Kishiwada Castle

This last week I went with James and Taylor to Kishiwada Castle - 岸和田城。The pictures above were added in a hurry, so check this post for more info on the pictures. I have been there a lot before (one of my favorite places), but I hadn't been on the inside. So, we payed our $3 (300yen) and walked around the museums inside. A lot of the stuff had signs that said not to take pictures, but one of my favorite pictures didn't. Tada! After looking around at the armor, ancient farming tools, calligraphy from famous generals, and so on, we went up to the roof. From up there, we had a great birds-eye view of the rock garden just outside the castle. We also could feel a bit of a breeze. It felt like heaven to be slightly less hot and sticky. We also could see the neighboring school - and the baseball game that was being played. I never thought I would spend part of my day watching baseball from on top of a castle, but I did. It was fun.

When we finally descended from the roof, we walked around the moat and counted the little turtles in the moat. That moat has fish, turtles, ducks, and some flowers. Combo plus!

Next we went to a nearby shrine and wandered around snapping pictures. Here are a few of them.


It was super hot, so we went and bought drinks at a vending machine. I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but there are vending machines everywhere in Japan. If you were to walk down a small street, you would probably see two or three. I tried a new grapefruit sports drink. Ok, but not amazing. We had a little time to burn, so we walked over to the tree garden, laughed at pigeons and the monkey, and just chilled.

After that I went back to the Yukimoto's, had dinner, and went to class. Pretty average evening. I think I need to plan more little day trips/excursions. Even doing something simple like going to the castle is fun. I've heard that a new movie by Makoto Shinkai (did 5 centimeters per second - excellent film) is out, so maybe I will see if I can get someone to go with me, if it is playing near me. I also want to go to the ocean sometime soon.

Nara

This is called massive picture dump while the internet works. I will rearrange them and put captions later.
Today was another great rainy Saturday. I went to Nara with Taylor, James, Ali Baba (Haha), Sister Sato, and Sister Sugimoto. I had an amazing time!

First, we went to a big park with deer all over the place. I'm serious. They were everywhere. There were warning signs about the deer, but also every shop sold food for the deer. We all bought some senbei (crackers) and fed them. It was really fun at first, but after a while they got a little annoying. Especially since they made my hands all dirty.

Me feeding the deer.

All of us taking a picture with a deer.

Next, we went to see the Daibutsu - a huge statue of Buddha. I have never been so happy to see one of the ritual places for hand-washing or drinking out of metal cups. Yay for being clean again! The Buddha statue was way tall, and we were actually allowed to take pictures of this, so I will upload some. We also went through Buddha's nostril. What I mean by that, is that we got to take turns squeezing through this hole in a large wood pillar. My picture is a little blurry, but I will try to get it up. Oh, there was also a statue outside that kind of looked evil, but the impression was smothered by the conflicting impression of wearing a shower cap. I don't know why, but I found it very amusing.

We grabbed lunch really quick at some fast food place, and I got pork on rice. We had less than ten minutes until an appointment, so we had to eat way fast. I couldn't eat it all in time, so I had to finish it later.

Honestly, most of the time I don't really know where we are going until we get there. In this case, it turned out to be a meeting with a man who makes ink. There are 12 places in this area that make 95% of the ink in Japan. This man and his helpers ran one of the 12 places. The black ink is made out of charcoal (either from red pine or coal), glue, and perfume (so it doesn't smell so bad). The perfume was also specially made at this place. First he showed us the way they make blocks of ink. They take the rubbery mixture, roll it one way to get air bubbles in it, roll it into a ball to make it smooth, and then roll it out to the size of the mold. The man did it all in about 10 seconds. One of our purposes in coming was to learn about the ink making process. The other was to do hand imprints with the rubbery ink. We all got to keep our imprints, although we can't open the boxes for 3 months. The man also gave us a present: his personal, hand-made ink from 25 years ago. The ink improves with age, so this was a very generous gift. The ink cost roughly 6 dollars at the time, but due to the time and the improved quality, it is now worth much more. Wow.

