We look into the eyes of history on this island.

I accompanied Marissa on her filed trip to 3 "War Memorial" sites with her Social Studies class and although I still feel VERY overwhelmed by all the information, painful stories, pictures and tears- I wanted to share our experience with you.

Our trip was so fast so we were very rushed through the sites. There was not really enough time to take it all in. This is a trip that will have to be re-visited with more time and Kleenexes. I guess I never realized how the Okinawan's were so scared of us due to lies told about the Americans, they were scared for there lives and families. The fear of watching us abuse and mutilate their children and family caused many of them to murder their children and elderly. Standing at the cliffside where mothers threw there children off into the sea took my breath away trying to imagine the emotions that must have encompassed her.

Okinawa was a land set apart from Japan that had to suffer the consequences of evil rule and war that was necessary for all of us to live freely today. Many Americans, Okinawans and Civilians lost their lives on these grounds. I am humbled by them all.

Peace Prayer Park

The NeoPark Experience

My babies are getting ready to go back to school and I was feeling like a little bit of a slacker mother since we have been so consumed with the moving process and settling in. My friend Denise had mentioned that there was a place South of us called NeoPark that is like an animal sanctuary. You actually walk through and can feed all the bird and Lemurs and really anything else that you can get close enough to feed. (Shhh...don't tell the staff of NeoPark I just told you guys that)

We loaded up the kiddos and another friend of mine, Carmen and off we went to explore the wildlife of Japan. What a fun place!!! Only with a crew of 7, 4 of them being children can you have so many mishaps and laughs. The birds are so funny, they totally know when you walk up to the glass door to go outside that you have food and boy are they ready for ya.

Javan was not so hip on the birds considering most of them were as tall as he was!! In this picture he was literally yelling, "Mooommmmmyyy, HELP!"


With so many birds comes bird poop and Marissa could not resist falling right into the excitement of their excretions. Marissa, you bring so many good stories to the table. I love you soooo much!


These birds were great, there were so many of them I have never seen before and they would walk right up to you. We took all of our left over crackers and Denise brought raisins to coax the Lemurs out of the trees. Their tiny lemur hands are sooo soft, like a newborn baby and they are so gentle taking the raisin from your hand ever so carefully. I wanted to bring the little guy home!

Bad hair day

Denise and the kids feeding the lemur.


Now you have to come with me to the Afurican Savanna. Yes, I said Afurican Savannah. That is Engrish. In the Afurican Savanna they have all the exotic animals you would normally see in Afurica, Like the rare Doxon, and Chihuahua. It still makes me laugh just writing about it! They have dogs on display! Yes, they have dogs as exhibits AND you can pay 200 yen to go to the petting zoo to pet the rare species. We had to do it in the spirit of exploration. Along with about 10-12 dogs they had a Little baby boar that ran around and mingled with the dog peters. He was small and cute and commanded your attention. Javan got right down to his level and was petting him and the little guy licked his chin and made us all laugh, awww so sweet. Marissa thought she too wanted to do this so right to her bottom she went to pet the fella. She did not consider that she had bird food in her pocket and HOLY PIG!! That little pig attacked her and was squealing and nipping the whole time. All we could do was scream as she fought the pig off! Everyone was screaming - American and Japanese alike! She made it out unscathed but I do think she will not travel the Afurican Savanna again anytime real soon.

Engrish:


The very rarely seen mixed breeds of the Afurican Savanna.


This little piggy was the naughty one, I am so happy Javan did not have food on his face after lunch! We would be having a pig roast!


That was about all the excitement we could stand for the day, a few more visits with some monkeys and HUGE fish that are from the Amazon and we finished up the perfect day with a group photo! Traditional Japanese garb complete with the accessories. This is when you finish and are about to leave the park for $5.00, can't beat it!


Only in Okinawa can you: Fall in bird poop, feed a lemur, see wild chihuahuas on exhibit, be attacked by a baby pig, feed ginormous fish and dress up in kimonos for a photo opp. all in one afternoon! Gotta love this place!

With rain comes rainbows.

It will rain at the drop of a hat here. You can just be walking around outside and "BAm~!" Rain. Never would have expected it, but there it is. It isn't always a sprinkle either, it could be a downpour! It is one of the craziest things I have ever seen.

It will go away just as quickly as it came too and the sun is so hot here that any proof of rain will disappear within minutes just leaving it humid and muggy.

By experience... you can literally get out of your car with the sun shining and start walking to a building, get drenched in the parking lot because it didn't even LOOK like it was going to rain, get in the door all soaked - rain stops, everyone looks at you like "what have you been doing?" and they go on about thier way to go outside and it does not even look as if it had rained. Thank goodness that 90% of the same people have probably found themselves in the same situation so it does not require much explaining!

The beautiful rainbow showed up as we were driving away from our house on base. It was so perfect I had to share.

Sooo....my first mistake was

We decided to go purchase another car yesterday. Here in Okinawa you have 2 choices when it comes to buying a car.
1-Lemon lot (where people sell their cars prior to PCS'ing)
2-American Car Lot (usually run by retired military selling Japanese cars)

We decided to go back to the lemon lot for car #2 since we did not want to have to make car payments and plus you can really haggle since military members HAVE to have sold their cars prior to getting authorization to leave Japan to go back to the states. Piece of cake - we are so going to get a deal!!

