Slides, Sea, Sun and Surf

Slides on Steroids!

We have already noticed that Japanese parks are much like parks in the United States used to be before safety standards or civil lawsuits were invented. This rollerside provided Denver and McCall with lots sliding enjoyment, warm rear-ends and extreme wedgies.

Dinner at the Kadena Marina Seaside Inn Restaurant.

Jason and Holly enjoyed the seafood and the begging garbage fish below the deck enjoyed Denver and McCall’s kids meals.

Swings with a View!

Who’s that handsome stud on the middle swing?

I Like Rice!

Coming Soon to a McDonalds in the U.S – the MEGA-MAC!!!

Like the Japanese have done with many commodities originally developed in the U.S., they again taken an invention from the U.S. and vastly improved upon it. I don’t know what we are going to do if they ever find out about the bean burritos from Beto’s.

Pleasing the Great Okinawan Pineapple Warriors!

We are standing on what the Okinawan’s refer to ask the great pineapple altar. In olden times, newcomers to the island were required to come to this altar and plead for the approval of the two great pineapple warriors of Okinawa (piney-san on the left, and apple-san on the right). If the pineapple warriors did not approve of the newcomers, they would take the youngest child in the family into servitude for a life of slavery in the Pineapple Fields. Unfortunately, our pleading must have been acceptable because they didn’t take McCall away. A fun family Jason met through work took us to the pineapple factory up north. The tour was good, but the gift shop was awesome!! Unlimited sampling of about 100 different treats made with pineapple ie; drinks, cakes, chocolate, pastries, gummies, jellies, etc…. and then when you think it couldn’t get any better, you enter another room where workers spend all day cutting up different kinds of pineapple and piling it on platters for you to sample to your hearts content.

Habusaki!

From the very informative Okinawa yellow pages: “Habu is an indigenous venomous snake on Okinawa. They are known as one of the most deadly snakes in the world. Habu has a triangular head, white belly and thick, firm tail with the normal length of 2 yards. They are nocturnal reptiles that are active from April to November. They inhabit damp, secluded places such as sugar cane fields, bushy tombs, road sides, between stone walls, and in caves. Every year approximately 250 people become the victims of habu attacks. The major symptoms are paralyzing pains, swellings that are caused by internal hemorrhage.” I need to tell the yellow page company that people from the U.S. prefer pictures of lawyers in the yellow pages rather than valuable information.

Anyways, I digressed a little bit. In order to curtail the increasing size of the Okinawa habu population, the locals decided a few hundred years ago to satisfy two basic human needs (i.e., the need not be bitten by a venomous snake and the need to feel manly) with one solution. The result was habusaki. Saki is Japanese rice beer and from the picture you can probably guess where the first part of the word comes from. Lucky for me, I don’t drink and I will therefore not be tempted to prove my manlihood by downing a bottle of this stuff.

A Saturday Wouldn’t Be Complete without a Beach Visit!

For the third Saturday in a row we spent some time at the beach. I don’t know how long we can keep up this grueling trend. We spent Saturday afternoon and evening at the Okuma Beach Festival. Okuma is a military recreation facility on the north part of the island.