April sewing

After all the months of cold and gray I was wondering if I'd somehow lost the ability to find beautiful things around me.  I often went outside with the camera but came home with no photos.  Now however, the world is glittering and full of color and my blog friends are going to be tired of all the scenery photos on my blog! 

So for a break I'll show what's in my sewing room this week.

I made up another fabric post card for my mother earlier this month but in the excitement of having Takumi come and going up to Morioka I've forgotten to send it.  As it is still April 30th in California I will put it in the mail today.

The post card this month was a bit more of a challenge than previous months.  Do you notice the difference?  I am keeping the paper cards for myself as a record of what I've been making for my mother, and the previous three months were silhouettes of animals whereas the ladybug this month is completely cutout with the color behind each part.  These are still a lot of fun to make though maybe I like the paper version better (but for the past three years I've sent my mother FABRIC postcards so I'm keeping the tradition with her.)

And in the early part of April I worked on another Mola block.  It is trying to be a seahorse otherwise known as a dragon out of the 12 animals from the Chinese horoscope.  In Chinese it was believed that the seahorse was a sea dragon...  and the Japanese name tatsunootoshigo, has something to do with dragons (I think)...  Anyway, this block is trying to be a sea-dragon (the pattern's choice... not mine).

So now I've made 6 Mola blocks...  Time to get out the red fabric again!

Boys' Day Carp Kites

Golden Week has started in Japan with Saturday being a day off.  Monday and Tuesday are regular days again but Wednesday, Thursday and Friday are holidays again.  We celebrated the start of Golden week by eating breakfast outside yesterday morning and then going to look for flying carp kites in the countryside.  Boys' Day is May 5th.

There weren't as many carp out as we expected...  In the city it is hard to fly the huge carp kites but the farmers with their rice fields and multiple generations living in the same home often have family Boys' Day kites flying.  This is the first set we found not far from us.

And another set by the side of the road.  (Tetsu took this photo from his car window.)

The third set was probably set up by a small town off in the hills.  It was in a town park.  I spent a lot of time under the carps waiting for them to fly in the wind.

Close-up, I noticed the gold patterns on the carp...  Flying cranes!

Tetsu finally got a photo of them soaring in the wind!

And the "fourth" set of cranes was also set up by the whole length of the town.  Hundreds and hundreds...  thousands! of mini carp kites along the roads leading to and out of the town.

And that was about it for the carp kites yesterday.  Though the weather was nice in the morning, by afternoon it was thundering, the rain was coming down in sheets and the wind whipping the trees around.  I'm sure most of the farmers hurriedly took down their carp kites before the storm hit!

These are the only Boys' Day carp in my house!

Morioka church

So...  Winding up our third reason to go to Morioka.

Tetsu and I are members of this little church up north.  We had switched our membership a couple of years back choosing to return to the small church where Tetsu had been baptized more than 35 years ago.  And as mentioned yesterday, our family grave is located in the church's section of the Christian cemetery and thus it seemed a logical choice to want to support the church more with membership and offerings.  Although we only get to the Morioka church once a year, we do worship regularly at a local church...  But the two churches are VERY different!

The church in our town is loud and joyful and crowded with people.  There are lots of foreigners as there is English and Chinese interpretation going on.  There are 5 weekly services and Tetsu and I choose to attend the guitar and drums and keyboard gospel service.  It reminds me a bit of the contemporary service at my California church.  There are lots of young people and young families.  Tetsu and I add to the older generation at this service.  People listen to the sermon while drinking from their coffee cups or water bottles, the seating arrangements are folding chairs that we drag to the sides of the room after each service.  NOT TRADITIONAL!

 On the other hand, the Morioka church, where Tetsu was baptized is a beautiful, somber sanctuary with stained glass windows and wooden pews. 

