In May of 2002 we took a trip to Japan to attend the 4th International Marriage Society World Wide Convention.

At this convention I gave a speech, in Japanese, telling about our early married life. I have covered this information in my book titled Tsuchino, My life with a Japanese War Bride. This speech was one of the hardest things I have ever done. I have made many speeches before large audiences and feel quite comfortable speaking before large crowds. But it is different when you try to do it in your non native tongue. To prepare for this I went to Japanese class at Bellevue Community College for two years, but I still felt inadequate. Also the lighting was poor making it hard to read the speech. All that being said a video of the speech is available here.

After the conference we toured Japan with our friends Carl and Kazuko Stout. Click on the link here to see pictures from the trip.

In August of 2002 Tsuchino’s younger sister Miyako and her son Singi came to visit. This is their second visit to America. The last time they were here we were still living in Fairwood. So this time they got to see our new home.

October 15th of 2002, Tsuchino’s eldest sister and her daughter and two of the daughters children came to visit. It was an interesting and enjoyable time for us. Tsuchino’s eldest sister has been her before as was Hiromi one of the young people that came. Tsuchino spent considerable time getting everything ready for the visit. This includes completely cleaning the house and yard as well as renting a mini van since our car will not hold 6 people. A link to pictures from this visit is here. There are some great views of Seattle from the Space Needle at this link.

A copy of my Christmas letter for 2002 is available here.