Author: Chad Kohalyk
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Higashi Hongan-ji and Kyoto Tower, day and night
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Nice hidden coffee joint ☕️🇯🇵
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Kyoto alley cat
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The 手水舎 at Bukkō-ji is still running dry due to Covid precautions (Photo by my 10yo)
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On a rainy Sunday morning I got up early to take the cardboard out for the monthly pickup. Half the 町内会 (neighborhood association) were there! (I had met some of them when we went round the neighbourhood day before yesterday to make our greetings.)
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Arrived in Kyoto on a very wet day
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Relocating to Kyoto
Good afternoon from Vancouver International Airport. I am at Gate D70, about to board the plane. Yes, I just got back to Canada 3 weeks ago, but things… have been happening. In last month’s newsletter I explained why we had to change our Spring Break destination from a drive to Squamish to an emergency flight…
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Unzen – Where foreigners go to hell to cool off
From a tiny speck on the horizon, the volcano slow grew as I crossed first the mud flats of Kumamoto and then the shallow waters of the Ariake Sea. Now, at the foot of the volcano, looming over the small city of Shimabara, there was only one way to go: up! Unzen, the central volcano…
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Living “with volcano” — a trip to Shimabara
The Shimabara Peninsula, a peninsula of a peninsula in Nagasaki prefecture, is just one of the fascinating places I travelled to in Kyushu, looking for “Kyushu Firsts.” This is where the “black samurai” Yasuke first landed in Japan in 1579 and is the location of Japan’s first printing press. The peninsula hosted many Portuguese Jesuits…
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Signing for more expressiveness in group video chat
Recently my kids have been exploring the differences between American Sign Language (ASL) and Japanese Sign Language (JSL). For them it is another way to explore their own bilingualism, and understand how language is tied to cultural context. I recently read this short manga COVID-33 which describes a future world where talking outside is prohibited,…