Day Eight - More significant memories

I'm finding it interesting to see different people's response to reading this blog. Few are vocal but most are reading from a far. This is one of the reasons why I finally decided to share this with the public. As you continue reading you will see why so many people get away with child abuse. Most people don't want to get involved. I have speculated about this in my own mind. One thought I have had is that a reason why men don't want to get involved is that they can understand the feelings of a child molester. It's common to see men react to an attractive young girl. I don't know if this is true but it seems like it could be one reason. I kind of equate that analogy to a mother who has never harmed or physically abused her children, but at times understands why someone would want to harm or physically abuse their children.

Another reason I think why people don't want to get involved is because the perpetrator often is someone who is fun, funny, loving, important, famous..........
and nobody wants to rock the boat. If you find this interesting, keep reading to see how the school and board of directors responded when, years later, I contacted the school to report this. You will be completely amazed.

Okay, enough speculation and back to the story. A little more about Jack.  He was the 7th grade (and maybe 8th grade) girls basketball coach. I was on the 7th grade team. I don't remember if I was on the 8th and 9th grade team - my sister has all the Chochin's (yearbooks) - that's where I would get the information. Remember, not much memories from 8th and 9th grade. Jack also taught scuba diving. I wanted to learn to scuba dive so badly. Because of my poor vision, it made it difficult for me to see while I was swimming, so Jack purchased a prescription scuba mask for me. This is significant in that my parents couldn't afford the lessons or equipment, so I was unable to take the class, however; he still purchased the mask for me. I just googled prescription scuba masks and in today's pricing they run about $60. I don't know how much they cost back then.

Another thing he did was purchase my first pair of contacts. Back in the seventies, contact lenses were very new and more expensive than glasses. My parents didn't think they were necessary. The only kind they sold were the hard lenses (which I still wear to this day - not the same pair but the same kind). Both of these gifts were highly inappropriate for a teacher to purchase for a student. However, you can see how very cleverly he was setting me up.

I just had an incredible memory and thought. Another thing I struggled with when I was in junior high was my skin. My skin was very sensitive and susceptible to rashes. I contracted the very infectious skin disease called Impetigo. It was all over my hands. It is a staph infection on the skin and gets very infected and if left alone could kill you. My gymnastics coach noticed it and sent me to the school nurse. She immediately called my parents and they took me to the doctor. The doctor scared the living bejesus out of me. He said to me, "Young lady. You could die from this." Like I was deliberately avoiding the doctor. Duh! His statement, though, scared me so much. I didn't want to die. I already thought I had cancer and now this. I was trying to cover it up, however, because I wanted to complete in the upcoming gymnastics meet.  That didn't happen.

Well, one of the trips to Miyake, I had some kind of a skin issue. I remember Jack putting this skin cream on my skin and making me lie nude in the sun on a large rock near the beach, away from everyone else, thank God. I guess he thought the sun would heal my skin. But I just had this thought. If what I had was contagious and he ended up with what I had, that would have been a very interesting dilemma for him.

Wow, I don't think I could have written that five years ago. A lot of what I experienced with Jack made me feel very dependent upon him and very humiliated. He never said to me, "Now, don't go telling your parents about us." He didn't have to. I wouldn't tell anyone this! What would happen to me? I trusted him and valued the relationship so much that the painful part was worth it. It's hard to admit that someone had that much power over me. It causes feelings of weakness and being totally helpless and hopeless or TH&H. That must be why I was given that nick name.

I don't think I have anymore in me today. That was a bunch. Remind me tomorrow, or later if it's the case, to tell you about the old women living under the road.

[Short break]

Day Eight Final

That was probably the best sushi I have had in a while. Sushi Yama in Baton Rouge. The guy got my order wrong but it was still very fresh and very good. Thank you, Sushi Yama. It's really hard to find a good sushi place in the States because most are not owned by Japanese, but this really was exceptionally good. My friends who are completely and every bit American suggested Sushi Yama and it really is good. Thanks, Stotts!

After my last post, I felt a bit drained. I ordered sushi but before I picked it up I stopped by the local Walmart to pick up dog and cat food. I also picked up two gallons of Klienpeter milk, which will be gone by Monday - my boys drink a lot of milk. As I was walking through the store I started feeling a little exposed. I imagine that I will have a dream tonight about running through the halls of school naked. Am I the only one that has that dream?

While contemplating my feelings, I realized that part of writing this blog does lend itself to selfishness. Finally, someone knows my story. Finally, someone is listening. But the other side is that I'm communicating with people who I barely know who have gone through the same thing or even worse. And not 39 [or 45] years ago but much more recently. You see, it's still happening. Maybe not to me, or maybe not to you but to someone you love. In fact, statistically one in every four women and one in every six men have been sexually abused.

