Lift Up Your Hearts!

Today Janet was feeling the pressure of work to be done, and she decided we knew enough to be let out on our own for a while.  So—even though our stock of German comprised little more than "zwei Tageskarten," "bitte," "danke," and of Basel Swiss German merely "greutzi" and the word for thank you, which sounds passably enough like the French "merci"—off we went.

Janet's version is here.

Taking the tram to Barfüsserplatz brought us within easy walking distance of more museums than we could handle.  We began with the Puppenhausmuseum.  We did not expect to spend much time there, and at first I had flat-out refused, having heard much about their new Barbie exhibit.  Barbies, yuck!  The only reason any of those ridiculous dolls ever entered our house was as gifts that I did not have the heart (or courage) to dispose of.  But we both have fond memories of the Margaret Woodbury Strong Museum in Rochester, which is about much more than their incredible collection of dolls, and our Basel Cards granted us free admission, so we decided to give the Puppenhausmuseum a chance.  It was well worth it!  Even the Barbie exhibition was somewhat interesting, as she was only the vehicle for displaying over 200 hand-made outfits—and I have a weakness for miniatures.  The rest of the museum was filled with other dolls and toys, including the most amazing collection of teddy bears I've ever seen, plus doll houses, stores, and other buildings filled with miniatures, and also tiny working carousels.

In contrast, at our next two museums we spent much less time than we had expected.  Architecture can be fascinating, but the Architekturmuseum Basel had only a special exhibit:  Unaufgeräumt / As Found, which focused on "the reactivation and transformation of found spaces and existing buildings."  It was housed in a couple of small rooms, and there's only so long we can look at photographs when we can't understand the commentary.

There was more to see at our next venture, the Kunsthalle Basel, but it was all about Bas Jan Ader.  I have decided that performance art really doesn't do it for me.  This exhibit was worthwhile as a lesson in why I shouldn't waste any time worrying about this lack of culture on my part.  There are too many wonderful things to do in this world to choose to spend much time watching a video of someone deliberately falling off a roof while sitting in a chair, or standing on a path then slowly falling sideways.  I'm assured by musicians that modern musical compositions that seem like random noise are in reality complex creations with a definite purpose, so I'm sure it's true with art as well.  But in both cases I'm left with the same reaction:  There's already too much noise, ugliness, brutality and despair in the world.  There is a place in art for reflecting the darker side of our lives—but if it does so without offering at least a small spark of hope, hasn't it just multiplied the sorrow?  In any case, I certainly don't feel the need—nor the responsibility—to seek out additional pain in my life.

It was much more pleasant to return to the Historical Museum at the Barfüsserkirche and see some of the exhibits we'd missed on our first visit, after which we met up with Janet and returned home.  After a rest we went shopping, then ate rösti once again at the Stöckli.

The Historical Museum has other divisions, and we could have used a lot more time at the Musikmuseum.  Janet has described this collection of historical instruments so well there's no need for me to say much more, except that it would be a terrific place for homeschoolers.  The abundance of excellent, multimedia commentary is worth many visits.  Alas, we're unlikely to return, but I’m sure Janet will be back several times.

We all returned to the school, where we had a break in the cafeteria then attended Janet's Renaissance dance class.  Porter and I had planned to leave after a short time of observation, but it was so much fun to watch we ended up staying the whole time.  I even danced a little!  Afterwards we went out with the teacher and another student, and the conversation was even better than the delicious Flammkuchen.

Thus ended another wonderful, busy and exhausting day, and the next wasn't promising to be any more restful….

Janet's version is here.

Today we made the most of both our tram passes and our Basel Cards, the latter providing us free admission to most of the museums (Janet used her Swiss Museum Pass) and various other discounts.  We began with the Kunstmuseum, which has a collection of art that is quite impressive, at least for people who have not been to the Louvre in 40 years or so.  In many ways I actually liked this better than the Louvre, because it is limited enough in scope that we felt we could devote as much time as we wanted to particular pictures.  You can take your own tour here.

Next, a walk along the Rhine to a very old, but still working, paper mill.  On the way we stopped by part of the old city wall.

The Swiss Paper Museum was particularly fun because Porter's dad was in the papermakers' felt business for most of his life.  The machinery in this living history museum is driven by a working water wheel, which you can see below, and which must be replaced every 25 years.  Visit the museum virtually and see, floor by floor what it's all about.

We then enjoyed a ride on one of several ferries across the Rhine.  They are powered solely by the flow of the current as they move along a wire stretched from bank to bank.

What better after a leisurely walk along the beautiful Rhine than a coffee/tea/hot chocolate break at one of the many cafés with a great view of the river and the people passing by.

After fortifying ourselves with a Basel specialty bread that looks and tastes somewhat like a very large, soft pretzel, we hopped a bus to the Tinguely Museum.  I told you Jean Tinguely would return to our story.

I'm not a fan of modern art.  I find it generally weird and frequently depressing.  But Tinguely is intriguing enough to be interesting.  His sculptures invite viewer participation, and the way he uses odd, discarded objects and scrap metal is fascinating.  One of his works, made as a kind of memorial "altar piece" from items recovered from a tragic fire, made me think of my own "Morbid Mobile," which I made as a project for physics class, out of pieces from a plane that had crashed in the Adirondack Mountains.  It wasn't until quite some time after the crash that my father and I were hiking on that mountain, but we found a few pieces that I took home with me.  What inspired me to make them into a mobile several years later, I have no idea.  But I'm sorry I let my physics teacher talk me into giving it to him.  Otherwise, I'd now have my own Tinguely-esque sculpture. 

One non-Tinguely exhibit at the museum featured the student uprising of May 1968 that began in Paris.    It was surrealistic in more ways than one.  It's bad enough to see the events of one's life become history—but to have them become art!

Baracca Zermatt.  That's were we ate dinner.  If Janet gets into grad school at the Schola and returns to Switzerland for another two or three years, I know that some of my readers are going to find a way to visit her.  If so, Baracca Zermatt is a must.  When in Switzerland, one must experience fondue, and I can't imagine it any better than this.  Only three things could have improved the night:  (1) had the restaurant been non-smoking, (2) had they been willing to serve us tap water instead of expensive bottles of spring water, and (3) had it been cold and snowy outside—the wood stove in the center of the lodge-like dining room gave out a glorious heat, an effect that was quite wasted on such a warm, spring day.  The Baracca Zermatt had just opened, and was recommended by one of Janet's teachers.  Until the guidebooks discover it, you won't find it unless you know where it is, or else happen to be wandering around near the zoo.  One other indication that it's not primarily designed for tourists is that our waiter was uncomfortable with English—we were glad in more than one way to have Janet with us!

