Do you want to go to the ｓeaside?

I'm not trying to say that everybody wants to go...

Update time! On Wednesday, Jillian and I went to Udo Jingu, or Udo Shrine, which is on the coast about a half hour drive from the university. We hadn't seen Kaori in a little while, so we were happy to go out and visit such a beautiful place with her. (Jill has been to Udo Jingu twice already, and posted about one of her visits here.)

A lovely view of the ocean - you can see some tiny figures fishing on the rocks on the right side of the picture if you look really closely!

We left the college at about two in the afternoon with Kaori, since she'd had a presentation that morning. Along the way, we passed the Devil's Washboard in Aoshima, which I unfortunately couldn't get a good picture of since we were moving. Unlike the sandy beaches of Hawaii or the pebbly beaches of Olympia, the Devil's Washboard is a really unique formation that has a weird sort of angular washboard-like look to it. (It's worth it to Google or Wiki it if you'd like to see a picture)

An observation Jill made about the view was that in Japan, or at least in Kyushu, there isn't really a tree line like in Washington. That is to say, when one looks at the mountains here, they're entirely covered with green. Also, the trees go almost all the way to the water, except where people have developed the land.

Along the way, we almost ran over this little fellow:

Why, hello there!

Luckily, Kaori saw him in time and slowed down. At first, he ran back into his little hole, which gave me the chance to snap this picture. Kaori had never seen one of these before, either. We think that he may have been some kind of たぬき, (TaNuKi - or raccoon dog) but we weren't entirely sure.

Run, run little guy! Whew... he made it across the road safely.

"Raccoon" seems like kind of a poor comparison for these things, since they're very different from the raccoons we usually see around Evergreen. If you're a Mario fan, you might recognize the word "tanuki" from Mario 3, where Mario can don a Tanuk Suit, that makes him look like a raccoon. (Or, maybe you're not a huge nerd and have no idea what I'm talking about. ^^) Actually though, this guy looked kind of weasely... in any case, we can speculate about what he is later.

Ah, Udo Jingu, the shrine by the sea...

Lucky for us, Wednesday was really sunny in Aoshima, although a bit windy. Unlike the last time Jillian, Kaori, Charlie and Max had come here, it was nice and dry out, so the climb down the stairs to the small cavern in a cliff where the shrine is wasn't the slippery, treacherous scramble they'd had to deal with before.

Jill and Kaori at the shrine. Almost more amazing than the structure itself is the cave it resides in - the rock formations are amazingly interesting.

One thing I might not have mentioned before about shrines is that there's always a place where one washes their hands before coming into the grounds. Men also, (if they're brave) are supposed to wash their mouths with the water as well, but not everybody does so.

Udo Jingu has a cool, but scary dragon at its hand-washing pool to ensure 100% cooperation. If one fails to wash, he promptly soaks you with a blast of icy water. (Not really, but wouldn't that be awesome?)

To my surprise, there were a lot of people at the shrine when were there. Not as many as when I went to Dazaifu, but still quite a few. When we asked Kaori about it, she explained that ever since Higashi Sonomanma (remember that guy in the orange robe I wrote about before?) became governor, the tourist trade in Miyazaki prefecture had been revitalized and boosted in a much-needed way. Tourists come to Miyazaki from all over Japan now, whereas it was considered to be kind of a backwater before the new governor came along.

This is a good luck bunny inside the cave.

Jill, Kaori and I pet this bunny on its head for good luck. Jillian's Chinese zodiac is ウサギ、(USaGi - rabbit,) mine is トラ、(ToRa - tiger) and Kaori's is 牛, (うし、UShi, Bull or Cow.) We thought that it was kind of neat that all of our birth signs go in a row! (1985 - Jill, 1986 - Moi, 1987 - Kaori-san) For Jill, this bunny is extra-lucky, I think.

Another thing we saw at the shrine were a bunch of えま、(EMa) which are the flat, wooden things in the picture below. Kaori explained to me that the kanji for ema are the kanji for picture (e) next to the kanji for horse (uma). In some of the books I'm reading for my contract, the authors often state that Japanese people seem to think in pictures, or pictures of words, rather than words. Being exposed to so much kanji here, I'm beginning to understand that a little better, although I can still only recognize and read a few kanji i learned back at Evergreen, along with the ones I see here every day.

There were so many of ema, most likely from students, because this is the college entrance exam time of year. One writes their wishes on the piece of wood, and then hangs it up at the shrine with a little prayer for good luck. Students were hanging these up at Dazaifu, too, but I didn't know what they were then.

The Breast-Rock sign, and lots of 絵馬。

One particular attraction of this cave is the mother's breasts-rocks, which are a section of the rock wall that look kind of like breasts. Expecting mothers and newlyweds come to these rocks to wish for good luck. (I didn't take a picture of the rocks themselves, since they are difficult to photograph well.) It's entirely acceptable to touch the breasts, but I just couldn't bring myself to.

Something that Jill had written about when she visited Udo Jingu the last time is the throwing of rocks into a circle out in a little cove. Kaori was the only one who could manage to make it into the circle before, so I was eager to try it out!

