Lots of photos here. I hope you find it worth the wait.

	Takahashi Album Hachioji, Kawasaki, Tohoku
	I met Keiko Takahashi when she was in the Early American Studies program at Brown University. Here she is at graduation. She offered to put me up in her mother's apartment in Kawasaki (across the river from Tokyo). While I was there, they took me on many trips, and Keiko spent days walking all over Tokyo with me. I was there in July-August, the time of O-bon - when Japanese return to their ancesters' home town to pay their respects. Keiko's father was buried in Kurikoma, a small farming village in Northern Japan, but his elder brother lived in Hachioji, a city in Tokyo prefecture (state) about an hour west of the city by train. He was too old to travel to Kurikoma, so I was taken on a day trip to pay respects to him as the oldest male member of the family. Muneo Takahashi lives with his son and daughter-in-law, Fusako, who is telling me of the birds that nest in and visit their garden. Here's Keiko and her sister, Yohko as we were waiting for the bullet-train - shinkansen - to travel north to Kurikoma. At least that's what I thought. I found out later that they had planned to visit several other historic places and tourist areas for my benefit. Oh yes, that's Dolby, Keiko's pomeranian. He was a good traveller. We were off to the Tohoku region, a six-state region at the Northern end of the main island of Honshu, and the home of several major historic temples, many near sites of ancient battles among the Fujiwara,Taira, and Minamoto families, each of which played major roles in Japan's history during the 9th - 12th centuries. It was at one of these, Mohtsu-ji, that the famous 16th-17th century poet, Basho, composed his famous haiku commemorating one of those battles. Natsu kusa ya Tsuwa mono domo ga Yu me no ato This is the rock inscribed with the poem in Japanese. The summer grass Tis all that's left of ancient warrior's dreams. Read from the right, top to bottom This is the inscription in English that had such an important effect on my trip. Reading about Basho and reciting the poem prompted many to befriend and/or aid me in my travels. Another famous temple, Chuson-ji, is on a mountain that looks down on the bridge where, according to legend, Benkei, a monk renowned for his bravery and swordsmanship, died. He was a loyal servant of Yoshitsune, one of the Minamoto. When Yoritomo, Yoshitsune's brother, turned against him and chased him to the North, it was Benkei who, supposedly hit by 31 arrows, held off the enemy until his master, Yoshitsune, was able to escape - to this day historians are unsure whether he committed seppuku, ritual suicide, and thus died honorably or, as one story has it, made his way to the continent to join the forces of Ghengis Khan. Here's what Benkei looked like . . . sort of . . . This Takahashi farmhouse below was built in the early part of this century, maybe seventy-five years ago. The one here, shown from two vantage points, is a much earlier farm house, over two hundred years old. This is the Chiba Family Magariya - L-shaped house - a perfect example of a typical thatched-roof house that was common during the seventeenth century. It is on the list of the ten best preserved private dwellings, and is now owned by Tokyo University. Keiko's father was born in the Tohoku region of Japan, the six most northern prefectures on the main island of Honshu. It is a largely mountainous region so that the population lives primarily along the Pacific and Japan Sea coasts, with some in small towns nestled in the various basins and valleys. Kurikoma is one of those towns, and that is where Takahashi-san was born and where his brother, Shoichi-san, still lives with his family in this typical farm house. Here is the family of Keiko's uncle Shoichi (he's at the right rear). His wife, Hatsune, is in the center, between her daughter and grand-daughter to the left and Keiko's mother, Sumiko, and sister, Yohko, to the right. Keiko's brother Tohru is next to Keiko in the front. The reason we were here was for O-bon, the ritual held every August when nearly two thirds of the entire Japanese population revisits family gravesites to honor the dead. And so we visited the gravesite. We had finished rinsing the stones and placing small items of food and some flowers, and the family is saying their prayers. Here's Yohko and Okaasan at a smaller temple, Johkenji, interesting due to this statue of a mythical figure known all over Japan as Kappa. In some areas of Japan, the Kappa is not a friendly critter - more like a troll - but in the Tohno area of Tohoku it's beneficent. There, the Kappa helps with the rice harvest. Folklore has it that as long as the indentation in the top of its head is kept filled with water, the harvest will be a good one. A famous tourist spot in the Tohoku region is the coastal town of Matsushima, a fishing village whose harbor is home to over 250 islands ranging in size from a few rocks with some lichen, moss, and a pine tree or two to more substantial ones like this one, with its small shrine hidden among the trees. It is considered as one of the "Nihon Sankai", Japan's three most beautiful sights, as this misty scene suggests. Keiko gives Dolby some exercise along a path in a large temple nearby, while Tohru takes a brief rest. These photos depict a rather unusual culinary experience, unique to the city of Morioka, the northernmost major city on Honshu. One of its more famous assets is a meal involving soba, a noodle made from buckwheat. It's eaten all over Japan, often in soup, but Morioka has a special way to serve it. It's called "Wanko-soba", but I call it "Samurai-soba" because it seems like a war. A waitress stands over the table (you can see part of her above) holding a large tray with a dozen or so bowls, each filled with a single mouthful of soba. When she sees you taking your portion to eat, she literally throws another single portion into the bowl from above. With five of us around the table, it was raining soba! Here's Keiko Suzuki (right) and her college classmate, Mami. They picked me up at the Sendai train station, on my second trip to Japan, to take me to Kurikoma so I could pay my respects to my friend Keiko Takahashi's father. We were delighted to discover when we got to the town that it was the time of their annual festival. Here's Keiko Takahashi's uncle, Shoichi, paying respects to his older brother.And Keiko Suzuki paying respects to her uncle. Another place I visited on my second trip was to Geibikei Gorge. This is an historic place as it was the 'highway' for transporting gold from the mountains. At their highest, the walls are over 90 meters high, a beautiful sight. We took a trip up-river in the same kind of boat used to transport the gold, and on the way back, the boatman sang the same worksongs that were sung 400 years ago as similar boatmen went about their work. Here's the Suzuki family. . . from the left, Keiko, her brother Kohichi, yours truly, Kohichi's wife, Michiyo, and Keiko's mother holding Ryo, her grand-daughter. They put me up for three days and were very gracious, taking me to several interesting places -- and on one night we had a lot of fun at a karaoke bar, one of Japan's more popular inventions. One interesting place they took me was to this model home in a development in Sendai. It's a very nice home, not very large - maybe 1200 square feet. It seemed to be very well constructed, and all the appliances and fixtures were of very high quality. Still, it truly was a shock to discover that the price was $1 million. Real estate prices in Japan are astronomical, and far out of reach of the average couple. It is a real problem that Japan has yet to solve. Two years after my '93 trip, I had the very great honor to give my dear friend Keiko Takahashi away at her wedding. She married Bay Bigelow, himself the son of a Japanese mother. She came to the United States in 1939 to work at the World's Fair where she met and married a true Boston Brahmin, Hugh Bigelow. And here she is with friends and family outside their restaurant, Oh! Bento, in Rockland, Maine. Keiko is in the middle of the front row, and Bay is at the back right. Keiko's sister, Yohko, is at the front left with her daughter, Sanae, between her and Keiko. Keiko's mom is peeking out from behind her. My wife, Marie, is between her and a friend, Tomoko. Behind me is Keitaro, Sanae's husband. We're all standing beneath the sign I carved for them when they opened the restaurant. In Japanese, o-bento means box lunch, so they Americanized by changing the honorific 'o' to 'Oh!'
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