Prince Aze Beach

Holidays are close, today we stopped all the work before lunch. After lunch I went with Taka san and Haruki to Kamtsu for some shopping. I had no idea that this shopping meant 'buy beers for Dag, buy many beers'. I was smiling to Haruki, the beer hasn't arrived yet here.

Oh yes, we bought also a bicycle. I tested it immediately, riding to my favorite beach on Tokunoshima, Prince Aze Beach. After 5 minutes I was sick of the bicycle and wanted to go back home to switch it for the scooter, but I endured another 5 minutes and was rewarded with the view that I kept in my heart for the last four years.

Commercial break. Kirin. Brewed for good times.

On the way home. View of the sugarcane valley from the village.

Tokunoshima

徳之島
Tokunoshima
My last night on Okinawa was a hard one. The new guest in our dormitory was a prodigy - he managed to outsnore me. Those who know me can imagine what kind of noise that was. At 3.30AM I had enough of it, had to get up early anyway, took a shower, made me a liter of coffee and a slow breakfast, still no hurry, watched an anime and finally it was five, I checked once again if all my stuff was packed and Sayonara, Base Hostel, see you next year! A half hour walk to the port, bought my ticket and boarded the ferry for the nine-or-so-hours trip to Tokunoshima. I got seasick few minutes after we left the port of Naha. And I wasn't the only one. Quite a lot of the passengers in the cabin were throwing up which made me sick even more. I went on the deck to bid farewell to the island, but it was freezing cold and the rolling of the ferry even worse.

The smoking area on the ferry is pretty small, but, as you can guess, it didn't cross the mind of any smoker to trespass the yellow line.

Besides, you also have the choice to not to smoke in the smoking area. Or to smoke where is forbidden to? I don't get. It's Japan, you know.

But I survived, it's the fate of survivors. Slept quite a lot, in fact and was feeling a little bit better when in the afternoon we came to Tokunoshima.

Taka san was waiting for me at the port with his little grandson Haruki. When we met last time (with Taka san, not with Haruki, this was the first time to meet the boy) I wasn't able to say a single word in Japanese. This time I greeted him properly in Japanese so, as I expected, he started talking with me in Japanese. Sorry, let's switch to English, OK?  With Chika san was all smiles and laugh, she doesn't speak English, so she cleraly spoke with me in Japanese, probably not expecting any kind of reply so she was really shocked when I answered correctly to her inquiry and the next moment she flooded me with Japanese that I couldn't understand. But she was happy to find out that I started learning and now everybody is speaking with me very slowly and in simple sentences so I can say that I'm making some slow progress. Mostly because of little Haruki. I met his mother during dinner and was happy because finally I used hajimemashite instead of hisashiburi. The little chap found me interesting (maybe thinking that I'm Ramon) and we started playing while eating and continued after dinner when he received the present that Santa san left. He got one of those books with pictures that come with a "magic" pen - when you press the pen on a picture it says the name of the thing. And the pen has two modes: modo Nihongo  and modo Eigo. Great! We can study together! So we did. And when he was bored I just took his hand and guided him so that he pressed the pen to my head, at which I said (imitating at my best the voice of the pen): BAKA! Poor Haruki didn't have a clue why everybody was laughing so loud.
I realized how worn out from the ferry I was when I started dozing after two small cans of Kirin. Oyasumi, tomorrow is an early wake up and start to work. And after four years (almost) I was more than pleased to go to work in the morning again on a Yamaha scooter, model Vino, the same one. Only the helmeto is different and there's a new bento box.. No more communication like with the old one.
The sugarcane is waiting. It will wait for few weeks more.

Today we finished early, part because of the bad weather, part because it's time to start the New Year holidays. I went immediately to the nearest beach, just to walk on the sand.

View of the lower village from the graveyard.

And this is the decoration in front of the house for New Year. A traditional one.

A Lazy Day

The Koza riot begun late on the night of December 20th, 1970. It involved from 3000 to 7000 locals - different references, different numbers. It seems a fair supposition to me that 5000 cold be quite accurate. After they gave a good beating to some US soldiers and torched their cars, they actually attacked the Kadena air base and with improvised molotov cocktails, made in the nearby homes and bars, managed to burn down a part of it. Early in the morning the rioters were finally tamed with tear gas and water cannons. It ended without fatalities.
I have nothing against beating soldiers (no matter where are they from), they deserve worse. But to find out that few thousand people gathered and did this because a soldier hit a drunk Okinawan with his car? At first I thought he killed him. No, he wasn't injured too bad. Then I started finding out that this was just the spark that ignited all the gunpowder that the occupation troops were piling during the years. Accidents, hit-and-runs, kidnappings, rapes, murders... you name it, soldiers did it.
But history is cruel. It can be wiped so easily. You can't find Koza anymore, it doesn't exist. The name was changed to Okinawa-shi. When I started asking locals (those that speak English), they gave me looks. They have no clue as what happened. When I had enough of being treated as a retard I showed them the article about the riot on the Japanese wiki and they were all amazed that such  a thing happened. Later they told me that probably older people still remember, but the new generations surely don't. True enough. On December 20th, 2012, I took a bicycle and had a ride across Okinawa-shi. No signs that any sort of remembrance day was going on. Well, most probably there was something, that a few people attended, but no way I could ever find them. And, after all, why should I? I'd be considered another American killer, most probably.
So it seemed to be a better idea to go back to Naha, I had still the whole afternoon and I was (surprise surprise!) still sober. Let's go to the beach near the hostel!