We each ordered the Kleines Matterhorn.  Don't be deceived by the adjective kleines.  There was nothing small about this meal.  The first picture shows you what we ate, at least if you read German; the second is the appetizer portion (a meal in itself) and the third, the fondue itself.  Yes, we polished off that huge bowl of cheese!  It was fabulous.  It was so, so good.  When the waiter brought the fondue, he also brought each of us a small glass of clear liquid, as you can see in the third picture.  Janet inquired, "Wasser?" to which he replied, "Nein, Kirsch."  Firewasser.  Even though Porter looks in the picture as if he has already consumed some of it, none of us tried more than a taste, it was that powerful.  I know kirsch is often used in fondues, in fact I include it when I make fondue at home and like the addition.  We considered adding some to the cheese mixture, but it was so delicious as it was, we couldn’t bring ourselves to make any changes.

 

After such a meal, all that remained was to travel home and fall into bed.  Almost.  We had to do a wash, and Janet, bless her, volunteered to stay up until it was finished to hang it on the line.  Europeans seem almost as unwilling as the Japanese to use clothes dryers.  And what it is about their washers that takes so long to clean clothes, I don't know, but our experience with three of them leads us to believe that two hours to complete a load is a normal experience.

We slept late this morning but otherwise showed more effects from all our walking yesterday than from jet lag.  Janet gave up her bedroom to us and is sleeping on the couch, so she awoke early with her host family, but had no trouble falling back to sleep.  Fortunately she was awake when the call came from the airport:  Porter's suitcase had arrived and would be delivered between ten and eleven this morning if someone would be here to receive it.  Janet handled the entire conversation in German, by the way.

This is what I didn't know about the Swiss yesterday at the airport:  They don't deliver an item "sometime tomorrow between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.," and when they say someone will arrive between ten and eleven, he will.  In this case, right at 10:30.

So we had a leisurely morning, received Porter's lost luggage, and had the rest of the day to explore Basel.  Once again, I recommend you read Janet's version of the day, but here are my own thoughts.

We bought our Tageskarten and went everywhere via a combination of tram, bus, and lots of walking.  It's hard to remember that Basel is a city—Switzerland's third largest, in fact.  Although it is not as clean as I remember Swiss cities being in 1969, it is still remarkably so.  It is a peaceful place, and quiet.  While we were visiting I noticed the noise only once, and that was at a construction site.  No car radios blaring obscene lyrics over a booming bass.  No horns blasting.  No incessant radio/television noise, no background music, no Muzak.  Only an occasional street musician, and that's a pleasant sound and never loud.  Janet is right that the Swiss at first appear unfriendly as they go about intent on their own business, but I tend to be focused like that myself, so I didn't take offense.  There's a lot we can learn from the Swiss about city living, but I must also remember that, third largest city or not, it is still only about the size of Huntsville, Alabama, considerably smaller than Orlando, and only four times the size of Altamonte Springs!  There's more than one reason why it doesn't feel like a city.

We ended up spending much more time at the Münster Cathedral than Janet had planned.  Several days later, after spending most of the day at the Louvre, ours sensibilities glazed over and we learned to take our sights at a faster pace.  But this was very early in the trip, and there is much to see at the Münster.

The grave of Jacob Bernoulli, for instance.  The Bernoulli family was replete with famous mathematicians, though Jacob's brother, Daniel, is the one who makes airplanes fly and sailboats sail.

Erasmus is also buried there at the Münster.  Another one of Basel's famous sons is mathematician Leonhard Euler, but he is buried elsewhere.

The crypt was closed, but we could see some of the Romanesque frescos through the bars.  The sign said it is closed at certain times to protect them; as far as we could tell, this was one of the times it should have been open, but then again even Janet's German isn't always up to technicalities.

This is one of the two towers.  The other, behind, is shrouded in scaffolding because it is being repaired.  One or the other of the towers is always under repair, because of the red sandstone of which they are constructed is deteriorates rapidly. Note the sundial.

The stairs to the top of the tower are often narrow and difficult, and probably dangerous.  They certainly felt that way to me, though I'm not at my best when dealing with heights.  Nonetheless, for a small fee (and no liability waiver!) one is welcome to climb them, so climb them we did.

Graffiti isn't so bad when it's two and a half centuries old.

The tower was our favorite part of the visit!  The fact that such a thing can no longer be done in the U. S. (thanks to overly cautious insurance companies in fear of overly zealous lawyers) certainly added to the pleasure.  Here are some views from the top.

Next stop, lunch!  The Marktplatz features a daily farmers' market of sorts with colorful tents and luscious food.  We shared a lunch of wonderful sausage, cheese, and bread, as well as many samples along the way.  The vendors would cut off a sample and hold it out, expecting us to remove it with our fingers, which took a bit of getting used to, accustomed as I am to food handling being done here with gloves and single-use toothpicks, sample cups, and tasting spoons.  I wish I had been able to be bold (or subtle) enough to take a picture of one Swiss lady who was also eating her lunch at Markplatz, deftly cutting off slices and conveying them to her mouth with her pocketknife—a Swiss Army knife, of course!

Lunch was followed by a bus ride and a goodly walk to the Roman ruins of Augusta Raurica.  Yes, those Romans got around.  It was exciting for me because, unlike Porter and Janet, I'd never seen Roman ruins in person.  All of us were disappointed that much of the area had been restored, however.  Thinking—always!—like a homeschooler, I could see the educational advantages, but as a tourist I would rather have been able to be certain what was old and what was new.  I'm pretty sure the remains of the baths below are old.  The crane is new.

Here we're underground, in the well area.  It was cool and damp and felt wonderful to us because we were hot from hiking in the sun, but it did give me a hint as to how miserable it might be to be chained in a dungeon even on the best of days.

I took these two pictures because I love unexpected connections.  Note the reference to Sebastian Münster's Cosmographia in the first picture, and the illustration it refers to in the second.  You see, I had heard of it before….  Not because I'm a well-educated person who naturally had learned about such a famous book, but because I love good mystery stories, and the Cosmographia features prominently in Dorothy Sayers' Peter Wimsey story, The Learned Adventure of the Dragon's Head.  Don't ask me to explain my memory; I can actually enjoy reading mysteries multiple times (if they were worth reading once) because I've forgotten so much of what happened, yet details like this one will stick with me clearly and forever.  This Münster, too, was a son of Basel, by the way—not born here, but lived much of his life and died here.  He really should be buried in the Münster Cathedral with Bernoulli and Erasmus, but if he is, I don't know about it.

On our walk to the ruins, we came upon this sign, which serves as an excuse to mention the often-wordless signs here.  It's quite a good idea when people might not speak the language, but of course one still must understand the sign language.  We are accustomed to a slash through the red circle indicating that something is forbidden, but in Switzerland (and maybe Europe in general) it's the red circle that is indicative of taboo.  For example, in the lower sign, an American might infer that dogs are allowed, whereas I believe it is really saying, no dogs except on a leash.  The top sign was a mystery and I interpreted it as saying, "Whatever you were thinking about doing, don't."  But it turns out it's more like a "No Vehicles" sign, not nearly so interesting.

