Kobe! (and Osaka)
This was the 2nd day of our school trip to Kyoto, and our designated free day. Li and I had plans for this day for quite some time, and for a very specific purpose. You see, the visual novel Fate/Stay Night (of which Li and I are rabid fans, evident from my previous posts) used many places in Kobe in reference photos for its background images. Now, these locations have already been found by other fans before, but finding them yourself and getting your own photos of the places has become somewhat of a pilgrimage, which only a few have been able to complete. I found a site (in Japanese) where these two Japanese guys completed The Pilgrimage(TM) and posted their pictures and directions, so using those directions and street view on Google Maps I found and marked down all the reference photo locations I could find (which was pretty much all of them). Unfortunately, only about 2/3 of them were in Kobe, with three of those too far into the outskirts to make it to in time. This still left us with a good 8 or so locations in the Kobe area. Thus, with our breakfast eaten we ventured to the nearby Kyoto station and hopped on the express for our one hour ride to Kobe.
The station that marked the physical center of the area containing The Pilgrimage(TM) was Sannomiya Station, the main station of Kobe. Kobe is an interesting city. Much like Fuyuki City from F/SN it has a distinct Western area that overlooks the city, which originated from a small Western settlement due to Kobe being in the Osaka Bay area. It is also not a very tall city (one skyscraper), and even though it is fairly dense like most other Japanese cities, it had a much more 'authentic' feel to it. Its difficult to describe, but the place just felt very homey. I have to say, out of all the cities I've been to that weren't Tokyo, I could see myself enjoying living in Kobe the most.
Our first stop, closest to the station, was the Hotel Monterey Kobe for the church courtyard, church basement altar, and Kotomine's room. Unfortunately, being a very high class hotel, having an absolutely beautiful atmosphere, and it also being spring, there were two weddings taking place here today. Fortunately, I was able to get my pictures of the courtyard, but the rest of the hotel was unavailable to me at each of my several attempts throughout the day.
Stop number two was one of the ones I was looking forward to the most: Rin's house. This was an interesting one to find on Google street view, since it actually isn't anyone's house anymore; it is a museum of the old Western houses in that area and two sides of the building are part of a small park. The walk up to the house (and I mean up, have I mentioned Kobe is very hilly?) was very interesting. There was a quick, yet almost unnoticeable transition from the Japanese area to the Western area. This area consists of most of the hillside, which is pretty steep at points, and overlooks a great deal of Kobe and the bay. It was quite an amazing sight, and right in the middle of it you couldn't tell if you were still in Japan or in some town in Italy. My favorite part about that was how, even though it was a bit of a tourist attraction, it wasn't a major one and acted as if it wasn't one at all. We soon reached the small park with Rin's house, and apparently the park had just finished some renovations since there seemed to be a little event going on. The street performer was amazing, and was flipping around and balancing a small tea kettle with a little stick that he was holding with his mouth. I took a video of it, which I'll post up on facebook or something (hopefully) soon. Rin's house itself was very beautiful. We didn't go inside, but the outside was good enough on its own.
Nearby was our third stop of the day: the road leading up to the Western houses (which is actually right in the middle of it, not leading up to it). It was very upsetting for me that I missed my perfect shot when there was absolutely no one on the hill (highly unlikely given its length) and only got a picture with my point-and-shoot. At least I got one though. I did still wait there for a while taking pictures with both cameras intermittently and got some really good shots, but none without a single person on the hill like when I first got there >_<.
Also not very far away was our fourth stop: the road going up the hill to the church (except there wasn't a church there :P) This was another shot that was easy to find but difficult to take. You see, this road has a moderate amount of traffic, and less than 100 yards behind me was a major intersection, meaning during a red light traffic would get backed up far enough that I couldn't get the shot. Did I mention that in order to get the shot I needed to stand in the middle of the street? This meant that during a green light I would need to get out of the way as well, thus making it quite difficult to get the picture. It was pretty hilarious seeing all the people walking past on the sidewalk stare at me like, "wth is that gaijin doing?" Definitely one of the highlights of my day haha.
With this our stops north of the station were completed, and so we began the long walk (a few miles) down to the bay where we would find our next four stops. South of the station there lies a pretty big park and one of the most interesting ones I've seen. I took a lot of pictures of this place, with its multiple statues and inscribed monoliths, but most importantly the fountains. By far the best fountain-type thing I've ever seen was in this park. At first it doesn't look very interesting: a big obsidian block with water flowing out the top and falling off all four sides into a small pool a few feet below it. Then you notice the walkway going underground a little ways away. Curiosity grips you and you venture into the depths. At the end of the path you find yourself directly underneath the fountain, with the entire ceiling made of glass. The perimeter of the room seemed to be a memorial (as most parks are), but the ceiling was absolutely amazing. I took a couple photos of this and a video of me walking around inside the room as well. At the southern end of this very long park there was a huge clearing with a massive fountain. This fountain wasn't anything super-special - just the usual alternating water jets - but it was still pretty cool.
Finally we reached the bridge that connected the residential part of Fuyuki to the downtown part (which actually just connected to a port island). Now, as we were walking along the bridge we realized just how extremely windy it was today, and how cold that wind could make you. At this point I was really regretting not wearing my jacket and the cold was slowing my hands, but "I can still fight!" :P The bridge itself has two of our shots: one going and one coming, however they are both taken from the same walkway, which of course we were on the opposite side from. Not a big deal though, since we could just take the other walkway on the way back. The important part was what lied at the end of the bridge: the park. When we first got to the park I was a bit worried, since there seemed to be a motorcyclist (not biker-gang) gathering going on. It wasn't huge, but it was in the park and there were about 20 or so of them. Fortunately, once I found the exact spots for the two shots in this area I saw that they were just off the edge of the picture. For one of them I needed to stand on the edge of this moderately large fountain in such a way that I was dangerously close to falling in. Remember that extreme wind? That didn't make it any easier. After quite a long while and many many pictures I felt satisfied with what I had for those two spots and started heading back over the bridge.
Li had left me some time before because the wind and cold were too much for him and was waiting in the Port Terminal building on the other end of the bridge. The wind was coming from the South East-ish direction and the bridge runs East-West, so on our first crossing (which was on the North side of the bridge) we didn't feel the full effects of the wind. Well, I had a good half hour of intimate time with that wind on the South side while I fought to get the two shots I needed. I was lucky in that no one was there to block my shots, since no one in their right mind would cross on the South side when the North side was just as easily accessible. The wind here was some of the strongest I have ever seen in my life. I had to frequently actively work to not get knocked down by how strong it was, and on several occasions the gusts would be strong enough to actually lift up the little stones scattered about the walkway high enough to hit me in the face, and hard enough to make it really hurt. These two shots truly were a battle, but even after getting pummeled with gravel I said, "this is nothing!" :P (Ok, thats enough of those silly parodies).
By the time I finished with the bridge photos the sun was already starting to get lower in the sky. I hurried to meet up with Li, who had apparently found a small cosplay convention thing going on in part of the Port Terminal called CosOne. You had to pay to get in and it looked to be more of a modeling/photo shoot thing, so he just looked longingly through the opening in the curtains. There weren't many people there, I would say 20 or so. Their cosplay was quite good though, so after we left we decided to be super-creepy otaku and get some 'clandestine' photos. By 'clandestine' I mean we were about 150 yards away and noticed a bunch of them out on a walkway in plain sight, so I rested my camera on the railing and zoomed in almost to the max to take some photos. We were extremely conspicuous, and they definitely noticed us haha. I still got my pics though, so that's all that matters :P
With this we had one stop left for The Pilgrimage(TM), or rather what we could get done of it in the time we had, and so we hopped on the train at Sannomiya and went two stops away to Mikage station. The final photo we needed was of the intersection near Shirou's house. To get this picture was the ultimate challenge, since not even the pair of Japanese guys who found it knew where it was. Their directions said that they heard it was in this area so they took a bus and got off near here, then they wandered around for a few hours, got lost, and eventually found the place. Unfortunately, they were so lost that they had no clue where it was, just that it was somewhere near where they got off the bus. Following what little directions they had I was able to find the place on Google Maps using satellite view and street view, but when I went to save the location from street view I clicked the wrong button and completely lost the location. I spent quite a while finding it again and managed to save it correctly on my maps. To my dismay, when we followed my maps and got to the location we found that it was actually not the right place and I hadn't actually found the same place that I lost the first time, just something very similar. We roamed the area for the next couple hours until the sun set trying to find this place, and even found ourselves at one of the highest points in the city (this area was at the base/side of a very large hill and had a road that branched off and went almost up to the top and then looped back to connect to the other side of the neighborhood). By the time we reached the top of this hill it went from a walk to more of a climb. In the beginning a sign said it was around a 20 degree incline, but it must have been at least 40 by the time we got to the top because it got much steeper long after that sign. The view was amazing from the top, and we noticed that we were just about matched with the roof of the one skyscraper in the area. Then we wanted to cry as we realized that building was around 40 stories and we started from the same elevation. We wanted to cry even harder when I looked to our left and noticed that a half-mile away there were small apartment buildings who's bases were higher up the mountain than we were. Seriously, the people from Kobe must be mountain goats or something. I would die if I had to hike up that every day. The walk of shame back to the station was disheartening, but also beautiful since the city started lighting up. Then, we noticed that from our elevation we could see a place that might be what we were looking for. As if possessed, my tired and broken body took off running in that direction leaving Li behind and confused. I spent close to an hour roaming the area once more and at a much faster pace, and I even included a wholly different area south of the train tracks that we did not suspect our destination to be in. Finally, I accepted my defeat and walked back to the station in shame. Fortunately, Li had been spending his time in the conbini across the street from the station and had not abandoned me. Once we had reunited, we said goodbye to the wonderful yet harsh city of Kobe and made our way to Osaka for some normal sight seeing before going back to Kyoto.
