When the Honda team arrived in the Island in 1959, A Japanese lady, Kay Karran went to see them at the Nursery Hotel, Onchan. Kay had married a Manxman at the end of the war. She used to invite the team back to her house where she cooked them their native dishes, to save them being homesick!
Kay still keeps contact with 'her riders' she befriended over the years, I meet her every TT week around the Grandstand area, still soaking up the TT atmosphere.