Yesterday was 33 1/2 hours long! We woke up in Japan at 7:00 a.m. on Tuesday morning. Our plane left the runway exactly 12 hours later and 9 1/2 hours after that, we landed in Vancouver. It was a somewhat turbulent flight and although we tried to nap on the plane, we weren’t very successful.

When we landed in Vancouver, it was Tuesday morning again! I find it hard to get my head around but having crossed the International Date Line, we had gone back in time! Funny, we didn’t feel any younger!

My theory is that the best way to combat jet lag and get back into a normal routine is to stay up until a normal bedtime regardless of when you arrive somewhere. That meant staying awake for another 12 hours! We finally fell into bed last night and didn’t wake up until after 9:30 this morning! I’m sure it’ll be a few days before the effects of our super long day wear off completely but with the help of a bit of coffee, I’m managing.

Saying good-bye was hard to do especially since we don’t know when we’ll be back in Japan again. The most difficult part was leaving the four little children that we’ve become so close to. All under the age of 3, they will have changed so much by the time we see them again.

We had quite a send-off at the airport. We originally thought that we’d be making our way out to Narita by train which would be doable but not easy with all our baggage. Our friends wouldn’t hear of such a thing, however. Instead, we piled into Smoky and Ikuko’s little car with their entire family and all our luggage. On the way, we stopped at a highway rest stop where were met by Seiko and her two children!

Now we’re back in Canada enjoying our Vancouver grandchildren including Nathan Michael (Nate) born to Matt and Robin on February 15 while we were in Japan! He’s adorable, of course, and he and his big brother, Sam, don’t seem bothered by the fact that Gram and Grandpa are a wee bit tired.

We’ve been living out of suitcases for the past month. It hasn’t been as difficult as it might have been because we’ve been blessed to be able to use Pastor Steve and Shelley’s beautiful house as a home base and have only taken our smaller suitcases when we’ve left here to go to Osaka and to other homes in this area.  Our time here is running out, however, and the time has come for a complete repacking job.

We have four nights left in Japan. We’ll spend the first two with Seiko, Atsuo and their two boys (our Japanese grandsons) then move back to Smoky and Ikuko’s for the last two. Again, we’ll take only our smaller suitcases to Seiko and Atsuo’s but I want to have everything ready for our flight back to Canada today as we’ll only stop here for a few minutes to pick up the rest of our baggage on our way to Smoky and Ikuko’s after church on Sunday. We’ll go to the airport from their place on Tuesday.

So, everything is folded and sitting in piles on the bed and now it’s a matter of figuring out what goes in which bag. Instead, I’m procrastinating and sitting on the computer! It really isn’t that big of a job. We travel light and I know there’s enough room for everything. We’ve picked up a few mementos and gifts to take home with us but we’ve also unloaded the gifts that we brought for people here so it should even out.

We’ll be carrying an extra box back but that’s because we did some shopping for Matt and Robin while we’ve been here. Having lived in Japan for two years, there are things they can’t get at home that they wanted us to pick up. Their box is already packed though. Now it’s just a matter of getting our own stuff organized. So why am I still sitting here? Why am I procrastinating?

I’m looking forward to going home and especially to our ten day stopover in Vancouver where we’ll meet our new grandson who was born while we’ve been here but perhaps I’m also a little bit sad to see our time here coming to an end. I do love Japan and it’s going to be hard to say good bye again. We have to leave so many special people behind!

Over the past couple of weeks as we’ve revisited many of the places that we enjoyed during our year in Japan and explored a few new ones, I’ve been reminded how fortunate we were to live where we did. Funabashi is part of the greater Tokyo area but our students often referred to it as the countryside. To those of us who are used to the wide open spaces of the Canadian prairie, it is extremely urban but compared to the crowds and bustle of Tokyo proper, it’s definitely more peaceful. I loved being close enough to enjoy time in Tokyo but was always glad to return to the relative calm of our quieter neighbourhood.

Last night we had supper in downtown Tokyo with a friend from church who chooses to commute two hours to and from work each day in order to enjoy living in Chiba which is even further out than Funabashi. In addition to the more peaceful lifestyle, lower housing costs also draw people away from the city centre. We’ve been told that it costs less to rent an apartment in Funabashi than a parking stall in downtown Tokyo!