Osaka:
Our goal in Osaka was to go see Osaka Castle all lit up at night. It took us a little while to figure out the Osaka train system, which is not easily deciphered. We finally got to the station closest to the castle around 9pm I think, and in order to get to the place we needed to go through the park, cross one of two bridges that go over the moat, then walk around to the gateway through the inner walls, until we finally reached the area immediately surrounding the castle. I can definitely see why this place was such a stronghold; I know I wouldn't want to be the guy trying to assault the place. Unless I had trebuchets. Trebuchets make everything better. So anyways, very shortly after arriving in the park a wild cat ran across our path, so I exclaimed "kitty!" and ran off after it while Li sighed and continued towards the castle. What, I'm having a huge cat deficiency, don't judge me >_>. The cat was hiding under a very low tree, so it took me about 15 minutes to slowly make my way up to it until I was within range of petting it. By this point, it didn't seem overly wary of me, but it was hard to judge its disposition. I tried petting it and it loved it, which made my day :D. After petting it for a while I resumed heading towards the castle, when a few minutes later I saw another wild cat sitting on a ledge nearby. I slowly walked up to this one, who was a little more talkative than the one before, and slowly reached out my hand towards it. I made the mistake of reaching out the same hand I had used to pet the other cat, so after sniffing my hand for a moment it let out this quick annoyed-sounding meow and ran off. On the way to the castle I saw several other cats, though these wouldn't let me close to them. The walls on this place were gigantic. I wish I could have gotten pictures of them, but it was dark and the lighting was terrible. I did get several pictures of the castle itself though, which looked really cool since they had spotlights positioned perfectly to light up every inch of it. The white walls of the castle with the black trim and roofs look really awesome, especially when it is contrasting with the night sky around it.
Finally, with our time running out, we made our way back to the station to head back to Kyoto. There must have been something going on, since food stands were everywhere on our side of the station. At this point Li and I realized we were starving, so we grabbed some soba, wolfed it down, and then continued to the train. With a little more understanding of how the system worked (and with fewer train choices) we fairly easily made our way back to the main station. This time, instead of taking the express back to Kyoto (which was packed) we decided on taking the local train back since our bodies were tired and broken from a very long day. Instead of a very uncomfortable 30 minutes standing on the express, we had a nice time sitting and sleeping on the local line for a little over an hour.
Back in Kyoto, it was about 11:15 and the hotel locked up at 12:30. The baths also closed at 12:30, and we desperately wanted one, so we hurried back and grabbed some kara'age from one of the many Lawsons around. When we passed the only arcade we had seen in all of Kyoto, we decided to head in for 15 minutes to play some fighting games before walking the remaining block to the hotel. This was actually my first time playing BlazBlue, and I must say I quite enjoy it. We also played a couple rounds of Fate/Unlimited Codes, which I have on my PSP but the buttons on the arcade machine weren't labeled so I had no idea how to do the few combos I could remember.
When we got to the hotel we quickly got ready for the bath and then soaked all of our pain away. No scotch, snacks, and TV for us tonight; we collapsed into our futons almost immediately upon returning to the room.
Tomorrow: Yukata & the 1,000 Torii Shrine
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Day 73 - March 20 - Kyoto Day 1
Kyoto!
So these three days were the school trip to Kyoto. Saturday morning through Monday evening (we had Monday and Tuesday off). I had to get up at 5:30am Saturday morning, which was excruciating and people are not meant to exist at that hour of the day. We all met up in the Shinagawa station at 7:30am and moved to the platform for our 8am-ish train. No normal train of course. We took the shinkansen (bullet train), which was awesome. The interior is basically the same as an airplane, except the leg room is MASSIVE. Seriously, it almost felt like too much legroom. Li and I sat on the side of the train where you can see Mt. Fuji, which was really cool. The area south of Tokyo is quite hilly and very beautiful. At several times I found myself wondering, "there are still so many people living out here, but what do they do?" Quite a distance out of the city the population density was low enough to where there were quite a few open fields, but still high enough to warrant the occasional apartment building. Mostly it was just a sea of houses though. What could all those people possibly do though?
The shinkansen travels very quickly (they call it a bullet train for a reason) and can go from Tokyo to Kyoto in about two hours. Check it out on a map; its no small distance. It goes so fast that the train actually needs to make fairly banked turns; enough that it was plainly noticeable inside the car. Anyways, I was absolutely exhausted from only getting 3 1/2 hours of sleep the night before - I don't quite remember why - so I spent the majority of the train ride sleeping. I was not alone it seems, since only a handful of the 40-something students stayed awake.
Today was the guided tour day, so immediately upon arrival in Kyoto we all board a tour bus and load our larger luggage into the bottom. I only brought my messenger bag and my backpack, so I kept them with me up top. On the way to our first destination, which was Arashiyama, we were given some bento boxes to eat on the bus for lunch. They were alright, significantly better than the ones on the camping trip. Once we got to Arashiyama, we all got off the bus and started walking as a group to our various tour destinations in the area. Our first stop was the Tenryuji Temple, which was very pretty and had some beautiful gardens. I took quite a few pictures of this place. Oh, that reminds me, I picked up a memory card for the good camera so I was dual-wielding cameras for almost the entire trip. The bigger/better one had enough space for ~1600 images while my little point-and-shoot had enough for ~700. I think I took around 1800 pictures over the whole trip, with just this one temple taking up around 200 of them. The gardens here were really beautiful. I love the temples in this country, the good ones give me a similar feeling to the 'real' castles of Scotland that I loved.
Our next stop was on the way back towards the bus (kind of), at Nomiya Shrine. As with all Shinto shrines, this place was very red. I don't remember what it was a shrine to, but it wasn't that big actually. There was no main building or structure to go inside, just a few little shrines off the side of this shaded back road. The walk there was interesting. Very shortly after leaving the main road we completely left civilization and were in the middle of a forest and/or bamboo thicket, with only a few houses scattered fairly far apart. As I mentioned before, the road was very shaded due to the trees, and the entrance to this shrine was very unimposing. It was a very simple entrance, with very small and simple shrines on a path inside. The area around the path was immaculate and very beautiful. I really hope the pictures do it justice.
For our third and final destination (in Arashiyama), we went to the Monkey Park across the very large river that ran through the area. The full name of the place is actually Arashiyama Monkey Park Iwatayama, but everyone just called it the Monkey Park. I was unaware of this until we started ascending, but apparently the actual observation area is at the top of the mountain - which was very tall - and we were at the bottom. After a painful and occasionally rather steep hike up this mountain (which was actually a pretty beautiful hike, except it was extremely hot) we made it to the observatory, and the monkeys. Oh my, there were monkeys everywhere. There was actually a 'rest area' house-thing at the observatory, and in the 'rest room' the top half of the walls were only an interlocked fence leading directly outside. Well, monkeys love to climb things and you can also feed them from inside this room (absolutely not outside of it though), so there were a good dozen monkeys just chillin' on the fence. It was pretty cool to watch while catching my breath and cooling down. Once I stepped outside and took a moment to look around I realized what an amazing view there was. The edge of the observation area was pretty much a cliff face, so there were no trees blocking the view of the entire city. There was also a secondary observation area a little higher up the hill which had an even better view. I took a lot of pictures at this park, and I mean a lot. At least 200 between both cameras. So anyways, it was pretty awesome watching the monkeys frolic about, urinate on the roof and almost hit someone under the edge (they knew what they were doing), and try to catch the Koi in the little pond. Right before I left to head back down they had feeding time. Now I know why they say you must absolutely not even hint that you have food on you outside the rest area, because those monkeys went INSANE. Fortunately, I have a video of it because there is no way images could catch how crazy this was.