Here is the target where you throw the clay balls. 5 tries for 100円！

What I didn't know until I purchased my tries was that traditionally at Udo Jingu, men are supposed to throw with their left hand, and women are supposed to throw with their right. It's just our luck that Jillian happens to be left-handed, and me right-handed. We got pretty close a few times, and even managed to hit the inside of the circle a few times, but they kept bouncing out or breaking - we just couldn't make it into that little pool of water!

Darn, missed again! The man next to me kept encouraging me, though. He was really nice.

After the shrine, we stopped by the お土産矢　（おみやげや、OMiYaGeYa - souvenir shop) for some soft cream. (Soft-serve ice cream) We each got Hyuganatsu, which is Miyazaki's famous fruit. (A yellow-colored citrus fruit that tastes kind of like a cross between a lemon and an orange) The woman who sold us the ice cream insisted that she give us a larger-than-normal portion, since we spoke English. (We actually ordered in Japanese, but she heard us speaking in English to each other when we were trying to decide which kind of get) We were grateful, but also a little embarrassed. The ice cream was amazing, though. Very light and refreshing, even though it was a cold day.

We also stopped by Kaori's friend Keiko's house, who Jill and Kaori hadn't seen since November. Keiko, a Miyazaki University graduate, had a baby back in September, who is an adorable and energetic baby named Nago-chan.

Kaori, Keiko, Nagomu, Jillian and I - Nago-kun was shy for this picture

Jillian and Kaori were both really surprised at how much Nagomu had grown since the last time they'd seen him. It was my first time meeting Keiko and her baby, but they were both still super nice. Kaori has an amazing talent for stopping Nago-chan from crying, and Jillian's fingers are some of Nagomu's favorite toys.

Aw... isn't he cute? He liked Jillian quite a bit. He was really shy with me, though.

We're hoping to go back to Keiko's in a few weeks to make lunch together, since she really seemed to appreciate the company. (She doesn't get out as often since she's had the baby) Keiko-san's husband works as a driving instructor near the college, so he wasn't home that day.

On the way back to Kibana, Jill saw a monkey and its baby, too! I guess before, Kaori and Jillian had seen a big family of monkeys near Udo Jingu on their last trip. I, unfortunately, missed the monkey because I was looking at the trees, but I did see a monkey that someone was keeping as a pet in their back yard from the train a few weeks ago. (It was jumping, a lot, but not on a bed.)

The only monkeys I saw this time were these road work monkeys -Of course, Japanese barriers have to be cute too, you know.

Later on, we went to pick up Rumi, Kaori's sister from the library at the nursing college, then dropped her off at work in Aoshima. Jill, Kaori and I went out for Okonomiyaki for dinner, (My favorite! Mmm...) and reflected about the trip so far and the weeks to come. It was a lovely lovely day, and spending time with Kaori is always therapeutic. Although we were sad that we couldn't share these times with our friends back at Evergreen that we used to make dinner and spend time with, Kaori seemed to take comfort in knowing that our friend Allison will be coming to study in Kobe soon, and Charlie should be coming to Miyazaki in the next few weeks to visit before returning to the states, too.

Thursday was Saint Valentine's Day, which Jill and I spent together on a little date downtown. The morning was spent cleaning, though, since the International Dormitory at Miyazaki University that Jill lives in had their end-of-semester cleaning day on Wednesday morning. Pretty much everybody that lives here go together to clean all of the common areas like the hals and kitchens. It seemed a little rough to have Valentine's be the cleaning day, but at least it was taken care of in the morning instead of in the evening when people seemed to be busy. (Some girl's on Jill's floor were making home-made chocolates in the kitchen. It smelled amazing!)

An interesting thing about Valentine's Day in Japan is that only women buy chocolates and give them to men, who then give gifts to the women who gave them gifts a month later, on White Day, March 14th. Also, it's almost exclusively called Saint Valentine's Day here, not just Valentine's Day. It is, of course, just as commercialized, if not more so, than in the states. We had a nice, relaxing day on Thursday though, and I received a fantastic care package of Annie's Mac and Cheese, Valentine's Candy, and other tasty comfort snacks from home. (Thanks Mom, Kevin, Tyler, Wilson and Dan!)

Um, that's all for now. I'm sleepy. Next week - Nagasaki, Fukuoka, and I'll (hopefully) finally get around to writing that friendship thing. 'till then!

Fukuoka - 一人で

Mini 日本語　Lesson: 一人で　or ひとりで or HiToRiDe means "alone" Does the horribly written translation-type stuff help anyone at all? Please let me know so that I can continue or discontinue this with, uh, knowledge. (Huh?) Normal romanji is all in lower-case, but I thought that maybe capitalizing would help differentiate what the different hiragana mean. In the case above, it's Kanji, then Hiragana, then Romanji, and then English. わかる？-　WaKaRu? - Understand? - Capiche? (In this case, Hiragana, Romanji, English, English-Slang~)

First time traveling alone in Japan - accomplished! (First time traveling, mind you, not first time-traveling, although that would be pretty cool.) Jill's tutor Satomi helped me figured out the cheapest tickets, and I made the reservation by phone. Well, okay, Jill helped, since the lady was speaking really fast and I couldn't understand her about halfway through the conversation. It was a little odd because in order to circumvent credit cards, the method of paying by phone is that after one makes a reservation, the bus company gives a number that is taken to the local convenience store. (conbini) That number is given to the clerk, who enters it into the register, verifies the name (AnSoNee-sama, in my case) and then the bus fare is paid at the convenience store. A receipt isn't even necessary upon boarding! They just look up the name and verify its been paid.

