Living in Japan and Okinawa - Part Six, Final

     After leaving Okinawa for the final time in 1968, I returned to Tokyo 11 years later in 1979.  This time I was back in Tokyo with the US Embassy as a Foreign Service Officer.  Jo and our two kids with our dog Smoke joined me a week later.  We were housed in a three bedroom apartment in the Grew House of the Mitsui Compound in Roppongi.  The Mitsui Compound is an 11 acre piece of land owned by the U.S. Government at the edge of Roppongi, bordering Akasaka.  It consisted of three apartment buildings named Perry House (after Commodore Perry, who opened diplomatic relations with Japan), Harris House (Townsend Harris, the first U.S. Consul to Japan), and Grew House (Ambassador Grew who was the US Ambassador to Japan before World War Two).  The compound was built shortly after the end of World War Two and by 1979 was literally bursting at the seams.  Many of the embassy personnel lived in private rentals because there was not enough room at Mitsui Compound.  So, the State Department decided to rebuild the compound with bigger and more modern versions of the Perry House, Harris House, and Grew House buildings, plus, surround the compound with townhouses for additional housing. 
     In the fall of 1979 everyone was moved out of the compound and placed in private rentals around the area, some as far away as Meguro.  We were very fortunate in that we were moved to a three story flat in Roppongi.  The Torizaka Place was a three story building with each floor containing large, well appointed, modern flats.  We were on the second floor,  a spacious four bedroom flat with two and half baths and a balcony!  To give you an idea of high rent costs in Tokyo, even at that time the U.S. government was paying $3500 a month rent for that apartment!  All three floors were occupied by U.S. Embassy families, so the embassy was paying out over $10,000 a month.
     My third stay in Tokyo was just as good and memorable as it was on the two previous occasions.  Tokyo had, of course, changed.  But still, it was the same Tokyo that I remembered.  We revisited some of my old hang outs, had pizza at Nicola's Pizza House and spaghetti at Sicilia's.  It was very nice to be back in Tokyo, and I felt very comfortable.  Jo too enjoyed Tokyo tremendously.  She became the embassy's first Community Liaison Officer, and in that capacity, got to visit all sorts of places and meet all kinds of interesting folks.  Our kids too enjoyed Tokyo very much.  It is, as I said before, possibly the world's safest city, and the kids were able to go around on their own on subway without any fear.  Our daughter Natalie, who was nine years old at the time, would get all dressed up and go with her friend, who was a year older, to have tea and cookies at a Roppongi tea shop every Saturday afternoon!  Can you imagine two little girls that age going out on their own to have tea in New York, or any other city for that matter?  They were perfectly safe in Tokyo and we never worried!
     I was able to go hunting during the season and revisit some of the places that I had hunted as a kid.  That was quite an experience, especially re-visiting the same places with the same hunters, my Japanese uncle and his friend Mano-san, who were now 25 years older!  My uncle also took us to the most famous tempura restaurant in Tokyo located in Shinbashi.  He took us there on the occasion when Jo's parents came out to visit us in Tokyo.  The tempura was fabulous, served one piece at a time.  I am not an expert on Japanese cuisine, so I really couldn't tell you just how good it was.  But even to my rather uneducated palate, the tempura at that place seem to be a cut above the average.  The bill, I discovered when I glanced over my uncle's shoulder as he paid, was something like $2000 for the eight of us, my uncle, his wife, Jo's mom and dad, our two kids, and Jo and me!
     There were many such eye opening experiences for us.  I was invited along with several other embassy officers to a famous geisha house by a yakuza boss.  The invitation was actually extended to everyone in our section, but not everyone wanted to attend and be seen with gangsters.   At the same time we were advised that to refuse would be an insult and could cause problems down the line.  The yakuza boss, was also a powerful industrialist who owned several legitimate businesses, a common practice among yakuza.  So, rather than turning down the invitation, a few were chosen, and luckily I was included, otherwise I would have never had the experience.  Wives were not included!  The famous geisha house, Nakagawa, is still very much in existence, and still very famous.  Powerful business tycoons and Prime Ministers regularly patronize that place!  Contrary to popular foreigners' perception that geisha houses are brothels, the Nakagawa strictly serves food and alcohol, and geisha's sing and dance and mostly converse, nothing more!  It is strictly timed, since billing is based on time.  Our time was two hours, during which we ate fabulous Japanese food served in small portions (no rice) and drank a lot of good sake!  The geishas engaged us in conversation and entertained us with traditional dances.  At the end of two hours we were ushered out, each one of us put in a haya (a black limousine) and whisked off home.  No ride sharing, each guest had his own haya!  When I got home, the uniformed, white gloved driver opened the door and bowing deeply and handed me a long cedar box wrapped in a beautiful silk furoshiki.  He said that it was gift from the house Nakagawa.  At home, Jo and I were very curious see what it was and opened the box and discovered that it contained three perfectly shaped honey dew melons!  The melons, incidentally, cost about $40 each in Tokyo at that time!
     There were may unexpected and delightful experiences during our stay in Tokyo.  Roppongi and Akasaka were truly cosmopolitan with various international eateries.  You could find almost any kind of ethnic restaurant!  Moti's was an excellent Indian restaurant where the nan maker put on a show flipping the dough high in the air.  There were many other excellent and inexpensive restaurants. There were many art galleries and they were treasure troves of Japanese woodblock prints!  We bought so many artifacts and other things that when we were packing out of Tokyo, we discovered that we had doubled the size of our household goods shipment!  Jo discovered some wonderful galleries and boutiques, many of these discoveries came about because of her position as the embassy's Community Liaison Officer.  One women's clothing boutique that she found in Roppongi, Tomoyo, specialized in using fancy kimono material to make fashionable, Western clothing.  She had several items made at this boutique.  She had a casual jacket made that became her favorite that she wore all the time, and she had some beautiful cocktail dresses made out of silk kimono material.
     All in all, our tour in Tokyo was a very rewarding and fascinating experience.  The kids benefited tremendously from their Tokyo exposure, and it made their subsequent experiences in other countries much easier.  For Jo and me, the tour in Tokyo was like a homecoming, it felt very familiar and comfortable.  I was able to return to Tokyo briefly (spent a week in Japan) in 1993, and although it had changed again, it was still that old familiar Tokyo!  Our daughter Natalie was there more recently, twice, once on a business trip about six or seven years ago, and more recently she took our grandchildren with her to attend one of her uncles' wedding.  Everyone loved their time in Tokyo and want to go back, the grand children especially want to go back to eat ramen!