Anyways, we were told before entering the park that we could leave whenever we wanted and do whatever in the area, just as long as we met up at 15:00. With about 30 minutes left until the deadline, Li and I began trying to complete our first objective for this trip: find and procure some yukata. We saw a shop that had some on our way to the Monkey Park, so we went back there. They had an alright selection, but the only ones that were affordable were pretty bland looking, so we opted to continue the search later. I then took some really nice pictures of the bridge and river, and the two of us got to the bus only a few minutes after the deadline.
Our 2nd to last tour destination was Kinkakuji, the Golden Pavilion. Since we were running pretty late and the grounds around the building weren't very interesting we decided to make this a very short stop, around 20 minutes I think it was. The Golden Pavilion is, as the name suggests, golden. The sun was already getting lower so the light reflecting off the building looked really cool, and of course I took a plethora of pictures.
We all then walked very briskly to our final destination, the Ryoanji Temple. The brisk walk was required because they stop letting people in at 1700, it was currently 1640, and it takes about 20 minutes to walk there. Fortunately, we managed to get there with about 5 minutes to spare, which gave us about 35 minutes to view the place. Unlike the Kinkakuji, the grounds around the Ryoanji Temple were very beautiful and certainly more appealing than the inside, which only offered a rock garden. It was a very large and very pretty rock garden, but the big lake and the trees around it outside were more appealing to me. Following in my trend, I took a great many pictures here.
Finally, we gathered back up and hopped on the bus, which took us to our lodgings for the weekend: Japanese-style Hotel Wakamiya. Here is their English website: http://www.kyoto-wakamiya.net/
This place was pretty cool, and not very far from Kyoto Station. The rooms were definitely traditional; tatami floors, a small table with cushions around it, and futons in the closet. A nice perk to the place is they push the table out of the way and set up your futons for you, then put them away in the morning after you leave.
We had the rest of the night to ourselves, but pretty much everyone went to the light-up event in Kiyumizudera, just in different groups. For those who don't know, the temple here is the one with the famous stage where people make a leap of faith/courage/suicide. Its very high up and the area blow isn't very forgiving, otherwise I would have tried. They say about 8 people do it a year, but there is only a 10% or so death rate. If you jump its pretty much guaranteed that you'll break both your legs though, and only that if you're lucky. Also at this temple were two very large and very heavy staffs with the rings at the top. They are held upright in this wooden rack, but are left so that you can still try to lift them. By the way, they are both solid metal, the smaller being about 1 1/2" in diameter and around 6' tall, the other having a rectangular shaft about 3" across and about 8' tall. Li said that the legend states that if you can lift these then you have the makings of a dragon-slayer (or something along those lines). I could easily lift the smaller one with one hand, but I couldn't get the larger one even a millimeter off the ground. Out of all the people I watched who tried, I don't think a single one was able to. This temple is also home to the famous lucky fountain/waterfall thing with three streams that come out from over the little roof and fall down into a small pool at the bottom. From left to right (when you are on the platform) they are: good fortune in love, good fortune in career, and good fortune in health. They have long ladles that you use to reach out and collect some water from the stream before moving on to the next. You are only allowed to drink from the streams once per year, and only from two of the three streams, otherwise you are too greedy and none of it will come true. Li didn't join us since he went last semester, but a couple other people and I waited in the (rather long) line to drink from the streams. I chose career first and then health second, since I don't need to rely on fortune for my relationship. Damnit, I need to find a job >_<. Hopefully this fortune helps me somehow. Oh, and Li got pics of me up there, which turned out well.
By the time we finished drinking from the streams the area was closing down, so we departed for our remaining two destinations for the night: Geishas in Gion (an area of Kyoto fairly close to Kiyumizudera) and an all-you-can-eat sukiyaki place that Li found online, which was fairly close to Gion as well. Unfortunately for us, our luck plunged like a rock at this point. Half-way to Gion it started raining lightly, and by the time we got there it was heavy enough that there was zero chance of any Geishas being out on the back streets. Well, technically it would be Maiko (Geisha in training) that would be out on the street, but close enough. We were saddened by this, but our ever-increasing hunger quickly dampened that. The side streets in the area were confusing, since there were more of them than on the map, so we ended up needing to stop at a Koban (Police box) to ask for directions. Fortunately the girl who was with us (I can't remember her name >_<) spoke better Japanese than the rest of us, so we were able to get through it fairly painlessly. Also, it turned out we were only about 100yds away from our destination when we asked, of course. Well, much like the roads in the area the building this place was in was also very confusing. We could not find any way that led up to this place, which was on the 5th floor, as the main staircase only went up to the 2nd. Down a back hallway we spotted an elevator, so we hopped in that and hit 5. Nothing. 4. Nothing. Hmm, maybe the elevator is just weird. 3. Ok, its moving! We get out at 3 and find ourselves in what looks to be a back stairwell, but that was fine with us since it still went up. The 4th floor was some hair salon or something, which seemed to be closed. This was pretty understandable for 10pm on a Saturday night. What was rather disconcerting was the boxes on the staircase going further up to the 5th floor. Of course, the door was locked with no sign visible to explain what was going on. Finally, we asked one of the guys who worked at the restaurant on the 2nd floor what was going on, and eventually we found out that for SOME reason that place was closed for the next few weeks, but he didn't know why. One would think that they would post something on their massive 5ft sign at ground level stating such, but no. Disheartened, we started wandering the back streets in search of some open restaurant.
Thus began my dislike for the way Kyoto operates. After about 20 minutes of wandering around and being greeted by dark storefronts, we came to the conclusion that even on one of biggest festivals of the year, where everyone is out in that area at night, AND on a Saturday night no less, Kyoto shuts down at 10pm. The hotel locks its doors at 12:30am, and it was currently around 11pm, so we just said "screw it" and went to McDonalds. That night was a disappointment, at least until we got back to the hotel and got into the bath, then everything just melted away. Also, since it was close to the time when they close the baths Li and I were the only ones in at the time. Once all our frustrations were melted away by the bath, we very quickly regressed into making VERY homoerotic innuendos and saying things that, if you were to only hear without the visual context, you would think something wholly different was happening. For example: we each sat at a washing station in the corner of the room so that we were perpendicular to each other. Li would dump the bucket of cold water on himself and a good amount would make it over to me, to which I would respond with a yelp of "oh god, YES. Oh I love it when you do that." True, the cold water felt extremely nice after getting out of the quite hot bath, however this dialogue could have been grossly misinterpreted. Things only went downhill from here.
To end the night, Li and I sat at the table in our room, each drinking some of the scotch we had brought with us while eating a portion of the mass-quantities of snacks we also brought with us, all while watching one of the many very odd Japanese game shows. Oh, and of course we were each wearing a yukata that was supplied with the room. God damn those things are comfortable. So yea, sakura-flavored Kit-Kats are absolutely wonderful. They taste of spring!
Coming up next: Kyoto Day 2: Kobe! -or- The Pilgrimage Continues!
Also, in case you don't know what a yukata is and are too lazy to look it up on Wikipedia (shame on you) I shall try to explain. A yukata is basically a thin light-weight kimono, but without the ungodly intricate designs and the beautifully designed (and also gigantic) obi (belts). They can still have very intricate designs, but nothing even remotely close to those crazy kimonos that are more like a painting than clothing. Also, the primary purposes of yukata are for comfort and also a casual form of a kimono, which is VERY formal. Its like wearing a suit that is also wearing a suit.
Here is a better explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yukata
So these three days were the school trip to Kyoto. Saturday morning through Monday evening (we had Monday and Tuesday off). I had to get up at 5:30am Saturday morning, which was excruciating and people are not meant to exist at that hour of the day. We all met up in the Shinagawa station at 7:30am and moved to the platform for our 8am-ish train. No normal train of course. We took the shinkansen (bullet train), which was awesome. The interior is basically the same as an airplane, except the leg room is MASSIVE. Seriously, it almost felt like too much legroom. Li and I sat on the side of the train where you can see Mt. Fuji, which was really cool. The area south of Tokyo is quite hilly and very beautiful. At several times I found myself wondering, "there are still so many people living out here, but what do they do?" Quite a distance out of the city the population density was low enough to where there were quite a few open fields, but still high enough to warrant the occasional apartment building. Mostly it was just a sea of houses though. What could all those people possibly do though?
The shinkansen travels very quickly (they call it a bullet train for a reason) and can go from Tokyo to Kyoto in about two hours. Check it out on a map; its no small distance. It goes so fast that the train actually needs to make fairly banked turns; enough that it was plainly noticeable inside the car. Anyways, I was absolutely exhausted from only getting 3 1/2 hours of sleep the night before - I don't quite remember why - so I spent the majority of the train ride sleeping. I was not alone it seems, since only a handful of the 40-something students stayed awake.
