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March 16, 2005
So much fun, so little time!
I’ve not posted much lately so now I’ve got to much to post. I’m going to start it up again by backing up a bit. The following pictures come from the very end of February. I’ll post a bit more over the next few days, so much has happened and I’ve been more than busy, is that possible?! Ah well, all in the name of fun…
Ekiden Race down south
(February 27th 2005)
The southern town of Shirokawa hosted an ekiden race which consist of running an eleven person relay with various lengths. There was a pre-race party on Saturday night. I ran 800meters, but I’m no runner and it showed especially since my leg of the race turned out to be up hill! Thanks to our better runners the team came in 2nd out of a dozen or so teams.
John, my neighbor from one town over, came over in the evening and helped cook up some dinner before we went to Shirokawa. I thought I might throw in a picture of my kitchen since I haven’t gotten around to showing the rest of my house yet. To summarize John, he’s a sarcastic wit from New Zealand with a zeal for cooking and quite a few other hobbies including languages. I don’t doubt that this kid will have parapara (perfect) Japanese in a year or two!
The moon was huge on the way down to the pre-race party. We had to pull a number of illegal U-turns to get to a good spot to take photos but the night turned out to be to cold to hold our cameras steady anyways!
Most of the gaijin (foreigner) team racers and friends stayed at Sara’s house in Shirokawa. This is the scene right before everyone woke up and made the mad dash to the race after sleeping only a few hours and drinking a bit to much. Other than the all the beer the party also included dog piles, a cool card game called apples to apples, music, dancin’ and a dramatic wedgie.
Lining up for the closing ceremony. Please take note of Yacoub’s ultra-stylish blinding-hot orange shorts and contrasting baby blue jacket topped with calf high grass green socks…classic!
Most of the trophies are reused over and over. Winners keep the trophy for a time, attach a name ribbon to it and pass it along to the next winner when that time comes.
Our two lead runners, Gab and Frank, line up to receive our award. We were all disappointed to discover that we weren’t actually allowed to compete with the other teams but instead were placed in a special category. This is fine, as we didn’t fulfill all the rules, but they also didn’t acknowledge the fastest individual times despite that these two guys held the two top spots over all. That sucked, but isn’t an unusual way to be treated as non-japanese. Hopefully next year the organizing will be fairer!
One of the many parties after the race. Each grouping on the floor contained a different hot pot with a different soup cooking. Sebo is shocked to learn that he’s been in Japan for the past 7 months.
As often happens as the token foreigners we had to entertain the crowd with self-introductions. Everyone managed in Japanese and it was great to see that we’ve all learned so much!
Playing some step-child version of soccer with some local elementary school boys after dinner.
Shirokowa is really contry side and tucked up in the mountains. Almost as much fun as the pre-party, race, or after-party combined, was just seeing the beauty of this area!
I wish I knew why this water is so blue.
Construction and road signs taking a lazy nap in the afternoon.
Stopping along the road on the way back home.
Posted by theinfonaut at 09:15 PM | Comments (3)
March 18, 2005
Hiroshima for the first time
A quick 2 days at the end of February with Edo and Patricia, the two craziest people I know.
We met up with a few other people, got some Mexican food, went out and ended up seeing a hip hop dance competition. We also got a glimpse of “reggae dancing” which is a weird (read: slutty bastardazation of whatever reggae dancing is supposed to be) but very athletic tabletop-style dancing. I’ve made a habit of not bringing my camera along when I go out at night, but as it warms up I’ll change that habit, somethings you just have to see to believe.
Edo close up, abunai! Edo is pretty crazy, and that’s saying a lot seeing as most of the gaijin I know around here are pretty wild. (side note: word spell check knows the word gaijin (foreigner)! Weird!) But he lives out on a tiny island and I figure you have to be a little bit crazy to keep having a good time out there.
We took a bus over to Hiroshima. It’s only about 3 hours away, but the bus costs approximately 30 bucks one way. We tried to study Japanese on the way there, probably scared the be-jesus out of the other passengers while we repeated words like “weird” and Edo impersonated old islander men.
Japanese work eithic is strange to me. Teachers at my school stay well past dark almost every day. I stayed late once to finish a lesson and left at 7pm while teachers were making themselves hot instant ramen. My guess is that this guy is a victim of a late night, but that’s still not a good reason to be falling asleep out on the road!! Every time traffic came to a stop he dozed off and then woke back up when things started to move again.
The Hiroshima skyline.