I also received communications from someone I don't know. The email felt a little abrasive or crass. Maybe it wasn't intended that way but you decide for yourself. My response follows:

Email to me from ?: "I'm wondering why you are bothering to change the name of the teacher in your blog when you linked to a bio of him with his full name and you use the school's name? It is obvious who you are talking about, even to people who may not have known him. Why not just say who it is? And if you are going to change names, why didn't you change the school name too?" [Editors note: Since all has finally been exposed, I went back and changed his name from "Mr. J" to Jack Moyer.]

My response: "I guess you have a point. But, I thought protecting his son might be more important. Most people who are reading my blog know who he is. There's no reason for his son's children, friends or colleagues to know. They would have to do research to make the connection. But if you googled 's name, my blog wouldn't come up. Hope that covers the question. With regards to the school, I have no interest in protecting it. Who are you?"

I guess, if I were to hide Jack's name and the name of the school, then I should also go undercover? My new nickname is: ten -twenty two. Whenever you hear that, you will know it's me. You can also look for 10:22 or 10-22. Oh, I forgot, you can also google TH&H. It will probably come up as well. I'm sorry, it's getting late and I don't really know how to respond to that kind of email. I know I will have negative reactions. but if you are so concerned about my not identifying who is who is, why not identify yourself Mr. or Mrs. email person. (note: I didn't identify who you are. I'll leave that up to you.) Okay, I'm getting testy. I need to go.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Eight - Article from Web Japan

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It came to my attention that the article I posted on Day Four didn't include all of the words. I'm so sorry to frustrate you by not providing all the information for you to read. Please see below and read the full article. I shall return later.

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Discovering Japan, Miyake, and the Oceans
Born in Kansas in 1929, Jack Moyer first came to Japan as an airman in August 1951, in the midst of the Korean War. From day one - when, through the train window en route from Yokohama Port to the US airbase in western Tokyo, he witnessed Japanese families having dinner on low tables in their houses - he felt a strong urge to experience Japanese life. Very soon, he was umpiring baseball games for Japanese kids and having dinner with a Japanese family every evening. All the weekends and days off duty were spent collecting bird specimens around the Kanto area for the Chicago Natural History Museum.

Moyer's lifelong rapport with the people of Miyake-jima, one of the seven Izu Islands where he has lived on and off for close to 50 years, began in 1952. He had heard that US practice bombings of a reef near the island were endangering a very rare species of seabirds that bred there called the Japanese murrelet. "Being 23 years old and optimistic and idealistic and naive," he wrote about the plight of the birds to two associates of President Harry Truman. Miraculously, the bombings were stopped several months later.

This made front-page news in Japan, and Moyer made his first trip to Miyake for a story with the Yomiuri Shimbun. During his stay, Moyer took a dive using a pair of wooden goggles he had borrowed from some children at the beach, and there under the water he saw coral and coral-reef fishes for the first time in his life. This breathtaking first encounter marked the start of his eventual shift from ornithology to ichthyology.

Moyer also learned that the direct flow of the warm Kuroshio current hits Miyake-jima during the summer, giving rise to a rich coral habitat, which at 30 degrees to 40 degrees North latitude is rarely seen around the world. The island also had subtropical forests, likewise unusual for its latitude. Mr. J knew then that his scientific pursuits would bring him back to Miyake.

Expanding the Nature Schools
Fifty years later, Moyer finds himself uprooted from Miyake due to a volcanic eruption in 2000 and based in Tokyo. But in a fortuitous twist of fate, this has led to the evolution of the ocean schools that he started on the island in 1987 to a much larger scale. Following the eruption, which forced residents to evacuate the island, the schools have come to be held across the country. Now, instead of just one five-day session during the whole summer, six or seven sessions are held each year, with participants hailing from across the country and spanning grades 5 through 11.

Since 1993 Moyer has worked as a team with Yoshiaki Unno, a nature guide who also prefers a field approach to the classroom. Moyer feels that their efforts have thus far been very successful. Their next step is the "jimoto (local) level," he says, of helping people recognize that places like the Great Barrier Reef or Hawaii are not the only valuable marine environments but that their own reefs are extremely valuable and immensely exciting. In that sense he feels they are still "on the way" to success. Several years ago they aided Yasuyuki Nakamura, a Miyake-jima elementary school teacher, in starting an excellent sogo gakushu (general studies) program for Miyake children that focused on the ocean. Since the eruption, similar programs targeting local kids have been held across the country at no cost to the participants.

A Global Focus
At age 74 - an "old geezer" as he jokingly calls himself - Moyer is an energetic man with a message to tell. He is a prolific writer, particularly of nature education books for children. He is always on the go, running education programs, giving lectures, and leading ecotours, and he is also involved in organizing yet more nature-related programs. "I want to do more and more and more," he confesses.

Moyer is also the father of two children, an eight-year-old boy, and a five-year-old girl. Along with his wife, whom he married in 1987, they are now the primary focus and purpose of his life. The three live in the Philippines, and as much as he misses them, he manages to get by with a daily phone call, because, as he says, "You have to have roots, and if they have a Yankee papa and a Philippine mama and live in Japan, their roots are going to be very confused."