Today was the guided tour day, so immediately upon arrival in Kyoto we all board a tour bus and load our larger luggage into the bottom. I only brought my messenger bag and my backpack, so I kept them with me up top. On the way to our first destination, which was Arashiyama, we were given some bento boxes to eat on the bus for lunch. They were alright, significantly better than the ones on the camping trip. Once we got to Arashiyama, we all got off the bus and started walking as a group to our various tour destinations in the area. Our first stop was the Tenryuji Temple, which was very pretty and had some beautiful gardens. I took quite a few pictures of this place. Oh, that reminds me, I picked up a memory card for the good camera so I was dual-wielding cameras for almost the entire trip. The bigger/better one had enough space for ~1600 images while my little point-and-shoot had enough for ~700. I think I took around 1800 pictures over the whole trip, with just this one temple taking up around 200 of them. The gardens here were really beautiful. I love the temples in this country, the good ones give me a similar feeling to the 'real' castles of Scotland that I loved.
Our next stop was on the way back towards the bus (kind of), at Nomiya Shrine. As with all Shinto shrines, this place was very red. I don't remember what it was a shrine to, but it wasn't that big actually. There was no main building or structure to go inside, just a few little shrines off the side of this shaded back road. The walk there was interesting. Very shortly after leaving the main road we completely left civilization and were in the middle of a forest and/or bamboo thicket, with only a few houses scattered fairly far apart. As I mentioned before, the road was very shaded due to the trees, and the entrance to this shrine was very unimposing. It was a very simple entrance, with very small and simple shrines on a path inside. The area around the path was immaculate and very beautiful. I really hope the pictures do it justice.
For our third and final destination (in Arashiyama), we went to the Monkey Park across the very large river that ran through the area. The full name of the place is actually Arashiyama Monkey Park Iwatayama, but everyone just called it the Monkey Park. I was unaware of this until we started ascending, but apparently the actual observation area is at the top of the mountain - which was very tall - and we were at the bottom. After a painful and occasionally rather steep hike up this mountain (which was actually a pretty beautiful hike, except it was extremely hot) we made it to the observatory, and the monkeys. Oh my, there were monkeys everywhere. There was actually a 'rest area' house-thing at the observatory, and in the 'rest room' the top half of the walls were only an interlocked fence leading directly outside. Well, monkeys love to climb things and you can also feed them from inside this room (absolutely not outside of it though), so there were a good dozen monkeys just chillin' on the fence. It was pretty cool to watch while catching my breath and cooling down. Once I stepped outside and took a moment to look around I realized what an amazing view there was. The edge of the observation area was pretty much a cliff face, so there were no trees blocking the view of the entire city. There was also a secondary observation area a little higher up the hill which had an even better view. I took a lot of pictures at this park, and I mean a lot. At least 200 between both cameras. So anyways, it was pretty awesome watching the monkeys frolic about, urinate on the roof and almost hit someone under the edge (they knew what they were doing), and try to catch the Koi in the little pond. Right before I left to head back down they had feeding time. Now I know why they say you must absolutely not even hint that you have food on you outside the rest area, because those monkeys went INSANE. Fortunately, I have a video of it because there is no way images could catch how crazy this was.
Anyways, we were told before entering the park that we could leave whenever we wanted and do whatever in the area, just as long as we met up at 15:00. With about 30 minutes left until the deadline, Li and I began trying to complete our first objective for this trip: find and procure some yukata. We saw a shop that had some on our way to the Monkey Park, so we went back there. They had an alright selection, but the only ones that were affordable were pretty bland looking, so we opted to continue the search later. I then took some really nice pictures of the bridge and river, and the two of us got to the bus only a few minutes after the deadline.
Our 2nd to last tour destination was Kinkakuji, the Golden Pavilion. Since we were running pretty late and the grounds around the building weren't very interesting we decided to make this a very short stop, around 20 minutes I think it was. The Golden Pavilion is, as the name suggests, golden. The sun was already getting lower so the light reflecting off the building looked really cool, and of course I took a plethora of pictures.
We all then walked very briskly to our final destination, the Ryoanji Temple. The brisk walk was required because they stop letting people in at 1700, it was currently 1640, and it takes about 20 minutes to walk there. Fortunately, we managed to get there with about 5 minutes to spare, which gave us about 35 minutes to view the place. Unlike the Kinkakuji, the grounds around the Ryoanji Temple were very beautiful and certainly more appealing than the inside, which only offered a rock garden. It was a very large and very pretty rock garden, but the big lake and the trees around it outside were more appealing to me. Following in my trend, I took a great many pictures here.
Finally, we gathered back up and hopped on the bus, which took us to our lodgings for the weekend: Japanese-style Hotel Wakamiya. Here is their English website: http://www.kyoto-wakamiya.net/
This place was pretty cool, and not very far from Kyoto Station. The rooms were definitely traditional; tatami floors, a small table with cushions around it, and futons in the closet. A nice perk to the place is they push the table out of the way and set up your futons for you, then put them away in the morning after you leave.
We had the rest of the night to ourselves, but pretty much everyone went to the light-up event in Kiyumizudera, just in different groups. For those who don't know, the temple here is the one with the famous stage where people make a leap of faith/courage/suicide. Its very high up and the area blow isn't very forgiving, otherwise I would have tried. They say about 8 people do it a year, but there is only a 10% or so death rate. If you jump its pretty much guaranteed that you'll break both your legs though, and only that if you're lucky. Also at this temple were two very large and very heavy staffs with the rings at the top. They are held upright in this wooden rack, but are left so that you can still try to lift them. By the way, they are both solid metal, the smaller being about 1 1/2" in diameter and around 6' tall, the other having a rectangular shaft about 3" across and about 8' tall. Li said that the legend states that if you can lift these then you have the makings of a dragon-slayer (or something along those lines). I could easily lift the smaller one with one hand, but I couldn't get the larger one even a millimeter off the ground. Out of all the people I watched who tried, I don't think a single one was able to. This temple is also home to the famous lucky fountain/waterfall thing with three streams that come out from over the little roof and fall down into a small pool at the bottom. From left to right (when you are on the platform) they are: good fortune in love, good fortune in career, and good fortune in health. They have long ladles that you use to reach out and collect some water from the stream before moving on to the next. You are only allowed to drink from the streams once per year, and only from two of the three streams, otherwise you are too greedy and none of it will come true. Li didn't join us since he went last semester, but a couple other people and I waited in the (rather long) line to drink from the streams. I chose career first and then health second, since I don't need to rely on fortune for my relationship. Damnit, I need to find a job >_<. Hopefully this fortune helps me somehow. Oh, and Li got pics of me up there, which turned out well.
By the time we finished drinking from the streams the area was closing down, so we departed for our remaining two destinations for the night: Geishas in Gion (an area of Kyoto fairly close to Kiyumizudera) and an all-you-can-eat sukiyaki place that Li found online, which was fairly close to Gion as well. Unfortunately for us, our luck plunged like a rock at this point. Half-way to Gion it started raining lightly, and by the time we got there it was heavy enough that there was zero chance of any Geishas being out on the back streets. Well, technically it would be Maiko (Geisha in training) that would be out on the street, but close enough. We were saddened by this, but our ever-increasing hunger quickly dampened that. The side streets in the area were confusing, since there were more of them than on the map, so we ended up needing to stop at a Koban (Police box) to ask for directions. Fortunately the girl who was with us (I can't remember her name >_<) spoke better Japanese than the rest of us, so we were able to get through it fairly painlessly. Also, it turned out we were only about 100yds away from our destination when we asked, of course. Well, much like the roads in the area the building this place was in was also very confusing. We could not find any way that led up to this place, which was on the 5th floor, as the main staircase only went up to the 2nd. Down a back hallway we spotted an elevator, so we hopped in that and hit 5. Nothing. 4. Nothing. Hmm, maybe the elevator is just weird. 3. Ok, its moving! We get out at 3 and find ourselves in what looks to be a back stairwell, but that was fine with us since it still went up. The 4th floor was some hair salon or something, which seemed to be closed. This was pretty understandable for 10pm on a Saturday night. What was rather disconcerting was the boxes on the staircase going further up to the 5th floor. Of course, the door was locked with no sign visible to explain what was going on. Finally, we asked one of the guys who worked at the restaurant on the 2nd floor what was going on, and eventually we found out that for SOME reason that place was closed for the next few weeks, but he didn't know why. One would think that they would post something on their massive 5ft sign at ground level stating such, but no. Disheartened, we started wandering the back streets in search of some open restaurant.
Thus began my dislike for the way Kyoto operates. After about 20 minutes of wandering around and being greeted by dark storefronts, we came to the conclusion that even on one of biggest festivals of the year, where everyone is out in that area at night, AND on a Saturday night no less, Kyoto shuts down at 10pm. The hotel locks its doors at 12:30am, and it was currently around 11pm, so we just said "screw it" and went to McDonalds. That night was a disappointment, at least until we got back to the hotel and got into the bath, then everything just melted away. Also, since it was close to the time when they close the baths Li and I were the only ones in at the time. Once all our frustrations were melted away by the bath, we very quickly regressed into making VERY homoerotic innuendos and saying things that, if you were to only hear without the visual context, you would think something wholly different was happening. For example: we each sat at a washing station in the corner of the room so that we were perpendicular to each other. Li would dump the bucket of cold water on himself and a good amount would make it over to me, to which I would respond with a yelp of "oh god, YES. Oh I love it when you do that." True, the cold water felt extremely nice after getting out of the quite hot bath, however this dialogue could have been grossly misinterpreted. Things only went downhill from here.
