Giro’s Shack - Version 7

With Yuko promising to come help me take my luggage down the stairs and walk with me over to the school, I had to be up early one last time. I woke up at 7:30, took a quick shower, finished up the last bit of packing, and made sure to leave my rent (a measly 8000 yen for 4 days) on the main room table before I left. Yuko would knock at around 8:45. Helping me take my always heavy piece of luggage down the stairs, we took off towards the university.

While I could have easily left from Yamuramachi station, only a few minutes from Tsuru-goya, I decided to stop by the university one last time, ideally to hopefully see Fumi-san, who could possibly drive me all the way to Otsuki (as she had done two years ago on my last trip to Tsuru). While this would not really save me much in time or money (only about 530 yen and most likely I would get no time benefit from this, since I would have to wait at Otsuki station for the train to Tokyo anyway), it would nonetheless be a nice thing to see Fumi-san one last time. Me and Yuko would struggle a bit on the long walk to the university (there was a train for a reason). While I obviously took responsibility of pulling (and sometimes pushing) the large piece of luggage, Yuko had to carry my bag of fragile gifts (stuff I didn’t want to leave to chance in my luggage). Heavy enough that it wouldn’t make the walk too pleasant, we distracted ourselves by talking about my trip in general, as well as Yuko’s now future plans in Santa Cruz next year. She was also surprised a little bit at all the excitement that had happened on her Facebook. I again reminded her that Facebook would be a necessary evil in America, so it was better to get used to it now.

Of course, there would be that fun walk up the hill to school as well to deal with. When we finally did reach the foreign student lounge, I would be exhausted and would (probably rudely) ask to sit down in the chairs at the office. Yuko had made herself late for class by helping me, so she couldn’t stick for a long goodbye, but I thanked her for her help and said I would be seeing her in San Francisco sometime soon. Takiguchi-sensei would watch the whole scene with little input, busy working on the computer. Fumi-san would not be coming in today, as I would learn from Takiguchi-sensei, meaning that I would have to get to the airport completely under my own power.

I would rest for a few minutes and then excuse myself from the office, under the excuse that I was going to see someone else. In reality, I would just take a random walk to the foreign student’s main classroom to see if they or any teacher I knew would be there. No one was around, so I went back to the office, knowing that I had to get down to Tsuru University station pretty soon. I would hastily write a note to Fumi-san in English, mainly due to time. In addition to my note to Fumi-san, I attached a note to the UC foreign students, which I had wrote in Japanese but took a damn long time to write the night before (that’s how I knew to write Fumi-san in English). With the notes on her desk, I also said goodbye to Takiguchi-sensei as politely as I could in my tired taste before heading down the hill and to Tsuru University station.

I would arrive about 10 minutes early for the train to Otsuki, so I took full advantage of this breather. One of the things that I didn’t get in my previous fall-only experiences in Japan was to see the recruiting season for college graduates in full swing. While I waited at the station, almost all the other people who came for the train would be in business suits. To my benefit, as Tsuru was majority female, there would be quite a few professional looking ladies coming by. I swear it was like I was back in ABA again.

Me and the many hopeful job candidates took the train to Otsuki. Once there, I went up to the JR window and bought my ticket for Narita Airport, just like a common Japanese person now without my JR Rail Pass. Remembering how damn heavy my luggage was, I began to ask the guy at the window for help with the bag, to which he told me I didn’t need to take the stairs, as my train was thankfully just on the platform right outside the station entrance. As he was saying that, the train just pulled up, so I quickly climbed on board and got settled in.

I would fade into sleep as the train sped towards Tokyo Station. I would be out for at least a hour, maybe a hour and a half. Luckily, I didn’t need to transfer out of the car until the end of the line, so I wouldn’t oversleep my stop. When I woke back up in the busy city of Tokyo, most of the university students in suits who had got in with me in Otsuki had been replaced with a great deal of salarymen workers instead.

At Tokyo station, I transferred for the Narita Express train. My transfer time was only short enough that I could only enjoy an onigiri (rice ball) though, before I got on the direct train right to the airport. The city of Tokyo would turn into the countryside of Chiba prefecture, my trip getting closer and closer to the end with each second.

Narita Airport was the signal that things were coming to an end. I quickly put my remaining affairs in order. I returned the beloved cell phone, which probably served more as a watch rather than a phone (I only clocked in about 35 minutes total on it). The line to check-in was a breeze, very little wait, and they didn’t even worry about the weight of my bag, although they could have easily checked it and probably charged me for it. No problems at security, although immigration control did give me quite a look over at my passport, another reminder that I really need to update all my identification with new pictures.

I would get an hour to kill at the gate before my flight would start boarding. I put money down one more gift to cram into my packed bag of gifts. Lunch would be a McDonalds Mega Mac, a big mac that they put 4 beef patties in. But then again, a Japanese large size is like a regular one in America. I had little left to do in the area of shopping or eating, so I just relaxed at the gate until boarding started. I noticed a large group of high school and/or university students hanging around, probably getting ready for their own trip to LA, maybe the US for the first time ever? As mine ended, theirs probably began.

On the plane, I would manage to find space for my backpack and the large bag of gifts, although I would unfortunately see someone cram their bag into the same compartment as my gift bag, crushing it a bit in the process. But what was I going to do? I would get an aisle seat for the 9 hour flight, so I would only have one person to interact with. Of course, it would not be one of those cute female university students from the tour group, but rather a kid from Canada who apparently had no problem talking with strangers. While it was nice to have someone to talk with, I probably could have done without his constant line of questioning about games (he saw my DS). Maybe I was more in a mood to be reflect on the trip, but the kid next to me would find something to talk about, almost sometimes out of nowhere.

In any case, the airplane doors would close, the plane itself would pull away from the gate, and then speed up and leave the country of Japan. My trip in Japan (and also Korea) was over.

I didn’t want to leave.

Despite being able to wake up at 10, my staying up late the night before sabotaged me yet again. When I woke up, apparently the girl living upstairs had already came into the shower, which was fine, since I wasn’t ready to get started just yet. When she came out, she gave another quiet greeting and politely asked me when I was leaving. I thought she meant just today, to which I said 11, and then she started in on talking about the bill. I said it okay, but then realized that I was mistaken and she was talking about when I would be leaving Tsuru-goya for good. Normally in this situation, I would just let it slide, but when I figured out that this was a big enough mistake for me to do something about, I quickly ran after her and told her I was leaving tomorrow, not today. She immediately told me it was okay and then hurried upstairs. Maybe she thought she made the mistake instead.

As I was about to head out of Tsuru-goya to meet the foreign students at their apartments, I noticed that a new e-mail had come from Lucia. She basically screamed at me that lunch was at 1 and inquired if I was reading her message. Almost I had, so I now found myself with more time than I had expected. I was in no hurry to eat the okonomiyaki they had planned, so I decided to take a walk up into the mountains of Tsuru. As expected for a place like Tsuru, it was pretty damn empty on a non school day. I took the scenic route around the city and even found a pretty fantastic looking temple I hadn’t seen in my travels previous. Even a place like Tsuru had new things for me to find. How many times would I need to go to see it all?