Janet had arranged for us to have dinner with a couple from her church, but half of them ended up with the flu and, generous as they are, this was one thing they did not want to share.  So the other half took us on a tour of Riehen, their village, where we saw many things from mansions of those who made their money in Basel's chemical industry to beautiful scenes like this:

The Foundation Beyeler museum is in Riehen, and was featuring a special Edvard Munch exhibit, but it was closed at that hour and we never did make it back.  Ah, well, we did see fair amount of other art on this vacation….

A lovely bakery provided rest and refreshment.  Take a look at the coffee cups in this picture.  They represent a confection that's more dessert than drink:  layers of espresso, chocolate, cream, and caramel.

It was great to have the opportunity to talk with Nils, who is a native-born Swiss, though I understand that even so he is not long allowed to forget that he is from Bern, not Basel, and doesn't speak the language right.  :)  We learned a lot about Swiss culture, good and bad.  Question:  Why do Swiss people seem so pessimistic?  Answer:  Because they expect everything to be perfect, and are therefore always disappointed.  After a few days of experiencing the transportation system, I understood a little better.  It very nearly is perfect!  When they say a tram, bus, or train will arrive at 6:15, it does.  Being three minutes late is a shocking occurrence, and more than that a catastrophe!

Nils assured us that what I had experienced nearly forty years ago is still true:  the lovely public fountains in Switzerland are safe to drink from.  To someone from a state that is increasingly worried about its water supply, the idea of fresh water continually pouring out of the fountains and draining away seems wasteful, but it's wonderful to experience.  One of my less pleasant memories of my 1969 trip to Europe was of being perpetually thirsty, except in Switzerland.  We were cautioned not to drink the water in France or in Italy—though I was thirsty enough to break the rule in both places, and had no trouble—and it was never offered at a drink when we ate.  There were wine and coffee in abundance, which I suppose should have been a daring trip to a group of high school girls from the U. S., but I didn't like either and they certainly didn't quench my thirst.  Even on the rare occasions when we ate at restaurants instead of youth hostels and convents, it wasn't much better. Bottled water was not readily available, and ice nonexistent.

Oddly enough, I found myself thirsty on this trip as well.  Bottles of water met our needs well on our hikes, but mealtime was another story.  For all I know, Europeans are shocked at the waste in America because restaurants provide as much water as you want, even if you don't ask for it.  We ate in many restaurants and cafés this trip, and I believe only once were we provided a pitcher of water.  Water is considered a drink; you buy it as you would a soda, a beer, or a glass of wine, and it can be as expensive, too.  So I almost never had enough to drink at mealtimes.  It's easy to become dehydrated on vacation, I've found, and this one was no exception.  Except for our stay at the château in France, where our American-born hostess had installed a modern refrigerator with ice and cold water dispenser.  Ah, bliss!  But once again I am jumping ahead.

We capped the evening with a concert at Kartäuserkirche, a beautiful old church.  Sponsored by the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis (Janet's school), it was entitled Der Liebesschmerz:  Guillaum do Machaut und seine Vorgänger.  (The last part means "Guillaum de Machaut and his predecessors," but der Libesschmerz appears to be "the dear pain," so maybe Janet can suggest something more reasonable.)  At any rate, this was a concert of Medieval music and featured a singer and a host of odd instruments including a fidel and a dudelsack.  The featured work was Machaut's Loyauté que point ne delay.  It was a delightful piece, and quite a test of endurance for the singer, but really, the protagonist needs to get a life.  He goes on and on and on about his lost love—no, it's worse than that.  He's not really singing about his love, but about how the loss affects him.  Narcissus had nothing on this guy.

Here's another of those surprises Europe apparently has around every corner.  This lovely lady is positioned in front of a lovely picture of Basel in older times.  The painting is just sitting there, exposed to the elements, in a former boathouse.

Back home again, to collapse into bed after another full and satisfying day.  Not satiating, not yet….

As I mentioned before, we recently returned from a delightful two weeks in Europe, visiting Janet in Switzerland and some friends who live in France.  There were other friends we wanted to visit, but there's only so much you can do in two weeks and remain sane, so we'll just have to make a return trip.

It was nearly as perfect as such a vacation can be.  We had a tense moment or two in Paris, for which I take much of the blame by not having planned the program sufficiently.  It is very hard to leave the agenda open when you're trying to take into account the desires of three people, none of whom enjoys making decisions and each of whom will only be happy if the others are happy first!  But we got over that, and the rest of the trip was idyllic.  Much credit goes to our hosts in Switzerland and in France, and most especially to Janet.  As in Japan, she was an excellent tour guide and rarely showed how worried she was that she hadn't done enough to prepare.  It was enough!  It was perfect!  Now she can start worrying that our next trip can't possibly live up to the high standards set by this one....

As you can tell, I've been posting a lot of random stuff lately—mostly because it's much easier than buckling down to the job of editing pictures and preparing this trip journal.  But here's a start, with more to follow.  Be sure to check out Janet's version (this post and following), if you haven't already.  And remember that the pictures are only previews that do not show the complete scene; click on the preview to get the full picture.

Our trip began at the Orlando International Airport, and for a while it appeared as if that's where it was going to end, 15 days prematurely.  We had nearly two hours to make our connection in Miami, but our flight from Orlando was delayed, and delayed again…by an hour and a half.  You can't make up that kind of time in the 200-odd miles between Orlando and Miami.  Desperate, I called Heather and Jon to ask them to pray, and to e-mail Janet, who was as anxious as we were that we not miss our flight.

Then came an announcement:  Would two adults be willing to give up their seats and move to an emergency exit row?  Porter leaped at the chance, because it meant moving from the back of the plane to the front, a critical advantage when you must race to make a connection.  And race we did, arriving at the next gate before the boarding process had completed.  Whew!

We flew American Airlines this time.  If the service was not quite as delightful as on our Continental trip to Japan, it was good enough, and a much nicer (i.e. roomier) plane.  Porter, airplane veteran that he is, slept well, but I only dozed.  I tried to distract myself by listening to my Pimsleur and Hippo recordings, and I could tell I'd slept some when I awoke in the middle of the Louvre.  (Rick Steves' audio tour of the Louvre was next on my mp3 player.)

We landed safely in London, at Heathrow.  We had two hours to make our connecting flight, and it's a good thing.  First a long walk from our arrival gate:  up, down, all around, then outside the terminal, where we caught a bus that took us to Terminal 4 via Wales, I think.  All that took us out of the secure area, so we had to repeat the screening process.  For those of you who haven't flown through Heathrow lately, this involves stuffing one's purse into one's carry-on bag, because only one carry-on is allowed.  (Or, as the British Aviation Authority so politely puts it, of course you can have a personal item in addition to your hand baggage, provided the one fits inside of the other.)  Fortunately, we knew about the restriction ahead of time.

