Personal Hygiene Day!

Today basically everything I did was related to personal hygiene. So be warned, this might be a Too Much Info post.

Woke up at 8:00 this morning because I had gone to bed so early last night. I did the usual morning routine and gathered my stuff together to go to Kurama for the hot springs, which is located north of Kyōto, about two hours away total, including waiting for buses and such. The ride there was not a whole lot of fun; the train to Kyōto was packed and really hot, and by the time I had transferred to the small Eizan Line train, I was wondering if I should be getting out my little plastic bag for wet things in case I got sick. But my stomach settled and I didn't have any problems. I was really sleepy, though, and I dozed on the way. I feel so Japanese when I fall asleep on the trains.

Right as I arrived at the station, the free shuttle bus from the onsen arrived, so I hopped on that. The driver was really nice and gave me a brochure in English. ^_^ He took us up this crazy narrow residential street winding up the mountain. When we arrived at the resort, I was a bit disappointed. All the literature had made it look like this grand hotel affair, but it wasn't like that at all. It was a little gravel parking lot with some nondescript buildings. But the setting was beautiful: the mountains were so steep, and you could hear the sound of a waterfall nearby. It was really cool.

So I bought my ticket for the outdoor bath for ¥1100 and proceeded to the bath house. You had to walk up this pretty awesome stone staircase under the tallest cedar trees I've ever seen. Right next to the stairway there was a little stream rushing down to meet the big one with the waterfall, with these big ferns along its banks. And the forest smelled wonderful. I hadn't realized how much cleaner the air would seem even just this little bit away from the city. But it was a beautiful clear day, and with the nice fresh cedar smell and musty earth smell it was great.

This onsen was much, much different from the one I went to with Yukari. First, it's small. The outdoor bath is one pool, just the one you see in the pictures. And the shower area was small as well. But this was nice, because it wasn't at all crowded. This is what I had thought an onsen would be like. It was such a nice little rustic place. I mean, it's probably totally contrived as a tourist trap, but I sure fell for it. Beautiful.

The changing room wasn't heated, so I was careful to plan things so I'd spend as little time exposed to the November air as possible. After shoving my things into a little locker, I rushed outside and fumbled with the showers to get the water temperature hot enough. I washed, rinsed, and was totally ready to soak.

I stayed in the water for about 45 minutes, I think. Not 45 minutes straight, of course; it's much too hot for that. But I'd dip into the water for a while, then get out and sit on the side of the pool and just look around. It's peak leaf season here right now, but I was a bit disappointed because the cedar forest around the onsen was quite green. Still, the sun kept coming and going behind the clouds, and the mountains were beautiful. Plus, there was a small garden in the bath area, and the maple tree was a lovely red.

After a while I couldn't stand the heat and steam any more, so I got out and showered again, this time washing my hair. Then I got dressed quickly, used the blow drier, and left the onsen. I felt so refreshed!

I decided to walk back to the station instead of waiting for a bus. The weather was great: I was perfectly comfortable in my jacket and jeans, and sky was really interesting. There were those heavy grey clouds that look like snow, but the sun was also out. This made the fall colors even brighter than they would be normally. The road down the mountain followed the waterfall stream the whole way, so there were all those babbling brook sounds. And so I walked through a little neighborhood down the mountainside, taking lots of pictures of pretty scenery along the way. As I got close to the station, I stopped in some souvenir shops and picked up a few things. At that point it also started to drizzle, so I was glad to have beaten the rain.

On the ride back I stood by the window and watched the scenery. Absolutely gorgeous. It reminded me of the mountains in Kentucky, except that the forests were a mixture of cedars, deciduous trees, bamboo, and palm trees. I half expected to see a Totoro somewhere in those woods. At one point, the sun came out while it was still raining. In Japanese folklore, this means that the kitsune, or fox spirits, are having a wedding. I don't doubt it; Kurama is the kind of place where that could happen.

When I arrived back home smelling all nice from the bath, I did some laundry. Today I also clipped my fingernails, exercised, and did some eyebrow maintenaince, which makes it a Personal Hygiene Day.

And now, to continue the theme, I'm going to brush my teeth before bed. Goodnight.

Not much, again

I've had something of a headache for about the past two days, located above my right eye. It comes and goes, but this morning my vision was a little funny, so I think it's a mild migraine. I get those sometimes. Oh well.

Let's see, nothing spectacular happened in class today. Today the sky looked like snow, but of course it was too warm. We got a little bit of rain. I bought another bar of soap from the 7Eleven because my other one is getting small.

I have a lot of homework this weekend, but at the moment I have no motivation to do it. Hopefully by Sunday I'll feel a bit more inspired.

Tomorrow I'm going to go to an onsen north of Kyōto called Kurama Onsen. I'll go early and try to beat the crowds.

Blah. I want to come home. Three more weeks.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Few people here seem to care about the holiday, strangely. I mean, I didn't expect the Japanese to be serving turkey sushi or anything, but I was amazed at how many people had never even heard of it. Yesterday I had to totally explain it to Yukari, who seemed completely amazed. And the seminar house Otōsan had never heard of it, either. A large portion of the Americans, too, didn't realize that today was the day. I got a lot of, "Oh, is that today?" responses in class today when I mentioned Thanksgiving. I guess it's easy to lose track of time.

For lunch, though, some of my friends from the seminar house and I went to the campus McDonald's and binged on fried things. Yum! Oh, and Mom made me some cookies that arrived in the mail today, so I've been celebrating with those.

Anyway, classes today were nice and nondescript. Afterward, I went to tutor the kids in English. Again, it was a blast. I wasn't looking forward to skipping my afternoon nap, especially because I'm still exhausted from the onsen. But once I was there and teaching, I had a great time. Tomoko, the lady who runs the school, even gave us mochi (sweet rice cakes, basically) to snack on because today's topic was food likes and dislikes. Yum! Mmm, hot tea and freshly warmed mochi really do hit the spot on a cold, dreary day like today. It's the Japanese equivalent of cookies and milk, I'd have to say. The teaching was fun and the kids were amusing, as usual. They were amazed that I don't like sushi, and they had trouble wrapping their minds around the fact that the English language word for "okonomiyaki" is, actually, "okonomiyaki."

I got home kind of late and was wet from the rain that surprised me on the bike ride home, so I decided not to particpate in our makeshift Thanksgiving meal. A bunch of the Americans in the dorm pooled their monetary and culinary resources to cook things like a glazed chicken and apple pie. It looked really good, but I decided not to have any because I didn't contribute anything, and besides I was quite content with my potstickers. Sounds like a terrible Thanksgiving, probably, but it wasn't. I had a good day.

Like I said, I'm totally beat. So now it's bed time, and I hope tomorrow won't be as draining.

Kristen and the Miracle of Onsens

Today I went to an onsen with Yukari, my speaking partner. From now on, every bath I will ever take is hereby declared a disappointment in comparison to today’s. It was totally sweet.

We took a bus from school to Hirakata-shi Eki, then another bus to Ibaraki-shi Eki, then another bus, this one a private shuttle, directly to Sumireno-yu baths. The building looked like a standard, boxy building. But you walk inside and everything was suddenly very posh. It was amazing, a two-story affair with a restaurant, massage parlor, and sauna-type things on the first floor. The second floor had a snack bar, library, and men’s and women’s baths.

Now, the Japanese word for bath, “ofuro,” can basically be a play on the word for “twenty-six,” so apparently on the 26th of each month they have special deals. That was a nice surprise. So we got a discount, and they gave us bottled water when we entered. For two hours, my grand total came to ¥1000—about $10. Not bad at all for two hours of anything, really; just wait and hear all the great stuff I got to do for those ten bucks! In America, those two hours would have cost me probably $200 at a spa, I bet.

We had left our shoes in a little lock box in the entranceway and got our little ID bracelets, towels, robes, and the bottled water from the lady at the desk. We went upstairs and got other lockers, where we left all of our things. And by all I do mean all. I was left with a hand towel, my glasses (I forgot to put my contact lenses in this morning, which was unfortunate because the glasses kept fogging up), and a bar of soap. Totally naked in front of God and everybody, including some very old women who may well have been animated prunes for all their wrinkles, a little girl probably about six years old who kept staring at me as the lone white person in the place, and my beautiful little waif of a speaking partner. Yes, the awkward turtles were spawning.

Okay, I make it sound terrible. It wasn’t a big deal at all. After living in a dorm for two and a half years, you really do become indifferent on some level to people seeing you naked. I think Yukari was a bit shy about things, actually, but I sure wasn’t. Dang it, I don’t get to frolic around naked from pool to pool very often, and I was going to enjoy it. Plus, my glasses were so foggy that I eventually took them off, so I really couldn’t see anybody else, which made things considerably more comfortable, I think. Anyway, it’s kinda fun to stand naked outside in winter. I’ve never done it before.

So, my Witt friends, anyone up for streaking the Hollow, followed by a nice bath?

Anyway, we rinsed off before getting into the baths. You are supposed to be clean before you enter the water, so it’s not like you’re actually sitting in anyone’s filth, which is much better than one can say about American baths. Really, sitting in a bubble bath is just a “you soup” when you think about it…gross. But this was freakin’ awesome.

First, we went to the outdoor section. It was surrounded by a high wall and had some very nice little garden plants. There was even a plasma screen TV showing the news, so you can sit and soak and get your weather forecast all in one. There were also lounge chairs that would be lovely in the summer, and a nice canopy covering the pools. The water was hot, though no hotter than a hot tub. They had thermometers set up at each pool so you knew what you were getting into; most of the ones we used were about 40°C (104°F). The cold outside air made the water steam, which was pretty cool. Anyway, after chilling (well, I guess “warming” would be a better term) in the main pool, we got into these really cool big urns that were overflowing with water. It was really cool, like swimming in an ancient fountain or something. It also reminded me of that story called “Two of Everything” where an old couple finds a big pot that doubles anything you put into it, which is great when you put in money but bad when you accidentally fall in.