This morning on my way to the train station, (I woke up at like, 5:30 to make sure I'd get there in time) I wrote a poem, 'cause there were tons of roosters crowing. It's a poem that wishes it could be real haiku, or something.

へんところで、
とりのうたをきく。
あさ、わかる。

HeN ToKoRo De,
ToRi No UTa (w)O KiKu.
ASa, WaKaRu.

In a strange place,
I hear a bird's song.
I know it's morning.

Yeah, it needs a little work, but I can only do so much with my limited Japanese and the restrictions of a 5-7-5 syllable pattern!

In the early morning, students regularly sleep on trains.

The train ride was uneventful, although it was packed with sleeping students. My first obstacle was to actually find my bus stop, since I was using a discount Sun Marine Liner bus that doesn't go to the typical bus station. Although I'd seen a map of where the pick-up point was, I couldn't find any defining markers. I wandered around for about half an hour before finally asking a city bus driver, who had no idea what I was talking about. I went to the bus station, but although they knew where it was, I couldn't really follow their directions very well. Finally, I asked a nice storekeeper near where I thought the bus stop should be, but she tried to direct me back to the bus station. I stumbled through trying to explain in Japanese that I'd been told to come to the spot where I was searching, 「あの。。。　みやこにできないいっていました。　ここにぐらい、あの。。。ごめんあさい。。。」　and eventually we ran into her friend who was opening up shop next door who directed me to an unmarked spot on the street that was apparently where the bus was supposed to stop.

Eventually, after standing there alone for a while feeling not only like an idiot but also doubtful that I was actually in the right place, another guy came by who looked nearly as lost as I felt. I asked him if he was looking for the Sun Marine Liner bus, and he was like, 「はい。　でも、はじめてから。。。」　It was a first time for us both! It did turn out that we were in the right place, though, so when the bus finally came, we were relieved.

Fukuoka is nearly a 4-hour bus ride (including one other pick-up point and two rest-stops) across farmland and through mountains. (HUGE tunnels) I read, napped, woke up, read some more, and was happy to stretch my legs when we stopped every now and then.

Fukuoka - Near Hakata Station

After the bus ride, I wound up in the Hakata area, which is kind of a port town. Hakata and Fukuoka used to be two cities, a port town and a castle town, but have kind of merged, from what I understand. The first thing I did was get promptly lost, as expected. I wanted to find an information booth where I could find out where the cool, hip places to check out in Fukuoka were, but instead ended up wandering around aimlessly in the complex labyrinth that makes up the combination of bus, train, subway and shinkansen (bullet train) stations, that are also connected to a myriad of underground shopping centers, which lead into tall department store buildings.

After a quick lunch, (Mm... teriyaki Mos Burger) and some unintentional browsing, I made my way back to the station I originally started at, about an hour and a half after I left it. I'd also managed to find a post office, so I could withdraw some money as well. (Post offices are good places to make international withdrawals in Japan... when they're open) When I finally found the information desk, the lady I spoke with was immensely helpful, and buried me in maps and brochures for places I could check out. Although she didn't speak much English, we were able to get by with my Japanese and lots of gesturing, and she also graciously provided me with English copies of pamphlets. The places she'd recommended were mostly famous shopping centers, but I wasn't too interested in those since I hadn't planned on spending loads of money. She did, however, mention Dazaifu, which is an ancient city that high-ranking courtiers were sometimes exiled to. I was hesitant at first since getting there was a little confusing, but she gave me another map that very clearly outlined all of the subways lines and transfers I would need to make to get there.

Here's a random pictures of some interesting ice cream flavors in Dazaifu that I wasn't brave enough to try. Um, seriously? わさび(Horseradish)-flavored ice cream!? Jill thinks the tofu looks pretty odd, too.

As a sort of aside, an elderly (Australian, I think?) couple heard me say "awesome" when I was receiving information, and seemed surprised and relieved that I knew both English and at least some Japanese. They asked me to help them, since the information lady helping them was having some trouble communicating. I explained that it was my first time to Fukuoka, but would try my best to help. I kept stupidly answering them in Japanese when they would ask me questions, but would catch myself mid-sentence. ("Oh, you know English!" "あの。。。はい、　er... yes!"　"And you understand Japanese, too?" ”すこしい。。。　uh, I mean, a little...") From what I could tell, the hotel they said they wanted to go to was on the other side of Hakata, according to the information lady, but they insisted that their hotel was much closer than that, since they had walked to the station before. I tried asking them if maybe they'd gotten off at a wrong stop, but they were really really frustrated and didn't remember which stop they'd gotten off at previously. Since I personally had no idea where their hotel was or how to get there, I couldn't really help them that much, but it seemed pretty clear that the name they were saying matched the name that the lady was indicating on the map, which was a dot quite a ways away from the station. The information lady offered to call them a cab, but I never found out what they decided to do. (The wife went away to use the restroom, and the husband decided to call the hotel, after thanking me for trying to help) I hope they got back okay!

