Right after she picked me up we headed over to the school where the younger daughter was performing in a ceremony honoring the older members of the community. We ran across a group of children from her school heading the same way. One little boy couldn't walk he was looking at me so hard. Non-Japanese people never come to this area because it is off the radar for tourists. All over we were unusual, it was hard to tell with adults though, they are too polite to show it especially in this culture that avoids eye contact. Children are a different story though, they show their curiosity.
Here are the kids performing. Hopefully, I will be able to upload one of the videos too. The kids were such great performers. 3 year olds dancing to 8 min. songs and getting the majority of the moves!
We picked Kai up afterwards to head "home."
Sai and Kai are making charms that you color on and then melt in the oven. I felt overall the adults are much more willing to let kids do things that we would consider dangerous.
We visited the Kyushu National Museum. It was about an hour away. It was interesting, but I think the girls lost interest fairly quickly. :)
This is all of us outside the museum. I'm not sure why the picture flipped back over. I'll try to edit later once things are uploading better.
More signs of Hello Kitty. She is everywhere! The whole store was mostly dedicated to her, but I thought her golden palace was especially unique.
Language was a barrier, but fun is fun in any language. I put my sunglasses on Kai and later the girls taught me some origami over at Grandma's house.
The next day was raining, but we went out to get flowers for Ikebana anyway. Ikebana is Japanese flower arranging, it is very stylized and beautiful. My host mom taught me how to do it. Though my arrangement below was very much guided by her.
Grandma helped the girls do their own arranging.
One of the best parts of my host family visit was being dressed up in grandma's kimono. You can tell the kimono meant a lot to the family. It was wrapped in tissue paper in a wooden box with all the accoutrements. They are also monetarily valuable. I learned that the obi, which is the band around the middle, is not the only tie. In fact, I had 15 ties around my ribcage. There is also an under kimono (which is also beautiful but hidden) and a sort of slip underneath. There are stays to make the collar stiff and special socks to go with the tiny shoes.
These are Japanese socks. They are worn with a kimono. They allow you to wear the special shoes. As you can see they have been around longer than elastic so they have a hook and eye system.
We were at "Grandma's" house a lot. She does all the cooking. The families live next door and have an intercom system. I'll feature some of her food in my "Food" entry. Here she is teaching me how to make the very popular rice dough/bean cakes. The kids were having a blast with the four and the dough. It made me think of my family gathered around making chocolate chip cookies!
Then they had me make these sticky rice triangles wrapped in nori/seaweed. They were yummy, but they sure laughed at my not quite triangles! Squares are much easier, but I kept on trying!
In Fukutsu our pictures were taken all the time, with many cameras. This was one of our "handlers." A member of the education ministry who went everywhere with us. He was always loaded with cameras and would hide them in his pocket pulling them out to say, "One More!" It became a running joke with us.
This is my final moment with my host family. The kids were crying as I left and they all stayed to wave while the bus was pulling away. What a great experience.
I gave the greeting speech in front of all the families and dignitaries who were gathered to welcome us. Tomokoson, our guide, is the one translating for me in the video. (After several hours of trying, this video has never loaded. I'll try to figure it out and come back later.)
The town waving us goodbye!
Performance by 3 and 4 year olds for the oldest people in the community. Aren't they talented!
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