The next hurdle was checking in, and that went much better than it might have.  For reasons unknown, we were not able to check in on the London-Basel flight ahead of time, and didn't even have seat numbers.  The kindly security guard ushered us to a much shorter line (for problem people, I suppose) and we were able to correct the situation with no difficulty at the check-in counter.  (They have a check-in counter on the far side of the security screening, so I suppose we weren't the only ones to have need of it.)

The flight to Basel was only half full and very pleasant.  Soon we landed in the small and friendly Basel-Mulhouse airport, where we encountered a small glitch:  the luggage carousel duly produced my suitcase, but Porter's never appeared.  We joined perhaps a dozen others with problems, telling our tales of woe to a friendly, if busy, French lady who fortunately spoke English (and no doubt German as well).  She determined that there was no point in waiting around any longer, as the suitcase was still in Miami, but assured us they would deliver it the next day.  We gave her Janet's address, and fretted a little because they wouldn't leave it at the door, but required someone be home to receive it.  We had plans to spend most of the day sightseeing, and didn't relish staying home all day for a suitcase that might (or might not) come at any hour.  We had a lot to learn about the Swiss.

Suitcase or no suitcase, all troubles were swept away when we saw Janet!  Here she is with Porter at the tourist information booth, which is half in France, and half in Switzerland.  The airport is physically located in France, but part of the airport, and the road leading across the border, are legally Swiss.

As in Japan, Janet guided us onto a bus, but the resemblance ended there.  The ride was more like 20 minutes than four hours, and we were not falling asleep.  I'll have more to say about Swiss transportation elsewhere, but 8CF for an all-day tram/bus pass is a great deal when public transportation is so clean and convenient.  We soon learned to say, "Zwei Tageskarten, bitte" each morning—but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Our first stop was home, for lunch of wonderful bread, cheese, fruit and läckerli, a Basel specialty cookie that reminds me of Christmas, and to meet Stephan and Anu, Janet's hosts, who most graciously allowed us to stay with them as well.  Little Tamino was shy at first, but soon accepted us as another set of crazy adults who can't speak either German or Hindi.  He's every bit as cute as Janet says he is.

Janet was determined to keep us busy so we wouldn't give in to jet lag, and she succeeded.  We did a lot of walking around the center of Basel, and I have to say it was hard to remember that we were in a city, one of the largest in Switzerland.  If it was not as clean as the Switzerland I remember from my visit in 1969, it was certainly the cleanest city I've been in since then.  I found it quiet and beautiful; there were no hurried crowds and very little traffic—though that was partly because it was a Sunday.

Janet has covered our adventures of this day quite well, but here are a few more comments.  We saw a lot for half a day!  It helps that Basel is so far north it has a long day this time of year.

The Rein (Rhine) is beautiful, as was the walk across the Mittlere Rheinbrücke  (Middle Bridge) from Kleinbasel to Grossbasel.  Here we are with the statue of Helvetia, on the Kleinbasel side.

The Historical Museum at the Barfüsser Church is free on the first Sunday of the month, and we were not done exploring its wonders by the time it closed.  Barfüsser means "barefoot," and the church was so named because of the barefoot Franciscan monks who were its first inhabitants in the 13th century.

I couldn't resist taking this picture of Chief Sitting Duck.

The Rathaus, or city hall, is beautifully decorated, and all those paintings are unprotected in the open air.

The Spalentor is an old city gate that was nearly torn down in the 19th century because the tram wouldn't fit through its arch.  Cooler heads prevailed and the tram tracks now curve around the gate.

Here's what it looks like from inside the Spalentor if you're aiming an arrow at your enemies outside.

This delightful fountain is in at Theaterplatz, and was created by Basel-trained Jean Tinguely.  Little did we know then that this would not be our last encounter with hitherto-unknown (to us) Tinguely.  The only thing wrong with this fountain is that children are not allowed to play in it. I'm told, however, that children do, despite their law-abiding Swiss heritage.  I like to think Tinguely, whose art often encouraged audience participation, would approve.

As delightful as all these sights were, for me the most special visit was to the Musik-Akademie der Stadt Basel and the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, its early music division.  One of the things I like best about traveling, whether across the world or merely to another city, is that I feel so much closer to those who live there if I have been there myself.  It was very good to stand on the grounds where Janet has discovered so much that she loves!

We had hoped to meet Stephan and Anu for dinner, but that didn't work out, so we had to come up with a Plan B.  What made that especially difficult was the fact that Switzerland does not have many non-smoking restaurants.  We'd pick one out, walk in, and walk right out again, overcome by the smoke.  Finally we found Zum Alten Stöckli, which had been recommended to us.  It, too, allowed smoking, but for most of our meal we were the only customers in the small restaurant, so we were able to enjoy our meal.  Röschti is a traditional Swiss potato dish and we all agreed that the variety made with cheese was our favorite.

Before collapsing into bed we hand-washed some clothes for Porter to wear the next day.  Stephan lent him some clothes to sleep in, and I was able to provide a toothbrush, because after my experience with delayed luggage in Connecticut, I'd learned to pack one in my carry-on.  We sank gratefully into bed, while Janet manfully stayed awake to report on our first day to her loyal blog readers.

Whew!  I have all new respect for Janet's faithfulness in writing up her adventures.  It takes a LONG time!

We just returned from a dream vacation in Europe—hmmm, that sounds a bit pretentious, doesn't it?  But it's true.  It had all the earmarks of a great vacation—visiting with family and friends, wonderful weather, awesome food, more to see and do than we could take in—plus a view of other countries and cultures from the inside, and a stay at at fairy tale castle to boot!

Li'l Writer Guy went quite crazy, having so much to say and no time nor opportunity to say it.  I trust he will be able to deciper his hastily-scribbled manuscripts and produce both chronological description and commentary while I'm unpacking and trying to catch up with "normal" life.  In the meantime, here are some random thoughts inspired by our trip.  Bear in mind that we only experienced small parts of France and Switzerland (and a minuscule portion of Germany), though I will occasionally use the terms "Europe" and "European" for convenience.

The last time I was in Europe (France, Switzerland, northern Italy, and England) was in 1969.  One of my vivid memories from then was the great variety of toilet paper I encountered, all of it unpleasant:  I catalogued waxed paper, brown paper bag paper, almost anything scratchy and non-absorbant short of corn cobs and banana leaves.  (I was in high school and given to odd amusements.)  This trip, I'm happy to say, was quite a different experience; all the paper was effective and skin-friendly.  Sad to say, there were none of Japan's cool toilet styles, but all were clean and easy to use, though we did encounter quite a variety of flushing mechanisms that were sometimes a bit tricky to discern, from a button on the floor to pull-levers to ones that blended in with the toilet tank to big flush/little flush choices.

