Dear People of the World (formerly Dear Americans)

The main purpose was to meet people in Okinawa who confronts most unwanted unwelcome environmentally destructive and dangerous facilities in Okinawa. I joined them. If you want to know the detail, please read this article.

The below is the video clip I made for the summary of my Anti-US base tour.

However, I really enjoyed sightseeing and leisure in Okinawa, too. Swimming in emerald green sea, attending a concert on the beach, eating delicous food, forest trecking and seeing magnificient views of the island. This is the most beautiful island in the world only if the US fucking bases are gotten rid of. See the below video clip. That's fun part of Okinawa trip.

Since the Cold War is over, their presence is useless. Potential threat, China? No. China is world's largest owner of U.S. treasury bonds. They can't confront China because they owe Chinese a lot. All they do in Okinawa or other base towns in Japan is spread pollution disease, killing endangered mammals, commiting crimes such as rape and murder.

What are they doing? Go back where they belong, where they are welcome. Not in Okinawa, Not elsewhere in Japan. 

Today, I have become a guide for free walking tour guide for Imperial Palace in Tokyo.

Though I am not a professional guide but I speak English so I joined the volunteer activity.

It was nice. Today I and other two guides started the tour from Tokyo Station.

There were 10 people gathered at the exit. They were from Canada, Australia, Sweden and North Carolina (U.S.A).

After explaining to them history and current renovation plan of Tokyo Station, we took them to Tokyo's most famous tourist spot, Imperial Palace. 

We explained to them how the castle was protected from invaders, such as surrounding mort, Stone Walls, Trap gate, and checkpoints.

We talked about middle age to modern time history of Japan as to how the country was developed into a unified nation.

It was sunny and hot day. They really seemed to enjoy the tour.

If you are living in Tokyo or have a chance to visit here, why don't you join the tour.

The tour is held every Saturday afternoon at 1PM. Gather at the Marunouchi central exit of Tokyo Station.

Straight-ahead is Imperial Palace. 

See you there!!

Not high-season any more, but you can do that on Shiga Highland, Nagano Prefecture, 2 hours and half train ride and 1 hour and half bus ride from Tokyo.

It was for me first time in 14 years. Last time was 1995 in Brockenridge, Colorado in that year's January and Zelmatt, Switzerland in August.

That was really fun. Acutually this time was first time I skied in Japan.

Skiing has changed since then. Snowboarding became more popular and new type of ski boards, curving skiing which is shorter and round shape are now commonly used. I used this new type of skiing equipment.

The photo is what I took from the top of the slope. The highland was very beautiful.

The town was also famous for hot springs. I bathed very good hot spring. The big bath room had big glass window that I could enjoy spectacular view of highland's snow mountain. That was awesome experience.

Skiing is not as popular as it used to be. It was very popular at the time of big economy boom between late 1980's and early 1990's.

The boom in the past was caused by the popular movie "Watashiwo-Ski-ni-Tsuretette (Take me to the Ski)."

I was impressed by the movie and decided to join the ski tour. Not only the skiing scenes were great but youngsters' life in the film was nice.

At that time youngsters could afford a nice sporty car to drive to ski slopes from a city on vacation and rent a lodge holding parties.

Now youngsters are struggling with their working-poor conditions. I skied and envied the life of ski boom period.

The below is You Tube clip of the Ski Slope I videotaped. Ski slope was really empty and I never had to worry about bumping to other skiers.

On 14 of September, Sunday, I visited Japan's most famous shrine in Nikko city, which is 2 hour train ride from Tokyo.

It is called Nikko-Toshogu. The shrine was established for the grave of the Shogun, Tokugawa Ieyasu, who established Tokugawa dynasty in early 17th century. The dynasty established unified Japan. He placed Japan's capital in Tokyo, which was called Edo at that time.

The reason I went there is not just to enjoy the views of the shrine but to pray the Budha or enshrined spirits to protect Tokyo capital region. The shrine is said to be built to forever protect Tokyo capital region. Tokyo is now in dangerous period because the dangerous ship of barbarians are coming and to be anchored very soon. Read this article.

