Kamakura

First day of class was yesterday! I only had one class but it was very interesting (kabuki and bunraku ) except it's a double which means it's 3 hours long- and since the building is so old, so are the "desks". ahem, I mean the little rickety tables with the 5 inch bench. OW my back.
Today I had more classes though including my Japanese class- I feel like I tested into the right place- I WANNA GET TO LEARNIN SO I CAN HAS SPEAK BETTR? Except the weird thing is we're not learning any new kanji in this class! - we are responsible for learning on our own or taking a kanji class which I thought was interesting...(kanji is one of the alphabets used in Japan by the way-thousands of characters...you have to know about 3000 to be able to read a newspaper. These are the 'chinese characters' which foreigners often turn into bad tattoos....)

anyway

3 days ago, the group of Oregon kids ventured out to Kamakura with our Japanese friends.

The first stop we made there was to see the famous "Great Buddha" or Daibutsu. (Built from 1252-1262) The special thing about this giant Buddha is you can walk inside of it! Really neat and really beautiful~.

Giant straw shoes that belong to the Buddha

The idea was to make it look like they were holding it...but I may have failed portraying that.

 Here's the inside...that hole is the head:

The next stop was to eat lunch at Yuigahama beach. It was so nice! I will have to take another trip out here to go swimming (the water was pretty warm, well at least compared to Oregon beaches haha). There were a lot of surfers. 

Our last stop was to visit Enoshima (a small island connected to the beach). Walking around was fun: a lot of shops, trying lots of different types of famous snacks, and seeing a shrine.... So, prepare for pictures!

You walk down this long street of shops and then walk past the "tori", entering the shrine. In shintoism, this signifies that you are entering a new ethereal world.

When standing on the stairs and looking back towards the shops you would see this:

As you travel up you can see statues:

And guardians:

Walk up the stairs, and you will see this area, so you may cleanse your hands before praying:

Eventually you will make it to the shri-OH hey guys!

Me and Dorothy walking through the straw circle, for luck I think...?

You usually buy lucky fortunes here too. Although, not all are lucky. If they are bad fortunes, you are supposed to tie it to this fence like thing, and eventually it will be burned (hopefully along with your bad luck!)

Other shots:

 

He reminds me of Tatsu (my pug baby)

The view from up top:

You can see the beach we ate lunch at!

This little kitty crawled right into Demian's lap (one of the Oregon students). Looks can be deceiving but this kitteh could tell he is a good person.

If that's not good luck I don't know what is.

Nick and the girls

That thing Dorothy is eating is OCTOPUS. It wasn't half bad ;)

I can just picture Cristi Steiert (my friend's mom) going EWWWW

As we were leaving, the sun was setting and we saw this:

Oh Japan

And on the train home, I caught a glimpse of something else: THE GIANT KANNON I STUDIED IN MY BUDDHIST ART HISTORY CLASS LAST TERM! ughhh I will be making another trip to see it some other time. It's beautiful too!

As promised earlier, I finally got around to getting pictures on the internet from the famous photo booths known as*~* PURIKURA *~* :
Big eyes are cute in Japan...but what happens when you already have them..AHHH

I know what you're thinking...oh gawd why?

WELCOME TO OUR "VIGAN LABORATORY" ....?

until next time.

Asakusa

Waseda University's Okuma Auditorium

        A few days ago, we were officially welcomed into Waseda University with the opening ceremonies for the SILS department (that would be the english speaking department). 

All the teachers, deans, etc of the SILS department

The school is nice, it's not really big (as in spread out like University of Oregon) but it is super tall! We chose our classes too a few days ago. I signed up for Japanese of course, British history (haha random I know), Kabuki and Bunraku, and Photography. The Kabuki and Bunraku class is the one I'm most excited for...actually I don't know- I'm excited for all of them BUT! the Kabuki and Bunraku class gets to take field trips to some of the theaters to see shows (YUSS). Also, if you've never heard of Kabuki before, google. It's one of Japan's major theater types...and I think it's super interesting...but I've yet to see a live show.

