ITT Tour- Tanbo Art and Kokeshi Painting

One of the great things about living in Misawa Japan is that every time we leave the base, we are in for a great adventure in Japan.  The military ITT office at Misawa plans day and over night tours every weekend so that we can explore Japan.  We are going to try to take advantage of these tours once a month.  Today we boarded the bus and traveled to Tsugaru Kokeshi Hall in Aomori.  There we toured the museum of the Kokeshi dolls.  Each prefecture in Japan has a little different style.  Then we were able to paint our own dolls with the guidance of an accomplished artist.

I asked the professional to write my name in Katakana on my doll.  

The kids are enjoying the foot onsen at the Tsugaru Kokeshi Hall

Our next stop on the tour was to Inkadate Town to see the Tanbo Art fields.  The fields are planted with 12 different types of rice that grow into a picture.  It was pretty amazing to see.

Famous Japanese General

Godzilla

Castle in Inakadate that now serves as the City Hall.  The rice fields are to the right of the castle.

Our last stop was to Seibien to see a Japanese garden and Japanese Hybrid house.  The gardens and house inspired the animation for the Studio Ghibli film, The Secret World of Arrietty. 

Bear commented that we were looking at more green in this one garden than we saw the whole time we were in Las Vegas.  What a switch of culture, climate, language, food, and everything for us!