Somehow there are always adventures on a Ferguson holiday to the beach. Usually these involve some kind of injury and a visit to the local hospital. This time we went one better and spent some time in the local police station. The place we go to is an OMF holiday home right on the beach in a tiny village in a fairly remote part of Hokkaido. There is a small town nearby and Daniel was walking in to town one morning. As if from nowhere, out pops a policeman and asks to see Daniel's passport. He is not carrying it (as we don't usually need to). The only ID he has is his Hebron school card. So he is driven back to the holiday home and Dad is summoned from the beach to deal with the friendly local police officer. After protracted communication with the local police station and David showing his ID, we were then asked to go the station and were duly driven there. After an hour or so, we were told it would take another two hours to sort it all out. Anyway, the 'crime' was that as Daniel had just turned 16 he should have been carrying his passport until his ID card (which all foreigners must carry at all times and which we had applied for) was issued. He was due to get it the following week. Daniel had to sign a letter expressing his remorse and asking the police to be tolerant (it sounded much better in Japanese). It really was amazing how such a little thing could take such a long time to sort out. But we had some good chats with the various police officers. It probably made their day to have such an 'incident' - there is unlikely to be much exciting criminal activity in such a sleepy little town. Life on a Ferguson holiday is never dull.
Monday, August 16, 2010
Arrested on holiday!
Somehow there are always adventures on a Ferguson holiday to the beach. Usually these involve some kind of injury and a visit to the local hospital. This time we went one better and spent some time in the local police station. The place we go to is an OMF holiday home right on the beach in a tiny village in a fairly remote part of Hokkaido. There is a small town nearby and Daniel was walking in to town one morning. As if from nowhere, out pops a policeman and asks to see Daniel's passport. He is not carrying it (as we don't usually need to). The only ID he has is his Hebron school card. So he is driven back to the holiday home and Dad is summoned from the beach to deal with the friendly local police officer. After protracted communication with the local police station and David showing his ID, we were then asked to go the station and were duly driven there. After an hour or so, we were told it would take another two hours to sort it all out. Anyway, the 'crime' was that as Daniel had just turned 16 he should have been carrying his passport until his ID card (which all foreigners must carry at all times and which we had applied for) was issued. He was due to get it the following week. Daniel had to sign a letter expressing his remorse and asking the police to be tolerant (it sounded much better in Japanese). It really was amazing how such a little thing could take such a long time to sort out. But we had some good chats with the various police officers. It probably made their day to have such an 'incident' - there is unlikely to be much exciting criminal activity in such a sleepy little town. Life on a Ferguson holiday is never dull.
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