Shuri Castle and International Street

I had last Monday off in observance of Columbus day, weird to celebrate Columbus day in Japan! My students had no idea who Columbus was, so I gave a brief explanation, hoping they would remember why they were getting the day off of school. Rachel and I took advantage of our free day by heading down south to Naha, the capital of Okinawa.

Our first stop was Shuri Castle. According to my travel book, Shuri Castle is the #1 must see historical spot on the island. We followed the directions from my travel book and forgot our map at home. Luckily, we had an easy time finding the castle.

A little history, Shuri castle was the palace of the Ryūkyū Kingdom. In 1945, during the Battle of Okinawa, it was almost completely destroyed. In 1992, it was reconstructed on the original site. Shuri flourished as the capital, and continued to do so during the second Sho dynasty. For 450 years from the beginning of the 15th century, it was the royal court and administrative center of the Ryūkyūan Kingdom. It was the focal point of foreign trade, as well as the political, economical and cultural heart of the Ryūkyū Kingdom.

Rachel and I at the entrance of Shuri Castle

Pathway along the perimeter of the castle

Stairway leading up to the castle grounds

View of Naha from the top of the castle

One last picture before entering the castle (which is still being reconstructed).

Authentic Japanese performance by geisha's.

We had to walk barefoot inside the castle. We were given plastic bags to put our shoes in.

A Tatami mat, as shown here, is traditional Japanese flooring. Tatami mats have a uniform size and shape. Houses and restaurants have tatami rooms in which you eat on the floor. A room with 6 tatami mats would be called a "6 tatami room."

Exiting the castle. The castle was smaller than expected, we were only there an hour. It was a great piece of history to learn about.

After Shuri castle, we attempted to go to International Street, a famous street in downtown Naha that has a variety of shops and restaurants. A worker at Shuri castle was nice enough to give us a map and directions to International Street. We ended up at grocery store where a worker tried to give us directions but didn't speak English. The worker ran to a small restaurant in the same parking lot and got a chef in the restaurant who spoke English, to give us directions. We were happily surprised at the kindness of the workers and laughed about how people in L.A. would not go out of their way like this to help others. The chef told us we could leave our car in the parking lot and walk to International street which was about 10 minutes away. So, we did just that. We were surprised to see that International Street looked VERY similar to downtown L.A., minus the bums. The shops actually sell a lot of items that I've seen in the stores in L.A., now I know where they came from!

International Street

My tour book said that one of the best places to eat at on the island is this Sam's restaurant. So, we stopped to eat here and were VERY impressed by the fresh, delicious seafood and steak!

Our chef, cooked our food on the grill in front of us and even enjoyed posing for the camera =)

I ordered scallops and shrimp, Rachel had a steak. Our meal included veggies and pineapple bread and butter! It was different but delicious!

We ordered speciality drinks so we could get the souvenir cup!

After eating we browsed a little more before heading home. Neither of us bought anything, it was fun to look at but nothing worth buying.

We stopped at A&W on the way home and had root beer floats. I had a root beer float at A&W on base and it was normal....the ones off base are not normal. They put cubes of ice in the float, it doesn't sound like a big deal but it just ruins it!

We didn't end up going to the salsa club last weekend because Rachel was sick. She started getting a bad cold and stayed home all week to rest. She tried buying cough drops at the store but couldn't read the labels because they were all in Japanese. She ended up buying candy that looked like cough drops and used those ever time she coughed! Luckily, she is better now, even without taking real cough drops! =)

I finally got a few mattress for my bed here! Jessica's friend was a nanny for a military family here and the family has been really nice to us. They told me they had an extra mattress that is a brand new, American mattress. I took them up on the offer, borrowed the school van and picked up the mattress. I took off my mattress pad because I realized that was also hurting my back. I am sleeping much better now and my back is no longer hurting, thank goodness!

More postings and updates to come within the next few days. I'm so glad I'm able to use Rachel's computer until my new one arrives in the mail!

Love to you all!!!

Kristen