After an arduous journey, including 13.5 hours of layover in the Toronto airport, a night in Tokyo at a precious hikers/youth hostel and hours on trains, I’m back. Niigata greeted me with refreshingly cool air, a relief from the heat and humidity Tokyo had offered. It feels great to be back in Japan. I always find myself brimming with a mixture of relief, excitement and wonder anew when returning to Japan. There is something about this country, her people and their lifestyle that makes me feel perfectly comfortable and at home.
My first night back I stayed at the Khaosan Tokyo Samurai, the newest of the Khaosan Tokyo hostel chain’s locations in Asakusa. There are a ton of hostel chains in Tokyo to chose from, but based on my experience I think the Khaosan brand is the best. They win out in terms of cleanliness, safety, atmosphere, customer service, and even generally location. You would be hard pressed to find a more inviting hostel, with nicer facilities, friendlier staff or such a great value. The Sakura group of hostels, hotels and apartments are much more heavily advertised, and comparably priced. However, I have not enjoyed my experiences with Sakura nearly as much as those with Khaosan. This time, the Khaosan Samurai staff gave out going away gifts of a piece of candy inside of an origami bird. They also have their own bar a few blocks away, and offer a free drink ticket when you arrive.
Other than resting up in my hostel, I also met with a friend and former classmate for dinner in Shinagawa, and made it out to Akihabara’s Yodobashi Camera to finally buy a camera. After years of wanting to move up to a DSLR, I’ve finally bitten the bullet. I took the death of my late Canon Powershot as a sign that I needed to take the next step – and I don’t regret it. After handling all of the cameras on my list of candidates, I decided on the Nikon D5000. It will take some time to fully acclimate to the button layout, and to navigate all of the menus, but I’m enjoying it already. I’m already planning on a macro lens and a wide-angle lens purchase in the near future. Happy early early birthday to myself!
All in all I had a great summer. It was to short, and obviously I didn’t get to spend as much time as I would have liked with everyone I wanted to see. However, I managed three weekends with the fiance – between that and celebrating marriage in Tennessee, a half-century birthday in Georgia, and spending time with the elusive and rare Democrat in South Carolina, it was a good summer. I miss ya’ll already (but I’m also excited to get started with this new school year). ‘Till next time!
Between not having a camera and being super busy with classes, it has been a challenge to simultaneously muster both the energy and the desire to update this blog. The truth is there has been plenty to say! A few weeks ago we had a festival on campus called Open Day. That was a lot of fun, especially watching all of the performances. I was in one, the Yoga dance, but some of my friends were in four different performances! Amazing!
The following week we had the IUJ Olympics, in which I grudgingly participated. The truth is, though I admit I wasn’t terribly excited about it at first, it turned out to be a blast! My team was very laid back, and it was completely enjoyable. I played soccer during the Olympics, and while we’d run drills with the Ladies’ Soccer club in previous terms, this was the first actual playing I’ve done in years (almost a decade, even).
Last weekend I went to Tokyo for a going away party – it was an extremely short trip, but also very enjoyable. Here are some things we saw/did in Tokyo:
A man walking a monkey down a busy shopping street
Watched some very serious Grease Lightning dancers, decked out in period outfits and complete with serious pompadours
People practicing trick frisbee moves
Saw a bizarre instrument being played in Yoyogi park
So now I’m back in my village, packing up my things and suffering from a cold (I believe it was caused by the shock of city air – the air here is so amazingly clean). I hope it will clear up between now and Friday, and I’m not looking forward to airports and planes while sick, but there is very little I can do about it. Thankfully, all of this bed rest may prevent the effects of jet lag (I’m sleeping during the day!).
I’m back from spring break, and I had a great time. I went to Tokyo for a few days and stayed with two lovely friends. I joined in on a trip to Showa Kinen Koen, a huge and gorgeous park in the Tokyo suburbs. There, we soaked up the perfect weather, the view of the lovely flowers and freshly booming Sakura trees, and I was introduced to this game called “disc golf” or frisbee golf. It is basically just like golf, only you use small frisbees and have cages for holes. Though I was skeptical at first, it was a lot of fun! And did I mention the weather was perfect? Because it was perfect.