As for his own identity, Moyer does not feel he has a nation, but at the same time he feels he has three. "I have a deep love of most aspects of all three countries, and I have things that I really disapprove of in all three," he says. Nevertheless, having spent much of the last 50 years in Japan, he notes that his friends are in Japan and that his way of life has become Japanese. Moyer plans to apply for Japanese citizenship by the end of the year.

Grew up in Kansas, Chicago, and New York. Received a master's degree from the University of Michigan and a PhD from the University of Tokyo. Came to Japan in 1951. Currently concentrates on environmental education and ecotourism. Has received many awards and recognition's for his contribution to environmental protection. Author of Ikimono, minna tomodachi (Animals Are All Our Friends) and other books.

Copyright (c) 2004 Web Japan. Edited by Japan Echo Inc. based on domestic Japanese news sources. Articles presented here are offered for reference purposes and do not necessarily represent the policy or views of the Japanese Government.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Eight - Side note

For those of you who want to follow the blog but do it anonymously, you can sign in anonymously and comment that way as well. Just follow the steps. I'm starting to get some comments and welcome them and encourage them. Thank you so much for sharing this with me. I can't believe that it's already starting to feel worth it. I also heard from a dear, dear friend this week. I can't express the emotions that I felt. I'll leave it at that. If she wants to comment or respond, I'll leave that up to her.

By the way, everyone who has sent responses of encouragement and support, I can't tell you how deeply I appreciate it. I love you for it. Thank you.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Seven

Another long day.

I worked until noon and came home and cleaned the house. Another football game tonight. My middle and youngest sons play football for Catholic High School in Baton Rouge. I could start another blog just about football. But I'll save that for another day.

When I was in eighth grade we moved into the heart of Tokyo. We lived in Shibuya in a Southern Baptist missionary complex near several consulates and embassies.

This meant that, instead of walking fifteen minutes to school, I would ride the train to school. Riding the train was similar to the commonly stated story that parents tell their children. "I walked up hill in the snow, barefooted for an hour." It wasn't quite that way, but I did walk 15 minutes to the train station, rode the train for about 30 minutes and then walked another 10 - 15 minutes to school.

My memories of 8th and 9th grade are very foggy. I don't really remember much of anything. I do remember that I went to Miyake several times during this time. One time I went during the school year. It was the same year ASIJ students performed the musical "A Wonderful Town." I didn't participate in this musical but I remember the music and particularly the song, "Why oh, Why oh, Why oh, Why did we ever leave Ohio?"

One thing you need to know is this, every time we left Miyake and got on the boat, we didn't want to leave. As a result, everyone (well at least the girls) cried and was despondent about leaving. We would wave goodbye to Jack and sob and cry and act all crazy.

Well, this one particular time I was on the island with several friends, it was during the school year. Jack rode the boat with us to the island and he rode the boat back with us to Tokyo. As we were departing Miyake on the boat to return to Tokyo, several of us started to sing, "Why oh, Why oh, Why oh? Why do we have to leave Miyake?" And like always when we left the island we began crying. Jack always responded to our crying with compassion and love. This time, however, because he was with us on our trip back, he responded with anger. He couldn't understand why we were upset about leaving the island. He was disgusted by our behavior. As I grew older and was better able to understand this situation, I realized that Jack believed that we were upset because we were leaving him, not because we were leaving the experience of being on the island. His anger was representative of how he thought. As time goes on you will see how deranged and narcissistic his thinking was.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Six

I'm really feeling much better today. Had a good meeting at work. I'm pumped about the possibilities of really cool stuff happening with my job. I am tired but walked about 2 1/2 miles and that gave me a little bit of extra energy. So, now I'm embarking on talking about Miyake.

Miyake-Jima, as it's known in Japan, is a beautiful island off Tokyo Bay in the Pacific Ocean. As I mentioned previously, it is a live volcano. In the 70's, in order to get there you had to get on a boat, not a cruise ship, but a crowded boat that traveled over night to the island. Everyone on the boat bunked in the same place. So sleeping quarters were in a contained area of just floor. The floors may have been covered with some kind of carpet, but I don't remember. Basically, everyone layed down in this shared compartment and slept during the trip. My memories of the trips to the island are not very good, but I do remember one time getting dealthly ill. The seas were really rough and as we were traveling to the island, the boat hit a wave and we would roll with the wave. All of these bodies were rolling in one direction or another. I think that was the start of my sea-sickness.

If you read Day Four, you read the article about Miyake-Jima and why Jack was so welcomed there. I'm having a difficult time figuring out where to go from here. So I'll just jump in.

My first visit to Miyake was with my seventh grade class. I was with a group of classmates and teachers. We stayed half of the time at Jack's house and the other half at the Minshuku - (hostle). Nothing significant happened during this trip but the regular things all seventh graders experience.

Every summer, Jack picked a select group of kids to "study" marine biology at Miyake. They spent a good part of the summer at the farm on Miyake. Before the team of "biologists" showed up, he had a group of kids come out and get the farm ready for the team - a pre-camp of sorts. I was one of the kids he asked to come to the island for the pre-camp.

