Hi
We had a wonderful 13 days in Japan. This photo on the left is of Pook
and our
son Brin, at the
Growing Village Pavilion
at Expo site. The Wall Street Journal
on the 29th of March says "Growing Village is nowhere near the biggest
pavilion at Expo 2005. But it is probably the most authentic effort on
site.".
The expo people are some
of the most gracious and helpful that we have met when dealing with a
big
organization. From the people who gave us the information on how to get
to expo by
bus, to the people who made sure that we would have good memories of
expo, to the simple good-bye greeting as we left.
The
photo on the right is two of the finished pieces that appear at the
expo. We
sent 8 pieces in all, some of which is on the photo page. We went to
Japan to
see our display and to see first hand the other artists work, as we had
only
seen photos of their pieces before. John
Gathright is the major mover and shaker
for our art form. He helped make it possible for us to go to Japan.
This is the first showing
of our work and we are pleased that John and his team have put so much
work into
getting the Growing Village Pavilion up and running at Expo. They have
done an excellent
job of showcasing this art form to the world. We also got to meet
Ahron Naveh
and his wife Roni for a few hours. We wish that we could've had more
time to
talk without the kids with us. Oh well, maybe next time. We would like
to thank
Hiroko Gathright for taking us out and doing things for us. And a big
thanks to Johnny,
and Danny Gathright for playing with Brin, and keeping him out of our
hair so
that we could spent time with their parents.
The
Seto Home stay was a great experience. The photo on the left
is of Becky and
our daughter Shar at the park which was within easy walking distance to
our host
family Ninomiya. Our hostess Miho, was very helpful and seemed to enjoy
our company. We had some of the best food at their place while we were
in Japan.
Our boy Brin had started to made Japanese sounds (he is only 19.5
months old) by
the 10th day of our stay. We went to expo 4 times and spent lots of
time walking
around Seto. As the culture is so different to ours we found that we
learned all
sorts of things. Now that we are home we are seeing our culture in a
new light. Some things
we would like to build in our new home. Especially the Japanese
bathroom, which is
a room where you shower in and then bath, not a shower stall and a
bath.
The leaving the shoes at the front door is a great idea.
Home