To end the night, Li and I sat at the table in our room, each drinking some of the scotch we had brought with us while eating a portion of the mass-quantities of snacks we also brought with us, all while watching one of the many very odd Japanese game shows. Oh, and of course we were each wearing a yukata that was supplied with the room. God damn those things are comfortable. So yea, sakura-flavored Kit-Kats are absolutely wonderful. They taste of spring!
Coming up next: Kyoto Day 2: Kobe! -or- The Pilgrimage Continues!
Also, in case you don't know what a yukata is and are too lazy to look it up on Wikipedia (shame on you) I shall try to explain. A yukata is basically a thin light-weight kimono, but without the ungodly intricate designs and the beautifully designed (and also gigantic) obi (belts). They can still have very intricate designs, but nothing even remotely close to those crazy kimonos that are more like a painting than clothing. Also, the primary purposes of yukata are for comfort and also a casual form of a kimono, which is VERY formal. Its like wearing a suit that is also wearing a suit.
Here is a better explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yukata
Friday, March 5, 2010
Day 56 - March 3
Today was the school trip to Kamakura. Unfortunately, I was still extremely sleep deprived since Friday night I got very little sleep since I needed to be up at 6am, Saturday night was the camping trip and I got 4 1/2 hours of sleep, Sunday night I had to catch up on assignments and got 6 hours (not too bad), then Monday night I got 4 hours because I had a big assignment due on Tuesday. What made all that even more fun was the fact that the bus left from school at 8am this time, which means we needed to be there at 7:45am, which means I needed to get up at 5:45am DX.
Kamakura is an old town North(?) of Tokyo full of temples and shrines. It took us about an hour and a half to get there by bus, but supposedly it is just as easy to get there by train. I think I'll be taking Tsuki there while she's here, so that is useful information. We arrived at our first destination, the Kencho-ji temple, a little before 10am. This place was absolutely beautiful. The huge old wooden buildings and the immaculate grounds... just amazing. Once we got inside the main building the Buddhist monk who was going to be guiding us today met up with us and brought us all to the main meditation room. Here we all set out our little mats, shown how to set it up, then shown how to get into the lotus position, or half-lotus if you can't do the full one. After he instructed us on what to do and how to do it for a little while, the time finally came to start meditating. This was a very large room, and many of the rather large doors going directly outside where it was rather cold were wide open, thus making the very large room rather cold as well. Interestingly enough, after a short time meditating I couldn't feel the cold anymore. The monk stopped us around 15-20 minutes in and taught us about "the stick." It is usually portrayed that the head monk walks along the line of people meditating and hits the ones who are doing it wrong with this big stick. He told us that it is actually a willing thing, where the person meditating feels like their mind is straying and they need something to help them focus. They change their hand position to give the sign, he comes up, the both bow to each other, the person bends over their knees and arches their back, he hits them two times on each side, between the shoulder-blade and the spine, then they bow to each other again and the person resumes meditating. So basically its just a way of calling in an external force to help you concentrate. We then went on for another 15-20 minute meditation session, this time with him pacing with the stick. I only called him over once, but some people called him over a few times. He hits pretty hard, but it really does help. Anyways, we did a total of four sessions, which added up to around 80 minutes of meditating. Each time we had a break I immediately started feeling very cold again, but during the meditation it all went away. Also, after stretching enough I was able to get myself into the full lotus position by the third session, but I didn't want to do it because it was still hard enough to be distracting.
After the "Zazen Experience" we were guided to the dining hall and given a typical meal that the monks at the temple eat. This meal was very simple and, obviously, vegetarian. He instructed us on the etiquette of the whole process, which of course there was a whole process for, and then we got down to eating. Silently. That was one of the main rules, you do not talk during the meal. The food was alright, a couple of the things they gave us I just couldn't handle. There was this one thing that looked like little pieces of mulch (and possibly was) that was actually pretty good.
Once lunch was finished we were given about 30 minutes to wander the area freely before we had to move on to our next destination. Fortunately, I remembered my camera this time (unlike the camping trip, which I only had my cell phone camera for >_<), so I got a lot of pictures. I also picked up a couple little gifts for people back home. I'm not sure who those people are yet though...
Our next destination was about a 5 minute drive away: the Tsurugaokahachimangu Shrine. Yea, thats a mouthful. This place was a very large Shinto shrine with a lot of open space and big bright red buildings with bright yellow/gold accents. It was beautiful for a while, but then it just kind of started feeling gaudy. It didn't help that this place was obviously a tourist attraction. So, once we were given our two hour free time Li and I inquired about a shrine that was part of our Fate/Stay Night Pilgrimage that we heard was in the area. Apparently, it was back up the road past our previous stop, though they didn't know how far. They said if we left right then we might be able to make it back in time. Disheartened, Li and I spent about 45 minutes wandering around the Shinto shrine and taking pictures, then we started getting bored. So, we figured that if we were able to make it to the Meigetsuin shrine, an unknown distance away, in 25 minutes each way, that would leave us with about 5 minutes to see the place and get the pictures of the staircase for our Pilgrimage.
I'm very glad we did this, since the area between our starting point and ending point was the Japan I'd been longing to see. This wasn't Tokyo anymore, this was the real Japan, or pretty close to it. In our whole walk we didn't see a single other foreigner. Its hard to describe the atmosphere other than it being not Tokyo, but it was really nice. I took around 300 pictures during this trip, so there is plenty to see of the area. At 20 minutes into our walk (we had passed the first temple around 7 minutes in) we finally saw a sign that said Meigetsuin 300m ->. It ended up taking us almost exactly 25 minutes to get there, which means we had 5 minutes to completely absorb this place. Well, that didn't happen lol. This place is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen, and none of the plants were even in bloom yet! I can't describe it well, but it felt so... sacred. Where the other places were still sacred, it had diminished from the amount of tourists. In this place, there were maybe two other people who didn't work there. It felt a lot like the situation with the castles in Scotland. I loved the old ones that were maintained to keep them frozen in time, not restore them and turn them into fake tourist attractions like the Edinburgh Castle. This place wasn't falling apart - it was very well maintained - but it just felt like sacred ground, much like those old castle ruins.
Once we realized we had about 19 minutes to get back before the bus left, we came back to our senses and started getting out of there. Of course we took a barrage of photos of that staircase. On the way back I wanted to take pictures of so many things, but we just didn't have the time, so I ended up doing my best to take them while walking. For the most part they came out pretty good. Some I had to take blind (i.e. over my head facing the opposite direction, while walking), but even most of those came out well. It would seem the gods of that shrine had blessed us or something, because even with stopping at a vending machine to grab a few drinks we still made it back to the bus with 4 minutes to spare, and we never once ran or even jogged. Even more fortunately, we were not the last ones; there were still two girls who got on the bus about 3 minutes after we did.
Our final destination of the day was about a 20 minute drive away: the Great Buddha. This massive bronze Buddha was made some X amount of long times ago, to the point where the building that was built over it was destroyed and it was left out in the elements. Even the foundation was destroyed at one point, yet the statue still remained undamaged. They said this thing was big, and they weren't kidding. This statue was MASSIVE. I'm a horrible judge of feet, but if I had to guess I would say it was 50ft tall. Just look at the pictures on facebook, you'll be able to see how gigantic it is. I think his ear is as tall as I am. I got a lot of pictures of the statue, and shortly before we left I noticed that you could actually go inside the statue. I can now say that I have been inside Buddha! It was quite interesting, the whole thing is completely hollow. I didn't have time to read the sign inside telling how it was made, but I have a picture of it so I could read it later. As we headed back to the bus we got the one last thing we needed to make this a super-awesome-fantastic day: Sakura-flavored Ice Cream. How can an ice cream taste like a flower? It just does. I don't think I've had any ice cream that even remotely rivals that in taste and pure awesomeness in my entire life.
Finally, we got on the bus at 4pm and drove back to school. We took a different route this time, driving down the coastline so we could see the ocean, which was pretty cool. Come to think of it, the ocean was on our right, so we couldn't have been North of Tokyo. Oh well. Awesome trip though, and I definitely want to go back with Tsuki. I especially want to see the Meigetsuin in full-bloom and give it and the surrounding area the amount of time they deserve.
After we got back, Li and I had our daily Gundam, I stopped by the bank, then we each got back to our rooms at about 8pm I think. I then commenced writing up a Japanese assignment and creating the presentation/making notes/practicing for my 10 minute speech in Public Speaking tomorrow. So once again, I was only able to get about 4 1/2 hours of sleep. At least it was a good day.