I eventually got back to the (mostly empty) university and worked my way to the mountains just behind the school. I had noticed the mountains were covered in blossoms on Friday, but the consecutive days of showers had caused most of the blossoms to fall of the trees. Instead of hanging beautifully in the trees, the fallen blossoms carpeted the path, giving the ground a pretty much completely pink look to them. They had just fallen and it was also a rarely taken path, so the blossoms were not dirty, in fact, they were just as bright as when they hung on the trees, so it was an interesting sight to behold.

Admittedly, I had to take a personal moment for myself and sat on a bench overlooking the city. Blossoms continued to fall and added to the ridiculous drama of the scene. Pink surrounded me and the city looked so quiet, sandwiched in the mountains. The only signs of life I could see were a small group of students practicing in the field behind the university. I still had plenty of time to kill before the okonomiyaki lunch, so I sat and reflected on my trip as a whole and the fact I was going back to America so soon. Obviously, I did not want to go back so soon, but it might be more because it was a vacation rather than the fact I was in Japan. Nonetheless, the more I thought about it, the more I was not ready to leave. I had just made some great friends in Tsuru with the new foreign students and they were already going to become memories most likely. There were teachers I still did not have a chance to meet. I was having a great time here. But with any great vacation, there must be an end.

The cherry blossoms continued to fall as I tried to accept the fact my vacation was almost over. As much as I didn’t want to, I had to go. I made my peace and descended from the mountain, back into the city of Tsuru. Ogino was apparently busy with girls outside the store speaking praises about the latest cell phones and a dog shelter from Fujiyoshida had brought dogs for sale as well. As adorable the dogs were, I did not stop to play with them, as I had to buy some more gifts at the sweets shop near Tsuru station before going to meet the foreign students at the apartments.

I was greeted with the sight of Motoki waiting outside the apartment, while a message on the door told me that they were at the supermarket and to wait. Finding it interesting that I was important enough to warrant a memo, I waited a little bit with Motoki before Nina and Krista would arrive and open up Lucia’s room for us. They started preparing things and before long, Lucia and Kacey would show up and the cooking would get started. I chose to stay out of the kitchen due to my lack of cooking ability, leaving it to the professionals. Lucia, Kacey, Nina, Krista, Motoki, and me would settle for a nice meal of okonomiyaki. Admittedly, I like my okonomi with yakisoba thanks to Hiroshima and their style of making it, but Lucia’s was excellent as well. Afterwards, they had brought desserts as well from the nearby bakery, bringing on another onset of nostalgia for me. How often had all the tutors and foreign students eaten together in Tsuru? Here I was, doing the same thing 3 years later. Insanity.

After lunch, we talked for a little bit, but we all had things to do. They all had to do homework (Motoki had to do some English homework of his own) while I had to pack, so we called it an afternoon, with the promise that I would see them again later for dinner when I met up with Kanae and Yuko. Back at Tsuru-goya I packed, while fielding various instant messages online from Lucia, Sayaka, and Saori. I would again do things too slowly and realize that my packing took longer than it needed to. I had to run over to meet/wake up the foreign students in time so we could meet up with Kanae and Yuko (and apparently Taki-chan as well) in time. I will admit to taking the secret entrance to the foreign students apartments, as I wanted to avoid alerting the ones I didn’t get to invite to dinner so they didn’t feel left out (the big thing about our apartments were that it was damn easy to see who was coming and going).

Grabbing Motoki, Krista, Lucia, and Kacey, we set off to Kawafuji, only to get a phone call from Yuko midway to find out that Kawafuji was closed. We were all somewhat disappointed (me quite a bit, as I had been looking forward to that Chicken Cheese Katsu the whole damn time I was here in Tsuru) but we regrouped to eat at the sweets shop (which did have a restaurant attached). Kanae and Taki-chan would come sweeping in on their bikes as well and we all went in together. Inevitably, the table kind of split up into two groups, the old tutors + Taki-chan and the foreign students + Motoki and Wei (a current tutor). I was in the middle, as the chain, so I tried to get people to speak with each other, but they pretty much kept to their own groups. There was limited exchange at the borders, as Yuko, Kanae, and Taki-chan found out that Motoki was one of the legendary English speakers that Takiguchi-sensei had heaped praised on (a rarity with her). Kacey, to her credit, asked questions to the old tutor group in order to complete her homework. But it would be separated for the most part, but as long as people were having a good time, I was happy. I got into another heated argument with Kanae about Americans, but I managed to restrain myself, although I knew I was feeling the frustration that Ajay had something when he was getting backed into a corner. But it couldn’t be helped.

Food would consist of Japanese style dishes, I settled with shrimp tempura (which was good, I had managed to not eat tempura for most of the trip). Food came and went (although that was a little bit of a mix up with the orders for awhile) and then dessert came after awhile as well. Of course, the obligatory pictures were taken as well, I tried to get one with everyone. Dinner would come to an end and while I would’ve liked to treat everyone, I didn’t have the funds to do so. Kanae and Taki-chan would take their leave there, although I told them to come by San Francisco whenever they could. I knew Kanae was itching to go back to Davis and Taki-chan was actually studying at Davis the next year, so they would definitely be in the area. As they biked away, I went with Yuko and the others back to the foreign student apartments.

I took a few more pictures when we got to the station and then had said my goodbye to them all, in a mix of Japanese and Western styles, as there was a little bowing, a little hugging, and some hand shaking. They said goodbye to their senpai (senior) and I said goodbye to my kohai (juniors). Me and Yuko started back towards Yamura-machi to her place (very close to Tsuru-goya), only taking a small stopover at 7-11 for ice cream that we didn’t need to buy after all. I went to Yuko’s place for a little bit (because, of course, I didn’t want to go back just yet), helping her set up her Facebook profile, as I told her that she really would need one as it was what the American kids were using. Just like Japanese kids text on their phones, you need your Facebook account to survive over there. We also spent a good amount of time doing a little Facebook stalking. Yuko’s education in becoming American was already beginning.

Around 12 I would take my leave, although Yuko would come at 8:40 the next morning to help me with my bags, so it was not goodbye just yet. Just good night. I went back to Tsuru-goya for the last time and went to bed. If I could, I would’ve had the TV on to CDTV just like three years ago in my old apartment. But I would have to the settle for the quiet noise of the space heater until it went into sleep mode.

My body betrayed me this morning and woke up at around 6:45, well in advance of my 7:15 alarm (I need 15 minutes of snooze at least). Groggy, I would get up and slowly work my way towards presentability. Again, the person upstairs would come in, this time to pick up the trash, to which I had again relent to. But after some time, I would get myself ready to head out and made my way to Tsuru University station. I would make wake up calls to Lucia, Kacey, and Lisa, to which I got expected groggy responses (it was a fun but late night of drinking last night after all) confirming they would all still come and be there at 9.

The day looked beautiful, so the fog that had invaded the mountains yesterday in the rain was all completely gone. At the station, the first to arrive would be Lisa, followed actually by Natalie, who was also going to Tokyo today (with her tutor). Kacey and Lucia would arrive together (as would Natalie’s tutor). With all of us together now, we got on the train for Otsuki. I had mistakenly assumed that special express trains in Japan had no charge in the unreserved seating, to which I would be wrong, when Natalie would call me back from the special express train saying that there was even a 900 yen charge would using the train in the free seating. I guess I had gotten to used to my rail pass covering all costs and I sheepishly apologized and took the later (and slower) local train with the group towards Tokyo.