When we asked where we were heading next, we were told that we were going to go study. I was almost disappointed, until I heard the next part: we were going to study brush-making and try to make our own brushes. Once again, we were told about the process, and given partially completed brushes to finish. When we finished, we were allowed to keep the brushes. The brushes being sold in the shop ranged from $30-$140. There were all sorts of brushes: brushes made from horse hair, cow hair, flying squirrel hair, weasel hair, and more. It was crazy, and cool.

We rode in the car for a while after that, and talked about a bunch of random things. The only thing I can remember clearly was discussing a book where dinosaurs invade the earth from the moon. It was a free book on kindle. We made fun of the idea for a while, but when James let me start reading it on his ipod, I actually liked it, which led to bit of teasing from Taylor.

The other place we were going closed before we made it there, so we headed back to Sakai.

In Sakai we ate dinner at Ohsho's - my second time this week. I was really happy because I got to eat Annin dofu again. I also got teased a bit for having a cat's tongue. I have heard this phrase a ton this week. It basically means that you can't handle hot foods. I think it is common sense. You don't eat something that will scald your tongue! Of course I blow on hot soup and hot foods before I eat them!

After we finished dinner, we decided to all go to the Sato's and watch a movie. We watched Megamind. It was my first time seeing it, so that was nice.

Overall, today was a great break. Weekends seem to be just as busy as weekdays, but I am doing fun stuff, so I don't mind being exhausted by the end of the day.

A few of my favorite things

The past week has been really rough, both with the language, homework, teaching, and with my host family. I had a bit of a problem with my host family - a combination of misunderstandings and differences in personalities. I think the major problems have been resolved now, but it was really stressful for me. Thank you to James for translating when all communication broke down. I wasn't too happy, so I made a list of a bunch of things that make me happy for whatever reason (or sometimes no reason). I figured that other people might like to see the things that make me happy, even if some of them are weird. In no particular order, here is my list of happiness.