I've heard a lot about European rudeness, especially to Americans and especially in Paris, but that was not our experience at all.  We encountered one rude Parisian taxi driver, and one Parisian bus driver was a bit abrupt—he had some excuse, since I later realized I'd asked him, not how long it took the bus to get to the train station, but how often it went there.  Other than that, everyone was exceedingly friendly and helpful, and more than patient in attempting to communicate in French, even though their English was much, much better than my French.  I'd say the same for Janet/Switzerland/German, except that her German is quite good by now.  That reminds me—there was one waitress in Luzern who was impatient even with Janet's German, but we were in a touristy place.  In general we followed this most excellent advice giving by a friend, and had a lovely experience:

Whatever you do, avoid cafes that have big menus in English. This is where tourists get their ideas that Parisians are rude. Parisians are lovely...tourist waiters are rude (same as anywhere). So, if you have an amazing view of a monument, a big menu in English, and the sodas are 6€ each, you're in the wrong cafe.

We were only gone two weeks, but still experienced culture shock upon returning.  I'm not going to go on a Europe is good, America is bad rant.  There are aspects of each culture that enchant, and those that appall.  One thing that saddened me upon our return was how unfriendly America must seem to visitors.  For one thing, when we landed in Chicago, everything was in English except an initial welcome sign.  I'm all for English as the one official language of the United States, but it shouldn't be so hard for visitors to find their way through the confusing maze of entering this country.

A vistor could also be justified in thinking his reception rude.  No smiles from the officials, no small talk, just suspicious looks and gruff, businesslike grunts, single words, and gestures.  "Welcome home," I thought grimly.  After rechecking our bags post-Customs, we lingered to examine the information board for the gate of our connecting flight.  There was a man there whose job was to give out that information, which was good, except that he said it in such a curt way we felt as if all he wanted to accomplish was to get us out of the way.  The trouble was, the gate he told us did not correspond with the gate on the board.  He was not happy when we pointed this out, and rudely informed us that the flight was delayed.  Did I say rudely?  Well, I thought so at the time.  But as we were walking away, I said "Thank you," and the man reached out for my arm, saying in a much softer and friendlier voice, "Thank you.  I was giving out the wrong information."  I don't think he had meant to be rude at all, and probably the other officials didn't either.  It's too bad they came across that way.

There was one encourging sign upon reentering the U.S.  Among the many lines at Passport Control ("U.S. Passport Holders and U.S. Residents," "Visitors," "Wheelchair," "Military," "Flight Crew") was one specifically labelled "Refugees."

Another reentry shock was noise.  Sheer volume.  A bevy of teenage girls talking at shriek-level.  Background music everywhere.  Everything, in general, at high decibels.  No wonder Americans are so stressed.  If Europe (our small glimpse of it, at least) was anything, it was quiet.  Nearly every restaurant in which we ate had no background music, and the patrons were consequently quiet as well, being able to converse without shouting.  Even in the cities, even in Paris, the general volume was much less than in the U.S.  Sheer bliss!

On the other hand, smoke was as pervasive there as noise is here.  In an unpleasant reminder of what eating out was like here 30 years ago, we had difficulty finding restaurants where cigarette smoke did not diminish the pleasure of the meal.  (Come to think of it, this is still true in North Carolina.)  If Europeans are generally more health conscious than Americans, this is a strking exception.

Lawyers have not yet ruined Europe.  We climbed all over the Münster Cathedral tower, a feat that would have insurance companies shrieking "lawsuit" here at home.

Polticians, on the other hand, have done damage that is so pervasive the natives don't even realize it.  Socialism is deeply ingrained.  They speak proudly of their "free" or heavily subsidized social programs, heath care, education, and transportation, while taking for granted punitively high taxes, and not acknowledging that the system is in many ways unravelling, nor counting the heavy cost exacted on freedom of choice.  France's free day care system must sound ideal to some, but to me it screams that families who are already sacrificing so that mothers can be home to rear their own children must pay so that other families can have two incomes.

European food has ruined me!  Specifically, bread.  I used to think we generally ate good bread in our family:  homemade bread, bread from the bakery section of the store, 100% whole wheat sandwich bread.  But I came home to find that the Publix bakery French bread that I thought was so good now tastes like Wonder Bread.  :(  More than that, the texture is wrong.  In France and Switzerland, even the white bread fights back a little when you chew it.  I was excited to find blood oranges at a local specialty store, but this California variety was dry, mealy, and bland compared with what we enjoyed in Basel (which came from either Spain or Israel, I forget which).  Unpasteurized milk is legal to buy in France (though we didn't have any), and organic milk no more expensive than the ordinary kind.  This trip did nothing to diminish my belief that Americans eat too much because we're trying to make up with quantity for lack of quality, searching for the flavor we know should be in our food.

That's enough for this post.  Li'l Writer Guy needs to step aside in favor of Li'l Housekeeper, or some such mythical being....

I had an incredible experience recently.  Having been transplanted, through the woders of modern aviation technology, from our unseasonably warm Florida home to some of the coldest Connecticut weather of the season, I was a little chilled.  Our kind hosts provided a fire in the fireplace and a space heater in our bedroom, so we weren't uncomfortable, but going outside was an adventure, despite heavy coats, hats, gloves, and scarves.

That is, until I found it desirable to take some pictures of the low Old Saybrook tide.  Leaning gloveless (I had to operate the camera) against a stiff, steady blow that pushed the wind chill-modified temperature below zero, I was beyond cold.  But when my hand finally thawed, something inside me snapped—or more accurately, some internal fire ignited.  For the rest of the week, I was warm!  Forget the hat, scarf, and gloves; if all I was doing was going from building to car to building again, my coat—and that often enough not even zipped—was sufficient.

On our sledding adventure, I condescended to don hat and gloves (and zip the coat), and the chill never reached me.  What a glorious feeling, to feel the cold without being cold!

Alas—though probably all for the best—my internal fire was quenched by returning to Florida's tropical temperatures.  Our current cold snap (presently 47 degrees outside) has me feeling quite chilly, even though it's above 60 degrees in the house.   I think I'll go fix some hot cocoa while the rest of you laugh at me.

We were in Old Saybrook for what in my personal expert assures me was the lowest tide in his nearly 80-year-old memory.  (We forgot to think about tsunamis.)

In Pittsburgh it can be faster to take the bus to the airport than to drive, because there are special bus-only lanes that sneer at rush hour traffic.  Not so in Orlando, where the trip takes 45 minutes by car and more than twice that by bus.  Today was actually my first venture onto Orlando's public transportation system (such as it is), if you don't count the downtown freebie Lymmo service (which actually counts for quite a lot; it's pretty handy).  Anyway, I ventured from home to the airport and thence to a Thai restaurant where we met some friends for dinner, just for the experience.