Living in Japan and Okinawa - Part Five

     In the Spring of 1966 I returned to Okinawa after I had gotten out of the Army.  I came to Okinawa to live and work in the private sector, not affiliated with the U.S. government or the military.  Life on Okinawa was good, and the little island had changed somewhat since my high school days five years earlier.  The Pizza House was still there, in fact, it was one of the first places that I visited upon my arrival on Okinawa.  But there were a few other "new" places that didn't exist before.  In the 1950s and the early 60s, the only decent Chinese restaurant in Naha was the Rai Rai Ken, which served food that was actually in the style of Japanese/Chinese food.  Plaza House in Awase Meadows had a decent Chinese restaurant (Hong Kong style), and there was one in Koza that was supposed to be half way decent, but that was about it.  However, in 1966 there was a very decent Chinese restaurant on Kokusai Dori, a couple of blocks south of Rai Rai Ken, called the Mandarin House that actually had better food than Rai Rai Ken or Plaza House.  There was also a Korea House in the Machinato commercial area, a few doors down from the old Tuttle's Book Store and across the street from the Rendezvous Supper Club that had very good Korean food.  There were a couple of excellent Japanese restaurants in Naha, especially a sushiya on Kokusai Dori, a few doors down from Ryubo Department Store.  There were definitely more decent eateries and other places of entertainment.
     Jo and I got married in the Fall of 1966.  We first lived at a small one bedroom apartment called Yamashiro Apartments that was built and rented to almost exclusively U.S. military and civilian personnel.  I think we were the only couple living in the complex (two apartment buildings) who were not affiliated with U.S. government.   A few months later we moved to a house in an area called Onishi Terrace Heights in Ojana, which was on the east side of Highway One, between Machinato Housing Area and Futema.  It was a three bedroom house, a bit much space for just the two of us, but it was all that was available!  The private rental houses on Okinawa were very different from those in Japan.  In Japan the houses were simply whatever was available and were not built specifically for U.S. personnel.  On Okinawa, other than Okinawan houses, all the private rentals were designed and built to be rented to Americans.  Housing on bases could not accommodate all of the families.  This dated back to the 1950s, so enterprising Okinawan developers built housing for Americans and made a sizable profit.  In many respects, living in one of those developments was not really all that different from living on base.  The main difference was that there was no chain link fencing or guards at the gates since there were no gates!  Otherwise, everyone around in those houses were either military or civilian government employees.
     Our neighbors on one side was an Air Force family while the ones on the other side was a Navy family.  All of our neighbors were Americans.  Okinawans simply did not live in those houses.  Rent by Okinawan standards was high, and the utility rates were "American" rates, 100% above what Okinawans paid.  Still, it was cheap.  Our rent for the three bedroom house was $90.00 a month and monthly utilities for water and electricity (there was no gas) amounted to about $50.00 combined.  In contrast, a friend of mine, Jack, who was married to an Okinawan girl and had rented a house in her name paid about $5 a month for utilities!  Still, it was cheap for us, we paid out less than a $100 a month for our housing and utilities.
     Despite the fact that we had no access to PX/BX as non-government civilians, life was still cheap and good.  Bakery goods from Jimmy's Bakery were always better than anything you could find in a commissary, and the baked goods were not only good, but cheap!  Interestingly, you could get everything you wanted on the economy if you knew where to look for it.  I don't know whether the stuff was stolen or what, but it didn't cost much more than commissary, some things cost the same!  
     Since we weren't all that much into cooking those first years, Jo and I took advantage of the "new" places and frequented the Mandarin House and a small Japanese restaurant in the back street of Naha.  We also enjoyed the Korean barbeque, which was cheap and as good as any Korean barbeque anywhere.  Of course the good old Pizza House was always a good place to get together with our friends, which we did frequently.  Obviously, we ate out a lot!
     Because of my life long passion for hunting, naturally I resumed my avocation and Jo joined me.  We hunted just about all of the island, often with our good friend Jack, the one who was married to the Okinawan girl.  Jack had been on Okinawa with the U.S. Army and upon leaving the service returned to the island and married his Okinawan girl friend and lived and worked in the private sector like us.
     Although we hunted all over the island, as far north as Henoko and Nago, we mostly stayed in the south, around Camp Chinen, an area with which I was very familiar.  I no longer could walk out the back gate and head for my favorite spots, but I could drive to those locations from our house in Ojana area.  We revisited all of my favorite haunts, all of the locations which I had named, like "the Pond,"  "the Commo Site,"  the "Ravine," etc.   The "Ravine" was actually my very favorite spot that I, along with my buddy Larry, discovered in the Fall of 1957.  It was located about a half hour walk east of the back gate of Camp Chinen.  It was a ravine, surrounded on three sides by steep wooded hills, with the bottom of the ravine being more or less a marshy area that surprisingly always held moorhens and woodcock in season.  In, Snap Shots, the second chapter is named after my favorite old hunting dog, Robin.  In it I describe how I purchased Robin from a pet shop in Roppongi, Tokyo in 1954 and trained him myself to be a bird dog.  Robin came into his own on Okinawa, and the "Ravine" was the place that I am sure Robin remembers fondly if dogs remember the good old days in the Happy Hunting Grounds.  It was only natural that the "Ravine" was one of the first places that I took Jo when we went hunting.  It was also a place we visited frequently with our new pup, Mark, a German Shorthair Pointer.
     Life on Okinawa in our first years of marriage was indeed carefree and fun.  Because of my passion for hunting, Jo took to it like a good sport, learned to shoot and accompanied me all over the island.

