Electric City

For this trip, we didn’t want to duplicate any sites we saw last time, so we tried three different areas. On Monday night, we went to Akihabara, to an area known as “Electric City” for its abundance of electronics shops and video game arcades. (We were in dire need of an ethernet cable to use in our hotel room.) We found a store with seven stories that sold everything from big screen HDTVs to chopsticks.

Tokyo Metro at Night

On Tuesday night, we ate dinner at MOS Burger fairly early with Sam’s advisor, so we just wanted to find some good dessert. We ended up going to Ikebukuro to an enormous shopping mall called “Sunshine City.” It was also several stories tall (about the first 5-6 floors of a 59+ story skyscraper). There were so many places to see (there are 120 shops and 60 restaurants, plus an aquarium), that I know we only saw a fraction (plus it was getting late). We couldn’t decide on what to get for dessert until we agreed on ice cream from Cold Stone Creamery (but this Cold Stone had green tea ice cream!).

Imperial Palace

On Wednesday, our last day in Tokyo, we parked our luggage at Tokyo Station, where we would be catching the shinkansen (bullet train) later. We toured the grounds of the Imperial Palace, an area built in the Edo era, and still in use today. It was a beautiful area that gave us just a glimpse into feudal Japan.

Statue of Kusonoki Masashige

Since Japan (and Tokyo especially) is a complete mix of modern and traditional, this entire area of Japan cultural history is surrounded by expensive skyscrapers, international embassies, world trade, and everything that embodies the global society. We ate lunch in what could be considered “downtown” Tokyo, as it was the equivalent of New York’s Fifth Avenue.

Shinkansen at Tokyo Station

We did a little more shopping and then rested our very sore feet for a while before boarding the bullet train to Takasaki to meet Paul and Stacey Herrington (see next several posts).

This conference is held every 2 years and alternates between Japan and the U.S.; what fantastic timing that it was in Japan the year that I was asked to attend! This year it was on the Hongo campus of the University of Tokyo.

The conference was all in English, so I didn’t need to learn Japanese or have a translator. My talk was titled “Energy Analysis of a Turret Punch in a Production Setting,” which looked at how a CNC turret punch used electricity as it produced parts. Think of ENERGY STAR efficiency but for manufacturing equipment. My talk was well-received and there were good questions afterward.

Judith Alexander, a missionary who currently works with the Taga church and helped us arrange our travel, was a great friend we had made there during our short visit in 2006. We were able to catch up with her as well as the preacher, Sugao Tadokoro. They treated us to lunch and great conversation at Woody’s (just a few blocks from the church building), before having to head back to the bus station. Judith drove us to the bus stop (after first making a detour to the beach), and they sent us off with hugs and greetings for the Haruna church.

Below are two pictures from the most recent trip and two from the previous trip. Clockwise, from upper left: 1) The Taga church building, 2) Sugao preaching on Sunday morning (this trip), 3) Saito-san, a wonderful elderly couple in the church (from last trip), and 4) Sugao and Judith (from last trip).

Mike and Tomoko have three lovely daughters, Ana, Erika, and Kiara. They volunteered–on very short notice, mind you–to keep Samantha and me for a couple nights when we went to Hitachi to visit our brothers and sisters at the Taga church. We were so blessed to have this opportunity to get to know them better on this trip, and they really treated us like family. They were such a joy to be around, and we definitely feel like they were more of an encouragement to us than we were to them.

Thank you, Mike and Tomoko, for opening your home and hearts to us, and we give thanks to our Lord for the blessing you gave us through your company. God bless you and your family!

The sushi is on specific plates that indicate their price; as you take plates off and eat, the way the waitress knows your tab is to count the plates. We had a huge stack when we were done! Among the “standard” sushi Americans are familiar with (like California rolls or cucumber), I’m proud to say that both Ryan and I tried eel sushi and sea urchin sushi, and Ryan had raw salmon sashimi.

On Saturday I had the opportunity to learn Ikebana, the Japanese art of floral arranging. This is way more than just putting flowers into a vase! There are detailed patterns of varying skill level, each one adding complexity. This is an old art form that dates back to the 1400s.

Tomoko has been going to a class for several years (and it shows!) and asked her teacher if I could join in for one lesson. We traveled to her teacher’s house, a beautiful and pristine traditional Japanese house. The teacher had a special room dedicated to this class, a lot like a sun room.

I chose a simple pattern to follow and the teacher (with Tomoko translating) guided me through the steps of how to measure out the length of branches and stems, the proper way to cut the stems, placement of flowers at specific angles, and filling out the arrangement. You can see the book on the table showing the pattern I followed.

As stressful as it seemed at first, between having the language barrier and never arranging flowers before, I thought this was very relaxing activity. It demanded your whole attention and really focused your thoughts on the plants and the patterns they made.

The teacher was such a gracious host and even sent me home with copies of the patterns and instructions so that I can do it again. The photo below shows my completed arrangement, as well as Tomoko and her daughter Ana making their beautiful arrangements. Thank you, Tomoko, for introducing me to an awsome new hobby!