This week we’ve both immersed ourselves in the heart of the city and sought out quieter spots. It’s actually quite easy to do both. The day before yesterday, we walked through the bustling shopping districts of Harajuku and Shibuya and crossed the world’s busiest pedestrian intersection but we also strolled the wooded grounds of Yoyogi Koen. Today we revisited a smaller park in the area where we lived. I love the vibrancy of the world’s largest city but I’m glad I didn’t live in the middle of it. I also need time in more tranquil places.

When we taught English in Japan, most of our fellow teachers were the age of our children. Many of them were here for a year or two before returning to North America to establish careers or return to school for further education. Others moved on from our English school to other employment here in Japan. We were a bit concerned about a few who seemed to be in a rut, staying on at MIL only because they didn’t know what else to do with their lives. Today we had lunch with one of the young men that we taught with and were excited to hear about his plans. After five years in Japan, he’s on his way back to America to enter grad school.

After lunch, we headed out to the temple town of Narita to revisit one of our favourite spots. To me, the Buddhist temple, Shinsho-ji, dedicated to Fudo Myouou, the god of fire, is representative of the spiritual darkness that blankets this land but the grounds, especially those furthest from the temple itself, are an area of great beauty and tranquility. We’ve visited in both spring at cherry blossom time and in the fall when the trees were clothed in autumn splendor. Today, with many of them bare and only the earliest blossoms bursting forth, the look was somewhat starker but no less beautiful. Pathways circle three ponds with water flowing from one to the next. Without the colour of cherry blossoms or autumn leaves to focus on, my eye was especially drawn to reflections on the water.

Our main reason for wanting to return to Japan was the people. Over the past couple of weeks we’ve reconnected with quite a few former students and colleagues as well as our wonderful church family. We’ve also had plenty of time to revisit favourite places in and around Tokyo and to explore some new ones. We continue to be amazed at how easily two hicks from rural Alberta manage to navigate the world’s largest city. Even when we get on the wrong train, as we did this morning, we manage to find our way.

We spent much of this afternoon strolling through Asakusa. The district’s big attraction is its Buddhist temple, Senso-ji, but we’d visited it before and have seen enough temples to last a lifetime so we spent our time exploring Nakamise-dori, the shopping street leading up to the temple where everything from junky tourist trinkets to genuine crafts are sold. We also wandered many of the little side streets surrounding it. After awhile, I’d had enough of shops and crowds so after relaxing over coffee at a nearby Starbuck’s, we went for a long stroll along the Sumida River. So relaxing!

As we walked, we had a good view of the newest structure on the Tokyo skyline. When complete, the Tokyo Sky Tree will be 634 metres high; the tallest tower in the world. It’s main purpose will be radio and television broadcasting but it will also house a restaurant and observation tower.

In spite of yesterday's snow, there are flowers in Tokyo in February!

As we planned our trip to Japan, one of my great desires was to reconnect with a former student with whom I’d had a special friendship during our year here. It was Rie who invited us to spend a weekend at her second home at Onjuku and it was she and her classmates that I sang karaoke with. Unfortunately, she doesn’t use the internet and I had failed to get her mailing address before returning to Canada so we’d lost contact with one another.

Several weeks ago, I decided to email our supervisor at the English school where we taught to see if he could assist me in getting back in touch with her. He responded right away but, for privacy reasons, was unable to give me her contact information. That was perfectly understandable. What he did do, however, was let me know that she still attends the same Monday afternoon class that she did when I was teaching her. Reading between the lines, it was easy to see that if I showed up at the right school at the right time on a Monday afternoon, I would catch her there!

I couldn’t remember if Rie’s class met at one o’clock or two so the day before yesterday, we made sure that we were at the school by 1:40. The receptionists were happy to inform me that she’d be arriving soon for the 2:00 class. We decided to go for a walk around the area and come back in time to see her at the end of her class but as we left the school, who should be walking toward us but Rie! The moment she spotted us, her face lit up and within moments she had invited us to her home for dinner the following evening! After class, she also invited the other two ladies who had shared the class with her to join us.

What an evening it turned out to be! Rie is a multi-talented but genuinely humble lady. In her early to mid sixties, she continues to work as a tennis instructor four days a week. When we entered her livingroom two things stood out, a cabinet filled with tennis trophies and a baby grand piano! Urged on by her classmates, she played a bit of Tchaikovsky for us after dinner. What a dinner it was! We knew from past experience what a wonderful cook she is. This time, the main dish was vegetable tempura but there were also many delicious side dishes. Tennis, piano and cooking are but a few of Rie’s talents. She also paints watercolours, does Japanese flower arranging and has taught the tea ceremony.

