AN UNEXPECTED ENCOUNTER

 

March 31, 2024 – Part 2

We walked the two or three blocks back to our hotel following a great reunion party. We had to stop at a signal before crossing the street, and two American guys on bicycles crossed the other direction and passed us. The signal changed, and we crossed.

As we reached the opposite corner, the bicyclists came back and stopped next to us.

One of the fellows looked at Larry. “I noticed your name on your jacket and wondered if you are the Larry Collins who wrote the book 31 Months in Japan.” (We were wearing our USJ team jackets with our names both in English and Japanese.)

This was curious because 1) I couldn’t figure out how he could have made out Larry’s name on his jacket as they rode by and 2) Obviously, he knew the name of the book. (People often get it incorrect. They get the number wrong or they change “months” to “weeks” or “days.”)

Of course, we confessed to being the authors.

“We really loved your book. We’re working on the project now, and all the challenges you wrote about, we’re still dealing with.”

“Yeah, the book has been a real help,” the second guy added. “We even gave a copy to our boss, Molly Murphy.” (I didn’t recognize the name, but I looked her up and discovered she is the president of Universal Creative out of Orlando, Florida.)

Turns out, they were returning to the park after a meal just at the same time we were headed back to the hotel. Two minutes earlier or later, and we would have missed them altogether.

They asked us about some of the people in the book, correctly identifying “Jurassic Mark,” with whom they had worked, and guessing at a few others. We asked if they were working with our friend, Tommy. We had just seen him at the reunion party. They were all on the current project.

We spent a couple of minutes answering questions and sharing some items not included in the book.

They had to get back to work, and it was getting cold outside. We shook hands and thanked them for stopping. The first guy said his name was Tom. I didn’t catch the name of the other one. As they rode off, I thought of all the times we had ridden our bikes around the park during construction, including on this same street. Of course, it wasn’t actually a paved road then.

To me, it felt like an echo from twenty-three years before. We still felt connected to this place where we had spent so much time.

This conversation emphasized the need to publish the Japanese translation. Our book was still relevant, if only to those still updating the park. From time to time, we’ve heard from those who are visiting Japan or who have gone there to teach English how valuable the book had been for them.

We first published it in 2005, and every year we still sell some. It is on Amazon, Walmart, Barnes & Noble and other online retailers. We also sell them on our website: http://www.lornalarry.com.

The next day, we confirmed the names of the both fellows with Tommy (Tom Fitz and Josh McMurray). I hope we can contact them again.

Once back in the hotel, we decided to stop at the little snack shop on the ground floor for dessert. By the time we had stopped socializing long enough to eat, the desserts were gone. This little shop had several ice cream choices. So we each got one and enjoyed our sweets.

Then we returned to our room to finish re-packing for the next day.

We went to bed, hoping we would get a good night’s sleep.

EASTER IN JAPAN

 March 31, 2024    

Easter Sunday started very early. We heard a noise at 2:45 a.m. It took a minute to figure out it had come from our phones and another minute to get to them across the room. We finally realized the sound came from our Ring doorbell. Larry tried to use the talk feature, but it was already too late.

We looked at the video and realized it was our postal clerk delivering mail to our front door. She wore her rain outfit. (She had brought it to our door because it was raining pretty hard.)

Once we were awake, we had a hard time getting back to sleep. We were still overtired from the day before and excited about the afternoon.

We eventually got up, showered, and got ready.

Today was the reunion party for the USJ Construction Team. We’d have liked to have gone to our church in Kobe, but we didn’t have enough time before the party. We were excited to see everyone again.

We went to breakfast a little later than usual, and we took our time eating.

As we passed through the hotel lobby, we stopped by the minions to take pictures.

Then we returned to our room and repacked most of our stuff since we were leaving the next day. Our dirty clothes went into the checked bag, and the clean ones went into our carry-on bags. We had received quite a few gifts from friends, and they had to be fitted in.