Then we went inside and sat for a while in the bubbly pool, which was basically like a regular hot tub. We also tried the steam sauna, which I didn’t like too terribly much. It was just hard to breathe and kinda smelled funny, and I don’t like being sweaty anyway so saunas are lousy for me. Oh, by the way, none of the waters here smelled like sulfur or anything; some of them did have a bit of a smell, but it was pleasant. After that we decided we wanted to do some non-water things, so we washed off at the shower stations and put on our nice pink robes. I say robes, but they were really capri and tunic sets, I guess. Very comfy cotton, though.

We went downstairs, and it was nice to be fully clothed, I have to say. It was weird seeing the men walk around in their orange robe sets; I had rather forgotten that there was a whole other half of the building that I couldn’t enter because it’s men only at the moment!

Okay, we’ve all heard about Japan’s capsule hotels, right? Those places where you basically rent a drawer to sleep in for the night? The concept might have come from an onsen, really! There was this wonderful, wonderful room that I want to recreate in my sprawling, creepy mansion when I become a billionaire eccentric who frightens small children. You enter and it’s hot—again, about 40°C (100°F)—and very quiet, and fairly dark. There’s a wooden walkway leading through the room, and the floor around the walkway is covered with smooth, dark stones like the ones they put in those nice calming nature-sound fountains at stores like Brookstone. And there are these small dividers every few feet creating little cubicle or stall areas. What you do is take your onsen-provided towel, lay it down on the black rocks, which are heated from below, lie down on top of it with your head on the little wooden pillow they give you, and take a nap! All the while it’s warm and comfy, and there’s water rushing just under your head so it sounds very pleasant. It was great. Any place that actually provides a designated napping area is automatically amazing.

Unfortunately, the heat was too extreme for me to actually fall asleep. Still, it was a great concept, and if I could have turned the temperature down a bit you liketa died getting me out of that place. Then we went into the cold room, which was like an anti-sauna. It was fabulous, with these walls with a thin layer of bubbling water behind them, so it was like being in an aquarium. A pleasantly cold aquarium. Next we sat on these little hexagonal stools that I think were supposed to warm your butt, but I don’t think mine was working. I was underwhelmed, in any case.

And imagine this: You know those ball pool things they have at places like Chuck E. Cheese and places? Okay, imagine that scaled down, with a nice ledge to sit on on the side. And the balls aren’t germ-covered plastic things, but heavy, round pebbles in the colors of your standard Dippin’ Dots ice cream (probably also covered in germs, but I don’t think about that). And the Dippin’ Dots ball pool is heated from below, and you put your feet in and wiggle your toes under the rocks and it’s a lot of fun.

One thing I didn’t really like, though, was this suspiciously oven-like device that made me feel like Gretel in the witch’s house. It was this dark little one person-sized domed structure that you crawled into and lay down on the ground. And then there was this heat lamp shining down on me, and I felt a bit like a forgotten French fry stuck between double cheeseburgers at a McDonald’s. I didn’t stay in there long. It was just weird.

Then we went back to the bath area, did the outside thing, did the inside thing, and took showers. We got dressed, and used the really nice vanity area to blow dry our hair, and Yukari did her makeup again. I was amazed at how much planning they put into this place’s design: they provided everything you could need, from canned Cokes to Q-tips. (You had to pay for the drinks; the Q-tips were free.)

And then we were done, and we took the buses back to Ibaraki-shi Eki. Then Yukari suggested we do purikura, so we did. Purikura is basically this photo booth that Japanese young people tend to go nuts over. And it’s really fun, actually; much better than those American photo booths at amusement parks where it draws you in grayscale and charges you like $17. (Not that I’ve ever actually used one of those; Mom and Dad had the good sense to convince me early on that they are a waste of money, and I still hold to that. But I digress.) So you go in and it’s this fairly large space with nice lighting, and you put in your ¥400 (so it only cost me ¥200 because we were sharing). You use a touch screen to choose the different frames you want, then the insanely peppy teenage girl voice encourages you to strike different poses and it takes pictures of you goofing off.

When you’re finished, it asks you to go to another section of the photo booth (perhaps it should be called a photo mansion, really), where you doctor the photos. You can digitally write things on them, add effects like sparkles and hearts, and even give yourself princess crowns. You choose the size of the pictures, and it prints them out in sticker form so you can post obnoxious photos of yourself surrounded by dancing mushroom people anywhere you please. It was a total blast! My favorite picture, actually, is one that makes me look really, really awful, like a confused hybrid of a pig and a turtle. But I ran with it, and now there are some really funny comments, and a little mushroom man sitting on Yukari’s head. It’s one of those “you had to be there” things.

I was very pleased that Yukari and I were able to find enough conversation to fill most of the day. That had worried me more that anything, honestly. Still, I was nice to be on my own after the draining day of new experiences. When I got back to Hirakatashi, for supper I had a chicken sandwich from Mos Burger, which was delicious but overpriced. And I came home and wrote this monster entry, which has sapped what little energy I had after the onsen.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and I am a little bit sad. I want to be home with my family eating hamburger dressing and going to see some terrible movie that no one actually wants to watch, just because it’s tradition that we go to the movies. But that’s okay, if missing this one meal is my greatest worry in life, I figure I’m doing pretty good. Anyway, I’ll be celebrating in my own way. I’m going to McDonald’s and buying all the stuff I want and not feeling guilty about it. And I will eat as many chicken nuggets and cheeseburgers and fries as I want, and if the Makudo workers look at me funny, whatever. It’s Thanksgiving, and I’m going to celebrate.

Also tomorrow I go to tutor for the last time. It should be fun, but I’m so tired right now that I’m not looking forward to it.

Excuses, excuses

Sorry I didn't update yesterday! At about 4PM the Internet went down in the dorms, and it didn't get working again until sometime after I went to bed.

What to say about yesterday, then? No classes, because it was a national holiday (Labor Thanksgiving Day, I think). It was really terribly rainy and dreary, so I stayed in, napped, and read.

Today, though, the weather is beautiful and the Internet is working. It's been a great day. I woke up to find confirmation in my email inbox that I got a single in Polis to live in for the spring! I'm so, so excited. I've never had my own room before, unless you count my nursery before Erin was born. Also, I got two Thanksgiving cards in the mail today: one from Aunt Louise and her family, and one from Grandma and Grandpa. Thanks, everyone!

It's going to be a crazy busy week, so I've got a lot of homework to do tonight, probably. But for now I'm going to take a much needed nap. I haven't had a lot of energy lately. But that's okay, because sleeping is fun.

Cool Art and Another Rant

For as unsure of what to do with myself as I was last night, when I woke up at 7:30 this morning to go to the bathroom I sure had some plans. So, according to the schedule I had apparently set in my head in my sleep, I went back to bed until 10:30, when I woke up, set up my computer in the downstairs lounge, and made some curry rice for brunch. I ate that during a nice, long Skype date with David. Then, about 2:00, I left the seminar house to go to the Kyōto National Museum.

I timed the trip just right. I entered the museum with two hours to explore before it closed, and it was exactly the right amount of time. The museum is really, really cool. I was amazed at how much super-famous stuff they had. My favorite room was the first one, which contained prehistoric artifacts all the way up through the Kofun Period. Several of the pieces on display were things we had studied in art history, so that was cool. I also got to see this incredibly famous—and way cooler in real life than in pictures—Portrait of Minamoto no Yoritomo. I think I’ll be writing my next art history paper on this work. And I was fascinated by the display of works by Qi Baishi, a Chinese artist I had never heard of before. His paintings are amazing; I love their sense of humor. They’re all very clever, and one of my favorites was this Song Style Landscape. I love it. Also, there was a really cool display of swords and samurai armor. It was super awesome to get to see the armor up close. I had no idea how many knots there were in those suits! Crazy. Really, really intricate stuff. Anyway, I finished looking around right at 5:00 when the museum closed.

Okay, everything below this should probably be considered rated R, and some of the links might be Not Safe For Work, just so you know. Really, it's probably not that bad, but this is more explicit than the stuff I usually write about, so I thought I should warn you.

One observation: a lot of stuff that’s totally permissible here would be completely scandalous back at home. I don’t know, maybe we’re prudes in the States. But my Catholic school alumna, never kissed anybody but my boyfriend, Bible Belt-born self is just amazed sometimes. The extreme shortness of girls’ skirts and the extreme highness of the boots they wear with them, porn shops lining the streets of Den Den Town, the mere existence of maid cafes and host clubs, teenagers wearing t-shirts with sayings in English that you don’t hear on cable at 3AM, pachinko parlors with barely-dressed cartoon women on their advertisements, gachapon machines in toy stores selling teeny sexy naked dolls, chikan, love hotels everywhere. It’s very different.

I know in America a lot of people—me included—like to worry about the increasing sexualization of our culture and stuff. But I don’t think I’ll complain as much anymore after Japan. There are some things that the Japanese are totally chill about that I think we should be too. And there are some things that make me think, “Wow, Paris Hilton really isn’t that extreme.”

Take the love hotels, for instance. They’re not all that sleazy here; they’re clean, safe places where couples go. It’s not like some creepy back alley pay by the hour and bring your own hooker place like we have at home. Not that I’ve been to such places either in the US or Japan; this is all hearsay and my own imagination. But when you can see from the train station a neon pink high-rise love hotel called "Hotel Chapel Coconuts" and their employees hand out discount coupons on the street corners, you know there’s a certain attitude of acceptance about the whole thing. My friends tell me they even have things like arcades and karaoke and stuff at love hotels. A very interesting idea, I think. If such places were to become widespread and acceptable in the US, I imagine the average germ content of the back seats of many American cars would drastically decrease, in any case. Think about that next time you rent a car.

Some of Japan’s sexual stuff, though, just absolutely needs to stop. Really. Like, right now. I am all for cultural diversity and political correctness and all—just ask Mom, she’ll tell you how much fun it is to get me started at the dinner table. But honestly, Japan, this chikan thing has got to stop NOW. A chikan is, basically, the term for a pervert. Specifically, it refers to men who grope people on crowded trains. When your language has to FREAKING CREATE A WORD FOR “MEN WHO GROPE PEOPLE ON CROWDED TRAINS” you know you have a problem. But don’t get me going on my chikan rant; that’s a whole entry of its own.