The Ganbaku Dome (Hiroshima Peace Memorial above which the first atomic bomb was centered on August 6th, 1945) is visible on the left but it’s dwarfed by the growing city. I didn’t go to the museum this trip because I’m still debating about going through that experience, but I have a feeling I will.
Posed. Taking in the city as we first start to walk around.
Patricia and I did way too much window-shopping for our own good; she showed me some uber-cool shoes that I later bought in Osaka. This store was a little too stylish and they had to label the door (“DO-A”) so that people could get in. On the inside they had a mix of gothic chain and death garb mixed with trendy pastel pop wear and a splash of stylish retro-inspired (as in 19th century) duds all watched over by store clerks that started at age 40 something. Wha?
Dozing on the way back to Ehime.
The inland sea is so beautiful. We passed over a series of bridges to get from mainland Japan (Honshu) to our island (Shikoku).
Posted by theinfonaut at 04:53 PM | Comments (0)
March 21, 2005
Jeremy Sewell came all the way to Japan!
Jeremy Sewell came all the way to Japan! How cool is that? I had an awesome time! It was great to see Jeremy, to travel around, to talk shop (design), and show this side of the world to someone from my side. We went to Kyoto for the first weekend, then came back to Tanbara for a week of school (I had to work) and then back out to Osaka for a long weekend! School was fun, Jeremy got to experience the weirdness that is Japanese youth. In Osaka we shopped, walked, played tourists and then also visited my favorite museum CASO and swung over the neighboring warehouses to see a sound installation piece. At night, despite the cold we made the club circuit as well, Osaka has an impressive range of clubs! And oh my I’ve got a lot of pictures for this entry!
Inside the Ijo castle complex.
Same location: Ijo-jo, in the gardens the blossoms were blooming: cherry, plums, and a few others that I don’t know.
Stones of the deceased.
I can’t call this a grave yard because the dead are cremated here. This site went up the side of a mountain overlooking the city.
After walking up through Gion we came to the temple complex of Kiyomizu-Dera. This is Kyoto’s most beleloved temple according to Ben’s Japanese co-worker. Mizu means water and this temple has 3 water fountains coming out of the side of the mountain from which you can take a drink. Each fall gives you health, wealth or intelligence. You can only drink from two though. ;)
Kinkakuji (golden pavilion)
I had come to this temple with Ben, but it was really cool so I brought Jeremy to it as well. I like this photo.
Feisty koi.
Jeremy outside of my apartment as we left for an evening in Matsuyama, the big city in Ehime prefecture.
Some sweet graffiti in Matsuyama. Is it a nipple or belly button? I say belly button.
Pachinko Tainment. My god I love it.
On to Osaka with us! Yaqoub came along to pick up his friend Timmo who was coming in from Germany. I’m not sure what this critter is, but it rather enjoyed being kissed by Yaqoub, and the man leading it around only said that it’s famous in Japan.
This is the coolest toy.
If only I had this as a little girl while going through my horse phase (Shush, you went through that same phase too, it’s freaking universal girl-ness)!
I like this photo too.
Osaka castle.
It was beautiful for half the trip, freezing cold, snowing and rainy for the other half. It’s actually snowing in this picture and Yaqoub and Timmo are warming their mitts above a barrel fire.
Osaka castle and the encroaching city skyline.
March 3rd is girls’ day (Hina-matsuri) and the celebration includes setting up displays of dolls depicting the emperor and his court. I would have been more into dolls if mine had looked this cool. I love the hair and the dozens of layers of kimono.
The matching male figurine.
These two were on display at the Osaka history museum. There will be a boy's day celebration as well. This includes fish air socks and more dolls (only these dolls are warrior gods! wha!? girls got the shaft!). Girl’s day is 3/3 and cutely enough boy’s day is 5/5.
Wha? Also at the museum. These are ema, boards to write your wish on and leave at a shrine. I wonder what the theme is supposed to be for these ones?
Yacoub and Jeremy at a small noodle shop in Osaka. I think the cold induced everyone into drinking to much alcohol, but beer and ramen are admittedly a good combination.
We stayed at a capsule hotel!! And I didn’t get any pictures of my cubby hole!!! This is the lounge area, complete with comics and video games.
On the way back to Shikoku on the day ferry. Again, the inland sea is just gorgeous.
A small island floats by.
One of the massive bridges connecting Shikoku to the mainland by leapfrogging across the inland sea’s islands.
Posted by theinfonaut at 12:55 PM | Comments (2)