Kamakura

Less than two weeks in Japan... :(

Whew okay I am behind on write-ups for a couple of things. But for now I want to write about Kamakura, which I went to last weekend with friends. Kamakura is a town about an hour outside of Tokyo. We were originally planning to stay overnight, but as everyone was too busy we ended up just doing a day trip. It was amazing though, I loved it - I wish I'd discovered it earlier!

The full set of photos is here. Some of my favorite photos, Kamakura was GORGEOUS.

Anyway. We got in around 10:30 or 11 in the morning, and after hopping on the cute streetcar-like Enoden train we headed off to see the Daibutsu, the second largest Buddha statue in Japan. On the way, we saw a sign for Hase Kannon Temple, and stopped there first. This is probably my favorite part of the trip. It was a beautiful, beautiful Buddhist temple. Much of Kamakura was more tropical-looking and covered in green, and Hase Temple has a beautiful garden, plus a walkway up the mountain/hillside covered with thick hydrangea bushes and other flowers, as well as bamboo trees. It had a lot of levels, and you got a great view of the ocean and the surrounding mountains/hills. It also had a cave full of little statues, that was very dark and very low and gave the tall German kid in our group some trouble. Overall, it was just so green and incredibly peaceful. Probably my favorite place that I've been to in Japan.


View of Kamakura

There were a lot of these cute states

Not entirely sure why these statues have bibs.



Next, the Daibutsu. Great big Buddha! An older Japanese man stopped to tell me I had a beautiful Japanese accent; he thought I might have been a natural speaker at first. :) That made me smile.


It was incredibly hot and humid, so we stopped for ice cream (mmmm, cassis ice cream) before heading off to another temple. I can't actually remember this one's name. Anyway, it had beautiful decorations up for tanabata (a festival on the 7th day of the 7th month, though most of the celebrations aren't actually until August, sadness) and a small inari shrine. We also ran into an Amish restaurant. In Japan. Wait, how did the Amish get to Japan?? Aren't planes...? We were so confused, but it was more of a cafe and we didn't go in to see if they were actually Amish people.


Crowd of people in front of the shrine, along with tanabata decorations

Inari statue

AMISH COOKING


Following that temple, we originally intended to do a hike and see yagura (tomb caves) along the way. However, when trying to find where the trails began, we found out that the hike actually takes about 3 hours, instead of what we thought would be 1-1/2 hours, and was quite dangerous. So we went off to find another temple that had them. They sounded really cool - exploring caves! Ooh! Unfortunately, after a forty minute or an hour walk to get to the small, out-of-the-way temple, we found it was less than enthralling. They turned out to be a hole in the cliffside, that went in about 6-10 feet. Well... it looked kind of cool from the outside at least. We sat around that temple for a little bit recovering from the walk and the hot, sticky weather, disappointed by the not-caves, but it was another beautiful spot at least.

It looked cool from the outside... This one was empty. Another, smaller one had miniature torii gates inside and a small shrine.



We took a long walk back, stopped at another small... temple? Garden? We weren't sure what it was, but it was very pretty. And also mosquito-infested. Despite spraying my legs with bug spray every hour or so, I got bitten over a half-dozen times and UGH Japanese mosquitos are worse than the ones back home! Anyway, we grabbed some ramen for dinner, picked up snacks, drinks, and fireworks (hanabi) and headed for the beach.

The previous few days were grey and rainy, but we ended up with a perfect day. It was sunny and if hot while exploring temples, it was at least great on the beach where there was a good breeze. Japanese beaches aren't terribly nice, but we spread out a blanket and started drinking, waiting for dark to set off fireworks (as it was the 4th of July and the couple of other American girls and I thought it would be fun). We saw a kitty on a leash stalking a pigeon at the start of the beach, talked, watched the huge number of dogs on the beach, and took a lot of pictures. We also soon saw the reason for a sign saying "beware of hawks" - a huge one swooped down on three Japanese teens, flying between two of them, to grab something from one girl's hand as she started shrieking and jumping away from it. Damn. I would've expected that from seagulls - oddly enough, there weren't any on the beach - but a hawk?? Wow.

Sunset was not quite as exciting as we hoped - got a few big dark clouds around that time - but it was still quite a sight and once the sun went down we set off sparklers and one larger firework. A few other people on the beach did the same.


Friends :)

Sunset



So yeah. That was an amazing trip. :) And I don't want to leave Japan, I want to do more traveling...

