Aomori? Okay!

Today is our only chance on this trip to go to Aomori, so we decide to take advantage of that fact, and the one day where Mike and I have nothing planned (due to Masahiro and Kevin's absence), and hang out with Narumi Sensei.

We called him the night before to coordinate last minute, and we take an early afternoon train to meet up with him. But before we actually get on 

the train, we buy him a little thank you gift at the station to smooth things over and hopefully counterbalance even a fraction of the imposition upon him.

It takes about an hour to get to Aomori from Misawa, but we spend our time well, creating sweet rhymes and discussing what we are up to when we are back in the states.

When the train makes it's final stop (at least for us), we are about twenty minutes early to meet Narumi. So, never being one to waste time, I tell Mike I will be right back, and I start running.

My mission is a simple one: to find a mini zebra pen, only sold in a particular shop off the main drag in Aomori city. The thing about this pen, is that it used to be sold in the states a long time ago, back when I was in middle school, and now they no longer have it anywhere near where I

 live. Naturally, that would just lead me to assume that they are no longer in production, except for last year, I went to this same art supply store, and I found a whole bunch of them! Not only are the still in production, but they have them in silver and gold. So anyway, this wouldn't be a problem, and I wouldn't need this pen since I bought one last year, except that someone stole it.

Anyway, as I am running down this street, not wasting any time to take in the sights, I am slowly realizing that I can't locate the store. I jog all the way to the end of the five blocks of street with no luck. I try and take a little more time on my way back to see if I just overlooked it, but I'm still without luck

Damn.

I go back to the station defeated. But it was just a pen, so I don't really care all that much.

Mike is waiting for me at the top of the stairway. I made it with five minutes to spare - not bad.

We go to the other side of the station, and as we hand our tickets over to the person at the window and step out the exit, there Narumi is waiting for us with his van. Obviously, he recognizes us, what other two gaijin are going to be walking out of this train station?

The first destination on our journey is Narumi's place, which also serves as a small studio. He tells us that we are just going to hang out there for awhile before we move on.

Once we get there, we sit down, give him our paltry offering (which he accepts kindly), and talk about shamisen and his playing. One interesting thing he brought up was a synthetic prototype shamisen skin, rather than using dog. It's stronger and cheaper to acquire according to him, although I would question how great the tone is. I'm sure that this synthetic skin would be great for a practice shamisen, or someone just starting to learn.

When the time comes we wrap things up and head out onto the road.

The drive is through the mountains of Aomori, and it is extremely beautiful. The trees and fauna are all very green, fluffy, and inviting. It makes me want to get out of the car and start wandering into the forest.

Once we reach the other side of the mountains, we are far out from the city, and are in rural farm country again.

Weaving through small town streets and roads, we finally come to a school. Narumi is giving a lesson to a class of high school students, I wasn't expecting that.

Seeing how I've never encountered how things are done in Japan as far as schooling is done, It's quite interesting to watch the students' interaction with Narumi, and how he gets shamisen technique across.

All of his tutelage must work though, because I recognized one of his students from the Kanagi tournament. I remember her specifically because she won the Yu-Sho (first place) in the teen division, and she also had her school outfit on still.

Once that is done with we head back through the mountains and out another direction entirely; along the coast toward Noheji. We are all over the place, everywhere but Aomori!

It takes a while, but we come to the small town that he is performing in. We park in front a very nice looking building, and he tells us that we are going to eat some dinner beforehand. I don't know what I was expecting, but it definitely wasn't something as peculiar as this. The restaurant is fancy and all that, but beside that point, there is a giant pool in the middle of the place with fish swimming in it! There's a bar sorrounding it, and the people who sit there can throw food to the fish... the fish that they are going to eat. I've never seen anything like it.

The meals are traditional Japanese style, and I order the tempura, whereas Mike and Narumi get sashimi.

We gobble it up, but before Mike and I have a chance to finish, Narumi says he has to go get ready to perform and pays the bill. The restaurant was pretty chic, so it was super nice of him to cover us like that.

We finish gorging ourselves and make our way a block over to where the performance is. It looks 

to be inside of a very nice hotel in the lobby. The seats are already full when we walk inside, and all the people are dressed in robes. Obviously this place is meant to be a nice resort with an ocean view.

Narumi starts and destroys the crowd. The only way to describe his playing is "fierce". Not only is he a wild man on the Shamisen, but he plays the Shakuhachi and tells some great jokes about Tsugaru to the crowd. Definitely an entertaining show. He also invites a couple of his students to join him on stage.

Once the show is over, Narumi drops us off at the Aomori train station and we take the very last train home.

Once back in Misawa we walk back, come up with some sweet rhymes and hit the McDonalds.