Living in Japan and Okinawa - Part Four

     My second time around in Japan gave me a slightly different experience from the previous stay.  Because I was older and had developed different interests, I no longer prowled the Tokyo streets, checking out all the neat shops with toys and other wonderful gadgets.  My interests were now more centered around hanging around with friends in Roppongi at places like Nicola's, Hamburger Inn and Sicilia's.  My Narimasu friends were almost exclusively those who lived in private rentals and a few from the Mitsui (US Embassy) Compound in Roppongi.  But besides my American friends,  I began to hang out with some Japanese college aged young men who belonged to a motorcycle club called the "Black Knights."  My good friend Norman, a Narimasu classmate, who was riding around Tokyo on his Triumph motorcycle befriended the "Black Knights," and since I was Norman's friend, naturally I too began to hang around with them.  So, 1959 in Tokyo started my life long interest and fascination with motorcycles.
     The spring and summer of 1959 was a time when Norman and I went all over the place with the "Black Knights," we visited all of the surrounding area Tokyo!  We never got tired of riding around on motorcycles, bouncing around on some bad roads, literally rattling our teeth, or cruising at high speed on paved highways!  It was a fascinating and interesting time.  After zipping around on motorcycles with our Japanese buddies all day, we would come home, then meet at Roppongi with our American friends to party!  The energy level of teenagers is just amazing!
     I returned to Okinawa and Camp Chinen for the junior year in Kubasaki.  Life on Okinawa was drastically different for me than it was in Tokyo.  There was no easy access to entertainment areas like Roppongi, in fact there were no places on Okinawa like Roppongi.  There were entertainment areas to be sure, but they were places like Koza and Naminoue in Naha, just bars and pawn shops for G.I.s, not a very conducive place for a teen.  Teenagers just did not hang out at those places, unless they were looking to get into trouble!  There was the Pizza House in Oyama that had pizza's that tasted remarkably similar to those at Nicola's in Tokyo.  I later learned that the owner of Pizza House on Okinawa had yakuza connections same as the Nicola's' owner.  In fact, it was rumored that the first pizza chef that came to Okinawa was one of the former Nicola's' pizza makers!
     Sometimes I used to get a ride to Naha or Machinato area, but most of the time I would take an Okinawan bus from Oyakibaru, just outside of the main gate of Camp Chinen, to Naha Main Bus Terminal.  From there I would make my way to Machinato Teen Club or meet up with my buddy Tomo and hang out in Naha.  We would go see a Japanese chambara (samurai) or gangster movie for something like 15 cents, then go eat at one of the very inexpensive restaurants in the back streets of Naha.  We got to meet some very interesting characters, including a one-legged Okinawan gangster who was purportedly the leader of the Naha gang.  We never got into any trouble during those times, never got into any kind of a scuffle or any sort of altercation.  During the fall and winter months, when I didn't go to hang out with Tomo, I went hunting around Camp Chinen as I did before.
     The following year things stayed about the same.  Tomo left for Tokyo in the summer of 1960 and I hung out with my buddy Nelson.  I used to come out and spend entire weekends at his house!  We would hang out at Machinato Teen Club, go to Pizza House, or go to Futenma to play pin ball machines.  Nelson was an amazing pin ball player.  He is the only one I know who could go and play those machines and win consistently!
     In 1961 I got a motorcycle and began to spend much more time outside of Camp Chinen.  I remember one Saturday I had an appointment to have some adjustments made on my motorcycle at a shop in Yonabaru.  I wanted to get it done quickly before the shop became busy so I left Camp Chinen around 7:30 in the morning, got down to Yonabaru and was finished by 8!  I couldn't think of much to do for the rest of the day so I rode out to Machinato area to see if Tomo was around.  Tomo had returned from Tokyo and was sort of in a limbo before returning to Hawaii.  I picked up Tomo and we decided to go up to Nago!  Tomo said that he had heard there was a good Japanese restaurant in Nago, so off we went.  We got to Nago but never found the "good" restaurant, so we ate at some tiny place and headed back. 
     On the way back we swung by Kadena and while on base found ourselves in the housing area near a friend's house.  We stopped and visited for a while and before long it was time to head back to Machinato area.  I dropped Tomo off at around 5 and was back in Camp Chinen by 6.  I had spent nearly 12 hours riding around on a motorcycle!
     My fondness for motorcycles continued and while I was in the Army, although I had a car, I also had a motorcycle!  I stopped riding motorcycles shortly before getting married.  In my old age, possibly with senility, I have thought of getting a motorcycle again.  I see today that most motorcycle riders are older people, not young kids as it was in the past!  Of course the price of motorcycles today rivals that of small cars!  I suppose only older people, who are financially secure, can afford to buy motorcycles!  May be not, from time to time I do see younger people speeding around on fast bikes, especially those neat, bright colored Kawasaki Nijas!  Unfortunately or fortunately (depends on how you look at it), I don't think I am up to zipping around on a lime green colored Ninja motorcycle anymore!