Anyway, here's one last picture of the school:

DID YOU KNOW? They have SCHOOL ON SATURDAYS ughhhhh. I have one of my Japanese classes on Saturday morning - talk about culture shock!


As for the weather, it's finally cooled down! I guess a Typhoon is coming so there's been super heavy rain- but that means that the weather is cooler. (YUSSS. I don't think I've ever sweated this much in my life basically)

A lot of rain would pour off this building and hit a car below. So much in fact, it set the car's alarm off.

Because of the rain though, we decided to go to Asakusa and the Edo-Tokyo Museum on Thursday. (Originally we had planned to go to Kamakura, but decided against it because that involved being outside most of the time. We're going there tomorrow though- rain or shine! Last big outing before school starts on Monday).

So! The museum:

Model of some streets in Edo (the old capitol that's now called Tokyo)

Another Model

Lots of models

A portable shrine and some drums

And a Kabuki display!

Of course with kabuki...kabuki faces were to be had and Dorothy is the queen:

There's a famous Sumo Stadium outside of the museum, so at the train station we were using, there was a whole bunch of Sumo Wrestlers- so cool!

 

Anyway after the museum we went to Asakusa! On the way there you can see the new tower they are building called "Sky Tree". It's going to be taller than the Tokyo Tower when it's done. 470 meters. It's really neat  to see it now as it's being built.

Anyway, in Asakusa there's a whole bunch of stores in this area with a big temple at the end of it. So, here are some pictures from our time there:

Front Gate 

Front Gate's lantern design on the famous Asakusa snack (kind of like a bread filled with red bean paste called Anko or Azuki)

After you enter the front gate

Looking back at the front gate

New friends

Another new friend, Daichi! (I want to be his best friend haha)

David Davoooods

Saki-chan (new shopping friend)

Random Gate

One of the shops that makes the famous Asakusa snacks pictured earlier

So. Many. Shops.

Then after the shops, you have the temple entrance

At the temple, you first light some incense...and waft it towards you I guess. Then you wash your hands and mouth:

Then you throw your 5 en (good luck and for friendship) into this grate looking thing:

Then you pray:

And just for the record....the swastika aren't Nazi swastikas. Here's a quote about them taken from this website if you're interested:
"The Swastika is a well-know good-luck symbol from India. Unfortunately, it is too well known in the west, as the Nazis chose it as their main symbol. In Sanskrit, swastika means "conducive to well-being". In the Buddhist tradition, the swastika symbolizes the feet or footprints of the Buddha and is often used to mark the beginning of texts. Modern Tibetan Buddhism uses it as a clothing decoration. With the spread of Buddhism, it has passed into the iconography of China and Japan where it has been used to denote plurality, abundance, prosperity and long life."

Usually on maps, temples are marked by swastikas. I recall my last trip to Japan when I was showing my dad a  picture of a map of Kyoto and he was confused like "why are there swastikas all over it?" 

Anyway, PAGODA

Where Buddha's relics are said to be kept

Asakusa Dango and osenbei. YUMMY

After Asakusa, we had an okonomiyaki party at a restaurant. Okonomiyaki is kind of like a pancake, but with veggies and fish and stuff. DELICIOUS. Anyway here's how the "nomikai" party works: you pay around 21 bucks to sit in this room for 2 hours and drink and eat as much as you can. AND IT WAS SO MUCH FUN.
We order the okonomiyaki we want to eat, then using the grill on our tables, make it! Oh, also a note on Japanese drinks: They have this stuff called Chew hi or something. It's alcoholic (like 8 % ) but doesn't taste at all like alcohol! They warned us of it at orientation cause you can think "oh I'm not drinking a lot of alcohol because I can't taste it". Anyway I tried this "grape sour" and it seriously tasted like a Popsicle haha.

Dorothy getting ready to flip it

Ebi (shrimp) okonomiyaki, before you stir it and cook it

grill it and cut it into pieces.

After it's done, you put fish flakes on it and Japanese mayonnaise which is a bit different than american mayo and totally more delicious.

Cheese!

Last note: for lunch one day I had this...a hot dog bun filled with soba noodles. Oh Japan <3 (pink stuff is ginger)