Anyway, it’s been interesting seeing things from a different point of view. In Film and Literature we’ve talked about how the chivalrous, self-congratulatory West likes to see Japan as a country of sexually deviant heathens who don’t know how to treat women properly. I don’t want to perpetuate that at all. Okay, so Japanese people don’t generally freak out about nudity. That’s cool. And really, if Japan is okay with having a major chikan problem, whatever. Just make sure I can get a spot on the Women Only train car during the morning commute.

What to do?

Today I did absolutely nothing. Slept in, surfed the Internet, napped, ate when necessary, showered, and that's about it. It was glorious.

Except that when the people got back from the Mount Hiei hike, I was really sad that I hadn't gone with them. Turns out that just about all of my friends had gone, which would have made it really fun. They're all excited now about being warrior monks and all. They all talked about it in awe and said it was beautiful, and from the pictures I've seen it seems so. I really do feel like I missed out.

But they also said it was really strenuous and some of the hiking points were actually really dangerous to get around. I heard about numb toes and slipping on rocks. They all looked exhausted, so I know I made the right choice not to go. Still, I'm a little disappointed.

I'm thinking of going by myself maybe on Monday and taking the cable car up the mountain. I don't know.

I'm not really sure what to do with this weekend. The trees are beautiful so I feel like I should go do sightseeing. But the rest of Japan has the same idea, so everywhere is really crowded this time of year. We have Monday off and I have little homework, so I think I should get out and about. I just don't feel like it, though, honestly. I've been thoroughly enjoying my naps. I had wanted to go to Spa World on Monday, but after reading their rules and regulations it looks like I'll have to wait a few days before I'm allowed in the water. So, I've just kinda been hanging around, which is fine, I guess. This is going to be a very busy week for me, so it's nice to rest up.

I forgot to mention the other day that I saw Gackt on TV! There's this really funny show I watch when I can where this group of four comedians in drag and one guest celebrity try to pick out which items on a table are worth ¥100 and which are ridiculously expensive although you'd never know it. The other day, Gackt was the special guest. He's so pretty...too bad his age is starting to show, and badly. He's looking a bit Botoxed, unfortunately. But for someone who claims to be over 200 years old, I suppose that's expected.

This morning I walked to school instead of biking, and on the way chatted with Olga, my friend from the seminar house and speaking class. That was a lot of fun; she's really sweet, and I love her accent. She's from Ossetia, which is cool.

Today I had lunch with Jacinthe, Jessica, and Shane from psych class. We had some conversations that were...interesting. I learned some new words in Japanese, although I can't repeat them here. ^_^ Should come in handy, though.

In Film and Lit today we watched a Shirley MacLaine movie from the 60s called My Geisha. Kind of offensive in that you had this white woman with her eyes taped back talking about "honorable palents," but kind of really cute and romantic too.

I have decided that I will not be hiking up Mount Hiei tomorrow. The cold and strain probably would not do me good. I'm not sure what I'll do intead; perhaps Arashiyama. This is probably the peak leaf color weekend, so I feel like I should go to Kyōto, definitely. I'm just not sure what to do there yet. I don't know. In a few minutes I'm leaving to have dinner and go to the izakaya with some friends, which should be fun; we'll see how I'm feeling about sightseeing tomorrow at the end of the night.

Three Weird Classes and Some Complaints

I leave to come home one month from today.

Classes today were kind of unusal. In Reading/Writing we did a practice version of the Level 3 Japanese test that they use in things like grad school placement and job interviews and stuff. It wasn't nearly as bad as I expected it to be. I wonder how I'd do on the Level 2, which is the next level up.

In Speaking we got our tests back. Turns out I didn't bomb! In fact, I pulled off a low A. >.< Often, when I say that I think I did poorly on a test, it's a lot out of modesty, but I really and truly thought that I failed this one. It was a nice surprise to get the friendly bunny stamp and some swirls of approval/votices of manly accomplishment on my test. That class was fun today, too, because since we've finished our textbook we'll be doing new and interesting things. Today we had a bunch of Japanese students come in, we broke up into pairs, and just chatted with them for the whole class. It was a lot of fun, and I exchanged email addresses with Chiaki, the girl I talked to the most.

In Psych today we learned about Jung and his fascination with mandalas. We even got to draw our own mandalas, which was great! I love coloring, and getting to sit for half an hour in a usually frustrating class and color was awesome. My mandala doesn't look like the example ones, but I guess that's okay. We're going to discuss them next week, so maybe I'll figure out all its deep meanings then.

Tomorrow is Friday, which means that I'll have lunch with Jacinthe and the girls from Witt, and I'm going back to the izakaya with William in the evening. But this time we're going earlier, so I'll be able to take the proper bus back home.

Tomorrow is also supposed to be a bit warmer, which is good because it's really, really cold even inside the buildings here. Remember how I said that they don't have air conditioning in the hallways of buildings? Apparently they don't have heat either. Every time I go down the hall to the bathroom I have to put a cardigan on and run down the hallway before I get frostbite or something. Okay, it's not frostbite bad, but it is lousy when you have to put on a jacket to go pee. Oh well. I'll pretend I'm Laura Ingalls Wilder or something and it's a grand outhouse adventure.

So Japan, here is what I say to you: Either freaking use technology or don't. You're giving me Oto-Himes and Warmlets (heated toilet seats) in the toilet and eraser vacuums in classrooms, but there's no wireless Internet or heated hallways. WTF? Are we super high-tech or really archaic? Pick one.

Technology

It got cold. Like, actually cold. Like, I don't want to ride my bike in 40 degree weather with a strong headwind. ::sigh:: Oh well. At least we haven't had a killing frost yet. Still, even though it's Wednesday and I have a four hour break, there's no way I'm biking back home for Skype today. My ears might fall off or something.

So, something that's been bothering me since the beginning of the year was these little boxes at the front of all our classrooms. They are about the size of a breadbox, light brown, and plug into the wall. I didn't know what they were for until yesterday. Turns out they clean the dust off erasers. You flip a switch and it starts a vaccuum thingy on the top, and you run the blackboard eraser over it and it cleans it for you. It was a lot of fun to play with.

Still, I'm concerned that no one gets the class job of having to go outside at the end of the day and clap the erasers together. I have so many memories of choking on dust in the third grade, or writing my name in chalk dust on the side of the school building.

It's interesting, I think, how we find little devices to do small tasks for us. Like this chalk dust vacuum; do we really need that? How much money and time do we spend producing these things, when we could just as easily whack two erasers together, get some exercise and fresh (though chalky) air, and save all that metal and plastic. Same thing with Oto-Hime. I love the things, but I wonder how bad our carbon emissions are because we're producing them. And I wonder what experiences like eraser-cleaning I'm missing because I let machines do it for me.

Just something to think about.

This is My 100th Blog Post

In the morning I have a test in Speaking class over chapters 22 and 23 of our Genki textbook. These are the last chapters. I have completed elementary Japanese. Yay!

Yay? There’s still so far to go, so much I don’t know! There are many things that Genki doesn’t include, and I certainly don’t know the Genki content nearly as well as I should. I’ve just scratched the surface, and it was, sometimes, a halfhearted scratch at that.

Sometimes I wonder if I want to keep studying Japanese or not. It’s a beautiful language, but it’s really, really hard. I think about how well I could communicate in Spanish by the end of high school, and this seems really pointless. I can’t even read simple children’s books in Japanese; I just don’t have the vocabulary to understand them. Why should I spend so much time on a language when I’ll probably never even be able to read a newspaper article? It’s frustrating. And having been here and used what skills I have, it would be lovely to go home and never utter another te-form verb again.

Of course I won’t quit. I really, really love Imai-sensei’s class. It makes me work and makes me think in fun new ways, Sensei is brilliant, and the people in it are so much fun. Kanji is so much fun to practice, too. I could sit down with a nice gel pen and paper in front of a movie and practice kanji for hours. And the sociological applications of the language are cool beyond cool.

I think I’m just a bit burned out from the whole Japan thing. It’s occupied so much of my life for the last two and a half years, since I started at Witt. Now I’m here in Japan, surrounded by Japanese people, taking five classes about Japan, using Japanese toilets, watching Japanese TV, eating Japanese food, and going to an hour of Japanese conversation practice every morning. It’s overkill. It’s been great, but I’m totally ready to go back to being an American in America. Dang it, I want my Taco Bell and South Park.

In other news, I have been sleeping a lot better lately, though I’m still having some weird dreams. Last night I dreamt that I was supposed to take Erin to school at AHS, except that we were on Witt’s campus. We were about to leave when the Isings arrived to drive us there, just like when they would take me to school. Except Mr. Ising was driving this car that was kind of like a hayride wagon and kind of like the Cat Bus from My Neighbor Totoro. Very strange.

Now I’m a bit chilly and tired, so I think I’ll be off to bed early tonight. Maybe I’ll dream about the Cat Bus again.

Weird teachers, crêpes, and leaves

I had a test in Reading/Writing this morning, and I think it went really well. In Speaking class we watched a few commercials online. You have got to check out these hilarious Fanta ads; it’s okay if you don’t know any Japanese, they’re still funny. Reminds me of those kids’ books The Bailey School Kids, where this class has all these teachers who may or may not be werewolves, vampires, mummies, Big Foot, etc.

After my morning classes I was able to Skype with David and Nikki, clean my room, and take a nap. It was cold this morning, but the afternoon was beautiful and I enjoyed leaving the balcony door open. It was a good day.

For supper, I was supposed to meet William and his friends at Makino to go to a Mexican restaurant there. But his friend—the only one who knew where the place was—couldn’t come today, so we decided to do it next week. That put me in a bit of a spot for supper, because I had very little food. But I made some grilled cheese, and worked on a crossword puzzle with my dorm friends while I ate. That was fun; as college kids we can make anything infinitely more interesting than it normally should be. Let’s just say that there was much inappropriate discussion about what could be a four letter word for “balls.” (The answer? “Orbs.”)

Afterward, Jamie wanted to go to Fresco to buy crêpes from the people who set up their little stands outside the store. Since I needed to do grocery shopping anyway, I went along with him. Crêpe man wasn’t there this evening, so Jamie got these little donuts from a different vendor. I got a lot of shopping done for very cheap, and I should be set through the weekend.