While we all did our best to keep talking on the way to Tokyo, it would be difficult as we all started to succumb to sleepiness. For my own part, I would fall asleep until Shinjuku, to which I reminded everyone we were going as far as the terminal at Tokyo station, since we were all getting hungry (something I hadn’t planned for in my scheduling with the special express) we should go to Akihabara first.

A couple quick transfers and I took the group to Yodobashi Camera, the huge place I had taken Ajay to during our first visit to Akihabara. My game plan was to bring everyone to the big restaurant floor there, since there was enough variety that there was bound to be something that pleased most of the group. Unable to decide just looking at the directory, we resorted to just walking by the restaurants. Lucia immediately stopped at the third place we found, a place specializing on vegetable twists on Japanese dishes (which is to say they made the dishes more healthy with vegetables, they did not make them vegetarian dishes). We all settled in for a nice lunch and were now ready to face the excitement of Tokyo with a full stomach.

We started to work our way down Yodobahsi Camera, starting at the book store on the 7th floor. Lucia and Lisa grabbed some random books, I grabbed the missing volumes of Saito-san I needed. We continued working our way down until the 3rd floor, which had random gifts and some beauty care items. We separated for a little bit here, I grabbed some random Japanese traditional gifts while Lucia got a hair straightener, and Kacey got a hair dryer. I guess you can’t find those items easily enough in Tsuru. One more floor down and Lucia grabbed an Ipod Shuffle (now a measly 58000 yen). Our minor shopping spree at Yodobashi Camera over, we headed into the heart of Akihabara, as I wanted to go back to the used DVD store Trader and buy the rest of the volumes (2-4) of the Best of complication of Downtown’s (Japanese comedy duo) old sketch comedy show. I did so, while Kacey grabbed Season 1 of Grey’s Anatomy, the Japanese version, because she wanted to hear the dubbing in Japanese.

Quickly heading out Akihabara, away from the crowds there, we decided to jump right into the crowds at Asakusa. My main purpose was to buy more traditional gifts for people at home. We slowly walked up the shopping street, having to stop for a little bit when the Waseda and Keio bands came playing down the main street, in full gear, complete with their cheerleaders and apparently some alumni from the schools as well. It must’ve been time for the annual showdown between Waseda and Keio baseball game (the rivalry is just as strong as USC/UCLA since both schools are in the same city also) as the bands started competing with each other in a sort of competition as we got closer to the temple. Despite Lucia having little interest in going to the big temple at Asakusa, we peeked in for a little bit, mostly because I wanted to buy some charms there as gifts. After buying my charms, we slowly may our way back down the street towards the subway station, although we all stop at random shops for some gifts along the way.

One more stop for us to make in Tokyo, which would be Harajuku. I just realized that Ajay wanted a gift of his own from there, so I needed to make the stop. We were greeted by the sight of tons of umbrellas crowding the shopping street at Harajuku, meaning it would be yet another slow walk down the shopping street at Harajuku. We quickly found a store selling glossy photos of Japanese idols. While the place was lined wall to wall with pictures, it unfortunately seemed like it was more male idols than female idols. While I was able to find the few large size photos of Ai Otsuka and grabbed one, Kacey spent a good deal of time wandering around, looking for the right photos of Oguri Shun (a popular male idol from Hana Yori Dango). Happily, she would make her selections and spend the rest of the day taking peeks at the large photo and small photo of him that she bought.

Escaping from the wall to wall idol pictures, we made our way to Harajuku for some crepes, which of course was the thing you had to do in Harajuku. We needed a snack and the crepes hit the spot. We walked all the way down the street and back, popping into random clothing stores at each girl’s discretion. For my own part, I actually happened to come across the store of Hide from Ainori. He had spent some time on a popular Japanese reality show (Ainori) and part of the show featured him spending time in Africa. He came back to Japan and then proceeded to up his own shop in Harajuku of African crafts. While I came only to see Hide (which I did and was quite excited to…no pictures though), Lisa actually made a purchase as well, making our trip not completely selfish on my part.

At this time it was already 5:30 and we needed to hurry back to Tsuru. The plan was to have dinner with Kanae and Yuko. Unfortunately, the fact we couldn’t use limited express trains meant we got into Tsuru at around 8:30. By this time, I had already fielded calls from Yuko and Kanae (one nicer than the other) saying that they would try for dinner tomorrow night instead as they were insanely hungry and couldn’t take it anymore. As part of my change of plans, I decided to go to Happo with the foreign students who came to Tokyo with me. As always, another great time at Happo, as the mom started talking with some of the foreign students, and I could see the hesitation they had in their Japanese just like I did three years ago. The food was excellent as always and we also enjoyed a little bit of the new season of Gokusen as well. The foreign students were glad to come along as well, as my presence enabled to get some of the bonus snacks that come with being a regular at Happo.

Another farewell from the Happo couple and I suggested we take a quick trip to the new drug store near Happo as I was looking for something to help with my lip sore. Surprisingly, as we crossed the street, out of nowhere Kacey and Lucia seemed to fall into the earth. Apparently, the ditch on the side here had not been grated and both fell down into it. Nothing serious, but it was quite a shock. After a quick recovery, we went into the drug store. I couldn’t find (or maybe just couldn’t understand) my lip medication, but the other girls seemed to take the chance to pick up random items for their apartments. While I didn’t get what I need, they apparently did.

Back at the apartments, I hung out in Krista’s room for a little longer, maybe more because I didn’t want to go back home just yet. We spent some time watching Pirates of the Caribbean in Japanese on the TV, being awed/making fun of the English of Motoki (a really good English speaker), and calling Lucia a “thirsty soul” for drinking so much. Enjoyable (and extremely nostalgic) times in the apartments, but I had to get back home eventually. There was no need for me to sleep early, so what did I do? I sabotaged myself by staying up late doing random things online just so I didn’t get that 8 hours of sleep I needed.

Here came the last day in Japan.

No surprises here yet again, I would have to wake up earlier than I would’ve liked to in order to pack in the events I had planned for today. Unfortunately, I had woken up during the night because of the rather freezing cold of Tsurugoya, more my fault because I had only used one blankets when there were two available (and the second one was much heavier). While I was warm enough to sleep the rest of the night, my sleep was nonetheless interrupted.

As I slowly got ready in my traditional way (I don’t need a hour to get ready, I just like to ease into things), the person who lived above me came in (the key was left outside the door for the person upstairs to use, trust is not a big issue in rural Japan) and meekly asked to use the shower, to which I had to relent (I think they were one of the club’s members) which delayed my own shower just a little bit later. But I would eventually get ready and take my rainy walk to the university.

Coming from Yamura-machi was a long walk but something I had no problem with as the nostalgia level was ridiculously high for me as I walked back. Walking the main road towards the university inevitably brought back loads of memories. Oh, there was the family restaurant that we all ate as a group together for the first time. Look, there’s the old senbei shop. I didn’t have time to stop by every random location that triggered some old memory, as I had to make it to the university in time to meet with Yuko.

I’m not even ready to get started to describe how nostalgic taking the walk up to the university was for me. Despite some of the changes happening to the area around the university, the actual place itself remained the same. A sort of time warp happened for me as I was taking the walk up with the rest of the students getting ready for the next period. Surprisingly, I came across one of my old supervisors, Takiguchi-sensei on the way up to the old student lounge. I had immediately recognized her and started heading her way. Interestingly, she would stare at me for quite bit, as if appraising who I was. Luckily, she did immediately remember who I was, although she would admit as we headed to the student lounge, she thought I was just another regular student of the university, another testament to how much I look like a Japanese person.

