Summer in Sasebo, Japan

The rice patty I walk past daily

Here it is, August, and summer is ending with the kids getting back to school.  It has not been that hot here although it has been hot and quite humid.  After Bahrain, though this is a piece of cake. A little typhoon gave us a glancing blow and a day off work last month, but overall it has been rather uneventful.. I went to Okinawa to see Laura and Jordan Andrew (and their parents) over the July 4^th long weekend and that was very nice.  The weather could have been better but I have been there and done that so visiting with the family was the only thing really on order.

Sasebo is a nice and fairly quiet little city with a long history full of tales of Samurai, Portuguese missionaries, and many things typical of Japan, like anpan, onigiri and sake.  The Naval Facilities here were once a strategic Naval Base of the Imperial Navy up until around the end of WW2. Nagasaki is about an hour from here and really a very pretty city now. I went there only to do battle with the Immigration Office over my visa, but after a 5 hour skirmish I got it all settled. Their English was a tad better than my Japanese, otherwise I might still be sitting there. I plan to go back to actually visit the city when the weather cools off a bit.  Hiroshima is a 3 hour 

commute by train and I plan to visit there too (with cousin Sarah, who teaches in Tokushima.) I really don’t have much to blog about right now, but I didn’t want time to disappear without at least posting a few pictures to prove that I am indeed, back in Japan.

Samurai Shrine - Sasebo

A little temple I walk past daily

The Macheskys in Okinawa

 

Breaking the rules in Okinawa

Springtime in America

It is nice to be home for a little while and two and ½ months is a good vacation.  It was nice to watch the barren trees come back to life on my little gulley property in Tennessee, although now I can barely walk back there. Cutting my hair was a big step, but I was able to donate about 18 inches to Wigs for Kids. After a short stint of going

completely bald I realized that keeping my crown shaven was more work than blow-drying so I have decided to allow hair to come back.  Who knows? Maybe I will grow it long again…or maybe not. Then there was the long road trip from

Paris, Tennessee to Pensacola, Florida to see my family and friends there. That grandson is growing fast: pushing 5 years old and talking and thinking constantly he is gonna be a force to be reckoned with. After a week I drove to see Blake and Ashley in St. Petersburg, Florida. We had a great

visit, although it was too short  when I enjoy someone’s company so much. Still, I would rather that than “Is Dad ever going to leave?”  Then, off to Key West to see Mark and Lisa

who have a nice little place on a canal with everything Key West within reach: beaches, coconut trees, iguanas, and US Navy Jets.  Then the long 20 hour return drive to Paris again. 

Not resting for long I flew to Columbus, Ohio to visit Robert, Christina, et al. We had a great time visiting and I loved having the kids around me from breakfast to bedtime; of course Robert and Christina were great too. Love those kids! Now I am in pre-trip mode with pre-packing and sorting to see what I need and what I can take for a year away in Japan. A couple more dinners and outings with the nephews and a few friends and then I am outta here again in 7 days. There is always Messenger and Skype, which are an acceptable substitute to actually being there, but I am already looking forward to seeing everyone in person next summer. I the meantime, I definitely plan to enjoy Japan, visiting with my niece and her family in Okinawa, friends in Japan and Korea. It’s good to know people everywhere. Who knows where my adventures will take me, but I’m hoping to hit up a few places that I don’t have a fridge magnet for, like Taiwan and Thailand and Viet Nam.  We shall see.  

