Drag Racing, Driving through Fukushima, Meeting the Govenor of Fukushima, And Charity Pub Quiz in Koriyama!

6/11/2017

The next morning the three of us woke up, got ready and started out to our first destination, the Fukushima Drift Racing Track.

Cormac had gotten a hold of three tickets for the drift racing while his friend was here, and since I had never seen any racing of any kind, I was interested to try it out. Because Fukushima has quite a large drifting racetrack, it is fairly common to talk to people who either participate in drift racing or watch it for fun.

We arrived around noon and took some time walking around the cars and looking at their interiors (colorful and minimal to save on weight,) the engine and hood/trunk (usually had slatted holes running along the hood and trunk to help with airflow and keeping the engine cool,) and the exhaust (usually had exhaust pipes coming out of the engine, through the interior of the car and exiting out a funnel attached to the side windows.) A lot of them were really pretty colors and they were covered with sponsor stickers.

When we were done looking at all the cars we still had some time left before the races started so we stopped at the little restaurant next to the track and got something to eat. I got some soba noodles that were served cold with a broth that was separate from the noodles. You were supposed to dip the noodles into the broth one bite at a time and then eat it. The broth was really good, and the temperature was great for the hot day, but it’s not my favorite because the texture of the cold noodles is not great.

When the races started it was exciting. I did a quick search on the rules for the drift racing we were seeing. What they were showing that day was called “tandem drifting” where you have two cars; a leader and a follower. The leader is trying to execute the perfect drift and not crash with the following car. The following car is trying to mess up the leading car without crashing into it while also trying to execute the perfect drift. If a crash does happen it is the follower’s fault. The rules seem simple, but I don’t quite get how you would ever, ever run as the follower. Because the leader has only one goal, to execute the perfect drift and does not need to worry about losing the match, because if a crash happens it is the follower’s fault. Whereas the follower must not only try to achieve more, but could be sabotaged by the leader if the leader tried to crash to make the follower lose. It seems so one-sided that I wonder how it is a fair sport, so I must be missing something.

We watched the races for an hour/hour and a half or so and then decided to head out.

Look at the size of that camera!

I had gotten tickets for a traditional music festival in Minamisoma, so we got in the car and started driving towards my town. Shane was curious about the exclusion zone, so I told him that Namie had recently opened up and that we could drive through that town on our way to the music festival. Because of this I took a different way home than I normally do.

We were driving through the Fukushima countryside intending to drive through the mountains and pop out in Namie and then drive north to Minamisoma. But halfway along this mountain road we ran into a roadblock. This was when I realized that while the center of town, where most of the people lived had been opened back up for habitation, the more remote parts of the town limits were still cordoned off. As I approached the roadblock and realized what was happening, the man in charge of guarding the roadblock held out his flashing light-stick and just shook his head at me. He didn’t say anything, just stood there shaking his head at me. I pulled over to the side of the road did a 3-point turn and started driving back the way we had come. We had gone quite far down this road, so I was quite sad to have lost a total of about 40+ minutes of our day driving that way. But oh well. We drove through Itate town and saw the beautiful scenery of that area. I hadn’t seen it before, so I thought it was nice. Sadly we didn’t have enough time that day to show Shane Namie.

When we got to my house and I picked up the music festival tickets, I realized that I had mis-remembered the start time of the festival and it was long over.

We were running out of daylight, however, so I took Cormac and Shane to go see the 1000 year old stone reliefs of Kannon and the Buddhas to the south in Odaka. These would be the same relief statues that scare me, so I was excited to go see them when I was not by myself.

By the time we got to the relief statues, the sun had set and the sky was growing dark. But Shane was impressed with the reliefs. I think he enjoyed seeing them a lot. That trip was also good for me too, because that time I didn’t feel as much fear as I usually do when I see those relief statues, and the darkness outside greatly lessened the glare that shone on the windows in front of the Buddhas, so I didn’t have to get so close to the glass to peer through. All-in-all it was a good trip.

When Shane had his fill of the stone Buddhas and Kannon we went to Minamisoma Beach. This was more for Shane. He had just been in San Francisco a few days before, so we thought it would be cool to visit the Pacific Ocean from the other side. It was super dark and we could barely see anything. But it was fun.

When we were done looking out at the black ocean we stopped at a family-style restaurant in Minamisoma (Coco’s Family Kitchen) and socialized while eating delicious food.

After that I drove Shane and Cormac back to Fukushima City. Sadly in our misadventures and loss of time we had missed the last bus that could take them back to Fukushima City. This ended up being fine because I was still sick. I decided that it would be ok because I would go to the hospital right next to Cormac’s apartment and get some medicine to help me. So the next day I went and got myself some medicine and called in sick to work. I spent the next 4 days in bed. My illness kept getting worse and worse.

That Friday (06/16/20179 I was able to rally enough to go to a Leaver’s Conference where they gave out information about what we needed to do in order to leave Japan. It was a good meeting and it had a lot of valuable information that I needed to know, so I made myself get out of bed and attend.