Speaking of the weekend, I’m still deciding if I should go on my art history class’s field trip to Mt. Hiei. It’s a really famous and beautiful mountain outside of Kyōto, and I would absolutely love to go. The only problem is that we’re hiking up one side and down the other. The first two and a half hours would be strictly uphill hiking, plus there would be the hike down as well as the commute to and from the site, which would be exhausting in itself. Having not been able to bike to Hirakata last weekend, I think that might be too much of a strain on my body. But I really, really want to be able to say I’ve hiked up one side of Mt. Hiei and down the other. I’d be able to see Lake Biwa, too. I don’t know. If I don’t go to Mt. Hiei, I’ll go to the Monkey Park at Arashiyama, which will be awesome!

The leaves on campus have started to fall. They were very beautiful coming down in the wind today. But they’re so good about sweeping up the leaves and garbage and debris every day that there’s no way the leaves will collect enough to get a good crunch. What a shame; sometimes it’s good to be tidy, but I rather pity these Japanese kids who are so used to these immaculate yards and parks and don’t get to trudge through crunchy leaves.

Sunday, Boring Sunday

Today was gloriously uneventful. Slept in, ate lunch, did homework, napped, read for fun, ate supper, showered, studied, snacked. That's been my day. Not much else to say about that.

Last night I dreamt about getting all my stuff packed to go home. I guess that's a reminder for me to be confirming my flights and looking into weight limits and such. Yuck; I'm not looking forward to all that. Still, it's exciting to plan for going home.

Tomorrow I have a lesson test in Reading/Writing. Also, I'm going out for Mexican food with some friends, which should be fun.

Osaka's Entertainment Districts in a Day

Last night was a bit rough. Remember that plum wine? Delicious. Absolutely delicious. Also really, really messed with me several hours after I drank it, although I only had two glasses all night. When I got up to use the bathroom at about 4AM I kinda stumbled my way down the hall. It was weird; I just had no balance. So I’ll be more careful with the plum wine next time if I have any at all.

This morning I met a bunch of the Seminar House 2 people for an excursion to Den Den Town. This is Osaka’s big electronics, porn, and anime district, and I was very excited to see it even though I have little appreciation for such things.

There were nine of us, and we all rode our bikes down to Hirakatashi-eki rather than take the bus. This was not my decision. The bike ride was terrible. I couldn’t keep up with the rest of the group, and before long I had lost sight of them completely. I was worried that they’d forget me and leave without me. I was really going as fast as I could, though. Luckily, Martyn, Jacob, and Tammy had sent the others ahead and were waiting for me to catch up, which was nice. We finally arrived at the station and met up with the others. My face was beet red and I was dripping with sweat and quite embarrassed for having slowed everyone down.

You know, I think there’s something wrong with me energy- and strength-wise, really. I have been having more and more trouble just making it up the little hill to campus on my bike. I’ve been eating more fruits and veggies in hopes that it was just a vitamin deficiency, but it hasn’t helped. I get sleepy and bodily tired so, so easily. It’s a bit worrisome. I hadn’t thought much of it until today, but the fact that I was red-faced, sweating, and breathless, getting left in the dust, by eight other people, two of whom are very overweight, seems to be a sign that there may be a problem.

Anyway, we finally got to Den Den Town. Honestly, I was disappointed. I had expected a sprawling, glittering expanse of electronics stores. Instead, it was a kinda standard Osaka city street, except that all the shops, instead of being clothing stores or restaurants, were selling electronics or used video games. It probably would have been more impressive if I knew a good digital camera from a bad one, but since I don’t it was a big, “So what?” moment. Still, it’s one of those things that you’d like if you’re the kind of person who likes that kind of thing, and some of the people I had come with split off from the group and ended up staying until about 9PM! Anyway, we spent some time hunting around used video game stores, and I saw so many old game and game systems that I had forgotten about. Diddy Kong Racing for N64, for instance. Blast from the past, right?

Also saw a bunch of maid cafés, arcades, konbinis, takoyaki stands, and “used book stores” (which generally have obnoxious orange signs and are obviously highly questionable porno shops). I actually really want to go into a maid café, but they’re expensive and I’d be terribly embarrassed.

After having a delicious and filling lunch at a place specializing in gyōza, my group was ready to leave, being the less electronically-minded people of the original traveling group. We decided to go shopping in another Osaka district, and the most convenient subway stop was Nanba. So we went there and quickly found ourselves in Shinsaibashi, the place I had gone shopping with Saho. After wandering around there for a while we found ourselves in Amerika-Mura.

I really enjoyed Ame-Mura. I had heard that it was not at all like America, but I don’t think that’s the case. True, it’s definitely at Japanese shopping district; the sidewalks, street signs and lack thereof, storefronts, etc. are all Japanese. But the shops were playing American music, and I saw more SpongeBob there than I ever needed to. It was cool. There was also a small Statue of Liberty on top of a building, and lots of American flags. Apparently the district originally had a bunch of American shops that are now gone, but they kept the theme going.

At that point I was tired and ready to go home, so our group split up further and I headed back to Hirakata with Jamie and Daniel. The bike ride home was not fun, although not a complete fiasco like the earlier one. I still couldn’t make it up even the smallest hill, so I felt really bad for slowing the boys down. But we eventually made it home safely, and after a shower I was feeling much better. Still, I’m exhausted and plan to go to bed early.

We watched The Princess Bride this evening in the dorm lounge, which was a lot of fun. Joanne, who is from France, had never seen it before (inconceivable, I know), and she really got a kick out of it. It was fun watching with a first-timer.

Tomorrow will be a lazy homework day, I think. We also get to change our bed linens, which always makes me happy.

Oh, and Corinne, today I got you Rurouni Kenshin volume 1 in Japanese. It’s really nice, with the proper coloring and all. I've been attempting to read it, and it's so cool to get Kenshin's speech style in the original Japanese de gozaru! I think you’ll like it; can it be your souvenir/Christmas present/birthday present/welcome home present?

Stuck at the bus stop

I'm really sleepy and I've got to get up at a decent hour tomorrow to go to Den Den Town, so I'll keep it short.

Classes today were fine, though I wasn't happy to have to go to reading/writing. The weather was lovely, too. Took a nice nap this afternoon when I got home.

This evening I went to the izakaya in Hirakata with William. We sat there for about three hours drinking, eating, and gossiping. It was a lot of fun talking about the things we miss at Witt. I also discovered the most delicious plum wine. It was like drinking liquid candy, and I wish I could have had more, but that would have been a Bad Thing. It was nice to be out of the house but still doing something chill.

By the time I headed home, the last bus had already left, so I was stuck at the station. I panicked at first because I didn't want to walk home alone in the dark, but then I realized that I could either take a taxi home or try to find another bus route that would work. Luckily there was another bus coming that wouldn't be as convenient as my normal one, but it would work. So I rode that home with a bunch of office workers coming home after a long week.

Seriously, everything here closes so early. Groceries close at about 7:00. The last bus home on a Friday night leaves at 10:58. Restaurants are closed by 9:00 unless they're bars. I mean really, in the US if a restaurant closed at 9PM on a weekend, it wouldn't last a month. It's just a very different time schedule, I guess. I don't like it. I want my 2AM Taco Bell.

And now I'm tired and going to bed.

Oh, but an update on the burns: My fingers are totally fine now. They stopped hurting last night, actually. The burn wouldn't have been painful at all, probably, if it hadn't been directly on my fingertips.

A good day with several small disasters

I woke up shaking and sweaty last night around 2:30 from a nightmare in which David had drowned and I was lost in a cave with a group of strangers who also kept dying one by one. Not a fun dream.

I arrived on campus this morning about ten minutes early for reading and writing, as usual. But when 9:00 came around, Kawahara-sensei still hadn’t come in. Instead, a guy from the CIE office walked in and said that class was cancelled today. But he took roll, and passed around a paper so we could sign up to come to class tomorrow. I was so mad!

I had come to class today; why should I have to come back again tomorrow?! It’s so lousy. The professor wasn’t there, so class should just be cancelled, right? Oh well. So now, instead of a two hour lunch break tomorrow, I have one hour for lunch because the class I planned to attend today will be happening at noon tomorrow. >.< I’m pretty frustrated with it. And this happened on the week where Tuesday classes were cancelled; I hate Tuesdays because my schedule on Tuesdays is the same as it will be tomorrow. The one week I thought I had escaped my strenuous class day, and it comes back to haunt me!

I used my new bright and early in the morning hour of nothing to complete the rest of my language lab homework for the semester before speaking. After speaking class I ate lunch with William and some of his Japanese friends, which was fun. It’s been a while since I’ve gotten to see him, so it was nice to catch up. We talked about what it was like to move to Ohio from the South (he’s from North Carolina), which was funny; turns out we noticed a lot of the same things about Northerners when we first arrived at Witt.

For supper this evening I made some blackened pepper fish, but I overdid it on the pepper and it wound up a bit too spicy to properly enjoy. I also managed to burn my fingers pretty badly in the process of cooking it, which wasn’t good. Right now I’m wishing I had an aloe plant, because it still hurts. Oh well; the fish looked pretty, if nothing else.

The weather today was beautiful, so after supper I took a short walk in the park near the seminar house. I had forgotten how nice it is just to walk around without a destination; the park is basically just a big open loop, a lot like the U of L apartments' track at home. It was nice, and the moon was lovely.

This evening I’m trying to round up some people to watch a movie or something. I dunno, maybe I’ll just take my reading down to the kitchen and chill with the people there. Sometimes we get a card game going or something.

Hmm, this update sounds a lot more complainy than I intended it too. Really, I've had a very good day and I'm in quite a cheerful mood. I just happen to have had a nightmare, a rescheduled class, burned fingers, and too-spicy fish today. Still, I'm quite chipper and looking forward to the weekend.

A short post! Wow!

Not much in particular to report about the day; it was kind of a normal Wednesday. Oh, but the weather was really nice. It was cool this morning, about 50 degrees, but it warmed up to the high sixties and was sunny and gorgeous. That made the bike rides back and forth to school very pleasant.

My package from home arrived in the mail today, so now I have good old American deodorant, and I won’t be stinky and anti-ozone layer with the lousy Japanese spray stuff that doesn’t work. Also, I have exactly one month to go of having classes; after that it’s finals and coming home! Crazy that time goes so fast.

