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Sunday, 28 June 2009

  • Prelude to Fuji

    Prelude to Mt. Fuji: 

    As some of you know, one of my life goals is to climb to the summit of Mt. Fuji, Japan.  In order to prepare myself for that climb in July, four of my fellow climbers, Robin Britt, Karrissa Dennis, Rebekah, and I headed to Yoneyamma,the highest peak in our prefecture, and started trekking up it.  Yoneyamma has several paths up it and we happen to choose one of the roughest ones.  Laura drove us to the start of the Odara trail, wished us good luck, and said to call if something happened along the way. 

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    The four of us                              Guardian markers in the village of Odaira.

    It was a short hike through the village of Odaira to the head of the trail.  It was

    marked with this sign 

     

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     and took us passed an old, abandoned, thatched farmhouse.

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    As we moved up the trail, I was surprised to find this solitary grave beside the path since most Japanese villages have graveyards for the community..

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    The Odaira trail had some beautiful vistas.  

     

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    We met this little fella along the way. 

     

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    The trail was not anywhere near easy!  The path was usually this wide (About 18-24 inches) and this was a two-way path. 

     

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    Some of the places had steps that were more like ladders and in some places, we had to use ropes to climb up it. 

     

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    We reached the half way point in about an hour and a half.  From there we could see the summit and its buildings.

     

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    At one of our rest stops, we found this jizo.  A jizo is a guardian spirit for a particular area.  This one was the protector for this part of the trail.  If you look in the second photo, you can see that someone left an offering of candy so the this jizo would take special notice of them and give them added protection along the way.

     

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    The trail was pretty clean but there were still signs that hikers had came this way.  This tree seems to have been a favorite place for people to crave messages into.

     

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    After leaving the jizo, we found that we were running out of water.  It was in the upper 80’s so we were drinking a lot of water to try and keep hydrated.  Rebekah solved the problem when she found a sign that said;

    “ Water Place 30 seconds.”  Boo and I followed the trail and found a spring of cool water coming out of the side of the mountain.  We filled up the bottles and rejoined the others for the final push up Yoneyama.

     

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    When we reached the top, this was the view.

     

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    There are three buildings on the summit; a temple,

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    a restroom and a meeting room.  After a quick trip to the facilities, we went to the meeting room for lunch and a game of euche before heading down.

     

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    As we were heading down Yoneyama, Laura called and said that she would pick us up.  Originally we were going to walk to a train station and ride back from there.  Laura pick us up and that old van of ours looked pretty good.

     

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    At the base of the trail, the sun was just starting to go down, so I snapped this shot.

     

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    On the way back, we decided to celebrate our successful climb with expresso shakes for the adults (We didn't have any Klingon Blood Wine.) and donuts for the kids.

     

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    What did I learn from this experience?  First, you can’t lie to a mountain.  You might think that you’re in shape, believe you know the trail, made all the need preparations and have everything under control, but the mountain knows what you really are and how well you’ve prepared for your hike up her.  Yoneyama is a cold hearted lady who will not hesitate to show you how out of shape and ill prepared you are.  These lessons are taught with sore muscles and dry throats.  I suspect that Fuji san is even more cold hearted.  Second, the mountain reduces you to your basic thoughts.  You don’t think about your classes or studies, or what you are going to do after you get down.  You think of only taking the next step.  After that, taking the next step until you rest, make it to the top or reach the bottom..  Taking the next step is where you focus all your energy and concentration.  Everything else becomes unneeded baggage.  I’m still working through all the feelings, insights, and impressions I have from climbing Yoneyama, and I can’t quite put them into words, but I believe, somehow, I am a better person for having done so.  I believe that Fuji will teach me similar, and perhaps, deeper lessons when we climb her on July 18th

     

     

Friday, 19 June 2009

  • Bluff With a Pair of Twos

    This is chaper  10 in the Great Xanga Round Story  If you are new to the storyline click here http://legendairy.xanga.com/697882899/table-of-contents/to see the table of conents and catch up on what's been happening.

     

    Bluffing with a Pair of Twos.

     

