The Brassfield's do Tokyo! Week 1

I went to Atlanta for four fun filled and glorious weeks! I spent mothers day with my family, attended Alison’s bachelorette party in Florida and then Alison was married in a beautiful ceremony and I even made a speech at the wedding. That trip will just have to wait to be blogged about because I’ve already got going on this one about my parent’s visit to Japan. That’s right. The Brassfield’s actually came to Tokyo. For 3 weeks. And it was a blast. I certainly cannot recap everything that happened on this trip but I'll try to give you the highlights! Another option is for you to just come to Tokyo to visit to see for yourself what it's like to visit me. :) 

Day 1: 6/13- Wednesday

I just knew there would be a ton of traffic and my parents would get off of the plane and not know what to do; boy was I wrong.  We began this three week journey trip by arriving at the airport with plenty of time to spare. Once we arrived in record time, I just knew my parents would be the last ones off of the plane, and boy was I right. All of the people from their flight came through the immigration door, then the crew members, and then the people from the flight after them and their crewmembers. We were seriously the last people waiting for an arrival passenger in that whole airport. I went to the security desk to report them as missing. Then, of course, they showed up! One of their bags had gotten lost so they were busy filling out some paperwork to get it back. They’re here! Hooray!

Day 2: 6/14- Thursday

We spent the day getting my parents acclimated to the base. We exchanged some money, gave them a tour and George even spared a few minutes to give them a tour of the C-130. I forget how special getting an airplane tour is. To me, a C-130 is a plane that takes my husband away frequently and breaks down even more frequently. But George loves it, as do I. And it has brought me here with my Yokota family so I guess it’s all good. In the hood. No more rhymes. Sorry. My parents were very fascinated by that big Hercules plane and enjoyed watching George in his element.

That night we packed up and headed to the Seibu Lions baseball game! There’s nothing quite like watching a Japanese baseball game. Nothing! It’s basically the same thing as an MLB game in the states, except totally different. The food is different, the crowd cheers the whole entire time, and is run by the fans, not by the sound control guy, or the guy who bangs the giant drum in the outfield of Turned Field. It’s an experience, to say the least. Dad did good by putting on his navy blue tee and fit right on in. We met some of our closest friends at the game, and had a great time with them- particularly with our ‘victory balloons’. These are blown up by the fans and released during the 7^th inning stretch. It’s very fun.

 A Coca-cola vendor... your coca-cola products made in 

my hometown of Atlanta shipped right to you in Tokyo! 

 One point during the game they have you say "Ohhhhh" or "Yaaay!" or "Goooo!" Very fun! 

 My very mature friends/husband enjoyed doing this to my hair with our victory balloons!

Mom, Dad, Chelsea and George

 Victory Balloons! 

The highlight of the whole game was seeing a foul ball soaring right towards us. I played softball from ages 5-18 and I can catch me a doggone fly ball, but not without a glove. And hearing my friend Jenn’s story about being beamed in the head by Ken Griffey Jr. did not help my nerves! (Jenn… can you post a link to that blog? :) ) So I ducked way down and covered my head. But not my Mama. Judy leapt for that ball and it landed in between her and a nice Japanese lady. She claims her fingers touched that ball, but because of my lectures on how nice and cordial the Japanese are she didn’t want to be conceived as the greedy American so she let it go and let the other lady have it. She did get a skinned knee and hand out of the ordeal, but not a souvenir baseball. Good try Mom! I’m proud of your effort! If it were me, I’m sure I would have snatched it from that lady’s grip- way to stay classy!    

 This is the man holding a sign that says "Watch out for fly balls." 
Or so we think. We really have no idea. 

Day 3: 6/15- Friday

We got a late start to our day on Friday (you’ll find this was a trend)… but made it out to a fun filled lunch of Ramen and Gyoza at George’s favorite Ramen restaurant. This ramen is not the same as your $0.22 packs you ate in college, I assure you. My dad actually did a great job using his chopsticks, and Mom, well, she gave it a great try. This is where she learned she should carry a fork in her purse at all times. :) After lunch George had to head back to work and we finally settled on making a trip to Showa Kinen Memorial Park. It’s a beautiful nature filled park with trails, flowers and ice cream not far from the base.This was day number one of our soft cream ice cream, and the introduction lead to us getting one of these cones almost every other day my mom and dad were visiting us! Yum!

We walked around and saw the lakes, flowers, trails, and Cheyenne had a great time walking us. One of these days she’s going to get really good at walking on a leash. Maybe.

We managed to be lost quite a bit in this park. We got there just a couple of hours before closing time and had a lot to see before 5pm so it was important to not just wander and make sure we were back at the gate before they locked us in! We had a blast!

