1 PARADiSE
I stared out the window of the bus. We drove over a big bridge. I loved bridges. They connected one place to another. They were high up so you could see far-off things.
I looked down. Below us was the ocean. My big sister, Sophie, did not like being up high. It made her nervous. Next to me, she kept her eyes closed and listened to music on Mom’s phone. Sophie said it was a good distraction.
We were spending most of our summer vacation in Japan traveling. We took a plane from our home in Los Angeles to Tokyo. From Tokyo we took a super-fast train to Hiroshima to visit our grandma. Usually Obaachan comes to our house for New Year’s and stays a whole month. This was our first time visiting her in Japan. We’ve been on subways and taxis and even a ferryboat. And we’ve done a lot of walking. Now we were on a bus.
I, Jasmine Toguchi, was on my way to a village called Kabo on an island called Suo Oshima. Obaachan grew up here before she moved to the United States. When Obaachan moved back to Japan though, she moved to Hiroshima. Her sister still lived in Kabo. Mom used to spend her summer vacations here. It was strange to think of Obaachan and Mom ever being my age.
“How much longer until we get there?” I asked Obaachan, who was sitting in front of us.
“We are almost there, Misa-chan,” she said, calling me by my Japanese middle name.
I did not really believe her because Dad always said the same thing whenever we were driving somewhere. “Almost there” always felt like forever.
I looked out the window again. After we crossed the bridge onto the island, the bus drove on a road right next to the ocean. The sun bounced off the sea, making little diamonds on the water. It was very pretty. It was almost like watching a movie.
The bus slowed down and came to a stop. I followed Mom and Dad, Sophie and Obaachan off the bus. After the bus driver unloaded our luggage, he drove away, leaving us in a small shelter.
“Where are we?” Sophie asked.
Across the road was a low wall.
“Go ahead,” Dad said. “Take a peek.”
Even though the road looked like a highway, there were no cars. Sophie took my hand. We looked both ways, then scurried across.
“Wowee zowee!” I said, leaning on the wall.
Below us were giant concrete blocks, a small sandy beach, and a big blue ocean. It was strange to see a beach with no people on it. Back home in Los Angeles, when we went to the beach, it was always crowded. People sat on towels and beach chairs and blankets. Kids played catch with balls or Frisbees. Families flew kites, built sandcastles, and waded in the ocean. Surfers rode the waves. It was busy and loud.
Here it was empty and quiet. Peaceful.
Mom came over and put her arms around our shoulders. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” she said. “I came here almost every summer when I was a kid. We always had the whole beach to ourselves.”
It was like a paradise. Our very own paradise!
“Can we play on the beach?” I asked.
“Yes, but later,” Mom said. “Let’s go to the house. Your great-aunt, Yasuko Obaachan, is waiting. I haven’t seen her in over ten years.”
We crossed back to the bus stop. Dad and Obaachan were already walking away on a path, dragging their suitcases.
“We have to walk?” I asked. We walked a lot in Japan!
“It’s not far,” Mom promised.
Sophie and I grabbed our suitcases and followed Mom. We walked past a school. It had a huge yard.
“They have seesaws!” I shouted.
I have been wanting to ride a seesaw ever since I saw one at a park in Hiroshima. It looked like a long plank of wood with handles on both sides. You and a friend sat on opposite sides and went up and down.
“Sophie,” I said, “will you ride with me?”
Sophie scrunched her nose. She did not like to be up high. I looked for Dad, but he and Obaachan were already far ahead of us.
I walked with Mom and Sophie, wishing Dad had waited for us.
“What is that?” I asked, looking down next to the path. Pointing is rude in Japan. I did not point, but mostly because one hand was dragging my suitcase and the other hand was holding Fred Just Fred. Fred Just Fred was my second-favorite stuffed flamingo. I had to leave Felicia Flamingo at home because she is just as tall as me and would have been hard to carry around.
“These are rice paddies,” Mom said. “This is how rice is grown.”
I squinted at the field. The area was flooded with water, and narrow green plants sprouted up.
“It doesn’t look like rice,” I said.
Sophie screeched next to my ear. I jumped in surprise. Mom grabbed my backpack so I didn’t tumble into the rice paddy.
I turned to glare at my sister. “You almost made me fall!”
But Sophie didn’t hear me. She was already running away. She flailed her arms around her head, screaming, “A giant bug!”
2 NOiSY NATURE
I ran after Sophie. She had already caught up to Dad and Obaachan. I did not want her to get to the house before me.
“Matte!” I called out to her, telling her in Japanese to wait. I did not speak Japanese, but I knew some words. Sophie studied before we came to Japan, so she understood Japanese better than me. I was learning new words every day though.
It was very hot and sticky in Japan. I was hot and sticky, too, by the time I caught up to Sophie at the top of the steep path. There was another narrow pathway that led to a house. Obaachan was talking to someone who looked almost like her. She wore a tan dress with a blue apron over it. She had short gray hair like puffy clouds. Black wire glasses perched on her nose, and her smile was wide, making her whole face light up like the sun.
Obaachan waved us over. “Hina-chan, Misa-chan, this is my sister and your great-aunt, Yasuko Obaachan.”
Sophie and I bowed.
Mom and Dad finally caught up. They all laughed and talked very fast in Japanese. Their words skittered and skipped as their voices blended together.
“Doesn’t Yasuko Obaachan speak English?” I asked quietly.
Dad patted my shoulder. “She’s lived in Japan for so long without visiting the States that she has forgotten most of her English. Obaachan talks with you both a lot. And she stays with us, so she gets to practice more often.”
I took a deep breath. “It smells like oranges,” I said.
Mom nodded to the area below us. “It’s a tangerine grove. This island is known for their mikan.”