The pastor wears a flowing black robe weekly.  The music is provided by an electric organ.  The weekly congregation attendance is less then 30 people and the average age of the members these days is probably in the 70s.  Even when we attended this church nearly 40 years ago, the congregation was much the same in age and make-up...  thus these days we really don't know many people at the church.  So many have passed on and the "younger" generation are all retired or have moved away to live with their children.  The church attendees are all pleasant and quiet and they cherish the holy atmosphere of the worship services. 

A member was arranging flowers from her garden for this Sunday's altar.

In all honesty I prefer the celebration of our local church but Tetsu finds comfort in the old hymns and solemn rites of the Morioka church where he first learned of God and Jesus.  Isn't it nice that there are so many ways, all right, to worship our God!

We left Morioka immediately after the Sunday morning service only stopping to take a photo of the majestic Mt. Iwate which overlooks the city.  It was a good weekend and we arrived in Nikko in the early evening.  All cats fine, Choco happy, message from Takumi that they were enjoying themselves, a tired Tetsu from all the driving!
 

A visit to Morioka

With Takumi and the others on their way to other parts of Japan, Friday morning Tetsu and I took off for Morioka, his hometown and the city where I first lived when coming to Japan.  40 years ago there was still no Bullet Train and the foreigners were few and far between.  Now it is rather a bustling city.

But we weren't going up to Morioka by Bullet Train, instead we drove the 6 hours on the expressway making rest stops along the way.  My neighbors agreed to take care of the cats for me but we bundled Choco and her kennel into the car and she joined us on the trip.  I'm not sure how much Choco likes traveling as she has to spend all that time in her kennel... but she can see out the window and I slipped her treats occasionally.  There are very nice dog runs at the different service areas along route.

The reason for going to Morioka was...  to see friends, to pay an annual visit to the church where we are members, to visit our family's grave. All three reasons are true, but to Japanese, only the last one really makes any sense. Anybody and everybody makes annual, bi-annual treks to their hometowns to visit their family grave...  It is a major part of filial piety!  I always find this a bit difficult to understand as in America I never had the custom of grave visiting.  I have never visited my grandparents graves (in Indiana and Illinois) and my father's ashes were spread at sea so there's no place to visit there either...

The first stop we made in Morioka was at a garden and hardware store to pick up some decorative stones for our grave site.   With only a yearly visit, we knew that the first job was going to be pulling weeds and raking up the area.  The Christian cemetery is up on a hillside (rather than on Buddhist temple grounds) and each grave is cared for by each family so little maintenance gets done. Once we'd loaded bags of gravel and stones we headed for the small business hotel in the middle of downtown Morioka for the night.  (Choco slept in the car.)

The next morning we treated Choco to a romp around the city park which is located on castle ruins...  and then off we went to the cemetery.

 The bridge crossing a dry castle moat.

Japanese castle walls are a fascinating interlocking of large and small stones.  They are constructed so that they hold up even with the strong earthquakes we get (as proven by the Kumamoto castle which managed to survive the 7.0 strength earthquake last year with the corner stones just barely holding the castle weight).

 Yep...  Choco looks like she's glad she was included on our trip.

The cherry blossoms were just beginning to bloom.

Tetsu and I did a bunch of weeding and then spread out our stones and washed down the grave stone. We'd also bought some measly flowers at a local supermarket when....

 Da-da-da-da!  My friend Nobuko-san arrived at the cemetery laden with flowers from her garden!

Nobuko-san was my first friend when I arrived in Japan and as I couldn't yet speak Japanese I chattered away at her in English and she chattered back at me in Japanese and somehow we made a lasting friendship. 

Our family grave... It is our immediate family's grave for one reason because Tetsu isn't the eldest son and his ancestor's grave is somewhere else (generations and generations of ashes are kept in the same grave). It is also our own grave as we are Christian whereas the rest of Tetsu's family is Buddhist.  Their grave is on a temple ground.  And this is our family grave because it already holds the ashes of our first born child, Maya-chan who died at two months of age.  Though Tetsu and I were young, we were "given" a small portion of land in our church's section of the Christian cemetery and we were able to start our own "family" grave.  The inscription (besides our family name) is from Exodus 15:2.