Living in Japan and Okinawa - Part Three

     Although I started my sophomore year at Kubasaki, we moved back to Tokyo so I spent the rest of the year at Narimasu in 1959.  Tokyo had changed somewhat during my two year absence.  I left Tokyo in the Spring of 1957 as an 8th Grader,  finished the 8th Grade at the old Kubasaki in a Quonset hut, and began my high school at the newer location.  Kubasaki had moved to Naha Wheel area. Two old barracks buildings were converted to classrooms with the administration office, school library, and cafeteria on the ground floor of the first building, with that corrugated steel (oversized Quonset) building outside as the school gym!  So, between part of 8th Grade and beginning of 10th Grade, I had spent 2 years on Okinawa before returning to Tokyo.
     Our second time in Tokyo we once again lived in a private rental.  This time the house was located in Aoyama, actually not far from our old house in Kasumi-cho in Azabu.  We were only about a five to ten minute walk from our old house!  As I said earlier, Tokyo had changed, but it had more to do with my perspective than actual physical change.  Naturally there were new buildings, new stores, etc.  But I was no longer seeing Tokyo as a pre-teen, but rather as a teenager.  During my earlier days in Tokyo, although my friends and I appreciated the inexpensive meals at small Japanese eateries, we ate at those places when we couldn't afford the pricier food at military run snack bars.  A hamburger and a coke cost almost twice as much as a bowl of katsudon or a plate of yakisoba! Movies at the military theaters cost 25 cents, and a small bag of popcorn 5 cents.  In Tokyo area there were many movie theaters like the Ernie Pyle Theaters (the big and little theater) at the old Takarazuka theater building downtown.  There was also a small movie theater in Hardy Barracks in Roppongi, as well as one in Washington Heights and couple of other locations.  Between all of those marvelous small Japanese shops laden with goodies (toys and gadgets) and movie theaters, for pre-teen boys there was more than enough to do.
     For teenagers, there were Teen Clubs at places like Washington Heights, located on the side of the building that housed the Officer's Club.  But for teens who lived in private rentals, Roppongi became a popular place for hanging out.  Roppongi had become a trendy hangout for young people by 1959.  In 1954, a former G.I. with New York mob connections opened the first authentic Pizzaria in Japan.  Nicola's Pizza House was located at the edge of Roppongi with an Azabu address, but everyone simply considered the place as being in Roppongi.  Earlier, in 1950, another ex-G.I. opened the very first hamburger joint outside of military snack bars, the place immediately became a hit and was called The Hamburger Inn, not a very original name!  But aside from those places run by former G.I.s, there were other popular hangouts for American teenagers.  Sicilia's Italian restaurant located in Roppongi was very popular.  It was a tiny place by American standards with a small, almost unnoticeable entry.  You had to negotiate down a steep stairway in to a cave-like, dark interior.  But Sicilia's had excellent Italian food, especially their spaghetti marinara was outstanding!
     Teens who lived in private rentals tended to form groups and hang out.  Many lived in private rentals near Roppongi, so it was quite natural that they would hang out there.  The American Embassy personnel lived (then as now) either in private rentals or in what is called the Mitsui Compound, a large piece of land on which three apartment buildings were located to house families (today the compound consists of three apartment buildings surrounded by townhouses).  The artificial exchange rate of 360 yen to a dollar made the dollar go far.  So, a teen with only 5 to 10 dollars worth of yen in the pocket could have a pretty good time! 
     To compete with burgers in military snack bars, The Hamburger Inn served exceptionally tasty burgers at a very cheap price.  Nicola's pizza were some of the best I've tasted anywhere.  Interestingly, the pizzas in Okinawa's old Pizza House located in Oyama tasted almost exactly the same!  More on that later.  There was no shortage of inexpensive but excellent food in Tokyo.  To teenagers, that was heaven!  Everyone knows how teenagers eat!  One of the newer eating areas in Tokyo was called Sukiyabashi Food Center.  This place was located underground in Nishi-Ginza, near Shinbashi.  The food center was a row of small restaurants which were smaller versions of the same restaurants above ground - all well known restaurants.  Food was excellent and very inexpensive.  The very same dish above ground would cost almost twice the price!  The restaurants were able to sell food cheaper because of the low overhead - the rental spaces underground were cheap!
     A marvelous place Tokyo.....I have some of the most pleasant memories of Tokyo from that era.
Before the start of my junior year, we returned to Okinawa and to Camp Chinen.  I was back in Kubasaki for my junior year at the same campus in Naha Wheel area.  Once again I resumed my roaming around the countryside outside of Camp Chinen during hunting season.  But, I also started to take the Okinawan bus from Oyakibaru bus stop just outside the Camp Chinen main gate, in front of the fire house.  The bus ride was long and during the hot months, uncomfortable.  But, it was cheap and it got me to Naha from where I could catch a cab to Machinato Teen Club or other locations.  However, I spent an awful lot of time simply hanging around Naha with my good friend Tomo.  We found places where food was good and cheap.  It wasn't quite like it was in Tokyo, but it was good enough.  Rai Rai Ken on Kokusai Dori offered very good ramen.  It was the cheapest dish on the menu and before ramen became such a popular dish.  The good old Pizza House in Oyama surprisingly served pizza that tasted almost exactly like the ones in Nicola's in Tokyo.  A&W hadn't yet opened, so there weren't may places outside of Pizza House where American teens could hang out.  Interestingly, there were some tiny places that served burgers and other American fast food type stuff, but these places were little known and didn't seem to last long.  There were burger and hot dog joints in Koza, where vast majority of customers  were G.I.s, but teenagers for the most part did not hang out there.  There may have been some from Kadena who went to Koza, but not many.
     Like Tokyo, Okinawa too was changing, not as fast, but still changing.  It was still, relatively speaking, a very innocent and life style that was almost pastoral.  Many claimed that the time between the early 1960s and the early 1970s, before reversion to Japan, was the "Golden Era" of Okinawa.  Despite the heavy dependence on U.S. military, Okinawans were relatively well off, stress free.  They were much better off than they were before the war under Japanese rule.  This was the opinion of many Okinawans, not an invention of some Americans.  Of course today many will disagree.  Be that as it may, life on Okinawa was good for most.

