Golden Week

Hey it's been awhile (as always)!

I had the parents out for a felt-longer-than-it-really-was 2 week visit around Golden Week.
Golden Week being a bunch of holidays in succession around the end of April/beginning of May, almost all in one week, which make it, well, a golden week. I took them all over my prefecture and to my schools too!

They loved the sand bath; it's where you lie on a beach in a yukata (light summer bathrobe style thing) and get covered with naturally heated sand right up to your neck. It's hot and the recommended time you stay in is 10 minutes, but at about 7 my body is screaming to get out. You sweat buckets and after you feel oh so good (and your skin is so soft!)

At elementary school my parents got to meet all the kids as they took turns introducing themselves. "mayonnaise is ..." = "my name is..." I had to do some translating of English to English. At junior high the students presented Japanese culture to my parents. They had a chopstick competition to see who could pick up the most beans in 1 minute (my mom won). They tried shodo, Japanese calligraphy, and tried on yukatas. I was impressed with how much the students put into their presentations and I think my parents had a really good time. I also took them to some friend's houses for dinner where they ate authentic Japanese and Mexican food! Mexican? Are? (Japanese expression, kinda pronounced "aray") Yup, that's right. Mexican food made by lived-in-Mexico-long-ago Kedoin cho resident. I firmly believe this world is really really small and our sense of distance is skewed by travel time.

We also went on a trip to Nagasaki City which is a lot further to travel to than I thought. I think it's my favorite city on Kyushu right now. It's nestled in a hilly harbour on the north western side of the island. Perhaps you've heard of it? Something about a world war and a bomb? Many people say it reminds them of San Fransisco and I'm sure if I had ever been there it would do the same for me. It's an interesting place because it's had quite a bit of contact with the "outside" world, comparatively, in Japanese history. There are many churches and even a Chinatown! We saw old colonial style buildings from past Dutch residents of the city; they were all moved to one area so that people could come from far and near and gawk at the sprawling verandas and strikingly different from Japanese architecture architecture.

Of course we visited the Atomic Bomb museum which I thought did a good job of presenting such a sensitive topic. I wonder how things will change when there's no one left that was alive during the bombing (will they change?) The last section in the museum is a time line of nuclear weapons development and that was educational and interesting. I had no idea the extent of nuclear testing and the locations... fascinating. Took me back to good ol' Wallace's class at UBC. (anyone? weapons of mass distraction?) After, we took a stroll around Peace Park which honestly did not have much of an effect on me. I thought it was gaudy. I said it, gaudy. In all honesty, that's what I thought. I'm all for peace and artistic expression and expression in general, but that park just didn't do it for me. Maybe I was too cynical after the museum...