We found a blue S-MX ( I'll show pictures later) that is small and cute, will fit the kids and I just fine and it ran great! The family selling this car had another black one just like it that they were selling too. Steve and I being the totally rational, thorough people we are thought "Hey, we should drive that one too, compare them and really see if we are getting what we are paying for. (Mistake #1)

We hop in the black one and I happen to drive it first...
[Sidenote: Why am I driving the car to "test-drive" it? I am no more in-tune with cars than I am NASA!]
I drive it down the street to a parking lot and park the thing and ask Steve if he would like to drive it back upon which his answer is "NO". (Mistake #2)
Neither one of us were really impressed with this one so I just turned right around and left the parking lot to go back to the lot.

When entering the lot I had a few choices to make one being to back the car in like he had it originally or pull it in. Knowing myself well enough to know that backing it in was probably not "safe" I decided to pull it in. (Mistake #3)

You see, the car has "aftermarket" ground effects on it (which didn't mean anything to me) but after I ripped it off and broke it, peeled off the paint and scratched it all up the people who owned the car were sure to tell us that they were "AFTERMARKET" ahhh... now I know what that means.

I pulled up too close and I could tell judging by the size of the eyes of the some random people who just happened to be standing in front of the parking spot that I parked in that it was not the best parking job ever. She mouthed "YOU BROKE IT!"

Sure enough, I did and Steve nor I both were real happy. Long story shorter, we offered to pay for the damages on a car we are not buying. We are in fact buying their other car so to say the least we could not "haggle" since I totally messed up their car that someone was coming to buy from them the next day. Steve and the guy worked it out to where the repair cost are included into our purchase costs so that we do not "owe" him anything once the final sell is made.

Humph... only me. (but my little blue car is cute!)

Oh, for the love of Stripes!

After calling American Airlines to find out what it actually takes to get a gecko to Okinawa they were sorry to inform me that they DO NOT fly gecko's to Japan. I am really confused on how all these animals get there. There are soooo many military families with animals over there, how the hell did they do it? It costs a small fortune!

Cyrus I understand is so big that his crate does not fit through the connection flight from Tokyo to Okinawa so therefore you have to spend lotsa $$$$$ to have him "specialty" shipped. The fat tailed gecko on the other hand is ity bity (don't let the name fool ya), like maybe 6 oz. less if I skinny his little tail up! He Can not go on the flight with us so he too has to go as cargo but may be easier to get through Tokyo customs. They are telling us maybe around $800-1000.00 or maybe more to get the little guy over there! Craziness.

This little guy has been through so much, we almost lost him to double pneumonia back in Jan. of 07, he was so sick. Stripes was in intensive care and in grave condition, very touch and go for a little while. The doctors had sat us down and explained they really did not expect to see him make it through. We never gave up on the little man and he spent about a month and a half in the hospital with antibiotic therapy and forced feedings and finally his chest x-rays showed his pneumonia was all cleared up and he came home looking very thin and sad. We missed him while he was gone terribly and made get-well cards for him with Javan's picture and we would call and check on him quite often or go by and visit. Javan and stripes grew very close and now look at us, possibly not able to take him with us. I'm distraught.

My children are going to grow up never being able to maintain healthy relationships, things they love are going to be dispensable, they are going to give their spouses and children away every time they move!! Oh crap. It will be our fault that they are relationship nomads.

I could really use some good news regarding animals right about now. But I don't see it coming.

Web orders have arrived!

So...we officially have them! The conversation went something like this:
(I was at work when the news came)
Steve: Do you want the good news or the bad news?
Me: Um, not really sure, kinda having a bad day. Is it going to make me cry?
Steve: Not sure, I'll wait til' we get home to tell you.

Well you all know me too well to know that I COULD NOT wait until we got home to hear what was so important.

Me:Tell me now, I can't wait!
Steve proceeded to tell me he was not eligible for re-enlistment and his papers where denied. I really could not even think as to what to say. I think a million thoughts went through my head like, the house,the bills,the kids,the cars, health insurance. OMG! What are we going to do?

Then Steve soothed it all by saying "Just kidding,I was approved for re-enlistment. I got orders too, We're going to Okinawa! In February!! Holy Cow! The questions that went through my head like, the house, the bills, the kids, the cars, all the same questions!

To say the least It was quite a shock for both of us. February? How the hell are we going to get out of here by February? After it all sunk in the kids and I were ready to hit the road by planes trains and automobiles but Steve being the voice of reason in our house explained we were gong to pull back to May/June to allow the kids to finish school. :(

So I have realized after a week or so to process this all that it is going to be harder to get our dog into Japan vs. the kids! Rabies, Farvars titers, quarantining and everything else, Oh my! I so hope I don't get them confused and take the kids for their rabies shot although the quarantining might not be so bad!

Cyrus goes for his first vaccination tomorrow, I have not told him yet. I will break it to him in the morning!

Well, I hope this will keep you all posted as to how we are doing on our work-up to leave for our international move. I may have to refer back to it myself a few times! Javan is just excited he will get to learn "Javaneese"!

Oh! I almost forgot, if any of you are interested to see some of the local culture and information I found a great website- WWW.Japanupdate.com This is their local paper for Americans.