Terri had asked us to bring copies of our book, 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park, because some of the contractors wanted them. So, we put them in a bag along with the other items we needed to take with us to the banquet (omiage, etc,).

Then we headed to the hotel where the banquet would be held.

One of the first people I saw was Dote-san. We were really happy to see each other!

Dote-san and me

We spent quite a while catching up with friends.

Miho, Dote-san, Yuki, Lorna, Chie, Larry, Richard (Chie’s husband)

Hatanaka-san and Bob Murphy

Hunvey Chen, Christiane Sentianin, Tommy Garcia, Mark Adams

Noriko and Maki

USI Team: Back: Bob Murphy, Mark Adams, Larry Collins, Tommy Garcia, Setsuko
Front: Hunvey Chen, Terri Igarashi, Christiane Sentianin, Lorna, Tomoko, Chie

Opening the sake barrel: Ritzuko, Terri, Tomoko

These were the sake cups we were each given as mementos of the event.

Hunvey, Christiane, Tomoko, Terri

USI Team: Christiane, Mark Adams, Hunvey, Bob Murphy, Lorna, Larry, Yuki

Terri and Larry

We were served a terrific buffet meal with lots of choices to please everyone. Sake, beer, and other beverages were available. Non-alcoholic choices were also offered.

And there were games…

Lots of socializing.

Lorna, Chie, Christiane, Larry

While we were all there, we took a “class photo” of everyone.

What a great event! And we sold six books. We could have sold more if we’d had them.

We received a wonderful gift. Yuko Yamashita, the wife of one of the contractor employees, gave us a CD with our book, 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park, translated into Japanese! I have always wanted to have it available in that language so all our friends could read it. Now I have to figure out how to format it.

BACK TO THE PARK

 March 30, 2024

Although we were still tired after our big adventure the day before, we were excited about seeing “our” park again. We had already noticed from our room how much bigger USJ had grown since it was built. We also knew ET, Back to the Future, Backdraft, Terminator-2, Western Stunt Show, Animal Actors, and other original attractions were long gone. ET was replaced by Spiderman, and it, too, closed the week before we arrived.

We had been in touch with Christiane Sentianin, the Area 3 admin in Hollywood, prior to our trip. She and Hunvey Chen had planned to visit the park on the 30^th. They told us what tickets to get. Yuki Nakamura and Mark Adams and his wife also planned on going the same day. We had bought our tickets and express passes for the same date and time as they had before we left home.

We went down to breakfast early, but not quite as early as the day before. Everything seemed to be back to normal. Regular length lines. No overflow restaurant. A full selection of items.

We knew the park would open at eight a.m. I had texted Christiane to see when they would get to the park. She said they planned to arrive about nine.

We returned to our room and got ready to go. We decided to go early in case there were any issues with our tickets. Fortunately, there were none. We carried our express passes for the most popular attractions. Our first scheduled ride was Mario Cart at 11:30, so we had lots of time.

We entered the park about eight-fifteen and found a table outside Boulangère on Hollywood Boulevard. From there, we could look down the street toward the entrance.

Christiane texted a couple of times to let us know where they were. Before long, I looked up and saw her running around the corner with her arms outstretched. Hunvey and Yuki were not far behind her. We hadn’t seen her in person since our last morning at USJ 2001 when we ate breakfast with her. (We have stayed in touch through email and Facebook.)

Christiane, Larry, Yuki, Lorna, Hunvey

Our next objective was to find our names on the windows in the park. With the replacement of some of the areas and attractions, several of our friends lost theirs, but all of ours are still there.

Larry is on the 2^nd floor, second from right (Bail Bondsman). I am diagonally above him (Tailor).

Christiane is on the yellow sign.

Yuki’s window is the one on the left.

Hunvey is on the window.

We then walked around the lagoon past Mel’s Drive-in. The vintage cars are still there, but we weren’t sure they were the same ones Cathy arranged for in 2001.