    Gregory could feel beads of sweat forming on his forehead.  “I’m so dead or will be in a few seconds.” he thought. “I said get down now!  Are you deaf or just plain slow?” the large man growled.  “Let me make it clear for you, hick.”  Gregory heard a round snap into the gun’s chamber.  “I’ve got one chance,” Gregory thought as he licked his lops.  “If he thinks I’m a hick mechanic, I might be able to bluff my way out of this.”  “Who up thar pard, Ah’ll be gitting maw self down thar inna sec.” Gregory called down as he wiped grease and dust on the broom handle, his hands and the front of his clothes.  “Look out, Ah’m comin down.”  Gregory dropped the broom handle down first and then eased himself down feet first into the elevator.  Stand in front of him were two men.  The man on the left was middle aged, short, bespectacled with thinning salt and pepper hair.  The man on the right was tall, well muscled, and young and pointing what looked like a cannon at Gregory’s chest.  Gregory smiled and said genteely “Iffin yew’d point that thar piece somewhere else, pard, Ah’d be much obliged.”  The large man’s eyes narrowed. “What were you doing up there and what did you hear?  And it had better be a good answer or you’ll be seeing Biggs in Security.”  Gregory scratched the back of his head and said, “Well, boys, it was like this.  Ah had jest got offa maw shift and was headin fer home when this here elevator up and begana screachin like a cat in heat.  It up an come to a dead stop betwit floors.  So, I crawled up on top to have a lookie the cable since Ah figured it was a problem with the pulleys and sure nuff, the cable had up an got jammed in a pulley.  “What’s with the broom stick?” The large man gestured with his head at the broomstick on the elevator’s floor.  Gregory gave a short snort. “Look, pard, Ah may be from the sticks, but Ah ain’t stupid enough ta use maw hand to unstick a jammed pulley.  One na the janitors broke a broom head an Ah was takin the handle wif me ta see iffin Ah could find me a new un at the hardware store. Lucky Ah had it too.  That thar stick made a right fine pry bar.  Ah stuck it in betwit the cable and gave er a good pull and she came free slicker than snot on slate.  You fellers musta got on after she got to movin again.”  The older man nodded his head.  “That’s true.  The car was empty when we got in, Dan.”  “So, why was he still up there after the elevator started moving?  The large man glared at Gregory.  “Answer me that, hill rat.”  Gregory shrugged his shoulders.  “Shoot, pard, Ah needed ta see iffin the cable was a gonna git stuck again.  So, I watched er fer a bit, It’s noiseier than a tin roof inna hailstorm in that shaft, so Ah didn’t hear y’all in the elevator till yew hollared at me to git on down an, well here we be.”  The large man gave a short laugh but kept his gun leveled at Gregory. “Yeah, here we are.  You might be telling the truth, hill rat.  But I don’t think so.  I think we're going to go down to Security and you can repeat your story to Biggs.  He has a a real talent for getting to the bottom of things.  Now keep your hands where I can see them.”           

Wednesday, 10 June 2009

  • Giant Kites and Octopus Balls

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    Giant Kites and Octopus Balls.

     

    In Japan, everything has a time and a place.  You can expect certain things to happen simply because it’s that time of the year.  Sunday was one of those times.  For 350 years in the village of Shirome there has been an annual kite fighting festival.  The origin of this event is essentially an Asian version of the Hatfields and McCoys feud set in Japan.  Shirome has a man-made river that runs through it.  The river bisects the town into the West and East Banks.  Each of the Banks were responsible for the upkeep of their side of the river and the levees that protected the rice fields from flooding.  In May, 1737, the local ruling family, the Mizoguchi Clan, celebrated the birth of a son and invited the head of East Shirone village, Kamiyama Chubei to the party.  In honor of the son, a giant kite, daiko, made of 30 paper panes was built.  At the end of the celebration, the kite was given to Kamiyama-san as a token of thanks for the work he and the East Bankers had done on the levees.  Kamiyama decided he had to rub the West Bankers’ nose in the fact that the East Bankers had been honored and they hadn’t and took the kite down to the river to fly it.  The kite got off the ground but crashed on the west side into the house of a farmer named Mataemon.  Mataemon had a long standing grudge against the East Bankers and he took this accident as a deliberate insult towards him and all West Bankers.  With the help of his friends and neighbors, Mataemon built another giant kite.  The West Bankers took the kite to the river, launched it and kamikazed Kamiyama’s house with it.  Lord Mizoguchi put the kibosh on the escalating kite war by declaring the two sides would hold a kite fighting festival. So, each year the two sides of Shirome gather on the banks of the Nakakuchigawa to see who gets splashed and who soars to victory.  

     

    We started the day with a trip to Shirone's Kite Museum.

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    As you enter in, there is this wall hanging to your left. The kanju is the word tako or kite.   It's a symbol that most of the people in the kite fights have on their clothes.

     

    DSCF0014 How big  are these kites?  The woman in the middle of this photo is 5' 3".  Most of the fighting kites are 30 feet long by 12-15 feet wide.  The usual theme on a kite is either a samurai hero or one of the Shito gods.

    However, not all of the kite at the museum were fighting kites.

    These ones are for one_eared_batman and like_a_tiguh

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    An old fashion farm house.                 A dragon kite. 

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    A butterfly                                             Sailor Moon

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    I found these ladies hiding in a cubbie.

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    And this  chorus line above Laura in a small wing on the second floor.

    DSCF0025 and my favorites are these two.

    A lion dog

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    and a carp.

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    We left the museum at about 5 and made it to the river in time to watch some of the o-dako get lanched  Each kite has a team of 30-40 men and woman running with the kite rope to try and get their kite up and flying. 

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    Once up and airborne, the kite's crew tries to either snap their rival's rope or force it down into the river.  First kite down loses.  The crew gets their instructions from their captain by a series of whistles, so the whole fight is one loud chaotic free for all.

    While the kites foght, we had a quick supper of yaki soba (fried noodles with vegetables and pork), karage,(deep fried chicken), po-po yaki (a steamed bread), and tako yaki (octopus dough balls).  I like the tako yaki best.  It's good, but a bit like chewing rubber bands.

