Show us your favorite photo from last summer.
Dan and I went to Japan last summer as part of our Honeymoon/one day of work in a foreign country thing. We were requested by the US Military Base for their Fourth of July celebration and figured - "hey, we're working one day there, why not spend another 6 days there checking out this lovely country?" Another one of those perks of being a professional magician!
One of my favorite photos was from a hike we took up one of the mountains - when I was younger, I was nicknamed "Monkey" by my parents because I was always found climbing up a tree. When Dan was younger, he was called "Monkey" by his parents because he acted (looked?) like a little monkey.
Naturally, this photo became our parents' favorite photo of us because, now married, their two little monkeys have grown up. :)
Here is one of the letters I wrote to everyone from Japan on July 1, 2006. Enjoy!
Greetings from Iwakuni,
Japan! We
landed in Hiroshima Airport yesterday night and was so blessed that we
didn't get fogged out and sent to another airport! We were given a
ride to the Military Base in Iwakuni (about a hour and a half drive)
and have been having a blast running around since! We did have a few
small stumblings blocks along the way (including dealing with jet lag
and almost getting rained out of sight seeing this morning) but by the
grace of God, He parted those clouds and gave us both enough energy to
do everything that we wanted to do for today! :) Amen to that and our
safe travels to
Japan :-D
We've eaten plenty of GREAT Japanese food since we've landed
here - much of which I have no clue what it was, but know that it
tastes great! You think that Japanese food tastes good in the states -
you should try the stuff here! So far, we've dined on Onigiri (rice
balls), curries, mochis (sweeten rice balls), hot rice bowls with
crunchy rice on the bottom and veggies and kim chee on top, soba
noodles and even wasabi soft serve ice cream! (It's like vanilla ice
cream with little green wasabi bits in it!) The green tea soft serve
ice cream is also divine! We're planning on finding some Kobe Beef to
try out, and might possibly go back to the curry shop in Iwakuni to try
cuttlefish in black ink sauce!! We've eaten so much food - and
imagine, this is only day one!!! Luckily for us, we've been literally
running and walking all over the place!
I've been driving Dan nuts by running back and forth all over the
place and dragging him to every single cutie shop I can find. I am in
HEAVEN just looking at all the things they have here! Both men and
women have tons of cute keychains and fuzzy dangly-doos on their phone
and bags, there are tons of cartoon characters on everything (from
freeway signs to vending machines to warning signs...you name it,
they've cute-ified it). In one of the department stores that we
visited, there is an entire floor dedicated to the UFO catcher machines
(claw machines where you can win stuffed animals), gumball machines
full of cute toys and keychains, and of course, all the Hello Kitty
stuff you can buy. If this department store was in the States, trust
me - you'd see me in there for at least a week just to go through all
the neat stuff they have here! Even the airport mall was super cute!
I'm surprise I'm not going broke from buying all these cute stuff -
(un)fortunately, Dan is carrying all the yen, so I don't have to worry
about going too broke....
Today, we also took a bus to Kintaikyo Bridge and not only walked
the bridge, but also took a hike up the mountain to visit the temple at
the top of the mountain. It took one hour, lots of sweat, two 2-liter
bottles of amino acid drinks (called Amino Suppli - very tasty!), and a few mosquito bites, but we made it
to the top! The view was spectacular!
There are so many sights to
see and so many things I have to tell you guys when I get home!!! The
temples here are very beautiful - and the gardens are so lush! Again -
God certainly answers prayers - we didn't have rain the entire time we
were outside! Amen to that, ya'll! :)
One funny story:
My first introduction to true Japanese life was my first visit to a Japanese Bathroom in the airport during a layover in Tokyo,
Japan.
First off, the bathroom actually had a MAP next to the entrance of the
bathroom. I didn't notice this and promptly walked into the restroom
area to find two full blown bathrooms to the side complete with a bed (in case you got tired and needed a nap after taking a poop?) and big enough to be a small bedroom (complete with toilet!). When you walk
in further, there are 3 types of toilet to visit....one is a "standard"
toilet with a seat on the side to lock your toddler in (2 months to 18
months, if I remember correctly). This is the stall I walked into (and
probably was not supposed to as there are only 2 of these stalls). The
other type of stall is one with a picture of the stall with butt
getting sprayed - yes, the infamous butt sprayer....I have not been
that adventurous yet - but they are everywhere in Japan. The last type are the infamous "squat" toilets. I graduated and
tried one out today and did NOT get anything on me! These types are
EVERYWHERE you go - the one I used at the bus station only had these
types - when in Rome, ne? :-) I can say that everywhere I've gone so
far are SUPER clean at least...but OYE! Can you imagine the confusion
of having to choose between 4 different stalls (and the confusion I had
when seeing a urinal in a girls bathroom - for kids, I presume)? Dan had it
just as bad - when you walk between the boys and the girls facilities,
the boy's bathroom area is as open as it gets - I could see straight
into their bathrooms, complete with the urinals lined up in a row!
Talk about lack of privacy!!!
