October 26th, 2008 Scott
Gina wants a new car. I can’t blame her. She got the ‘hand me down’ car after I got my Ractis last November. This car is a fairly worn out Nissan March. They don’t sell them in the states, but they could. It is a very typical compact car, but hers is tired and is a shaky at speed on the freeway. She wants something better and I’m think that’s a good idea.
We’ve been car shopping a few times and it has been challening to say the least. She wants a small car to better handle driving on the smalls streets here. My car seems huge to her, but keep in mind that it is actually smaller than our Subaru Forester we used to have back home in the states. Everything’s relative though and my car does seem large compared to many of the yellow plate or Kei cars (ケイカ) around here. However, it can’t be too small as to not be able to see easily out the back passenger windows from the driver’s seat when looking over your shoulder. Right away we wrote off the Copen because of the window issue. The Tanto, while small, made her feel weird because it is so tall. Ultimately we’ve settled on a Daihatsu Latte, if we can find one at a good price. The Latte has only been around since 2004 so even used ones are around $8000. That’s a lot of money around here when most used cars are less than $2500. Keep in mind that we cold buy a brand new Latte for only $10,000. Cars are much cheaper here than in the states, but they are also much smaller. The Latte is a yellow plate or Kei Car which means the engine can only be 660cc’s. That’s the size of a nice snow mobile engine back in the states. These cars are not taxed as heavily and have other financial incentives to get people to save space. I’d say half to two thirds of the cars here in Okinawa are Kei Cars.
In perusing the Latte web site, I found out that a new one has a nice feature: seat deodorant. In fact, their web site has a hilarus little cartoon to demonstrate the purpose of this seat deodorant. Choose one of the colors of the cars when you get there, then make the girl eat the hamburger (if you choose the cool) or the eggs (if you choose the pink one on the left) by clicking on the food and watch what happens. This car is specifically marketed to women in their 20s or 30s and this is one of several features that might appeal to a woman driver.
Only would the japanese advertise a fart eating seat using a blushing cartoon.
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October 18th, 2008 Scott
Gina and I went to the Naha Tug of War last Sunday and had a great time. Here is the Wikipedia article about it (click on any image to see a larger, more detailed version):
The Naha Tug of war (那覇大綱挽, Naha Tug of war?) is an event at the annual festival held in Naha, Okinawa, Japan. Its roots may be traced back to the 1600s. Held on Route 58, it is a battle between the East and West teams. This correlates with the competition between two rulers in the Naha area in days of old [1]
The event draws some 25,000 attendees annually, and is preceded on the prior day with a parade celebration on Kokusai Street (also in Naha). In 1997 the event was first logged in the Guinness Book of World Records as being the largest tug-of-war event in the world. (reference url same as above). The rope weighs some 40 metric tons.
The festival begins with men dressed in traditional garb standing on the rope facing in opposite directions to symbolize the battle between East and West. A myriad of performances take place along the rope’s length—from martial-artists of varying ages to older women performing a sort of fan-dance. It is a truly international event with Japanese nationals, American military, and tourists all in attendance. Just before the start of the match a man dressed in the garb of the Ryūkyūan kings stands on a wooden platform hoisted in the air on the shoulders of men standing on opposite sides of the rope. The “king” is carried on this platform down the length of the rope, 
before the festival starts.
The main rope has many smaller ropes extending from it, and the participints pull these during the contest. The contest lasts 30 minutes and the challenge is to pull the other team a total of 30 meters. Not doing so results in a draw.
After the time limit expires, it is customary for participants to take a length of the rope as a token, and so throngs of people using tools ranging from their hands to hacksaws set on the rope cutting lengths of it to commemarate the festival.
Gina and I did manage to get a piece of rope at the conclusion so we have our one year of good luck. We didn’t actually partake in the tug for it looked a little dicey to get involved with that aspect of the event. However, as you can see, I did get several good pictures of the event. Even though I had watched it on TV last year, to be there in person was a whole new level of entertainment. The men holding the large poles with decorations at the top worked very hard to keep those poles vertical. There were about eight of these poles with groups of men working each one. During the actual ‘tug’, they made those poles dance and swing. Before the tug started, they paraded them around the site and into position, but only one person at a time would hold up the pole as they did this. It looked to me like it weighed in excess of 100 pounds and each person would only last a few seconds before handing it off to the next person. One of the groups did get their pole badly tipped over and nearly hit the crowd. A scary moment that reminded me of the year some balloons got out of control at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day 
Parade.