    After the last fight the kites that were still intact were rolled up and moved to be stored.  Here are a few of the teams with their kites.

    DSCF0110 DSCF0114 Yes, boys, a woman CAN  be a team leader.

     

    DSCF0117 This poor guy's hauling off part of his kite that got splashed in a fight.  Better luck next year, fella.

     

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    These kites will be taken apart and put into storege until next year or they might end up on display in the museum.

    We headed home after the last kite passed both tired and excited.

     

Tuesday, 02 June 2009

  • Tlinghan jIH: Confessions of a Closet Klingon

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    Tlinghan jIH:  Confessions of a Closet Klingon

     

     

    “A promise made is a debt unpaid.”  or so the saying goes.  I’m writing to ante up on a promise that I made to shatterFocus a few weeks ago.  ShatterFocus posted a blog that invited anyone to ask her a question about herself and if she answered that question, you were to man up and spill the beans about a question that she would ask you.  Her question to me was “What’s your secret or dark pleasure?”  So, here it is.

     

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    I am a closet Klingon

     

     

     I haven’t always been a closet Klingon.  When I got hocked on the original Star Trek series as a young Trekker, Klingons were the archetypical bad guys the Federation good guys would beat when every they came out to wreak havoc on the universe. (Note: Not Trekkie.  Trekkie is what a non-Trekker calls a Trekker. Doing this at a convention will, at best, give you a reputation of being an ignorant duffus and at worst, a bat’lath in the back, But I digress.)  After the series was cancelled and the cartoon series of Star Trek had run its course, there was an explosion of books that keep the Star Trek universe and the crew of the Enterprise going “where no man has gone before”.  One of the best was “The Final Refection” by John Ford.  The entire book was about Klingons, their life philosophy and values, and what effects they had on a Klingon male throughout his life and service to the Empire.  I liked what I saw.  Here was a race that valued honor, loyalty to your clan, honesty and openness in words and actions, t fighting for a cause, and sacrifice for the good of the group as positive values.  My impression was that Klingons were a cross between Japan’s samurai and the ancient Vikings. When Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager hit the scene, Klingons went from bad guys to

     

      Klingons lursa-betor

    desirable bad boys                                                          (and girls)

     

    of the universe with many Trekkers.

     

    So, what makes me a closet Klingon?  Well, one of my life goals is to learn Klingon fluently before I die.  Laura thinks I’ve lost it.  “Why do you want to learn a language that no one but a few Trekkies (low rumble in my throat) even speak?” she asked me when I shared this tidbit of information with her.  I guess that answer would be the same reason a person masters tea ceremony, kyudo, or many of the cultural arts.  It’s the process of attempting to achieve a difficult task that teaches you more than the product of doing the task.  Secondly, I have been incorporating some of the philosophy of the Klingon culture into my lifestyle.  Simple food and surroundings, loyalty to friends and family, honesty and forthrightness in speech, and never giving up on a job even if it is difficult to finish, are some of the things that I’ve observed in the Klingon way that I believe I would do well to follow in my own life.  Finally, the emphasis that Klingons put on being physically and mentally fit is just plain common sense to me.  I’m creeping up on the end of my middle age years and from where I stand, getting old isn’t for cowards.  I want to keep lean and mean until the day I die and that means aerobic training, weights and martial arts for me. 

     

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    So, there you have it.  I raise my cup of qa'vIn to you all and say Tlinghan jIH and Hu’tegh proud of it!

     

Friday, 29 May 2009

  • Get Out There And Thump Somebody

     

    Get Out There and Thump Somebody.

     

    Santvi challenged all Xangans to follow Thumper's (Bambi’s rabbit bud) advice and say something nice about some of the Xangans that we read or comment about.  Here are a few of my favorites.

     

    Made2singforJesus. 

    Your site is an oasis after a day of tests, lectures and grading.  Talking to you is like talking to a neighbor over the fence

     

    Seedsower

    You have some of the best pictures that I ‘ve seen and you tell stories about you family, faith, and neighborhood with a warmth would make the worst grouch smile.

     

    Simbathe2nd

    You’re about the most mature blogger on Xanga bar none.  You write with conviction and stand by those convictions without being offensive or condescending.  Even those that don’t agree with tyou respect you  for that.

     

    Levana

    You have your dark side at times but you also write some stirring poems because of those issues.  You are a mover and a shaker and it brings a smile on my face to hear about your latest daredevil stunt or adventure.  

     

    StephSays

    You’re one of the newer people that I subscribe to but you strike me as one of the most down to earth and real folks that I’ve seen.  You don’t have problems telling about yourself and letting it stand at that.

     

    ScatterFocus

    You’re another person that I just started reading but ya got style, Kid.  You are very open about your feelings and yourself and you invite others to feel free to do the same.

     

    Okay, people, get out there and go thump (in a nice way) some of the people out in the Xangasphere that make your day.

jeremiahstears

  • Visit jeremiahstears's Xanga Site
    • Name: Jerry
    • Gender: Male
    • Member Since: 5/11/2008

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