I say participate because there are several of us in overseas locations that have decided to do this together and share the pictures.  One of the participants, for instance, is in Italy. One of her friends has done amateur photography and has started with our assignment for the month of January -

So – in the spirit of the New Year and Project 366 – here is my (Heather’s) first photo! Mike helped by adding the decoration to the sand

Our Christmas was wonderful!  It started when we went up to Camp Schwab to share some Christmas food and joy at the USO.  Several families from the church we have been attending signed up to bring up food and serve the Marines and Sailors that live and work there.  We made our first ham…which was an adventure in itself, and Mike’s new Christmas staple, creamed corn as well as stuffing, cornbread, mashed potatoes, gravy!  And most of it was gone within 15 minutes!  It was an awesome feeling seeing all the smiling faces and full plates! 

We came home to skype with our VA family while opening presents, it felt like we were in each other’s living room…as digitally possible as possible.  Thank God for Skype and Facetime!

Merry Christmas to all of our friends around the world from Okinawa! 

Love, Mike and Heather

While it may sound strange, we have found ourselves more at home here than we ever were  able to in California. This is the first time we have moved together, with our things mingled together – with them being ours, and not hers and his.  The people are friendly and the world around us is a daily new adventure.

We have been blessed to have friends already here and to make new friends as we have been here.  Additionally, we are right next to the only Army base on island which has surprisingly availed us to a world of opportunities.  Okinawa living is truly fantastic. The picture on the left is from Rocktoberfest – which took place on Torii Station (the Army base right next door to us).  It was a weekend festival full of Japenese rock bands – some were cover bands (Heather favored the 50s cover band with girls in poodle skirts and their male leader who looked like  a Japanese elvis), and others were popular bands from Tokyo.  The songs were sung in a mix of English and Japanese.  In the spirit of Octoberfest, they also had german beer on tap as well as Miller Lite. Heather chose the former.   Also in the spirit of Octoberfest, Mike at a bratwurst topped with saurkraut and real whole grain mustard.  It was a little taste of festivals at home, right on “American” soil.

Over the long Columbus Day weekend, we went to check out Cape Zanpa – one of the many juts the island makes into the China Sea. The Cape boasts the only lighthouse on the island.  And a park with a giant Shishi or Shisa dog – see picture on the right.  It looks like it is made out of clay, but it is actually poured cement, and it looks to be covered with paint. The dog is at the entrance of the park. Open soccer fields flank a small “rock climbing wall” (poured cement with rocks sticking out of it).  There are paths that lead up to the lighthouse (we didn’t go up because it was cloudy, rainy and windy, and since it was Y200 to go up, we would prefer to check out the view on a clear day) and lead along the cliff wall. It had spectacular views, and even more so with the wind pushing the waves onto the rocks.

This island is beautiful, and we hope to continue to explore, and make time to explore.

Happy fall everyone!  Sorry for the delay on this post…the perfectionist in us is working on NOT being that way!

So, the day of, we played one of my birthday presents (Lego Pirates of the Caribbean – for a girl that didn’t have video games growing up, this was quite fun!), went for a walk on the beach, hiked around a park near our house that has paths carved out by the ocean water (quite relaxing), and walked to try out a restaurant near our house.  It was yummy Okinawan soba and gyoza for lunch, and it was delicious!  After our lunch, we walked to the grocery store to get new trash bags (you have to buy city trash bags to put your burnable trash in) and we happened to also buy the sweetest looking (and tasting) cake from Patisserie Porusche – chocolate cake with strawberries amongst the heavenly filling….yum.

My birthday didn’t end on the day of! Since we both had to be at work the next morning, we went to bed at 2030 (830 pm), so we didn’t do the out in town birthday dinner until Saturday.  Justine and Andrew met us at Genki – a fabulolus sushi/yakitori/yum restaurant by Araha beach.  The sushi rolls were HUGE!  And delicious.  We tried out Wasabi yakitori – a little zing, but flavorful.  Mike was brave and tried about the stir-fried squid… I tried it and it was quite flavorable, and not at all chewy like the calamari rings we have had back in the states.  It was quite an intimidating dish though with the squid legs dangling off plate .  After the four of us downed 3 rolls of sushi, wasabi yakitori, fried squid, and noodles…we decided to head out for ice cream at Blue Seal.  On the way to the car, fireworks were exploding on Araha Beach!  Andrew joked that they had planned the whole thing!  The fireworks show ended and we headed to get ice cream.  As we arrived at Blue Seal, we heard a sound we had heard during Obon – a guitar that is used in traditional Okinawan music.  We walked around the ice cream shop to the adjoining Starbucks, and Eisa dancers were set up and dancing away…at the Starbucks!  Ok, so I know that the dancers weren’t there for me, but it was still a pretty cool birthday dinner – and it was very much an Okinawan birthday.  Slowly, we are making our apartment feel like home, and as we grow more familiar with our area, Yomitan is feeling like home.  We still miss our friends and family terribly, but I think we are getting the hang of embracing the adventure before us!