This is where my memories become hazzy. I know I went to Miyake several times. How many, I don't recall. But I do know that this first summer when I went several things occured. First, I was given a nick name by the team. It was TH&H. That stood for "Totally Helpless and Hopeless". In order to get that name, I must have been somewhat worthless. I don't really remember why I was named TH&H but the implications of what that meant have stayed with me throughout my lifetime.

Jack's house had three main rooms, a kitchen, a work room and a bathroom. The three main rooms and the work room were all tatami floors. The kitchen was more functional with linoleum or vinyl floors and the bathroom was a typical Japanese bathroom with an Ofuro. The front of the house sported a long foyer next to the three main rooms, where you could deposit your shoes before you entered into the tatami floor. The three main rooms were adjacent to each other. Jack designated the room to the left as the boys room, the room to the right as the girls room and the room in the middle as his room. All rooms were connected with only shoji (paper) doors separating them. Often the doors were left open to create one big room.

Like many Japanese homes, the bedding was housed in the large closets in each room. At night, we would pull out the futon mattresses, carefully stored in the closets, and set up our beds. The girls in the girls room and the boys in the boys room and Jack in the middle room. Because there was a large open space in each room, each room could accommodate quite a few people sleeping on futon mattresses.

My first summer at Miyake was incredible. Jack picked me to be one of the people who set up his marine biology camp. I didn't care if I was "Totally Helpless and Hopeless", I wanted to be there. I was cool. I was one of the chosen. What I didn't realize was what being one of the chosen meant. The first night, as we were setting up our mattresses, Jack told me to put my mattress in the middle room next to his. Innocently, I did, not realizing what was to come in the night. Like the title of the book, "Things That Go Bump in the Night", I truly experienced "things that go bump in the night". Every night after that, I was told to put my mattress in the middle room.

I was now twelve years old.

I know now that I wasn't the only one, but at the time I didn't.

© Janet Calcote Simmons

Early morning sidebar

I just went to my blog home page and noticed that there are certain words tagged with a different font color and underlined twice. When I clicked on them they were advertising for University of Phoenix. I'm not sure how that works but evidently blogspot uses certain words that people write in their blogs to link to different advertisers. I'm not opposed to that at all, infact, I'm glad they are providing a place where I can write without charging me for it. So, that's that.


© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Five

Before I continue with my story I'd like to offer some form of release for my readers. First, please do not pity me, feel sad for me or wonder if you shouldn't talk to me about this. My resolve to do this comes from a deep strength I have, not from me but ultimately from God. This blog is for anyone and everyone. There may be times that I sound weak. Please know that during that writing I might be going through some of those emotions associated with that writing. But, if you continue to see my postings, know that those emotions are just a part of going through the life experiences all over again. Please, please, please write me and talk with me. If you disagree with me, please feel free to share that with me. Part of the problem with child sexual abuse is that too many people don't want to talk about it. So, please share with me your thoughts, feelings, disagreements or encouragements. I have never felt stronger about sharing this story than now. Please, share this with people you know who have experienced this or those who you know would be interested in knowing my story.

Different feelings surface as I write about my experiences as a child and subsequent experiences as an adult. I think I am starting to identify partially some of the struggles I have as an adult are a result of what I went through as a child. My dad wrote an auto-biography about his life - sort of what I'm doing. I am using his book as a reference for my time line and history. As I was reading through his book last night it became very apparent that during the early 70's, I was not a major problem in the family and so, since the sqweeky wheel gets the oil, I didn't get any oil. As I shared yesterday, our family dynamics were very messed up. So, as my dad wrote his auto-biography there was no mention of what I was experiencing in the early 70's. In fact, not much was mentioned about me during that part of his recollections about our family.

As I realized this, I began to understand other struggles that I have had with regards to other pertinent events in my life. It's seems that whenever something major has happened in my life, other events have prevailed and my issues, no matter how good or bad, became lost in the shuffle. I will share more about this as the story unfolds. It is helpful, however, to recognize why I react or respond to certain things. Hopefully, it will make me a better friend, mom, colleague and most importantly, wife.

Thirty nine [now 45] years ago, I started the seventh grade at ASIJ. My favorite class was Japan Lands and People (JLAP). I immediately made a connection there. My teacher actually took notice of who I was. He saw beyond my glasses and confused state. He became my friend.

ASIJ was on a different type of schedule than your traditional middle school. I can't remember if we were on block schedule at the time or converted to it later, either way, we had free time between classes and/or didn't have classes scheduled all the time. Subsequently, this provided free time to study, mingle, go to the cafeteria and play cards, etc. During my seventh, eighth and ninth grade years I spent a lot of time in Jack's office. I began developing friendships with other people who also hung around his office. I'm sure there is a name for those of us who were his groupies but I can't remember what it was.

Surely there are many details that will be left out in this story, only because my mind hasn't retained all of them, or by God's grace I've forgotten a lot. But I will do my best to write accurately about my memories.