Speaking of time, today is Dad’s birthday. Happy birthday! I really wish I could be home to celebrate with my family. I missed out on some chocolate cake today, I hear. ;_; Anyway, Dad, hope your day was great. I was thinking about you a lot. Miss you and love you!

I did some grocery shopping today and tried going to Fresco instead of Top World. Their selection wasn’t as good, but some things were a little cheaper. I’ll probably stick with Top World, and of course QQ for the basics. With my new foodstuffs I made okonomiyaki for supper and put in a lot of veggies. I had bought a vegetable grater to make it easier to add things like carrots and radish, so that was convenient.

This weekend I’m planning to take a break from visiting temples and shrines. William and I are supposed to chill out on Friday, and on Saturday I’m going to Den Den Town, Osaka’s big electronics and anime district, with Tamara, Jamie, and some other people from the dorm. That should be fun, although I’m not really geeky in that kind of way. Still, it’ll be nice to do some shopping and explore Osaka. Maybe I’ll be able to find the Outback Steakhouse there. Yum….

Hōryūji

Disclaimer: This post contains large sections of Kristen gushing about old things you probably really don't care about. This is the price you pay for reading the blog of a geeky kid who just came back from art history heaven. Feel free to skip over the boring art rants.

Today I went to Hōryūji, a temple in Ikaruga near Nara dating from the Asuka Period. It features some of the oldest wooden buildings in the world—about 1300 years old. Puts the historical “wow” factor of the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace to shame, huh? (Not that there’s much to beat there; ask me for that story some other time.)

Today, of course, was a regular Tuesday for the rest of the world, although my classes were cancelled. This meant, of course, that the rush hour trains were crowded with commuters. That was interesting. I was just on the tail end of the morning rush, but it was fun watching all the businesspeople in suits running for their trains.

On the way to the temple, I had one of those experiences that only happens in Japan. I slurped down some udon for breakfast during rush hour in Ōsaka at a train station standing at a noodle counter between sararīman. (That was a lot of prepositions!) So quintessentially Japanese.

Anyway, when I finally got to Ikaruga, I decided to walk the 1.5km to the temple. Unfortunately, the signage wasn’t as good as I was expecting, and I quickly managed to get myself lost. I got suspicious when one of the few signs for tourists didn’t mention Hōryūji. Then, the shops became less frequent and the vegetable patches more frequent. I realized I was heading quickly for the middle of nowhere. Well, that’s an exaggeration; there were still plenty of houses around. But I wasn’t in touristville anymore. Luckily I stumbled across what I think was a nursing home, though I’m not sure. There were a bunch of people sitting outside with their feet in a hot spring pool, and I asked them for directions. Turns out I was going perpendicular to where I should have been. Anyway, after getting that all worked out, I turned around and got on the right track after talking to some different ladies who were very excited to try out some of their English on me.

After trekking the 1.5km in the proper direction, stopping at a konbini for some Grape Fanta, and getting some mediocre curry rice from a small takeout place, I arrived at Hōryūji. Something you should know about this place: it’s an art historian’s dream. I totally geeked out the whole time I was there. This place is absolutely brimming with Important Cultural Properties and National Treasures and World Cultural Heritage markers, and every time you turn a corner it seems you find something else you have seen in an art history textbook.

First I explored the far western section of the temple complex, which, by the way, is enormous. I was standing in front of the West Round Hall getting ready to take a picture when one of the temple attendants freaked out on me and shouted not to take photos, so I had to stop. There really were a lot of places at this temple where you couldn’t take photos. Luckily, most of the stuff is hella famous and there are images all over the Internet. By the way, there were a lot of cats in this part of the temple. I also saw two praying mantises.

After paying the ¥1000 entrance fee (expensive for a temple!) I went into the Western Precinct proper. It was amazing; so different from the other temples I’ve been to. Art texts usually remark on Hōryūji as a display of power and human control, and I have to agree. The plaza was huge and must be fantastic during big festivals. And the pagoda and kondō absolutely tower over you with the most intricate construction decorated in bright colors and dragons and abstract designs. It was really neat. From there I moved on along the designated path, seeing all the statues and buildings along the way. I won’t bore you with descriptions of everything, because there was a lot and I promise I could go on for days about it. Let’s just say I spent a long, long time looking at things that are very, very old and very, very famous.

Being a weekday afternoon, the temple wasn’t very crowded with regular tourists, although there were school groups everywhere. It was mostly middle-schoolers. They were bold! It was really surprising. I don’t know how many small groups of kids just came up to me waving and shouting “Hello!” One boy even whipped out a “Nice to meet you.” I would answer back, “Hello! How are you?” and they would run off giggling. Bizarre.

Part of the temple was a building that had been constructed about ten years ago to act as a museum. This was really cool, too. I do love art museums. Going to temples is fantastic because you get to see artworks in their original contexts, but it’s often hard to see because the buildings are dark or someone tall is in front of you. I liked having seen both the original placements and the nicely displayed objects. Again, many of these things were artworks we have studied in art history.

One thing that you might be interested in is called the Tamamushi Shrine—literally, “jewel bug” shrine. It’s called that because part of the decoration of it is made from the shells of these really shiny green beetles. Very cool! You rather have to wonder, though, how the artisans reconciled Buddhism’s no-killing precepts with tearing the wings off thousands of beetles. In any case, the shrine is maybe eight feet tall, much bigger than I expected. Very cool lacquer artwork on the side, too. It was neat.

And one more artwork before I wrap this baby up: Yumedono Kannon, a.k.a. Guze Kannon. This statue is located in the Yumedono, or Dream Hall, in the Eastern Precinct. The hall got its name because Prince Shōtoku Taishi, who had Hōryūji built so long ago, would come here to meditate and receive helpful dreams from Kannon (the bodhisattva of compassion; he acts a bit like the Blessed Mother, to tell you the truth) when he couldn’t understand part of a Buddhist teaching. This statue, the Yumedono Kannon, is only displayed two times a year, and it was on display now. That’s the main reason why I waited to long to visit this particular temple, actually. I’ve wanted to see this statue for quite a while. Ernest Fenollosa, the American scholar who was an early student of Japan, and Okakura Tenshin “re-discovered” this statue during the Meiji Period. It had been kept locked away in secret for centuries, until Fenollosa convinced (I’m a bit suspicious of that; I think he probably threatened them) the Hōryūji priests to let him see it. He and Okakura unwrapped cloths from the statue, and this beautiful, gold, life-sized bodhisattva was standing before them. It must have been magic. It’s such an elegant piece, although the Asuka/Tori Busshi/Northern Wei style it shows usually isn’t my cup of tea. Anyway, today the Kannon was displayed in the Yumedono. It was so dark you could barely tell it was there, although luckily one of the tour guides who happened to be nearby had a flashlight.

Okay, I’d better stop before I decide to gush about the Kudara Kannon, which, by the way, is also beautiful. Um, after spending about two or two and a half hours at the temple complex, I was ready for home. It was overcast and cool today, and I needed a nap. I decided to take the bus back to the train station so I wouldn’t get lost this time. A man at the bus stop struck up a conversation with me, and despite some awkward silences we were able to have a decent chat as we rode the bus together. Turns out he has a married daughter who lives in Florida. He asked about the election—go figure—and we agreed that we like Obama. I was surprised, though, that I was able to understand as much of his Japanese as I could. He must have been using the more standard polite forms that college-aged guys don’t use.

Anyway, I made it home fine, napped, and had an egg sandwich for supper. I need to go grocery shopping tomorrow; I really feel like I have very little food.

"Where's my truck?"--Helen Hunt in Twister

Today was pretty productive, and I have tomorrow off because it’s University Foundation Day, so I was able to take it easy this evening. I was able to get the rest of my laundry in the wash before heading to class, even. That was a good start.

I aced both my kanji quiz and vocab quiz this morning, and after spending some time in the language lab finally wrapped my head around causative-passive verbs. For lunch I had some yummy chicken nuggets while I edited David’s paper, which was relaxing.

I don’t have classes on Monday afternoon, so I returned home, ran the sweeper, and put my clothes out to dry. I have also decided that I need to get a little bit of physical activity in my life, so I did some crunches and little floor exercises before taking a nap.

Made grilled cheese for supper, got my laundry folded, and showered. I had been invited to go out for karaoke at 8:00, but decided against it. It’s kind of cold outside (probably about 50 degrees), and I didn’t feel like making the twenty minute hike to Makino to spend ¥2000 and get home late. Instead, I fixed some potstickers as a snack and watched Twister in the lounge with Paui and Daniel. I remember the first time I saw that movie; we were at Aunt Louise’s house for some family gathering, and I remember sitting in what is now Andrew’s room with Nick and Aimee, playing MindTrap and watching the film. It was so scary and well-made at the time; now the fluffy 90s hair, huge cell phones, and terrible dialogue are just fun.

Tomorrow I’m going to Hōryūji, so I’ll be getting up early. Time for me to head to bed, then. I’ll have a very long update for tomorrow, I’m sure.

Fushimi-Inari Taisha

Today Daniel and I took a short daytrip to Kyōto to see Fushimi-Inari Taisha, a shrine known for its kitsune statues and many torii gates. It was cool and drizzly this morning when I woke up to make breakfast before we left, but the rain stopped and it wasn’t as cold as I expected. We walked to Makino-Eki and took the trains to Fushimi-Inari, which is a pretty cool little local train station with fox pictures everywhere.

We walked up the touristy street to get to the shrine, and Daniel wasn’t watching when he tried to cross the street and almost got flattened by a bicycle. But we made it to the shrine okay, and when we arrived we were amazed; it was so crowded and big! Sundays are always busy at shrines, but this was crazy. Then we realized that it was because Shichi-Go-San is coming up. There were a lot of little kids all dressed up for the holiday there with their families. Cute little girls in bright pink kimono, and these two adorable little five year old boys who were loving the attention from their families and kept swooshing their hakama around. I took a lot of pictures of other people’s kids; is that creepy? Oh well.

We saw lots of fox statues and took lots of pictures with them. One thing that surprised me, though, was this thing called the Horse Shrine. It was this little shed-like shrine structure with a big white horse statue inside, kind of in the fashion of something you’d see on a carousel, but bigger. On the altar area in front of it people had left offerings of carrots. ^_^ I thought that was pretty cool. I’m not sure why there were horses there. Kitsune makes sense, because they’re associated with Inari, but I’m not sure about horses.