 Ice cream!

 With their grandpuppy!

 This dragon has a speaker inside that roared at us when

 we stepped into it's mouth. I almost peed myself.

 We were frequently lost! 

Thanks for a fun day Mom and Dad!

That night we ordered pizza at home and then went to Karaoke! It was so much fun, as usual! I don’t have any pictures but we had a great time singing and dancing. Even Dad sang one or two Elvis songs!

Day 4: 6/16-Saturday 

On Saturday I was co-hosting a baby shower for my sweet friend Mel and Mel was nice enough to let my mom attend the shower too! I don't have a single picture from the shower in my possession but it was a beautiful day and tons of fun to celebrate Mel, DJ and baby to come. Dad went golfing with George and the boys, then we all met up and had dinner and a movie at my place. It was a great day to hang and relax as friends/family before the crazy of the rest of Japan got a hold of us!

Day 5: 6/17- Sunday

I got up on Sunday and sent George off to the airport. He'll be gone for about 6 weeks doing some training stateside. My parents and I were bummed to see him go, particularly my dad, who was stuck with just my mom and I for the remainder of the their 3 week vacation! Poor guy! :) 

I have a small handful of complaints about my husband (you have them about yours too, be honest) and one my complaints is that he walks WAY too fast. I often feel like a small child trailing behind him because I can't keep up. He always looks back to check on me, but it's still bothersome. Funny how that role reversed with my very slow parents trying to keep up with me! Ha! So after a sad goodbye with George we high tailed it to the train station and began day one of the first of many train rides in Japan! 

 Mom and Dad's first train ride!

 Takahatafudo Temple

We caught the train and took it (well, 4 different trains) to Takahatafudo Temple. There was a Hydrangea Festival going on! It was neat to check out the temple there, see the beautiful flowers and see the items the shrine sale people had for purchase. It was a little smaller than I had imagined it took us about an hour to see everything there was to see at the festival. Since it had taken about an hour and a half on the trains to get there, so we had to find something to do to occupy the rest of our day! We managed to kill some time by walking around the town and checking out a 7-11, (more fun than it sounds), a hardwood store, a bakery and a cosmetic store where we got my mom some of that famous and fancy BB cream. (You should get some; it’ll change your life.) We also had berry vanilla soft cream. Yumm-o.

Day 6: 6/18- Monday

Day roku (Japanese for 6) found us in my car driving out to Mt. Fuji. It was not a very clear day but I was determined for them to see Fuji-san on this trip. How can you come to Japan and not see it?! And we all know about my secret love affair with the mountain.

We stopped by the visitor’s center to get our bearings and figure out where we were.

 I still can't believe they didn't purchase these hats!

Then we made it to the famous Moose Hill Burgers. It’s delightful to have an American style burger in Japan. A true delight.

 After that we managed to follow a map to Shiraito Falls, a beautiful waterfall near the base of Mt. Fuji. The water was so clear and beautiful, and it was really cool to share that experience with my parents! (Then we found more soft cream… I had peach. It was delish.)

 After the falls we still hadn’t even seen the top of Mt. Fuji yet and I was getting a little annoyed. We decided to head up the mountain. We followed the street signs and threw that little Mazda into 2^nd gear and went up, up, up. Eventually it looked like we’d see a break in the clouds, and finally we did… because we were above the cloud line! 

We made it to the 5^th station, which is as far up as you can drive. We were on the opposite side of the mountain than where I climbed it from last summer, so it was a neat experience to see another side of Fuji-san. We got out of the car and at my mom’s insistence, we walked up the trail for about 15 minutes. That’s all I was going to do. I swore to myself last summer I’d never hike it again but it was cool for Mom and Dad to get an idea of what it’s like to slide on rocks for 11 hours.

 See how rocky? (And Dad finally got down the art of the peace sign)

 After we had our Fuji fill, we went back down, down, down the mountain and drove around the 5 Lake District. The clouds cleared out just enough for us to see the whole mountain, in all ‘er glory! How very majestic!

The most comical part of the whole day was as we were about to get back on the highway to drive home we saw this man, walking 15 dogs. You can’t make this stuff up. 

Day 7: 6/19- Tuesday

Tuesday was rather uneventful. It was time for Mom and Dad to do some laundry, and for me to hit the grocery store. We were getting a tad burned out from all of the fun so we just took it easy at home. I was supposed to teach an English class that night which my parents would attend but because of a typhoon that came our way it was cancelled. We spent the evening playing my favorite game, Settlers of Catan and having dinner at home. It was nice to have a day to relax!