To Osaka

Today started with me gathering all my things today and heading off for the Shinkansen to Osaka! After saying goodbye at Shin-Yokohama station and then embarked on my four-hour journey down south as I hadn't accounted for the fact that I couldn't use my rail on the most direct Shinkansen. But that wasn't an issue as I enjoyed resting while I could and watching the scenery pass by at a high speed. After I arrived in Osaka I had a brief rest and then walked around the bustling Namba where I was staying.

After a while, I settled on a restaurant advertising some vegetable tempura with rice with some miso as a set meal. When the food arrived I was struck by how strange the miso soup looked and upon tasting it realised it was, in fact, the dipping sauce for the tempura and the miso had yet to arrive. After that slightly embarrassing meal, I headed back for an early night at the hostel.

2017年9月6日

Kamakura⛩

This morning started with a short train trip to Kamakura! As we arrived, we walked through the main street towards a temple which was lined with bollards which were meant to appear old but were in face advertising various companies which sponsor them (My friend told me he often saw Americans taking photos of themselves in front of them..) Then we made our way to temple and I got a really good fortune given to me (the best! My friend got the middle one).

Then a squirrel came to say hello!

Posing on a fancy bridge

Casually walking through the streets

After walking around a bit, admiring the temples and gardens we went to another temple and did some calligraphy! Below you can see my progression from novice to master.

After that, we gave my book into the monk to sign and stopped for a bit of traditional Japanese Buddhist funeral food (as it's all vegetarian) which was delicious and beautifully presented. Then we went and visited my friend's Grandparent's grave and said hello, and then collected my book from earlier. Then made our way to 大仏！(Big Buddha) When we got there an old man was kind enough to instruct me on the correct way to position my hands in order to correctly imitate the giant next to us.

Feeling at one with everything around us.

Finally, we ended the day by going to karaoke for three hours, which had some interesting drinks available: Opera voice, Clear voice, Reggae voice, American husky voice, and last but not least, London punk voice.

We then had dinner where we grilled our own food on a hot plate which was fun and then had a good rest after a day of walking around and singing.

My friend Masa shot this video of our trip, enjoy!💖

2017年9月5日

Yokohama!

The day started off with walking through Yokohama's numerous and empty shopping centres on the way to the cup noodle museum!

A fun time was had as we made our own cup noodles and walk around the various exhibits which likened the creator of the cup noodle (Momofuku Ando) to some kind of demigod.

 Me channeling my creative powers

Smiling serenely upon my creation

Afterwards, we stopped for lunch and had cheese udon (an interesting experiment, 6/10) and then made our way to Sankeien, a traditional Japanese garden.

 Holding a crane  

 Appreciating the nature around me 

 Seiza is hard

Breathing in the clean air of the park

After that we went for Karaoke for one and half hours and then spent a while searching for dinner which in the end was only successful because we asked for meat to be removed from a dish. Tomorrow, Kamakura! By the way, all the photos taken here and the following post were by my friend, Masaya who's a professional cameraman!

2017年9月4日

Let's go to the beach🌞

I woke up with my newly found companions in my friend's house and we got up in search of breakfast. While we ate I attempted to translate the trashy news programme we were watching and we formed plans to go to the beach as a friend of one of us was coming over to spend the day and they drove. When they arrived however we ran into a problem, their car only had seats for four people and there were five of us. This led to me squashing into the boot on the way there which wasn't a problem, even if my leg did feel dead afterwards. Then it was beach time!

After the beach we went to a big new bookshop and had a nose around for a while, then stopped for lunch at a cheap restaurant, and then went to a discounted bookshop where I got some cheap manga!

We made our way back to the house and I was kindly offered a lift by Mana, unfortunately due to traffic I missed the train I'd wanted to catch but there was one 20 minutes afterwards which was fine. I made my way to Yokohama, met my friend Masa and had some vegetarian food in China town, unexpected but good day!

2017年9月3日

Nikko and Hitachitsuda!

I woke up in the hostel in my princess bed (with lacy netting surrounding me), had a brief panic when I thought I'd lost my key but managed to find it (it was in my bag all along) then headed out with a kind lady I'd met the night before who fancied showing me the way and possibly wanted a morning walk too. Firstly, I explored the impressive Toshogu shrine, complete with the three money (see no evil, hear no evil, tell no evil) and a ridiculously extravagant gate.

I saw the cat shrine too and on my way back down through all this fantastic expression of ancient wealth, I noticed a crowd had gathered around the three monkeys section and a window had opened. Intrigued, I made my way over and was met face to face with a white horse, looking quite bored with all the attention.

After that, I checked out Iemitsu's shrine too, which was a lot quieter and smaller, but no less impressive. Then I made my way down to the main street and had a stroll, leading back up to the main area and through a forest where there were some people engaged on a 20km, two-day walk challenge (I was offered some free beverages and snacks but politely decline). There, I walked for a bit, had some lunch on the way and made my way up and back down a steep hill and then retreated to the hostel, where I was hoping to dry my hair as it was still wet from this morning's shower. However, upon my arrival it became apparent that the hostel was closed, every day between 10am-4pm, for cleaning. This was fine, I just stood close by to use the wifi and then began the long trip to Hitachi-tsuda!

When I arrived at the station, I noticed that there was another foreign person, apparently waiting, after some time had passed and I hadn't seen the friend who'd said they'd collect me, me and the other girl ended up talking and it turns out we were both waiting for the same person. Luckily, I managed to remember the way to the house, where we interrupted our mutual friend's aroma therapy study session. After introductions and a bit of waiting around, we were joined by two other volunteers who'd just came back from going to a pottery museum (as well as a brief stop at a flamenco show) and we settled in for the night.

2017年9月2日