"The Lord is my strength and my song,

And He has become my salvation."

While Tetsu swept and scrubbed, Nobuko-san and I sat at the grave and got caught up on the last year.  You can tell a good friend when she even enjoys a visit with you at a CEMETERY!  We also wandered around looking at gravestones and "visiting" church friends whom we knew.
We said good-bye to Nobuko-san and then headed over to Tetsu's high school friend's house meeting up with yet another friend. 

We spent 7 hours chatting with these friends and munching on local foods that Tetsu remembers and loves so much. 

Part way through I started teaching the wife how to do tatting as I'd cleverly brought along a couple of tatting shuttles on the trip north.

 Tetsu's friend had a very cute dog!

Good times with good friends. 

Grave visit, checked off..  Visiting with friends, checked off.  Last purpose... getting to the church, to be done on the morrow.

Edo Wonderland

I'm sorry.  Today's post is going to be a complete photo bombard.  Takumi and Julieta-san and Augustin's last day in Nikko was spent at Edo Wonderland, a sort of Japanese amusement park... for lack of a better word.  Though I have known Edo Wonderland is not far from us I've never had an opportunity to go and Takumi had only read about it online and thought that Julieta-san might enjoy the experience.  Early Thursday morning the kids said good-bye to Tetsu (who had to go to work) and then I drove us to the back-lands of Nikko looking for Edo Wonderland.

"Where on earth is this place back in these mountains?  The signs are here along the roads but why would anyone build anything back this far away from the rest of the touristy places?"

We found out when suddenly coming upon a completely different world back there in the hills.  Absolutely beautiful!!!

Edo is the archaic name for Tokyo and Edo Wonderland is a re-creation of the shogunate period of Japanese history when samurai wandered the streets and peasants pulled carts and ninja stalked the back alleys.  The Edo town is set in the mountains of Nikko (with wild cherry blossoms still blooming on the hillside) and once even through the parking lot all the CAST (to use a Disneyland word) are dressed in kimono and are playing the parts of citizens living in the Edo period.

So.  Here we are getting ready to enter Edo Wonderland.  Already the signs were only written in Japanese (rather than with English subtitles etc.  We were given a map of the Wonderland that was in English.)

The samurai guardsman let us pass through and then we walked into the "village".  On the way Takumi wanted his picture taken with this Nikko character...  Sorry I don't remember what this little statue is but for some reason Takumi and Julieta-san were very excited to meet him in Edo Wonderland and we went looking for him...

There was a "shrine" to pay our respects at (as if we hadn't spent enough time at the real shrines the day before.)

 And then entering the town. 

 Displays of baskets and wares of the day.  Peasants pulling wooden carts and looking forlorn and overworked (the cast really gets into their character).

The big attraction for me was to have Julieta-san dress up in kimono and there was a shop where one could pick out a style of kimono and be dressed in it for the day.  One had a choice of being a peasant (brown and drab kimonos) a shop girl (striped cotton kimonos with a simple obi/belt,) a hipster (sort of an outlaw samurai in flashy kimono), a samurai daughter (a silk kimono and an elaborately tied obi) or a princess (colorful silk kimono with long hanging sleeves and a trailing obi).  I insisted that Julieta-san get dressed up as a samurai daughter and though Augustin declined the experience, Takumi agreed to play along and get dressed as a samurai.  Off the two of them went to be dressed properly.

Ta-da!  My samurai son!  The servant who helped him dress is getting ready to present him with a sword.

"Sword.  No fighting.  Carry like this."

Takumi leaned over to me and whispered...

"For some reason everyone thinks I'm a foreigner and they all try hard to speak to me in English.  After all their hard work I couldn't break it to them that I speak Japanese..."

