The break in the recent rains afforded me a chance to wander off the reservation today. Since Melba and I are going to brave the Japanese train network tomorrow for a trip to Yokota, I thought it best to venture off-base and have a look at the Yokosuka Chuo Train Station with my own eyes. It's best if surprises are left to birthdays and Christmas mornings rather than to a busy Saturday on a train platform in a foreign country.Naturally, being sans car, I walked. At my pace the station is 25-minutes away, and I've been told I walk fast. What this means is that we will be calling a taxi in the morning. I don't see us risking a walk of that length in the morning. The weather calls for more rain, and Melba and I have had enough of the Gene Kelly routine.
I believe that for the first time in my life I felt more like a traveler than a tourist as I took this walk on the busy streets and sidewalks of Yokosuka. There was no sensation of..., for lack of a better word I will just make up one, ...temporaryiness. I am here on Japanese soil for the duration of my wife's teaching contract; two years. To a little tejanito ranch kid from South Texas, away from friends and family, you can't hardly form a sentence with the words temporary and two years in it. The words will get caught in your throat long before they are formed by the mouth. Yet, here we are; temporarily away from home for two years.
Seven blocks south of the base gate, down Blue street, one comes to the Chuo Station. It's a busy place, as you can imagine. A bank of automated ticket machines line the wall outside. Everything on the ticket machine screens is in Japanese, but at the touch of a button from a knowing hand, the screen switches to instructions in English. God, don't you just love technology? Satisfied that there was nothing to fear at the station, except the fear of getting on the wrong train headed in the wrong direction, I headed back to the base at a more leisurely pace. I did not see one western-looking face the entire route. My mug stood out among the throng of Japanese citizenry like a pinto bean in a sea of rice.---
Almost on every block of the length of Blue Street that I walked I came across vendors hawking these colorful cell phones. From a distance the displays resembled racks of chewing gum for sale. They were everywhere.---
Melba earned both a compliment and her driver's license this morning. At the conclusion of the driving portion of her test, the instructor looked over to her and said, "You are a good driver." When I tested he didn't tell me that, but then, he only discovered what I already knew.
