Little things: on the train to Kamakura, the young female conductor bows to the entire car every time she appears to check tickets.
No one talks on their cell phone in a subway car. Many check their texts, etc. But no one talks. Yes, it might be hard to hear in the car, but that's true in New York too--where I know they talk on the subway.
When we entered the toy story this morning we were greeted by four young women, two who were "greeters," another two who were slipping plastic bags over everyone's umbrellas.
It's hard to avoid "Rashomon" blogging here--more than one version of events--but...
Kamakura was splendid. The cherry trees were so pretty. Koji and Nobuko were so gracious, showing us the sites. I liked learning a little more about them, how old they were when they met, where they grew up, etc. And to see their house. It was also fun to retrace some of the steps the Millers--just Paul?, I forget--took years ago--e.g., the shrine where we "washed" money, and made a money laundering joke that I'm sure Koji and Nobuko have heard before but laughed at anyway. The "feeling" I had at the shrine was of ancientness, sanctity, simplicity. After emerging from a tunnel through a hill, we came into a kind of large "bowl" with moss-covered walls, a waterfall into a pond with large koi, and a small bridge across the pond to a tiny shrine where some believers had left raw eggs for the snake who supposedly told the "chief" almost a thousand years ago to create the shrine.
when Japanese started using cellphones, people talked on the trains with loud voice. then there were big blames evrywhere. Train conductors kept asking not to talk on the cellphone. Then,email started. Now young people don't like to talk, but love to email through cellphone. they start checking email as soon as getting on the train. Nobuko
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