Kamakura is an old town North(?) of Tokyo full of temples and shrines. It took us about an hour and a half to get there by bus, but supposedly it is just as easy to get there by train. I think I'll be taking Tsuki there while she's here, so that is useful information. We arrived at our first destination, the Kencho-ji temple, a little before 10am. This place was absolutely beautiful. The huge old wooden buildings and the immaculate grounds... just amazing. Once we got inside the main building the Buddhist monk who was going to be guiding us today met up with us and brought us all to the main meditation room. Here we all set out our little mats, shown how to set it up, then shown how to get into the lotus position, or half-lotus if you can't do the full one. After he instructed us on what to do and how to do it for a little while, the time finally came to start meditating. This was a very large room, and many of the rather large doors going directly outside where it was rather cold were wide open, thus making the very large room rather cold as well. Interestingly enough, after a short time meditating I couldn't feel the cold anymore. The monk stopped us around 15-20 minutes in and taught us about "the stick." It is usually portrayed that the head monk walks along the line of people meditating and hits the ones who are doing it wrong with this big stick. He told us that it is actually a willing thing, where the person meditating feels like their mind is straying and they need something to help them focus. They change their hand position to give the sign, he comes up, the both bow to each other, the person bends over their knees and arches their back, he hits them two times on each side, between the shoulder-blade and the spine, then they bow to each other again and the person resumes meditating. So basically its just a way of calling in an external force to help you concentrate. We then went on for another 15-20 minute meditation session, this time with him pacing with the stick. I only called him over once, but some people called him over a few times. He hits pretty hard, but it really does help. Anyways, we did a total of four sessions, which added up to around 80 minutes of meditating. Each time we had a break I immediately started feeling very cold again, but during the meditation it all went away. Also, after stretching enough I was able to get myself into the full lotus position by the third session, but I didn't want to do it because it was still hard enough to be distracting.
After the "Zazen Experience" we were guided to the dining hall and given a typical meal that the monks at the temple eat. This meal was very simple and, obviously, vegetarian. He instructed us on the etiquette of the whole process, which of course there was a whole process for, and then we got down to eating. Silently. That was one of the main rules, you do not talk during the meal. The food was alright, a couple of the things they gave us I just couldn't handle. There was this one thing that looked like little pieces of mulch (and possibly was) that was actually pretty good.
Once lunch was finished we were given about 30 minutes to wander the area freely before we had to move on to our next destination. Fortunately, I remembered my camera this time (unlike the camping trip, which I only had my cell phone camera for >_<), so I got a lot of pictures. I also picked up a couple little gifts for people back home. I'm not sure who those people are yet though...
Our next destination was about a 5 minute drive away: the Tsurugaokahachimangu Shrine. Yea, thats a mouthful. This place was a very large Shinto shrine with a lot of open space and big bright red buildings with bright yellow/gold accents. It was beautiful for a while, but then it just kind of started feeling gaudy. It didn't help that this place was obviously a tourist attraction. So, once we were given our two hour free time Li and I inquired about a shrine that was part of our Fate/Stay Night Pilgrimage that we heard was in the area. Apparently, it was back up the road past our previous stop, though they didn't know how far. They said if we left right then we might be able to make it back in time. Disheartened, Li and I spent about 45 minutes wandering around the Shinto shrine and taking pictures, then we started getting bored. So, we figured that if we were able to make it to the Meigetsuin shrine, an unknown distance away, in 25 minutes each way, that would leave us with about 5 minutes to see the place and get the pictures of the staircase for our Pilgrimage.
I'm very glad we did this, since the area between our starting point and ending point was the Japan I'd been longing to see. This wasn't Tokyo anymore, this was the real Japan, or pretty close to it. In our whole walk we didn't see a single other foreigner. Its hard to describe the atmosphere other than it being not Tokyo, but it was really nice. I took around 300 pictures during this trip, so there is plenty to see of the area. At 20 minutes into our walk (we had passed the first temple around 7 minutes in) we finally saw a sign that said Meigetsuin 300m ->. It ended up taking us almost exactly 25 minutes to get there, which means we had 5 minutes to completely absorb this place. Well, that didn't happen lol. This place is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen, and none of the plants were even in bloom yet! I can't describe it well, but it felt so... sacred. Where the other places were still sacred, it had diminished from the amount of tourists. In this place, there were maybe two other people who didn't work there. It felt a lot like the situation with the castles in Scotland. I loved the old ones that were maintained to keep them frozen in time, not restore them and turn them into fake tourist attractions like the Edinburgh Castle. This place wasn't falling apart - it was very well maintained - but it just felt like sacred ground, much like those old castle ruins.
Once we realized we had about 19 minutes to get back before the bus left, we came back to our senses and started getting out of there. Of course we took a barrage of photos of that staircase. On the way back I wanted to take pictures of so many things, but we just didn't have the time, so I ended up doing my best to take them while walking. For the most part they came out pretty good. Some I had to take blind (i.e. over my head facing the opposite direction, while walking), but even most of those came out well. It would seem the gods of that shrine had blessed us or something, because even with stopping at a vending machine to grab a few drinks we still made it back to the bus with 4 minutes to spare, and we never once ran or even jogged. Even more fortunately, we were not the last ones; there were still two girls who got on the bus about 3 minutes after we did.
Our final destination of the day was about a 20 minute drive away: the Great Buddha. This massive bronze Buddha was made some X amount of long times ago, to the point where the building that was built over it was destroyed and it was left out in the elements. Even the foundation was destroyed at one point, yet the statue still remained undamaged. They said this thing was big, and they weren't kidding. This statue was MASSIVE. I'm a horrible judge of feet, but if I had to guess I would say it was 50ft tall. Just look at the pictures on facebook, you'll be able to see how gigantic it is. I think his ear is as tall as I am. I got a lot of pictures of the statue, and shortly before we left I noticed that you could actually go inside the statue. I can now say that I have been inside Buddha! It was quite interesting, the whole thing is completely hollow. I didn't have time to read the sign inside telling how it was made, but I have a picture of it so I could read it later. As we headed back to the bus we got the one last thing we needed to make this a super-awesome-fantastic day: Sakura-flavored Ice Cream. How can an ice cream taste like a flower? It just does. I don't think I've had any ice cream that even remotely rivals that in taste and pure awesomeness in my entire life.
Finally, we got on the bus at 4pm and drove back to school. We took a different route this time, driving down the coastline so we could see the ocean, which was pretty cool. Come to think of it, the ocean was on our right, so we couldn't have been North of Tokyo. Oh well. Awesome trip though, and I definitely want to go back with Tsuki. I especially want to see the Meigetsuin in full-bloom and give it and the surrounding area the amount of time they deserve.
After we got back, Li and I had our daily Gundam, I stopped by the bank, then we each got back to our rooms at about 8pm I think. I then commenced writing up a Japanese assignment and creating the presentation/making notes/practicing for my 10 minute speech in Public Speaking tomorrow. So once again, I was only able to get about 4 1/2 hours of sleep. At least it was a good day.
Day 52-53 - Feb 27-28
This weekend was the Culture Exchange Camping trip; a two day weekend trip to get out of Tokyo and exchange some culture with native Japanese students at TUJ. The trip took place in a campground park kind of place (similar to Onanda Park for those who know it) in Ibaraki. We had to be at the school at 8am to depart, which means I needed to get up at 6am. Human beings are not meant to be alive at that hour of the day. Li and I grumbled our way to the back of the bus, reclined our seats, and did our best to pass out. On the way there, this girl came back and introduced herself to us and this other girl who was nearby. Interestingly enough, her name is McKenna. After a little while we got talking about our heritage, and it turns out she is Scottish as well. Apparently her practically white hair is naturally very red. She also said that her family is very proud of its heritage, possibly too much, which I found interesting. Eventually she got called back up by her friend (maybe bf? I still can't figure it out) and I resumed my passing out.
The place we stayed at in Ibaraki was only heated in some places. Namely, the rooms, the gym, and the kitchen. There was also a few super-space heaters in this big meeting room, which is where we went upon arrival. We spent several minutes waiting there all sitting around in front of this white board that was mostly blank. Several people made the analogy to Battle Royale. Fortunately, when the guy showed up he wasn't wheeling in a couple dozen bags of weapons/supplies. We were told the rules of the place, and then told which rooms we were going to be in. There were 6 people per room, and I was rooming with Li, Winston, Sean, Tony (McKenna's friend), and Takuya (native). The rooms were set up with bunk beds, but not normal bunk beds. These were each the size of one tatami mat and in fact had a tatami mat in each one. Basically, we needed to set our beds up like a traditional futon on the ground, except in a bunk (the bunk part made it rather difficult).