“Wowee zowee!” I said. There were so many trees! “Can I climb one?”
Back home, Mrs. Reese, our neighbor, lets me climb her apricot tree whenever I want. I use it as my thinking tree. I missed climbing and thinking.
“It’s better that you don’t,” Mom said. “These trees are precious. Yasuko Obaachan grows and sells mikan. It’s her job.”
Sophie nudged me. “That means don’t touch the trees, Squirt.”
Squirt was the special name Sophie had for me when we were younger, when we were friends. All through her fifth-grade and my third-grade year, she was bossy and mean and ignored me a lot. But since we got to Japan, Sophie has been nicer. She started calling me Squirt again. Sophie and I were getting along and it made me happy! We were going to have so much fun together in Kabo!
We followed Yasuko Obaachan into the house. There was a dirt floor with a raised wood platform just like at Obaachan’s house in Hiroshima. I knew what to do. I took off my shoes and climbed up into the house. The adults put on slippers, but Sophie and I stayed in our bare feet. The whole house had tatami floors. They looked like woven straw mats.
Yasuko Obaachan gave us a tour of the house. It had three main rooms: the eating area with a low table, a mostly empty room where we would all sleep, and another room where Yasuko Obaachan slept. Just like at Obaachan’s house, all the doors slid open and shut. They reminded me of the doors that slid open to the backyard at my best friend Linnie Green’s house. Except her doors were made of glass and you could see through them. The shoji doors here were made of wood and paper, and you could not see through them.
Thinking of Linnie made me miss her. We had never been apart this long. Good thing she gave me a journal before I left. I wrote in it like I was talking to her.
The house also had a kitchen, a bathroom, and a bathing area. It had a Japanese bathtub just like at Obaachan’s house. You take a bath outside the tub, splashing water on yourself.
We all sat down on zabutons, or cushions, at the low table. We snacked on crunchy cookies and drank hot tea.
At first Mom or Dad would tell me and Sophie what everyone was saying, since they were talking in Japanese. But after a while, Mom and Dad forgot to translate. I had no idea what was going on. I got bored as soon as the food was gone.
Sophie and I walked to the front room. The doors to the house were all slid open. It was like the house had no walls. We could see all the way down to the ocean, where we had gotten off the bus.
Even though we were in a village on a small island and even though there was no traffic or crowds of people, it was very, very loud.
“What is that noise?” I asked.
“Dad said insects.” Sophie wrapped her arms around herself and shivered even though it was hot.
“Whoa,” I said. “Those insects must be huge to make such loud sounds. Let’s go explore!”
“Um.” Sophie looked around the room. “I have to go to the bathroom!” she said as she rushed away.
I sat down to wait. My legs dangled over the edge of the house. I was not surprised Mom was so happy, chattering away with the family, but I also wished she noticed that I was sitting here alone.
Suddenly I heard Sophie scream. I jumped up and ran back to the other room. Sophie dashed in, her eyes wide.
“What happened?” Mom asked.
“There’s a frog in the bathroom!” Sophie’s face was red.
Obaachan smiled. “There is a lot of nature here.”
Sophie grumbled and stalked over to her backpack, pulling out her book. She sat with her back to the wall and read.
I guessed we weren’t going to explore after all.
Jasmine’s Journal
Dear Linnie,
Konnichiwa! That’s hello in Japanese, but I already told you that before. We are finally in Kabo.
I have great plans for adventures here! I want Sophie to explore with me and to ride a seesaw with me. We will go to the beach, and Sophie and I can make sandcastles and play in the ocean. It’s a good thing Sophie and I are friends, because Mom is very busy paying attention to Obaachan and Yasuko Obaachan.
But Sophie is reading now. I have nothing to do, so I am writing to you. If you were with me, we could play!
What are you doing today? I wish you were here.
3 MiSSiNG HOME
After I finished writing in my journal, Sophie was still reading, so I wandered back to the table. The food was all gone, but now the table was piled with books. I loved books!
I sat next to Mom. “What are you reading?” I asked.
“We’re looking at pictures,” she said. “These albums have a lot of photos of me when I was your age.”
Mom opened a book and pointed to a picture of a little girl in a dress with a strawberry print. Her hair was in two braids. She was smiling and had a missing tooth.
“That’s you?” I asked.
“That’s me,” Mom said.
“Wowee zowee!”
At first it was fun to see Mom as a kid. There she was lying on a beach towel. And there she was sitting on the steps to this house. There she was eating at a table with some friends. She sure sat a lot.
I had a hard time sitting still. It took forever to turn a page in the album. For every picture, Mom or Obaachan or Yasuko Obaachan had a long story to share. And they kept talking in Japanese and Mom and Dad kept forgetting to translate into English for me.
After a whole bunch of pictures of people I didn’t know, I got bored. Again.
I went back to the room where Sophie was still reading. I hugged Fred Just Fred and that made me feel a little better.
I sighed. Sophie didn’t hear me. I sighed louder. Really loud.
Sophie finally looked up from her manga. “What’s up, Squirt?”
“Let’s do something,” I said.
“There’s nothing to do here,” Sophie said. “Mom will take us to the beach tomorrow.”
Tomorrow was forever away! I wanted to do something today. Now!
I didn’t feel like reading. I didn’t feel like playing by myself. I just wrote in my journal, so I had nothing new to say.
I took Fred Just Fred and sat at the front door. Alone and away from everyone who was having a good time. I was happy that Mom was happy, but I was lonely. I thought this vacation was all about family time and being together. But the adults were busy talking and Sophie was reading by herself.
“I miss Linnie,” I said to Fred Just Fred. “I bet you miss Felicia Flamingo.”
Text copyright © 2023 by Debbi Michiko Florence
Illustrations copyright © 2023 by Elizabet Vukovic´
