The Pilgrimage: Part 1

I forsee another post about the Heart Mountain Pilgrimage, but I just couldn't wait to start telling you all about what's going on. I just have to get it out somehow!

1. Yesterday I was out watering the gravel (which Dad later told me was a euphemism for something else and I needed a better description of what I was doing)....literally spraying water from the garden hose onto a recently finished gravel walkway that needed water to firm things up and cut down on the dust...when a Japanese American man and his mother came up to me and asked how I was and what I was doing and if he could take my picture as I watered the gravel (literally spraying water from the garden hose, remember). I introduced myself and then he introduced himself as Lance Ito. Now I knew we had an Ito that was coming to dedicate our new garden after one of the Ito's, so I figured this was the guy. What I didn't realize at that exact moment was that this was JUDGE Ito, who presided over the OJ Simpson trial. HE TOOK MY PICTURE! I got pretty excited later when I realized exactly who he was. He and his mother really appreciated all the efforts that went into the making of the garden and enjoyed looking around. Fast forward to tonight, when Judge Ito was giving a presentation on the garden that is named in memory of his father who was in charge of agriculture at Heart Mountain in 1942 and 1943. He's going through his slideshow and gets towards the end of it, and there is a slide with one picture on it. Guess who's picture it was. Yep. MINE! I got a slide all to myself as he thanked ALL the people who worked on the garden. SWEET! I had no idea I was going to be in his slideshow. I don't think anybody else except the staff realized who was in the picture, but that's ok. Judge Ito is an extremely nice man....very unassuming and somewhat quiet. I enjoyed the few moments speaking with him and his mother out in the garden yesterday.

2. Since there wasn't assigned seating at tonight's dinner and program, the staff had to squeeze in whichever chairs were left open. I had originally had an assigned seat with a fellow North Carolinian (about 1/4 of seats had been assigned to speakers/presenters/board members/high-ups/etc.) but then I got bumped for somebody more important. So as Bethany and Kim and I are looking around for seats, I saw an open chair next to Bacon. Yes. His name is Bacon. And he is awesome. His nickname is Mr. Heart Mountain and he comes periodically to give presentations at the museum. He was 13 when he was interned with his family. I had met him yesterday when he was giving his presentation and later was asked to take a couple of pictures of him with various guests. Out of all the single seats left open, the one at his table was one where I knew SOMEBODY and could make myself comfortable. I snagged that seat. And thank goodness I did! It was so great! There were 4 former internees at my table.
       1. Bacon S. (yes, his name really is Bacon......yet another reason I like him)
       2. Amy (she was friends with one of the internees before camp)
       3. Judge Raymond Ono (he's an extremely nice man I enjoyed speaking with who had a special segment in the program with Bacon talking about how they adapted and overcame struggles following the end of WWII)
      4. Tak (one of the board members and trustees...he gave me his card (ahh!! so excited!!)....he was one of the resisters who resisted being drafted in the military. I look forward to talking with him more in the future)
                     Side note: There were men of draft age in the internment camps who resisted the draft. They wanted to gain their rights as American citizens back.....they were American citizens who were being held against their will in a concentration camp, yet were being drafted to fight a war for a goverment and country that was holding them against their will. They said that when they were given their rights back as citizens, they would be willing to serve in the military.

3. We watched a short documentary film that was awesome...it is being done by a news anchor from LA who has won mulitple Emmy's and other awards...and he's been doing some interviews the past couple of days to finish up that documentary.

Tomorrow looks like it is going to be a really full day full of ceremonies and events. I should hit the hay, but I wanted to go ahead and write down a few of the events from tonight. I am VERY excited to see what connection I make during tomorrow's program!

Exciting Happenings

I have several fun stories to share this time...we're gonna go back a few days for the first one...

The chimney on one of the buildings out at Heart Mountain has been having some work done on it since March to stabilize it. Over the years it has acquired an 18 degree tilt all the way up to the top, so they've been working on it to stabilize the entire thing so that it won't tilt anymore. It's sort of like the Leaning Tower of Pisa...they didn't fix it, they are just preventing any further damage. Next week is our Pilgrimmage at the museum, and everyone has been hoping that the chimney will be finished by the time the Pilgrimmage starts. This week I think they will finally get the scaffolding down just in the nick of time. One of the perks of working in a museum is you get to see and do cool stuff behind the scenes. Last week I went up to the top of the chimney on the scaffolding (175.5 ft up!) and check out the world and take pictures from way up there! SO COOL!! Here's a couple pictures of the view and me up there!