Living in Japan and Okinawa - Part Two

     Within a decade after the end of the terrible war that almost completely leveled Tokyo and killed thousands upon thousands of people, Tokyo was a bustling, lively city, bursting with energy.  It is truly a testament to the resilience, dedication and hard work of the Japanese people, and of course, the tremendous help that Japan received from the United States, that Tokyo could recover so quickly.  
     Even before the war and its destruction of the city, Tokyo was a world class city, a metropolis, not just a town.  Granted, there were no skyscrapers then as now, but nevertheless, it was a major city in the world.  By the mid 1950s, Tokyo barely showed signs of the terrible war, truly an amazing accomplishment, and there were new large and tall buildings such as the Nikkatsu in Nishi-Ginza, and Roppongi was fast becoming a trendy area, especially for the younger generation.  There were many things that were available in Tokyo that were not that easily found elsewhere.  The wonderful Fujiya Bakery was famous for their feather-light strawberry short cakes.  It was amazing how they were able to make such light yet tasty desert.  Today, the Fujiya strawberry short cake has taken on a different identity - it is known all over Japan as a "Christmas Cake."
     For kids who were old enough to be on their own, pre-teens, Tokyo was absolutely a marvelous place to be in the 1950s.  You could take a trolley to just about anywhere around Tokyo.  If you wanted to venture outside the city, you could take the trains that would take you as far as you wished to go.  It was absolutely safe, exciting place to be.  To this day, I believe Tokyo is one of the safest, if not the safest large cities in the world!
     In contrast, Okinawa in the 1950s was very rural.  Naha, the largest city on the island was but a village.  It was equivalent of a small town on the outskirts of Tokyo, not a city.  It is not surprising that most Americans referred to any town, be it Naha or Koza, as "vills," short for village.  When we moved to Okinawa in 1957, we went from living in Azabu in central Tokyo to Camp Chinen, at the southern tip of the island of Okinawa.  Had we moved to some place like Kadena, Sukiran, or other larger military base and housing area, the difference would not have been so great.  It would have been a transition more like moving from private rental in Tokyo to Camp Zama or Yokota Air Base.  But going from a bustling city, living in a house amidst Japanese people to a relatively isolated Camp Chinen was somewhat of a cultural shock.
     For younger kids, life in Camp Chinen was good.  But for older kids it was not always the greatest place to be.  There was a small movie theater that showed movies, a bowling alley with four lanes, a gym, a tiny library and a PX.  Of course there was the Club Hotei for the grown ups.  Drinking was very much part of the social life in the 1950s so Club Hotei was a very necessary watering hole for Camp Chinen residents.  There was a golf course spread out through out the "lower base," tennis courts, and a swimming pool.   
     Camp Chinen was located at the top of a hamlet, a couple of hundred feet above sea level.  Out here in the western part of the U.S., it would be called a butte or a mesa.  To reach Camp Chinen you had to go up a winding road up a steep hill that Americans called "Habu Hill."  The closest village of any size, Baten, was at the bottom of "Habu Hill" before you started the steep climb.  The next decent size village heading north towards Naha was Yonabaru.  In all, it took about a half hour to get from Camp Chinen to Naha.  The closest Teen Club at Naha Air Base or Machinato Housing Area was a good 45 minutes away by a car, driving at the 30 mph (the legal speed limit on Okinawa)!  For a 9th Grader with no car, getting to those Teen Clubs was not something that could be done easily.  Fortunately I had a friend, Larry, who was a senior at Kubasaki and would borrow his parents' car from time to time and we would go to one of the Teen Clubs. 
     Although I did get out once in a while, mostly thanks to Larry, for most of the time during that first year on Okinawa, I spent my time in Camp Chinen and the immediate surrounding area.  I befriended the bowling alley manager, a fascinating man who was originally from Hiroshima and a former tokkotai, a kamikaze pilot as a teenager in the closing days of the war. Although I did not bowl, I spent a lot of time chatting with him.  I also befriended the manager of gym and spent time with him playing go - he taught me how to play go. But the activity that allowed me to see Okinawa from  a different perspective was my avid interest in hunting.  I spent hours upon hours roaming around the countryside outside of Camp Chinen, for about a six month period, usually from around October until March.  When I was in Tokyo, I was taken hunting by adults which allowed me to see Japan in a very different light.  I visited various areas around Honshu, hunting pheasant, partridge, duck, and other game.  I was taken on these hunting trips by a very close family friend and my Japanese uncle whom we met for the first time when we came to Tokyo in 1953!  But on Okinawa, I did not have anyone to take me around, so I had to do it all on my own.
     How times have changed!  When we came to Camp Chinen, I expressed my interest in hunting.  I was told that I had to get an Okinawan hunting license through our Security Office which cost all of $1.00!  The security officer suggested that I hunt within Camp Chinen, that it was OK for me to shoot as long as I was away from the houses!  However, I did not feel comfortable about shooting within Camp Chinen and chose to hunt outside.  I would walk down the steep hill from the back gate of the "upper base" (housing area) with my dog and my shotgun.  Can you imagine doing something like that today?  There would be a SWAT team on the scene within 10 minutes!  Sometimes I hunted with my buddy Larry, a lot of times I went on my own. 
     I roamed around all over.  Depending on which direction I went, sometimes I ended up in Bucknerville area which was just above the village of Baten, or if I went in the other direction I would find myself by the seashore at a place called Okutake, or at an area of vast rice paddies called Funakoshi.  Thinking back, it is amazing how much I walked.  If I did that today I would drop from exhaustion within a couple of hours!  I learned a lot about rural Okinawa and Okinawan people.  Whenever I met anyone, they were always friendly and more than willing to give me information or direction.  I learned about the surrounding area and life in that part of Okinawa.  I would often stop at one of the tiny country stores and buy an ice cold coke and some Okinawan crackers, bisuketo for a grand total of about 15 cents!  It was during these excursions that I first learned how different Okinawan people were from the Japanese.  They seemed to me to be completely different, much less reserved, much more outgoing.  On those occasions, when I was roaming around the Okinawan countryside, life was good, very good.