The views of the shrine was magnificient. I really enjoyed. A lot of foreign tourists were there. The decorations of the shrine's gate and walls are very artisitic. The statues of Budha, engraves, paintings, all satisfied my expectations. The shrines decorations are relatively flashy compared with typical shrines in Japan. But they are still Japanese and outcompete Chinese temples or old buildings. I really found another type of Japanese beauty.

Next to this shrine is third Shogun, Tokugawa Iemitsu's grave shrine. He is grandson of Ieyasu. Iemitsu in fact established foundamental systems and rules of the dynasty that ran 15 generations, more than 260 years such as seclusion, banning of Christianity and alternate year attendance for regional lords. Those things were done to prevent colonization by the West and separation of the country. He really was great Shogun. Interesting thing is he was known to be very gay Shogun. Although as Shogun, he could have many girls to sleep with, he never made any successor until middle age. He had gay relationship with his retainers. It was openly done because being gay was not conceived inmoral thing in those days. When he died, one samurai lord committed suicide because he was very loyal to him and had strong love relationship with Iemitsu. Well, that is how Japanese samurais were different from western knights.

The below is video clip of the visit on You Tube.

This is the sequel of already posted article "Ich bin ein Berliner." My trip in Europe last month. After I enjoyed my 2 day stay in Berlin, I flew to Krakow, the old capital of Poland. From the city, I went to one of the famous World Heritage sites. It took 1 and a half hour to get to Auschwitz Museum by car. It was clear and sunny day. The place looked strangely beautiful although what happend there was so scary. At first I went to the second part of the former concentration camp, Birkenau.

Over 1 million people were said to be murdered there. The below photo is the bombed gas chamber. Nazis bombed the chamber when they left that place to destroy the evidence. It looked like Roman ruin to me.

The below is where the prisoners slept and their toilet.

Also the below is the site of forced labour in the ditch.

The below is the freight train car used for deportation of the prisoners. No seats in it. They had to stand up inside for days without food.

Then I went to the Auschwitz. That is me in front of the famous gate "ARBEIT MACHT FREI. (Labor makes you free.)" But the prisoners never became free. 90% of them died inside the camp.

Between 9 and 12 of July, I was staying in Berlin, Deutschland (Germany).

It was a beautiful and interesting city. The purpose of visiting there was to learn history of holocaust and the Cold War era.

The first place I visited was Holocaust Memorial. It is Wave of Stones.

The memorial for 6 million Jewish victims. The place was near Brandenburger Gate and the Parliament Building.

On one downtown street, I found small memorial plates. It is called "Stolperstein. (Hitting stones)" One of 1600-1700 existed on Berlin streets to mourn holocaust victims.

I also visited some history museums. One of the most impressive ones was German History Museum. I saw below postar for Anti-Jew proganda, which depicts Jews as greedy and communist.

The same museum exhibited part of former Berlin Wall.  

I went to Checkpoint Charlie, the former checkpoint between West and East Berlin. That now became tourist spot.

The below photo is memorial for Border Crosser who failed and then being killed.

Berlin experienced very dramatic history. I really felt that by being there.  

I've made video clip of my stay in Berlin. See this you tube clip.

On 12 of July I left Berlin for Krakow to see one of the famous World Heritage designated by UNESCO.

I will talk about that later.  

Danke schonn!

December 7 is Pearl Habor memorial day for you. For us, it is December 8 because of the time zone difference.

Pearl Habor is famous for the navy base which had been attacked by Japanese imperial army in 1941. More than 2000 GIs were killed.

I visited there when I was in college. I flew to Hawaii from San Francisco. I was there on vacation.

At that time, I was kind of ignorant about history. I did not feel guilty or express condolence to the dead soldiers. Now I do.

People in Japan claim we've had far more casualties than Pearl Harbor by the U.S. air raids afterwards. But historical fact is Japan bombed Chinese cities and killed so many Chinese civilians. That caused the tension between the U.S. and Japan. It was even before Pearl Harbor. 