Before we left the house in the morning, we heard a loud speaker announcement outside the house. Think elections are obnoxious in the States? In Japan, political parties and candidates drive around town with loud speakers on their cars and announce their political platforms. We got to experience this because Japan was having an important election the next day on Sunday.

Ryan, Mike and Erika took a trip to an electronics store and the fish market. Living in Kansas, we don’t get to see a true fish market. This one was filled with fish caught by local fisherman that day–super fresh! It had the typical salmon, crab and tuna, but it also had squid, eel, snails, and octopus (pictured below). They then drove around the Ibaraki Christian College campus for a quick tour before a lunch of cold soba, udon, tempura, rice, and Japanese pickles.

I went with Tomoko, Ana, and Kiara to an Ikebana class (more to come on this in a separate post). We then drove down the beach road that follows the coast line on our way to lunch at a ramen shop. After lunch we drove past Ibaraki Christian College and the Shinto shrine down the street from it (shrine pictured below).

While finishing up my masters thesis, my advisor presented me with an opportunity to accompany her and share my research at an academic conference. This conference was on automated manufacturing equipment, and my thesis looked at how manufacturing equipment used energy (electricity) as they build parts and ways to save energy. This conference goes from city to city each year, and it turned out that this year’s conference just happened to be at the University of Tokyo! I asked if I could bring Ryan and extend our stay on either side of the conference and my advisor said yes. Japan, here we come!

We contacted Judith Alexander, the missionary we worked with in Hitachi-Taga, and told her that we’d be able to come back and visit everyone. She helped us plan out our travel between Tokyo’s Narita Airport and Hitachi, and also connected us to Mike and Tomoko McLain, who offered to house us while in Hitachi.

Like with our Ireland/Scotland trip, we made a big effort to only take carry-on luggage: one backpack and one small carry-on each. We did it, and took even less stuff than when we went to Ireland! The difference between checking bags and only taking carry-ons is amazing–there’s much more freedom and we can move so much faster. Honestly, the less we take the better time we have because it forces us to go out into the community where we are to do laundry, buy toiletries and other supplies. We really get to know the people, and building relationships really makes the trip meaningful. Pictured below is all we traveled with, but it contained: clothes for one + week, shoes, laptop, iPad, books, gifts, medicine, toiletries (in the 1-quart clear ziplock), Lara bars and snacks, and gifts.

After dinner there were games of ladder ball and volleyball, and then singing! A group congregated around the gentleman in the cowboy hat, pictured below. He is a fantastic cowboy singer, and taught/sang us the history behind our state song Home on the Range. There were a few sing along songs, too.

The fireworks show happened in between rain showers, but didn’t last too long! When we first arrived the all-day downpour had finally let up, but only to start again right as fireworks began. Everyone relocated into the shed for cover from the rain to watch a few more fireworks before the wicks were put out by the rain.

It was a great evening–thank you Tristan and Leslie for inviting us!

This special class was focused on the geography and culture of Caracas, Venezuela. I wanted to kids to be able to see how far away Venezuela is from Kansas, see photos of the people that Jonathan served, and taste some of the food that they eat there.

The lesson started with a short video clip from the Disney movie UP!, where the two kids talk about visiting “Paradise Falls” (which is Angel Falls in Venezuela). The kids recognized this clip so I used it to introduce where we were heading on our map. I used Google Earth and started the map in Kansas, right over our church building, and then flew south down to South America to Caracas. Once we “arrived” in Caracas, preachers Steve Tandy & Mark Yeakley talked to the kids about their first-hand experience in Caracas from when they went to visit Jonathan earlier in the year. They had some great stories to tell the class about the mountains, the beach, the people, and what worship and bible class are like for kids their age in Caracas.

We then traveled from Caracas to Cocoli, which is difficult to find on a map. Jonathan had given us the distance from Caracas to the fishing village, so I had the kids help me use the ruler tool in Google Earth to measure the distance to find the fishing village.

I had made one of my favorite latin dishes, ceviche, for the kids to try. Jonathan said that this is a very common dish and would be perfect to introduce the kids to fishing village food. After reviewing our food tasting etiquette, the kids each enjoyed a small helping of ceviche with chips. Most liked it, but it wasn’t as successful as our lentil stew or bread and cheese classroom taste tests.

In a way that on the Holy Spirit could do, we had an unexpected visit from missionaries Josh & Julie Marcum from Bolivia. For the last part of our class they were so gracious and taught the kids a song in Spanish, showed them Bolivian money and then prayed with kids in both Spanish and English. I was so thankful that they were there–their example and teaching really made the lesson come alive and real to the kids!

We finished by showing a video Jonathan had made called Campaign for the Children of Cocoli. This introduced the service project: collecting spare change to provide Bibles and other supplies for the children in Cocoli. They kids were really excited to help and since this time have been faithfully bringing their spare change each week to their Bible classes.