Living in Japan and Okinawa - Part One

     I've had the good fortune to have lived in Japan on three separate occasions and on Okinawa two separate times.  You may have noticed that I do not refer to Okinawa as Japan, that is because at the time I lived there, it was not part of Japan.  Okinawa did not become a Japanese prefecture (for the second time) until 1972 and I lived on that island on both occasions before the reversion to Japan took place.
     I first lived in Tokyo, Japan from early 1950s until mid to late 1950s.  Then I moved to Okinawa in 1957, but returned to Tokyo in 1959, only to go back to Okinawa once more and live there until early 1960s.  I returned to Okinawa in mid 1960s and left in the late 1960s.  I returned to live in Tokyo for the final time in the late 1970s.  Although I have been back to both Tokyo and Okinawa for a visit, I have not lived in either place since those earlier years.
     Living in Japan in the early 1950s under the auspices of the U.S. government (military or civilian) meant that you lived either on a military base or housing area or in a private rental on the economy.  In Tokyo that meant the Washington Heights Housing Area in Yoyogi, next to Meiji Park, or in Grant Heights closer to where Narimasu High School was located.  There were no military "bases" per se in Tokyo metropolitan area, except for a small army installation known as Hardy Barracks and Camp Drake.  On the outskirts of Tokyo there was Camp Zama with appropriate housing for dependents, and Tachikawa Air Base, Yokota Air Base, and Johnson Air Base.  Navy had Yokohama and of course the large Yokosuka Naval Base.  Of course, there were other smaller installations here and there, but for all practical purposes, for the military, those were it!
     We lived in a private rental, because civilian employees of the government rarely, if ever lived in housing areas such as Washington Heights and Grant Heights.  It was different for those civilians who worked on large bases like Zama and Yokota that had its own housing.  But for those civilian employees working in Tokyo,  private rentals were the only option.  So, we lived on Kasumi-cho in Azabu, a very nice area with pretty nice houses for the times.
     There was a definite advantage to living in private rentals.  It allowed for daily contact with local population and encouraged quicker learning of local ways.  Even as a child I noticed a difference.  In Washington Heights, a huge U.S. military housing complex, life was more or less like it was in America. In fact, the minute you stepped into Washington Heights, you felt as if you were in America.  All street were named after some streets in hometown USA.  It was a microcosm of small town life in America!  Washington Heights had its own BX and commissary, churches, movie theaters, officer's club, everything you might expect in a typical American small town.  It was entirely possible to live for months on end without having any contact with the Japanese other than the maids and employees at the club, BX, commissary, etc.  This life style certainly did not encourage learning more about local ways and life.  I noticed immediately that the kids who lived in private rentals seem to be able to get around much better, make themselves understood in their limited Japanese!  Although there was a financial gap between the Americans and the Japanese in those days, it wasn't quite as great as one might think.  In the neighborhood where I lived, most Japanese were pretty well off by the standards of the day, so being an American did not necessarily make you stand out.
     Japan in the early to mid 1950s was a marvelous, exciting place for a kid to grow up.  It was absolutely safe, no fear whatsoever of some weirdo doing bad things to kids!  All kids, be they foreign or Japanese, were essentially coddled by the grown ups.  Kids could wander around Tokyo or even venture outside the city on trains or buses without fear of having something terrible happening.
Kodomo, Japanese for child or children has a special meaning.  It just doesn't just mean a child or someone young, it literally signifies someone special, and that is how Japanese treat children.  It is not surprising that until recently, according to Japanese law, anyone under 14 could commit murder and not spend a day in jail!
     Living on the economy, as I did, within a year I noticed that, whereas I could communicate in Japanese fairly well by that time, my friends who lived in Washington Heights could not.  Whenever we were outside in Harajuku (Harjuku was just outside of the main gate of Washington Heights) or Shibuya, wandering around, I was always the one doing all the talking in negotiating a purchase or ordering food. It was the kids who lived in private rentals who introduced the other kids to the wonderful world of inexpensive Japanese food....udon, soba, and that all time favorite with American kids, oyakudon, katsudon, and yakisoba!  Ramen had not yet caught on at that time.
     It was a marvelous time for me, a great adventure.  I was in 5th grade through 8th Grade at Yoyogi Elementary School during that time.  Yoyogi Elementary School was located in Washington Heights and I used to walk to school from my house in Azabu every day.  I could have taken a bus, but it was more fun to walk, since I could look at all the interesting things in stores on the way!
     At the end of my 8th Grade year we moved to Okinawa and for the first time I experienced what my friends who lived in Washington Heights experienced.  Actually, my experience was more extreme, since I lived in a rather isolated installation on Okinawa, away from everything.

