he goes by 'Jay'

He is not the 'Jason' from all the 'Friday the 13th' movies, even though that's the only Jason anyone around here has heard of!

Well, my brother, after a long journey across the ocean, an overnight stay at the Hotel Chisun in Osaka by himself(Lost in Translation??), and two long train rides, finally made it to Arao. It's his first time in Japan. He speaks (almost) no Japanese.
We ate dinner last night with Etsuko, her son Yuji, and Hiro. It was an assortment of take-out--some sashimi, a shrimp, tuna and squid pizza, barbecued drumsticks, stuffed peppers, potato salad, etc. I enjoyed the evening with them, and I believe Jay did too. I had asked him to talk a little more slowly than usual, and to try not to use slang too much. I think he found trying to do this difficult at first, but soon we found ourselves all together comfortably chatting about this and that. A good time was had by all. : )

Today we've got tickets for the opener game of the Fukuoka Hawks baseball team. I think they're playing the Something Fighters, but the ticket's in kanji, so I can't be 100% sure. We're both looking forward to that experience. After the game, we will potentially visit Sushi Den in Fukuoka for dinner, whose sister restaurant is in Denver, where my brother is from.

Next week we want to go to Osaka, Nara, Kyoto and Tokyo. It's a lot to see and do in a week, but　頑張ってましょ! Ganbattemasho--We can do it!

I'm feeling sort of delighted to see him. Something about being reunited with your own blood, or something like that. A sense of care and joy. : )

Oh yeah, and he assures me, his 'guest blog' is forthcoming.