So. As another way of procrastinating (of course) (it's almost done, I promise! And I have two more pages than the minimum to boot) here are pictures of my last couple of weeks here:
To start off, trip to Kyoto and Osaka with Janet!
On the way to Shinjuku station. I like this Korean music group. and they're in ads in Japan!
They gave slippers for the bus. and the bathroom was in the middle of the bus and you took stairs down. it was kind of cool..
The bus with the impossibly tiny foot space that we spent from 11 pm to 5:30 am on..
And arrived at Kyoto station where it was hot and humid as if it was the middle of the day.
Funky weather, storm clouds and sun.
The guest house we stayed out. Verdict: good for it's price, cleaner than I thought it would be sharing a room with 5 other girls, comfy futons, not too clean showers but surprisingly new looking bathrooms. What is it with Japanese people and new toilets.
Destination #1: Kiyomizudera (clean water temple)
Looking out into Kyoto
Long pretty tree trunks far away
kind of creepy but can you spot Jeannette?
If only this were true.
The dissolving bucket.
The famous viewpoint as seen in the guidebooks. There's a saying "清水の舞台から飛び降りる" or taking the plunge (from the stage of kiyomizu) and going with something with great passion as if you would jump off that stage like platform...
Picture V ^^
Crossing around the mountain in the same temple. I like the rustic-ness of this one.
Jeannette taking part in the Peace sign culture.
Can you see the edge of the person disappearing into the columns?
All the Orange of the past few pictures are from Destination #2: Heian Jingu or Heian Shrine.
Ponds and gardens around the back of the orange building
Where are the frogsss
I seem to like this kind of picture taking. I'm sorry the tree branches aren't the most interesting all the time though.
Rocks in a river so neatly placed..
Bridge.
So we went to the place pictured on the 10 yen coin which is Destination #3: Byoudoin in Uji
Apparently there's a complete replica in Hawaii.
There was some significance with the chicken/rooster like 'phoenixes' on the top of the building but I don't really remember what it was... -_-
So I was told I had to try matcha green tea and wagashi (Japanese sweets). As soon as we entered the lady made us sit down and take a picture. Apparently this was the backdrop for a tourguide book featuring Kyoto.
Matcha with red beans and two dangos (sweet mochi like things) on top of shaved ice. Very good.
But I wanted to try the real thing. Bitter tea with sweet sweets. It was good.
Which leads us to Destination #4: Fushimi Inari (Jeannette- the Inari is the same inari zushi inari... Apparently in the past you went there to pray to the god of.. rice I believe? and or maybe it was the fox god who so happened to love the outer skin thing of inari zushi so people would bring it as offering.
And it's a fox not a dog this time, doing it's job and being a messenger of .. messages .. like the one its mouth right now...
And it's a fox not a dog this time, doing it's job and being a messenger of .. messages .. like the one its mouth right now...
many thousands of cranes.
I presume this person wanted luck in the games?
And finally, the torii (gates)
Each one stands because of donations. The ones with names on them are just signifying who gave the donation to have had the torii put up.
Me trying to be a torii. Yes not working I know.
Spider webbbb
Little torii among big torii
The ubiquitous 自動販売機 / vending machine.
In between different sets of torii (see below)
In between different sets of torii (see below)
the picture taken before running back down the one Jeannette and her friend went down though we realized that both paths ended up in the same place. It was kinda.. spooky once it got dark
They say it's open 24/7. I don't know who would want to be there during the night. The paths are pretty long and go all around the mountain.
They say it's open 24/7. I don't know who would want to be there during the night. The paths are pretty long and go all around the mountain.
Destination #5: Gion. Home of the .. theaters for .. bunraku?
Okonomiyaki (お好み焼き) but.. not precisely to our "okonomi" (お好み or one's liking) as it was a one choice restaurant...
Cute. I want my name on a building with hearts.
Cute. I want my name on a building with hearts.
四条 the main shopping street in Kyoto/still gion? but with most of the stores closed at this point.
The dream like shinkansen, famous expression used with the bullet-trains here since they began to run in Japan (and the stupid kanji that I missed on the final exam. I still don't know exactly how to read it)
Other side of Kyoto station.
The actual Kyoto tower.