Jack coached the junior high girls basketball team and also taught scuba diving. I was on the basketball team and desperately wanted to be a cheerleader. I also wanted to learn how to scuba dive but I believe that desire only came because of Jack's influence on me. I was also on the gymnastics team.

After the first few months of school Jack asked me if I wanted to come help him run his dogs. He had German Shephards. One of his German Shephard's was not very bright. I remember him being a big, lanky, stupid but friendly dog. I'm sure some of my classmates would disagree with that assessment. Anyway, because I lived right around the corner, it was easy for me to get up early (before sunlight) and run the dogs on the golf course. The prospect of me getting to go to my favorite teacher's house and help him walk the dogs was unbelievable. Especially since he was the COOLEST teacher in the school.

So, an innocent run with the dogs turned into joining him for coffee in the mornings. Coffee turned into an innocent back rub. Okay - now this is where it gets hard. I don't really know how to share information with you that is difficult for me to even visualize, much less verbalize. An innocent back rub turned into more invasive exploring. Although, I knew this wasn't right for a teacher to be doing this to me, I also didn't want to lose my "favor" with the COOLEST teacher in the school. So, I continued to go run the dogs in the morning.

I was still only eleven years old.

Wow!! ASIJ was the coolest school in the world. We did so many different and fun learning things. (Have I really retreated to eleven years old?) In fact, the reality is that I would love for my children to experience the things we did at ASIJ. One of the benefits of going through ASIJ as a seventh grader was that you got to go on a week long field trip to Miyake-Jima (Island). Miyake is an active volcanic island about 5 miles around located in the Izu Island chain southeast of Honshu in the Pacific Ocean. If you go to Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miyakejima you will find everything you wanted to know about Miyake including a biography of my teacher. I believe you will find it enlightening.

Jack owned a "farm" on Miyake. The seventh grade class was split up into several groups and each group went and spent a week on the island. We studied so many neat things. We got to look at the tidal pools on the island and learned about sea urchins and sea anemone amongst many other things. We learned what plants grew in certain terraine, we learned about the Japan Culture. It was a wonderful time of learning in a kid friendly environment. For half of the week we stayed in a Minshiku (hostle) and the other half we stayed at Jack's house.

Jack's house was on the island about a quarter of a mile from the ocean. The island sported steep cliffs and unbelievable black sand beaches. The marine life was incredible. And so was the music. I learned to love Aretha Franklin and James Taylor while visiting the island. My favorite group from the 70's is Sly and the Family Stone. I found out about them because of Jack. He also introduced me to the true blues.

Another fun thing that each seventh grade class experienced was the shrine story. Just north of Jack's house was a Shinto (?) shrine in the middle of the forest. Jack would gather all the seventh graders around and tell a story about an old woman who lived on the property. As I recall from the story, (those of you who remember please correct my mistakes) she ended up dying on the property and haunted the shrine ever since. Jack issued a challenge to the entire class. The challenge was to walk up to the shrine at night and retrieve a wooden spoon that had been previously placed there by Jack. Then the next student, who was up to the challenge, would go up to the shrine and place the spoon on the step. Then the next student, would retrieve the spoon........ and on and on until no one would go. Okay, so I was chicken. I didn't go.. at least not then.

Wow! Again. Who gets to do this stuff in seventh grade? We had so much privilege it was amazing. The opportunity to learn about an island in the Pacific Ocean.? The marine life? The culture of another country and people and blues on top of that? Wow! Who gets to do that?

I'm getting really tired now, so I think I will retreat to my book - sofa - and television. Tomorrow I will talk about what life at Miyake was like.

Thank you again for reading my story.

There was so much to gain by being apart of this great ecological work. (If you don't know what I'm referencing, please see the articles I previously referenced.) We were saving the world.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Four

After a long day of work and long night of Freshman football, I finally am able to get some time to sit down and put some thoughts on the computer. Some of you may be wondering why I have decided to write about this now. Why now? Well, I began writing about it quite some time ago. As the story evolves you will see why it has taken so long. About five years ago, I became serious about writing. However, all the work that I saved crashed on a computer that didn't have proper back up. Then I saved everything to a thumb drive that was stolen out of my office in the Spring of this year. When that happened I thought, what's the point and pretty much set about going on with life and not worrying about sharing my story.

But as most of you know, just this week, another young girl, now 18 years later has her own story, mainly because no one listened. [Jaycee Lee Duggard] There were signs all over the place. The man who abducted her and then subsequently fathered her two children was a registered sex offender among other things. There were many signs but no one paid attention. You see, that's typical for children who are subjected to the horrific act of child sexual abuse. People, for what ever reason, turn the other way. They don't want to face the fact that it's happening in their family, or neighborhood or school. That is why this story is so important.


It started for me in 1970 when I was only eleven years old. And although I still am working through the issues that surround child sexual abuse it ended [Edit: appeared to have ended] in January 2004 a few weeks before my mom died, just 34 years later.