1. Watching airplane contrails
2. Bridges
3. Anything with water - see below
4. Rivers
5. Waterfalls
6. Lakes
7. The Ocean
8. The smell and sound of the ocean
9. The sound of rain
10. The smell of rain
11. The feel of rain, but only if it is not cold winter rain
12. Castles with moats
13. Riding the train
14. Watching people sleep (especially on the train ^^)
15. Sleeping on the train and waking up just in time for my stop
16. When someone says just what I was thinking
17. A clean whiteboard to write on
18. When the whiteboard markers actually work
19. Teaching an enthusiastic class
20. Going off on tangents
21. Cobblestone streets
22. Streets filled with tiny shops
23. Decorated drain covers (planning to post my picture collection later)
24. Walking down a street that is playing music
25. Those days with perfect temperature
26. Eating good food at a new restaurant
27. Spending time with friends
28. Annin dofu - Almond gelatin mixed with fruit cocktail. Delicious.
29. Carbonated candy
30. Having Calpis ready-made in the fridge
31. Turning on the TV and seeing a show I like
32. Getting a letter
33. Watching clouds
34. Airplanes
35. Understanding a difficult Japanese conversation
36. Succeeding at a new challenge on my own
37. Weekends
38. Adorable elementary school kids
39. Going on walks
40. Plants that are actually green
41. Driving in the car at night
42. Looking down on city lights from up above
43. Watching stars
44. Fireflies
45. Beautiful Sunsets
46. Having a class I teach go well
47. Making new friends
48. Being random
49. Mountains
50. Paying less for something than I thought
51. Having a song I like on the radio
52. Listening to music with other people (this is when some of the best conversations happen)
53. Funny Japanese commercials
54. Sliding doors
55. Wood floors
56. The smell of wet wood, or wet asphalt
57. Purin (Amazing Japanese pudding with not-sweet caramel at the bottom)
58. A cold drink on a hot day
59. Walking barefoot on grass
60. Finding a coin on the ground
61. Getting an email
62. The beach
63. Talking to my family on Skype
64. Receiving presents
65. Walking through the shrine at night (a little like walking through a graveyard, but better lit)
66. The smell of incense at Buddhist temples (ceder?)
67. Heights
68. Having an adventure (sometimes even getting lost)
69. Playing the piano
70. Playing my flute
71. Watching random movies online (usually not in English)
72. Learning words in other languages
73. Garlic rolls
74. Multi-lingual hymn night with roommates (miss you guys!)
75. Reading, even if I've read it many times before
76 trombones led the big parade
77. Quoting from places that other people may or may not understand. See above.
78. Roller coasters
79. Ice cream
80. Chocolate, dark or with fruit flavor.
81. Staying up way too late to have ridiculous conversations
82. Using complex words that people don't usually use in normal conversation.
83. Sidewalk chalk
84. Cooking
85. Water slides
86. Thunder
87. My fuzzy socks that I thought I would never like when I first got them
88. Flip-flops
89. Starting new classes
90. Waking up early and being productive (doesn't go well with number 81)
91. Driving past the store named "The Jolly Pasta". I don't know why, but it makes me laugh. I have all sorts of associations that come with the word "jolly," and none of them go with pasta.
92. Sidewalk chalk
93. Little animal figures carved out of wood or stone to use as bookends
94. Tunnels (this deserves to be much higher on the list if it were in order)
95. Hiking
96. Frisbee
97. Picnics
98. Biking
99. Windy days
100. Humidity
101. The smell of wood
102. When the song in my head matches the window wipers or the turn signal
103. The smell of orange peels
104. Mist
105. Running down stairs, usually several at a time
106. Laughing for no reason at all
107. Fans (the kind that blow air)
108. Fans (the kind that ask for my autograph, especially those under age 12)
109. Knowing my way around a place in the dark or with my eyes closed
110. Watching a new movie for the first time

The End. I might add more if I feel like it.

Fun Afternoon

Today was Sunday, so I was at church in the morning. Afterwards Taylor and I stayed at the church for 2 hours until one of my students came to pick us up for the afternoon. While we were waiting we started talking to one of the other people in the kitchen, Yabutana sensei. It turns out that he teaches English at a local high school. I mentioned that sometime I would like to visit a Japanese high school, and he got really excited. He invited me and Taylor to come to his class any time, plus we have an official invitation to join any of the school clubs. It is just like being in high school, but without the homework. Attend class when you want, and feel free to do the fun stuff with the kids. Yes! We are going for the first time this Thursday at about 2:00 and staying for about an hour. After this time we will probably decide how involved we want to be with the English club, Yabutani sensei's classes, and other clubs. I am so excited! There really aren't many people my age around, so I think this is a great opportunity to make some new friends. I was actually just wondering the other day how I could arrange to visit a high school, and here it is. Super blessing. Plus, the high school is only about a 15 minute bike ride away from my home stay house. Yay!!!!!

We were supposed to go up in the mountains with Noriko to watch the fireflies after church, but it was really pouring. We went to Noriko's house for dinner (curry, vegetable gratin, fruit jelly, and chocolate mousse). Then we played some games. First we played this card game using lords, ladies, and fools (as far as I could tell). There was a huge stack of cards, and everyone took a turn turning one card over. If it was a lord, you kept the card. If it was a fool, you had to discard all of the cards you accumulated. If it was a lady, you got to pick up the discard stack. It was fun and easy to play. We also played a matching game, and I beat everyone soundly. 12 matches to 5 or 6 apiece.

I forgot to mention earlier, but while we were talking, I accidentally used Kansai ben. Oops! Noriko started laughing and said that it sounds so cute when I use it. Haha. oops. Seriously though, Noriko speaks with the strongest accent I've ever heard, so it is a little hard not to speak in a similar way.

