Butterfly House, Nakijin Castle

As I said before, the pressure of the last year in Okinawa is starting to weigh heavy on my shoulders. I feel like EVERY weekend should be an opportunity to explore this island (that I didn't explore for the last 2 years.)And 3-day weekends are special and should be treated as such.

Martin Luther King Holiday Weekend came too fast after Christmas and New Year's Day, so we didn't have our act together enough to plan an off-island vacation.

When we were invited to participate in the annual Trim Marathon at Ocean Expo Park (90 minute drive north of our house), I suggested to Benny that we get a hotel room and explore the North part of the island (Motobu region) for the weekend.

Friday night was spent with my co-workers at an izakaya for a ShinNen-Kai (New Year Party).

Olivia was in good hands at home with the babysitter. She didn't even wake up when an earthquake shook the buildings.

After Alligator Steps on Saturday morning we packed the car with the essentials.


Checked into the hotel.


Went to the Butterfly House.





Hiked Nakijin Castle ruins right before sunset.


Didn't see a bounty of cherry blossoms, as I had hoped.

Enjoyed an Okinawa dinner at the hotel restaurant before heading to bed. Tomorrow was going to be a big day.

10, count them 10

Olivia turned 10 months old this month.

She wanted to show you here pearly whites. Her sixth tooth just popped through the gums today.

Family traditions

Christmas 2009. It's Olivia's first Christmas and a lot is at stake here.

First of all, this is the beginning of our family traditions. Last year I emailed a group of friends and asked about family traditions for Christmas. I was already thinking of our baby's first Christmas. And I'm always amazed about the rules and strict traditions of Japanese culture. Everyone does basically the same things for the same holidays. They eat the same food. They do the same activities. And Americans seem a bit more hodge-podge than that.

So back to family traditions.

First we took some of Benny's family traditions. We went to candlelight service at the chapel on Christmas Eve. We made and ate oyster stew, Benny's mom's recipe.

Then we took some of my family's traditions. Olivia used the Advent calendar I've had since I was a child (my dear friend, Irene made it for me). It was Olivia's countdown to Dec. 25 and I think she enjoyed moving the mouse to a new pocket each day. And we took a family photo on Christmas Eve.

Then I thought about this red Christmas journal that my mom had and would write down the details of every Christmas. For example, you write what the weather was like that day, what you ate, what you did and what your favorite gift was. As an adult, it's amusing to go back to read about our family Christmases (is that a word) from the past 25 years. I wonder if my mom continues to write in this journal. Or if it all filled in and forgotten?

In any case, I really want to have one to start documenting the Volkmann family Christmases, so I ordered one on Amazon. I'm hoping to have it in 10 days.

Two traditions we started doing this year, we stole from other families. Is that bad?

I believe it was Shelly who first told me about the tradition of new pajamas for everyone in the family given out in Christmas Eve. And I believe that Benny's mom has given new pajamas to the grandchildren occasionally on Dec. 24. So I LOVE this tradition. The idea of sleeping snug in new soft pajamas is better than a plate full of cookies with a glass of milk. So Olivia received red Christmas pajamas.

You can't quite see it, but there are reindeer with antlers on them. And on her chest it says "Santa's Helper." Adorable.

And finally we decided to start a 3 present limit on gifts. I first heard about this from his sister Colleen. She has a friend whose children receive only 3 gifts from Santa because the wise men brought 3 gifts to baby Jesus. Again, I LOVE this idea and couldn't wait to start it with our children.

But once shopping started in December, this self-imposed limit was much harder than I ever imagined. There was so much I wanted to buy Olivia because of course she "needed" it.

Instead I waged my options, researched Parents magazine articles and customer reviews on Amazon.com. Olivia's three gifts were: a doll (her first), a set of wooden blocks and a baby band set complete with a drum (which is lost in the mail somewhere over the Pacific Ocean and still has not arrived.)

Benny received a yellow Orion T-shirt, a Japanese stamp that has Volkmann written in Kanji and "Daddy Time" gift certificates that he can redeem for hours to play ultimate Frisbee or study for his professional engineer exam.

I received a sweatshirt (that I picked out), Ryukyu glass chopstick rests (that Benny picked out!) and a picture frame for a family picture.

When I was researching this three gift idea, I came across a mother used this idea and made special holiday gift tags to identify this gifts. So even within the 3 gifts there is a special meaning for each gift.

If I make these permanent gift tags as a Christmas craft project, would Tammy be proud of me?

But we have one tradition left undecided: When to open our gifts? My family opens them on Christmas Eve and Benny's family opens their presents on Christmas Day.

Any opinions on this one?

A gift from Aunt Colleen

The video of Olivia opening her first gift:

Good holiday spirit

On Dec. 4, I made a huge mistake. At the end of the year party (bonnekai) for Benny's office, everyone kept asking me about the plans for Olivia's first Christmas. I told them repeatedly that I wasn't in the Christmas mood, didn't plan on doing anything special and didn't even want to decorate. She is 9 months old, she'll never know the difference, I reasoned.

The mistake I made was announcing my anti-Christmas plans within ear shot of Benny.

The next morning Olivia and I came home from her Saturday morning Alligator Steps to blaring Christmas music, ornaments scattered all over the floor and Benny holding up Olivia's stocking and asking "Where does this go?"

I told myself I wasn't going to help him decorate the house. But he marched on in a happy elf way. Finally I gave in and started to hang the Chinese Christmas paper lanterns I bought at the 100 Yen store in Tokyo in November. And I pointed and told Benny where to put things he pulled out of the box. It's hard to ignore someone when they are singing, "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth" over and over again.