We moved to Tokyo in 1970 because of the problems that arose in the Southern Baptist dormitory. My dad was frustrated that his work in Nagoya had to be put on the back burner. He already had to move his ministry from Kyushu to Nagoya because of the school situation. He shares this experience in his own book, "Windows in the Wall." My oldest sister was attending a college in Tokyo and her relationship with my parents was tenuous at best. Daddy was traveling back and forth between Nagoya and Tokyo and we had two other MK's (missionary kids) living with us. Stress probably isn't a strong enough word to describe our life during that time.

We moved to a small community close to the school in Mitaka. Right down the street from our house was the local insane asylum. All through-out the day and night, sirens from ambulances and police cars would stream past our house heading towards the insane asylum. I know that term is not the politically correct term to use, however, it provides the strong backdrop of scene that this young eleven year old was to experience.

My seventh grade year was a mixture of fear, anticipation, wonder, excitement and intrigue. We lived close to the school which backed up to a golf course. Our house was about a 15 minute walk through the side streets by the golf course from the school. From what I can remember I would walk across a very busy highway toward the teacher's housing which was next to a missionary compound and another dorm. Generally, I would meet up with my good MK friend and we would walk together to school.

If your stomach is squeamish, I suggest you skip this paragraph. One day, as we were walking home from school, we noticed something in a field we regularly passed that was quite odd. It appeared to be a large wad of toilet paper on top of a mound of something appearing to be dirt or something like that. For several days after that we noticed more large wads of toilet paper on top of these mounds. By the end of the week as we were walking home, we noticed not only the large wads of toilet paper but a man who was relieving his bowels in our presence. We realized that this man was leaving evidence of his presence for us to find and finally was able to muster up the courage to go in front of us. All of us were horrified and ran to the closest home only to burst out in hysterical laughter because of what this man had done.

One of the mom's got wind of what had happened and called the police. The man was eventually arrested but not before he was given a nick name by us, Unko Ogisan, translated to mean Uncle Doo Doo. This was only one of many times we Gaigin (foreign) girls were subjected to exhibitionists. It got so prevelent while we were in Japan that, most if not all, young American girls knew how to respond to a man who either exposed himself or chose to go the extra step and attempt to masterbate in public. Our immediate response was to say, "Chisai desu ne?" Translated to mean, "Very small, yes?" The exhibitionist immediate response was to retract into complete humiliation and retreat in an attempt to not be seen.

I was still only eleven.

Having just moved to a new city and new school, trying to fit in, being the youngest in my class, struggling to be a part of a stress filled dysfunctional family, being exposed to things no adult should be exposed to, I can only assume that the implications of all that began to cause fear and anxiety in me. Despite all of this, there was still some kind of spunk in me. I had my ears pierced in the basement of our church one Sunday morning during Sunday School by a friend who used several cubes of ice to numb my ear lobes and an apple as the "core" needed for the needle to penetrate behind my ear. Wanting so deperately to fit in and be "cool" I resorted to the pain and subsequent infection of my newly pierced ears.

The infection in my ears caused the glands behind my ears to swell. One day during a break in the class schedule, one of my friends and I were sitting up in an empty classroom on the second floor. I was bothered by this infection in my ear lobe and was feeling behind my ear, rubbing the swollen gland. When I felt the lump behind my ear, I became alarmed and asked my friend to feel it. She did and immediately said, "It's cancer." I was scared to death. I went home that afternoon completely convinced that I had cancer and was going to die.

For several weeks I would come home and go immediately to my room. I was convinced that I was going to die. I didn't want to tell anyone with the fear that if I did it would definitely come true. I would hide myself in my room and cry and cry knowing that the sirens that flew past our house everyday would eventually come for me.

One day while I was getting a snack in the kitchen, my mom noticed my red eyes. I attempted to conceal them but was unable to and she called my dad to come and see what was wrong. My dad took me to his study and asked me what was wrong. I finally told him that I had cancer and was going to die. Shortly after that, we went to the doctor and they diagnosed the infection in my ears and with medication were able to stop the "cancer" and heal my infection.

[My friend who diagnosed my "cancer" eventually gave her life to real cancer. I miss you my friend.]

Another event that impacted my first year in Tokyo was the murder of my oldest sister's friend in Los Angeles. I remember her getting word that her friend had been murdered. Many scary and uncontrollable things were happening to me.

I was still only eleven.

When I was five I used to come home with skinned up knees from school. Yes, I was considered a tom-boy. My older brother really wanted a brother after two sisters and I guess I was his little "brother" in a sense. I don't remember being too prissy or sensitive to girly type things. Finally, someone recognized that my
skinned knees meant more than just rough playing. I was constantly tripping over things. Either Daddy or Mother or someone realized that I couldn't see. So, from the age of five I wore corrective lenses or glasses. This was when glasses were shaped like coke bottle bottoms and the frames were very unattractive and pre-contact lenses.