Then we continued up the mountain from the main shrine, through the hiking trails that are made tunnel-like from all the torii that people have donated lining the paths. It was kind of creepy, actually, being in this old-growth forest on a dreary day surrounded by all these vermillion gates. I’ve got some pictures that make the Body Chute at Waverly Hills look pretty comfy. It was such a beautiful place though, and I wish we could have stayed longer. The whole torii trail takes about two hours, though, and we didn’t have the energy or time for it. But we got to go to the part of the shrine that displays the main object of worship, a sacred mirror. It’s really unusual for shrines to display something so holy, but there it was. I took a picture; I hope that’s okay. I also gave money to the kami and bought an amulet for Betsy, so maybe that makes up for it.

Anyway, we came home after walking back to the station and stopping at Mister Donut in Makino, although I didn’t buy anything. But now I know that they have delicious-looking chocolate donuts, so maybe some other time. I napped this afternoon, had curry rice for supper, and did some homework. And that is all.

If you have a Facebook account, you can see my pictures from the shrine today, as well as some other miscellaneous things, by going here.

Mushrooms and Sweet Potatoes

Today was so productive! I got up and did laundry, but since it was pretty cool and drizzly outside today it took a long time for my clothes to dry. My pajamas were smelling pretty unbearably funky, though, so I couldn’t delay it any longer.

This morning David and I did a Skype date and I had a bit of an emotional breakdown on him, but he was patient with me as usual, and now I’m feeling much better. Culture shock and long-distance blues seem to have arrived at the exact same time, and I got slammed with both of them over the past few days. He talked me through a lot of the mess, and now I’m feeling like I can handle it. So that was good.

One thing that made me laugh: he went on this really hilarious rant about Panera’s portabella mushroom sandwich, which had been his favorite but is now gone from the menu. “They said it was a seasonal product. Seasonal! You can’t &$@&^ tell me that mushrooms are seasonal. They grow underground. It’s always like 65 degrees and dark! How is that seasonal?! Just give me my *)!%# sandwich.” A man after my own heart, with ranting skillz like that.

I went to campus today despite the dreary weather so I could return some library books and print off some papers. I treated myself to some delicious McDonald’s for lunch, and did grocery shopping afterward. Top World, the full-blown supermarket that I use for stuff I can’t get at the QQ, was crazy today! There were all these sample-giving employees everywhere, and people standing at little special stations, which made it kind of like a market atmosphere. You could get some guy to put a really, really recently dead fish into a box for you, for instance. So some parts of the store were fishier smelling than usual, but it was cool to watch them fillet things. Anyway, after that I came home and napped before my Evening Plans.

Momoko had invited me to her home this evening for an okonomiyaki party. I met her at the front gate of school and we took the bus to her house. Her English teacher, who is from Ohio, was supposed to be at the party, but he couldn’t come. It was just me, her parents, her mom’s sister-in-law, and her young cousin. It was a really nice dinner party, and I had a blast. The food was so elaborate! For appetizers we had onigiri in the shape of stars, chicken katsu, these beautiful scallops with asparagus spears stuck right through the middle, and some sort of fried thing that was pretty tasty but unidentifiable. The main attraction, though, was the okonomiyaki. It was delicious! I had mine with cheese, squid, and yakisoba. Yum! Dessert was divine, too. I had my first tapioca, which was so-so. Kind of a weird consistency, if you ask me, like fish eggs in bad milk. But I also had some sort of sweet bean budding, and the most delicious strawberry mousse concoction. And we also had fruit—persimmons, strawberries, and what were either really big grapes or really small plums, I’m not sure.

The dinner conversation was interesting; there were a lot of blank stares and much use of the electronic dictionary, but it was fun. We talked about how Japanese and American aluminum foil and Saran wrap are a little different, and what Japanese movie stars I knew, and if I was happy about Barack Obama, and baby carrots. They were really impressed about the baby carrots. A lot of Japanese people don’t like carrots, like a lot of Americans don’t like fish. So they were really surprised when I told them that schoolkids often like to get carrot sticks in their lunchboxes.

After we finished eating, Momoko, Ayaka (the cousin; she was probably about seven), and I played Wii. I was pretty bad at the fishing, but I kicked butt at the shooting game. Momoko said that was because I’m American. I know she was kidding, but I was a little offended, actually. >.< Yay. Statue of Liberty, Abraham Lincoln, hamburgers, and shooting things. Anyway, her parents gave us candy as prizes, and now I have a boatload of little sweets to snack on. It was a lot of fun.

They sent me home with all my candy loot, the leftover appetizers, and three sweet potatoes. I’m not sure what to do with the sweet potatoes; seems like a weird parting gift, but whatever. They’re often sold at convenience stores where they’re grilled on coals, but I’m not sure how you eat them. They still have the skin on them and they’re kinda dirty, so I’m really perplexed. Any tips? In any case, it was a really, really enjoyable party, and I feel bad that all I brought to it was a potted plant. They were so kind to me. I’ll have to write them a really nice thank you note.

Tomorrow I’m going to Kyōto with Daniel to see Fushimi-Inari Taisha for some hiking, leaf-viewing, and kitsune udon.

Causative-Passive Troubles and Scrambled Pancakes

Woke up early today and had some pineapple for breakfast, but it wasn't nearly as sweet as the last pineapple I had, so that was a bit disappointed. But the rain stopped before I left for school, which was pleasantly convenient.

Japanese today was really frustrating. We're learning the causative-passive verb forms, and I don't understand it. Really, it's not hard, and with practice I'm sure it'll be fine. But right now I just can't seem to get it right, and it makes me mad. I don't like not being really good at things, especially things that I know I should understand. On top of it, the Brandon, the guy who sits next to me and was my practice partner today, really seems to have caught on to it quickly, so I'm jealous of him and feel really behind compared to him. I haven't been frustrated by schoolwork like that in a very long time. It's just something I need to get over, though; I'm not going to be good at everything, and it's not worth getting that upset over causative-passive verbs in Japanese. Still, I left class on the verge of tears. Yuck.

During lunch I edited a lot of David's paper, which was a lot of fun. I really, really like editing. It's something that I might want to do as part of a career, actually. I don't think I want to go throught the formal schooling that would probably be needed to be a real editor at a publishing company. But if I ever end up working in an office setting, I'd love to look over reports before they're submitted or something. I like nonfiction writing, and I like being nitpicky.

In art history today, after taking notes on the lecture for about forty-five minutes, we got to look at some reproductions of Kamakura Period scrolls. It was pretty cool to get to see them in scroll form rather than digital photos. One particularly interesting scroll is called the Farting Scroll. Seriously. I can't find any images of it online at the moment, but if I can I'll post a link so you can share it with all the twelve year old boys you know. It's a really funny scroll showing these guys having a farting contest. Very strange.

In Film and Literature we watched parts of Come See the Paradise, a really poorly done film in which Dennis Quaid is a fugitive on the run who marries a Japanese-American woman who is later sent to an internment camp. Really, really terrible romantic dialogue. But its depiction of the camps was interesting, so whatever.

Barely escaped the rain coming come today, and took a nap this afternoon.

For supper I decided to make hash browns and chocolate chip pancakes. The pancakes were a disaster. First, I had to get a European guy, who now probably thinks I'm the world's biggest idiot, to help me figure out that a gram of water equals a mL of water, so it was silly for me to be measuring water on a scale, even thought the instructions for the pancakes called for water and milk by weight rather than volume. ::facepalm:: I broke up a chocolate bar I had bought and used that instead of proper chocolate chips, because the full chocolate bar cost 100yen, but the teeny pack of chocolate chips was like 250yen. So after I got the mix right, it was time to cook. I had enough for two pancakes. Pancake #1 stuck horribly to the skillet and wound up basically black on one side and raw on the other. But I had put chocolate in it, so it was edible. For Pancake #2, I used the skillet that had cooked the hash browns, in hopes that the little leftover grease would prevent extreme stickage. It didn't. I got mad and decided to just make scrambled pancakes. So I hacked up the already damaged Pancake #2 and just smushed it around the frying pan until it was relatively cooked. Both pancakes were edible, but they looked like a marshmallow had gotten diarrhea. I don't think I'll be making pancakes again. I don't know what the problem was--that I used skim milk? That I'm not used to gas stoves? That Japanese pancakes are just a different consistency than American ones? Oh well, no harm, no foul. The pancake mix had come free with Coke I had bought, so I'm not really out any money.

I thought about going out drinking with Fedora and some of his friends tonight, but decided to stay in and chill instead. I've been looking into OSU's graduate programs in East Asian Studies. I believe I may be forming the beginnings of an answer to the dreaded "What are you going to do with that degree?"

My back has been feeling really funny lately. It's my upper back, kinda right between the lower part of my shoulder blades. And when I sit at my desk in my room like right now, I feel like I'm sitting crooked, like my back won't straighten out and I lean to the left. Maybe it's the chair, but it's starting to concern me. Scoliosis runs in the family, and I'm already at high risk for osteoporosis. I'm hoping, though, that I just pulled a muscle and it'll right itself.

Tomorrow I'm doing laundry and going to Momoko's house for an okonomiyaki party.

AWESOME CAFE

Okay, so Betsy just told me about this cafe in Tokyo where she's going next week where you pay like 800yen to sit and read for 90 minutes and drink coffee, and they GIVE YOU A CAT THAT SITS ON YOUR LAP. I totally wanna go! I want a rent-a-cat here! And to quote Betsy, because she's hilarious, "Here's your mocha latte and would you like a tabby or an American shorthair today?"

That is all.

Frost and Presidential Chopsticks

I think we may have had our first light frost last night, though I’m not sure. I noticed that some of the marigolds were a bit wilty on the way to school this morning, and some of these pink flowers that look a bit like double hibiscus had dropped. But today it warmed up really nicely to probably about 70, and I have my window open right now.

I forgot to mention that at our residents’ meeting yesterday we got a handout detailing the end-of-semester checkout procedures. That was pretty exciting.

