Marty Magic Travel

The Waiting Game

Art and John start the morning off with a run down to the Shintoshin Park. It’s another glorious day with blue skies and mild temperature. We eat breakfast together in our Super Hotel and I do a load of laundry in the tiny washing machines. At 10:00 A.M. we must leave for the day so that the hotel can be cleaned. John grabs his skateboard and we head to the Monorail to go downtown. Kokusai Street, is lined with tourist shops, restaurants and bars. I am happy to be wandering along this bustling street again. There is an energy here that is more exciting and “foreign” than that in the Shintoshin district. This is my fourth trip to Okinawa and I am familiar and comfortable on my own so I part ways with Art and John. The shops I want to poke into are of no interest to them and visa versa. We agree to meet at 11:30 A.M. at the every present Starbucks. We meet and Art leads us down a side street to his favorite hole in the wall for lunch. A half dozen tables line the wall of the tiny noodle restaurant. There is no glossy menu to order from, just simple drawings of the “sets” posted on the wall. I can’t say the food is memorable, but it is ample and cheap.

After lunch we wander down Heiwadori Street on a quest for freshly baked sweet bean fish. (a pastry in the shape of a fish with a sweet bean filling.) Heiwadori means “Peace Street” and is a long covered market with hundreds of tiny shops, street venders and narrow alley ways. As we exit John spies a beetle vender and is immediately enthralled. He REALLY wants one. These are the horned rhinoceros beetles that are several inches long. There are several species to choose from. I am not sure how I feel about adopting a beetle, but I think it may be an option once we move into our apartment. John is excited and talks nonstop about this for the rest of the afternoon. Should we allow him to buy one, John has already chosen the name, Frackasaurus. “Frack” will not be able to return home with us so one of the prerequisites to all of this is that John find a future home for his beetle when we leave.

Takaaki picks us up at Heiwadori Street and drives us to the internet café. There is a “Pet Box” a block away so John and I go there while Art and Takaaki drink iced coffees. Pet Box is the Japanese equivalent to Pet Smart except that our local Pet Smart doesn’t have rhinoceros beetles for sale. John browses all the accessories available for purchase to house and feed his future beetle. We return to the cafe and decide that Art will go with Takaaki to sign the rental agreement for our apartment while John and I walk back to our Super Hotel via the skate park. I sit under a tree while John skates, pull out my book and begin to read. The skating is short lived since John refuses to wear his helmet and we get into our first serious argument of the trip. We leave the park and walk back in silence. Actually, I am silent while John tells me exactly what he thinks about my rules. We sit on the curb in front of the hotel and “discuss “our differences. Fortunately neither one of us ever stays mad for long and we return to the skate park an hour later. This time John wears his helmet while on the half pipe but continues to test me when he is on flat pavement.

We catch a cab back to Heiwadori Street in the evening. We have been offered the use of a friend’s cell phone and we plan to have dinner downtown at the same time. John is hungry and impatient with our search of the perfect restaurant. I am determined to choose a restaurant quickly and within a few minutes we decide to gamble our luck on an upstairs tonkatsu restaurant. From street level it looks quite charming but when we enter we discover that we are the only patron which is never a good sign and the menu is all in Kanji. There are no glossy pictures to choose from so Art translates as best as he can. We each order a different type of tonkatsu. Tonkatsu is basically a wiener schnitzel and is a specialty in Okinawa. It’s served with a thick sweet steak sauce somewhat like Worcestershire sauce. Art and I share a small heated flask of sake. Dinner is excellent.

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

Our bodies still haven’t adjusted to Okinawa time so we wake at 5:00 A.M. and are the first ones downstairs for breakfast in our Super Hotel. An entire wall in the dining area is lined with drink vending machines and one of the machines is programmed to offer the hotel guests free coffee and tea between the hours of 7:00 A.M. and 9:00 A.M. John makes a beeline for the machine and pushes the icon for the hot milk coffee. A cold breakfast buffet is arranged along the side counter plus hot rice and miso soup. There are platters of cold tamago, cold seaweed mixed with rice noodles and vegetables and what I think is a stir fry bamboo dish, also cold. There are triangles of tuna and egg sandwiches with the crusts cut off and small square pieces of teriyaki duck or chicken. A sliced roll of mystery meat and vegetable pate is yet another option. Three small dishes hold colorfully dyed pickled vegetables and on the shelf above are saran wrapped “croissants” and butter and jam. John eats several pieces of tamago (a sweet cold egg omelet) and gorges on the overly processed croissants which he stuffs with jam and butter. This morning’s breakfast and the dining room is far removed from the breakfast buffets at hotels back home which in my opinion also leave much to be desired. A dozen tables are arranged grid like in the dining area. They are more like 4 person desks. Each “desk” has a white plastic vertical partition visually dividing the diners on one side of the table from the diners on the other side. The hotels guests begin to arrive. They are mostly Japanese business men wearing crisp white shirts and ties. Each picks up a plastic tray, configured somewhat like a T.V. dinner tray with several partitions for each choice of food. Each fills their tray and then sits facing the blank partition to eat breakfast in silence. No one is overweight except for Art and me.

