The night before our sleep was interrupted by the earthquake announcement on our cell phones. At 1:30 am this morning we were awaken by a phone call from a Citibank bank fraud agent. Mike and I had tried to add 2000 yen to our Pasmo card with our Apple wallet on our phone. Norm had helped set it up before our trip. We had added 1000 yen to Pasmo before leaving for Japan. Yesterday I tried to add 2000 yen to Pasmo and it didn't work. We were going to call Citibank today to get it taken care of, but here they were, calling us in the middle of the night. The agent asked tons of questions to verify that I was the account holder. She had a pleasant voice with a Latin accent. She asked how much I was trying to load on the Pasmo, but she wanted to know the US dollar amount. In the middle of the night, I didn't have the presence of mind to try to convert 2000 yen into dollars (even with a presence of mind, I can't agilely do the conversion of knocking off the last two digits and taking 2/3rds of the number). She reviewed a past transaction at a restaurant whose name she couldn't pronounce (Gyukatsu Motomuru, the beef cutlet restaurant). She verified all other purchases as well. It was a very extensive review. Lastly she asked about a telephone number ending in 11. I could only think of our landline home phone number ending in 110. That wasn't even close. Mike finally thought of my office number so I gave her my work number that ends in 11. Originally when I opened the Costco account is was connected to my business. I asked that she delete that and add my cellphone number to the account which had never been added to the account. That was the reason why my charge triggered a fraud alert. The call ended after she told me my number had been added. It took awhile for me to fall back to sleep. At 7:50 we had another great breakfast spread and headed to the JR station to visit the Dazaifu temple in the city of Dazaifu. The temple grounds has countless plum trees whose blossoms we have missed by one month. The train decor celebrates the seasonal flowers of the area. 
The street leading to the temple was lined with charming boutique shops, food cafes, and snack shops. 
There is a famous Starbucks with a basket weave design made of wood that is put together without nails. 
I bought a hat for this sunny day. After passing through two old stone tori gates we cross over three vermillion bridges that represent past, present and future. 
The first and last bridge are arched and offer great views back to the entrance and forward to the main sanctuary. The middle bridge, representing the present, is flat and you cannot see what is ahead. 
There is a pond with beautiful koi. 
The temple is a mecca for students. The Dazaifu Temple is a shrine for an ancient scholar who is known as a god of learning. An oxen carrying his casket was said to have stopped where the shrine is located and refused to move. This was taken as a sign to bury the scholar at the stopping spot. There are many oxen statues in the area. 
The largest one is a shiny bronze one at the entrance. We admired it from afar as there was a long line of students waiting their turn to rub the oxen's head in the hopes of passing their exams and getting good grades.
After visiting the temple we shopped at a Ghibli store (Ghibli is a Japanese studio that produces Japanese animated movies such as "Kiki's Delivery Service") and bought some Kiki Delivery Service puzzles. 
Lunch was across the street from the temple. We climbed the steep staircase to the second story curry house cafe. 
Then we took a train to the village of Yanagawa, known as "Little Venice" for a canal boat ride, otherwise known as punting.
It's 77 degrees. We rent bamboo hats for 100 yen to keep our heads cool during the one hour boat ride. 
We wait in a queue for over half an hour. The canal is very shallow. Our boatsman help guide fifteen people onto the boat. 
It sways as you walk along to get to your seat so you must go slowly. Most of the boatsman were men, but we did see a woman when we came up to a tight spot. 
Both our boats narrowly missed colliding as both boatsmen scrambled to adjust. Both boats bushed up against the canal banks. 
Our boatsman narrates primarily in Japanese with an occasional bit of English thrown in. We cross ten bridges, one so low we duck our heads. 
Under one wide bridge our boatsman broke out into song with the bridge providing excellent acoustics for singing. 
The centuries-old narrow waterways used to be moats surrounding the castle that does not exist anymore. The scenic ride includes views of turtles, a crane, houses and yards that line the canal. 
Half way in the ride we pull up to an ice cream shop. The shop keeper gave ropes to Norm and I to pull the boat up to the ramp. Without getting out, we handed our yens for the strawberry ice cream. At 400 yen, it was a delicious and refreshing snack for the ride. 
At the end of the ride we walk into town and catch a bus back to the beginning.
From there we went to Tenjin and bought Happy Meals for DeAnne. Both Shirley and I got the same toy. Shirley took hers back to ask if she could switch, but they only had two toys and she didn't want the other one, so she decided to keep what she got. Son Cameron had asked us to look for Yamaroku Shoyu Pure Artisan Dark Sweet Japanese Premim Barrel Aged 4 year Soy Sauce "Tsuru Bishiho". Researching the shoyu I learned that the shoyu brewery is a 150 year old business in a small town on Shodo Island, an island famous for soy sauce production. A fifth generation owner operates the brewery. We contemplated travelling to the island to take in a free tour and buying the shoyu but decided against it. It's definitely something we can consider on our next visit. After McDonald's we shop at a department store. The Gees go up to higher floors to look for croc charms for her daughters. I go down to the basement floor to look for Cameron's soy sauce but have no luck. We have dinner at Three Black Pigs, a pork tonkatsu place. 
We ordered the premium pork cutlets which were extremely tender. I ordered the cutlet rice bowl and ended up switching with Mike since my cutlets were cooked with eggs, onions and rice with a sauce which made the coating soggy. I liked the crispy cutlet.
We took went to Hakata Station where we reserved the JR passes for Nagasaki and Kumamoto for Saturday and Sunday. 
We swapped the days because there were no seats available to Nagasaki on Saturday. There is rain forecasted for this weekend.
This featured blog entry was written by Helen K. from the blog Japan Trip 2024.
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