These are all ones in which I appear, sort of to prove to you (and remind myself) that I actually spent time in Japan, albeit years ago now (June - August of 2001). Most of all the pictures I now have a hard time remembering much about, but fortunately for me, I did keep copies of my e-mail updates, and have managed to keep in touch with a couple of the folks who also went with the same team, so between those and my own recollections, I can probably piece together a good chunk of the pictures. These, however, I can recall fairly well. I have something on the order of 200 pictures, and I placed all the negatives into one envelope with wanton disregard for the order. I figured I could do that in the future based on how they appear in my photo album (as I recall, those are reasonably close to being in chronological order).
So here now I describe these five pictures in pictorial (not chronological order):
1. Me with a gentleman who was involved in the church who had trained as a kamikaze boat pilot for the Japanese Navy during WWII, but the war ended before he could be put into combat. He immediately picked up on the fact that both my grandfathers had been in the US Navy at the same time.
2. The Mt. Fuji group. Judging from the fact that I have an Alabama sweatshirt on, it was after my ill-fated attempt to climb the mountain. This one is interesting because I haven't seen it in over seven years now. Take note that it looks like it was an end of the roll picture or something and the original folks who developed it felt it wasn't worthy of putting to print. (It looks like about 10% of the picture is cut off and 10% of either the next or previous picture is also in the frame).
3. My home stay family minus the father (he is taking the picture if I recall), plus the father's parents. I have a couple of pictures with the father in them, so I do remember (was reminded?) what he looks like. They took me out to eat at some Japanese restaurant. Yes, they have Japanese restaurants in Japan. (I forget the food that was served exactly, probably pretty standard fare, sort of like the equivalent of a Ruby Tuesday, Applebee's, O'Charley's, et cetera, but I think they had sake and made/let/allowed me to take a swig).
4. Me at the sign directing potential patrons to the Hard Rock Cafe in Nagoya. What better place for Americans in Japan to eat than at a place that serves American food. (For their part, they did have a Japanese flare...for example, one could get rice with their "All-American Cheeseburger" substituted for french fries).
5. Me with Kyoto (Japan's ancient capital, from AD 784 - 1868--it's been at Tokyo since) in the background. It was the only major city not razed during WWII, consequently it still looks much like it did circa 1941. It doesn't have all the hustle and bustle that a city like Tokyo, Osaka or Nagoya (the three largest cities in order) have.
Those are the highlights. Take note they all featured me. However, there are a few more that do feature me (me singing "Piano Man" at a karaoke bar), and a few more that don't feature me that I intend on posting in the near future, so keep looking!