As I had arrived a little early for Yuko, I caught up with Takiguchi-sensei in the slightly changed (the furniture had been moved around) foreign student affairs office. I did my best to keep the Japanese correct and polite when I was responding to her questions, receiving the traditional “your Japanese is still good” response. The validity of that statement aside, I made sure to hand over my obligatory gift of chocolate before Yuko would come, although several minutes late for her class.

So when I spoke with Yuko last night, she mentioned that she had taken a class with the foreign students from UC. I had believed this to mean that she was taking me to a class with those UC foreign students, especially since one of my old teachers, Okabe-sensei was teaching the class. This would not be the case, as she was leading me to a class meant for people training to become teachers of Japanese language. This was painfully obvious when I entered the room and saw a whole lecture hall of Japanese people and no foreign students. Also, since we were late, we were very obvious entering the room, compounded by the fact that we took seats in the first row.

Okabe-sensei would obviously notice her late students coming in, but she also then noticed me again almost immediately. She briefly broke off from her lecture to inquire as to what I was doing and to also introduce me briefly to the rest of the class (who would be teaching people like me in the future). Embarrassed to be the center of attention, I answered her questions briefly, bowed a little to the class, and quickly returned to my seat. I tried to follow along with Okabe-sensei’s lecture on the science of teaching Japanese, such as who would be your students, what “mother language” really meant, and where the interest in Japan was coming from (surprisingly a lot from Australia). I faded in and out in terms of understanding what was going on, but I did my best to make the most of my free lesson, especially since I was out of college already.

After the lecture was over, I was quickly greeted again by Okabe-sensei, who was just as how I remembered her. I informed her with the details of my trip and my brief stay in Tsuru. I was glad to see she was doing well (now having given birth to a daughter since I was last in Tsuru two years ago) and I handed off one of my gifts from Eihei-ji before excusing myself and leaving the class with Yuko.

Me and Yuko would part ways at lunchtime, as I was looking to go to Happo and she went to the cafeteria to eat with her friends. I took the long road down to Happo, where I was immediately surprised to see that Tentomushi Karaoke had turned into “Tent” Karaoke and had taken on a western cowboy theme now. Also, the 100 yen store was gone and the Mos Burger had turned into a crepe place (although that crepe place didn’t seem to be open either). A rather large drug store (like CVS) had opened up where a field used to be. What was going on here?

Luckily, Happo remained more or less the same. The place looked exactly the same, manga and the TV in the corner, the bar, the seats. The people were the same, as the couple who ran it were still there, looking well, and the mom also immediately recognized me and ran up to hug me with little hesitation. The food was the same, as the ramen I had was fantastic, as well as the random side dishes (a salad, some fish, and veggies) the Happo couple seemed content to serve me. The only small thing that had changed was the menu, which now boasted curry, which I was just shocked to find out about. Nonetheless, I spent a good deal of time at Happo, even after my food was gone, partly because I had nothing else to do, but also because I was just having a good time being back at the ramen place I spent so much time at and talking with the Happo couple yet again just like it was the past.

But I had to get out of Happo eventually and with a goodbye and a promise I would be back, I left and took a random walk around Tsuru. Mostly because I wanted to see what was going on with the place I remembered so fondly, I wandered here and there around the university area. Not too many big changes around Tsuru, the big buildings from two years ago were still doing fine, although more new small buildings had started pop up in random places. Perhaps the biggest surprise for me was that Ogino now sold alcohol, where they had been labeled as the “boring supermarket” by some of us three years ago because it would not stock any alcohol. Apparently the times had definitely changed around here.

I would take a stop by Katoh Books (and the staff that says “welcome” sarcastically…at least in my opinion) but would be disappointed to find out that they did not stock the other volumes of Saito-san that I needed, so I would head out empty handed and actually walk all the way back to Tsuru-goya, as I had nothing else to do. I would spend the next couple hours just working on my translations before 6 would roll around and I slowly headed back to campus, as Yuko had invited me to a welcoming party for the new class of foreign students from China (remember, Japanese school year starts in March/April) and well, I had nothing else to do.

One of the first sights I would see when I got to the welcoming party would be Fumi-san, the other foreign student supervisor and the “nice” one when compared to the more serious Takiguchi-sensei. Again, I would be greeted with an immediate welcome and Fumi-san was just as jolly as ever. I would also be reintroduced to Hei-chan, the Chinese foreign student who hung out with us a lot and still remembered who I was. While she admitted we didn’t do to many things together personally, she easily recounted the story of me running into her and the other foreign students completely by chance in Nara. Hei-chan hadn’t changed either, her Japanese was still just as loud, but it was another blast from the past.

I took a seat at Fumi-san and Hei-chan table, along with a new Chinese foreign student, and a couple students from Tsuru. After a couple welcoming speeches, we were off to eating the food. Interestingly, I actually sat next to the person who I had Facebook stalked at Kanae’s last night. I had mentioned a little bit that I had read his notes in English and commented that they were pretty good (my honest opinion). Of course, in Japanese style, he would thank me and say he would still continue to try his hardest. Also interestingly, the same guy would turn out to be a junior to Shige (from Fukui), as they were both in kendo club and Shige was his senior.

After we got through the food, we would then start in on some games that the tutors (of the Chinese students) had thought up. Our first game was having each table stand on sheets of newspaper and answer true/false to questions from the tutors about Tsuru, the tutors, and the staff. Getting an answer incorrect meant that your overall sheet size would get smaller, forcing the group to get closer and closer together and crowd around the smaller area of paper. Unfortunately, for the most part, the questions were easy enough that everyone gave the same correct answer, which meant that nothing was happening. Eventually, they resorted to cutting off more paper and asking completely random questions that no one could know but the person asking. My group got far, but not far enough as we would be eliminated eventually and I watched Takiguchi-sensei’s team finally win.

We would then play one more game, where again it would be our group, which would have to speedily line up in order based on a certain category, like age, hair length, shoe size, etc. Despite our best efforst, we would never be quick enough to be even be checked if we were correct, so we watched yet another team win, despite all our running around and shouting in Japanese.

The night would come to a close with some musical performances, one from the tutors (playing Tsubomi by Kokuburo with a guitar and mandolin), and one from the Chinese students singing a song in Chinese. As it was late, the party was brought to a hurried close and the tutors hurriedly started cleaning up while I finally had the chance to meet with Preston, one of the foreign students from UC. We started talking and before I knew it, I was slowly walking back with him all the way back to the old foreign student apartments, as it was the birthday party for one of the foreign students (and hey guess what, I had nothing better to do).

I was led to one of the spacious (by Japanese standards) apartments where we all again crammed in the main room making a circle around the room. It was a mix of foreign students, some tutors, and some random Japanese people who were friends of tutors. For my own part, I had to make a small introduction of myself to the large group, to the fact that I was an old school UC foreign student and also a senpai (senior) to all of them, making sure they all knew it with a little bit of ruder Japanese, which I could get away as I was the senpai to them.

