For all the hustle and bustle of Tokyo, about 60 miles away one can find pockets of quiet, natural serenity. My good friends the Kataokas have found a wooded haven from the busy cities in the beach-side village of Akiya. I spent my last 24 hours in Japan there. The beach of Akiya has some interesting rock formations that have been featured for hundreds of years in woodblock prints and photos. It was a beautiful place to end a very successful trip to Japan.

If you look closely, you might see the famous silhouette of Mt. Fuji. This was the first time I had seen it in 5 visits to Japan!

I am always looking for interesting plants and animals wherever I travel.

This is an intriguing little ground flower I found near Zushi.

This colorful garden spider’s body was about an inch long, so with its legs outstretched it appeared gigantic!

Japan has wonderful cuisine and there was always a delicious meal or dinner party waiting for me! Here are some of the tasty treats I had the pleasure of sampling:

Well, I did not eat this, but these are plastic representations of the meals this restaurant offers.

This is a common way to show off the menu in Japan.

This cluster of tiny mushrooms was dipped in tempura batter and deep-fried in light vegetable oils.

Oh, was it good! We were given kitchen scissors to cut it into bite-size pieces.

Every evening found us at a dinner party in “Sakura” the restaurant on the top floor of our hotel. In the front row from left to right are Valentine and Eyvonne Vox, Wendy Morgan, me, and Dale von Seggen. Behind us are Shu-san, Atsuko Yasuhara , and Manami Iimuro.

This is only part of the delicious meal set out by my friend Ike-san when I visited with her and her husband Akira Kataoka and son Megu in Akiya near Zushi.

Add Denny’s to the list of American eateries in international markets.

I had a Japanese soup and tofu salad at this seaside restaurant.

My 30th Anniversary year with Groark ended wonderfully with our third appearance at the Japanese Ventriloquist Association (JVA) convention held in Tokyo at the National Youth Olympic Memorial Center (NYC). The JVA Convention attracted almost 200 ventriloquism enthusiasts from all over Japan for 2 days of tightly packed meetings, workshops, award ceremonies and performances. Featured foreign ventriloquists were Wendy Morgan from Great Britain, Don Bryan from Canada,  and Americans Judy Buch (CT), Dale von Seggen (CO), Valentine Vox and his wife Eyvonne Carter-Vox (NV), Buddy and Dianna Big Mountain (NM), and Groark and me (CA). Ikeda Takeshi was our host.

Saturday morning I conducted a workshop on how I developed Groark and his personality over the last 30 years. It was an opportunity to look back over the years and think about what I did to make Groark the strong character that he is. More than one person was surprised that I was able to maintain a program for over 40 minutes with just one puppet character, but that is the nature of working with a puppet that I cannot put down during the show.

On Sunday morning I participated in a panel discussion on using puppets and ventriloquism with special populations such as hospitals, senior centers, prisons, etc. The panel moderator was Iimuro Manami, a former police woman and crime prevention lecturer. On the panel was Hisashi Suenaga, director of the Japanese Puppet Therapy Association, Wendy Morgan who has done extensive work in British cancer centers for children, and myself, with loads of experiences in many special situations.

On Sunday afternoon Groark and I performed at the Family Show Concert. I told the story of how I met Groark, totally in Japanese. This was the third time I had worked with this translated script. I have been practicing it for the last month. I hired Sam Koji Hale to update the jokes and coach me on pronunciation. Kathleen Yoshiko Nomura, a Japanese ventriloquist, and Kazumi Yamaguchi, an interpreter with a good sense of humor, added some material at the last minute. I used a storybook with my notes taped inside as a prop for the performance.

The show was a HIT! Everyone understood my Japanese! No small feat for a foreigner! And they laughed at all the jokes, especially the ones added by Sam, Kathleen, and Kazumi. What a great feeling! To share the magic of Groark with an audience in their own language was a thrill! I smiled the rest of the day!

Kuruma Ningyo or “cart puppetry’ is a form of puppetry that predates the more widely known Bunraku puppet tradition in Japan. The puppets themselves are very similar in construction, size, and appearance to the Bunraku puppets.  However the kuruma ningyo are manipulated by a single puppeteer seated on a small, wheeled “cart” for mobility in making the puppet move.

Koryu Nishikawa is a fifth generation member of his family to master and promote this art form. I have an earlier post about the history of the art and puppets from October 2007 when Nishikawa-san toured the USA, including Hanford, CA. He was kind enough to invite me to visit his theater and studio when I told him I was coming to Japan.

On October 9^th my plan was to make my way to Hachioji, about 35 miles west of Tokyo, and visit Nishikawa-san by myself. I just needed to get through Shinjuku Station, arguably the busiest train station in the world, with dozens of different train lines. Easy!…Yeah Right! What was I thinking?

On the morning of the 9^th I mentioned to my new friends, fellow American participants of the Japanese Ventriloquist Festival, Judy Buch and her friend Atsuko Balon, both of CT, that I was going to see a master puppeteer at his theater. They asked if they could come along and I said that I thought that that would be fine. Good thing!

Atsuko Balon

Atsuko speaks and reads Japanese. She was a godsend for the day! She was able to get us from Shinjuku to Hachioji, and back, without a hitch. She interpreted for us during our visit with Nishikawa-san. She and Judy were great traveling companions!

Koryu Nishikawa, Judy Buch, and Randel at the Hachioji Kuruma Ningyo Puppet Theater.

We had a wonderful time with Nishikawa-san. He explained the history of kuruma ningyo and his family’s involvement over the years. He showed us around his theater, his puppet costume closet, and the special room where the puppet heads are stored. He demonstrated trick/transformation puppets, how the puppets were “loaded” onto the puppeteer, he even performed a flamenco dance with a beautiful Spanish dancer puppet that he made to demonstrate the flexibility and grace of the puppetry form. What a rare and special experience!

Koryu Nishikawa shows his puppet costume closet.

Nishikawa-san demonstrates a puppet whose face can transform from tacit to surprised with the flick of a switch on the handle. The original puppet face looks like the one on the top shelf to the right that I have indicated with an arrow.

The flamenco dancer.