We take a long morning walk through the Shintoshin district. Shintoshin is a new upscale district with many new hotels, shopping malls and restaurants. John rides his skate board and we stop in at a sporting store to look at bicycles for John and me. The sky is bright blue, the temperature in the mid 70’s. At noon we choose a restaurant from the plastic food display in the window. Inside we order from a glossy picture menu depicting the “set” options and large lacquer trays arranged with our chosen dishes are delivered to us shortly. Lunch is good. This restaurant is just one of many like these, formula, but with mindful presentation and gracious service. Our bill is about $30 for the three of us, including tax and there is no tipping in Japan.

Takaki picks us up at the hotel at 1:00 P.M. sharp. He has arranged for us to look at an apartment near the harbor. This area of the city is older and Art and John would prefer to be in Shintoshin but there are not many short term apartments available anywhere. It is on the second floor, has two sunny front rooms, a narrow balcony and a second bedroom off the back but it isn’t furnished. It is $10,000. Yen per month plus utilities. (about $875) The apartment next door is also available, has the same floor plan and is furnished. It’s $12,000. (about $1050) Yen per month but the furnishings are ghastly. I am not sure I will be able to live with the turquoise floral bedspreads, lace covered Kleenex boxes and plaid couch but we decide to take the furnished one so that we don’t have to spend time and money setting up house. Unfortunately the apartment doesn’t have internet connection so we will have to walk to an internet café daily. The nearest one is about 20 minutes away and Takaki drives us there so we can check it out. We have all been getting along well, but the three of us can’t continue to live in our 10 foot x 10 foot room much longer without loosing our sanity.

We part ways with Takaki at the internet café to walk back to our hotel via the skate park and central park in Shintoshin. It’s another gorgeous day and John spends a few minutes on the half pipe, but he has the wrong board and skates ahead of us to get his longer board back at the hotel. Except for the traffic, we have no worries about John being on his own in the city. Art returns to the skate park to hang with John while I work on my blog in the hotel.

One more unconventional aspect of the Super Hotel is that you must leave your room between the hours of 10:00 A.M. and 3:00 P.M. During this time a crew of about 10 women cleans the rooms. I saw them gathering this morning just before we left. They stood in two lines facing each other reading in unison, almost chanting, from sheets of paper in front of them. The female desk clerk led them in this exercise. Apparently before the work day begins in many work groups in Japan, there is a team meeting where the employees recite the company values and motivational mantra. These women were all wearing matching green scrub covers. Their heads were covered with green scarves. They did not look joyful or motivated.

This Super Hotel is centrally located in the Shintoshin district so for dinner we walk over to the Duty Free Center Mall. Art promises us an adventure so we glide up a sleek escalator and at the top is the “Coliseum” food court. This is like no other food court that I have seen. The hostess at the top of the escalator hands us a “charge” card to record our purchases at any of the various food stations. We will pay the total when we leave. The lighting and ambience is elegant and we circle the various “Islands” trying to choose. There is a glimmering drink island where one can order most any libation and diverse entrees from around the world. When traveling our family has an extremely difficult time choosing where to eat and tonight is no exception. Although the prices are not exceptionally high, we are exhausted and decide that tonight might not be the best night to try this dining experience. We complete our circle, hand the hostess our unused cards and return to the street. We walk back past another mall and on its second floor is the usual food court. Art and John choose McDonalds and I eat a pate of chicken and salad. The mall is teaming with teenagers and I enjoy the fashion parade as I eat a very poor dinner.

Wednesday, February 7th

It’s 5:15 in the morning Okinawa time, and although I’m still exhausted, my California time body clock won’t let me sleep more. My husband, Art Bobroskie, myself and our 14 year old son, John traveled 22 hours to get here. We will be here for three months exploring the islands to learn all that we can about the culture, history and contemporary life in Okinawa. I have packed all of my wax carving tools and gemstones recently purchased from the Tucson Gem and Mineral show. As soon as we find an apartment I will set up a tiny work space so that I will be able to create new designs during our stay here. John has packed a suitcase full of books and will home school while we are here.

Monday Feb 5th.
I am awake before the 4:00 A.M. alarm mentally checking the final things off on my packing list. I work a final three hours in my office and at 7:00 A.M. I am surprised by an unexpected visit from Alisha, Sterling and Molly. We had said our goodbyes last night so I am completely surprised and delighted. We exchange more hugs and kisses and take a final long look at our 5 month old grand daughter, Molly. She will be crawling when we return in late April but Alisha promises to e-mail us photos. Our friend, Michael Shulman drive us to the airport and although we have 7 bags and Art’s oversized crated bicycle, we are early and check in is smooth. John has been anticipating 12 hours of non stop movies and is immediately involved in the remote control that operates the tiny seat back screen positioned in front of him. John is already taller than I am and he folds himself into the window seat. I scrunch into the middle seat, the peanut butter between Art and John. The flight is surprisingly painless and the 11 hours pass easily between movies and mediocre airline food. We land at Narita International Airport, Tokyo ahead of schedule.

