Yokohama: our second day

Our first stop today was the city of Kamakura, where we we saw the Great Buddha at Kamadura Diabustsu. Barek washes his hands at the ritual cleansing area. The bronze statue is 44 feet tall and weighs over 93 tons. The boys enjoyed walking inside the hollow statue.


Here we are with the Buddha. This small statue on the grounds caught my eye.


Next was Kamakura's Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine, orginally built in Kyoto in 1063 and moved to its present location in 1180.

The first photo is of empty Saki barrels: celebrations at the shrine include drinking traditional Japanese wine. The second photo is a stage area below the main shrine. Some traditionally-dressed Japanese people climb the steps with us. The main shrine contains a series of buildings.

People leave prayer requests at the main shrine. Charis and our new friend, Liz, walk down the steep steps past the famous Gingko tree.


An island in the shrine complex also contained prayer requests.


Our day concluded at Lake Ashi: we told Asher the lake was named for him. We went on the ferry boat in the first photo, but really liked the looks of the traditional boat in the second photo.

Above is a shrine we passed and the second photo gives a flavor of the mountain scenery. Unfortunately, cloud cover prevented us from seeing Mt. Fuji, which was the whole purpose of the boat and subsequent cable car ride up Mt. Komagatake in Hakone National Park. We got back on our "Poodle" bus (the owner of the company loves poodles) and headed back to the ship. We'll spend a day sailing to Kobe where we'll have more Japanese adventures.
We are enjoying our day off today. The majority of students, faculty and staff are traveling overland to our next port and will meet us in Kobe. With a relatively empty ship, we're being served a special dinner tonight for the 200 of us that are here--and we've got no classes, meetings, or activities. We loved sleeping in this morning!

Yokohama, Japan!

Land Ho!! We arrived in Yokohama, Japan, located on the Tokyo Bay, on the morning of February 9th. Everyone gathered on deck to watch the tugboat guide us into the pier. Although the hour was early, a fabulous group of Japanese drummers serenaded us as went through the long docking processs.

The pier terminal is relatively new and beautifully designed: the ceiling is meant to look like origami paper. Right outside the ship--and located throughout Yokohama--was a vending machine that contained ice cream, hot and cold drinks, hot noodles and much more! We were also fascinated by the public restrooms. The women's restrooms had a variety of buttons to press. Our favorites were the seat-warmer (!) and the sound effects button (which played your choice of running water, flushing sound, or music)!!

Our first stop of the day was the beautiful Sankien Garden, originally built by silk trader, Tomitaro Hara, as his private residence. Subsequently, many ancient Shinto shrines were moved from Kyoto, one of Japan's ancient capitols, to the gardens. This is one of the shrines, which we took off our shoes to enter.
There were smaller shrines throughout the gardens. Dafffodils and apricot trees were in bloom, but we could picture how the gardens would be even more beautiful during the spring and summer.

We walked around the interior of one of the homes, which was traditionally laid out with wooden and mat floors and minimal decoration. The kids signed the guest book.

This Shinto shrine, one of the oldest in Japan, was moved from Kyoto to Yokohama. Shinto is the ancient religion of Japan emphasizing nature. Most Japanese are Buddhist, but retain ancient Shinto beliefs and use shrines for weddings and other celebrations.
The terrain and vegetation varied throughout the park.

No trip to a tourist site would be complete without a snack! Here the vendor puts a pellet of ice cream into a machine that makes soft serve ice cream cones. Outside, the dog guards the wide variety of sweet and savory snacks.

Next stop was Landmark Tower, Japan's tallest building at 69 floors. We rode up the world's fastest elevator (impressive!) to see views of Yokohama, which has a population of about 3 million but seems larger because it folds into Tokyo, which is located about 30 minutes away. In the far distance of the left side of the second photo above, Mount Fuji is just barely visible. Yokohama amusement park is just below the tower.

Landmark Tower contains a shopping center and everything is especially colorful. The first photo is a Pokemon store.

Yes, there is a Yokohama Hard Rock Cafe! This photo is for Donnie! Lots of people commute by bike.

We walked through the amusement park and then stopped for a dinner that included Japanese noodles and sushi.

We looked back at the city and amusement park as we walked down the pier towards home. Although Yokohama was an ancient fishing village, the city itself did not come into its own until the mid-19th century. Consequently, many parts of the city have the look and feel of a newer American city.

Almost to Japan!

We watched the superbowl in the Union with all the students. Even though the Colts lost, we had a great time watching the game and seeing American TV again--especially all the commercials.


Today was Asia Day--and the dependent kids made a banner which was dispayed in "Timitz Square", the central office/gathering area of the ship.

The seas have calmed enough for the captain to sail faster. Both the relative calmness of the sea and especially the increased speed of the ship make for a much smoother ride. We are hoping this lasts through the night--it would be great to get a good sleep in before we arrive in Yokohama tomorrow morning. We'll make up up time through the night and will only be 3 hours late to the port. We are signed up for an afternoon city tour and are looking forward to seeing Japan and to feeling solid ground under our feet! We saw a couple of ships in the distance today, and this brought much excitement to all onboard! It really is very exciting to see something--anything!--on the horizon after days and days of being alone at sea.