We had an absolutely wonderful evening with all three women. It was so much more than I had ever hoped for when I wanted to reconnect! It was also a delight for me to see how much their confidence in English has grown over the past two years, especially Satomi’s.

Satomi, Elaine-sensei, Yoko & Rie

When our grandson, Drew, was diagnosed with a severe phonological disorder last month, it was suggested that Melaina make a picture book for him so that when he wanted to ask for something, he could point to the appropriate picture. Being the diligent and creative mom that she is, she went to work on Drew’s picture book the very next day. When she gave it to him, he began to use it right away and was so excited that he carried it around with him for the rest of the day.

I had to communicate in a similar manner today. A couple of days ago, I was hit by a stomach ailment of unknown origin. If I was in many parts of the world, I’d attribute this to drinking the water but Japan’s water is perfectly safe and no, it wasn’t the raw chicken because too much time had passed for that to be the cause. We’re not sure if this thing is viral, bacterial or stress related but I ended up spending most of Saturday in bed. Fortunately, by yesterday I felt much better and my strength had returned but I’ve been left with a nasty case of diarrhea. By this morning I’d decided that a visit to the pharmacy might be a good idea but how would I explain what I was looking for? No problem! Out came my trusty Japanese phrase book. I simply looked up diarrhea and pointed to the Japanese script for Do you have any medicine for diarrhea? Through gestures, the lady behind the counter was able to ask me if I was also vomiting or suffering from headaches which, thankfully, I’m not. She quickly produced a package of pills that even have English instructions on the packaging.

During all the time we lived in Japan, we seldom had to use our phrase book but it sure did come in handy today! Now, if only the pills will work. They are little black spheres and have the most vile odor and aftertaste imaginable but if they do the job, they’ll be totally worth it.

We came ‘home’ to Funabashi yesterday travelling from Osaka to Tokyo on the Shinkansen (bullet train). Ever the frugal travellers and having plenty of time to make the trip, we chose a less expensive train that made many stops along the way.

Our train pulling into the station

Though we’d been to both Osaka and Tokyo before, we hadn’t seen much of the countryside in between. Near Maibara we saw something we hadn’t seen in Japan before; snow! Apparently parts of the country have had a lot of it lately.

Further along the way we were blessed with a close up, almost perfect view of Mt. Fuji! What a sight! It was very cool to look at it in it’s shining glory and remember the morning in July 2008 when we watched the sunrise from its summit.

Fuji-San

Imagine trying to meet a friend in West Edmonton Mall on a busy day, perhaps during the Christmas shopping season. Now imagine that you’ve never been there before, you don’t know exactly where you’re supposed to meet and you can’t read any of the signs that surround you. That’s pretty much what our experience last evening was like!

We were supposed to meet Matt and Robin’s friend, Kumiko, for dinner. She suggested that we meet at the South/North gate of Namba subway station. South/North? That doesn’t make sense, I told her when we made our plans over the phone a couple of days earlier but she assured me that such a gate existed. I’ve seen enough of the crazy use of English in this country to accept that that was, in fact, a possibility. Namba station, like many others in Japan is a huge shopping complex as well as a train station but it doesn’t have a South/North gate.

When it became obvious that we had no idea where to find Kumiko, we tried calling her on a public phone but couldn’t figure out how it worked; another disadvantage of not knowing the language! We did find a helpful English-speaking lady in an information centre who assured us that the elusive South/North gate did not exist. She suggested that we might go to the station master’s office and ask to have our friend paged. That sounded like a great idea. When we got there, I tried to ask the young man who served us to do just that but his English was extremely limited. Through gestures, I tried to explain. “Oh, you want me to phone your friend?” he asked. That was even better than we hoped for! He made the call and Kumiko, who was actually running a little late, showed up a few minutes later!

She took us to a little restaurant nearby and treated us to an amazing assortment of Japanese dishes. Chicken is the restaurant’s specialty and, in addition to miso soup, seafood sashimi, vegetable tempura and rice, we enjoyed chicken in a variety of ways; raw, deep fried, in mini wraps with avocado, and grilled on little wooden skewers. It was all delicious and we were absolutely stuffed by the time we finished.

It was great to reconnect with Kumiko who was, in fact, our first tour guide in Japan. On the first day of our visit with Matt and Robin in 2005, they had to work and Kumiko spent the day showing us Kyoto.