The driver was friendly and helpful, the cost only $1.50 ($3.50 buys a pass good for unlimited trips in one day), and the bus itself was fine.  But the total time—walking from our house to the bus stop (35 minutes), waiting for the bus (20 minutes), and stopping at nearly every one of the multitude of stops on the way to the airport (100 minutes)—made for a long afternoon. Still, I proved it's possible to get to the airport without benefit of car, at least if one doesn't have too much in the way of baggage.

And the Thai food was good, too.

Terrorism? War? Disease? Crime? Not being able to communicate? For the places I'm likely to go, the biggest danger is none of these, but in being an Ugly American. An Ugly, Ignorant American.

Consider, for example, the experience of a friend, who recently returned from East Africa.

He was hiking, with a group of fellow tourists, under the direction of a native guide, and overheard the following conversation between the guide and an American elementary school teacher.

Teacher: What religion are you? Do you worship spirits? Ancestors?

Guide: I'm a Roman Catholic.

Teacher: Oh. Do you celebrate Christmas?

Friend: (Inarticulate noises, recognized by his father as the signs he is trying hard to stifle both laughter and rage.)

Guide (bemused, but polite): Yes, I celebrate Christmas.

Teacher: Oh. You don't celebrate Kwanzaa?

Friend: (Indications that rage is winning out over laughter. His father attempts to lead him away from the scene. Too little, too late.)

Guide (confused, but still polite): What's Kwanzaa?

Teacher (incredulous): It's an African holiday!

Friend: (In a mixture of incredulity and embarrassment that he bears the same nationality as the Teacher, erupts with a heated exposition of the history of Kwanzaa.)

I'm not sure which is more disconcerting: The ignorance of this person; that she is a teacher, and has doubtless passed her ignorance on to many innocent young children; or that telling this story has revealed other people who don't know that Kwanzaa is not of African origin, but was invented in 1966 by an American who wanted "to give a Black alternative to the existing holiday [Christmas] and give Blacks an opportunity to celebrate themselves and history, rather than simply imitate the practice of the dominant society."

Okay, the latest airport security problem is not in the least bit funny. But sometimes you have to see the humorous side to stay sane, especially when you have loved ones planning to fly in the next few days.

All liquids and gels are presently banned from carry-on luggage at U. S. Airports. Exceptions are being made for certain medications and for pre-mixed baby formula, which will be allowed after inspection. After getting the word, parents at the Orlando International Airport (and no doubt elsewere) were frantically preparing bottles of formula and hoping they wouldn't spoil on the trip, since they couldn't bring bottled water on board.

How nice to have your baby's food with you at all times, handy, pre-mixed, with no fear of spoilage, and in a form that can't be consigned to checked baggage.

It was nice of the Transportation Security Administration to reassure us on that last point, however (emphasis mine).

Exception: Baby formula, breast milk, or juice if a baby or small child is traveling; prescription medicine with a name that matches the passenger’s ticket; and insulin and essential other non-prescription medicines

I'm guessing they're referring to expressed breast milk in a bottle...but still...it makes one think....

I can't recommend the movie Lost in Translation to anyone I know. It's an R-rated film with an uninspiring story and scenes you'd rather not have in your mind. However, we watched it the other day and I enjoyed it very much, because it is set in Japan. It was fun to hear the crosswalk music (not Comin' Through the Rye, which you can hear in Swing Girls, but the tune for the other direction. I would never have noticed it in the movie if we hadn't been to Japan. It was also wonderful to be able to recognize some of the spoken Japanese words, though I was embarrassed by how much katakana I have forgotten.

Because the film is set mostly in Tokyo, it shows many of the parts of Japan I didn't care for, from the garish lights and colors to the pachinko parlors. But even those were reminders of our trip, and thus enjoyable.

I rode my bicycle to church! One of our two churches is still out of reach, 20 miles away and much of it not well suited to cycling, but the other is only 10 miles distant and almost all of the ride is along a lovely bike trail, so this weekend I decided it was within my reach. On Saturday I made a dry run, in order to know what time to leave home Sunday morning. Turns out it's almost exactly an hour's ride, give or take a minute or two where the trail crosses major highways. I was psyched; If Janet can ride an hour each way to church, so can I!

The first time I biked that distance the last half of the trip was so miserable anyone who saw me had a right to doubt my ability to make it home. This time I felt so good I made a two-mile detour in order to pick up something at Home Depot. I eagerly awaited repeating the trip Sunday morning.

My expectations were well-founded. The trip was delightful, even though the early-morning fog meant I had to take a little extra time at some of the intersections. Traffic may be sparser early on a Sunday morning, but what cars are there tend to go a little faster, and be less prepared to see a bicyclist, especially one materializing out of the fog.

I arrived at church in time to cool down a little, and change into more appropriate clothes. One might argue that a t-shirt, shorts, and sneakers shouldn't bar one from church, and I'm sure I would have been welcomed; but I'm equally sure that my wet t-shirt wasn't a good idea, and I know my fellow choir members appreciated the fact that I changed and applied the deodorant I had thought to bring with me.

The ride home was hotter, but it didn't matter because a cooling swim was awaiting me at home. It soon became obvious that despite how great I felt after Saturday's trip, my body hadn't fully recovered from that 22-mile exertion. By the end, I was hurting! Even so, I made the return trip in an hour, so I must not have let my exhaustion slow me down any.

I can't say I was much good for the rest of the day; the most ambitious thing I did was order pizza and drive out to get it. But it was worth it! I've been riding enough lately that the shorter trips leave me a bit unsatisfied; I needed this weekend's challenge.

Well, it turned out to be not so much of an adventure after all, which was a good thing. But you would have thought it was something major, the way I prepared for it.

The adventure began when I noticed that our lovely little Geo's air conditioning was a little peaked. I mean, it worked great when I didn't really need it, but summer has come to Central Florida and the A/C just wasn't keeping up the way it used to. This meant a trip to Blue Book was in order. Our favorite mechanic (and used car dealership) is over 12 miles away, but worth the trip. Usually we do what everyone else does: drive the car up and get a ride home. This time I decided to ride my bike home.

Our local bike trail gets me easily between home and Lake Mary Blvd.; the question was, how much sidewalk could I count on between there and Blue Book? (Technically, bicycles belong on the road, not the sidewalk. But if you've ever seen the roads around here you'll know why I say I prefer paying a fine to paying a hospital bill. Not that I've been fined yet, but it's a possiblity.) Yesterday I took a drive and learned the answer to my question: Trail and sidewalk are available for all but a very small portion, but that small gap might as well have been a chasm.