Hokkaido - yukimatsuri

So... Here is my delayed write-up on Hokkaido and the yukimatsuri (I flew back to the States a day after getting back). All my photos are up on my Flickr account, but there will be some in the post too (as well as some photos taken by friends).

First day
We left for Haneda airport in the morning. I like Haneda, it's smaller (mostly just domestic flights, though also some to Korea and such) and so relaxed - they didn't even check our ID! We arrived just before getting dark, and headed to our hostel, which was a few minutes' walk from Sapporo station, right at the center of everything.
We grabbed some ramen for dinner (Hokkaido is known for its miso ramen) and headed out to see the ice sculptures all lit up at night. Unfortunately on the way, I realized my boots were not waterproof and in fact had holes in them - snow got stuck up the holes and then melted, and melted on the end of my boots and soon I had wet, freezing feet. We stopped at a convenience store to grab some plastic bags that I wrapped my feet in (and would the rest of the trip, sigh). The sculptures were *amazing* though. They had mostly snow sculptures (quite a few of them huuuge) at Odori Park, and ice sculptures down the entertainment district of Susukino. We mostly saw the ice sculptures that night.

Hokkaido from the plane


This sculpture had fish and various sea creatures frozen in the ice blocks.

Phoenix


Day 2
All 8 of us slept in one room (girls and guys - slightly awkward, and arrrgh a couple of the guys snored and kept me awake!) We woke up later than intended, and I went down to the basement to shower - but the showers were open only from 6-9:30 in the mornings, and I went down a few minutes before 9:30. A woman glared at me, pointed at the hours, and went "Nooooo! Cleaning! Nooooo!" Seriously, she had this long, drawn-out "nooo!" as though I was killing a puppy or something. I snuck down again a half hour later, she was gone, and showered quickly - but she came back as I was getting dressed and went "Noooooo!!" again. Yeesh. :p

We went out to see the snow sculptures in Odori Park. Some elementary school kids came up asking us to fill out some surveys for them, practicing their English - they were so cute! They gave us little laminated cards with their names and what they like on them. Aww.



Disney sculpture

Filling out the survey for the kids


Then we went to the Sapporo dome, which had snow slides and more snow sculptures - unfortunately it closed 15 minutes after we got there...
WALL-E~~ ♥


Day 3
The girls went to a Scandanavian (?) bread museum; the guys went to a beer museum. The bread museum was pretty boring (although we did buy some tasty bread) - the "museum" was a single room, only interesting thing about it was the huge longboat in the center with stuffed caribou on it. :p
We then went on to a chocolate museum/factory that was known for its shiroi koibito (literally "white lover"), which was a cookie with chocolate in the center. The factory was beautiful, but rather bizarre. It had exhibits of western tea cups, saucers, etc., as well as a large exhibit of old toys. It had a lovely view of the mountains though.
After we came back to Sapporo, we went to the Sapporo Factory, which was a huge mall (but full of only pricey stores). The center atrium was beautiful.

View from the chocolate factory

The chocolate factory itself



Final Day
Our last day, we headed out to Otaru - a fishing village about a 45 minute train ride from Sapporo. They have illuminations at night, with lights strung out along the canal and candles in little snow sculptures along the sidewalks.

Sea + snow!

Hokkaido's peculiar mascot........ It's called marimokkori, after a little ball of algae (marimo) that we saw being sold in a lot of souvenir shops, and the word mokkori (slang for "large crotch"). Soo, it's basically what you get if you cross the marimo algae with mokkori... Read more here.

Illuminations






We came back in the evening, failed to sleep (much to my annoyance, people were still packing at 2 am), and got up at 6 am to fly back to Tokyo. And there you have it. :)

New Years trip part I: Kyoto and Osaka

Back from the trip!

Kyoto
- Mari and I took an overnight bus that left around 11:45, and we arrived in Kyoto around 6 am. Didn't really sleep at all - the bus stopped every hour and a half for a 20 minute break, and it turned the lights on full every time. Our friend in Kyoto told us not to expect her to be able to wake up until about 8 or so. We got some breakfast, went to two temples near the station, and met up with Sakiko and her boyfriend around 9.
Purifying ourselves at a temple


- Back to Saki's place, quick shower, then went out onto teramachi - a fun shopping street within walking distance of her apartment. Had amaazing tonkatsu.
- Then Sanjusangendo Temple, a Buddhist temple with over 1,000 statues of Kannon, the Buddhist goddess of mercy, 28 statues of Japanese deities, and 2 statues of traditional Buddhist temple guardians (Raijin, the thunder god, and Fujin, the wind god).. It's also the longest wooden building in Japan, apparently. It's also well known for archery contests.