The event happens every year in October and is a must see if you are visiting. October is when the weather finally starts cooling down as well so it is a very pleasant time of year to visit. Cooler but not so much rain yet. We also had a chance to do some sightseeing along Kokusai Street which is a long street of tourist shops that are all fairly cheesy. There are however some good restaurants there as well. We ventured off the street a few blocks to a local market and saw some great stuff there, including the fresh fish market. These fish are the same ones (the blue parrot fish in particular) that swim in the bay by our apartment and are constantly being fished for by the locals off the rocks. I understand they make very good sushimi.
Japanese lessons are going very well. We’ve learned Hiragana and Katakana and can now read a lot of signs around town. We also know how to sign our names in Katakana. Today I was able to read a sign and order a flavor of drink becuase I could read the sign. It was very cool to feel like I could communicate at least a little bit.
Preparing to tug
Fresh fish!
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October 6th, 2008 Scott
A big aqurium on Okinawa
This was homecoming week at Kadena High School and much like everything else here in this land of quasi-little America, it’s not quite the same as it would be in the USA. We had a short week including and early release on Tuesday for some inservice events and then no students on Wednesday for what they call “Educator Day”. Essentially this is a one day educator conference with sessions produced from within the district. All the teachers in the Okinawa DoDDS school district come to Kadena High School for the day and choose from a multitude of sessions to attend regarding various facets of education. Uniquely here, there are also sessions that have nothing to do with education. For example, my second session was with a vocational teacher from our building that likes to lead tours off island in his free time. His session was about going to Vietnam and Cambodia for 10 days over Winter break in December. It had nothing to do with teaching, learning, or student achievement but it was interesting and I signed up Gina and myself to go.
Christmas in Vietnam? I never thought I’d be saying those two words together in one sentence. It should be a unique experience to say the least and I’ll be sure to tell you all about it here.
At any rate, the students still put on a spirit week with dress up days (Wacky-Tacky Monday, Pajama Tuesday, Character Thursday, and Class Colors Friday) and the Pep
Gina walking out of the cave shrine
Rally on the field Friday afternoon with the homecoming game that night. We played Kubasaki, the only other football team on the island, for the third and final time. The best record of the three games gives the winner the ability to go to the Far East Championship which would be like a league championship in the states. We have 14 high schools in the Far East DoDDS area and that is divided into large schools and small schools to make two champions. Kadena is the reigning Far East Champion and won all three games against Kubasaki.
On Saturday, the students went to the Homecoming Dance at Camp Hansen, a Marine Corps base near where I live, but about 15 miles from Kadena High School. There is a curfew of 11:00 for all minors with American
Band students in action in the stands at Homecoming
families (SOFA status personel). So, all students need to be home by 11:00 PM. That means the dance ended at 10:00 and started at 7:00 PM. It was catered and had a very good dj according to my sources. I didn’t attend. I understand that many students do after hourse events at some parents’ homes after curfew and then remain there throughout the night until curfew ends at 6:00 AM or so. I don’t remember the exact time on that, but it allows the typical late night teenager to still have his evening entertainment and stay within the bounds of the curfew.
Small shrine in the cave at a temple. Click for detail
The band marched to the theme music from Halo for the half time show. This is the first time that Kadena HS has ever had a marching band. We bought some used uniforms this summer and cleaned them up and used them for the first time as well. Only two of my students had ever marched before so it took and extraordinarily long time to teach them how to field march. I had written the show for three songs (also from Video Games Live), but we simply didn’t have the time to get to those songs. I though the sound was okay and the marching okay for the time and experience that we had. More practice from the students would’ve helped, but that’s always going to be true. The critical review from our audience was awesome though. The intro to the song was without movement. When we started moving on the field, the crowd erupted in cheers and that was a huge positive vibe for my students. They soaked it all up and you could see it on their faces.
At the start of the year, my predominately freshman band was very anxious to not march. I did a survey today and 78% of my students indicated that marching was fun and should be done every year from now on.
Mission accomplished.
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