We went up in the mountains for a bit, but we only saw one firefly. It actually flew into one person, so he caught it and showed it to everyone. Afterward we drove back to Kishiwada to the Yukimoto's house.

Kobe

Today was so much fun, but it was also completely exhausting. We were on the go from 7 in the morning until close to 10 at night.

Today we did a bunch of stuff, like walking through a forest, visiting the world's longest suspension bridge, visiting an aquarium with a dolphin show (got soaked!), and finally, visiting an onsen - public bath up in the mountains. It was raining all day, but it was still fun.

First, we went to an Arboretum in the mountains. Unfortunately, most of the flowers were not in bloom yet, but here are a few pictures. While I was there I bought a cute carved wooden owl to use as a bookend when I get back to Utah.

These first pictures are from the Shinrin Arboretum at Mount Rokko. The main flowers weren't in bloom yet, so most of my pictures are of other things I thought were cool. I think the above picture gives you a feel for what the walk was like: a beautiful tree-lined path that led to all sorts of cool places.

These are some of the koi from the lotus pond. It tells you how many there were that I was able to get this many in one photo. They were also really big.

Pretty lotus pond.

Me in front of one of the flowering bushes. I thought these flowers were cool - they are little star shapes.

Some of the blossoms in front of the stone path. I really like this photo.

For those of you that can't read Japanese, this store name is basically Aaah! The building itself is nothing out of the ordinary, and there was no sort of clue to led me know what they might sell in this kind of store.

These next pictures are from our trip to the aquarium. We saw all sorts of cool fish and listened to the Japanese people saying how delicious they all looked. We even got to see a dolphin show. We got really good seats by sitting in the middle of the wet zone. See the second picture for me being wet. My pants were saturated, but my shirt mostly escaped. Thank goodness I was not wearing jeans!

This is a picture of me petting sharks. Much safer than the scorpion petting zoo, in case you were wondering.

Ok. Now it is time to describe the last part of my day: the onsen. Onsens are hot springs/public baths up in the mountains with beautiful scenery all around. Public bath=no clothes. They are divided into a section for the men, and a section for the women. We got our locker keys on wristbands at the front desk, and split into the two groups. I was also given two towels - a bath towel to dry off with, and a very small towel to cover myself with. Very small.
I won't lie, it was seriously awkward at first. It helped a lot that I did not have my glasses and couldn't see well. After a little while I got more used to it, and ended up having fun. There were a bunch of different pools, so I went around to most of them. I spend most of my time in a large sitting pool that had a bunch of boulders and a waterfall. I also almost fell asleep in a shallow pool meant for lying down. Unfortunately, most of the pools were way hotter than I would like. I was never able to find a pool that was truly cold, so that was a bit of a disappointment.
It wasn't that bad once I got used to it, but I don't know if I will go again, mostly because it gave me a massive headache to go without glasses for that long while trying to look at scenery.

After we got out of the baths, we all ate dinner. Their serving size was massive. No joke. Each portion would probably have served three people. The size of a bowl of kitsune udon was the size of a rather large mixing bowl. I got donburi, and it was delicious.

Happy Happy Day!

Today was a great day! I thought I would be way tired this morning since I stayed up too late watching a movie, but I wasn't tired at all. As usual, I met my friend Michiyo at Takaishi eki on the train ride to class. We talked as we walked to class, and she told me how she has been amazed that my personality seems very Japanese, as well as my way of speaking. Yay! My goal of acting in culturally appropriate ways seems to be working for the most part!

Class was a lot of fun. For the first hour we reviewed everything in the course so far. We basically played Jeopardy with questions I made this morning. I was having fun, and the students were too, so I made an executive decision and had the 101 class be 2 hours long. It usually is about an hour and a half, thanks to the extra time from Watabe sensei's 30 minute planned devotion (which takes 5 minutes). It was great, the students remembered a lot of things, and we got some good competition in there between the "King's team" and the "Superman team." The Kings team actually came from the day where we picked a king for the day, and I let the king decided the order that we did my planned activities. Therefore, the King's team was the one that had the king of the class on it. The second half of class was just as fun. We learned about Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. We read the story, discussed it, did a few other activities, and then drew a giant picture all over the whiteboard.