And so the birthday party started for Natalie, as with any party that happened at those apartments, you stuck to one corner of the room and spoke with the people there. My corner had several foreign students, who I spent a great deal talking with about my time, how their time was, what they did in UC, what I was up to, etc. Of course, at any Tsuru gathering, there was plenty of food, as someone had made chili and brought tortillas. And a cake, why not?

After a couple more drinks, I started inviting people to come with me to Tokyo the next day, to which some of the foreign students surprisingly said yes to. I don’t know if it I was my senpai privilege, the drinking, or the fact they really wanted to go to Tokyo, but I had found myself with a small group of foreign students that I had just met who were looking to come to Tokyo with me tomorrow. Go with the flow I thought, it’s better than going by myself.

With no game plan for the night, I spent most of the night at Natalie’s apartment, indulging in talking with whoever was around, in both Japanese and English. But with any good party, things die down and people start heading back home. For my own part, I ended up going back around 2, amazingly go back towards Yamura-machi with a random Japanese student (a friend of the tutor) who was sitting quietly in the corner with her own group. Maybe it was the drinking, but I chatted up a storm with her, learning she wanted to go to America but was really afraid to go alone because of all the guns and drugs there, to which I told there that there were places like that, but not all of America is a warzone. We’ve still gotta work on our worldly image folks.

I would get/run back to Tsuru-goya and promptly collapse, as I had just realized that some of the promises I had made to meet some of the foreign students at Tsuru station at 9 tomorrow meant I would be waking up in 5 hours.

Shige would ask to wake up early in order for us to maybe make a quick trip to the nearby Five Lakes of Mikata, but when I woke up to the sound of rain and strong wind, I knew that a trip to the Five Lakes would not be in the works. Everyone had already left the house by the time I got out of the futon, so it would be just me and Shige wasting time in the house since I wasn’t supposed to leave until about 1 from Tsuruga. There would be nothing to do but watch TV and occasionally try and get a hold of Yuuko, who was supposed to be my contact in Tsuru. As the rain and wind continued to blow and me and Shige kept talking, I would start in on a late breakfast (of more fish, of course). At some point Shige’s grandmother would come back home too, so as I was getting ready to leave the house, I had to answer back her questions in rather loud Japanese (she was hard of hearing) and of course take the snacks that gave me for the train (although I still had many snacks from when I visited Saori’s house and received some from Shige’s mom last night). Adorably she would wave to me from the front yard of the house (despite the rain and wind) as Shige drove the car away.

The plan for my last little part of time in Fukui, the plan would be to enjoy some of tasty katsu (fried pork/chicken) in Tsuruga. Tsuruga was only the next major town over, so it would not be a long drive. We soon arrived at “Europe” which was already busy with the lunch rush, a good sign of its popularity. I settled on the mix katsu lunch set (both pork and chicken), while Shige would go for the mini katsu lunch set. The katsu was quite good (they put just enough sauce on the katsu to barely cover it, so you would have to do it to your own liking with the sauce at the table) but unfortunately since I had just taken breakfast, I couldn’t finish it all. The shop had apparently knew this was the case for a lot of people and had a basket of take home boxes already set up at the counter. It would turn into my dinner on the train, as I had a nice 6 hour ride to look forward to to get to Tsuru.

Shige would take me to Tsuruga station and while I was getting my reserved seat tickets, she would get a station attendant to help me with my heavy suitcase (an embarrassing, but good call). Unfortunately, I had little time before my train for Maibara would come, so I had to give her a quick hug before I ran after the station attendant with my bag.

The route to Tsuru from Fukui would be a little complicated, requiring about 4 transfers. An express train south from Tsuruga to Maibara. Then catch the bullet train from Maibara to Shin-Yokohama (a hour outside of Tokyo). A local train (which meant it was jampacked with students going home) from Shin-Yokohama to Hachioji, and then an express from Hachioji to Otsuki. From Otsuki I would take the good old Fuji Kyu line towards Tsuru University. The only bad thing about Fuji Kyu (well, aside from its not being on schedule regularly) was it was not a JR line which meant I would have to fork over money for the ticket to Tsuru University station. Unfortunately, I then realized after I bought the ticket that I was supposed to get a ticket for the station before Tsuru University (Yamura-machi), which meant I would lose 80 cents on my mistake.

Riding back into Tsuru was definitely a blast into the past, coming across familiar station names and familiar sights. Arriving at Yamura-machi itself was a trip, heading back to that old rural country side station. Yuuko would come by the station just after I arrived, leading me to Tsuru-goya, an apartment renovated by her club that occasionally rented itself out for visitors. For the low price of 2000 yen a night, you too can rent a Japanese clubhouse! That wasn’t to say it wasn’t a nice place, it had all you needed, a bathroom, a shower/tub (which I did have to share with the person living above me though) and a rather wide main room with kitchen. The only problem was that there was no TV (plenty of books and CDs…but who needs those?) but I would resolve that with watching Japanese TV on my computer. Yuuko, unfortunately, had some work to take care of so she couldn’t stay with me that night, but promised she would meet up with me tomorrow and take me to the university.

However, I wasn’t right next to the university, so I couldn’t just walk into town. I decided to call Kanae and see what she was up to. She had unfortunately already started dinner (nabe) with a friend, but she invited me over to take part nonetheless, although I would have to take the train two stops over (one after Tsuru University) to get to her new apartment. I would find them walking the street to the station as I was walking down away from it. Kanae looked just the same (and just as loud!) and she introduced me to her friend, Taki-chan. Once at her apartment, we settled in for some nabe (miso and kimchi flavored) and started talking. While part of it was catching up on things, a lot of it was telling embarrassing stories (mostly about me) and a lot of it was also about Kanae’s massive dislike of American men (and we would spend some time making fun of some through Facebook). She would continually deny the fact that she had bad experiences with American men in Davis (I have told many UC Davis does ruin lives) mainly because she did not want to give me any credence to fact that I had been right about something. Figuring out that I would be unable to get rid of her bias (probably ever), we instead settled in to watch some TV and Japanese comedy on Youtube before I helped Taki-chan a little with her homework and Kanae got ready for her job interview tomorrow in Tokyo.

While I appreciated that Kanae was a lot more honest and direct than the average Japanese (I blame Davis), one could only take so much America bashing and embarrassing stories. Besides, I was getting sleepy and needed to get up early to make my way to the university tomorrow, so I would take my leave around 10:15 to catch the 10:22 train (which came obviously at 10:40). Although slightly worried about figuring out the way back to Tsurugoya, I would get back alright and settle in for the night.

Unfortunately, there would be another even earlier start to this day, just because in order to get to Amanohashidate, me and Shige would need to take three hours of train rides to get there, so in order to get a full enough experience at Amanohashidate and get back home in time for dinner, we’d need to leave pretty damn early. So I would enjoy breakfast with the rest of the family (as they were all up getting ready for work) and slowly get ready to leave for the station with Shige. A very short drive to the station and we were ready to leave from Mihama to Maizuru. We were both pretty tired so we slept most of the ride on the Obama Line, only occasionally woken up by the loud middle/high schoolers who would get on and off the train midway.

At Higashi (East) Maizuru, we would transfer to another line just one stop over to Nishi (West) Maizuru. With some time on our hands at Nishi Maizuru, we decided to walk around the city for a little bit. Maizuru very much seemed like a city on the decline as the department store we stopped by had closed off two of its floors, the second floor was mostly occupied by a 100 yen shop, and the third floor had an empty looking English school and a computer school that immediately closed its door when the guy there saw me and Shige coming towards him (only to get to the escalator to go back down).

