Enjoying Simple Pleasures

These days have been treating me well, perhaps to make up for the Nine Week Silence. I went with friends to a beautiful organic Japanese restaurant in Koide a few days ago. It was located in a gorgeous old fashioned Japanese building, complete with a pond and traditional garden. Inside, the ambiance was amazing in every detail, and they offered things like sakura scones and imported pastas and soya. The menu sounded so delicious cover to cover that deciding was an extremely painful experience. I ended up with a Tempeh Burger, and was not a mite disappointed.

Today, my cycling buddy messaged me shortly after class and we met with our bikes to face the ‘chance of rain’ forecast. It was perfect cycling weather, except for the unusually strong winds which actually pushed us around a lot! We went to the park and explored every corner. I bought some veggies at my favorite veggie vendor, after which the two of us sat out by the pond taking in the view. Luckily, she was up for fuwa-fuwa dome after a while, and we spent half an hour or so enjoying the bizarre trampoline and laughing like children. It was very refreshing. Check out the quality of this cell phone shot from the park!

After riding around the park for a bit, we caught a bite to eat for lunch at Budou no Hana and then headed back to campus. We took a totally new route neither of us had explored before, and found an enormous and beautiful old sakura tree, as well as a whole huge line of younger trees planted not 15 minutes from campus. They were all in bloom, and looked amazing against the still snow-capped mountains.

I think after today we have a pact to go to the park at least once a week. I’m looking forward to next time already.

A Day Without Shoes! (but with a bicycle)

April 8th is the Toms Shoes event – a day without shoes. This is an awareness raising campaign seeking to highlight the health problems caused for children in developing countries and poorer regions of the world, most of whom grow up without shoes. Learn more at their website: One Day Without Shoes.

I’m participating, although I didn’t get the rest of my act together ahead of time in order to drum up support on campus (there’s still next year!). It really snuck up on me. Anyways, we do still have snow on the ground, but today has been one of the clearest and therefore warmest days we have had in ages. It is fully 50 glorious degrees fahrenheit, and feels warmer with the sun filling up the cloudless sky.

To take advantage of this good fortune a friend and I took a bike ride. It was a little awkward riding without shoes at first (I threw some in my basket just in case), but I adjusted soon enough. We spent and hour and a half of the warmest part of the day basking in the gorgeous changing landscape around us, and exploring previously unknown roads that hug the curves of a nearby mountain. Here are some cell phone shots I took today:

And this last bit is where I walked through the puddles formed by melting snow. We couldn’t stop laughing at my footprints. It was a lot of fun.

Winter in Urasa (a photo post)

Many photos taken in Urasa and on campus over the past two weeks. Rumor has it that the snow is going to end early this year, sometime in February instead of March. I’m not entirely convinced, but only time will tell.

(a view from my dorm)

(the sidewalk, nearly transformed into a tunnel)

(Urasa with blue skies as seen from the soba stall in the station.  This is basically the entire town.)

(someone’s bike)

(the view from Urasa)

(those rare blue skies allowed these trees to shed their frosting)

(a view from the bridge, down to the river)

おしまい

Some snow in Snow Country

The second snow came this week after dark, and we watched the snow fall in a huge, thick shower of flakes. The light of the lamppost reflected off of each falling spot, creating an otherworldly affect – it almost felt like flying. The next morning we took a walk through the snow, and admired the frosted look it gave to the surrounding mountains. This was not my first snow, but it was certainly the most magical yet. And I am looking forward to the build up of snow that should occur in the coming months – this is “雪国 (yukiguni)” or Snow Country after all.