And that is all.

Hi friends and family!
So our room is packed up, and after a day of training and shopping we are getting ready to hit the road!
So see you all this upcoming week :o) Thanks for following our Okinawa adventures!

Second to last day :o(

So today we went to the Okinawa Peace Park - the memorial the Battle of Okinawa. It was astonishing, moving, and breath taking. Here are some pictures from the day:

The Memorial is in the south side of the island against the cliffs. The Japanese were pushed there by our troops - unfortunately thousands upon thousands of innocent Okinawians were caught in the middle. Here is a view from the backside of the memorial- you can see the stone walls with the names of those who died engraved in them, then triangle is a fountain of peace, and the ocean is in the background.

View of the breath taking cliffs with a tragic story. Many threw themselves off the cliffs out of fear of the troops :o( Regardless, they are absolutely breath taking today.


All the different "states" (prefectures actually) have memorials in another section of the memorial park. Here is one of them.
This memorial carries the ashes of over 100,000 souls.

There is also a museum there! This is in the hall of testimony (I believe). Each desk contains the eye-witness accounts of those who survived the battle and witnessed the horrors.
Dad reading the english translations:
and on a completely different note, here's me with some Japanese school girls! I saw them trying on hats and decided to try-out my new word "kawaii" which means cute in Japanese. They thought that was cool, and before I knew it the cameras were out, and I joined in the fun!

So tomorrow is our last day :o( We have all loved it, but are also looking forward to coming home! See you all soon!

Shuri Castle!

So today was filled with many good things! First we went to Shuri Castle, which was outstanding. It is a world Heritage Site, and absolutely amazing. Thereafter Sensei Clarke and dad trained for awhile, and I got to sneak away with the women and so some folk dancing! Unfortunately I forgot my camera, so I'll have to wait until I can grab pictures from someone else. Thereafter we went to dinner with Paul's friend Natsuki, because she is just fun to hang around :o) She took us to a great restaraunt where we ate alot of meat on skewers. It was, needless to say, delicious. Afterwards we walked around and she introduced Beth and I to japanese photoboothing. (taking pictures in a really swank photobooth). Again, much fun was had by all.

So here are some pictures from today!

Wall outside of Shuri Castle:
Gardens leading up to the castle:
Old original dragon-water fountain which was a gift from China around the 16th century. Much of the castle was destroyed in World War II, thus the fact that it is original is fairly significant:
So the stairs going up into the castle are pretty steep:
View from the wall. Here are myself and my dad!
Inside the castle gate. This is also when it began to rain. (Side story, when it was raining we stopped into the information building. There we bought umbrellas from a vending machien and learned how to make origami boats from the woman running the information counter! It was fun).
Inside the castle. Cannot quite remember what this was, but it was on the second floor! And I believe the king sat here for some purpose or another, although this was not his throne.

Walking around the administrative building. We had to take our shoes off to go around the museum, which I thought made alot of sense! Kept the floors clean.
So the faucets in the bathroom were really cool. Note how they resemble the water fountain I mentioned above!

We took the train back, and Beth had the great idea to sit in the front of the train!

And on a completely different note, I got a new gi :o) It is my first one since I got my original one! I pulled it out of the packaging tonight and had to snap a quick picture. Beautiful!

Wednesday

Hi ho! Again, another great day. Sensei Clarke went scuba diving, so you will have to wait for his pictures and take on that whole experience. Over all, from hear say, it went well! For us remaining three, we took a long leisurely stroll down Koksai-dori - the main shopping-street of Naha city. From there we took the train to the athletic park, which according to the travel guide had several shrines, temples, and other things of cultural interest. Additionally, it was a park, and the thought of leaving the city was incredibly enticing.

While we were there we ran across this foot thing. You know how in the US we have those athletic stations along paths, where you can do sit-ups, pulls ups, jumps, etc.? (and as a kid you just thought it was another form of a play ground?) Curiously enough - they have the same thing here! Only different. This was a path you walked along - presumably slowly - and the rocks on the path did something to the pressure points in your feet. It reminded me of the cake-walk at elementary school bake sales - minus the music and the baked goods.

If we could read Japanese, we would certainly know more about what it was and why it was - all we know for sure is that our feet felt well afterwards and so did we.

Here is a side ways few of the path:

Here is my dad walking along it slowly. We were following an Okinawain, who was stopping slowly on each section of the path, which dad was emulating here:
Beth in front of me, standing with much patience and control on the stones!

Another view of the path. You can see how it is a bit circular, and does have a railing for one to hold on to.

