti and sauce.

Japan, the final installment

So we are officially back in Grand Forks. After two marathon days of travelling we stayed in our own beds last night and it was great. The Jet Lag is still affecting the daughter as she was up from 3 to 5 pestering me about this and that. I finally gave in at 5 and put on a video while I caught up with some banking. So here is the final installment.

What you see in this picture is where we slept at night while at the great grandmothers place. The three mats lined up in a row housed, myself, the wife and kids and one of the cousins. In the foreground you will see the second dining table that had to be put away, well this is put away, between meals so that we could use the room. Six kids and seven adults living in a little more room that what some lunatics live in in Downtown Vancouver. It takes all types.

This is the kids playing with their second and first cousins. They have appeared in previous offerings and really we would have liked to get in even more play days but everyones schedules didn't always match up. How are one's children and one's cousin's children related. Are they second cousins. Third cousins. They share a great grand parent. Maybe this is the whole once removed thing. Well if you believe everything you read on wikipedia then they are second cousins. I of course am nothing in all of these relationships as I don't share an ancestor but everyone was nice enough to call me uncle or at least David, to my face.

Here we are in ishiki new town, or something new town. One of my old colleagues from my Kagoshima English teaching days runs her own school from inside her house. She is also the owner of the wonderful blog about her life and dog that I have listed in my links I likes. Of course it is in Japanese but the photos are real cute. You can check it out here. She had us over for lunch and my children spent the whole time chasing the dog. He is old and really timid and wasn't as in to my kids as they were into him. We had a nice afternoon and I caught up on some gossip about my old work place. Gossip never gets old does it.

Does everyone like Ramen? We sure do. This is a picture of Uncle Kanefumi, atomu, the son, and I. We are pretending to be lions outside the chinese food restaurant. I can see it. The uncle took us for lunch after we spent a gruelling morning gardening at the sis-in-laws place. I was feeling like a giant slug after not having done anything for three weeks so I decided to take on the yard. The uncle who was on his day off and came over to hang out ended up coming out and lending me some tools and getting in up to his elbows. Really I was way out of my league but with his tools, pick up truck, and know how we managed to put a good scald on that yard in about 3 hours. I was soaked in sweat and after a shower we all went out for the aforementioned lunch. This was also the only night on the whole trip that I drank Sho Chu. I paid for it for the remaining 7 days. Word to the wise, just say no to Sho Chu. People who drink it know what they are doing. People who don't just shouldn't. Nuff said.

I liked this action shot of the wife cleaning the tub for the evening bath. Notice the son hanging out in a bucket of water. That is what you do when it is 36 degrees 80% humidity and there is no relief in sight. In the foreground is my son's arch nemesis, Lilo. Lilo and he spent a lot of time together and she spent most of it pinching or biting him. She was really interested in whatever he was doing or holding and wanted it right now. If she didn't get it appropriate actions were taken. Hopefully, the next time we are there she will have her words and will not torture my son quite so frequently.

My mother in law is actually a hair dresser by trade and decided to dress up the wife and daughter for some glamour pics.
I really like the authentic hair do. We have a couple of family shots which may grace any christmas cards we make this year. Not that I have ever made christmas cards but I have always imagined myself as a christmas card sender. So this may be the year.

We planned to go fishing on this trip and this is a picture of us on my father-in-laws boat. This is unfortunately where it ended. There were large seas that day and we didn't want a puke fest. The kids enjoyed chasing the sea cockroaches and trying to find crabs.
I could have gone on any of a number of night fishing trips but I didn't think 12 hours from 5 pm to 5 am with six or seven guys who I barely understood when they are sober was that nice of a prospect. That and the staying up all night really didn't catch my idea of a good time. So there was no sea fishing this trip. I did go for a morning of sea shore fishing with Uncle Kanefumi and he caught a tiny little fish. I once again struck out. Maybe I should be a hunter instead.

Getting to the end of the trip here.

Can you imagine cooking on a gridle in the middle of the table when it is 35 degrees out? Well I can. No air conditioning and we are all sitting and sweating around the table eating some really delicious okonomiyaki. They had the yamaimo which makes all the difference.
Atomu unfortunately had the seat right where he is standing and got scalded with little oil burns numerous times during this meal. We had another griddle meal our last night as the daughter requested gyoza. Probably like her sixth gyoza meal of the trip. But homemade gyoza with home made chicken karage(my request) were an awesome last dinner. I ate way too much at both of these sittings but didn't have any beer the okonomiyaki night and only a few the last night. I came down with the stomach flu as a result of the sho chu night and really lightened up on the partying the last week.

Self taken picture by the wife. I think she did a great job of getting her sisters, herself and yours truly all in the shot. Here is a shot of the kids playing in a park the last morning we were there. Notice the brilliant sunshine and everyone hiding in the shade of a tree. Well they had to be rescued from this park by the father in law because a torrential downpour came and trapped them under the awning of a near by apartment building. Tropical weather is a weird thing. From here they drove us out to the airport and we made our return journey. It took most of a day for the whole flight -- lay over -- flight but we arrived 3 hours before we left. Gotta love crossing the international date line the other way. We stayed a night with the Harry bear and then made the trek home yesterday. It is now time to return to our regularly scheduled life.

It was a great trip and we really spent a lot of quality time with our relo's. Can I live in Japan again? Well lets just say the summers would be tough. But being near family would be awesome. The next blog will be back to dinner and hopefully the daily stuff that our lives are made of here.