Yokohama Navy Exchange was where?

Here's to Eric, wishing you a quick recovery from your cataract operation. I did wander around your Sannotani neighborhood after taking photos there without knowing a very interesting fact that I discovered only yesterday.
The most powerful man in Yokohama lives behind your Sannotani house. His name is Yukio Fujiki and he is called the "Don of Yokohama." A few months ago he maneuvered to stop the building of a casino near Yamashita Park, thwarted Prime Minister Suga's candidate for mayor of Yokohama and succeeded in getting his choice elected mayor. He is boss of Yokohama harbor, the baseball team and a whole lot of other enterprises. He even threatened to commit seppuku if a casino opened near the port. The prime minister had to resign after his candidate lost. So a whole lot of high rollers from China and Vegas pulled out of the venture. Now, among the citizens of this city, he has become a highly visible hero. Not bad for a guy who is 91.

Hello Honmokujin -

It sounds like you are having a good and interesting time in Yokohama....

Another coincidence: I ran into an interview that your daughter did regarding her most recent book...it is on YouTube. The woman who did the interview is also a writer....and her mother is a good friend of mine who lives in my building here......I don't think there are 7 degrees of separation between people...it is probably more like just 2 or 3.....


Hello Eric.......I hope you do well with your surgery. The tricky part is just remembering to take all those meds, in the proper order, etc. And also protecting the eye while it fully heals......

All the best -

Steffi

Well, I seem to discover something new every single day here in Yokohama. Today, I met up with Makiko Saigo, who ran one of Yokohama's most celebrated restaurants: Rinkaen, a Michelin one-star kaiseki formal dining place next to Sankeien. After a tour of the impeccably manicured garden, glistening greenery and azeleas abloom, she led me deep over a pond across a bridge to a restaurant/cafe that I had never visited. It is called Taishunkan and they serve Sankei-soba, oden, an-mitsu, bento boxes and other delights. Unlike her Rinkaen, that closed permanently last year, this Taishunkan is very inexpensive, with a view of the garden that rivals some of the finest in Kyoto. Makiko-san is a friend from my childhood days in Honmoku. Her younger brother, Takehiko-san runs this restaurant. The place is open only when the garden is open.

Steffi:
I had not seen the Youtube interview you mentioned. Thank you. It is amazing about degrees of separation.
Here are a few that I have encountered during this trip: At a luncheon in Chinatown with a bunch of St. Joseph College schoolmates, there was a woman who attended YoHi and the topic of conversation was: Who was the most famous graduate of Nile C Kinnick H.S.? I said the star of Star Wars, Pete Hamill. She mentioned another name, which I promptly forgot.
Over at Lucky's Place, a bar behind the Hotel New Grand, someone mentioned the Rickshaw Room. But sitting next to me was the legendary blues guitarist, Eddie Ban, who played for the Golden Cups. (There is/was a live mysic venue called the Golden Cups in Kominato, right near Areas One and Two and the Navy Exchange.) He told me of his trips to the Deep South where he visited some real dives where blues guitarists played. His hero is B.B. King. If you visit Yokohama, you have to drop by Lucky's Place. Lucky from Sri Lanka speaks English and Japanese fluently.

All turned out well this morning. Wife had the surgery and is thinking she may have the other eye done in a few weeks.

We planted our veggies in our raised beds last week. Frost worries are done here at Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri.

Son Jeremy is due back today from his two week adventure. He and some college chums visited the Seychelles, a British protectorate off the east coast of Africa.

Got a couple of facts wrong:
The star of Star Wars who graduated from YoHi is Mark Hamill. (Pete was a famous NYC journalist).
Eric's wife got cataract surgery.

Here is another news about the Navy Exchange neighborhood: The corner flower shop that sold Christmas trees is still there on HonmokuDori (Avenue D) and the other main road to Yamashita Park and Harbor. The noodle shop Tamaya, in front of Honmoku Sankeien stop, is still operating. I hear they serve the freshest fried fish (tempura) in the area at a bargain price.

Most folks in Japan have guessed he's skoshie baka...

If they tell him he is in Baltimore, he might not know the difference.

Having recently spent a month mostly in Yokohama, I can tell you now is the time to visit. Why? Because the value of the dollar hasn't been this high in decades. You get almost 130 yen to the dollar. Hotels have special bargain prices, and restaurants that seemed to charge a lot now seem quite reasonable.
Check out Japan Guide for places to visit. Far safer to be in a crowd in Tokyo than in New York: everyone is masked, indoors and outdoors. But I avoided crowded restaurants for obvious reasons.

Honmokujin....

There are major restrictions right now on who can enter Japan (just citizens, students, small accompanied groups, certain other categories) which is why you are seeing such bargain prices, I assume.

Enjoy and have a good time!!