Central Florida is not ready for bicycle and pedestrian traffic. In places we're trying: we have a number of very nice trails along and connecting former rail beds, there are sidewalks in many places, and some new road construction includes a bike lane. The trouble is that key connections are missing. The above-mentioned chasm is also known as Interstate 4. Lake Mary Blvd. crosses I-4, but there is no provision for pedestrian traffic; the sidewalks just end. In theory I could have ridden across, as there is a wide shoulder in most places, but it's pretty scary, and you have to cross three entrance/exit ramps, including one with four lanes of heavy traffic—and of course no walk light.

Clearly, I needed a Plan B. I tried out several alternate routes, each of which started out promising but petered out into long stretches of no sidewalk and roads too busy for comfortable biking. This is not Japan, where drivers are accustomed to sharing the road with bicyclists—though at least we have no concrete irrigation ditches to worry about. Finally I decided to take a detour that added about three miles to the trip, but allowed me to cross I-4 on a pedestrian/bike bridge that is part of the trail.

Last night I put the bike rack on the back of the car, put the bike on the rack, and took a brief test drive to make sure I'd put it on securely. This morning I packed my provisions (making sure I had plenty of water), slathered on sunscreen (which I hate to do, but I wasn't sure how much of the trip would be without benefit of shade), and headed out.

Once at Blue Book, Jim helped me get the bike off the rack and the rack in the car; I handed him the keys, donned my helmet and biking gloves, and was off.

I don't regret all the preparations. Of course I spent more gas planning my route than I saved by biking, but that's a one-time expense. Having some emergency provisions (like water and money) and using sunscreen weren't bad ideas. You never know when something might happen to disrupt your plans. But really, the trip was wonderful! I had been thinking of it as a major journey, a big deal, because it was (for me) in uncharted territory and a long distance. The odometer on my bike is broken, but the trip was about 16 miles. That seemed long to me, but then I realized I was only traveling one way! Since our regular Saturday bike ride is eight miles out and back, 16 miles should not have been anything to think twice about.

There were two areas along the way where the sidewalk was closed due to construction, but both were easily circumvented. One thing I enjoyed seeing was a place where a section of the trail itself was closed because of nearby construction work, and they had paved a temporary detour for the pedestrians/bicyclists, just as they do on roads for cars.

Mentally, I had built two resting places into my ride: St. Peter's Church, where a friend works, and Panera Bread. But as I said, the ride was much easier than I had expected, and I didn't want to stop, so I came straight home. It took me exactly an hour and 45 minutes. Lately I have been setting aside about an hour and a half each day for exercising, and it would have taken me more than 15 minutes to drive home from Blue Book, so overall I saved time as well as gasoline! Well, maybe not—there's a certain amount of overhead involved with getting the bike and the carrier on and off the car—but at any rate it didn't really cost me the time out of my day that one would think, and it was terrific fun!

The Longest Day. Our last day in Japan, the first day of our return home, the 37-hour day in which we landed at Newark before we took off from Narita. (It would have been a 38-hour day had not the switch from Standard to Daylight time occurred in our absence.)

Fuji-san came out to say sayonara, gracing us with one of the most beautiful views of our stay. Naito sensei and Yuko picked us up at 8 a.m., drove us to the bus station, and insisted on staying till the bus left at 8:40 so we would not have to say goodbye to Janet any sooner than absolutely necessary.

On the long ride to Narita Airport, which is on the far side of Tokyo, we enjoyed the scenery very much: the mountains, the towns, the houses with their large garden plots even close to the center of Tokyo, attempting to read the katakana signs, and the sight of many, beautiful, blooming sakura trees of varying shades from white to deep pink. A critical factor in our enjoyment was having decided to take the early bus instead of one that was scheduled to get us to the airport closer to our late afternoon departure time. Thus the fact that we became entangled in a major traffic problem caused no worry, even in my panic-prone heart. We did make an unexplained detour to drop off one couple in the middle of the city. (Correction: it was not unexplained, but of the driver's rapidly-spoken commentary I understood not a word.) Perhaps the delay had made them in danger of missing their flight, and they were let off in a place where they could catch a train to the airport. We'll never know.

Once at Narita, only about an hour late, we had no trouble disembarking at the correct terminal because all the recorded announcements on the bus are given in both Japanese and English. We had not been able to print our boarding passes in advance, because Janet has no printer, but because she does have Internet access I was able to determine last night where to go for check-in. I think it rather impressed Porter that I looked at the bewildering chaos and said, "go there," instead of just looking lost. :)

There was a long line at the Continental check-in, but we still had plenty of time. (Don Aslett is right: "Early" is your best friend.) At Narita checked bags are screened in your presence, sealed, and returned to you for check-in. As mine was x-rayed, it generated a small amount of excitement, which I can't report in detail without revealing someone's Christmas present, but that did not take long to resolve.

Check-in went smoothly as well, and we decided we had enough time to eat some lunch. Porter found a sushi restaurant in which the food was not only good, but also not that much more expensive that we were accustomed to, both of which were surprising for airport food. Moving through passport control and airport security went quickly, and we were soon at the gate. Porter wandered off in search for a snack, returning with the spicy Japanese rice crackers he likes so much, and I amused myself by translating katakana.

Once on the plane we were delighted to discover that we each had three seats to ourselves. In contrast to the very crowded flight over, the return flight was sparsely populated. We had chosen two aisle seats this time, and had resisted the check-in lady's attempts to seat us together, turned out to be a great strategy. The seats are contoured enough that sleeping, even lying down, was not comfortable, but it was much, much better than last time.

Again they fed us two full meals and a "snack" (cheeseburger and ice cream, not just a tiny bag of pretzels). Besides eating, I spent my time sleeping, translating the katakana on the video display of our flight path, reading Lee C. Camp's Mere Discipleship, and listening to our choir music for Holy Week. (This trip caused us to miss several key rehearsals, so we brought a CD and our sheet music with us.)

My comments about the benefits of being early found another, inverse, application. Next time we will endeavor to allow more than an hour and five minutes between flights when the first leg is international. We were late taking off from Narita, and although we made up the deficit in flight, there was a long delay between our landing at Newark and our actual arrival at the gate. We managed to exit the plane quickly, and even though the walk to passport control was long, and the lines moved slowly, that didn’t matter because we still reached baggage claim before our luggage did. But all four bags came through, close together and in good shape. Once we had them, going through Customs was a breeze. Life is easier when you have no interest in bringing in alcohol, tobacco, or expensive jewelry or electronics. :) Rechecking the bags was easy, also, and we began to think we might make our flight to Orlando after all.

Then we realized that going through Customs takes you out of the secure area of the airport, and we had to go through the regular Airport Security line! That was a long wait, and I was less patient than I usually am in such situations.... There should have been no reason for people with connecting flights to have to do that. Or perhaps they don't trust the security measures in other airports…perhaps with good reason, I don't know.