Once our rooms were set up, we all met in the kitchen and were each given a bento for lunch. The bento was pretty bad, which was unanimously agreed upon. Afterward we were broken up into different groups for a scavenger hunt type of thing. I was with McKenna, two native girls who's names I can't remember, and another guy who's name I do know but is escaping me at the moment. We were given a copy of a hand-drawn map of the area around the building, which had a couple dozen small circles drawn scattered around the area. At each circle was a sign with a number and a katakana. We were to randomly place the numbers 1-25 in this grid at the bottom of the map. Basically we were playing a cross between bingo and a scavenger hunt. We were given two-ish hours to find them all. Our group stayed together for a little while, and then ended up getting separated along the way. I wandered deep down into this ravine, eventually realizing that I had definitely gone too far (probably a mile and a half away) when I got to a bamboo grove at the base of the ravine. Not wanting to scramble my way up the somewhat steep and rather muddy path (it had rained most of the morning), since I had already fallen once and gotten mud all over my nice white hoodie, I recalled a similar situation in Hawaii. So, I broke off a good walking-stick size bamboo stalk and hiked my way back up. The area was really pretty and I rather enjoyed my hikes through it. At a few points I caught up with other members of my group and we exchanged info on the signs we had seen, eventually getting it to the person with the clipboard and the map. When they called us all back in we were pretty well exhausted. They must have anticipated this, since they actually made a small banner with two long poles holding it up that said "GOAL." Nearly every single person who came up to that area did a slow-motion run through the goal, and most did this without seeing anyone else do it. My group was tied for 2nd place, but we had the moral victory since all the other groups were texting each other, and we did it the natural way.
Once the hike had finished we had two hours of free time, so just about everyone went to the gym (since we were so exhausted lol). We got a really nice size game of dodgeball going, and I actually did really well in the beginning. As I got more tired though, my ability to catch balls thrown at me diminished. I only got hit once though; in all the rounds we played the only reason I got out was because I failed to catch a ball.
After dodgeball we got back with our hiking groups and were brought outside and told how to make our dinner: Curry Rice. We broke the jobs up amongst the members of our groups, and I was fortunate enough to get the job of building and then maintaining the fire, which also included keeping track of what we had cooking on the grill above it. The whole cooking process took us about two hours, leaving us rather starving by the time we got to eat. I was quite surprised, the curry rice was really good. They made it really spicy though, so by the time I got half way through the curry part I couldn't take any more. Also, half-way was a lot since somehow we ended up with a lot more than everyone else, as our servings were - in some cases - overflowing from our plates. Once we had finished eating we commenced cleaning, which brought me back to building/tending to the fire since we were heating the bowls which were filled with water to help them clean more easily.
Since the sun had set and our dinner event was complete, it was time for the bonfire. The people at the camp had set up a real nice bonfire for us, with the wood itself being around 4 feet high which made the flames around 10'. Nahomi (the advisor/supervisor lady, who is awesome btw) brought the fixin's for smores. With the fire as massive as it was though, most of the people had trouble getting close enough to cook their marshmallows. Even with a stick half as long as theirs I had no problem walking right up to it and sticking my 'mallow right in the flames, I guess because I have a high pain tolerance for heat or something. After I had consumed my third smore and didn't want anymore I started helping some of the girls who were having trouble with theirs. Oh, and did I mention in a previous post that Li and I bought flasks? Mine is red plaid and Li's is beige. We had each filled ours with the most appropriate fluid: scotch. Unfortunately, I discovered that mine actually had a small leak in it. This wasn't a problem as long as it was sealed, but as soon as I opened the cap it started dripping out the bottom. I need to fix that sometime soon, since I'll need it for Fuji. Anyways, as the fire died down we were all chatting etc., and I had the idea that I wanted to jump over it. The bonfire was within a ring of stones about 6 feet in diameter. Within the ring the ground was recessed about 6 inches to make a mini-fire pit. I knew that I could easily cover the distance, but my main concern was the height since I'm terrible at vertical jumping. After contemplating it for a while, Tony (who is about 6'5") jumped over it since no one else was. He barely made the distance though; another couple inches back and he would have fallen back into the fire or at the very least hurt his ankle badly. Of course, this just could not stand. So I waited a little longer for this one log that had since fallen so that it stuck straight up in the middle to get brittle enough that I could break it. Once I had done so, off I went. I easily covered the distance, making it about a foot farther than the opposite side of the ring, but it seems it was a good idea for me to wait since I cleared the top by barely a couple inches. McKenna was going to record it, but wasn't paying attention, so at her request I immediately turned around and did it again. I'm currently trying to get that video from her since I have found her on facebook.
Around 8:30pm we all got back to our rooms and were told that the lights in the halls would be shut off at 10pm, and we had until 9:30 to get our baths. Knowing that everyone was going to rush to the bath, Li and I instead made our beds and waited until 9:15 to get to the bath. This was a good decision, since it was completely empty and we had the whole place to ourselves. I'm quite surprised; I was not expecting to enjoy this public bath system as much as I do. I really really like it, and its probably one of the biggest things I'm going to miss about this country. Its very hard to explain to someone who hasn't done it. Its just a wonderful experience.
At about 10pm we got kicked out of the bath and made our way through the dark halls back to our room, where we found out that just about everyone was hanging out in a lounge farther down the hall. Li and I joined the party, and hung out there until about 2am, even though we needed to be up at 6:30. Rebecca Mock (who lives down the hall from me here) taught me Egyptian Rat Screw, which was quite enjoyable and reminded me of Set at the points where I would fail to slap the cards fast enough. Also, I got talking to this guy name Yuuki. Apparently Yuuki isn't a TUJ student, and was invited somehow to come along on the trip. He is actually a student at the Tokyo Science University, and even though he is studying there he wants to someday become a novelist or a writer for video games. You can see how this very quickly became relevant to my interests. Anyways, we stayed up talking with him about books, movies, and video games for many hours on end. When we finally went to bed we exchanged cell phone numbers, and I have sent him a few messages since then we've exchanged emails as well so we can keep in touch.
6:30am hurt, a lot. We had to clean up our rooms and fold up our beds, and then get our belongings and bring them down to the big meeting room. After leaving them there, we all moved on to the kitchen to consume breakfast. I don't really remember what it entailed, but it was alright. Certainly better than the bento from yesterday. Once we had finished breakfast we had until 11:30am for free time, so off to the nearest couch I went. I woke up at about 9:30 and went to the gym where most people were, apparently. Oh, and during breakfast it was sleeting rather badly. Around 10am it had shifted to snow, and was coming down even harder. During the time in the gym I played table tennis against this native Japanese girl, who was pretty good, then this native Japanese guy, who was very good, then against Li, who was about as good as me but couldn't serve as well. Our saving grace from the cold was Nahomi, who decided that instead of have everyone go outside and freeze while we made our lunch of Yakisoba, only the student helpers would be forced to go, along with any students who wanted to. Naturally, Li and I did not want to. I realized an opportunity and busted out my poi for the first time in a very long time. After a while I was finally able to master the 9-beat weave! My transitions have also gotten better.
Around 12:30 we were told food was ready, but we needed to go outside to eat it. Myself and about 4 other people, one of whom was Li, decided that it wasn't worth it and we would rather huddle around the heater in the big meeting room. Pretty much all of us took a nap, and awoke at 1:30pm when everyone came back inside for the final event of our trip: candle making. Apparently candle making really meant painting these odd cone-shaped candles, then dipping them in boiling wax to seal the paint. We all spent the next hour and a half painting our candles and such. I made mine a flame, with red at the tip, then fading to orange, then to yellow for the majority of it, then blue, then I ran out of time and couldn't figure out how to make clear on a slightly-pink candle so I just made it grey. Holy crap some people are extremely talented. Anyways, we got a big group photo out in front of the building and then hopped on the bus and went home. We returned at about 5pm, Li and I went for our daily Gundam, grabbed some groceries, and finally settled into our rooms at about 7:30pm.
All in all it was a pretty eventful trip. Oh, and apparently the reason it was so rainy/cold was because there was a Tsunami on the way and it was pushing cold wet air ahead of it. Somewhat fortunately it was going to hit only Hokkaido, but I kind of wanted to go see it since they said there would be 10' waves. Oh well, maybe there will be another before I leave.
PS: I forgot to mention two things.
1.) During breakfast one thing we had was called Kinpira Gobo, which was actually quite good.
2.) The native Japanese students were playing this card game Saturday night called Daihinmin. Turns out its almost exactly like the game "Presidents and Assholes" here, except there is an Uno element in the form of a reverse card.
The place we stayed at in Ibaraki was only heated in some places. Namely, the rooms, the gym, and the kitchen. There was also a few super-space heaters in this big meeting room, which is where we went upon arrival. We spent several minutes waiting there all sitting around in front of this white board that was mostly blank. Several people made the analogy to Battle Royale. Fortunately, when the guy showed up he wasn't wheeling in a couple dozen bags of weapons/supplies. We were told the rules of the place, and then told which rooms we were going to be in. There were 6 people per room, and I was rooming with Li, Winston, Sean, Tony (McKenna's friend), and Takuya (native). The rooms were set up with bunk beds, but not normal bunk beds. These were each the size of one tatami mat and in fact had a tatami mat in each one. Basically, we needed to set our beds up like a traditional futon on the ground, except in a bunk (the bunk part made it rather difficult).