After a game of disc golf, the other two girls left the guys who were quite serious about the game to play another round. The three of us walked the park and eventually went to what is called 「フワフワドーム」”Fluffy Dome” or 「雲の海」”The Sea of Clouds.” It is basically a huge version of this awesome trampoline that we have in our park. This one had three main sections, one smaller one that was for children of elementary school age or younger, one for tiny kids with their parents, and one for everyone. We left our shoes and climbed up to one of the dome’s peaks. It was a blast! We jumped on top of the springy hill until we were exhausted, then plopped down to the edge and watched the kids running around until we caught our breath. Then we ascended again to jump as high as we could. The age range was from 4 to around 70. There was one older man jumping with his granddaughter, and we watched them both roll down the hill half a dozen times. There were squishy benches where parents could rest and keep and eye on their kids. There were also some young teens practicing trick jumps, and even break dancing. We made a lot of friends with tiny children, and even unbalanced teens (one girl kept falling because she was wearing hose and her feet had no grip).
Here’s someone’s video of the park:
After having too much fun at the park, we headed back and had a delicious light dinner (originally intended as appetizers) of caprese salad, bread with Croatian cheese, imperial Sakura honey (that came with a story) and some pepper jam. Instead of dinner, half of the party enjoyed two hours of karaoke. Actually, I went to karaoke every night for four days in a row during my trip.
The next day we went to a small market by a shire. The perfect weather had ended and I felt as if the Niigata cold was stalking me. This feeling would persist even until I reached Osaka, where it actually snowed on my first night there! I know, I was shocked. Despite the cold, we went to a Sakura Matsuri at the controversial Yasukuni Shrine after grabbing lunch at a Thai restaurant. Two other traveling IUJers joined up with us at this point, as we explored the festival. I finally had the experience of buying a chocolate covered banana on a stick. This is one of those bizarre foods you can only find during a festival. As I mentioned earlier, we ended up going to karaoke again, with a bigger group this time, and it was a lot of fun. There was a black light mural in our room of whales and an under the seascape. The songs selected were particularly fun that night. The evening wrapped up with a delicious dinner at an Indian restaurant, and it was Anu’s birthday!
The next morning I got myself lost trying to find a specific train station, passing other stations on my search (I was trying to avoid a transfer) and ultimately walking in a huge, hilly, futile circle through a business district. I missed the train I had aimed for by about ten minutes, and by the time I grabbed a seat on the Nozomi train I felt like a real country bumpkin! Tokyo and Urasa are quite opposite places, despite their geographic proximity.
This adventure only set me 30 minutes late for meeting Risa in Shinimamiya. She found us a great, safe, cheap hostel where instead of dorms each person had a tiny room complete with its own fridge, television and (most importantly for the weary traveller) locking door. I don’t mind staying in regular hostels, but it is a nice luxury to know your things will be untampered with.
While in Osaka I met up with old classmates and new friends. We went to Tsutenkaku, Osaka’s token tower (very short compared to Tokyo Tower) and saw zebra and giraffes from above in the nearby zoo. We also touched the feet of Biliken, Osaka’s patron god. Osaka was so nostalgic, and Risa and I shared a lot of great memories, ate at nostalgic restaurants and went to our old favorite shops. We also found some great new shops where I bought a great scarf and really interesting kitted headband. Oh, and we went to a movie theater! It was my first time in almost 8 months!
On my last day in Osaka, Risa, Yeoni and I ate at the newly remodeled and renamed Cha-cha’s Indian Restaurant (now called ‘More’). The food was still great, although the prices have gone up a bit, probably to pay for the lovely remodeling and redecorating. After that we walked Ishibashi shopping street for a bit, and then headed on to the University campus. Basically the entire time in Osaka was a trip down memory lane. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
You can see the HEP5 ferris wheel from this park!
Also my pocket camera is officially dead, as it acquired a fatal error while I was in Osaka. Here’s the last photo it took.
When my taxi drove up to campus it was 10 at night and I couldn’t see clearly, but morning revealed that the snow, while still here, has finally begun to melt in earnest. Spring has almost reached us, even here in Snow Country.
There are some very overdue photos I hadn’t gotten around to sharing yet! When Chris was here last December we had loads of fun! Here is some evidence of our shenanigans:
