Okinawa!

Chuseok (Korean Thanksgiving) was last week, so Tim and I took a trip to Okinawa, Japan!  Okinawa is not part of the main land of Japan; it's further south and somewhat close to Taiwan.  We chose Okinawa because of its proximity to Korea, the subtropical climate, the UNESCO castle ruins, and the beaches.  We were not disappointed!  We had an amazing time and found the perfect balance between history and beaches!

Day 1

We arrived in Okinawa in the afternoon and checked in at our hostel.  We decided to stay in a hostel because it's MUCH cheaper than staying in a hotel or resort.  Plus, we figured we wouldn't be spending much time there anyway because we wanted to see Okinawa!  It was definitely not luxurious, but we had the basics: a private bedroom and bathroom, and it was in a good location.  We even met a new friend: a lizard!  (I freaked out!)

After we dropped our bags off and changed, we went and explored our little area on the free bikes from our hostel.  We found Kokusai Street, which is a tourist street with lots of souvenir shops and restaurants.  It was a pretty fun place.

Day 2

We quickly found that Okinawa is not like Korea in the area of public transportation.  It is definitely necessary to have a car in Okinawa!  So we found a rental car place and rented a car for a few days.  And of course, the Japanese drive on the left side of the road, so we had to get accustomed to that!  It was SO scary!  I didn't drive at all, but just being a passenger was stressful.  I was proud of Tim for getting the hang of it so quickly.  But we kept saying, "Left turns are easy, right turns are dangerous."  It was a crazy experience!

The first place that we drove to was Okinawa World.  It's a tourist area with lots of Okinawan things to experience, and also the longest limestone cave in Asia.  We spent the whole day there!  It was a blast!

The cave that went on forever

A BAT!

Pineapple field!

Doctor Fish!  Little fish eating the dead skin off of our feet!

At first I couldn't do it because I was so ticklish and weireded out.  But then I got used to it and loved it!

Tim blowing glass.

Me with my finished glass-blowing project.

Painting Bin-gata (Japanese cloth)

That night, we visited Shuri Castle, which was the central structure of the Ryukyu Kingdom for about 500 years.  It had been destroyed in war, but was restored so that people could walk through and see what life would have been like there.  It was gorgeous!  Out of respect and cleanliness, we had to walk barefoot through the whole interior of the castle.  I think it was even better that we visited at night because the moon and darkness gave it an eerie feeling.

The Shuri Castle

Us in front of the castle

The throne room inside the castle

One of the gates of the castle.  So old and erie and gorgeous!!!

Day 3

We always think it's important to know the history of a place that we are visiting, so on Thursday morning, we visited the Peace Memorial Museum.  First, we walked through an art museum, saw a giant Buddha statue, and then visited a beautiful butterfly garden.

A cocoon!  I had never seen a real one before!  It was so shiny!

Although the camera couldn't capture it, there were dozens of butterflies flying around behind us!

Next, we went into the museum that commemorated the Battle of Okinawa, which I had previously known almost nothing about.  It was very emotional!  This battle happened during World War II, and was horrific for the Okinawans.  America was bombing Okinawa because there were many Japanese bases there, and the Japanese were brutal to the Okinawans because they didn't trust them.  The Japanese thought that the Okinawans might be spies, so they treated them very inhumanely.  There was no relief for the Okinawans: they weren't on the American side or the Japanese side!  Caught in the middle, they suffered tremendously.  We read personal accounts and stories of people who had survived this battle, and it was awful.  Thankfully, peace was restored in the end, but the Battle of Okinawa is a very real and dark part of their history.  It was good for us to visit this museum so that we could understand Okinawa's history, and realize that it's more than just a fun vacation spot.

After we visited the museum, we drove up north to visit my friend Crystalin from high school!  Her husband, Andy is in the Marines, so they have lived in Okinawa for a year and a half.  I had started corresponding with her a few weeks before our trip, and she gave us amazing some suggestions and advice for what to do in Okinawa.  She also offered to show us around and take us to their favorite restaurant!  It was so much fun to spend the day with them and their adorable kids!
                                                                                 
             First we went to Cape Manza to see the beautiful views!

Crystalin's daughter and my buddy for the day!

Then we went to the Zakimi Castle ruins!  The old stone walls were beautiful, and I could just imagine what they once were.  I love old walls and things, so I was in heaven here.  Plus, we basically had the place to ourselves, with very few people around.  That is unheard of in Korea!  The whole site was just breath-taking.

After this, we went to Arin Krin (The Garlic House) for dinner.  The Japanese love to cook with garlic, so it is a whole menu with all types of garlic foods.  It was delicious!  Tim and I got garlic pizza, garlic chicken, and deep friend garlic potatoes.  YUM!  After dinner, we went to Yogurt Land, a self serve ice cream shop with many different flavors and toppings to choose from.  The shop was at a place called the American Village that has an iconic ferris wheel and lots of American-inspired things.  We had so much fun talking and hanging out with their family!  We are so thankful that they were willing to show us around and spend time with us!

Day 4

Friday was our beach day!  We drove up to the Moon Beach resort to catch some rays and play in the ocean.  We loved relaxing and laying out for a bit!  For dinner, we went to Arin Krin again since it was on our way home, and because we loved it so much!  :)

Day 5

Saturday (our last full day) was our island day!  We took the ferry to Tokashiki Island, which was absolutely incredible!  But before I regale you with stories of this beautiful place, I need to tell you what happened leading up to this day.  Bear with me...  As I said before, we had to rent a car while we were in Okinawa so that we could get around.  Since Saturday was our last full day, our plan was to turn the rental car back in and then walk down to the ferry at the port which was just minutes away.  Another detail that is important to this story is that Japan is EXPENSIVE and the exchange rate from Korean won to Japanese yen was just AWFUL.  So, needless to say, we were being really careful with our money.  We had rationed out our last bit of cash so that we would have just enough for our last day.  So all that being said, we went to get our car out of the paid parking lot we had parked in, and Tim said, "Can you give me the parking ticket?"  I DIDN'T HAVE IT!  Tim didn't have it either!  We spent the next 30 minutes tearing apart the car and our room.  It was nowhere.  This was a bad situation for a few reasons:

1. We were stuck in the parking lot with no way to get out without a ticket.
2.  If we ever were able to get out without a ticket, we'd have to pay the maximum price (and we didn't have enough money left for that).
3.  We were stuck in the parking lot, so we'd have to pay for another day of the rental car.
4.  No one around spoke enough English to understand this crazy predicament we were in and help us.

All of this was completely sabatoging our island day and our money supply!  We were devastated.  We decided to look in the room one last time.  I had a bad feeling that maybe I had thrown away the parking ticket, but quickly dismissed the idea, as I thought I was more observant and responsible than that.  But I decided to check the trash anyway.  The night before, I had gone through all of our receipts and papers that needed to be thrown away and ripped them up.  I always rip receipts and things that have personal information on them.  Identity theft fear, I guess, but now it's just a habit.  So back at the room, I took all of these ripped up papers out of the trash to see if it might possibly be there.  I didn't find it among the shards of paper, but Tim did.  I had ripped the parking ticket into 4 pieces!  Again, I was devastated.  We found some tape and taped it back together, careful not to put tape on the black magnetic side.  It looked really bad because the pieces weren't matched up perfectly, but it was all we could do.  We went back to the parking lot and PRAYED.  We knew that in any normal circumstance, the machine would not accept a ripped up and taped together card, but we needed it to.  We knew that the only way it would work is if God had His hand in the situation.  So we prayed.  By this time, the car was a wreck, with our things strewn everywhere, I was crying, and we needed a miracle.  Tim put the card in the machine, and it was accepted!  I started crying some more, out of relief, and we got the heck out of there.  We were so thankful for God's protection over us!!

All of this stress and drama made our day at Tokashiki Island even sweeter.  We took the 35 minute ferry ride (which was seriously more like a roller coaster ride... scary!) and arrived at this serene and gorgeous place.  The sand at the beach was pure white, and the water was a mix of deep blue and bright turquoise.  The mountains provided a beautiful backdrop for the beach.  It was so beautiful!  We had previously decided that we wanted to go snorkeling, so we didn't waste any time!  We snorkeled for hours!  The colors of the coral and exotic fish were incredible.  We even made up signals so that we could talk while underwater and not have to come up.  Tim thought the signals I made up were funny, but they worked! :)  Snorkeling is now our new favorite sport.  We are hooked!

After we got back from the island, we went to Sam's, a Japanese restaurant where they cook right in front of you.  It was awesome and delicious, and a good way to end our trip!

Overall, our trip to Okinawa was amazing!  Despite some moments of stress that inevitably come when traveling in another country, we had so much fun discovering the history and seeing the beautiful beaches.  WE LOVE OKINAWA!