Dazaifu - Main Street

After a 45-minute multi-subway trip, and a ten-minute stop in Tenjin (a fashion and culture district in Fukuoka) to e-mail Jill and let her know I'd made it okay, I made it to Dazaifu. I'd tried calling Jill's cell with the pay phones earlier in the day, but hadn't had any luck. I was able to find the information spot right away, and got a map of the area. Since I had to make it back to the bus stop in Hakata by 6:00, I decided that I'd just visit the Tenmangu Shrine to the god of Learning and the Kyushu National Museum in Dazaifu, with some time set aside for omiyage (gift souvenirs) shopping on the main street, too.

This guy, some kind of dragon-unicorn thing, guards the grounds around Tenmangu and its many mini-shrines. There's also some bronze bulls, deer, and other Chinese Lionesque statues as well.

As I should have expected at a shrine to a god of learning, there were tons and tons of students there. They were all on class trips, ranging from elementary school to high school. (College students' classes have ended for the semester, but I don't doubt that there were some there on holiday as well) There were also, of course, lots of foreign visitors as well, but it was interesting to see so many different kinds of uniforms all in one place!

A swarm of middle school students crossing the bridge to Tenmangu Shrine.

The shrine itself was neat, but not terribly unlike the Heian Shrine Jill and I had visited with Charlie in Kyoto once I got inside. The biggest difference was that this one was a lot busier, so I spent more time outside of the shrine looking at the plum blossoms which haven't really come to full bloom yet.

Baby Plum Blossoms

I got really excited when I found out that there's a tree somewhere on the grounds called Tobiume, which is apparently a famous, legendary plum tree. I realize it's kind of odd, but I'd named my car Tobiume before coming to Japan, thinking it meant "flying plum." (My car is actually black, so the name makes even less sense than it should) I never realized that there was an actual tree with this name, though! I'd stolen / borrowed the name from the anime character Hinamori Momo's (Bleach) sword, which fires pretty energy bursts. Unfortunately, I was pressed for time, and never found the famous tree, but hope to return to Dazaifu someday to find it!

Some bad fortunes tied up in preparation to be burned at a later date

I tried to visit the Kyushu National Museum as well, since it was like, two minutes from the shrine, but upon arrival I found out that they were closed. Normally they are only closed on Mondays, but since Monday was a holiday, they'd stayed open. However, if they stay open on a Monday, they close on the next day instead, which, unfortunately, was the Tuesday I decided to come to Fukuoka. Ah, well. One more thing to do the next time I come back and visit!

Some kind of ritual was going on at the shrine, but I didn't stick around to see what was going on. You can kind of see a mirror on the right-ish side of this picture. I think it may be national relic, since these kinds of mirrors are part of the Imperial Regalia.

Before heading back to Tenjin to catch the subway back to Hakata, I did some quick omiyage shopping since gifts were going to be kind of expected as I'd traveled. I also tried some umegae-mochi, which are these sort of lightly-grilled rice cakes filled with a delicious red bean paste. Although they have "ume" (Japanese apricot or plum) in the name, they don't actually contain any fruit. They're called umegae because when the woman who originally made them for the later deified Sugawara no Michizane, (the god of this shrine) she presented them with a twig from one of the plum trees on the dish. I picked up some to take back to Miyazaki to share with Jill and our friends as well!

Umegae-Mochi - That's my gloved hand! (It was cold, so the warm, sweet treat was welcome!) I haven't gotten in the Japanese habit of photographing food before its eaten yet, so as you can see, taking this picture was kind of an afterthought. Or, maybe, I was trying to show you what the inside of these things was like! Yeah, we'll go with that. These things are also said to have curative powers, and stave off disease! No joke!

Omiyage shopping also took me a little longer than planned, now that I think back about it. Usually when Jill and I visit places in Japan, it's easy to find omiyage that are obviously from the place we're visiting. This time though, every omiyage store I went to seemed to have omiyage from everywhere I've already been in Kyushu! (Little mango, hyuganatsu and chicken things from Miyazaki, shinto priests, priestesses, and kagura dolls from Takachiho, and little black boars, radishes, and Saigo Takamoris from Kagoshima, and much more that I couldn't identify!) Jill later explained that she thought the reason for this was that Fukuoka is essentially the first stop for people coming to Kyushu from Honshu, the main island of Japan. It's also usually the last stop for people who have been visiting Kyushu who are going back to Honshu. (by land, usually shinkansen, anyway) So, Fukuoka has omiyage from all over Kyushu just in case someone missed something along the way, I guessed.

For some reason there's this random Dazaifu children's theme park with small-world-esque music about two minutes away from the shrine, also. It, like the museum, was also closed today.

