Piano Bar in Kumamoto

This photo was taken in 2007 at シャルマンバルール in Kumamoto, Japan. The piano player was quite good and we sang a few songs together. The piano is thought to have been invented around 1700. The word is a shortened form of the Italian word for the instrument, pianoforte.

Catholic Church in Kumamoto

This photo was taken in 2007 in Kumamoto, Japan. Despite more than half of Japanese people claiming no religion, religion plays a large part of many people's lives in Japan. While the overwhelming majority of religious Japanese adhere to Shinto, Buddhism, or a mixture of the two, Christianity has a small following in Kyushu where the first Europeans landed in 1542. The Kyushu daimyo(lords) welcomed trade with the Europeans and tolerated their proselytizing. However, when Francis Xavier tried to spread Christianity to the capital, it resulted in the ruling general, Toyotomi Hideyoshi issuing a ban on Christianity and executing 26 Franciscan missionaries in Nagasaki. The ban stood from 1597 to 1873 when the Meiji restoration gave the Japanese freedom of religion. Today Christianity is practiced by between 600,000 and 1,000,000 Japanese.

Joro-gumo

This photo was taken in 2007 in my co-worker's backyard in Kumamoto, Japan. In Japan these spiders are called Joro-gumo, literally 'harlot spider.' The name comes from an old story from the Edo period about a woman who lures men into her home, then turns into a spider and eats them. In western countries this spider is called Nephila clavata and is a member of the golden orb-web spider group. The web of the female Joro-gumo can reach one meter in length. After mating, the female spins her egg sack, which can contain between 500-1500 eggs, and attaches it to a tree.

Cows at Mt. Aso

This photo was taken in 2006 at Mt. Aso in Aso, Japan. Cattle roam free around the foothills and mountains of Mt. Aso, which is the largest active volcano in Japan. The central cone group of Aso is made up of five peaks: Mt. Neko, Mt. Taka, Mt. Naka, Mt. Eboshi, and Mt. Kishima. Mt. Naka has the only active crater among the five, but hasn't erupted since 1991.

Dom Perignon

This photo was taken in 2007 in Kumamoto, Japan. My student, Kunio, took me and Gen, my co-worker, out to a French Restaurant and I had Dom Perignon for the first time in my life. They served it in etched glasses. Dom Perignon is named after a Benedictine monk and was only produced in 36 of the last 81 years. A bottle of Dom Perignon costs around 110 USD for a 2000 vintage. The same amount of money would buy forty 40 ounce bottles of Miller High Life.