Once our rooms were set up, we all met in the kitchen and were each given a bento for lunch. The bento was pretty bad, which was unanimously agreed upon. Afterward we were broken up into different groups for a scavenger hunt type of thing. I was with McKenna, two native girls who's names I can't remember, and another guy who's name I do know but is escaping me at the moment. We were given a copy of a hand-drawn map of the area around the building, which had a couple dozen small circles drawn scattered around the area. At each circle was a sign with a number and a katakana. We were to randomly place the numbers 1-25 in this grid at the bottom of the map. Basically we were playing a cross between bingo and a scavenger hunt. We were given two-ish hours to find them all. Our group stayed together for a little while, and then ended up getting separated along the way. I wandered deep down into this ravine, eventually realizing that I had definitely gone too far (probably a mile and a half away) when I got to a bamboo grove at the base of the ravine. Not wanting to scramble my way up the somewhat steep and rather muddy path (it had rained most of the morning), since I had already fallen once and gotten mud all over my nice white hoodie, I recalled a similar situation in Hawaii. So, I broke off a good walking-stick size bamboo stalk and hiked my way back up. The area was really pretty and I rather enjoyed my hikes through it. At a few points I caught up with other members of my group and we exchanged info on the signs we had seen, eventually getting it to the person with the clipboard and the map. When they called us all back in we were pretty well exhausted. They must have anticipated this, since they actually made a small banner with two long poles holding it up that said "GOAL." Nearly every single person who came up to that area did a slow-motion run through the goal, and most did this without seeing anyone else do it. My group was tied for 2nd place, but we had the moral victory since all the other groups were texting each other, and we did it the natural way.
Once the hike had finished we had two hours of free time, so just about everyone went to the gym (since we were so exhausted lol). We got a really nice size game of dodgeball going, and I actually did really well in the beginning. As I got more tired though, my ability to catch balls thrown at me diminished. I only got hit once though; in all the rounds we played the only reason I got out was because I failed to catch a ball.
After dodgeball we got back with our hiking groups and were brought outside and told how to make our dinner: Curry Rice. We broke the jobs up amongst the members of our groups, and I was fortunate enough to get the job of building and then maintaining the fire, which also included keeping track of what we had cooking on the grill above it. The whole cooking process took us about two hours, leaving us rather starving by the time we got to eat. I was quite surprised, the curry rice was really good. They made it really spicy though, so by the time I got half way through the curry part I couldn't take any more. Also, half-way was a lot since somehow we ended up with a lot more than everyone else, as our servings were - in some cases - overflowing from our plates. Once we had finished eating we commenced cleaning, which brought me back to building/tending to the fire since we were heating the bowls which were filled with water to help them clean more easily.
Since the sun had set and our dinner event was complete, it was time for the bonfire. The people at the camp had set up a real nice bonfire for us, with the wood itself being around 4 feet high which made the flames around 10'. Nahomi (the advisor/supervisor lady, who is awesome btw) brought the fixin's for smores. With the fire as massive as it was though, most of the people had trouble getting close enough to cook their marshmallows. Even with a stick half as long as theirs I had no problem walking right up to it and sticking my 'mallow right in the flames, I guess because I have a high pain tolerance for heat or something. After I had consumed my third smore and didn't want anymore I started helping some of the girls who were having trouble with theirs. Oh, and did I mention in a previous post that Li and I bought flasks? Mine is red plaid and Li's is beige. We had each filled ours with the most appropriate fluid: scotch. Unfortunately, I discovered that mine actually had a small leak in it. This wasn't a problem as long as it was sealed, but as soon as I opened the cap it started dripping out the bottom. I need to fix that sometime soon, since I'll need it for Fuji. Anyways, as the fire died down we were all chatting etc., and I had the idea that I wanted to jump over it. The bonfire was within a ring of stones about 6 feet in diameter. Within the ring the ground was recessed about 6 inches to make a mini-fire pit. I knew that I could easily cover the distance, but my main concern was the height since I'm terrible at vertical jumping. After contemplating it for a while, Tony (who is about 6'5") jumped over it since no one else was. He barely made the distance though; another couple inches back and he would have fallen back into the fire or at the very least hurt his ankle badly. Of course, this just could not stand. So I waited a little longer for this one log that had since fallen so that it stuck straight up in the middle to get brittle enough that I could break it. Once I had done so, off I went. I easily covered the distance, making it about a foot farther than the opposite side of the ring, but it seems it was a good idea for me to wait since I cleared the top by barely a couple inches. McKenna was going to record it, but wasn't paying attention, so at her request I immediately turned around and did it again. I'm currently trying to get that video from her since I have found her on facebook.
Around 8:30pm we all got back to our rooms and were told that the lights in the halls would be shut off at 10pm, and we had until 9:30 to get our baths. Knowing that everyone was going to rush to the bath, Li and I instead made our beds and waited until 9:15 to get to the bath. This was a good decision, since it was completely empty and we had the whole place to ourselves. I'm quite surprised; I was not expecting to enjoy this public bath system as much as I do. I really really like it, and its probably one of the biggest things I'm going to miss about this country. Its very hard to explain to someone who hasn't done it. Its just a wonderful experience.
At about 10pm we got kicked out of the bath and made our way through the dark halls back to our room, where we found out that just about everyone was hanging out in a lounge farther down the hall. Li and I joined the party, and hung out there until about 2am, even though we needed to be up at 6:30. Rebecca Mock (who lives down the hall from me here) taught me Egyptian Rat Screw, which was quite enjoyable and reminded me of Set at the points where I would fail to slap the cards fast enough. Also, I got talking to this guy name Yuuki. Apparently Yuuki isn't a TUJ student, and was invited somehow to come along on the trip. He is actually a student at the Tokyo Science University, and even though he is studying there he wants to someday become a novelist or a writer for video games. You can see how this very quickly became relevant to my interests. Anyways, we stayed up talking with him about books, movies, and video games for many hours on end. When we finally went to bed we exchanged cell phone numbers, and I have sent him a few messages since then we've exchanged emails as well so we can keep in touch.
6:30am hurt, a lot. We had to clean up our rooms and fold up our beds, and then get our belongings and bring them down to the big meeting room. After leaving them there, we all moved on to the kitchen to consume breakfast. I don't really remember what it entailed, but it was alright. Certainly better than the bento from yesterday. Once we had finished breakfast we had until 11:30am for free time, so off to the nearest couch I went. I woke up at about 9:30 and went to the gym where most people were, apparently. Oh, and during breakfast it was sleeting rather badly. Around 10am it had shifted to snow, and was coming down even harder. During the time in the gym I played table tennis against this native Japanese girl, who was pretty good, then this native Japanese guy, who was very good, then against Li, who was about as good as me but couldn't serve as well. Our saving grace from the cold was Nahomi, who decided that instead of have everyone go outside and freeze while we made our lunch of Yakisoba, only the student helpers would be forced to go, along with any students who wanted to. Naturally, Li and I did not want to. I realized an opportunity and busted out my poi for the first time in a very long time. After a while I was finally able to master the 9-beat weave! My transitions have also gotten better.
Around 12:30 we were told food was ready, but we needed to go outside to eat it. Myself and about 4 other people, one of whom was Li, decided that it wasn't worth it and we would rather huddle around the heater in the big meeting room. Pretty much all of us took a nap, and awoke at 1:30pm when everyone came back inside for the final event of our trip: candle making. Apparently candle making really meant painting these odd cone-shaped candles, then dipping them in boiling wax to seal the paint. We all spent the next hour and a half painting our candles and such. I made mine a flame, with red at the tip, then fading to orange, then to yellow for the majority of it, then blue, then I ran out of time and couldn't figure out how to make clear on a slightly-pink candle so I just made it grey. Holy crap some people are extremely talented. Anyways, we got a big group photo out in front of the building and then hopped on the bus and went home. We returned at about 5pm, Li and I went for our daily Gundam, grabbed some groceries, and finally settled into our rooms at about 7:30pm.
All in all it was a pretty eventful trip. Oh, and apparently the reason it was so rainy/cold was because there was a Tsunami on the way and it was pushing cold wet air ahead of it. Somewhat fortunately it was going to hit only Hokkaido, but I kind of wanted to go see it since they said there would be 10' waves. Oh well, maybe there will be another before I leave.
PS: I forgot to mention two things.
1.) During breakfast one thing we had was called Kinpira Gobo, which was actually quite good.
2.) The native Japanese students were playing this card game Saturday night called Daihinmin. Turns out its almost exactly like the game "Presidents and Assholes" here, except there is an Uno element in the form of a reverse card.
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