Not wanting to give up, even though the time for boarding our flight had theoretically passed, we raced to our gate, or rather to what we thought was our gate. There simply was no time to find and check a monitor, so we had to trust the gate number that was on our boarding passes. It was far, far away. Liberty International is a big airport, and though we were only going from one Continental gate to another Continental gate, the two were about as far apart as possible. As we neared the end of the run, I sprinted ahead of Porter, who was having trouble with his Achilles' tendon injury. As I arrived at the gate, I noticed that the flight displayed was the wrong one. I spoke with the attendant who said, tersely, "over there" and pointed. That was when I realized that people, at least in Japan, are more patient, and clearer in their explanations, when you don't speak the language. Porter had caught up with us by the time I understood that the gate we wanted was just down the hall. We flew there together, and lo and behold boarding was just starting! We gratefully took our places at the end of the line.

The flight to Orlando was more crowded, but that didn't matter in the least because it was only two hours long. They fed us dinner and once again had free headphones available. It was rather amusing that on every flight we were offered free headphones, and advised to take them with us because on every other flight they would cost $5.

Our luggage made it safely on flight but the very last: somewhere between Newark and Orlando one of the bags had its outside pocket ripped half off. Continental, which had treated us quite well up to this point, failed here. They refused to let us fill out a claim form, because they won't take responsibility for outside pockets. They did offer us a replacement suitcase, but the only one they had was smaller, and they wouldn't give it to us unless we gave them the damaged bag in return. Since this was the bag with most of our breakable items in it, which I had spent over an hour packing and repacking for greatest protection, I didn't find the offer acceptable. Had it just been clothes I might have been tempted, but I wanted to get everything home as it had been packed and have time to assess what other damage might have been done in the process of tearing the bag.

For the final leg of our journey Porter had arranged to rent a car; it was cheaper than a taxi and better than asking a friend to pick us up, especially since we weren't sure we'd make the flight from Newark. When we arrived home, all was well there, and we determined that the contents of our bags had escaped unscathed, though the episode does point out the importance of careful packing of anything that can be damaged. I don't remember exactly when we walked in the door, but I believe it was before 10 p.m.

What a wonderful trip! Japan is a delightful country; not perfect, and full of contradictions (another blog post, perhaps), but absolutely delightful and I'd love to return some time. I'm under no illusions that this trip makes me a world traveler, however. What made it so enjoyable was all the effort Janet put into sharing her world, her Japan, her life, church, school, friends, and pleasures. It's impossible to quantify the benefits, or to choose the best part of the trip, but high on my own list is having faces, views, sights, sounds, tastes, and scents to connect with the stories Janet tells of her experiences in Japan.

We relaxed a bit this morning, spending our time packing, reading, and practicing kanji, depending on who we were. :) Our lunch was a fitting ending to our visit: Naito sensei, Shimizu sensei, and Yuko had prepared a feast at Naito sensei's house. This also gave us a chance to meet Naito sensei's husband, daughter, and dog. (We have not seen many pets in Japan.) Janet enjoyed helping Naito sensei make sushi. Not to take away anything from the effort that went into the preparation, which is an art, but the Japanese have one great advantage over us when it comes to making sushi: one can buy beautiful pieces of fish, cut to appropriate sizes, at the grocery store! In addition to the fabulous sushi, we had delicious rolled-up sandwiches—one variety of which was strawberries and whipped cream!—salad, tea, and possibly some other delight I forgot to write down. For dessert we had lovely, individual confections that came from a bakery we had passed yesterday on our walk to the Takeda Shrine. We had looked in the bakery window briefly, but if we'd known what was awaiting us inside, we would have lingered.

As delicious as the meal was, the best part of the afternoon was the conversation. Out of courtesy to us, most of the conversation was in English, but some was also in Japanese as the four teachers discussed the new school year. (Did I mention that the Japanese school year begins in April?) They just received their new assignments and of course there was some excited buzz about that. Perhaps the conversation went a little more slowly because Janet was included, but I was thrilled to be able to understand just a little of the Japanese! Not enough by any means to follow the conversation, much less participate in anything beyond a simple greeting and "thank you very much"; but knowing the general subject and being able to recognize a few words and phrases, I was sometimes able to discern one word from another and have a vague idea of what they were talking about, which was really exciting. Okay, so it doesn't sound exciting, but for me there was a huge difference between the afternoon's conversation and my general experience of the Japanese language here, which is a totally incomprehensible wash of sound.

Here, also, we were given beautiful gifts: a Japanese box and bookmarks. The Japanese have certainly taken hospitality to great heights. Sometimes I think the custom of omiyage may be overdone, and could be accused of multiplying clutter and needless expense, but I can certainly learn something from their generosity as hosts. After we had left the Okajima store I on Tuesday, I had realized that we had perhaps not paid enough attention to getting souvenirs. (Shopping is an activity we all avoid whenever possible.) Not to worry! Everywhere we've been, our hosts have taken care of that omission, probably better than we could have ourselves.

I've been a bad tourist in another way on this trip: I brought no camera, since ours is heavy and a bit awkward. Instead I relied on Porter's new cell phone—the phone itself doesn't work in Japan, but the camera feature does—and Janet's new Japanese camera. This afternoon, not only did the teachers take many pictures, but so did Naito sensei's father-in-law, who is a photographer, so I hope to get a copy of some of them. Easy picture sharing is one of the great things about digital photography!

We were home in time to leave again. Janet's friend Aden, from China, took us to his apartment for dinner. He is a student here in Japan, and hopes to teach when he returns to China. On the way, we found out that in China people drive on the right hand side, while in Hong Kong they drive on the left, which makes for an interesting cross-over between the two.

The only thing wrong with our delicious, many-course dinner is that Aden, as cook, couldn’t join us until dessert. He explained that in China the cook does not eat with the guests, because of the nature of Chinese cooking. I can't give a good description of what we ate, but it included tea (of course), salad, vegetables, two dishes with rice (one of which was mapo doufu), with oranges (sliced and served with the rind as a cup) for dessert.

It was awesome to have the privilege of talking, as friends, with someone from Mainland China. It would not have been appropriate, in this situation, to discuss anything controversial or political, but conversation about ordinary life was sufficient to reveal vast differences in our understanding of certain situations and events. This highlights one of the greatest lessons I've learned on this trip: If we're serious about working for world peace, we must increase greatly opportunities for cultural exchange, in which real, ordinary individuals from one country get to know real, ordinary individuals from another. But that's a subject worthy of its own blog post.

"You can't out give the Japanese"—even when they're really Chinese. As were leaving, Aden gave us a large bag of the jasmine tea he had served us, tea which was grown in his home town!