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by Laura Ann Carpenter
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Sunday was a beautiful, bright day. We met Hummels at the bus stop and went to church together at Grant Heights Chapel. We had planned to wear our gardenias but both were too wilted. I wore a white carnation in my hair, anyway. Jim insisted on it as he likes flowers in my hair. JoAnn and Phil used to sing in a choir in College. JoAnn has been ask to sing in the Chapel choir. She is delighted and says she loves to sing in a choir. She is going to her first rehearsal this evening [Monday].
After church we saw Don Purnell. He sings in the choir and has another Sunday School Class. He was with a Second Lieutenant. This is unusual for an officer and an enlisted man to be buddies but they met at a GI religious retreat. Their rank was unimportant and both guys are good workers in the Grant Heights Chapel. The Second Lieutenant gave us a ride home. He has a state-side car over here.
Because of the perfect day, JoAnn and I suddenly decided on a picnic, so we went home to pick over our food supply for any picnic items. I fixed potato salad, dill pickles, cheese crackers, ice water, and 4 Pepsi Colas. She fixed some sandwiches, can of pork & beans, cookies and also 4 Pepsis. Jim ask Tommy Lee, our next door neighbor, who came over while I was peeling potatoes, where a good picnic spot could be found. Tommy gave him directions and information about a place close enough to ride our bikes. It was a Japanese park and cost 60 yen apiece to enter or about 17 cents a person.
Jim put our big bamboo basket, that we use to get groceries in by bike, on the back of his bike. We loaded it with food and 2 single-bed-sized blankets. I took a large bath towel and wet it, then wrapped the 4 Pepsi Colas in it and put them in my wire basket in front of my bike. We rode over to Hummels and Phil rented a bike from a Japanese man, who lives across the road from them. He rode JoAnn behind him and she sat on a blanket. We put their food with ours in the bamboo basket behind Jim. They also brought 4 Pepsi colas which were added with ours. They brought some ice, wrapped in a plastic bag and then newspapers, it was placed on top of the Pepsi Colas and we tied a cord around the basket to prevent bouncing anything out. So we were off.
It was a nice ride on black top road all the way. A few very small hills. It took us, maybe, 20 minutes more or less, just a guess. We left around 1 o'clock. We checked our bikes outside the gate of the park for 10 yen each or 3 cents which was well worth having someone else watch them. We carried in our picnic items and found a nice secluded spot by a shrine, hidden from the world by beautiful trees, high on a bank, with a straight cliff down to a stream of water.
There we ate and rested for awhile. Then we hid our stuff in the rocks by the shrine and went free handed to explore the park. We found some rowboats which we took immediate advantage of. It cost only 100 yen or 28 cents a boat for as long as we wanted. We had a boat to each couple. We had more fun than I could ever express in words. Only the moving pictures Phil & JoAnn took could really show all four of our delight. Jim took some movies of them with their camera, for them. We took our camera along, too, and took a few color slides. For such, a movie camera is much better. It clouded up and sprinkled a few drops but it didn't dampen our fun any. The place we were rowing was a man-made little lake-like stream. You could touch bottom with the paddles and we judged it to be from 3 to 4 feet deep.
We left the boats after having our fill [I rowed some, too] and set out to see what else was going on. We found some caged animals, swimming pool, natural deep streams where fishing was going on, some amusement rides, which none of us wanted to go on, and stands that sold food, drinks, odds and ends for souvenirs, near an outdoor stage. Nothing was going on, on the stage, but the back was tall hedges cut to look like curtains. It was very unusual.
After satisfying our curiosity we returned to where had left our picnic items and then out the gate to our awaiting bikes, which had a piece of plastic draped over all 3 of them. We rode home and so the end of a perfect day with many plans having been made for a quick return. We got home at about 5 o'clock.
[Editors Note:] The above account of the events of June 10, 1956 came from a letter that Laura Ann wrote her aunt back in Tulsa, telling her about the days activities. She wrote to the aunt so often it's like having a diary of everything we did in Japan with lots of details. . . . Jim