There was an article recently in the New York Times about Covid deaths around the world and Australia and Japan were at the bottom, meaning safest places to visit. On another realm of safety, I saw little kids going to school on their own in trains and streets, just as I did when I was in grade school taking the streetcar from Honmoku to Chiozakicho and up to St. Joseph.
But upon returning to Maryland, there were the usual news of killings on a daily basis in East D.C., then the Buffalo mass shooting and then, what hit the hardest, that brought tears, was the killing of 19 little kids in Texas. Now my daughter wants to move her family to Tokyo. Don't blame her for feeling that way. It's a gut wrenching time we're living through. Those hazy memories of Yokohama in our youth seem close to heavenly.

As a child in Yokohama, and even in Karuizawa when I was even younger, 4 1/2 to 7 years old, I remember playing outside, or in friends' houses, with other equally young kids, mostly Japanese, with no need for adult supervision. Adults were busy doing adult things. In my recollection, no one ever harmed a child, ever. It was totally unheard of that children or their parents needed to be afraid. I remember going everywhere, by myself, totally without any problems whatsoever. That was totally normal at the time.

I don't blame your daughter for wanting to return to Japan. The unspeakable trauma in Texas is mind-boggling, but totally unsurprising as government is helpless to put a few sensible laws in place. Children are sacrificed so corrupt politicians can remain in power. Guns are more important, apparently, than keeping children safe. There may be no solutions. We will see if this country is able to stay in one piece. It is heartbreaking.

As for covid, folks are "tired" and want to "get back to normal". Wouldn't we all? But we in the US now again have over 100,000 new documented cases a day. That doesn't take into account the folks who test positive using self-administered tests privately at home. We have lost over 1 million Americans, and counting. Masks are only sporadically worn, though required in some settings.

A friend of mine took me to Benny's Place, a sports bar near the entrance to Motomachi Shopping Center. It's on the 2nd floor of a small building near the bus stop and only a couple of blocks from Ishikawa-cho JR station. Anyway, Benny is from East St. Louis about which he told me, " Don't even stop at a red light if you're driving through and value your life," or something to that effect.
As a young sailor, he was stationed in Yokohama, got married to a Japanese, and lived in Negishi Heights. Their daughter Shelley, attended Byrd Elementary, then attended Japanese public schools. Shelley became a fashion model and later a famous TV hostess and personality.
Anyway, if you are a St. Louis Cardinals fan or a Yokohama Bay Stars fan, Benny's Place is where you should go to eat American-style food. And talk about baseball and St. Louis.

Way back in the mid 1950s, the St. Louis Cardinals arrived in Japan to play a series of demonstration games against Japanese baseball teams. My Cub Scout troop took in one of the games.

A Japanese batter hit a couple of foul balls in our direction and I was able to scoop one up.

A bit later, another foul came our way and that set off a series of chants from the Scouts, "Stan the Man, Stan the Man..." which brought Stan Musial himself over to our group, all of us wearing blue Scout shirts with yellow neckerchiefs...
I wasn't sure who Stan Musial was but he came over and signed the baseball I had recovered. It was a treasure I brought home to the States and treasured for many years.

Three-time MVP Hall-of-Famer Stan Musial in Japan and you got your ball autographed. How lucky is that. Worth about $150 probably because he signed so many baseballs until he died in his nineties. But if he added "Yokohama" and the date, it would be worth a thousand or more. If you got Albert Pujols to sign that same ball, who knows: The value would soar.
I remember going to Yokohama Stadium when it was still U.S. occupied. There was a bazaar and one game I played was tossing a ten-yen coin onto rows of Lucky Strikes. If it landed inside the circle, you won a pack of cigarettes. A soldier gave me one although I was just a kid.

I think you mean Yokosuka, not Yokohama? I'm not that familiar with Yokosuka, but I am with Yokota AFB because my father used to be stationed there, and I grew up around that area.

Hello everyone,

Former PM Shinzo Abe was shot with handmade shotgun on July 8 during Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic party election speech for a member of the house of councilors.

He suffered heavy heart damage by the second shot. His total term is 3288 days, which is the most long in Japan's PM.

The criminal belonged to the former ��aritime self defense force. His mother was a believer in a new religion in a neighboring country of Japan, and she donated a lot of money to her cult. The criminal was very indignant religion and triggered to Abe.

I don't know if it's complete information yet, but Abe's father and grandfather seemed to have connection with the religion's affiliated organization, the criminal is hated Shinzo strongly.

And while he was inaugurated as PM there may had been intermediary of the sale of the school lands.

But I am convinced that assassination should never be forgiven for any reason.

Condolences have arrived from more than 260 leaders around the world and Pope.

Thank you,

The Chinese government should shut up...

Hello Eric san,

Thank you for your reaction. Abe-san get Japan's highwat class medal and junior first court rank.
In any case, his achievement was great.

https://www8.cao.go.jp/shokun/shurui-juyotaisho-kunsho/kikkasho.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Japanese_court_ranks,_positions_...

It's a misspelling. Japan's "highest class" medal is correct.
My eyesight has deteriorated. I have presbyopia.