After an equally depressing walk through the shopping street of Maizuru (mostly closed this early) we got back to the station to get on the train to Amanohashidate. It would be another hour until we got there, but the route would take us by the bay and we could actually see the famous land bridge of Amanohashidate as we got closer to the station.

Amanohashidate would be quiet, but not as quiet as Matsushima had been (that is to say, there were a few tourists). A map in hand and we started out on our way to the northern side of the land bridge, where the famous views were to be seen apparently. Shige overheard that the walk across the land bridge would take a hour, which was a slight concern since we would only have about 3 hours at Amanohashidate before we needed to get back to Mihama (remember, we needed to be back in time for dinner).

But what could we do about that? Well, we could’ve taken bikes, which in retrospect, would have been an excellent idea but instead we decided to pocket the 300/400 yen and walk instead. While the walk wasn’t hard at all (no hills) the walk across the famous land bridge of Amanohashidate was a bit long, coming in a 3 kilometers. We would stop every so often at some of the famous pine trees that were marked with signs, although if the signs weren’t there, you would’ve just thought they were all the same in reality. Nonetheless, it was a pleasant walk through the forest of the land bridge on our way to the northern side of Amanohashidate.

We would discover that most of the people that we didn’t see on our walk north probably had taken the ferry from the southern side of the bay as we got into the northern part of the city. Not much to see on the north side of the city except for a temple under renovation and lots of loud shopkeepers trying to get anyone who walked by into their stores and restaurants. While one could walk up to the mountains of Amanohashidate (for the famous view), we decided to save that for the walk down (we were still feeling the effects of the yesterday as well as the long walk over the land bridge) and took the chairlift up to the top. Interestingly, they also had a cable car available, but the chairlift afforded a much better ride up as the path up was lined with still blooming (but blowing away in the wind) cherry blossoms.

Putting my fears of heights aside for some great pictures, I found the view of the land bridge (literally a “bridge to heaven”) got better and better as we got higher. A couple minutes later, we would reach the top and the fun picture taking would commence. As it was the last of my three best sights of Japan to see, I made sure to make the experience count. Tradition dictates that as you look at the land bridge, you’re supposed to look at it upside down (between your legs) so it looks like the bridge is going to the heavens. I tried and found that I could kind of see it (maybe it would’ve helped more if the weather was sunny) but Shige had trouble getting her imagination to work and couldn’t see it.

Other than the many pictures I would take of the bridge to heaven, there would be little else to do up at the top of the mountain. There was a circle (resembling a Buddhist prayer stick) that people tried to throw discs through to grant wishes. Me and Shige both tried and failed at invoking more blessings from the gods. We also decided to at least take lunch up there, Shige had some dango while I took in some udon. At this point we had to think a bit harder about the time we had left, if we missed our scheduled train, we would end up coming in two hours later to Mihama. While there supposedly was a fancy temple even higher up the mountain, it was a bus ride away, which meant walking would take too long. So I decided to play it safe and we walked down the mountain (after almost giving up on finding the path back). As we got back to the main shopping area, Shige grabbed some gifts for home as well some ice cream for herself, which apparently (combined with
the dango from before) made her full. Again worrying about time, we thought about taking the ferry back for a bit, but decided to walk back again (making it a 6 km walk total on the land bridge).

We would get back to the station with time to spare however, which we spent just resting our feet sitting down. There would be little excitement on the train ride back, Shige spent most of it sleeping while I watched random videos on my Ipod. We did stop again in Nishi Maizuru to buy some 100 yen envelopes for Shige, but other than that, we slowly make our back to Mihama (again sharing the train with middle/high schoolers, this time going home).

A long day behind us, we would get back to Mihama and drive home just in time for dinner. Shige’s mom tried her hand at making some okonomiyaki with the usual main dish of more fish. I wasn’t complaining, it was pretty good. After dinner would have me and Shige watching random Japanese comedy shows (although I would watch Haneru no Tobira again for the first time in awhile) and trying to figure out what I would do to get back to Tsuru. After figuring out that Shige wasn’t going with me to Kanazawa, I decided to give up on visiting Kanazawa and we instead decided to have lunch in Tsuruga (apparently some good katsu, or fried pork) before I made the 6 hour trip to Tsuru.

Today would probably be the earliest I’d have to wake up without having a major transfer in mind. While Shige and her mom were gracious enough to take me to see some of the popular sights of Fukui (and there weren’t too many, the section on it in my outdated Lonely Planet book only numbeered about 2 and a half pages) it would require a bit of driving from their part of Fukui, which meant we had to be out of the house by 8. We managed to do that and we were off on the road, with Shige driving the first part of the way to Tojinbo. We chose the scenic route, which took us along the Sea of Japan, which got better and better as the sun got higher up and the clouds started to disappear. The only problem we would have were the very narrow streets we had to drive on, which meant (for the very few times) when cars came our way, Shige would tense up and slow down quite a bit to make sure nothing happened.

The drive up to Tonjinbo more or less confirmed that Fukui was mainly a fishing place as we drove by a lot of seaside houses and boats with people fishing and also catching and drying seaweed on rows like clothes. Not a young person in sight, they must’ve been all at school while the adults (and even elderly) got to work in the fishing villages.

We would get to Tojinbo after about an hour and half of driving, although we took a few detours to appreciate a tunnel carved out of the rock and a daffodil museum (popular in the area apparently). Shige’s mom would also switch in to finish the drive up for Shige. While at first Tojinbo looked like a relatively quiet place (just like Matsushima) we found out we had just parked in the quieter part of it and as we got closer to the famous rock formations in the sea, more and more people started to appear. Yes, these were cliffs and they were quite impressive (and walkable on), although we could’ve used a bit more waves for a more impressive effect. Yet, that would’ve meant that wind would also be in the works and the weather was find as it was. It was a clear day and it made for some great pictures of the rocks with the endless sea in the background.

After we got our fill of danger (walking on those sea cliffs is still dangerous work) we all grabbed some grilled squid (how much squid have I eaten on this trip) before heading onto our next stop, Eiheiji, a popular temple complex (apparently a place where Buddhist priests in training from all over the country come to) located more inland in Fukui. This meant goodbye to the sea and hello to the vast fields of rural Fukui. About a hour more of driving and we arrived deep in the mountains of Fukui at Eiheiji, which was surprisingly full of tourists (and even foreign ones!)

There wasn’t much to see of the complex without having to pay the entrance fee, Shige’s mom complained a little about how the complex was now compared to back in the day (starting with the different entrance you have to use now). But since we came all this way, we paid our way in and walked through the complex. A lot of it is closed off (there are people in training) but the parts we did get to see we were quite impressive. They have some very large and elaborate rooms to house functions for the many students of Buddhism who reside at Eiheiji. The great weather of the day made the outdoor scenes that much more beautiful and I somehow wasn’t tired of temples just yet, even after having been to so many throughout my Japan trip.

We got our fill of the working temple lifestyle and descended the mountain to another mountain to the east, Katsuyama, to visit an apparently fancy dinosaur museum they had up there. While it was admittedly not a very Japanese thing to do, the museum itself was quite excellent (if devoid of people, it was a location out in the middle of nowhere really). There were many displays of dinosaurs, an extremely friendly and knowledgeable staff (they approached you if you looked like you needed to know so more), and a variety of exhibits including the history of animal and plant life and some hands on displays. Plus there was English! Huzzah!