 

 

Yesterday, some of the interns from the BB and I went to Yellowstone and went around the upper loop and then went to Byron for the awesome fireworks show! We saw 3 grizzily bears in the park yesterday, a couple elk (also known as deer-cows), antelope that were playing a serious game of tag (i'm not kidding....it was awesome!), and lots of chipmunks. We stopped for lunch in a meadow full of wildflowers and had a photo shoot....then we stopped along one of the rivers and had another photo shoot. It was fun to get out and walk around and splash in the river a little bit too.

 

 - Nicole, Kerry, Alex, and me

 - if you only knew how hard it was to get to that rock without falling in....you would be very impressed.

- i DID take my keys out of my pocket before attempting this just in case i fell in. luckily i did not...

 

 

 

 

Then we headed out the northeast entrance to Yellowstone and along the Chief Joseph Hwy. About 5 miles past Cooke City, which is just outside the northeast entrance, I pulled over so that we could take a few pictures of the Beartooth Mtns. A car that had been behind us also pulled over....inside were 2 guys who sounded like they were from Eastern Europe somewhere....we could never agree on exactly where based on their accents. They asked us where "the Yellowstone" was. I tried not to laugh as I gave the directions.....they couldn't be serious!? But I think they were. Here's the scenario....both cars were traveling east OUT of Yellowstone. There was only 1 road in and 1 road out with no airport. It made no sense that they were lost looking for YNP coming OUT of it!! It would be like driving away from the Outer Banks and asking for directions how to get there. After they turned around and headed the correct way, we laughed and laughed and laughed and came up with all kinds of scenarios that might possibly be how they got so lost. It was great.

 

 - Sunlight Basin

 

 

After Sunlight Basin we headed over to Byron for the fireworks show. I have been dying to get back to this show ever since I saw it 3 years ago. It was seriously the best fireworks I've ever seen in my entire life. You can get super close to them and sit right under them going off and it fills up your entire sky. They coordinate it with music and it's just fantastic. I had told the other interns about it and how great it was but I don't think they really believed me. Byron is a town with 593 people in it. Very small. With the best fireworks show EVER!! We got there and set up our chairs and as soon as the fireworks started going off 2 of the girls just started laughing. It was totally NOT what they had expected. They loved it!! And I did too....they had new fireworks i'd never seen before which were really neat. Towards the end of the show, they set off a whole bunch of the really loud fireworks and so many that it gets almost as bright as day....it is incredible. I found a video on youtube from 2 several years ago...it starts out a little slow, but bear with it....it finishes with a bang! :)

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlTFjK9tArQ

Independence Day

Happy 4th of July!

Independence Day here in Cody is a HUGE deal. They bring in the PRCA to the rodeo (basically all the professionals) for 4 days, have 3 separate parades, a special ceremony at the Memorial Park, and a big fireworks show. I went to 2 nights at the rodeo....Coy had gotten some tickets from one of the board members who wasn't going to be in town. It's nice to have friends in high places. :) We took a couple of the interns with us who are from England and Spain, and they'd never seen a rodeo before. It was really funny to see them watching it.

Tuesday's parade was the kiddie parade where all the kids in town get to ride their bikes or horses or go carts or 4 wheelers or whatever they want to in the parade. Wednesday was a preview of the actual 4th of July parade. I only went to the biggest one on the 4th....it lasted 2.5 hours....what a parade! My favorite entry this year was the batmobile....somebody in Cody owns 2 Batmobiles....one that looks like it's from the 60s show, and a more modern fancy car with a tailpipe for the turbo booster part. It was awesome! Here's some pictures from the parade....

 

Craig Johnson was the Grand Marshal of the parade....he's the author that writes the Longmire series...(people who read westerns will know who i'm talking about). He's a very jolly fellow...he came into the museum on Wednesday...

 

And of course a Hazel picture :) 

 

 

After the parade I took a nap...it was fantastic! We had a thunderstorm late in the day, and so I didn't know if we'd still have the fireworks show or not. I had planned to go over behind the museum to watch the fireworks with the interns and a few other folks, but with it raining I just wasn't sure. Like most storms in Cody, it quickly passed and we had a gorgeous sunset to watch. I sat in the car awhile while it was still raining before going down the hill behind the museum. The fireworks show was ok, but not spectacular. I think they've had to do some budget cuts and fireworks weren't too high on the list of things to keep. It was still fun to watch some though. They set them off across the river, and it is probably 3 miles away by air. The fireworks would go off and about 5 seconds later we'd hear the bang. The fireworks that make the really BIG bang were awesome, because they'd set off 3 or 4 of those at a time and the echo went forever....I bet animals in Yellowstone could hear them!

 

It was a good 4th of July with lots of celebrations all over town. I hope Mom and Dad can get out here one day for the parade....Dad would really like all the animals.

 

I'm enjoying my first Saturday to sleep in and be lazy in 3 weeks! It is so nice! I'm headed in to the museum to give a special tour this afternoon, but i'll only be there for about an hour. Just long enough to give the tour.