Next, we went on the JAWS ride. Since we had the express passes, we bypassed the long regular lines and got on the ride in just a few minutes. We checked to be sure Larry’s footprints were still on the beach. They are.

The sharks seemed to be missing their skins. They now look like painted metal. Not quite the same effect as the original, but they all were working.

We stopped at the restrooms opposite the ride and SURPRISE! When we built the park. 75% of the toilets were Japanese style (squat type) even though originally they were supposed to be 75% American. (Many discussions occurred about the type, but the Japanese ones took up less room and were cheaper.) Today, ALL of the toilets are American-style! In fact, every one we saw in the park was.

We went to Jurassic Park, but the ride was closed for refurbishment. However, there is a new rollercoaster next to it called The Flying Dragon. You hang on this one with your legs dangling, and it carries riders upside down, sideways, and facing the ground. Larry and I decided we didn’t really want to try it, but the other three did. I guess they enjoyed it, but as we watched it, I was glad we had passed.

It was getting close to the time for our scheduled ride on Mario Cart, so we headed in that direction. There, we met Mark Adams and his wife.

Lorna, Larry, Christiane, Yuki, Hunvey, Mark. Jessica

It was getting hot, and the access to the Mario ride was insane! We all agreed that it never would have been allowed in the US. To get to the start of the ride, we had to climb up and down about nine flights of stairs. By the time we reached the final queue, my knees were hurting. They handed each of us a headpiece—a heavy one. It was adjustable, but it slipped on my hair, sliding forward over my eyes or falling backward. (I never did get it to fit correctly.) When we finally reached the ride vehicles, they handed each of us a viewer glass that hooked onto the head piece, making it even heavier and more inclined to slip around.

Since I had absolutely no idea how the game was supposed to be played, I couldn’t figure out what to do, and I couldn’t see correctly through the view screen anyway.

I hated every minute. (The day before, we had been told by a kid that it was his favorite ride, and I could understand how it might be if the headset fit and worked and you knew how to play. But nothing worked for me.)

When we got out, Larry spotted an elevator, so we took it to get back down to the exit, where we met the rest of the gang.

We decided to go on Yoshi’s Adventure while we were there. It reminded me of the beginning of the Alice in Wonderland at Disneyland. Halfway through, I said to Larry, “What if they created a ride that did absolutely nothing?” By the end of the ride, we discovered that they had! It might have been fun for a child under four-years-old, but for anyone older than five, it was truly boring.

By this time (after 1:00 p.m.) we were hungry. We still had a wait before we could go on the Harry Potter ride, so we went back to the Discovery Restaurant in the JP area for lunch. Jessica and I held down a large table while the others got food. It was surprisingly good, and we enjoyed it very much.

We went back over to Harry Potter. We still had about half an hour to wait, so we found some shade and sat down.

Finally, our scheduled time arrived, and we entered the queue. This one was fine, and we got on the ride vehicle. I loved it! We had gone on the one in Hollywood once, but it had stopped soon after we got on. They started it again after about an hour, but they ran the ride with the work lights on, so we couldn’t see the film and missed all the effects. However, Larry enjoyed seeing how all the mechanical devices worked. This time, we got the full story and enjoyed the ride.

After our very long day the day before, we were getting tired. We decided to go back to the hotel since it was late afternoon. The rest of our group decided to stay for a while longer.

We were still impressed with how terrific “our” park was, and we remained proud of our part in creating it.

When we got back to the hotel, we rested. We didn’t want to go anywhere for dinner, so we ate granola bars and had tea. Just what we needed.

We went to bed early anticipating a busy day on Sunday.

COUNTDOWN TO JAPAN

The world is counting down to the Olympic Games to be held in Japan next month. Because of the pandemic, the games were delayed for a year. But now, it seems, they are really happening.