Unfortunately, what his meant for me was that it wasn't easy to identify what exactly the "famous" omiyage was, so I asked some elementary school kids, (with their cute little mandatory $600 backpacks) if they knew: 「すみません、　あの。。。　何がいちばん、ゆめいおみやげですか？」　(SuMiMaSeN, ANo... NaNi Ga IChiBan YuMei OmiYaGeDeSuKa? - Excuse me, um... what's the most famous souvenir?) The boy I asked said he had no idea, but wisely suggested that I ask the clerk instead, who directed me to the place where I would end up buying the umeage-mochi rice cakes. She also showed me some uso (bullfinch) mini totem-pole like things that are famous in Dazaifu, but were way too expensive for me to consider picking one up for each of our friends in Miyazaki. (Something like, $30 each! They are, however, supposed to turn bad luck into good luck...)

I regret that I didn't take any pictures of those kids, who were really friendly, but for some reason taking pictures of little kids feels kinda creepy. Instead, here's a nice garden slightly off of the Dazaifu main street.

Sadly, my dawdling and poor sense of direction had really limited the time I could spend in Fukuoka. I had hoped to explore Tenjin a bit, since it's a fairly famous fashion district in Fukuoka, but since I got lost (again!) once I got off of the train from Dazaifu, I was really pressed for time once I reoriented myself since my bus back to Miyazaki would be leaving soon.

I asked these bronze kappa monsters in a fountain in yet another underground shopping center (this time beneath Tenjin, not Hakata) if they could tell me how to get back home. Needless to say, they didn't reply. (At least not in a language I could understand)

So, yeah. It was a long day, and I'm super tired. I wish I'd been able to visit all of the places I'd hoped to, like the Hakata Canal City, the Robot Museum, (touch and talk to real-life robots, seriously! Awesome!) and the Zoology and Botany center, but Jill and I plan to go back maybe next week on a three-day tour of the Fukuoka and Nagasaki areas. (This was kind of like a scouting trip, in a sense)

Oh! I want to mention Japanese rest stops. Um, they're awesome. I caught the bus back at 6:00, (which was vital, since it was the only one available for the price I'd pre-paid) and arrived in Minami (South) Miyazaki around 10:00. This is one of the rest stops we stopped at in between:

Wow! A Rest Stop!

Japanese rest stops aren't the practically port-o-potty / Honey Buckets where there's sometimes free coffee I'm used to in the states. No, these rest stops have full-service restaurants (open late) gift shops, (open late) and of course, bath rooms (open always.) This one even had a pretty rainbow light dome on top! Oooh.

Also, because I couldn't show him earlier, here's a popular bronze bull in front of Tenmangu. It was really hard to get this picture, because people kept wanting to take pictures with the bull. I would've taken one with him, too, but I was too shy to ask someone to take a picture of me for me, and trying to do it myself, well... those pictures kept turning out really MySpacey, and were either too close, really blurry, caused a strange expression on my face, or a horrible combination of the three. End Long Caption Here.

Aaaand scene! Thus concludes probably my most haphazard blog post yet. Whoosh! Although it's been a really long day, (woke up 5:30, bussed from 7:55 to noon, took trains from about 1:30 to 2:15, then again from 4:00 to 4:45, then bussed again from 6:00 to 10:00) Jillian was a total sweetheart and unexpectedly met me at Kibana-Eki when I got off of the train from Minami Miyazaki. (This means that she walked about a mile, in the cold and dark, uphill, both ways, barefoot, you get the pictures) I was kind of dreading the walk home alone, so it was a really nice surprise! I'd picked up some goodies along the way too, (aside from omiyage and snacks) so I had more than just stories to share, although there were plenty of those. (Essentially, these) and we murmured a bit about politics, too. (boo)

Alrighties, even though I napped on the train and ate sugary foods way too late at night, I'm sleepy now. Thanks for keeping up, if you are, and I promise I'll eventually get to that stuff I said I'd write about before at some point in the future probably. kthxbaiyay :)

PS - For my own notes: later I should write about - JDramas, friendship (less than three) gardens in Miyazaki...

Japanese Classes at Miyadai - Also, some art!

Classes are officially over for the semester here at Miyazaki University, but I was thankfully able to attend a few during my time here. 宮崎大学,　（みやざきだいがく、MiYaZaKiDaIGaKu, or "Miyadaki" for short,) is a fairly smallish university, (About the same size as Evergreen, so around 4,000 students, I think?) and is probably most famous for its veterinary, engineering, and agricultural departments.

For no real reason, here's a picture of some Banana Pastries - Here in Japan, they like to eliminate doubt by labeling their foods in an obvious fashion.

Jill's Japanese classes are fairly small, so her teachers said that it was okay if I sat in on a few classes. Tanaka-Sensei's class, probably comparable to First-Year Japanese at Evergreen, was mostly grammar review for me, but there was a lot of new vocabulary, too. It's also a completely different experience from first-year Japanese in Olympia because the entire class is taught in Japanese! Tanaka-Sensei not only allowed me to participate in the class, but also assigned some written homework as well.