Oh, I forgot to mention, but there was a great slip-up today. Japanese speakers have a hard time telling the difference between l and r sounds. Today one of my students confidently told me that he eats a big bowl of lice every day. I couldn't help laughing. A lot. Then I had to explain to everyone why I was laughing and have them practice the correct pronunciation.

After class, I went out to eat with Michiyo and Naoto - the one teenager in the class. We had originally planned to eat okonomiyaki, but mysteriously, all of the okonomiyaki shops we went to were closed. We ended up getting udon instead. It was so much fun eating and talking with friends - I think those two are the only two in my class that I feel comfortable using casual language with. I will admit that by the end of the conversation I was completely lost. Naoto helped explain various things about the church to Michiyo. Church language still goes way over my head.

Afterward, we all walked together to the train station. We heard the signal, and everyone thought it was my train, so they urged me to run for it so I could make it. Well, I started running, then realized that it was not a local train, it was an express. When I looked back, both of them were laughing. I couldn't help but laugh too as I waved and called out "Mata ashita" (See you tomorrow!). Those two make me laugh. I will miss those two probably the most.

Speaking of which, I haven't written about it yet, but started next Monday I will be teaching evening classes instead of morning classes. There are three interns in Osaka, so we rotate every month so everyone gets a chance to teach the morning class (The other two teach together in the evening). In some ways it will be nice since it is a lot harder to prepare all of the work by myself rather than splitting it, but it is also hard to say goodbye to them. Tomorrow is my last day with the morning class. I will really miss them. I have already promised to come back and visit on the 4th of July - Hiroshi's birthday, but they are such a great group. It is hard to believe that I have only been with them for a month.

I really want to think of something special to do for them for the last day, but I can't think what.

On a completely different topic, I have decided to do some more fun things today. Sometimes I feel like I spend too much time doing homework and other things. I know I will have more time after the change next week, so hopefully I can start doing more fun things throughout the week.

Maybe to start with I will go wander around Kishiwada Castle. I have been there a couple times before, but it is the perfect distance for a walk, and I love staring into the moat. (Moat! It's a moat!) Anyway, that's it for now.

Not Always Interesting

This is a post to say that my life is boring. Sometimes. Today I got up, made my lesson plans (I didn't want to make them last night), rode the same train as always, taught a fairly average class, ate lunch, and did homework all afternoon. I'm afraid the only thing that was exciting to me today is that we bought more pineapple juice. Yup, that was the highlight of my day. Most of the time I post about the things that were out of the ordinary, but sometimes there just isn't anything to write about besides the boring stuff. I guess I could write some more about my everyday life, but I don't know that I really want to write more right now. Maybe I'll go see what everyone else is up to.

Namba and Osaka

Today I went with James and Taylor to Namba and Osaka. We didn`t spend a lot of time in Namba, but I just have to say that changing to different train lines still seems confusing to me. I know I could figure it out with time, but I wasn`t really paying attention, so it was disorienting.

When we arrived in Osaka, we went to see Osaka Castle. I`m afraid for the first little while I was just thinking about food - I hadn`t had lunch yet. I stopped by a little stand and got these little puffed vegetable things to tide me over. After that I enjoyed the parks a lot more. There were these huge ravens everywhere. Those things were seriously huge. They looked more like hawks than ravens.

The castle was pretty cool, and I`m sure I will post pictures later.

My favorite part of today was a group of 小学生-grade school kids in their school uniforms and bright yellow hats. I became an instant celebrity. A little kid named Sho started talking to me, and soon there was a swarm of little kids around me. Sho and another kid even asked if I would sign their hands with a marker. I had them all take a picture with me afterward. That`s another thing to check off of my to do list: have someone ask me for an autograph.