Here is a piece of what we say outside the Starbucks…cuz that happens in the states ALL the time…

It’s been a month now since we arrived.  Mike and I both have our SOFA drivers licenses, and are considered “professional drivers” here.  Driving is getting a bit better.  Since the cars are smaller here, in general a two-lane road can fit four cars width-wise if you have to go around a vehicle that is stopped for ice cream or a phone call on the side of the road (Okinawans do that – stop and park on a main road…it’s the norm here though).  I, for one, am still learning to weave.  Mike has become proficient at it. But his 45-minute commute might have something to do with it… or learning to drive in South Florida.

We both have automobiles as well. The process here isn’t very different from Virginia. Every two years the cars have to be inspected and pay the Government of Japan the JCI (Japanese Compulsory Insurance).  It is quite the expensive inspection though – costing several hundred dollars. To be perfectly frank, the inspection for the cube cost a few hundred dollars shy of the price we paid for the car!  Thankfully Mike’s car came previously inspected, so we only had to worry about mine.  Inspections are done at almost any local garage and a place on base.  We went to a local garage.  Another surprise here is that most of the Japanese know English, and very well at that.  So, the mechanic at the garage was able to explain everything to us, including all of the repairs the car needed – and even printed the list out in English for us.  One hiccup – my car has a part that has been recalled, so I have to find a Nissan dealer to get the part repaired.  The car is ok to drive, just a precaution to get it fixed.  The next adventure…finding a Nissan dealer.

Back to sushi…now that we are here, we are indulging!  And oh how glorious! No more is it just the spicy tuna roll and ahi sashimi… we have the lemon roll and dragon roll – both beautiful and delicious!  While we haven’t gorged ourselves in the sushi heaven that is around us quite yet, we plan on taking a slow journey down the river o’ sushi.  And man is it tasty!  So far we have tried out three places – one in the American Village that I can’t recall the name of, Gen Sushi and Yoshi Sushi. We were taken to American Village by some friends of ours from Camp Pendleton that moved out a couple months before us.  It may have just been the friendly faces and excitement that we were all on an adventure on this island together, but that sushi tasted SO amazing! Like melt in your mouth amazing. One of the rolls we had was the Dragon roll which contained and was draped with raw fish! Yum!

We were introduced to Gen Sushi by our Camp Pendleton friends as well. It was a cool experience as we ate because we ate on tatami mats.  However, these were the American-gene type because they had a divit in the middle where you could hang your legs.  Usually, upon tatami mats you sit Indian style. But on these mats, you can sit like you are in a regular chair, just remember to take your shoes off before sitting down!

Yoshi sushi was the full-out experience.  Justine, Mike and I found it quite by accident. Justine and I were craving sushi (which seems to be normal here on island – once you pop, you just can’t stop?) so I google searched “sushi” on my google map app.  Naturally, a few pins popped up with Kanji titles – I had no idea what they meant, but we decided to navigate near one. And Eureka, we arrive at Yoshi sushi!  Justine had been there before, and said it was good, so we were delighted to find it on accident.  We ordered 4 rolls for the three of us (usually we order 4 if her husband is with us…so these rolls were fantastic!).

I don’t think we could ever run our of places to eat here.  We could probably eat at a new place each weekend, and still have plenty left to try over the next few years!  I am certainly excited to try!

Let’s recap on what has happened in the last few weeks…

August 9 – We moved out of our apartment, with the help of my dear friend Meg.  Seriously, without her, we would have been there until 1 am, and then going to the hotel at 2 am in SD.  Thank you for sending us the random things we forgot about!

August 10 – We leave our nice hotel …seriously, it was a Holiday Inn, but it was MUCH better quality and service there than what we had at the Embassy Suites just a week before on our trip back from Monterey (more on that later)…at 5:30 am, to be at the airport at least by 7 am to comply with our 3 hour check-in prior to an international flight rule. We sit around the airport and call every family member we can think of or have a phone number to, since it is the last time that we will be able to use our US phones.

Appr0x. 1100 – We arrive in San Fran, and RUN to our next gate…apparently ANA boards their flights with the forethought that they don’t want to be late…so we barely made it.

I have no clue what time – We land in Tokyo…and Continental thought they lost one of our pieces of baggage….so we had to talk to customer service…because of all the confusion with them (all of our bags were there), we missed our connection to Okinawa. SO…we were put up in a hotel in Tokyo overnight (nice), to get a connecting flight in the morning….it was chaos getting to a bus, to the hotel….that was small, and smelled of smoke – but we were so tired, we didn’t care.  AND they fed us dinner – we ate at a Chinese restaurant at the hotel….but I think at this point we had been up for 36 hours, so we almost fell asleep at the dinner table.  We ate as fast as we could (because we knew we needed to), and passed out.  The next morning we got breakfast (they paid for, very nice) and we went to get on the bus…no room, so they called for a van for the cat and Mike and I…so we get to the airport with plenty of time…confusion at the desk on checking our cat (we had paid for her to go all the way from San Diego, but they didn’t have record of it since we weren’t on our original flight). We make it through booking, and check in, finally make it through security – and get to our flight…and the plane had mechanical difficulties (ok – next flight…) We get to the next flight, which made us late to our connection….so we get through our new connection, and the flight left on time!