We definitely ran the gamut of things to see, nature, culture, and science, so we decided it was enough and made our back to Mihama. Even with the highway from central Fukui, it took about 2 hours to get back home, a good 45 minutes of which I spent asleep. But once we got back, it was business as usual, I was ushered away into the TV room with the kotatsu (heated table) until dinnertime, where I ate another dinner of mostly fish (although some chicken this time around) and had to fumble around eating more new Japanese food. Another great dinner though and then back to the TV room to figure out how to get to Amanohashidate tomorrow while I enjoyed watching an episode of Lincoln (no need to download this one!) with Shige before I headed to bed. Unfortunately, it would be another early morning to get to Amanohashidate (a 3 hour trip by infrequent train) but I needed to finish my trip of the top 3 sights of Japan. It’s why I came to Japan in the first place.

So yep, it was time to pack my bags from Shiga and head for Fukui-ken, the prefecture to the north and a little bit more rural than Shiga. Being closer to the sea, it was more of a fishing location than farming, so supposedly the people had a more hard-working appeal to them than the people more inland. Getting to Yasu Station would require me to go back to waking up early. Everyone else had left the house by the time I woke up (it was a Monday after all and people had things to do) so it would be just me and Saori’s mom as I had breakfast and slowly got ready to leave the house. Soon enough I would be taking my final drive through the streets of Shiga as I got off at Yasu Station and said goodbye to Saori’s mom and the great times I had with the family in Shiga.

Heading north wouldn’t be a problem, although the many transfers I would have to make meant I couldn’t get one of my standard naps on the train. I would have to spend a great deal of time at Tsuruga Station since the train to Mihama (on the aptly named Obama line) only ran once an hour, a rural route just like the one to Yamadera. Luckily the station had foreseen this and had a nice little waiting area (with TV! Although it was showing NHK, the PBS of Japan) before I got on the train to Mihama.

The way to Mihama was country side mixed with views of the water. Mihama Station was small enough that I saw Shige right away. I would be staying with her family for the next three days in Fukui. As it always is with people that I know from Tsuru, we started talking again just like it hadn’t been two years since we last met. Maybe the most amazing thing is that she was the one who suggested I come by Fukui and stay at her house in the firstplace.

As I expected, as rural Shiga had been, Mihama was even more so. All the fun was apparently in the sea, as there were plenty of fields, but mostly undeveloped. In addition, the roads were even narrower than those in Shiga, apparently there was little need for wider ones.

Arriving at Shige’s house, it was of the more traditional style than that of Saori’s family, it was all one floor, mainly tatami rooms and lots of sliding doors. Shige’s mom was there to welcome me warmly, in the traditional “excited to meet you” Japanese style. I could only oblige as I tried to keep up with her Japanese. Shige came in handy though, as her tutor instincts kicked in and helped bridge the gap whenever she could.

While I had just arrived in Mihama, there was already a plan in place to at least do something for part of the day. We would head into Obama, which was 40 minutes away by car. I had actually been interested in seeing Obama because (you guessed it) it shared the name with Barack Obama and the city had embraced him with several Obama signs of support around the city. At least according to CNN. I had wanted to see the Obama support for myself in Obama. I knew they had to be also hoping he would get the presidency as well.

But besides their love for the presidential candidate, the city of Obama was also famous for its chopsticks. Our first stop in the city would be a chopsticks store which also let people try their hand at making their own. Well, not from scratch, they handed you raw chopsticks that had shells attached to them and you were supposed to file down the shells until you see pearls in some of them. To do this they provided the filing machines and you did the filing yourself. Me and Shige tried our hand at it, one of mine came out relatively well, although the other sadly had been filed so much that you could see a little bit of the wood (which probably decreased the value of the chopsticks by several thousand yen). But, it was a 2 dollar experience so no worries.

The next stop would be the local food museum. The main things that it featured was the many dishes that one could find in Obama (mainly fish) as well as some reproductions of sets from the NHK drama that had been set in Obama over the last year (it had just ended in March). The NHK drama apparently put Obama on the map so the city showed its appreciation by giving much love to it through exhibits and the like. But like my last couple places that I visited, there would be few visitors, not too many people were looking to learn about food and the drama popularity had already run its course already. A little discouraged that we weren’t
able to see any pictures of “Obama-san” in the city and made our way back to Mihama.

Back in Mihama, I would just hang in the house with Shige, catching up as well as learning words from my English/Japanese dictionary. We also got started on my long due postcards, Shige joined in writing some for our mutual friends. Soon enough it would be time for some dinner. Of course, Mihama being a fishing area, the dinner was mostly sashimi (raw fish slices) but I didn’t care and ate it all up. Shige’s grandmother and father would join us for dinner, so I had to keep up with my Japanese (Shige helped) although they spoke in a more countryside version of Japanese than I was used to, so Shige had to help a bit more during dinner.

There would be little excitement for the rest of the night after dinner, just using the internet for a bit, more TV, finishing up the postcards, then taking the all important bath before bed. Shige and Shige’s mom had apparently planned a quite ambitious schedule for tomorrow, which required us to leave around 7:30. Despite the fact I should’ve slept earlier, I ended up watching SMAPxSMAP and Ainori, two favorites from my foreign student days, because I knew in a week, I would be back in America.

The quiet times in Shiga would continue with another late waking up time and a late breakfast of eggs and rice. I would find it difficult to make conversation with Saori’s mom in the morning since my mind (and therefore my Japanese ability) wasn’t working at 100% just right after I wake up. But eventually the whole household would wake up and we would all be going out to see some of the random sights that were nearby in Shiga. I didn’t know what to expect, since no guide book really lists Shiga as a place that a tourist should visit, so I was glad to get a bit more of the sights off the beaten path. If anything, I didn’t expect to see any more foreigners wandering around as I had so many times in Tokyo, Kyoto and Hiroshima.

The first place we would all visit was actually lunch, which was quite problematic for me, as I had just had breakfast a few hours beforehand so eating more was usually out of the question for me. While I did enjoy having gyoza, ramen, karaage (fried chicken) and fried rice for lunch, I definitely couldn’t finish it all and I had to gracefully bow out of eating all of it. Perhaps I lost a few points with the family, but there were nice enough that they wouldn’t show it to me.

After lunch, we would go to Azuchi Castle, a place that Saori’s dad had promised to take me to after I had showed some interest in Oda Nobunaga (thanks to video games, I had known at least a little bit about Japanese history). We first stopped by the Azuchi Castle museum. In front of the museum was a huge cherry blossom festival though (the cherry blossoms, while going away, were still in relatively full bloom in the area), but we would pass by most of that excitement (I had already seen my fair share of cherry blossom festivals by now) to go right into the Azuchi Castle museum. It wasn’t much, just one big room that was mainly occupied by a model of the top of Azuchi Castle (Oda was a big player back in his day, apparently the top of his castle was all gold plated) and a few exhibits and displays that surrounded it. While interesting (I did have some interest in that period of Japanese history), it would be hard to follow the all Japanese displays and the guide that the family had asked for only spoke in Japanese, so I don’t think I got the full experience of being at the museum.