There is probably nothing worse than to put glasses on a pre-pubesent child, much less one who is already younger than everyone in her class. So, my arrival at the American School in Japan (ASIJ) was less than stellar. I was lost and scared, unsure of myself and had very little self-confidence. My parents were focused on their own issues and I was struggling to make it on my own. A perfect target.......

In 1970 all 7th graders took a class called JLAP or Japan Lands and People. This class was taught by an American man who arrived in Japan in 1951 as a member of the US Army. Below is an excerpt taken from an article written in 2004 in Japan about Jack Moyer.

Born in Kansas in 1929, Jack Moyer. first came to Japan as an airman in August 1951, in the midst of the Korean War. From day one - when, through the train window en route from Yokohama Port to the US airbase in western Tokyo, he witnessed Japanese families having dinner on low tables in their houses - he felt a strong urge to experience Japanese life. Very soon, he was umpiring baseball games for Japanese kids and having dinner with a Japanese family every evening. All the weekends and days off duty were spent collecting bird specimens around the Kanto area for the Chicago Natural History Museum. Moyer's lifelong rapport with the people of Miyake-jima, one of the seven Izu Islands where he has lived on and off for close to 50 years, began in 1952. He had heard that US practice bombings of a reef near the island were endangering a very rare species of seabirds that bred there called the Japanese murrelet. "Being 23 years old and optimistic and idealistic and naive," he wrote about the plight of the birds to two associates of President Harry Truman. Miraculously, the bombings were stopped several months later. This made front-page news in Japan, and Moyer made his first trip to Miyake for a story with the Yomiuri Shimbun. During his stay, Moyer took a dive using a pair of wooden goggles he had borrowed from some children at the beach, and there under the water he saw coral and coral-reef fishes for the first time in his life. This breathtaking first encounter marked the start of his eventual shift from ornithology to ichthyology. Moyer also learned that the direct flow of the warm Kuroshio current hits Miyake-jima during the summer, giving rise to a rich coral habitat, which at 30 degrees to 40 degrees North latitude is rarely seen around the world. The island also had subtropical forests, likewise unusual for its latitude. He knew then that his scientific pursuits would bring him back to Miyake. Expanding the Nature Schools Fifty years later, Moyer finds himself uprooted from Miyake due to a volcanic eruption in 2000 and based in Tokyo. But in a fortuitous twist of fate, this has led to the evolution of the ocean schools that he started on the island in 1987 to a much larger scale. Following the eruption, which forced residents to evacuate the island, the schools have come to be held across the country. Now, instead of just one five-day session during the whole summer, six or seven sessions are held each year, with participants hailing from across the country and spanning grades 5 through 11. Since 1993 Moyer has worked as a team with Yoshiaki Unno, a nature guide who also prefers a field approach to the classroom. Moyer feels that their efforts have thus far been very successful. Their next step is the "jimoto (local) level," he says, of helping people recognize that places like the Great Barrier Reef or Hawaii are not the only valuable marine environments but that their own reefs are extremely valuable and immensely exciting. In that sense he feels they are still "on the way" to success. Several years ago they aided Yasuyuki Nakamura, a Miyake-jima elementary school teacher, in starting an excellent sogo gakushu (general studies) program for Miyake children that focused on the ocean. Since the eruption, similar programs targeting local kids have been held across the country at no cost to the participants. A Global Focus At age 74 - an "old geezer" as he jokingly calls himself  - Moyer is an energetic man with a message to tell. He is a prolific writer, particularly of nature education books for children. He is always on the go, running education programs, giving lectures, and leading ecotours, and he is also involved in organizing yet more nature-related programs. "I want to do more and more and more," he confesses. Moyer is also the father of two children, an eight-year-old boy and a five-year-old girl, along with his wife, whom he married in 1987, they are now the primary focus and purpose of his life. The three live in the Philippines, and as much as he misses them, he manages to get by with a daily phone call, because, as he says, "You have to have roots, and if they have a Yankee papa and a Philippine mama and live in Japan, their roots are going to be very confused." As for his own identity, Moyer does not feel he has a nation, but at the same time he feels he has three. "I have a deep love of most aspects of all three countries, and I have things that I really disapprove of in all three," he says. Nevertheless, having spent much of the last 50 years in Japan, he notes that his friends are in Japan and that his way of life has become Japanese. Moyer plans to apply for Japanese citizenship by the end of the year. Moyer Grew up in Kansas, Chicago, and New York. Received a master's degree from the University of Michigan and a PhD from the University of Tokyo. Came to Japan in 1951. Currently concentrates on environmental education and ecotourism. Has received many awards and recognitions for his contribution to environmental protection. Author of Ikimono, minna tomodachi (Animals Are All Our Friends) and other books. Copyright (c) 2004 Web Japan. Edited by Japan Echo Inc. based on domestic Japanese news sources. Articles presented here are offered for reference purposes and do not necessarily represent the policy or views of the Japanese Government.		a

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Three

If you didn't know me 39 years ago, you probably are wondering how I made it to Japan. Just after the war in August of 1951, my parents, along with a host of other American's, went to Japan as missionaries. They arrived in Tokyo pushing a stroller with my then twenty-one month old brother. They immediately began Japanese language school in Tokyo. During their time in Tokyo, my oldest sister was born. In June of 1953 they moved to Kyushu, which is the southern most island of Japan. While there both my second sister, my little brother and I were born. We lived in Kyushu until 1964 when we moved to Nagoya, Japan, a city of about then 2 million people in central Honshu. Honshu is the main island of Japan housing the cities of Tokyo, Kyoto, Kobe, and Osaka.