11pm on Friday, August 12th – We arrive at the Courtney Lodge Temporary Lodging Facility (TLF).  Our sponsor checked us in, so I unpack a bag (because I need to nest) and we pass out. Surprisingly, we wake up at 5 am the next morning. Despite our best efforts, I am still not adjusted to Japan time.

After a series of workshops, check-ins, and orientations, we pass our driver tests and receive our driving licenses a week after being on island. And then move into our second TLF at Kadena…no room at our previous lodging…but it was only 5 days before we moved into our glorious apartment.

The beauty of not getting a play-by-play is that you, the reader, doesn’t have to read about the long, laborious car and house-hunt. At this point, 3 weeks in to living here, we both have cars (Mike, a Nissan March “Olga”, and Heather, a Nissan Cube “Bad Wolf” – no we didn’t choose Nissan, it just kinda happened) AND we are living OUT of lodging and in our apartment. We have received our advanced shipment which brought it’s assortment of household goods (yay!). And much sooner than expected, we will be receiving our household goods (ALL the furniture  - double yay!).

Now that our password has been updated, I promise to be more vigilant about actually updating our blog. It has been an adventure these last few weeks, and I’d like to actually have it written down to share.

Once congress passed the budget in late March we received our initial “web-orders” and were able to start the medical screening process for us and Madison.  That process took longer than we had hoped and consequently we were advised to hold off moving our belongings as well.  All said and done, our final approval came back around the middle of July… a few days shy of when we were originally supposed to leave for Okinawa.

Our belongings were all moved out a few days ago.  We are leaving to live in Japan for the next three years during the second week of August.  It is exciting and nerve-wrecking all at once.  We are in the process of selling our cars, our apartment is completely empty, and many of our belongings on their way to Japan while most of our belongings are now being stored here in California not to be seen for the next three years.

We are truly, Okinawa-bound.

We will post pictures.

When delving further into the article, it is interesting to note that while less affiliated with ‘religion,’ this generation is still almost as likely to pray and believe that God (or a god) exists as previous generations. The big deal is that this generation is less likely to affiliate themselves with a religion (Christian, Muslim, Jew, etc) or a denomination (Methodist, Pentacostal, etc) but still likely to be spiritual.

Perhaps there is a frustration with the church (al la organized religion)? But we already knew that didn’t we. There would be more room for acceptance, I believe, if we were more devoted to our faith (not less, my generation likes real stuff).

It is just something to think about if you’re sitting at your desk thinking about religion. Me, I’m waiting for my oil change.<div class="wp-caption alignnone" style="width: 650px"

Relgion Lack by Generation

The past few months have been pretty awesome.  I’ve had a few field exercises and little miss Madison Noel is still adjusting to her new environment.  I think that she likes not having to deal with her arch nemesis, AJ, on a daily basis.  She is getting a little spoiled though as she demands her food promptly at 0600 when I (Mike) get up to get ready for work.  She has also developed a rather strong liking for ice cubes, so much so that rather than drinking her own water she goes after ours… this is a habit she is going to have to lose.

We are still settling into the house and quite honestly, we haven’t bought a couch yet.  At least we managed to celebrate Christmas together in style with beautiful lights on the deck and a glorious looking Christmas tree (which has been packed up and interned in the garage ’till next year).  We stayed in for New Year’s because I was feeling sick but it was comfy and cozy to spend some time together watching the count-down and enjoying champagne.

For Martin Luther King weekend we went to Knott’s Berry Farm up near LA to have a day of riding roller coasters and enjoying the park.  We had a really great time!

We’re getting ready for our first Valentines Day together, although it won’t be very romantic per se.  We’re going to be flying from Ft Lauderdale, FL on St Valentines Day.  We are visiting my parents this week since I’m going to be on an “extended business trip” and they wanted to have the chance to spend some time with us and we, of course, wanted to have the chance to spend some time with them.

We are so glad to have seen so many people at the wedding, thank you to everyone who came. I hope that you had a great time as well.  As I’ve been saying to Heather, “I would love to have been a guest at our wedding, it looks like it was a good time.”  We were so busy at our wedding that we barely got to eat and barely got anything to drink either but it was still a great time.

I’m going to return to the pleasures of a lazy Saturday now… enjoy your blogging, readings, and Starbucks coffee (or whatever your drinking).