We were supposed to go back to Osaka this year, too. March 31 marked the twentieth anniversary of the opening of Universal Studios Japan. We spent from August of 1998 through the spring of 2001 there helping to build it.

During our time there, I sent home email messages every couple of weeks about places we’d visited, things we’d seen, and all our adventures living as expats. (Today, it would be called a blog.) These ended up being sent to about 150 people. When we returned, I discovered they had been forwarded to even more.

Friends insisted they had to be published as a book. Sounded easy. It wasn’t.

The individual subjects were timely when they were written, but they didn’t fit together well for a book. So, I started over.

After a few chapters, I discovered I needed—and wanted—Larry’s input. What he came up with was a totally different book than the one I intended.

We remained at an impasse until our friend, Julie, suggested we join her writing group and ask them for advice. At the first meeting, one of the members suggested a solution, and we began the book again with each of us writing our own chapters, identified by our names.

When we finished, we looked for an agent. Two of them liked the book, but they both had the same issue: it didn’t fit neatly into any category. It was about Japan, but it wasn’t a travel book. It was about building USJ, but it wasn’t exclusively a theme park book. It was about doing business in Japan, but it wasn’t specifically a business book. It was a memoir, but we were told memoirs wouldn’t sell unless you were famous. We weren’t.

Time passed, and interest in the building of the park was waning. So, we decided to use subsidy publishing. This is where you pay something for the publication, but not nearly what it costs the publisher.

After three grueling edits, 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park was finally published in the spring of 2005 in hardback, paperback, and ebook. In 2018, we added the audiobook with a great narrator. It went on to be one of two finalists for best ebook memoir of the year in 2006, was named one of Rebeccas Reads best nonfiction books of 2005, and was listed on the Forbes recommended reading list as well as several theme park websites.

If you would like to learn a bit about Japan in preparation for the Olympics, this is the book for you! If you plan to visit Japan, this book contains many tips to make your trip easier. If you want to learn about the trials and tribulations of building a world-class theme park, this is the only book ever written about the building of a Universal Studios theme park. (There is one other about a specific ride: Revenge of the Mummy.) And if you plan to relocate to Japan, be sure to check this one out.

If you have any questions about what it was like to live and work there, please feel free to ask.

Happy 4th of July!

This is an encore of a blog from July 4, 2003. Thought you might enjoy seeing it again.

I’ve been thinking about one of the most memorable ones in my life. I happened to read it again today and wanted to share it with you:

Independence Day - July 4, 2000 *

Our last year in Japan, we invited a large group to our home to enjoy a traditional 4^th of July barbecue. Our California friends, Dave and Ruth, had just arrived for a visit, so it was also a chance to introduce them to our co-workers, friends and Japanese “family” including Misayo-san and Kazue.

The evening before, we had decorated the apartment using fans I had purchased in the US, embellished with a flag motif. With a red tablecloth and white napkins and accessories, it looked very patriotic.

While I was at work, Ruth made potato salad for the festivities. In addition, I had prepared baked beans, a green salad and brownies. We served assorted chips and other snacks, besides the customary hamburgers and hot dogs. Most of our guests brought additional snacks, sweets and desserts. We fired up the charcoal in the small barbecue we had purchased at the Price Club. Two of the Japanese guys commandeered the spatulas and became our cooks for the evening.

Many of the people who attended were Japanese and had never experienced a real “American-style” 4^th of July before. We played lots of patriotic music, and ate our meal on the balcony while enjoying the twinkling lights of Osaka at night. We lamented the absence of fireworks, but God had other plans. He provided a fabulous thunderstorm that no man-made pyrotechnics or laser show could begin to match. And He waited until we were finished with our barbecue before it began.

Most people viewed the heavenly display from inside, but our friend Casey insisted on remaining out-of-doors where he could get the full effect of the thunder and lightning.

Everyone enjoyed the party. Dave and Ruth got to meet our friends, and we were able to introduce the Japanese to a real “red, white and blue” Independence Day celebration.