With the museum out of the way, it would be time to go to the actual castle ruins, which like Sendai and Morioka, meant that there was no more castle, just a stone foundation that you could walk around in and imagine that a castle used to be there. Steep stairways to climb up on, but it was interesting to see some of the hangouts of some of the most powerful men in Japanese history, as well nice views of the surrounding lakes and plains around the castle when we reached the high points. But there was little else to see besides that and we would hurry back to the car relatively quickly, as it was starting to rain as well.

We were kind of out of ideas on what to do next after the castle, shopping was thrown around as an idea (as Kenta worked part time near a mall) but that was dismissed and we would slowly make our way home instead, although we would stop by an old traditional Japanese house that resembled the house from My Neighbor Totoro (Japanese anime movie). Unfortunately, we would find that it would be closed already and forced to go back home with just the image of the outside of the house in my mind.

When we got back home, what else was there to do but watch TV? I loaded in one of my old Japanese comedy DVDs to watch with Takashi until dinner time rolled around, which would consist of nabe (Japanese hot pot). As with many things in Japanese culture, dinner is a family thing, so everyone gathered around the hot pot, dropping in meat and veggies they wanted to eat, then taking them out themselves out of the shared pot. Fun times as always, only heightened by the beer I drank with the rest of the family (everyone would join in at some point, although me and Saori’s dad would drink the most). As usual, my Japanese ability only seemed to get better when I drank (seemed anyway, not sure if it really did), so I had some pretty good conversations with the family about random things as usual, life, love, the world, etc.

Before we all realized it, it would be 11 and time to go to bed. Unfortunately, unlike for myself, the others had school and work to worry about. So we would take our turns going into the bath before retiring for the night, Takashi and Kenta said their final goodbyes to me as I would probably not see them in the morning. Tomorrow I would take my leave from Shiga, even though I kind of didn’t want to anymore, as I had gotten used to relaxing here and enjoying life with Saori’s family. But another family waited for me in Fukui and I had to get going soon.

The theme in my week of staying at people’s homes in rural Japan was to be able to truly have a vacation, i.e. actually rest. No need to wake up super early for sightseeing, walk around all day, and just be dead tired at night. I definitely accomplished the first part of that feat, waking up at around 10:30-11 AM and slowly making my way down for breakfast, which Saori’s mom was gracious enough to make for me and Takashi, who also had just woken up. Breakfast consisted of some soup and fried rice, which I had no problems taking care of.

The plan for today was to meet up with some relatives of the family and spend the day going around Shiga with them. But until then, there wasn’t much to do in the house, which was perfectly fine with me. Just some more rounds of Worldwide Soccer Manager on the computer and watching some good old Yoshimoto (Japanese comedy) on television with Takashi before Saori’s mom took us to Rai Rai Ten (I believe that’s the name) which was a very famous ramen chain that happened to be based out of Shiga. Me, being a huge ramen fan, am always down for some good ramen, which I was definitely treated too when we went there. I would have to rank it a close third, only because Sapporo and Fukuoka are just ridiculous good, but basically I’d be happy with any of them.

After the early lunch of ramen, we went back to the house to wait for the relatives to arrive, which we did by watching some of my old DVDs. Soon enough though they would arrive (with little advance warning, no bell or nothing) so I had to quickly gather up my things while the family was being shown into the house. They brought some gifts so then we brought out my gifts to Saori’s family and ate them all together with some tea while we talked about random things back and forth through the table. How I liked Japan, where I had been, what the families were up to, what there was to see nearby, where there was to eat nearby, etc. We were mostly killing time until Saori’s dad got back from work so we could all go out together.

We split up into three different cars, I was hanging with Saori’s uncle, her cousins (two girls, 21 and 17), and Takashi. The first stop would be Shigaraki, a place known for the tanuki (raccoon dog) statues that it made. However, there would be a little confusion along the way, and then all of a sudden the car with Saori’s mom and dad would have to return home while our car and one other (with Saori’s aunt and grandmother) continued on the way to Shigaraki. My image of Shiga being out in the country would be reinforced by the many fields would drive by, as well as a couple mountains and little else. No problem with me, I was just glad to be able to relax.

It would be obvious when I got into Shigaraki because every store would have loads of tanuki (big and small) out in the parking lot. Every now and then a frog statue would pop up as well (apparently they needed another animal). We would catch traffic before making a stop about Shigaraki station, which was pretty empty except for the 4 taxis hanging out in front with the taxi drivers all out of their cars talking and smoking. Apparently there was a pretty good store to see at the station, but it would already be closed at 5 so I would be out of luck in trying to buy a tanuki statue of my own. I would have to settle with a picture of the insanely large tanuki outside the station.

The next stop on our Shiga tour would be to a river that lit up the sakura trees planted along its banks. While a few of the trees were lit and they did look quite beautiful, for some reason they did not light up all the trees on the river banks, so the left side was much brighter than the right. We tried to wait to see if they would fix the lights, but we were itching to get to the next point on our tour, which was a trip to a public bath to enjoy the daily Japanese ritual of soaking after a long day of work.

We arrived at an insanely rich looking hotel (out in the middle of nowhere, apparently designed as a retreat for people wanting to get out of Osaka) with a fabulous interior, rooms for manga, exercise, ping pong, and billiards before we got to the main event, the public bath. Some foreigners think it embarrassing to get naked with a bunch of strangers and enjoy a bath, but in my opinion, everyone else is naked with you, so what do your really need to embarrassed about? I enjoyed my time taking a bath with Takashi and Saori’s uncle. Refreshed, we were all ready to head out to the last stop, conveyor belt sushi (my third time this trip…and I almost went in Sendai).

At the sushi place, Saori’s mom and dad were already there and had thankfully already taken a number so we didn’t have to wait long as the line was quite long to get a seat. We split up into two tables, where I sat with the older cousin, Takashi, and Saori’s dad. What else do you do at conveyor belt sushi but eat? But unlike the places I had gone to with Ajay, it was not a traditional setup where you sit in front of a sushi bar, all the cooks were in the back, while if you had a request, you spoke into an intercom. Also, the price was definitely right, every plate was only 105 yen. Saori’s dad would get overzealous with the request intercom a few times, ordering a bunch of sushi all at once. Each table was color coded, so you would pick up your dish when your color bowl came by. Unfortunately, Saori’s dad would come with an order of 20 sushi at one time, which meant 20 purple bowls would come strolling by, making it painfully obvious to anyone paying attention that the purple table were a bunch of big eaters (or just couldn’t wait). The younger cousin of Saori would note later that she knew that the line of purple table sushi had to be us, because who else could do that but Saori’s dad?

Full of sushi, I had to say goodbye to Saori’s relatives, but only after embarrassing them to take a picture with me in front of the sushi place (which they thought made it seem like it was the first time they ever had sushi, quite impossible for the average Japanese person, of course). I went back home with Saori’s family, bringing back some sushi for Kenta who had been unfortunately working the whole day. The night would be quiet, as I just shared a few more beers with Saori’s dad (although my full stomach kept me from drinking a lot) while the rest of the family made their way to bed. I had briefly toyed with the idea of going to Amanohashidate tomorrow, but I figured I should save it for Fukui when people would probably be more busy (I would be visiting during the work week) and decided to hang out with Saori’s family a little bit tomorrow instead.