The election buzz continued today, of course. I have only heard one person—an American student—express regret that McCain lost. There were parties in the Seminar Houses last night celebrating Obama’s victory, and I expect more tomorrow night. It’s amazing how much support he has from absolutely everyone. It’s such a change; just in the past two days, I’ve had so many non-Americans look at me with this strange sense of “wow” in their eyes. It sure beats the heck out of the “sorry your country hates my country” tension there used to be. It reminds me of when U of L’s basketball team got really good after that stretch of lousy years in the late 90s. It’s like there’s this renewed pride in your team. Of course, I’ve always stuck by the US/U of L, but it’s a lot more fun to be an American/Cardinal when you don’t have the UK fans sneering down at you all the time.

We spent about ten minutes in Asian Psych talking about Obama, Japan, which I might go visit with some friends in the next few weeks. Turns out the town was used long a go as a port to receive goods from Korea, and they’re also known for making chopsticks. Cool. I just want some photos with street signs.

In other news, it seems that the Morning Banana Diet fad might be over. My friend was looking through the grocery ads at supper tonight and she noticed that the bananas aren’t nearly as expensive anymore. This is good, since recently I’ve been trying to eat them more because I’ve been getting muscle cramps in my legs.

Right now I’m still working on my Film and Lit paper about how Tori in The Cheat is like Okakura Tenshin. I was able to scavenge a lot from my freshman year Okakura research paper I did for Huffman-sensei, which has made the writing a lot easier! Basically I just lifted Okakura’s biographical information from that essay and used it for this. That’s not plagiarism, is it? It’s my work, it’s just work that I did two years ago. It just seems a little too easy to be totally okay.

Well, back to the paper, I guess. No rest for the weary. Except that tomorrow is Friday and I have Tuesday off school, so I guess I can rest then if I’m weary. Okay, not I’m just rambling so I don’t have to do my paper.

A two-cry day and a bad joke

Today was a really, really good day. In speaking class this morning we just watched half of the class give their presentations; I go tomorrow, and I’m not worried.

On Skype this morning, my family surprised me by having Grandma and Grandpa show up! It was so exciting. I hadn’t gotten to talk to them at all since I left, and it was great to see them. It made me cry, I was so happy. Also on Skype, I found out from David that my class registration went well, although for some reason there was a problem with my Japanese class. I’ll just email Imai-sensei and it’ll all be okay, I’m sure.

After those nice conversations, I went to campus, grabbed some McDonald’s to go, and went to the classroom where they were broadcasting the election results. By that time Obama had a clear lead, but I was still on edge. I went to art history at 1PM here, 11PM at home, and when I got out of class I found that he had officially won. He had just finished his speech, and his family was coming out from backstage. It was really cool to watch; again, I cried because I was so happy. It was really neat.

But I had to collect myself fairly quickly because I had my interview with Saho and her friend today. They need to interview an exchange student for their English class, and we sat down for about twenty minutes and chatted in a weird mix of Japanese and English. One of the questions was about what Kentucky is famous for. After the standard “horses and chicken” answer, I tried to explain the idea of hillbillies to her. It’s hard to do in Japanese! But I think I finally got it across. After a few minutes, she said, “So people think people from Kentucky are poor and do not wear shoes and they have no teeth. But this is false.” I think that sums it up pretty well. At the end of the interview, she gave me candy, which I ate with my Kentucky-grown teeth.

Come to think of it, both girls were really surprised at the idea of no teeth meaning you’re poor. But when I think about it, Americans have an obsession with perfectly straight, white teeth that the rest of the world just doesn’t get. Very few Japanese people have braces, so there’s not the social stigma of not having straight teeth. I really feel like at home teeth are a big cue as to someone’s socio-economic status. If you’re middle class and you didn’t have braces, it’s weird. I don’t know how many conversations I’ve had with fellow middle class white kids about going to the orthodontist. All this brings to mind an article I found on the BBC website about Americans, the British, and teeth.

Anyway, I then re-watched part of The Cheat for the Film and Lit paper that I have due on Friday and should have started long ago. Then I came home, puttered around for a bit, and went to our Seminar House resident’s meeting. As usual, we were told to keep our voices down outside and to do our dishes.

Then I went to dinner at Sachi with my friends Jasper (from Tasmania) and Daniel (from Colorado). Our main topic of conversation, of course, was the election. It’s all anyone can talk about today, and most of the non-Americans seem more intrigued and excited than the Americans. But the politics discussion, as it always does, turned to religion eventually. Turns out we were quite the mix, sounding like a setup for a bad joke: “A Catholic, a Quaker, and a Mormon walk into a Japanese restaurant.” It was really neat to hear about their backgrounds and political views, but those kinds of conversations are always a little stressful, even if they’re perfectly friendly like this one was. While we were there, another international student came into the restaurant. Jasper and Daniel knew him, but I didn’t, so it was nice to meet him when he joined our table. Now I know a guy named Michael from Slovakia.

Nothing much to speak of after supper; did some homework, showered, now I’m off to bed.

'Shroom Candy, Fried Candy

Today was a really, really good day, which I needed. Long weekends are nice, but they make it hard to get back into the swing of things, and I really wasn’t feeling like doing much of anything when I went to bed last night.

When I woke up this morning, I had confirmation of my eligibility to register for classes from Kuri-sensei, and a message from Witt ResLife saying they have received my Polis application and I should be hearing from them shortly. So that was good.

I returned my five books at the library this morning, which means that I’m now free to get other books. I think I’ll start reading Tale of Genji when I finish my Film and Lit paper and get done editing some stuff for David.

In my mailbox I had my new November health insurance card, two Halloween cards, and a notice that I had a package. I was so excited to open the mail the cards and package, but I waited because I had a class.

Speaking class this morning went well. We learned about a kind of chocolate shortbread cookie called Kinoko no Yama. They are in the shape of mushrooms, which are called kinoko (literally, “tree children”) in Japanese. Very cute. I later learned that there are also candies by the same company shaped like tree stumps, and others like baby bamboo shoots. I love the sweets here. Well, sometimes; the more traditional Japanese kinds of sweets with bean pastes and such aren’t really my thing, but Western-style cookies are fabulous.

I went to lunch at the small cafeteria and opened the cards and the package. I got a really funny card with a ghost cow saying, “Moooooo. I mean, boooo!” from my family. Aunt Doris had sent the package, which was filled with Reese’s Cups (!) and included a very thoughtful card. These weren’t the little wimpy bite-sized Reese’s either, but the full-blown, chocolate-to-peanut-butter-ratio-is-perfect kind, and a whole bag of them! They’ve been in my possession for a whole day, and they aren’t gone yet, which goes to show how many there are. Anyway, thanks, Aunt Doris! Best of all, though, Grandma and Grandpa sent me a card. I haven’t been able to talk to them since I left, which makes me sad. Grandma wrote the sweetest letter ever and put it in the card. It’s now posted above my writing desk next to my mirror, and when I look at it I get choked up. But that’s okay; it’ll keep me from being too vain and looking in the mirror too much. ^_^ I will be very glad to come home (45 days left) to see my family.

Tuesday afternoons are long because I have three classes in a row. But in Reading and Writing we played a game where we broke into teams and had to arrange different elements of kanji into as many combinations as possible, which was a lot of fun although my team didn’t win.

Asian Psych went really well. We’ve gotten away from the more fundamental theoretical wishy-washy semi-religious stuff from the earlier parts of the course, which makes me happy because I found it all very confusing and vague. Today we finished learning about Morita Therapy and moved on to Naikan Therapy, both of which are really interesting concepts. Check them out. I’ll be doing my self-cultivation project for that class using some Morita journaling techniques. I’ll probably start that over the next week, so if my blog entries get temporarily shorter, please forgive me, but I’m doing a lot of other reflective writing for a class.

In Film and Literature we learned about the internment camps during World War II. Pretty horrific stuff. I mean, no one was tortured or starved or anything, but the thought that you could just be whisked away from your home and family and job…freaky. And I don’t doubt that we’d do it again, if pressed enough. As usual, it’s good to be a rich Caucasian Christian American woman.

Rather than going home after class, I stayed on campus to finish writing my presentation outline for Speaking class on Thursday. I have to give a five minute speech about Shōtoku Taishi. Yuck. At least we can use notes and a PowerPoint, and Sensei looked over our speeches beforehand. I had udon noodles and a cheeseburger for supper on campus while I started editing David’s writing.

When I finally returned to the Seminar House, I ran into my friend Daniel who invited me to watch Lord of the Rings with him and Joanne, so after my shower I joined them in the lounge with my Reese’s Cups to share and we watched the second half of the extended edition of Fellowship of the Ring. I hadn’t seen any of the extended versions before, but I liked its flow very much. It fills in a lot of the gaps that the more edited films leave out, although I don’t think anyone could ever achieve Tolkien’s original level of detail. It was fun to watch a movie with friends, though. Some of my other friends were having a Fried Stuff Party in the kitchen (Buffalo wings, French fries, Oreos, anything they could get their hands on), and I was able to barter some Reese’s Cups for some blooming onion petals. They said they’d try to deep fry the Reese’s, but I never heard how that turned out.

Anyway, it was a very good day because I was able to keep myself busy. A lot of times, because I finish my homework so early here, I get bored and mopey in the evenings, but tonight I was nicely sociable. I will try to continue to do find evening activities. It beats the heck out of reviewing kanji, reading ahead for classes, and playing FreeCell in my room.

Happy Election Day, by the way. I hope you voted. Apparently they’re going to be broadcasting the election results in the CIE tomorrow morning, so I’m looking forward to being able to keep up with that a little bit.

Boring Day

Today, being National Culture Day, there were no classes. I slept in until 10 and had a really nice Skype date with David. I had expected the Internet to be down because they were doing upgrade work, but it turned out to be fine, which was a nice surprise. Made some grilled cheese for lunch, as well as my fish marinade for supper. This afternoon I wrote my art paper and finished reading The Red Tent. For supper I had my blackened pepper tuna with rice pilaf and hash browns. And now here I am, with not much to say.

I've been having really vivid dreams lately. Not necessarily nightmares, but sometimes they're scary. It's weird. I have also been getting muscle cramps and fatigue easily. I've been eating bananas to try to counteract that.