We could only take photos outside, not of the status inside. Pretty little garden though.

For some reason, it had bright orange walls

- After that, we went to Gion - place of the geisha and maiko. We didn't see any, too early for them, but wandered through some pretty little alleyways and looked in the far too expensive stores with beautiful geisha supplies.

Alleyway

Goldfish bowls on the sidewalk in the alleyway



Kyoto Day II
- Paninis for brunch, then we wandered more around teramachi, browsing the shops - I bought gifts for friends; Kyoto is definitely a good place for omiyage (presents). Mostly just goofing off and having a good time.

Japan is very into parfait ice cream - which I will get more into later

Oh, Engrish. :)

- Went to a cultural thingymajig, made some glass enamel keychains and browsed through the gift store of traditional items - more omiyage!
- Highlight of the day: going to a store specializing in parfait ice creams. Very popular in Japan, this place had almost 200 different types of parfaits. Plus huuuge party-sized parfaits running between $80-180. Hoo boy.

Paaaarty~


- And finally, we head to Osaka for dinner with Mari's family. Her parents are very sweet (although her dog is INCREDIBLY YAPPY. CONSTANTLY.), and after dinner the family quizzed me with kanji flashcards I brought while her sister practiced her English with me. In the morning, we left for her grandparents' house in Shizuoka, a four hour drive away.

Part II coming tomorrow!

Shirakawa Pt. 2

H'okay. Part deux!
Day two: Gorgeous gardens, tea ceremony, baby's first castle, dharma pantings, sleeping at a Buddhist temple. Day three: museum, carving a stone necklace, hooome

We leave the ryokan and head back into Shirakawa-shi to go to Nanko Park - the first park ever built in Japan, back in 1800. We attend a tea ceremony, sort of. It's not a proper ceremony - the tea master talked a lot in Japanese, which hardly any of us exchange students understood, and the Japanese organizers didn't translate. They gave us tea and just showed us how to turn the cup, but it wasn't actually a proper ceremony like I saw in high school. We mostly enjoyed the heated tatami mats and looked out the nice big windows at the garden. Once we finished at the tea house, we wandered around the garden for a while. So gorgeous...




Following the teahouse and garden, we went to visit Shirakawa Castle. Pretty beautiful and imposing from the outside, but tiny within... Just one room, with steep stairs going up another two or three levels. I started to call it "Baby's First Castle," since it didn't really seem to have much room for a family!



We left the castle and went on to paint our own dharma (or "daruma") dolls. Dharma was an Indian Buddhist saint. Daruma dolls are red paper-made dolls that have a weight added to the bottom, allowing it to always bob back up when its knocked over. It suggests invincible will power and is often used as a mascot for good luck. Painting is rather hard though.... You make a wish, and paint in the eyes once the wish comes true.
Before being painted

My daruma doll... Haha.


Finally we head to our last destination for the day: a Buddhist temple where we will spend the night. It's unheated (in the morning, we could see our breath in the air) and the room we slept in had some rather intimidating paintings...


We go to a hotel (heat!!) for dinner and a farewell party, then go back to the Buddhist temple to drink and chat some more. No one slept very well - up late talking, and the clock in the room played a song and counted off the hour every hour... I'm a light sleeper and it woke me up almost every time, sigh.

We wake up at 7 for meditation at 7:30. Whoever thought of trying to make sleep-deprived college students wake up abysmally early and sit with their eyes closed for 30 minutes... :p Then breakfast of picked radishes, pickled plums, salty strips of seaweed, and a rice porridge thing. I didn't eat a much for breakfast.
Meditation

Breakfast

All the statues at the temple were wearing little hats and jackets or bibs.


After leaving the temple, we head to the Shirakawa Field Museum. It's a small museum focusing mainly on the Jomon era or Japan, and other early history. We get to carve a necklace out of soapstone or some other soft stone, using sandpaper. I quite enjoyed it, and now have a nice worry necklace, although my hands cramped up like crazy from sanding so much (and I also sanded my fingernails and fingers, ouch). Ramen for lunch (apparently a Shirakawa style of ramen is quite famous. All I know is that it was hot and tasty! Mmm, hot food). We stop at a small baked goods/ice cream shop (150 yen/$1.50 ice cream! Yum) and head home... to SHOWERS and sleep!

So, yes. :) A very fun trip, quite an interesting experience, and it was nice to get out of Tokyo for the first time.