Where in the World are Dave and Elizabeth?

Our first stop was the Imperial Palace, a compound of buildings and gardens built around old castle ruins.  The current emporer lives there, along with his family. No, he didn’t invite us in for tea. 😆 The next stop was a Buddhist temple compound.  Here is where you buy your fortune.  If your fortune is a bad one, you tie it to this rack — I suppose so that some one can pray for better things on your behalf,  The air all around and in the buildings was scented with incense.  It took me right back to World Bazaar in Atlanta when I was in seventh grade or so.  There were many little shrines in the grounds like this one.  If a mother loses her first child, she will come to One of these to pray to the Buddha.  If it is winter, she will clothe the statue with something warm.  This is thanks in return for the prayer, but also demonstrating motherly concern for her late child.  The grounds let out in a pedestrian shopping area that spans several streets.  We wandered through some shops, and

  Yesterday, we met ship friends Jae and Brad for lunch at Jango Jango in Naha for a bit of Mexican/Okinawan fusion.  With Americans stationed here since WWII, the two kinds of food combined.  We thought we were ordering the famous taco rice and soba, but it turned out to be actual tacos and soba.  It was all yummy. We had a great time at the Japanese version of the dollar store — Daiso.  We walked through neighborhoods and came to  Shinto shrine on top of a high hill.  People buy prayers or blessings here.  Did you know that Marie Kondo was a miko or Shinto shrine maiden for 5 years? A miko sells amulets, helps maintain the shrine grounds, and helps the priests perform rituals.  Shintos believe in gods called Kami which they think inhabit things like wind, rocks, mountains, trees, fertility.  They believe everything — from houses to shoes — are inhabited by spirits. Some Shinto believe they will become Kami when they die.  Some Buddhists in Japan have Kami as part of their cosmology,

Across the enormous, beautiful Pacific, there is a shadow, and that is the effects of WWII.  Dave and I took a taxi about 40 minutes from Naha to the Okinawa Perfectual Peace Memorial Museum, where the names of the 200,000 people who died in the bombing of Okinawa are etched in granite.  There is no way I can show by photo how huge the memorial is. Of course, it made me think of the Vietnam Memorial in DC.  It was only in the 60’s today, and it was misty and cloudy.  That only added to the serious ambiance.   Inside, we learned of the horrendous suffering of the Okinawan people.  The exhibit traced the beginnings of the conflict in Asia and the Pacific, and gave a brief history of the Japanese domination of the original Ryukyu kingdom of the Okinawan islands in the 1870’s. Thereafter, the Okinawans were propelled through Japanese conflicts in Asia toward the events of WWII and its aftermath.  The things that happened are too many and too sad to blog about.  The picture above is a child

  From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live.  27 God did this so that meanwhile n would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. Acts 17 I am thinking of people, cultures, and languages today. Did you know that the dominant religion in Okinawa today comes from a time before the region became part of Japan? It is animistic and also based on ancestor worship, as well as taking care of family. Today’s version has been influenced by several other religions, including Shintoism, Buddhism, and Christianity, but the base beliefs are the same as centuries ago.  Our first stop today was  Shuri  Castle. Built in the 14th Century, it has burned and been rebuilt to be the same a number of times.  It was the home of the kings of the Ryukyu, the people who lived here before combining with the Japanese.  Our second stop wa