I still can't figure out why I can't put pictures on Photobucket anymore. I even created a new account for myself, but it still won't take. Hmmm. Also, no progress on the course registration, although David is going to help me get that straightened out.

My hands still smell a bit like fish from cooking, so I'm going to take a shower. Hopefully tomorrow will be more interesting.

Croquet, Registration Woes, and Let's Talk about Soup

I have been here for two months now, so I have about one and a half to go.

Tomorrow is National Culture Day, a holiday, so there’s no school. I plan to use the day off to write my art paper.

I think they’re supposed to be doing Internet stuff tomorrow, so I’m not sure if I’ll have access to the Web. Please be patient if you’re trying to contact me.

Speaking of computers, I’m having trouble with the WittLink Portal, the website we use to register for my classes. First, I haven’t heard back from my advisor, Dr. Christiansen, so I don’t know if my classes for next semester are okay. On top of that, not being able to access the website means that I can’t find out my registration time and date, which should be sometime on either Monday or Tuesday, so I have to move swiftly to get this straightened out. Last, I can’t access the “Register for Classes” function, so even if I do get approved and find out my time, I can’t sign up for anything. I really don’t know what to do. I have given David my password and asked him to sign in as me to figure out my time. I might have to get him to register for me, too. It’s such a bother.

Pointless story: There’s a small park right across from the Komatsu plant that I pass every day going to school. Often, there are these old men who play croquet there. I think that’s cool. I have never seen people playing croquet in a park before. The end.

Today I made my First Soup Ever for supper. I used chicken consommé, udon noodles, small chicken pieces (my first time cutting up raw chicken, too!), cooking sake, mushrooms, cauliflower, chives, and carrots. It turned out pretty good, although I put in too much pepper. I’m very proud of myself, though. This was my first non-Campbell’s soup I’ve made.

Nara Synopsis

I left Seminar House 2 at 8AM and arrived at the train station in Nara at 10:30. Quite the trip! It was nice, though, because it wasn’t that expensive and I was able to read a lot of The Red Tent on the trains. When I got there, I stopped at a small noodle shop and had a bowl of delicious udon for breakfast. I walked up this long, really pretty street lined with restaurants and souvenir shops.

There were tourists everywhere, both Japanese and gaijin. The weather is beautiful at this time of year and the trees are about to hit their peak color probably within the next two weeks, so early November is one of the busiest tourism times in Japan. Nara is popular with tourists all the time, being easy to navigate and absolutely stuffed with cool historical sights. On top of those factors, November seems to be the time that many of the temples display the statues and artworks that they keep secret the rest of the year, and there are many special art exhibitions at museums. In short, these next few weeks are an aesthete-tourist’s dream, although that makes things very crowded. It is the main reason I decided not to procrastinate and got myself out of bed after five hours of sleep on a Saturday; Sundays are the biggest days for sightseeing, and I didn’t want to be in any bigger crowds than I had to.

But back to the story. So this street led to Nara Park, the main attraction of the town, I suppose. It’s this big, well, park (hence the name) inhabited by sacred deer who love biscuits. Within the park there are also art museums, restaurants, shrines, and temples: basically everything you need for a pretty awesome day of gawking, wearing fanny packs, and taking goofy pictures. On the edge of the park there was a really pretty pond that had all these turtles in it. I thought of the Ninja Turtles, being in Japan, but they didn’t look any different from American red-eared sliders, so I don’t think they had crimefighting superpowers to speak of. After wandering around the area trying to get oriented (the signs were surprisingly vague for such a high-tourism area), I finally found the Nara National Museum.

This museum is usually known for its impressive collection of Buddhist art from about the 500s to the 1300s, which is awesome. But the real reason I went was because of the special exhibit of treasures from the Shōsōin. The Shōsōin is basically an early museum or rental storage facility; it’s a storehouse owned by Tōdaiji, a temple in Nara dating from the 700s. The Imperial Household used the storehouse as a kind of Nara Period garage, putting various household items and exotic trinkets and souvenirs in there for storage. So years of stuff—some of it really elaborate, some really mundane, a lot of it from Western Asia via the Silk Road—have been accumulating there for like a thousand years, and the government has kept really close records of all the stuff this whole time. In 1946, the government started picking out several objects to display to the public for about two weeks each year, and that’s what was going on yesterday. Some of the objects were really cool because of their decorations; I especially liked the shakuhachi flute. (Dad, check it out; you might be interested what with your pennywhistle thing and all.) Other things were just strange. You’ve gotta wonder why they kept a mummified ermine. And this coconut is just bizarre. Then again, I still have stockpiles of all my science tests from fourth grade sitting in my bedroom at home, so I really have no room to talk.

I enjoyed the Shōsōin exhibit a lot, but it was very crowded and loud, and you had to fight to see anything up close. It was nice to see so many people interested in art, though. That was cool. I’m not used to art museums being packed. Still, I very much preferred the more permanent collection of Buddhist sculpture that was on display. Much of it was very similar to the stuff we’ve been studying in art history, so that was really cool. There were a couple of objects, actually, that I think we studied specifically, though I’m not sure because “Tempyō Period Miroku” isn’t very specific. There was also a pretty cool collection of ancient Chinese bronze items. That was neat, but there are only so many two thousand year old cauldrons that you can see before getting bored.

After the museum, I wandered around a bit on the museum grounds, where there were many tents set up selling souvenirs and snack foods because the museum is so popular at this time of year. I also got my first closeups with the shika, or deer. You can buy these little packs of biscuits for ¥150 and feed them. The only problem is that as soon as they sense that you have them you get stampeded. It was pretty intense, but at least the deer are smaller than the deer we have at home, and the park caretakers cut off their antlers every year so you don’t get gored. After basically throwing my whole pack of biscuits on the ground and running away from the animals, I watched other people have their fun. It was kinda funny to watch all the families with small children. About half of the small children loved the deer, while the other half were scared out of their minds; all the deer loved all the children. There was one little girl probably about two years old who kept walking right up to these deer that were like eight times her size and patting them on the side. Then there was this kid who ran screaming away from the deer that wanted his biscuit. Very funny.

Stopped for a ridiculously overpriced lunch (¥950!) of curry rice at a convenient little noodle shop in the park area. Despite being financially suckered by the touristy stuff it was a fun atmosphere, Nara Park. You know how Disney World is fun because everyone’s there to have a good time? It was like that. Except my Japanese isn’t that great, so I couldn’t understand when the frustrated parents said typical things like, “We’re on vacation! Stop complaining and have fun.”

Next I walked through the park area proper, where there were even more deer, more biscuits, and more deer attacks. And when I say attacks, I really mean “uncomfortably close encounters with hungry deer.” And did I mention the deer are sacred? That’s why they’re allowed to terrorize the tourists. You can’t beat them off with a stick or anything, either, because I suspect God wouldn’t like that so much. I make these things sound awful; they were cute, really, and just hungry. Heck, if I was surrounded by deer carrying Reese’s Cups, I’m pretty sure I’d mob them to get at the candy.

Anyway, the purpose of going further into Deer World was to get to Tōdaiji, the temple complex that manages the Shōsōin. Tōdaiji, in addition to being a working temple with associated charities including a support program for people with learning differences, is known as featuring the largest wooden building in the world. This building, called the Daibutsuden, houses the Daibutsu, or Great Buddha, whose body is 48.91 feet tall, according to my ticket stub. Everything at Tōdaiji is big. You go through Huge Wooden Gate #1, which features two huge statues of fierce Buddhist guardian figures. Then you pick your way through more deer (which, by the way, poop a lot after all those biscuits) and go to Huge Wooden Gate #2, which also has big statues. I got these Aussies to take my picture there, which was nice.

I paid my entrance fee after knocking over a bicycle (no worries--parked and unoccupied) while trying to take a picture of Huge Wooden Gate #2 and then righting it. I then met this American couple and took their picture for them, and they did the same for me. They were really nice grandma-types and they were really worried that my camera made my face look really dark, so I had to keep assuring them that I could fix it on the computer. We kept running into each other at the temple after that, which was fun. I liked them a lot.

Between Huge Wooden Gate #2 and the largest wooden building in the world is a Really Big Lantern (15.15 feet tall). I took pictures of that, then went to the big statue of Binzuru, a being who helps cure ailments. If you rub a part of the statue and then touch that part of your body, it’s said that he will help heal it. I couldn’t reach his abdomen for my ulcerative colitis, so I went for the foot instead and asked to finally get rid of this wart that won’t go away.

Inside the Daibutsuden is more Big Stuff. Really, this whole experience was like Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. The Daibutsu is, as described, huge, and he’s flanked by two huge bodhisattvas. There are huge guardians behind him. One of the columns that supports the roof has this hole in the bottom that’s pretty funny. It’s said to be the exact size of the Daibutsu’s nostril, and if you can fit through the hole it’s good luck. There were a bunch of school kids crawling through it when I was there. Pretty entertaining.

The statues were cool and all, but really, I liked just being in the space of the great hall. I’m very much a “space” person; I find that being in places with a certain feel about them can really impact my mood. The Daibutsuden was a good space for me. I seem to like dark, earthy, holy, open spaces, I think. I love Mina’s attic, for instance, and Grandma’s basement, art museums, small clearings in forests, and Our Mother of Sorrows church when the lights are off. Anyway, I really liked the space of the Daibutsuden. It was so tall and dark and smelled of incense, and although it was crowded it wasn’t overwhelming.

After the Daibutsuden it was getting late, but I decided to hike up the hillside to Nigatsudō, which is part of the Tōdaiji complex. It’s this beautiful collection of wooden buildings overrun with more of the deer and overlooking Nara. The view was lovely, but I didn’t know anything of the place’s history or purpose, so it was mainly me going, “Ooh, pretty.” However, remember our friend Fudō Myō-ō, the scary fire guy who sits under waterfalls? There was another waterfall for him there, and there was a crab chilling there. I only noticed him after he ran away when I put the metal water dipper under the waterfall for a drink and it made a loud noise, startling both him and me. I love discovering unexpected things!

Rather than walking back, I took the bus to the train station. I got back home at about 8:30, I think, so it was quite the long day. I probably smelled like deer and looked like I had just hiked up a mountain, which I had. It was a very good day, though, and I’m glad I went yesterday instead of today.

Photos to come soon, I hope.