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Published: January 30th 2007
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Peace Pagoda
Tyler enjoying the garden at the beautiful Peace Pagoda. Let me explain. There's a few reasons for our title, none of which mean we didn't enjoy our time in Japan. We enjoyed it immensely. We did find, however, that we had a bit more trouble communicating while we were in this country than we have had in other countries on our trip. First of all, on a purely logistic basis -- our mobiles and Blackberrys didn't work in Japan! Plus, Ted's laptop died and he had to have it sent back to the Sony factory to be fixed, so we didn't have his laptop for our time in Japan. So, communication with our life back in the US was limited to the time we could get on our sons' laptops -- Tyler was very generous with his, I should add. Secondly, we had a number of interesting experiences in stores and restaurants in particular trying to explain to clerks and waiters what it was that we wanted. Unlike other tours, we were on our own for much of our time in Japan and although we found the Japanese extremely eager to assist us, most had as much trouble with English as we did with Japanese.
But enough of that and
Kinkakuji Temple
Golden Pavilion built by a 13th century shogun. on to our tour of Japan. We started in Tokyo and met our tour mates, Debbie and Bryna Shmerling, a mother and daughter from Nashville and Seoul, South Korea, respectively. Very coincidently, it turns out that Debbie and her husband Jim are moving to Denver as Jim has taken the position of President and CEO of Children's Hospital. We found Tokyo, a city of 12 million, to be as exciting and fabulous as we had expected. Interestingly, for those of you who are familiar with the movie "Lost in Translation" starring Bill Murray, our first hotel in Tokyo was the Park Hyatt where much of the movie was filmed. I didn't know this when I booked the hotel but as that is Tyler's favorite movie, he was pretty excited to see it in person. In addition to some great shopping opportunities in the Shibuya and Ginza districts, we visited the Tokyo Tower (333 meters high) and the Imperial Palace Plaza where the Emperor and Empress of Japan live. Jill and Griff spent a day at Tokyo Disneyland, completing Griffin's goal of visiting all the Disneylands in the world and while they were enjoying the thrill of Peter Pan's flight, Ted
Tokyo
View from Tokyo Tower. and Tyler were hitting golf balls at a driving range on the top floor of a downtown Tokyo building. Do we know how to have fun??
After Tokyo we travelled to Mt. Fuji but we didn't actually
see Mt. Fuji because it was too cloudy. We spent the night in the hot springs resort town of Hakone and the next day took the bullet train to Kyoto and were lucky enough to see Mt. Fuji on the way. Kyoto, the capital of Japan for over 1,000 years, is a historic city of quiet beauty with many Shinto and Buddhist temples like Kiyomizu and Rokuon-ji, which we visited. We also toured the shogunate Nijo Castle and the Imperial Palace, which was both a political and cultural center from 1331 until the capital was moved to Tokyo in 1869. We enjoyed the simple beauty of the architecture and settings of these sites.
After 2 days in Kyoto, another bullet train ride took us to Hiroshima. Our visit to Hiroshima was emotionally intense. After visiting the serene Miyajima Itsukushima Shrine, we went to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in the center of the city where we viewed, among other things, a diorama depicting
the city both before and and after the atomic bomb was dropped on August 6, 1945. The visual is nothing short of horrific. Hiroshima's legacy is one of survival, hope and the quest for world peace and nuclear disarmament. We were awed and inspired by what we heard and saw during our time there.
Following Hiroshima we travelled to Okayama and Kurashiki where we visited the Okayama Castle and Korakuen Park. Even though it is winter in Japan, the gardens in Korakuen are still lovely to stroll through. Lastly, we had a brief stop in Osaka before returning to Tokyo. Next stop is Africa. We have been in Asia for over 3 months now and we will miss it -- the people, the food, the wondrous places we saw. Until we meet again...
P.S. In case you might not have noticed, we are posting more pictures than before in these last two blog entries and in order to see them all, you need to hit either the "Next" or "2" button at the end of the photos. We don't want anyone to miss anything!
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Courtney Clark
non-member comment
Hi guys!!
Y'all look like y'all are having such a great time!! Miss you guys sooo much!! Chicago is going really well, but I can't wait to here all about Africa!! Love you guys soooo much!!