And for our final destination in Kyoto on the next day: the oh so iconic Kinkaku (having the "ji" to cal it kinkakuji isn't quite correct as the gold building isn't the temple but rather a building near the site of a temple)
Alex, Jeannette, Me infront of the most popular picture taking spot.
More pictures of the remake of the gold building.
Another one of those birds on the roof.
Jeannette anticipating what we both ordered to eat for lunch.
Unagi! (eel) but we were jipped. It was Definitely bigger in the picture outside the restaurant.
And after quite the experience of trying to get from Kyoto to Osaka in a timely fashion, our ryokan stay experience. This is what awaited us.
Doutondori and the tourbook-ish crab sign.
With nothing much else to do since most everything was closed and it was pretty late.
This was fun.
This is what awaited us when we came back in to sleep.
Black sesame kit kat.
The river. our ryokan/hotel was on our left by the water as this picture was being taken. The ferris wheel like thing is I guess characteristically known of Osaka?
Interesting building.
Don't have many pictures of Osaka so here's a panorama of Osaka/Umeda station.
Lots of department stores.
And after quite the experience trying to find where our bus was to return home.. arriving back at shinjuku station at 6 in the morning.
And heading towards Tokyo Station.
The imperial moat.
And the end of our crazy trip :)
In time to go to the Farewell Party held for us by the Shorinji Kempo people:
Gan-chan and Me :)
Korean Bi bim bap. yummy. My first red dish in a loooong time..
Mariko, Kotomi, Jeannette and me :)
Lots of people squished in
Lots of people squished in
And even more here. :)
Lots of stuff going on in this one.
splitting ways.
splitting ways.
Reminiscent of our picture at the camp!
Saying good bye to everyone was bitter sweet.
Friend from Politics class. we were both lamenting on how we didn't want to write our papers and so I asked her to play some for me. This is pre-tuning.
Post tuning Ayane (the koto, whose name means the colors of sound) and Haruka
St Ignatius Church of Sophia University. Since I had never been during the whole 4 months. One of my host parent's daughter got married here.
And after a couple days of paper torture (during which I ended up not writing any bit of my paper)
To the mountains where my host parents stay during the summer to avoid the heat.
Tateshina village where they've had a second house for about 30 years.
It was really cool and had no trace of humidity. It was like it was forever in the season of Autumn. I had no phone service, no phone contract as it ended on the day I left for the mountains, no internet service, it was the reclusive paradise and I wish I had finished my paper before leaving so I could enjoy it to the full but the last night I had with my host parents, I was typing away in the living room on my laptop -____-
Their daughter and her family were there for the first day I was. Her two sons were so adorable.
The little one carried around a box with several stuffed animals and wouldn't go anywhere without them. Usually it would just be one but this kid had to have all of them.. it was so cute.
Mountains.
Mountains.
Houses. I want to live here.
and here.
the path downwards looked cool.
and perhaps here if it had a bit more privacy...
Talk about camouflage..
can you see it?
Not all of life is a piece of pie.. (is that even the right expression?)
I like lots of windows. big ones.
doesn't this remind you of the house in the movie Lakehouse?
Host parent's house which I thought was the coolest with the whole thing built in the front by host dad and his brother. Had this pully system too that would slide down a cart from the house to the little seating area in the front and back.
The room I stayed in. with shouji- paper doors and sliding glass doors and big amado- rain doors that would shut out all light whatsoever. I liked all the sliding doors.
It was roughing it for a while. There were bugs everywhere. I found a dead mosquito the size of a quarter in my room. But surprisingly I didn't get bitten much so it was easy to get used to
The writing on the wall was done by my Host dad's sister in law who briefly showed me how to do calligraphy a couple weeks ago. This is the writing style that would typically be carved onto stones.
The writing on the wall was done by my Host dad's sister in law who briefly showed me how to do calligraphy a couple weeks ago. This is the writing style that would typically be carved onto stones.
Going to shirokomanoike?
where the trees roots stand up on rocks
where are the hobbits?
the mini lake.
Me and my host mom.
I'm going to miss them a lot.
終わり!
and now.. I'll be going back to Korea for two more weeks and then returning home for a couple of days before going back to school to start Year number 4! omy.
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