Landing in New York

Well, there is lots to tell about these last few weeks and sooo many pictures, so I will do my best to share with you all that we have done.



We arrived at JFK on August 14th around 7:30 p.m with Dan's sisters' family all waiting to see us! It was soooo much fun to get hugs and see them all again. We were lucky to see Dan Tunick (Kristi's husband) that evening because usually he works nights as a NYPD, his boss just happened to change his schedule for that day!
Ryan, Kristi's oldest son, made us a welcome home poster for us that said Daniel-san and Tante Chris. It was really great!
This is us with Dan's grandparents (Irene and Bill Trautenberg). We will be living with them until December.
We were thrilled to finally meet our nephew and Godson, Kenny Tunick. He is 10 months old now and is such a fun boy!
The family got together for dinner the night after our arrival for a small celebration. It was really nice to have a chance to relax and talk.
Before heading to Fergus Falls, we got together with two of Dan's best friends and their girlfriends for wings and a movie. We had a great time catching up and getting to know the Melanie and Candace.

We've arrived!

We have arrived to New York, safe and sound. We landed at JFK on Tuesday night and hit the ground runnin'! We have been visiting with Dan's family and friends and taking care of some odds and ends. I offically became a NY state resident yesterday after getting my driver's license and registering to become a voter. Woohoo!! We will be flying out to MN on Saturday morning at 8 a.m. and will be there for 10 days. Hopefully I will have a chance to see lots of friends and family!!

Kyoto Trip-Day 2

On Sunday morning we woke up later than planned, so we started the day off around 10:00 a.m. We opened up the hotel room curtains and looked out at the beautiful view that we had.


First off for the day, we made our way south of Kyoto to Fushimi Inari Temple. It's famous for having more than 1000 red "torii." Torii are significant of temples in Japan. If you follow all the torii at Fushimi Inari, you'll end up climbing up Mount Inari...which we ended up doing. Once we arrived at the top, we were amazed at how far we'd come and understood why we were so out of breath!!!

The main entrance torii.


Walking along the torii path.


A beautiful pond along the trek that was full of turtles.


Finally we reached the top. What an awesome view of Kyoto!


After Fushimi Inari we went to Kiyomizu Temple. This was the one of the buildings at the entrance.


This three-story pagoda was beautiful at night.


Here was the view from the top of Kiyomizu Temple.


These guys were so fun to see wheeling around people.

Kyoto Trip- Day 1

We are in Kyoto and having a wonderful time!!! Our trip has been well worth it and we are getting to see everything that we had wanted. Of course the most important thing for me to see was a maiko and I did!!!! I was so happy and will always remember that. We have visited temples, shrines, castles and more. So, enjoy some of our pictures and see all you American's soon!!!!!!!!


Maiko are Geisha apprentices. This young lady we saw during the day in Pontocho, a famous area in the Gion district. You can tell when the ladies are maiko when they wear their hair like she is.
Our friend, Kaino-san from Sendai, asked his sister-in-law Takako to show us around Kyoto one day since she lived there, so the first day we arrived she and her daughter met us at Kyoto station took us to Kinkakuji Temple and Ryoanji Temple.

Kinkakuji Temple "The Gold Pavilion"Me and Dan sitting by the rock garden at Ryoanji Temple.

Along the Kamo river in the center of Kyoto many resturants serve dinner on their patio and attact thousands of people by doing so. We were two of them. It was sooooo romantic!!

Morning Tuna Auction

On Saturday morning, before heading to Kyoto, me, Dan, Tomoko and Uwe were up at 4:30 a.m. and off to the Tuna fish auction by 5:00 a.m. All of us were really tired since we stayed up late the night before chatting, but we made it and were happy we did.



These huge tuna weigh tons and are massive compared to humans. When sushi cheif's or salemen come in to buy them every morning, they check the end where the fin has been removed for freshness and quality. The tuna are auctioned off once men have gotten a chance to check out the fish.



About 6:00 a.m we sat down on the street for a strong cup of iced coffee. It was already about 85* that morning.


Tomoko and Uwe sent us off for the last time at Tokyo station. We were sad to say goodbye, but we hope to see eachother again soon.

Visiting Tokyo

After leaving Sendai (Thursday) we took the bullet train to Tokyo were we visited the National Museum of Western Art, ate dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, walked down Ginza street, went the top of the Tokyo Dome hotel to the Artist Cafe to catch an awesome night view of Tokyo, then we ended the night singing Karoke. We had a blast! On Friday, Tomoko had the day off and took us by ferry to Hamarikyu Garden where we enjoyed a tea ceramony. After that, we headed to Zojoji Temple where we saw hundreds of small statues which represent lost or aborted babies. It was a solomn moment.....after that we entered the temple and were able to look around a little bit.

Dan posing under Rodin's "The Thinker"
I'm standing next to a wall mural of Monet's "Water Lilies" which we actually saw inside the gallery.
Uwe, Tomoko and Dan at Yoshinoya.
Me and Dan at the top of the Artist Cafe next to the Tokyo Dome.
Uwe, Tomoko and me singing at Karoke.

Me and Tomoko on the ferry.Hamarikyu Garden.

Small statues which represent lost or aborted babies.

Zojoji Temple and the Tokyo tower in the background.

Send off

Yesterday we left Sendai in the morning and were sent off by lots of our friends and students. We were so happy that we were able to see so many people again one last time! Some came to say goodbye at the church and others came to Sendai station to wait with us on the platform. We really had a traditional japanese send-off!!!

Leaving Sendai

This morning I am up early finishing packing our bags because today we leave Sendai at 12:00 p.m and head down to Tokyo. We will be flying back to America on the 14th, so these next few days we will be traveling around Kyoto and Tokyo. It's crazy that our time here is up, but we are happy that we finished saying goodbye to our students and now have sometime to reflect before heading to the states. Please keep us in your thoughts as we are traveling that no harm will come our way. Thank you to all of you who have become my blogging friends this year. We are going to continue to blog even after our move out to Long Island, NY, so don't go away!

Tanabata

Today was the big annual Tanabata festival in Sendai and a bunch of us went in to enjoy the atmosphere. Along with Dan and me were Christopher and Joshua Bengtson, the Sorensen clan and Tim Piccharini from Minneapolis, the son of Jan DeVries, a friend in Fergus Falls.

In the outdoor shopping Arcade that runs about 5 city blocks there are hundreds of hanging streamers that organizations, stores or clubs enter into a contest.

This particular row of streamers signified the 62nd anniversay of the Hiroshima and Nagaski bombing. You can read the tag that hung from each streamer below in the next picture. It felt quite humbling to be in Japan on the very day of the bombings 62 years later.

Me and some cute Japanese girls also in yukata (the cotton summer kimono).
While we were walking through the Arcade Maria found a yukata that she loved and was able to get it and have it put on at a kimono shop, so for the rest of the day, she and I walked around

The evening ended with a parade that we really enjoyed.

Fireworks festival

On Sunday evening our friends and English students, Tomita's, envited us and the Sorensen's to go watch the big fireworks display in downtown Sendai from Mr. Tomita's 7th story office building. Dan and I had recieved summer kimono's from our church earlier that morning and had the perfect opportunity to wear them that evening. It was so fun!!!! The best was that the office was air conditioned and didn't have bugs! They even surprised us with Pizza Hut pizza!! It was a great memory!