North Korea, Iran, and Syria

     The latest word out of Pyongyang, directly from the mouth of that enigmatic leader of North Korea, Kim Jong Un, is that he will obliterate New York with his new "Hydrogen" bomb.  According to him, his bomb is even more powerful than the "H" bombs that we had!  The response from the West, more specifically from the United States is that our "experts" are questioning the power of Kim Jong Un's alleged "H" bomb.  The experts are convinced that it is not as powerful as an "H" bomb, that it is just a powerful "A" bomb.  I fail to see the point in even discussing the issue of the power of the bomb!  It is obviously powerful enough to do a lot of damage, much more than damage caused by the bombs we dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki!  Isn't that powerful and terrible enough?  Who cares if it is an "H" or just a large "A" bomb, the fact remains that it is a nuclear bomb and it is very powerful!  Yet we try to demean and deemphasize the danger of having to face North Korea and its unpredictable and unstable leadership with such a weapon!
     We failed miserably in trying to negotiate with North Korea on the nuclear issue.  We just don't seem to know how to deal with them!  I've mentioned repeatedly in previous blogs on how we fail to "read" the North Koreans properly.  We do have people who not only understand but can get into the heads of North Koreans, but our government always seems to bypass such people and use negotiators who are favorites of the administration, but lack the expertise!  That is how the negotiations with North Korea failed during Clinton's administration.  The people chosen to do the negotiations were Clinton's hand picked individuals.  They may have been experienced Foreign Affairs experts and had experience dealing in Europe or other places, but they were complete novices when it came to North Korea.  There was not a single Korea or Asia expert on that negotiating team!  Of course South Korea had their people.  But North Korea insisted, as they always do, that they will only deal directly with us, the United States.  So, South Korea's expertise was not very helpful in that case.  Besides, apparently Clinton's negotiators were somewhat arrogant and ignored South Korea's advice!
     Now, most recently, in another nuclear negotiations which was declared "successful," we struck a deal with Iran despite opposition from many in our own government.  Who were our negotiators?  It was mainly John Kerry, our Secretary of State.  Kerry, despite administration's insistence that he is a polished and expert negotiator, is not what Obama's people say he is!  It seems he is not capable of striking good "deals" for the U.S., despite claims to the contrary!  Since the agreement was made Iran has already broken the agreement with multiple violations.  The most recent missile testing is just an exclamation mark to the message that Iran is sending, which is that they will do what they want to do regardless of any agreement.  The message which they wrote in bold Arabic on one of the missiles, "Israel should be wiped off the face of the earth!" was not only an insult to Israel but to the U.S. as well, since we are Israel's biggest supporters!  Iran doesn't care, they got what they wanted, all that money with which to buy missiles and other weapons and develop their nuclear program.  The idea that this agreement is somehow going to retard Iran's nuclear development or, as advertised, bring peace to the world, is laughable!
     So now Kerry and Company are working on a peace settlement in Syria.  You know, there may really be some sort of a stoppage of the fighting.  It is not because of Kerry's ability and skill to strike a deal, it is more because Russia does not want to continue to be involved in this expensive adventure.  Iran (and Hezbollah) also does not wish to prolong their involvement.  They would much rather spend the newly acquired funds (from the Nuclear Deal!) to beef up their own war making ability rather than spending it in Syria.  So it is possible that some sort of an accord could be struck.  But it will not be to our advantage, that is for sure.  Both Russia and Iran have got a firm foothold in that region, so stopping the fighting isn't going to change that.  Besides, supposedly the peace settlement will affect only the Assad regime and the anti Assad rebels.  What about ISIS?  More than likely ISIS will use the "quiet" time, if there is a lull in fighting, to regroup and start anew.  ISIS doesn't care about a peace treaty, they just want to take over the whole Middle East!

Executive Order 9066 in Alaska

     When we think of the Executive Order 9066 which was signed on February 19, 1942 by FDR, we think of the people of Japanese ancestry who were forcibly removed from their homes in America's West Coast and sent inland into the so-called "Relocation Centers."  When we think of the "West Coast," we normally think of only the Pacific Coast of the continental United States, from Washington down to California.  We really don't include Hawaii which is farther west, and we don't think of Alaska either, which is also farther west than any of the three Pacific Coast states in the Lower 48.
     Another thing that we don't think about is the fact that Washington, Oregon, and California were not the only states that were affected by the Executive Order 9066.  States such as Arizona and Nevada, and some other states west of Mississippi were also affected and its population of Japanese ancestry people were removed from their homes and sent to Relocation Centers.  Hawaii, despite its very high percentage of people of Japanese ancestry, still had a small number of Japanese, I believe about 200, who were held in a Relocation Center in Hawaii, then moved to the Continental United States.  Alaska, as strange as it may seem, did also have a small population of its residents who were of Japanese ancestry, and they too were removed from their homes and moved to a temporary "camp" at what was then Fort Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska.  Today that military installation is known as Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, which is shared by the U.S. Air Forces and U.S. Army.  After a short stay at the temporary camp at Fort Richardson, these people were moved to the Lower 48, mostly to an isolated camp in Idaho.  There were, in total, about 200 Alaskans who were classified as being of Japanese ancestry who were subjected to this terrible, cruel treatment.
     In 1907, Shonosuke Tanaka moved to Juneau, Alaska from the lower 48.  Tanaka was not a farmer, so he did not want to work in the fields in Hawaii or the West Coast.  Instead, he came to Juneau, Alaska and opened a café/diner called the City Café.  It became a very popular place for all the locals and Tanaka and his growing family ran the popular and successful business until that fateful day in 1942 when they were all forcibly removed from Juneau and put in a camp at Fort Richardson.  There they stayed with other families of Japanese ancestry until they were all scattered once more to camps in the Lower 48.
     The extreme, draconian nature of the Executive Order 9066 was that anyone who was at least 1/16th Japanese was subject to this law!  This essentially guaranteed that anyone with a Japanese surname would be put in a "Relocation Center" as these concentration camps were euphemistically called by the government.  It meant that someone who's great, great, grand parent was Japanese was subject to this law!  Just think about it!  The popular Hollywood actor Richard Gere is 1/4th Japanese (his grandmother is Japanese) and he would have been subject to this law!  It did not matter whether you physically looked Asian or not, if you had a Japanese surname or were known to be at least 1/16th Japanese, then you were subject to removal to a "Relocation Center."  Caucasian or non-Japanese women who were married to Japanese and had a Japanese surname were subject to this law.  Caucasian wives of Japanese were encouraged to drop the Japanese name to keep from going to these camps.  Some did drop their Japanese married name and stayed out of the camps.  A few refused to change their name and followed their husbands to the camps.  Other non-Japanese wives of Japanese who were Asian, were not given that option.
     In Alaska, there were native Alaskans with Japanese surnames, just as there were and still are many with Russian surnames.  That is because of Alaska's closeness to both Russian Siberia and Japan.  Besides, Alaska was Russian territory at one time.  Japanese fishing vessels often came to Alaska even in the 19th Century, and as is often the case, some Japanese sailors/fishermen stayed behind and fathered children by marrying native women.  These descendants all had Japanese surnames but were no more Japanese than those natives with Russian or English surnames.  Yet, because of this incredibly cruel law, Executive Order 9066, many of these Alaskan natives were rounded up and sent to Relocation Center!  The stupidity of this law and those who administered it is absolutely mind numbing!
     At the conclusion of World War Two, the Alaskans who were incarcerated in the Relocation Centers in Lower 48 returned home.  Unlike what happened to the Japanese who returned to California and other West Coast locations, the Alaskans did not lose their property and were not treated like outcasts.  The Tanaka's were welcomed back to Juneau and their City Café remained intact and once more opened for business.  The Alaskans, it seems, had a much better sense of fairness and loyalty to their former residents than those in the Lower 48!  In California, for example, many Japanese returned to their former homes only to find their homes and businesses had been confiscated or simply commandeered by non-Japanese squatters, so they had to move on and start all over!  There was still a lot of animosity directed at people of Japanese ancestry for several years after the end of the war.  When I was with academia in the 1970s, I had a good friend, a fellow academic who was a Japanese American and who started college in 1945.  He told me that in order to be accepted to University of California with a Japanese name, you had to have better grades, much better grades than what was required for admission for others!  Many changed their names to avoid discrimination.  A popular Hollywood comedian and actor Jack Soo was really born Jack Suzuki, but changed his name to Chinese so that he could get bookings as a standup comedian during and right after the war! Jack lived in Chicago where he was not subject to relocation!
     This ugly past in our history should not be forgotten or ignored.  It is easy to forget that such things could take place, since this happened over half a century ago.  But despite all the advances in equality in our country, keep in mind that all it takes is just some act or incident to trigger panic and hatred which can cause the creation of another Executive Order 9066, perhaps not directed at Japanese, but another ethnic or racial group.