And now a lesson on how advertising works. Did you like the beach? I know, it's not something really posh, but you have to admit that it's nice. OK, now the last picture, the actual view of the beach, from a small hill.

Today is a perfect day, not only warm but hot, too hot for the beach, so I went to study in a nearby park, with a nice view of Naha and the new port.

I just love the vegetation on these islands.

Found me some shadow and managed to intensively practice hiragana for almost two hours without a break. It was a real 'full immersion' study, you have to know that here even the birds sing in Japanese.

 Ah, yes, I went to the port to buy the ferry ticket for Tokunoshima... no reservations, no tickets in advance. On the day of the departure I have to be at the port at 6AM (argh) to buy the ticket for the 7 o'clock ferry.

O-KI-NA-WA!

My first day on Okinawa. The trip was nice, I already shared some fun here, this time I will put here some pictures I took. As the web page of Peach suggested it's on a "pinky"side so I was delighted to find out that even their planes share the same color, all is pink/grape, the only disappointment were the uniforms, no pink at all, professionally sober ( I really miss the  so hot black and red combination of Cathay Pacific), but when girls are cute it really doesn't matter what they are wearing...

Some outskirts of Seoul

Me at Osaka airport, unhappy because I wasn't laid by any stewardess.

At the Osaka airport I was drunk bored but I must admit I had an unpleasant experience. You know, the way we're conditioned by our upbringing that even when you have done nothing bad you still can feel guilty? I went to the toilet to take a leak. I was alone when I was removing some water from my body, when two little girls, about the age between 4 and 6, ran into the man's toilet looking for their dad. And they were so surprised to see a gaijin that they stopped looking for their dad and kept staring at me instead. I'm not able to blush anymore, but I felt like I was. Why? I've done nothing wrong. I had absolutely no dirty thoughts  to be ashamed of. It's not that was afraid (I was, but that is not the point here) what others might think. I just couldn't stop feeling like I am a bad guy. This conditioning is really scary.
When I boarded the plane for Okinawa it was my first time I started to behave like a real male pig. I had to pick on one stewardess, I really had to. You know the creep pick-up line 'Have we met before?', it worked perfectly. She did remember me. From the flight from Seoul. While I was drinking she went to Sapporo, came back (just for me, to be sure) and we happily went together to Okinawa. Dreams apart, she was really professional, I could enjoy her cute smile all the time, but it was clear that she was sort of scared of me. I was not rude and I felt bad, but it was a good lesson for me. Because I was going to Okinawa.

I agree, crap of picture, but I had to take it when set my feet on Okinawan land for the first time. It was late so I took a taxi for the first time in Japan ... I do realize that a taxi driver has a hard life but I really don't know what to think of a guy that has no clue where to go even after I gave him a printed map of the hostel I booked. I had to give him also their phone number so he called and asked for directions... First thing there I asked where the nearest 'convini' store is and went to buy umeshu. Lots of umeshu and I got lots of 'looks'. I'm used to 'looks', I spent my time in Asia, I still get them in my village in Korea. But I learned to distinguish 'looks' from 'bad looks'. And there was plenty of bad ones yesterday and today. I don't complain, I fully understand them. The first people I saw at the Okinawan airport was a bunch of American soldiers. Their behavior and their faces were clearly showing that their shoe size is higher than their IQ. From wiki: In May 2010, a survey of the Okinawan people conducted by Mainichi shimbun and Ryukyu shimpo, found that 71% of Okinawans surveyed thought that the presence of Marines on Okinawa was not necessary. Also: local citizens have complained about excessive aircraft noise as well as various crimes perpetrated against local civilians. Details? From 1952 to 2004, there were approximately 200,000 accidents and crimes involving U.S. troops, in which 1,076 Japanese civilians died...In 1995, the abduction and rape of a 12-year-old Okinawan schoolgirl by two U.S. Marines and one U.S. sailor led to demands for the removal of all U.S. military bases in Japan... February 2008, a 38-year-old U.S. Marine based on Okinawa was arrested in connection with the reported rape of a 14-year-old Okinawan girl... No, I don't blame the locals here for giving me 'looks'. But I feel bad the same. In a similar way that I felt at the Osaka airport toilet.
Today I went out only to buy more alcohol.