Florence in February

Michelangelo's Crucifix
not MY photo

President’s Day weekend often seems to be a great weekend to take a trip. This year I decided that Florence was calling me and although I had been near, I had never gone.  Sometimes I balk at a possible adventure because people tell me all about how “amazing” and “wonderful” and “awesome” and I worry that I will end up disappointed.  That has happened to a degree before but Florence was all that and more.  A couple of times I found myself welling up inside as I stood before Michelangelo’s David and Botticelli’s Birth of Venus, thinking “WOW…this is really it!”  I could go on and on about all the details, but instead I will mention a couple of things and you can watch the video to see for yourself. Two major letdowns happened over the weekend. I self corrected with the reminder that I was in Florence and that just because I can’t do everything I want my weekend is not a loss. At the Santo Spirito Church I hoped to get in to see the lovely church as well as Michelangelo’s Crucifix, a sculpture created when he was only 18 years old. It was very pretty inside, but alas there were No Camera signs up at the entrance and I even saw a guy get yelled at for taking pictures.  Then I found the crucifix, in a room that only opens four times a day for private viewing. The sign said 1245 pm. I looked at my watch; it was 1250 and the doors had already been shut.  I could see it through the wavy glass window, and something is always better than nothing, even if you can’t take a picture.  Then I went to the Synagogue to see the building erected 150 years ago after the abolition and demolition of the Jewish ghetto which had been there for almost 400 years since the Inquisition.  It is a beautiful Moorish type building with a breathtaking interior of rich color and intricate wood and tile work.  Before I went in, the guard with limited English told me, “No Camera,” so unhappily I loaded all my stuff into a locker and went in sans  iPod which is the only camera I use. Inside while admiring the structure I was annoyed to notice a lot of people taking pictures with their phones.  After I walked out and gathered my things, I told the new guard on duty that a lot of people were taking photos inside.  I hated to seem like a rat, but hey, same rules ought to apply to everyone right? This guard in fluent English told me that I could take pictures with my phone but not a camera. I asked to go back in with my iPod and she refused unless I paid again.  Rather miffed, I asked her what difference it made if I took a photo with a phone or a camera anyway.  She shrugged her shoulders. I dwelt on that little episode for about 30 minutes and decided if that was the worst thing that happened, then I was indeed a lucky guy.

Okay those are my two tales of one city.  Enjoy the video and if you do ever get the chance, I really recommend Florence. Better yet take a full 90 day tourist visa and travel around all of Italy.

My Florence video here

Frohes neues Jahr!!

Well, here it is: 2019. Another year past and another year on the brink of something great.  2018 was filled with great adventures, places I have never seen before and new friends. Starting in Rota, Spain, I welcomed the New Year pretty much like I always do: staying up until I feel like going to bed. But the Spain adventure continued with reacquainting myself with old friends, brushing up on my Spanish and visiting places like Cadiz, Seville, Granada and Ronda. It also gave me the cool opportunity to visit Morocco for a long weekend (first time on the African continent!)I gathered a few souvenirs, saw some fantastic sights, and almost got stranded as the ferries to Spain were mostly canceled due to bad weather. Fortunately, I got onto an overcrowded boat and made the choppy sojourn back to the other side (I blocked out the stories of what can happen in overcrowded boats during a storm.)  From Spain, I went back to the Sates for a few weeks and managed to squeeze in a little time for family visiting before heading out for Bahrain (see map). Bahrain was hot, and dusty,   and hot! It had its frustrations, but also some great opportunities like meeting some new friends and also running into old ones. Ramadan was an interesting time in Bahrain.  I listened to local radio and gained an appreciation for some kinds of Arabic style music.   I was a little surprised (probably shouldn’t have been) that there is a huge variety of Ramadan songs, many of which are catchy and sing-a-long-ish, although my Arabic is limited to a few words.  Anyway, I also visited Egypt during Ramadan and stood on and climbed into the Great Pyramid and visited the Cairo Museum.  Wow…just WOW. I also had the thrill of having my flight cancelled and contracting food poisoning, the former being a blessing in disguise as I could not possibly have flown that day because of the latter. I will not go into detail.  For my birthday, I went to Dubai for a long weekend, rode a camel into the desert where I sand-surfed, played with falcons, smoked a little shisha and enjoyed a great dinner and the company of a very cool new friend. Following Bahrain, I returned to the US and spent a couple of months with friends and family, saw months of planning for a family reunion come to fruition, and began work in earnest on a children’s book with my sister in law. For the second year in a row I got to spend Thanksgiving, Hanukkah and Christmas at home. And now here I sit in Wiesbaden, Germany thinking about 2019 and what it will hold; what decisions I have to make. Where and how will I be next year at this time? I have big plans but I won’t commit to them in public. I do understand the importance of goals and planning, so yes I have a plan, yes it is in writing and no I don’t want to share it.

and hot.

Oh…and: Happy New Year!

Instead of a bunch of pictures, I uploaded a video to youtube that can be seen here: https://youtu.be/8NQ5I9gM4Rw