UN Sanctions and North Korea

     The latest news involving North Korea centers around the UN sanctions that have been imposed, supposedly the strictest sanctions in 20 years.  Of course, those strict sanctions of 20 years ago did not work, so why should these latest ones work?  But never mind, both our Secretary of State John Kerry and our UN Ambassador Samantha Power say that these are the "toughest" sanctions ever and that North Korea will be paying a heavy price.  According to their explanations, the new sanctions will be imposed which will require that all ships and planes carrying goods with end-user documents listing North Korea will be thoroughly searched for materials that are not "allowed," i.e., material that can be used to make weapons.  This, we are told, is going to prevent North Korea from acquiring goods that can be used for weapons making.
     I am a little confused as to who exactly is going to impose these sanctions.  UN is great at talking tough, but has so far proven to be the proverbial "paper tiger"!  The last time UN did any fighting was in Korea, more than a half a century earlier!  Since then, UN has been more or less a toothless organization that seems to create more controversy than good.  The latest controversy involves some African nation UN peacekeeping force that allegedly is involved in rampant criminal misbehavior, namely raping of women!  The other time that the UN peacekeepers were in the news was more than 20 years ago when Pakistani UN peacekeepers refused to send their armor to help the besieged U.S. Army Rangers in Mogadishu!  UN has not had a very good record when it comes to peacekeeping!
     If I sound somewhat cynical, it is because UN's track record has been lousy!  Just how are they going to manage to control and sift through all the traffic that is found in the airways and sea lanes around the world.  It is a known fact that many illegal items are shipped to different countries using false end-user documents.  For instance, how is UN going to determine what is really heading to North Korea?  A ship headed for Japan, Russia, China, or South Korea with appropriate end-user documents will not be stopped.  Who is to say that this ship will not divert its course at the last instance and find port in North Korea or off load the goods to a smaller craft in the middle of the night?  But the bigger issue is that North Korea does not get most of its "illegal" material from ships and planes coming in from outside.  They get their stuff overland by trucks from China!  I had blogged about this problem earlier, that China is the biggest supplier of "forbidden" goods to North Korea.
     According to all the latest news agency reports, China was the main supporter of this latest UN sanctions. I had to laugh when I read that.  Of course China will be the biggest supporter of sanctions.  It makes China look good before other members of UN, especially the Security Council of which it is a permanent member!  But more importantly, the heavier the sanctions, the more dependent North Korea becomes on China, something that China wants!  Never fear, no matter how stiff the sanctions, North Korea will continue to receive what it needs to build its war machine!  Is UN going to set up shop along the North Korean border with China and do inspections?  Not very likely!  That part of China is mostly off limits to anyone outside of official Chinese!
     North Korea may find the new sanctions annoying, but it is in no way going to slow down or stop their weapons development.  As if to thumb their nose at everyone, UN in particular, North Korea immediately launched a half dozen missiles into the sea upon hearing about the new sanctions.  It was as if they were saying, "Here, take that!  That's what we think about your sanctions!"
     As long as China can benefit form North Korea's belligerent behavior and existence, they will continue to supply material to North Korea to build weapons.  China benefits from this in two ways.  First, it makes money off the sale of goods.  Then, just as importantly, it keeps North Korea as a threat to South Korea and Japan, China's two biggest economic competitors in the world!  China would like nothing more than to get Japan's and South Korea's share of the world market, especially the U.S. market.  What better way is there to keep those two competitors nervous, and spending money on defense than having a belligerent, unpredictable North Korea with a crazy leader and nuclear weapons!