Category: Timeline

201 Kitamura Mansion, 4-2-4 Minami Magome

I moved to Ota ku. With Yamada san’s help, I found a fine apartment. In October I began school to learn Japanese.. I repeated the first semestger because I was not learning. I repeaaaaaaated it a second time (!) in order to keepmy visa. I was enjoyihng the classes but my visiton was much worse than I thought and I could not read the Japanese textg fast enought to keep up with the class, and finally gave up.

Through my connections with Ota city people, I gat appoinbted a goodwill ambassador for Ota ku. Acturally a “cool ambassador”, the Enslish word cool is said kuru, which also means come – our goal is to get visitors to come to Ota. Tghat With the help of a lawyer, that got me another year on my vista.

Somewhere around 2008 I was looking for a Japanese tutor. A friend at church suggested her sister in law, a Japanese woman named Reiko.

Reikois married to an American living in Japan – she was here tp raise their son in America.

I began weekly lessons. I had no text book and being me, I did not study during th week, so I was not learning much. But I enjoyed the lessons and thought I was learning. We continued meeting for years.

In December 2013 Sharon died. I had a rough time for several months. One day when I went to Reiko’s for a lesson, without planning, I asked her to hold me for 5 minutes. That was a huge help – after that I calmed down and began to face my new life without Sharon.

The lessons continued – often at my house. We often went down to the Landing restaurant afterward for drinks and snacks – talking about many things. Over the next two and a half years we continued frequenting the Landing. We also did some day trips – cape Ann, Rockport, Nantucket, tried our hand at a golf driving range, did some shopping, attended her son’s middle school graduation, and more　

Reiko. was my touch with humanity. She became ａvery important friend. I am forever grateful to her.