Mitsuishi-Sensei, who is a bit younger than Tanaka-Sensei, (both are probably in their mid to late twenties, though) teachers the slightly harder Japanese class, although it is still considered elementary Japanese. I would compare it to Second-Year Japanese at Evergreen, (which I was taking last quarter) so the grammar and things were still pretty new. Tanaka-Sensei also expected my participation if I was to "sit in" on the class, and although I was able to answer some questions correctly, it was still pretty tough!

On my first visit to Miyazaki, before the airport debacle, I had a chance to practice calligraphy in Mitsuishi-Sensei's class with some visiting art teachers. We were told that our art was going to be shown in an art show in downtown Miyazaki, but since the date was after I was returning to Osaka, I didn't expect to ever see it. Luckily, though, I'm still here, and yesterday Jill and I went to Carino Miyazaki, a tall building with a Tsutaya Book Store, salon, and some DELL offices, as well as an international center where our art was featured.

Our Calligraphy display in Carino みやざき。

Our assignment was to draw "something you love," but to incorporate it into the kanji used to represent it. Can you guess which one is Jillian's and which one is mine?

The Artists' names: Jill and I are pretty easy to find on the list

So, before I reveal which ones are ours, (if you haven't already figured it out) I should note that both Jillian and I have actually done calligraphy before. Jill had practiced with some exchange students as a semi-extracurricular study two years ago, and is much, much better at calligraphy than I am. I learned calligraphy for the first time last quarter with Tsutsumi-Sensei and her assistant Hisako, an international student at Evergreen, but my writing style tends to "lack confidence" and looks "a little unsure." Calligraphy is part talent, part technique, and part soul, I think. The trained eye can tell a lot about a person from their, er... brush-person-ship, if that makes any sense.

Artists revealed! The picture was laminated, so it was difficult to photograph.

As you can see, mine is a little sloppy, but it was still a lot of fun! Jillian had trouble settling on just one thing that she loved, so she did a bunch of kanji and pictures on her piece.

Jill's work of art: As you can see, she loves a lot of things.

The kanji that Jill chose for her piece are: 木、（き、Ki - trees）花、（はな、HaNa - flowers）海、（うみ、UMi - the ocean）鳥、（とり、ToRi - birds）　日、（ひ、Hi - the sun）　and 空、（そら、SoRa - the sky.） Clearly, her studious interests have shown through here, since she's an ornithologist who is also studying environmental science! (Jill also has strong interests in Odissi Dance, Opera, Japanese language and culture, and now computer programming and game development!)

Here's mine... it's kind of silly, but I chose 亀。

亀、（かめ、KaMe - turtle) is one of the few kanji I know how to write, but unfortunately, not very well. I had a pet turtle as a child, and sleep with a stuffed turtle at night. Er, I mean, I use her as a pillow. Um, I mean, it. I use IT as a pillow. Oh, who am I kidding? So, I sleep with a turtle instead of a teddy bear. So what!? When Jill is around, though, she tends to steal Lily (That's the turtle's name) who is the perfect size for us to wrap our arms around. I had a really hard time picking a kanji to write, even though we had lots of newspaper to practice on before the fact. I'd played around with 日本語、（にほんご, NiHoNGo - Japanese）　日, （にち, NiChi - Sunday, also Sun) 月, （げつ, GeTsu - Monday, also Moon） 火, （か, Ka - Tuesday, also Fire） 水, （すい, SuI - Wednesday, also Water） 木, （もく, MoKu - Thursdsay, also Wood or Tree） 金, （きん, KiN - Friday, or Gold）and 土（ど, Do - I don't know what else "Do" means）　花（はな、HaNa - Flower） but had lots of reasons to not use those, and was told that the turtle idea was the cutest and most unique. (Nihongo was too hokey, the days of the week was a little weird, and each also needs 曜日（ようび、YoUBi - Day) at the end to actually make them a day, and Jill has already done Flower.

This is kind of random, but I figured this out two summers ago when taking Japanese Immersion as a summer class at Evergreen. I'd taken Spanish in middle school, and remembered that the days of the week were (starting from Monday) Lunes, Martes, Miércoles, Jueves, Viernes, Sábado and Domingo. These days of the week can be related to things in the solar system, like this: (in order) Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and... I'm not sure what to do with Saturday, but Domingo or Sunday goes with the Sun.

So, this is where the geek in me comes out. In the Anime Sailor Moon, each Sailor Scout has a planet name and special power. Sailor Mars, for example, uses fire attacks. Mars ~ Martes ~ Tuesday ~　火曜日　～　fire! The same works for Sailor Mercury: Mercury ~ Miercoles ~ Wednesday ~ 水曜日　~ water! I was really excited to piece this together, since it was the only like I could think of between Japanese, English and Spanish, but when I told my friend Allison about it, who is also studying Japanese, she'd pretty much already known about it. (Allison will be coming to Japan to study in Kobe for a year starting the beginning of April) I still thought it was pretty cool, though!

