Our Tower Home

Count up five balconies and that's ours. The two windows to the right of the balcony go to our guest room and our office/craft/storage/workout room :) See Rodney and Truman standing out on the balcony??

There they are!!

(Over Rodney's right shoulder is the lovely wind chime given to us by our Chapel family at the Amphib Base in Coronado:)

 This is the view of our building when you pull in...

One of our watchful "Shi-sa"s. This is a Japanese tradition: two Shi-sas sit outside your door or on your rooftop above your door like this. One has its mouth open to catch all the evil spirits, the partner Shi-sa has a closed mouth to then hold all the evil spirits. Traditionally, the opened mouth one is the male, while the female has the closed mouth. But, many say that should be reversed!!

(Sadly, our partner Shi-sa is missing!!)

One view across the street. I'm not sure what the building is in the background, but the building that looks to be behind the fence is a bento (Japanese boxed lunch) place. What's hard to see is the row of  four or five drink vending machines sitting out in front of it. They are everywhere!! You can get both hot and cold drinks from them: coffees, juices, teas, sodas,.....!

 A couple of views from our balcony....

Even though there are other towers in our view, we enjoy having as much green as we do, including a river, which actually is green in this picture....hhhmmmm...

I'll get pictures of the inside of our apartment once we get a little painting done and are able to get the final details all settled in :)

Our Island Rig

 This is Rodney's island run-around rig....a Suzuki X-90!!

It's a two-seater about the size of a Mazda Miata, but has a 4-wheel drive and a 5-inch lift kit!! It really looks like a baby monster truck :) It's so funny to be driving behind him and see the heads turning to watch that little red machine drive by knowing they're probably trying to figure out what it is!!!

 Here's our "nice" car :)

It's a Toyota Funcargo. It is fun to drive, too! See how little the tires are?? That's why its so funny to see REAL tires on the X-90!

And, yes, the steering wheels are on the right and we drive on the left. The pedals are all in the same place, but the column gear shift and wipers are on the left, while the turn signal is on the right. It's not uncommon to turn on the wipers when intending to turn on the turn signal!!

The catch with driving over here is this: as Americans, we are considered "professional drivers" to the Japanese, so if we are in an accident, whether its our fault or not, its our fault because we are the "professional drivers"!! So, gotta be careful!

Having another "Ball" or two!!

The cake from another Marine Bday ball....

And a couple of pictures of us from the Chaplain Corps Birthday ball....

Off to the Beach

We found out from one of our neighbors that there is a beach right here on base! So, we took Truman one afternoon and went to explore..... 

Our first glimpse of the beach...

 The tropical path down to the beach gave us the idea this was not going to be the type of beach we were used to in San Diego!

Sure enough, this is not the wide sweeping kind of beach, it is a tropical island beach!!

Here are a few pictures of the "backdrop"..... 

 

 

 

 

 

 Rodney's grinning at Truman who had been walking along with him, then just as I started to take the picture, took off running down the beach!! He really had a fun time, but avoided the water :)

 

 A couple of views across the "bay"....

 Truman stopped to take a little break from all his running around.

What might look like a gravel bar is actually washed up shells and pieces of coral!

 Rodney's collection...

Shells, coral, and sea glass.... And Truman's paw prints :)

Having a "Ball"!!

Not the best picture, but us with our table mates. The Marine sitting across from Rodney is from St. Louis! Met a couple that night from Webb City and Joplin---such a small world!!

All Smiles!!

This was our first Marine Ball, but have since attended another and still have one more to go just for this Marine Corps birthday season!

Our Temporary Lodgings

Rodney made arrangements for our temporary lodging at Eagle Lodge.

 I was expecting another hotel room, but we actually had a small 3-bedroom apartment! Looking at the picture above, the door to our apartment is on the right side (back) of the building and goes the width of the building with sliding glass doors out from the living room and two of the bedrooms to the balcony on the left side (front) of the building.

This picture shows the back of the building. Our apartment was on the 2nd floor at the far right.

Here are a few pics of the inside of our little place. (Please, ignore the clutter--we were getting ready for another, our FINAL, pack-out!!)

 This was an interesting feature...a step up to this little "outer" bathroom with a small utility sink. It made a great place to give Truman a bath after our long trip.

 Then, a second step up to the bathroom itself.

Here is the view from the balcony. Not that you can tell from the picture, but where the trees kind of "V" on the right side of the picture, we could see ocean! The building on the left is the East West Montessori School. It's a preschool for both Japanese (East) and American (West) children. The cool thing is the location of their playground---its on the roof!! Don't worry, it's covered and totally fenced in :)

 This is the view when we'd leave the apartment. The forest-y/jungle-y area is actually on US Gov't property. Between the trees off to the right in the picture are buildings on one of the bases. Those heavily vegetated areas are very common all around this tropical island and are inhabited be some HUGE bats!! They can have a wing span of about 1.5-2 feet, if not a little more! Their bodies are the size of some small cats! Thankfully, they eat fruit :-)

It was very comfortable lodgings, but we were so ready to get into housing, get our household goods, NOT live out of a suitcase any more, and sleep in our OWN bed!!

Welcome to Okinawa!! (Finally! ;)

October 15, 2010 ~ I was honored to be met at the airport by my own little greeting party--a few of the Chaplains and spouses!  The Command Chaplain's wife brought a basket of goodies from the Chaplain Spouses Club a couple of coffee mugs, rice cakes, chop sticks, dish soap and sponges, and an Okinawa hand towel. Even a fun little toy for Truman!!

The wife of the outgoing Chaplain brought me a little bag of Okinawa goodies, too!

Here a few pics of things that I thought you might find interesting....

a bag of rice cakes, a bottle of dish soap, a bag of little sugar packets, and a can of tea. In the front are some packs of gum, which were also in our welcome basket.

I find it kinda funny that we still get to drink California milk!! But, its not a gallon--its 3 qts! Also, its ULTRA pasteurized to have a longer shelf life. It does have just a little bit of a different taste, but not much.