Perhaps being so far away from home at the time, this particular holiday was especially precious to us.

We’re grateful for each one we get to celebrate, and for living in this fabulous country. Spending time elsewhere heightened our appreciation for America and its blessings!

So, celebrate in whatever way has meaning for you. Freedom is a hard-won privilege. Don’t ever forget it!

* Excerpt from 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park

©2005 Lorna Collins

On Whining

I confess I don’t like whining, and I don’t tolerate whiners well. It may be a character flaw, but I own it.

My daughter learned this early in life. If she tried whining, which she did a couple of times, I ignored her. She didn’t try it often. If she told me her problems, I listened and tried to help her find a solution.

I see a lot of whining on Facebook. Some people seem to use this as a platform to express self-pity. Sorry, they will get little sympathy from me unless they are actually doing something to change their situation.

I don’t mean sharing hard times. Several friends are currently fighting cancer. I want to know where they are in the battle. Others are enduring different tragedies, and I want to be there to support them. I’m talking about those people whose every entry is complaining about situations they could change if they wanted to. They just don’t want to.

This same intolerance led to a decision Larry and I made early in the writing of our first book, 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park.

We could have told all about the problems and difficulties—and there were enough to fill a book. We didn’t skip the hard times, but we wanted to make the book a celebration of our team’s accomplishments, not a list of complaints.

Despite setbacks, budget problems, personnel issues, we managed to complete a world-class theme park ahead of schedule and under budget. Now, that is something to celebrate.

Please share your problems with me. I want to be able to be of support. My mother-in-love used to say, “You have to tell me what’s wrong. I can’t pray for you if I don’t know you have a problem.”

However, constant whining and feeling sorry for yourself will cause me to dismiss your perceived problems. It may be a huge character flaw or the result of a difficult childhood where I had to pretend everything was okay so my mother could save face. I don’t know where it came from, but there it is.

Does anyone else have this same intolerance?

31 Months Goes Audio

I am currently in the process of creating the script for the audiobook of our memoir, 31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park.

I find it hard to believe how much I’ve forgotten!

We published the book in 2005 from lots of source material, collected during the construction of the Universal Studios Japan theme park.

I saved all the emails we sent home from Japan during our time there as well as other emails sent to and from the team. When we wrote the book, we used much of the material to present an accurate picture of our adventure.

Reliving those experiences fifteen years after park opening has been a great deal of fun. I’ve laughed and cried and been transported back to the actual events. I have also mourned the colleagues we’ve lost in the interim.

Although I remembered most of the events, I had forgotten the details. Reading them again transported me back to the great times in Osaka.

We wrote the book for ourselves, and also for the team (American and Japanese) who made the park a reality. Seeing it again, when we returned five years ago for the tenth anniversary of park opening, made me thankful to have been a part of its construction.

When we published the book, we thought only our fellow team members would be interested in it. However over the years, it has continued to sell.

People doing business with the Japanese and expatriates living in Japan discovered it. For a number of years, it was on the Forbes recommended reading list.

People going to Japan to teach English also found the book and recommended it to others. Interest spread through word-of-mouth, and books have sold in Australia, New Zealand, England, and Canada as well as in the US to these teachers.

Since it is the only book ever written about a Universal Studios theme park, junkies like us have been attracted to it. The title appears on several theme park aficionado sites.

We are excited about it appearing in yet another form. We are also considering doing a second edition with a chapter on our return to Japan ten years later.

This period in our lives is certainly a highlight, mostly because of the wonderful people we met who remain friends to this day.

Arigato gozaimasu, Universal and Japan, for giving us the sweet gift of wonderful memories.

31 Months in Japan: The Building of a Theme Park is available in paperback, hardback, and ebook through www.Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble (www.bn.com), as well as other online books stores and through our website, www.lornalarry.com. The audio version should be available later this year through www.audible.com and Amazon.