The ship doc removed Asher's stitches today and secured his healing wound with Steri-strips. He still needs to stay off his foot, but everything is healing nicely.

Rough Crossing

We've all had a lot of activities centered on Japan and China...the kids have had origami sessions and an enjoyable noodles and chopsticks lesson. After knitting and before the Huge student "Coffee House", the kids watched a movie in one of the classrooms while all the students on board took their Global Studies exam. The coffee house was great, but went on for quite awhile. Asher wanted to go to bed first, then Barek. They want to be fresh for the superbowl game, which starts in about an hour here.
The Pacific Ocean is very rough. The storm we are experiencing is unrelated to the earthquake Japan evidently experienced yesterday (which had no damage or fatalities as I understand.) We have had to go off course and have had to slow our speed considerably. We are headed north now, so there is less side to side rolling, but during the last 24 hours (and continuing now) lots of banging and pitching into the waves. The whole ship feels like it is being constantly tossed around. As a consequence to this, we are going to arrive in Yokohama late. Today they are going to let us know just how late we will arrive.
In the meantime, we're headed to watch the Colts--and are hoping the internet feed will work--and that we won't tip over too many times. The room where we'll be is one of the most unstable on the ship. Go Colts!

Time changes and more ship life

Charis enjoyed the ballroom and swingdance instruction last night...but got tired of me taking photos!


Today's PE session was in one of the dining rooms, as it was too windy out on the deck.

The library always posts helpful signs about the next port. And they, along with everyone else on the ship, have tied down their books as we head into the storm.


Steve held some "office hours" in the piano lounge where students meet to get a snack, play the piano, study or play cards.

The captain has steered our ship 200 miles off-course to avoid the worst of a Pacific storm, and we were warned to expect 20 foot swells starting this afternoon. But so far, so good! We've got some rolling, but nothing like we experienced before.

Right now it's Saturday evening here on ship, although my computer is still on Eastern Time. We're setting our clocks back AGAIN tonight, which makes 6 times that we've set our clocks back an hour. This is really terrific to get an extra hour's worth of sleep on these nights! We are definitely glad we are traveling westward, which makes the time changes so agreeable.

After much ado, they have managed to find a way to beam the superbowl game to the ship! We are very excited to watch our Colts' second victory! For us, the game will happen Monday morning at 8:30am. The internet feed may not work 100%, but we are excited to watch whatever we can. Luckily, Monday is not a regular class day, but a day with lots of programming about Asia. Steve and I will give presentations later that day, but we're free in the morning! Go Colts!

On Tuesday, we'll land in Yokohama, Japan, where we'll spend two days. We have the morning free and are signed up for an afternoon city tour on the first day, and we'll go on a day-long trip to some Buddhist monastaries and sights on the second day, and then we'll board the ship for the day trip to Kobe, Japan, where we'll spend another two days. This will be followed rather closely by our stops in China and Vietnam. Our next big stretch at sea won't be until we leave Saigon, Vietnam on March 3rd. We'll then have about a week at sea before landing in India.

Birthday party and a "new family"

Yesterday we celebrated Raphaela's 14th birthday with ice cream cake and bingo.

Afterwards, the boys went to the upper "pool deck" for some ping pong.

Tonight we had dinner with our new family: faculty can "adopt" students who sign up for the family program. We had our first dinner this evening with four delightful students and made plans to get together with them again before Japan. Our kids really enjoyed the "new kids" and the students were glad to be paired with a family that has young children. I know we'll enjoy their company over the course of the semester.

The boys are off playing cards, Charis is doing a quick Facebook session, Steve is watching a movie on his computer and I'm getting ready to do my presentation on Asian Theatre. That's the news from the Pacific Ocean!

A day off!

Yesterday evening the kids had finger-knitting again. Charis and Barek joined a group of 6 kids doing one finger-knitting project all together. Asher loves to knit, too, and prefered to make his own scarf. The dependent kids and the college students get together regularly for this service project and just love it.


In the evenings, there are "Explorer Seminars" about all sorts of different topics. Our "neighbor", Shelley, a lifelong learner on the ship, presented a session last night on Ikebana, the Japanese art of flower arranging. She gave us materials to work with and you can see my own personal Ikebana above!

Last night also was a ship dance for the students. Charis and the older children enjoyed the dance, too, and then met for a game of cards in one of the lobby areas. They enjoyed staying up late, knowing they wouldn't have to get up this morning.

Today is a rare day off at sea. Since we have so many days at sea, they broke it up with this "off day", which means no classes meet. We are all thrilled to have the chance to sleep in and not have to be anywhere today. I need to prepare for my Explorer Seminar on Asian Theatre that I'll present tomorrow evening. And the kids have a birthday party this afternoon for one of the dependent children who is from Germany.

Asher got a good report at the doctor's yesterday and we won't go back for several days. He still has to stay off the foot, but the doctor was pleased with the way the healing was going.

Tonight, Tuesday, we go to bed and wake up to Thursday. There is a seminar tonight explaining the International Date Line that we'll attend to get this figured out!