I started to go to Japanese kindergarten when I was four. Apparently, because I could draw the human anatomy with all 5 fingers and all 5 toes on each hand and foot, our doctor thought I was going to be brain child of our family. As a result, I started kindergarten at four and 1st grade at five. What the doctor didn't realize was that for the rest of my life I was doomed to be the "youngest" person in my class, group, team, etc. I believe that because I was one of the youngest in my group, this caused low self-confidence and a feeling of always trying to "catch up" to my class - not necessarily with my class-work but with social skills. I tried to prove that I was as old as my classmates, but the reality was that I was one or even two years younger than some of my classmates.

One of the many struggles missionaries faced with their families on the mission field was how to educate the children. While in Kyushu, my mom, along with other missionary moms, educated the children by home schooling. Once the children started to get older, however, it became more difficult. Many missionaries sent their children away to boarding schools, only to see them once or twice a year during the school year. My oldest brother went away to boarding school before I can even remember.

When schooling became more of a challenge, my parents requested the move to Nagoya because there was an International School in that community. My brother was still in boarding school at the Canadian Academy in Kobe. My sisters, my little brother and I all started attending the Nagoya International School or NIS. NIS was first housed in, what I remember to be, a large, old university type campus. I remember my first grade teacher, Ms. Collins. I have few other memories but none are really relevant to my story.

In 1965, my brother moved from the Canadian Academy to the American School in Japan (ASIJ) in Tokyo. He lived in the dorm provided by the Southern Baptist Mission. Later, my two older sisters ended up moving to ASIJ as well and lived in the dorm. In 1970, because of many different problems with the dorm, my parents ended up moving to Tokyo, so that we could live at home and attend school. I was eleven years old and entering the seventh grade.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.

Day Two - Extended

One of the things I have struggled with is the thought of how I can explain God in all of this. One thing you need to know about me is this - I am not a religous fanatic - I am, however, a believer in God Almighty, Jesus Christ and The Holy Spirit. I don't claim to know everything about God but know by His grace and mercy, I am forever His. As John said, "Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." I hope and pray that you may see the true and risen God, Christ our Redeemer.
© Copyright 2009 All rights reserved

Day Two

Yesterday, my daughter Kelli and I went to see the movie Julie & Julia. It was funny, inspiring, compelling and just down right enjoyable. As I was watching Julie, the young woman who cooked her way through Julia Child's cookbook in a year, and saw how she shared her story with others it made me realize that in order for me to share my story I needed to start somewhere. Not having a lot of experience with blogging, I'm not sure if I'm doing it right, however, maybe if you start reading it and have suggestions of making it better, you can tell me.

This blog is about a lot of different things. It's about intrigue. It's about betrayal. It's about love and about disappointment. It's about Japan culture and Third Culture Kids or TCK's. It's about being totally helpless and hopeless. It's about being as strong as Sampson. It's about all of this and more.

Before I begin my story, however, I need to make several disclaimers and several acknowledgments. Anything I write is not meant to hurt or harm anyone or their family. Whenever possible, I will not expose personal information about anyone else. If you happen to be a part of this story and don't want it to be out, I promise I will not reveal anything about you personally that would cause you harm, however, I plan to tell the truth as I remember it. Because this story began 39 years ago, I can't promise that my memory will be precisely correct, but again, I will do my best to convey my story in a factual and timely basis. If you see some discrepancies in the story, please let me know so I can correct them. If you would like to share your story in this blog, let me know that, too.[Edit: It has now been 45 years since the beginning of my story. 10.29.15]

I must say that I could not have made it through this far without the support of many people. First, my husband, who walked with me through the terror of exposing a child molester and bearing with me the fear, pain and shame of the exposure. Next, my wonderful brothers and sisters, who listened to me as I struggled through the day to day issues. My pastor and friends from church who prayed with me, listened to me, cried with me - I couldn't have made it without you. My friends from high school who supported me through it all. My dear, dear MK cousins whom I love like they are my own blood and encouraged me to tell my story. The other women (I detest the word victim so you won't see it used much if at all) who shared their stories with me. My children who, even though they weren't involved in any of this process, gave me strength and determination to make sure it didn't happen to anyone else. My mom, who finally listened to my struggles before she died and my dad, who finally understood what I needed from him. And last but most certainly not least, my friend and confidant, Michele Connor, to whom I can only say.....Thank you for holding my hand.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.