Some Americans consider Pearl Harbor and 911 the similar things. They are NOT.

In Pearl Harbor, the army targeted only naval base, not civilians. In 911, the target was mostly civilians. The terrorists knew the twin buildings contain private companies. Japan declared the war against the U.S. although it was delayed mistakably.

I have been to Hawaii, three times during my college days. Oahu, Maui, Kauai, Big Island. I enjoyed staying there.

I want to come back again.

It is getting cold lately. A winter is coming close. I do not like winter except that I can go out and ski.

I have good memories of skiing.  

During my college days in the U.S., I visited Colorado to ski 3 times. The same ski slope, Steamboat.

It was college's students ski tour. In the first time we travelled by Amtrack. I remeber it was more than a half day trip from Auckland. Crazily long and boring. 2nd time and 3rd time we went there by plane. Less than 4 hours.  

On 1st time trip, since I had never skied before so I took 1 day ski lesson and that enabled me to ski very well afterwards. Steamboat was a huge ski resort. Even I stayed there for 5 days, I couldn't ski on all of the courses there.

The photo was taken there.

Other place I skied than Steamboat was Zermatt in Switzerland. I skied there in August seeing the view of Matterhorn.

But not as good as Steamboat, because the ski zones were limited because it was summer.  

Well, now I get older, I don't think I want to go out and ski somewhere. There are many good ski resorts in Japan. But not as good as Steamboat or Zermatt. I don't want to get in crowded ski bus or trains to get to a crowded ski resort.

As it gets cold, I would stay longer at home watching DVDs. I rented an old Charlie Angels' drama episode that Angels went to Veil in Colorado to bodyguard a foreign important person. Kate Jackson (or lookalike) skied chasing a criminal very well.

That brought me back Steamboat memories, too.

Skiing is what you have to do NOW. As the whole earth gets warmer, more and more ski slopes are being closed. We wouldn't be enjoying skiing in near future. Maybe we should ski on artificial snow ground.

I was lucky I could enjoy skiing on real snow. It was high quality powder snow. I remember I could not make a snowball out of it.  

I went to Kyoto last night and came back home this morning. It was hectic trip. Indeed it was not a travel for private pleasure. The trip was for business. But I could manage to visit some tourist spots in Kyoto.

 One of them is Gion town street, where my favorit movie "Memoir of a Geisha" story took place. Geisha named SAYURI grew up there. It was pretty and very Japanese town. Unfortunately I could not see any Geisha walking on the street because it was early in the morning. But I enjoyed the street view very much. See the picture below.

The other place I went to was Kiyomizu Temple. It is famous for high stage wooden building. There is a proverb in Japan, "Jumping off the Kiyomizu Stage." meaning trying to do a big new thing. Imagine how brave you have to be to jump off this stage.

This is the view from the stage. It is 3-5 story building tall but in the old days, it was very high.

You can see other pictures of Kyoto along with other places in my photo album section on the right. Click on Japan Scenaries.

Kyoto is like foreign place for me because I used to live in US for several years and visite many foreign cities in Europe and China. Kyoto is one of great world's heritage.

Kyoto is beautiful, I am planning to visit there again near future. I will talk more about it later.

Last week I went to famous theme park called "Museum Meiji Mura" that exhibites old time buildings in Japan including western style ones which Japan accepted for modernising its society.

It is located in Inuyama, Aichi Japan (Prefecture in the middle region of Japan, 2 hour SuperExpress train ride from Japan).  Please look at http://www.meijimura.com/english/index-e.html

There were beautiful buildings that were transported from where it was. One of the most famous ones is the former Imperial Hotel building which was built in Tokyo, 1923. Only Entrance Hall and the Lobby were exhibited. It was designed by famous American architect named Frank Lloyd Wright. This building experienced a very big earthquake occurred in the year its contruction was completed but it survived.

The inside is below.

It was like a Retro trip.