Anyway, that was sort of a weird aside. I think my favorite piece of art, (although there were tons of other cool ones, including piece done by people living in Miyazaki from New Zealand, the U.S., Korea, Bolivia, China, Indonesia, the Philippines, England, and probably more!) was this map of the world:

An awesome Map of the World

This piece, made by a Korean student, was done with stamps from all around the world. I thought it was really cool that they used stamps from the states to make the landmass of the states, for example. (Although they kind of put stamps from individuals states like, wherever - like North Carolina was on the West Coast) Some of the stamps were improvised, like a Japanese stamp depicting Russia being used as part of the Russia landmass, but it was still really cool. There was also a nice message about how stamps help us communicate around the world, and how letters will never be outdone by e-mail. :)

One last random note about yesterday, (since that's when we went downtown and actually kind of stumbled across our art exhibit) I did something I never imagined I'd find myself doing. I had to convince my girlfriend not to buy a video game.

Jill has been toying with the idea of buying a Nintendo Wii in Japan for a few weeks now. They're slightly cheaper here than they are in the states, (because of the exchange rate) and there's a few games you can get here that you can't get yet in the states. Most notably is the game Super Smash Bros. Brawl, (or Super Smash Brothers X, in Japan) which is released here, but won't be out in the states until March.

I should take a moment to mention that Smash Bros isn't just any game. This game is EPIC! Like, seriously! Nintendo is putting a ton of stuff into this game, including mini-versions of the original games from the 80's that the characters in the game came from, pictures, stickers, stage-creation, and online play. Smash Bros is essentially the game lots of kids thought up when they were little: What would happen if your favorite Nintendo star was put up against your other favorite Nintendo star? Characters include Yoshi, Kirby, Princess Peach, Donkey Kong, Link (from the Legend of Zelda series) Princess Zelda herself, the Ice Climbers, Pit (from Kid Icarus, a game older than I am) Pikachu (as well as a multitude of other Pokemon) and of course, Mario. There's more characters too, some hidden and unlockable, but most notably are guest appearances by Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog and Solid Snake from the special ops recon (or something) game Metal Gear: Solid. The game can be played competitively or cooperatively, and is just... well, amazing. (Even the sountrack is awesome!)

One negative thing about getting the Wii here is that Nintendo Wiis are region-coded, which means that if you buy games here, you can't play them on an American Wii. The same goes for buying a Japanese Wii and trying to play games purchased in the states with it. This was definitely not my biggest point, though. I was mostly worried that the Wii, like so many other things we already have around us, would be a huge, huge distraction.

Although Jill and I do make time to study, travel, and get the most of Japan that we can, there's plenty around to distract us. At the very least, we have each other, Shiva, other American students, and day-to-day chores that keep us from studying as much as we should. Throw in the unessentials we have like American television via Jill's family's slingbox, Pokemon Cards, non-academic books, the various lures of the internet and Nintendo DS games, (not the Kanji practice one) well... a new game system is really the last thing we need.

There's also the matter of space, having to rearrange the room, get a TV in here, the number of other games Jill would want to buy, the extra controllers and other accessories she'd need to play the games she bought... Jill really likes to rearrange her room, though, and shipping it back wouldn't be too hard, because Wiis are relatively small, but...

In any case, I convinced her not to buy it, and was relieved. I'm normally not one to stifle run, especially of the video game variety, but this is a special opportunity for us both, and I'd hate for us to spend out time inside playing video games when that's definitely something we could just do at home. While I do admit that we might be able to learn something by trying to play these games in Japanese, it would really be more of a novelty than actually educational, I think. Jill may decide to pick one up later, but for the meantime, we are Wii free. (We'll definitely have this conversation again when we're both back home in the states, though!)

Um... I think that's all for now. I will get to the Kaeda Gorge pseudo-visit and friendship among guys reflection eventually. Next week I'll maybe be visiting northern Kyushu, but we'll just have to wait and see, I think. The prospect of traveling alone is scary! Bye bye for now.

Edit: I think I may have forgotten to write how pleased and grateful I was for the opportunity to participate in these classes. They were not only super-educational, but also really fun! It warmed my heart to see my name up with the names of the other foreign students at Miyadai, despite only being a visitor!

Time Skip: Kagoshima Day Trip

So, I know I'm skipping ahead a few weeks here, but I'd like to write about our trip on Sunday while it's still fairly fresh in my mind.

Kagoshima City, near Kagoshima Chuo Eki

Sunday morning Jillian and I made a day-trip to Kagoshima, about a two-hour bus ride south of Miyazaki. We woke up before dawn in order to catch the 6:50 train, and after a quick breakfast of bagel sandwiches, we caught the 7:50 express bus from Miyako City Station to Kagoshima Chuo Eki.

The bus we rode was pretty luxurious. There were three rows of seats, with aisles in between, and each seat was kind of like an airplane seat, minus the tray-table. (They did have footrests and little pockets for headphones and sick-bags, though) The bus ride even featured a movie, which was a touching story about a genius pianist who is crippled by a gunshot wound to the hand during a mugging, so he teaches a young disabled girl how to play. (Or something like that)

Upon arrival, it took us a little while to get our bearings, since neither Jill or I had been to Kagoshima before. With the help of the traveler's information center, we purchased a 600 yen bus pass that we could use on the city view tour buses all day, and also got a discount to all of Kagoshima's sight-seeing attractions.