We still have another flight to catch from a different airport so after proceeding through immigration we retrieve our bags, pass through customs and catch an Airport bus for the 1 hour and 20 minutes transfer to the Hanada Airport. Before leaving the United States, I had ordered yen from my bank at home. Having yen in our pockets streamlines our entry. We don’t need to agonize over the airport exchange rates and deal with currency exchange in order to purchase our 3,000 yen bus tickets to Hanada. We have taken this bus many times before and it seems outrageous that it costs nearly $30.00 each to transfer from the international airport to the domestic airport, but that is the way that it is. The bus is convienent and easy and our 7 bags and bicycle are immediately loaded underneath the bus. I look out the window in a jet lagged daze. The air is hazy and the sun is low in the sky. The route isn’t particularly scenic, but all is interesting when you travel. Blue and red tiled houses and apartment buildings with laundry drying on balconies whizz past us. We speed past industrial areas and past high tech districts with unusual and sometimes futuristic architecture. Ferris wheels are silhouetted grey against the hazy skyline and the towers of Disney World’s Magic Castle pierce the haze. The sun is a burning red ball on the horizon when we arrive at Hanada Airport. We watch it set, dipping low under an immense red steel arch. I wish for immediate access to my camera to capture the moment, but my camera is packed securely beneath my computer and sleep deprivation has all but immobilized me.

After retrieving our baggage from the belly of the bus we recheck our bags for the flight to Okinawa and wander the multi level airport shopping mall during our lay over. The airport mall sparkles with brilliantly lit shops and restaurants. We survey the plastic food displays in front of a dozen restaurants and finally chose a restaurant for dinner. Our “set” meals are served on black and red lacquered trays arranged with various sized lacquered dishes and covered bowls. The flight to Okinawa is half empty and John and I are able to stretch out on empty seats and sleep away the two hour flight.

Warm and humid air rushes at us as we deboard the plane and we float dreamlike along glassy corridors lined with literally hundreds of brilliant blooming orchids. The air is heavy with their fragrances. We have already been through immigration in Tokyo so the moving conveyor belt hums us silently and quickly to the baggage claim. Takaki and Tadashi meet us and it takes both of their vans to accommodate the three of us and our luggage.

We have hotel reservations at the Super Hotel. Checking in is a high tech experience. There is a desk clerk but check in is processed by a machine somewhat like an ATM. A screen displays room options and Art presses the screen and enters the number of people in our party and number of nights needed. He slides in crisp bills and a receipt prints out with our room number and a code to open our door. Our triple room is 8000 yen, (about $75) including breakfast for the three of us. Our room is on the 7th floor and Art punches our security code into the key pad. A light flashes green, we turn the handle and enter into our postage stamp sized room. The room is approximately 10 feet x 10 feet square equipped with a stark white fiberglass bathroom pod. This imaculate room is more like a state room onboard a ship than a hotel room. John is exhausted and climbes immediately up the black steel ladder to his narrow and tightly made bunk bed. Art and I fight with suitcases trying to find space to fit them into our room. There are no closets, but two wall racks with three hangers each for our belongings. A queen sized platform bed consumes the majority of the room, tucked underneath the single upper bunk bed. A narrow desk is along the window side of the room with a 12″ T.V. at one end, a hot water plate at the other and a tiny refigerator squeezed underneath. There are three pair of bathroom slippers hung below the narrow wall mirror and an emergency flashlight. Art falls into bed immediately but I take some time in our tiny and bathroom cleaning up from the long trip. I am not a stranger to the high tech world of the Japanese toilet, but this is the first time I have had one of these amazing toilets in my room. I hope the following comments will amuse and not offend my readers. The bathroom “pod” is aproximately 4 feet x 5.5 feet and remarkably well designed. A small but very deep bathtub is against the not so very far away wall with a tiny sink angled between tub and toilet. There is a drain in the center of the floor. I sit down to relieve my bladder and the cushioned seat is heated. Immediately there is a rush of water filling the toilet. The controls along side of the toilet have visually explicit icons. One button regulates a warm jet stream of water aimed at one’s butt and a second button operates a wider spray of water. There is a controll slide to regulated the pressure of the water. Although these features are more than satisfactory, this toilet lacks the of hot air option to dry one’s bottom. It also lacks the musical or “flushing noise” feature that I have noticed in some upscale public bathrooms. (A user can push this button to cover up any embarassing bathroom sounds he or she might emit.) Familiarized with the toilet I move to brush my teeth. Individually wrapped disposable toothbrushes are provided with miniscule tubes of toothpaste. There is one pivoting water faucet positioned between the bathtub and the sink. I swing the faucet so that it points into the sink, turn on the cold water and brush. I note that I will have the option of a deep bath or the use of a shower wand in the morning. Wall mounted soap and shampoo dispensers are installed for our convienence. Exhausted by the trip I slip gratefully into crisp sheet and sleep.

Marty