To drink on the roof of the hostel.

And on my way I saw a hotel that someone I know will love (Not for being casual, but for the name. I have no clue what casual hotel means.).

In the evening I was again out of booze, so another stroll to the Famima. Saw a beer for the first time and had to buy it, the guys at the hostel told me that 'Orion - Southern star' is the Okinawan beer. I have a good eye. And I swear that the picture tells exactly the way I see the can.

Time Travelers

As I predicted in the last post, things started to happen the moment I moved. Actually even before. The last evening at my home we had a nice farewell dinner with the neighbors - I made a few different dishes with rutabaga and we drank several different alcoholic beverages, ranging from 5,8% beer up to 55% persimmon spirit and I fell asleep at 7AM. Two hours later the worried neighbors woke me up so I didn't miss the bus for Seoul. There I stayed for two days in apartment of my friend and in one moment I almost freaked out. I was studying the airport plans to be able to find the Peach self check-in booth as quick as possible, when I noticed a warning on their web site. "If you have problems with your self check-in, please contact us 24 hours in advance and be at the booth at least 80 minutes prior to your departure." Great. I know how machines love me. So if I will get in troubles getting my ticket I'll just have to go back one day, call them and tell them to fuck off? I know that I can't complain much, they are a low fare operator and to keep their really low prices they have to cut on all luxuries (You want to drink water on the plane? Pay for it.), but to have no personel at all at the airport seemed a bit too much to me. In the end there was no need for the self check-in since a pretty girl checked me (I wished she could check me more...) and at the security control I had to give up on my favorite terrorist weapon of mass destruction, the shaving foam. I was boarding at 10AM and heard an announcement for more time travelers. It said that the flight for Ho Chi Minh is due to depart at 10:10 and was calling the passengers to be at the boarding gate at least 30 minutes earlier. Nice. This time I was lucky, I wasn't going to Vietnam. Even nicer... well, I apologize to the female readers here because I will sound like a male pig for all the comments I'll make but I just can't restrain myself. It's just that on the plane I had such a beautiful view... and I wasn't looking out of the window. The beautiful smiles and being again in the air made the flight a pure pleasure, I almost didn't care when few times we hit some pretty bad turbulences (actually some unsecured stuff went flying around the cabin and there were some panicking yells). I pretended to be cool and pretended that I was reading my Evangelion manga in Korean.
At the immigration the usual annoying guys and yet again I had to lecture them about Japanese geography - for my address in Japan I left the address in Tokunoshima, which is near Okinawa but is part of the Kagoshima province. And they wanted to know why I wrote an address from Kagoshima (which is in fact some 1000km far from Tokunoshima) if I'm going to Okinawa... Surprisingly they accepted a gaijin's lecture and I was free to pollute the Japanese land with my presence.
Six hours to wait for the next flight in the small terminal 2 of Kansai airport.  Free wifi, smoking room, canned coffee. It's been two hours since I arrived here and I'm starting to freak out the folk here. I'm on the terminal for local flights and I stand out like a gaijin in Japan, aimlessly strolling  around, oblivious of all the staring. Time for a beer. Kampai!

Time To Go!

And time for another post, finally.
Nothing exciting happened lately. Snow, ice, cold - yet another winter. But not for me. For a long time I've been planning to spend this winter on the Philippines but, as it goes with my plans, everything changed when I was looking for the best (cheapest) flight to Manila. I stumbled upon a promotional winter sale of Peach, a Japanese low-cost operator and bought a return ticket Osaka - Okinawa for the price of two sixpacks. The flight from Seoul to Osaka was a bit more expensive, but not much. And so next week I'll be enjoying the rainy Okinawa, but with friendly warm temperatures. I'll try to visit Koza on December 20th, the anniversary of the Koza riot when enraged locals attacked and set fire to an American military base. From Okinawa I'll go to a dream island, Tokunoshima, and spend there the winter, harvesting sugarcane. I wonder how many of my drinking buddies there will I be able to meet again. I hope my knowledge of Japanese will impress them - with all the anime watched I built a vocabulary of more than 100 expressions (of which more than half is completely useless in normal life) and I started to learn hiragana.
One thing is for sure: for the next few weeks I will make happen a lot of thins worth of blog posts, after all it's gonna be my first Xmass, new year and birthday in Japan!
Now it's almost two years since I was on a plane for the last time. Can't wait to fly again. And to think that it was not so long ago, in 2006, that I took my first plane and I was screaming in terror all the way to Istanbul. I'm actually so excited that I'm almost finished with packing my stuff. I only have to do a good cleanup of the house, since it's going to be empty for few months - but I can't start it yet, since tomorrow we're having a farewell dinner here. A rutabaga dinner. The folks here are going to have rutabaga nightmares after it.