The conference was in Fukushima City and it had the governor of Fukushima there to award us with “Ambassador to Fukushima” awards and listen to our thoughts about Fukushima.

While we were giving our speeches he listened quietly and thanked each of us for our service and dedication to helping Japan. There were a few television crews there with cameras who were filming us, and we were going to be on television the next day. I was towards the back of the room, so I was one of the last people to give my speech. As a result I listened to what everyone else was saying, and I started to feel super emotional. I started crying and struggled to keep it together.  As a way to combat this I tried focusing on what I was going to say in Japanese. This distracted me enough that I was able to stop crying.

My turn came and I started my speech in Japanese, and about halfway through I forgot some things and had to switch to English (this was ok because there were translators there who were helping if we needed it. Switching to English meant that I didn’t have to concentrate as hard and I started crying. Instantly all the television cameras all turned to me and filmed me crying and trying to finish my speech. I was a hot mess and I was the catalyst for others who were keeping  it together to start crying too. I know I made it on television the next day. I was unable to watch it, but I know I made it with my ugly, crying face.

After the conference was over, we rode our shuttle bus back to Minamisoma, where I started getting ready for the next day, where I had a whole day planned to spend in Koriyama.

6/17/17

The next day I woke up early so I could drive to Fukushima City to show my car to a woman who was interested in buying it from me. After letting her test drive it for a while and telling her all about it, she decided she did want to buy it. What a relief! I am so grateful, it is such a load off my mind.

This weekend Cormac had gone back to Ireland to participate in his Ph.D Graduation Ceremony, so he was absent from all the fun times.

After organizing things we needed to do to get the car sold and transferred into her name, I went to Koriyama to meet with a group of people there. We were doing a blood drive. I had signed up to do the blood drive a couple weeks prior. I have never donated blood before, and I don’t know my blood type, so I thought this would be an excellent opportunity to find out and do a good thing.

Because I was sick the previous week, there was a question as to whether they would let me donate at all, but I had to try. They asked me when the last time I had taken cold medication was (the day before) they double checked to make sure it was all safe, and then they have me the ok to donate. I was so happy! I found out that my blood type is B+.

Because I am a small person they only allowed me to donate 200ml of blood instead of the normal amount of 400ml. But that was ok, I still felt good to do my part.

When you donate blood the center gives you a bag of goodies including a box of tissues with the blood drive mascots of Tohoku, a hand towel with the mascots, and a pin that has hello kitty on it with your blood type, so mine had a large “B” on it.

I met a girl in the waiting room of the blood drive. We got to talking for a while and got to know each other. She was a high school student in Koriyama. We took a picture together. She LOVES snap chat filters!

After our group was done with donating blood we split up for a while, I went and got something to eat, a sashimi rice bowl with salmon roe. It was delicious! We then regrouped at a Charity Pub Quiz.

People brought things they wanted to get rid of and sell, but instead of taking the money yourself, you donated it to a charity to help out Kumamoto from their big earthquake last year.

I brought some things I was planning on selling, and things I needed gone from my apartment. Many other people brought clothes and books they were looking to get rid of. I had no intention of buying anything else, because I already have so much to get rid of, but I did find a rabbit fur coat someone was selling and I couldn’t help myself.

You can see me in the corner of the table on the left.

We formed groups and started the quiz portion of the charity gala. There were rounds that involved geography, entertainment, movie themes, numbers, general trivia, and colors. It was all quite fascinating. I was in a group with my friends Christina and Shaggy (John) and one of their friends who I had never met before. We all had such a different area of knowledge, that we fit well together and did a good job. It was so much fun! Christina knew that the character of Tarzan in the book also went by the name Lord Greystoke. Shaggy knew all the colors of the Olympic rings and knew that the black one represented Africa (colors category.) I knew that the scientific community removed Pluto from planet status in the year 2006. We all helped with entertainment and movie themes. At one point we were asked how many of Snow White’s dwarves’ names ended with a “y” and what were they? We could not remember Sneezy, but all brainstormed and were able to recall at the last minute. These were the most memorable moments, although there were many more, fun questions.  We did so well, although we all thought we were doing poorly. But it didn’t matter, because we were all having so much fun!

"Big Mike" is in the blue with his back to the camera.

At the end of the night when all the scores were totaled, we found out that our group placed second out of everyone! As a result each of us got a tote bag with Aizu’s Akabeko-chan on it in the place of the heart in “I (heart/Akabeko) Fukushima!” We also got a bag of snacks. It was so much fun! I had been wanting one of those tote bags ever since I saw one last year!

This is the Akabeko-Chan mascot of the Aizu region of Fukushima. If you put this in the heart's place in "I [heart] Fukushima." you can imagine what it looks like.

We said goodbye and I gave my friends Mercedez and Katie a ride back to Fukushima City. Katie was nice enough to let me stay with her that night. She also agreed to join me on my adventures the next day when I invited her along.

We talked for a while when I dropped Mercedez off, but when the end of the night came, I crashed hard. I needed to get enough sleep to make it through the next day.