Imagine moving to Japan when you are seven years old. Growing up in the military I have seen a good portion of the world. Japan though is to date the most memorable. See when you are a kid everything is new and exciting to you, more so when you think you are going to go see things that you only see on television. I am talking ninjas, samurai, and shogun. I was going to see it all. I would find out there was more to the Japanese culture than I knew at the time.
It was 1989 I had just turned seven when I found out I would be living in Japan for a few years. I had loved watching samurai movies and movies with ninjas in it, I knew I would love Japan. On the plane ride over there I was asking my dad every question in the book about the people and if I will see ninjas. His reply was something to the point of if you see them then they are not good ninjas are they. Upon landing on Yokota Air Force Base I realized my thoughts about Japan where completely wrong. There were no samurai to greet us no ancient castles in the background I had been ripped off.
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After a few weeks of nothing dad came up and said we were going to some local festival to check it out. Japanese festivals are a sensory overload of culture at times. They have something happening all over the place, food everywhere, and all sorts of things for kids. A few of the things they had to eat were grilled squid on a stick, grilled corn on the cobb, tempura cotton candy, and various other traditional things. Then they had one of the coolest things any kid would want to see, a reenactment of a samurai battle. Complete with horses and the whole nine yards. Being seven years old I was in complete awe of what I was watching. Shortly there-after we started going to all kinds of local event.
We were only supposed to be in Japan for three years but my dad met my stepmother. We stayed on mainland for another two years, then three more on Okinawa. The whole time I was getting immersed in Japanese culture. I was picking up the language and meeting friends. I would be given some Yen to go visit friends for the weekend and travel by train to their town; at times an hour or so away. I would also go visit my grandfather and grandmother by train or bus up north in the Aomori prefecture. A lot of my fellow Americans would think it is strange to let a 10- or 12-year-old to ride a train that far by themselves; but to them that is their culture. They trust people and their children. A person of legal age can buy beer from a vending machine on the streets. Or most the time parents will send their kids to the store to buy groceries and a beer; because they know that the owner will make sure the beer made it to them.
The Japanese are a very prideful people and will do anything for anyone, if you show them the proper amount of respect that they deserve. Growing up there over I learned a great deal about what Japan was as a culture. They take great pride in everything they do. Be it a home garden or to the making bullet train or Shinkansen. The Japanese students start learning English at the age of about 10. The students overall go to school all year round with little more than a couple weeks in between, depending on what course you are taking. I guess this is why they have one of the highest education rates in the world.
I had gotten to see a lot of the history in Japan. From caves that the Japanese soldiers hid out in on Okinawa, and where many eventually committed seppuku. Seppuku is the way to save face they when defeated they would disembowel themselves with a short blade, while someone stood behind them and removed their head. I had gotten to see and tour castles where shogun lived that were appointed by the emperor. Dad and I climbed Mount Fuji not once but twice. We did many other things together.
The Japanese are a great and diverse people that I for one am glad I got to spend so much time around. I had gotten to see a great many things, and learned a great deal. They have inspired much of our own culture at times, even though most people do not know it. They also continue to try and better themselves along with trying to better the world. Though they are not perfect and have made their own mistakes they have learned from them. They also have good ninjas because I have yet to see a real one.
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