Somewhat coherent notes

We flew into Naha on the main island. The southern part of this island is dominated by military bases. We left that area ASAP and headed up north for camping and beaches. The temperature was about the same as Kyoto, but there was a lovely sea breeze blowing to keep us a little cooler.

We took a little dip in the ocean at the beach where we camped before moving on to a sandier location up the road. And by sandier, I mean soft white sand in which umbrellas were stuck shading wealthy resort guests. We forewent the $30 for our own umbrella and dove right in to the crystal blue water.

Okinawa soba is like thicker ramen with larger pieces of pork.

I pulled off onto a tiny road to get a closer look at the Okinawan graves. Burial rituals in Okinawa are unique. The body of the deceased is buried and left to decompose. After a set amount of time, the remains are dug up, and the skull removed and washed in the ocean. The skull is then placed in the family grave which resembles a small stone house.

Down the road from the graves was a cape with an "elephant cliff" and a woman who was willing to give me a deal on a sanshin. I declined, but not without seriously thinking about paying $250 for this Okinawan musical instrument.

Shuri-jo is an old castle built back in the day when Okinawa was its own country. Okinawa did not officialy become part of Japan until 1972. Way before that it had quite a bit of direct contact with China. The southern islands are closer to Taiwan than to mainland Japan. The castle has a very famous gate that is pictured on the 2000 yen bill. The 2000 yen bill is like the US $2. Rare and hardly used.

We had dinner at an izakaya where the Okinawans laughed at us as we ate four dishes of Champuru, fish guts on tofu, and tried to choke down the incredibly strong Awamori, Okinawan specialty, sake.

We stopped by the Okinawa Peace Memorial Park, set up to commemorate those who died, both Japanese and American (I'd say 5% of those who died were American), in the Battle of Okinawa at the end of WWII. Then we went to see a limestone cave the Okinawa World Park. We also had a once in a lifetime chance to taste sake made with snake poison. You could even buy a bottle with the snake in it for a mere $400.

A little trip to the beach, and we got on the ferry heading to Ishigakijima, a southern island.
This not without a little mishap where the two guys got stuck in traffic returning the rent a car and missed the ferry. They had to fly to the island the next day. The ferry only leaves once a week.

The reef stretching from Naha to Ishigakijima is the largest in Japan. So of course, we went snorkeling. I'd never been snorkeling before. We found this cheap mom and pop's inn/snorkeling/boat place. The wizened old man took us out on his rickety boat, told us to put our masks on, and Go! He let us do whatever we wanted for three hours. Occasionally he'd say something and point, but since we couldn't understand a word of the Okinawan dialect, we just followed the direction of his finger.

It was amazing. The coral was at times a mere 6 inches below me. The fish were not afraid. They'd come up and stare at me and then nonchalantly swim away. I was even nibbled on once by the most amazingly striped fish. We saw "Nemo," neon blue, white, striped, orange, rainbow, flourescent, tiny, large, puffer, flat, round, and all sorts of other fish. Many I had only ever seen in the zoo. The coral was amazing too. It looked so soft, but I accidently knocked my knee on a bit and I can tell you, not soft.

Live Okinawan music after dinner.

The next day we went out to Iriomote Island, "Japan's last frontier." The inside of the island is jungle. The only road goes around the edges. We took a boat up the river and hiked a bit through the jungle to some waterfalls. There were lots of lizards, including blue tailed ones.

Before we left we walked to the Moon Beach, and the Star Sand Beach. Star sand is sand that is in the shape of stars. In actuality, it is dead sea creatures of some sort.

On our way back we stopped at another little island, Taketomi, where there is a traditional Okinawan village. Dirt/sand roads, red tiled houses, coral rock walls surrounding the houses, water buffalo, goats. It seemed really calm and peaceful.

Ferry back to Naha, where we made a brief visit to "International Street" before taking full advantage of the luxuries of a very very nice hotel. One of which was the television showing AFN, American Forces Network. It was nice to see Dave Letterman. I have to say, however, that the commercials on the station make me scared to be an American. How would you like to have commercials on your TV saying how good the Apache Attack Helicopter is? "This helicopter was instrumental in killing a whole lot of people. It has lots of guns and we should be commemorating it's use." There was that kind of commercial, and then there were public service announcements that looked like they were filmed with my digital camera and edited in the 1980's. Yikes.

Our flight back to Osaka was on ANA, a flight that was only 1/4 full. My friend's non-Japanese speaking friend who came with us asked the flight attendent why ANA sends flights that are not in any way full. She couldn't tell him why they would be so wasteful.

It's nice to be back in Kyoto again, but at the same time, I would really like to go back to Okinawa soon. I could possibily even conceive of living there. The people are so much more relaxed than the rest of Japan. The Japanese need to learn to take things a little easier.