And then Julieta-san came out.  It took her a bit more time to get her hair done too...  I thought the nice lady who dressed her, doing her best to speak a few words of English, was very picturesque in her servant's outfit too.  Julieta-san said she had been given a choice of three or four different kimono to choose from after being asked what color she would like, and this was her choice.

 A samurai and his girl!

Julieta-san's hair was done up (she has a lot of hair!) and decorated with the appropriate decorations...  Her kimono collar is suggestively low on her back making her very sexy.

"Woo-hoo Takumi!  Getting a thrill seeing the back of my neck like this?"

We began our stroll around the town and at every corner there was someplace that proved to be a perfect backdrop for the kimono clad couple.

 A back side view.

And a pose.  As you can see, not many people there yet but afternoon the place was quite bustling... mostly with foreigners and one or two local Japanese who had brought them to Edo Wonderland for the experience. 

 Dressing up in kimono is really the highlight.

"Did you want to get dressed up in kimono too, Tani-san?"

"No.  I'm the photographer today.  But I could imagine it with a friend or two...  I'm not sure I'd get Tetsu to join me in the experience."

There were various shows that we could attend though we managed to get off schedule and only saw a ninja show.  The ninjas are professional actors that do stunts in movies.

One very nice "shop" was a free shamisen lesson...  The traditional three stringed instrument.  Augustin (and Takumi) play the guitar and the two of them were very interested in how the strings are plucked, how the instrument is tuned etc.  Augustin went to town with his own version of "electric guitar/shamisen music.

Takumi took the lesson to heart and was trying to read the music provided.  In the end Augustin, Takumi and the shamisen teacher played a few bars of "Sakura" together.

 Different parts of the town had different scenery.  Shops, samurai homes etc.

 So cute together!  While wandering the streets we would occasionally pass cast members who would grip their swords tightly and give Takumi a frightened look or in some cases a threatening look.  Supposedly the "visiting" samurai are supposed to strut down the street either domineering over everyone or else being ready to engage themselves in a sword fight at a moments notice.

"That samurai on the bridge there just leered at me...  I hope I don't have to go fight him..."

Edo Wonderland does a good job of making all of us visitors feel as if we'd really stepped into a different world.

All three of my kids participated in a stage game...  Sort of a rock, paper, scissor game Japanese style.

Another corner was a traditional writing desk with hibachi nearby.  Julieta-san is trying to look like she knows what she is writing.

 There was a small museum with displays of Edo handcrafts.  Basket making became an art.

 Cut glass is still a beautiful handcraft.

 Hair combs and hair ornaments are intricately hand carved.

 There were shows and tea rooms to visit though a bit on the expensive side.

We enjoyed watching a tourist try sword fighting with one of the samurai cast...  (The goal was to smash one of the paper balloons off the opponent.

Ah yes...  Takumi and Julieta-san finally found the character they had been looking for...  Something about a welcoming cat samurai...  He doesn't look much like a cat with his ears under that samurai hairstyle...

 A pretty peacock adds some color to the scenery.

 A bamboo grove that Takumi was ready to fight through.  It ended in a maze that we wandered around lost in for a good 15 minutes. 

Takumi specifically asked me to take a photo of him in front of this display...  A MATH lesson in front of a school classroom.

I guess this is how they taught geometry back in the Edo days.

A last walk through the town before changing back into street clothes.  It was a very nice experience and we really could have spent a couple more hours there but the three young people had a train to catch for their next destination in Japan.

I was very grateful that Takumi wanted to stop and introduce Julieta-san to Obaachan.  She hadn't been expecting them and was asleep when we arrived but Takumi woke her up and made the introductions.  Both he and Julieta-san gave Obaachan a hug and though the few minutes were short, it meant a lot to me (and to Tetsu and I'm sure to Obaachan) that they made the effort to see her.

 Saying good-bye at the train station.

The three of them have spent the next few days in Kyoto and Nara and Tokyo and the last I heard they were flying back to California today.  Tetsu and I sure had a good time with them all and I hope they enjoyed their visit to Japan.