Talking on your cell phone is rude

We all know how irritating it is to be sitting next to someone screaming into their cell phone in a public place.  I don’t really care about your plans tonight or how crazy the party you were at last night was, so please, don’t add to the noise pollution around me.  (I’m assuming most people feel the same way…or I am just a very angry person.) This public announcement about cell phone use on the train makes me laugh.  You don’t want to make the elderly woman with a cane next to you cry due to your obscene cell phone use.  Nor do you want to make the cute girl next to you uncomfortable.  So please, turn those cell phones off!

Blessing of the Car

At the base of Mount Takao, on the outskirts of Tokyo, a Buddhist monk performed a ceremony of blessings.  Dressed in bright orange, the monk prayed over the white Toyota van, banged the drum a few times, and dripped holy water onto the hood.  The family watched quietly, perhaps praying along with the monk, for no accidents and safe driving.  We had just witnessed a Buddhist car blessing.

This was the first I had heard of a car blessing, and Sumi from Host Nations Relations explained to us what was happening.  “This is very exciting for you to watch,” she said.  This particular temple is specifically for car blessings, as you can see the parking spaces painted at the entrance of the temple.  They perform a blessing about every 15 or 30 minutes, depending on the demand.  After the van ceremony was done, a motorcyclist drove up to receive his blessing.  After a bit of research, there are both Buddhist and Shinto car blessings in Japan, and they are becoming more and more popular.  Shinto blessings involve flower petals being sprinkled on the car, and they are performed by a Shinto priest called a kannushi.  Based on the crazy driving situations in Japan, I can understand why they feel the need to have the extra assurance.  I wonder if our car was blessed when it was brand new (in 1998!).

Following in Howard's Footsteps

One of the first things we wanted to do in Japan was visit a site that Grandpa Howard did in 1945-1946 as part of the post-War occupying force.   He often tells of a visit he made one day with some shipmate into central Tokyo on a train from their ship in Yokosuka.  They rode the train past fields of burnt homes from US bombings, leaving only metal safes.



He said there was a Japanese girl on the train learning English through a vintage Reader’s Digest (interesting for the occupied country to embrace American culture so fast).  When they got to Tokyo the thing to do was visit the Imperial Palace, partly because it was not targeted by Allied bombing and was actually still intact.  All his sailor buddies got pictures taken in front a famous bridge on the palace grounds by a random Japanese photographer, who miraculously got the photos back to the correct ship.  Howard always finished this anecdote with his encounter with General MacArthur whose headquarters were nearby.  He watched as guards seemed to know precisely when to open the doors for the General to step out, wave at the Japanese well-wishers, and get into his famous black sedan.



Before we moved to Japan we spent an evening in Yorktown, and stumbled across Howard’s old photos.  We took a digital photo of his aging 1946 photograph from the Imperial Palace and used that as a reference to find the exact spot he stood over 65 years later.  On a nice late summer Saturday we took the train to the center of modern Tokyo to walk the outside of the palace grounds to find the photo spot.  The bridge was remarkably easy to find and is still THE place to get your photo taken.  Dozens of tourists, both international and Japanese, were lining up to take pictures with this bridge in the background.  In 1945 the Emperor officially renounced his deity status to a shocked country, but the place is still revered. And guarded.  Across the before mentioned bridge were stern looking uniformed guards that kind of reminded me of the Queen’s Guards in England.  I am pretty sure we were being watched the whole time.  But we got a photo of another Naval Gouger in the same spot as Petty Officer Howard did in the 1940s.

Classy Rest Area

On Monday, I went on a trip with the ladies to Shimada for the triennial (every three years) Obi festival.  On the way to the festival, we stopped at a rest area, and discovered the most amazing thing.  An electronic stall vacancy sign!!  This sign was right when you walked into the restroom, and it tells you which toilet is in use, and which one is vacant.  (Green – Vacant; Black – In Use) It also tells you which stall has a western vs. a Japanese toilet, which is very useful!  I don’t know how many times I’ve wandered through a bathroom here trying to figure out which stall had the western toilet.  Squatting isn’t really my style, so I only use Japanese toilets if there is nothing else available.  I’m sure everyone in the restroom was laughing at us for taking pictures, but I had to get a shot of this!

Hate is a strong word

I HATE SPIDERS!!  I don’t use the word hate very often, because it’s a very emotional word in my opinion.  But when it comes to spiders, I can’t think of a better word.  I despise them.  My childhood is filled with very vivid memories of spider incidents, none of them ending well.  These included the spiders that used to live in the tub and pretend to be dead, but would pump themselves up and walk away after a few minutes.  Then there was the time we were picking mushrooms in Michigan, and I picked a big one that had a huge spider living inside of it.  Then there was the enormous tree spider that had to be killed with a hammer outside of our house in Charleston.  I touched it with my hand thinking it was bark…and then it moved.  I can still feel it on my hand when I think about it.  And then in high school I was bit by a spider, and the doctor told me in could be living in my mattress.  You’d better believe my parents bought me new mattresses that day!  And there are a handful of other stories, traumatizing moments in my life involving spiders.  When James was deployed, there was a spider on our ceiling in the bedroom.  I slept in the living room for three weeks.  That’s just how it is with me and spiders.

Last weekend, James and I spent a nice day at the Bazaar in Yokosuka, a few horrible hours stuck in traffic, and we came home to a monster spider outside of our door.  James didn’t believe me that it was a spider, but I can spot them from a mile away, in the dark.  He tried to kill it, but it was on the ceiling outside, and in the dark, it was difficult.  I didn’t sleep that night.  I kept thinking of that evil thing living outside of our door.  I couldn’t wait for the moment when I was sure it was dead.  The attack was easier in the day light, though it still proved to be trying.  James used a whole can of bug killer, while I stayed behind the screen door screeching and watching with anticipation. After James had sprayed a ton of killer on it, I got up the courage to walk outside and take a picture. (Honestly, I'm not even sure why I wanted a picture...)  I figured that even if the spider came after us, he was covered in poison, so he couldn’t come that fast.  James kept telling me he was dead, but then he would keep moving, and I wanted confirmation that it was over.  He sat on the wall clinging to life, when all of a sudden he made a run at us.  I started screaming and ran to the grass, and James was spraying him with what was left in the can.  James was yelling at me to get him something to squish it with, but that would involve me walking towards the spider to get to the house, and I couldn’t bring myself to do it.  Thankfully, our neighbor came to the rescue with his tennis shoes.  And the spider was squished for good.  The incident gave my heart a good test, but I can sleep well knowing he is dead.