Tuesday

Today we again hit the road pretty early and just as well as the heat was already stifling. Our first point of call was The World heritage Site -Sefa-utaki. This site was many hundreds of years old and again you had to make a steep climb. There are only remnants left of buildings long gone, but it is amazing how the Japanese look after their history. Next we drove to Okinawa world where we watched a snake show and then we moved to an outside theatre where we were again given an outstanding performance by singers muscians and various sizes of Taiko drums including a large one which was on a stand, the sound was absolutely magnificent and the acrobatic performance of the taiko players was unbelievable. From there we drove to the Okinawa Peace Hall. The buildings on this site were incredible. Inside the main hall were many paintings where the artist bought peace through his art work. The Okinawa Peace Hall stands on the opposite side of the 'Cornerstone of peace which was erected to commemorate the war dead of the 50th anniversary of the end of the battle of Okinawa. The names of all the war dead, regardless of nationality, soldiers or civilians are there. From there we travelled on to the Himeguri Peace Museum. This museum consists of 6 chambers. The first chamber shows the youth of Himegui. The second chamber depicts the Himeyuri students at the front.
The third chamber depicts when the deactivation order was given and people roaming towards certain death. The fourth chamber is the Requeam - this room is dedicated to the teachers and students who died in the war. The 200 portraits on the wall memorialize their lives and existence. Visitors are able to read the survivors accounts and to take a look at the full scale, reconstructed model of a makeship clinic inside a cave. In this cave concentrated tea gas took a heavy toll of lives. The 5th chamber is the memorial and the 6th chamber is the Passage to Peace. this place left a lasting and very emotional impression of sadness in my heart, as did Hiroshima when I visited there last year.
From there we moved onto a glass blowing factory. Ayaka organised for us to able to make our own glass as well as purchase some beautiful items. I really felt sorry for the people working there in the furnaces as the heat was immense.
Then it was time for some more retail shopping therapy. We visited a very large outlet shopping centre with shops such as Gucci, Reebok, Adidas, Swatch, Dunedin and Almani as well as many others. We went into a little Italian Cafe & had an Italian Hot Dog. Unfortunately Ayaka realized she had not passed in our tickets at the glass factory. She decided to return to the glass factory and said I could stay and shop, but before she went I bought myself a genuine pair of cros. Ayaka had just left when down came the rain in bucket loads. Next thing Ayaka rings me to say she cannot find the tickets and that she thinks she may have left them in the restaurant. I go to the cafe in the pouring rain and got absolutely soaked, but unfortunately the people did not understand what I was asking. Before I visit Japan again I am definately going to learn more of the language. Luckily there was a lovely Japanese lady who came to my rescue but not tickets were found. I was absolutly drenched but within 5 mins my clothes were dry, it was that hot.
Ayaka ended up ringing the glass factory and they told her not to worry everything was ok. We then left to return our vehicle and head for Nara airport for our return journey home. To Ayaka a very special thank you from the bottom of my heart for this very special trip, memories of which will stay with me for a lifetime. Ayaka you looked after me so wll and I do not know how I will ever repay you, but I hope that one day I can return the many favours you did for me. I consider myself very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to have such a wonderful homestay student come and stay with us 2 years ago.
And so ended our trip to Okinawa.
Tommorow was going to be a very special day.
Tommorow I will let you know why and what happended to make it so special.
Bye for now!