More fun people

Michiyo keeps in touch with some of her former students at the English-speaking Jelly Bean preschool. One day in Kumamoto, we had lunch with two of them, Mina and Nana and their Moms.
Mina is on the left, Nana on the right. Nana's English is very impressive, and she won first prize in the city-wide English competition. She herself calls Michiyo when we are in town. We encouraged both of these girls, like we did so many of our friends and family in Japan, to come stay with us in America sometime. Hiroki was showing off his huge baby biceps.

Nana's Mom Kazumi, on the left, and Mina's Mom Rina, on the right, invited us out to join them at a great Chinese restaurant in downtown Kumamoto.

Can you see the cockroach on the table? I brought this fake cockroach with me, and got a LOT of mileage out of it. Nana and Mina were disgusted, but could not get enough, constantly asking me in Japanese, "Where is the Goki buri?"

Michiyo studied in Eugene, Oregon for two years, 1999-2001. One of the friends she made there was Yoko. She and her husband Koji came down to see us from Saga on the last weekend.

We had fun meeting each other and catching up. They have been married four years, and really want to have kids. They had been living in downtown Kobe, and Koji was a 'salary-man' for about 18 years. However, the goal of having kids is so important, that they uprooted their lives to live in a less stressful, more natural environment. For the last year or so, they have been studying and preparing how to run a farm. They are now living in the countryside as farmers, evaluating exactly what to grow in order to make a living. Listening to their situation and their life choices was fascinating.

Yoko's hope is to have Koji do the main work of farming, and she wants to provide a place for people to experience a homestay in the Japanese countryside. She envisions foreigners, especially kids but families too, as well as Japanese kids from city areas, living for a bit in the country. She also wants to have foreigners teach English for short periods in exchange for meals and accomodation.

They asked what I did for a living, and naturally requested to see some magic tricks. Koji really enjoyed my world-famous finger-in-the-box surprise, which countless folks in the Midwest have been shocked by.

We met Aki, a former roommate of Michiyo for tea one day.

In the same cafe, unbelievably, one of my first co-workers in Kumamoto approached me and said hello. Fukuda-sensei helped me teach English for three years at Jonan Junior High School. She is retired now, and when I asked her for her email, she said she doesn't use a computer. Oh well. It was great to see you Mrs. Fukuda! I'll have to write her a letter.