After this invigorating walk (which indeed it was), we headed home, napped, gi-ed up and went to the dojo, which was amazing! Again, no pictures :o( However for those in the dojo we'll share all we learned when we get home! We then went to dinner with our new friends Rick and Patty from Syracuse, which turned out to be a marvelous time, including playing the Sanshin - a native Okinawian guitar- in the restaraunt and talking with the restaraunt owner and the patrons. We had a marvelous time. However, due to afore said marvelous time, I'll have to wait to post pictures at a later time, as I need to head to bed. Hope your Wednesday was as marvelous as ours was :o) Konbanwa! (good evening!)

Tuesday

And the rain rain rain came down down down.....
Today has been very rainy, so the perfect day for doing a bit of shopping, eating, studying, sleeping and, of course, training. Here are some snap shots of the day!

First a little retro: Chris Langello (the head of a Jundokan dojo in Washington DC) took this picture during training this past week and I just got a hold of it! Made me laugh and laugh:

So today we got hungry after training and with to Hotto-Motto - which is like a take-out only fast-food place with meals for under 500 yen (that is 5 bucks). Thought this sign was cool, and to the point:
Here is dad and Clarke looking hungry:
Now to training- Beth had to dry her gi before we went and trained. The laundromat is right outside the dojo, so I took a moment to try to capture the "back-ally" feel of the dojo location.

First, the amazingly simply instructions that are on the washer and drier:

The laudromat itself (with Beth posing inside):
And then it was onto training - which we did for about four hours all together today. Unfortunately I cannot take pictures while training (only two hands, which are both occupied during the training time), however we did snap some pictures after wards!

This is the Jundokan from the above balcony, which encircles the dojo. you can see everyone training before Taira Sensei's Class! (by the way, Taira Sensei is roughly considered the technical head of the dojo, thus one of the best karate masters alive. And we got to take a class taught by him! Crazy, ne?)
Front of the dojo. The pictures on the front side are of the four main karate masters of the style. I wish I knew what the kanji meant!:
Along all the walls is the training equipment. Here are jars and weights for strength training:

Here are the taishishi's (again spelling completely off):

This is Taira Sensei doing some demonstrations. He is blurry a) because i'm a novice picture-taker and b) because he is going so fast. It appears blurry in real life too!


Here is a view from down below in the dojo to give a feel of what it is like within it:

And here is a shot of everyone's shoes, which you leave at the door coming in!
And that is that! Let us hope and pray it doesn't rain tomorrow - so much of Naha to see, so much training to do, and so little time! Every day is pretty exciting, every class challenging, and every encounter a great learning moment! Oh, and if you have a moment leave a comment, because it would be great to know who is reading this :o) Mata ne!

Monday: Aquarium

Up along the west coast of the island is the most extraordinary aquarium ever! Here are a few shots that we wanted to share!

The view of the ocean from the main pavilion:


Here is a group shot in the same pavilion:
Very nifty flower sea creatures:

So during the cool "dolphin/I am not quite sure what this animal is called but it is beautiful" show, this guy jumped up and stuck is tongue out at us :o) Again, ocean in the background!

Such a talented dolphin! Anyone else having flashes of "Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy" ? And again, I reiterate - ocean in the background.

Group shot in front of the fish, once we were inside the aquarium.

Oh look! Its Nemo and Dori! (And my own personal take on a fish impression)
So this is, as I understand it, the largest aquarium in the world! And yes, that is a real whale/large shark swimming by the vast amounts of people. Beautiful and surreal.



Obligatory shot in the sharks mouth:

Shark asleep on top of the tunnel:

And that is about all for the aquarium! It was an absolutely unforgettable experience!

Monday

Woah woah! Today was quite the day: Paul Smith drove us way up into the island, so we got to see a much different part of Okinawa than just Naha city! His friend Noski (spelling totally wrong) joined us, so the six of us trooped up up and away!

This was one of the views we passed on our way up into the island:

We had to stop for lunch, and decided that it was time to cave and satisfy our american stomachs. We stopped by a place called Moosburger - which is hamburgers AND coffee. Couldn't get better. Here is a sign from the store, which sums it all up:

From there we went to a Pineapple Park! So crazy. We took a tour of the pineapple "farm" in these cool pineapple carts:
Cool, ne? Here are Beth and I in the Pineapple Cart:
View of the pineapple trees:
So once you were into the park, they basically tried to sell you on as many pinepaple products as possible. There was pineapple iwne, pineapple vinegar, pineapple cake, pineapples juices, pineapple chocolate, pineapple cookies - and finally at the end: pineapple. You could taste as much as you wanted to! Here is Sensei Clarke with one of the ladies who helped with the tastings-
I never thought I would think "Man, I have eaten to many pineapple influenced products" but today I defintely did. It was alot of fun - quirky - yet every very fun.