Benny even convinced me to buy a real tree, one of the last ones on the lot.

I had previously refused to purchased a fake tree with the reason being why should we spend money on something that we will use for 3 weeks and store for 11 months.

Come Christmas morning, it was nice to smell the tree and take Olivia's picture in front of it.


I admit it -- I was grumpy and I'm grateful that Benny forced some good holiday spirit down my throat. I needed it.

Re-enacting Ryukyu Kingdom New Year

I have list of all the places I want to see, things I want to do and food I want to eat before I leave Okinawa. Under the "To Do: Places/Events" heading, I wrote "Attend a New Year's celebration at Shuri Castle."

So Saturday we did just that.


Benny, Olivia and I have been to Shuri Castle before. We took my mom when she was here in March 2009. The castle, which was rebuilt in 1992, is the only standing castle on island and is the cultural and historical center of Okinawa. The building is a token tourist destination. Shuri Castle is even pictured on the 2,000 yen bill.


For New Years, Shuri Castle has a 3-day celebration starting at 12:01 a.m. on Jan. 1.

We attended the three-part New Year's Ceremony on Jan. 2 (mostly to avoid the large crowds of Jan. 1.) Here was the crowd we were a part of:



The first part of the ceremony is called Ninufanuunufe. According to the English information I was handed at the castle, this is a ritual to pray to the gods. In this re-enactment, the ceremony is attended by the Ryukyu (which is now known as Okinawa) king, and royal family. There are high-ranking officials, ministers and community leaders.

A prayer for peace was solely in Japanese, so we couldn't understand anything they were saying.

But Benny DID notice and comment to me many times that the king and queen walked awful slow during the procession.




The second part (Chounuunufe) is a ritual for the people to celebrate the longevity of the King and the prosperity of the Ryukyu Kingdom. In this part, the king and queen were seated on the second story of the castle looking out, so Benny wasn't bored by their slow walking.

There was this guy who I assume was someone important, reading something important in Japanese.


And finally, during the ritual of Otori, the king and royal officials drank awamori, an Okinawa liquor. In our special re-enactment, the officials also offered sips of awamori to the crowd. Benny was bummed to not be in the front row during this part.


Each section lasted 25 minutes and there was a 25 minute break between each part. Luckily it didn't rain on us, so we enjoyed the time outside, listening to the traditonal Okinawa music.


Olivia listened for a while before deciding to chew on Benny's shoelaces. Apparently these shoelaces are more interesting than the re-enactment.


She took a nap during the second part of the ceremony.


And woke up in time to go to a yummy Indian curry restaurant with us. She had peas. We stuffed ourselves in rice, spinach curry and nann. But we did let her sample the mango ice cream.

Overall, I'm super happy that I checked this event off my list. I thought it was very interesting, even though I couldn't understand any word that was said at the ceremony.

But it raised all kinds of questions in my head. Who are the people who participate in this re-enactment? Who acts as king? How long do they practice for this?

Oh, my poor co-workers on Monday. They are definitely going to be bored with all my questions about Shuri Castle's New Year's Ceremony.

Ringing in the New Year when you're a new parent

Remember how last year I was determine to go out and celebrate for New Year's Eve, since it was our last end-of-the-year celebration before we became parents.

This year I wasn't sure what to do. One of our babysitters is in the States on vacation with her parents. I didn't want to book of the other two babysitters so Benny and I could spend a night fighting traffic to both go out for dinner and to drive the babysitter home at the end of the evening.

When a co-worker asked if I wanted to attend her family New Year's Eve party (and she lives walking distance from our house), everything just fell into place. Until I got the invitation.

The party started at 8 p.m. Olivia normally goes to bed at 7 p.m. What's a new parent to do?

Our options:

1) Put Olivia to bed earlier and then pull her from her bed after a couple of hours of sleep to take her to the party. Hope for the best.

2) Keep O awake all night and leave the party around 10:30 p.m. when she has a meltdown from being overtired.

3) Get O ready for bed and tuck her in her stroller as though she is going to bed. She will fall asleep on the way there and sleep in her stroller during the entire party.

We tried option No. 3.

First we went out for dinner at 5:30 p.m. at a family restuarant on the Air Force base. Olivia loved being in the high chair pulled up to our table and watching the waitresses busily walk past our table. She enjoyed a meal of Cheerios while Benny and I had a Italian dinner for two for the combined price of $20.10 (I still can't believe how inexpensive that was.)

We got home around 7 p.m. We let Olivia play for a while (which she loved because she thought she tricked us into forgetting about her bedtime). Then we gave her a bath, put her in her pajamas, and headed to the party. She fell asleep two blocks from our house.

We wheeled her into the house and parked her in a quiet room. We thought we in the free and clear to party. Nope, at 10:30 p.m., guess who woke up confused and sleepy.

Within a few minutes, she was acting her usual friendly self, trying to grab the karaoke microphones, grabbing at the family's Christmas tree and chewing on their guaitars.

I figured we would stay until she fell asleep or had a New York-sized meltdown. Neither one happened.

Notice the red countdown clock behind me. 14 minutes until midnight.


Five minutes to midnight.


10

9

8

7

6

5


4

3

2

1

HAPPY NEW YEAR!



We left the party at 12:45 a.m. when Benny and I were exhuasted, but Olivia was still going strong.

Luckily she fell alseep on the way home and quietly stayed asleep as we transferred her to her bed. She woke up at 7:45 a.m. in time to watch Iowa State beat Minnesota during the Insight Bowl.

It was wonderful that Olivia was such a happy baby during the party. But I have a feeling that it is a hint of her life as a party animal and a night owl. Bedtime looks to be the toughest time of the day at the Volkmann household.