Statue near the bus and train station commemorating the group of Satsuma-Clan students smuggled into the Europe to learn about Western culture and technology during the Tokugawa Isolation Edict in the mid-late nineteenth century.

Our first stop was the Meiji Restoration Museum, which Tsutsumi-Sensei, my Japanese Culture professor from last quarter, recommended I go see. The ladies in the museum all wore really interesting uniforms.

Museum Ladies

The Meiji Restoration Museum focuses mostly on Saigo Takamori, hero of the Satsuma Clan. (Kagoshima was actually called Satsuma a long time ago) The city has large bronze statues of many Satsuma clan members throughout, who all played vital roles in returning power to the imperial family at the end of the Edo Period from the Tokugawa Shogunate.

Saigo Takamori, Hero of the Meiji Restoration, some goof ball, and Okubo Toshimichi, who brought many forms of advanced technology back to Japan from Europe and North America.

One of the neatest things about the Meiji Restoration Museum is that it's a really interactive experience. Not only are there guided tours as one would typically expect, but in addition to the various exhibits and artifacts, they also have period replicas of clothing from the Meiji era that you can try on!

Jillian sporting a replica of Saigo Takamori's jacket. (That's a model of Saigo's dog to her right)

The museum even had a Satsuma Clan video game for children to play, and models and examples of technology that Toshimichi-san brought back from the west that you could touch and operate. (They have, of course, been modified for safety) The museum's biggest attraction is the Meiji ドラマ (DoRaMa, or Drama). Unfortunately, I couldn't take pictures of this particular attraction, but essentially it was a spectacle of light and sound, including a movie, animatronic historical figures, (including Takamori-san and Toshimichi-san, of course) and lightning, snow, and fire light effects. Jillian and I were provided with headphones for an English translation, although we were able to catch the gist of the Japanese even without them.

Satsuma Clan Video Game

Another cool exhibit featured tiny holographic images of people reenacting scenes from the end of the Edo period. (Shortly after Commodore Perry and his black ships arrived demanding that Japan open its ports for trade)

Tiny, ghostly holo-people.

To me, this particular museum is a really good example of Japan's tendency to copy things that other countries have done, but then implement them in a different way. (Japan has been doing this for centuries, starting with many forms of art, architecture and lifestyle from China., including their writing system.) By this I don't just mean the models of western technology and dress featured in the museum that Japan began to mimic from the west, but the museum itself.

Model of a Japanese ship developed from a Western design.

For example, the animatronic people in the Meiji Drama were not only technologically impressive, but we also being used for a genuinely interesting history lesson of sorts. Compared to the relatively boring Hall of Presidents animatrons in Disney World, these guys were pretty stellar. (Although still the awkward kind of jerky you expect from animatrons) Also, I'm fairly certain that the tiny holo-people in the reenactment exhibits were generated by similiar if not the same technology as the ghosts in Disney Land's Haunted Mansion. Again, these Japanese characters are being used for not solely entertainment, but education as well. One might even say that Japan not only mimicked the technology in a different way, but possibly even in a better way.

After the museum visit, Jill and I were pretty hungry, so we stopped at a ramen place near a park in the center of town for lunch. A nice lady from Hong Kong spoke English with us for a bit, and we were genuinely grateful for the chance to rest for a bit. Conveniently, the Saigo Takamori Statue was nearby, which I definitely had to take a picture of to send back to Tsutsumi-Sensei's class in Olympia. (Tsutsumi-Sensei had requested that I take some photos in Kagoshima since they're learning about the Meiji Restoration right now)

Bronze Statue in of Takamori Saigo, tragic, compassionate Hero.

Our next stop was "the cave where Saigo hid," (or so it was called on our map) which is the place where Saigo Takamori took his last stand at the end of the Satsuma Rebellion.

"The Cave where Saigo hid"

I won't give a full account of Saigo's story here, but essentially he was a prominent figure of the Satsuma clan who taught his pupils with the rules "Never lose, never lie, never bully." Young samurai were trained by other young samurai, since they had no school or formal teachers. The Meiji Restoration was a time of turmoil in Japan, since the Tokugawa government was being overthrown by people trying to return power to the Emperor of Japan. ("Restoration" in Japanese history refers to times where power that has been taken from the Imperial family is being restored) The Satsuma clan was on the side of the war that was fighting in favor of the imperial family, who were up against the Tokugawa Shogunate, who had been in power for over two centuries. Saigo was a compassionate man, even in victory, and although he had been exiled multiple times in his life for fear of his leading a rebellion, he allowed his enemies to live, saying that too much blood had already been spilled.

The sign outside of the cave. "My life is in your hands" refers to Saigo's reaction to his students' actions that led to the beginning of the last Satsuma Rebellion.

Later in his life, after Saigo has basically retired from the leadership scene, he was leading a school in Kagoshima for those without the means to travel to the best schools in the capital. (Or something like that) However, since the government was worried about Saigo raising another rebellion, they started to move all arms and munition formerly stored in Kagoshima to Kyoto, where they could keep an eye on it. Saigo's students, offended by this lack of trust in their mentor, attacked one of the munitions depots, which marked the beginning of the Seinan (?) Civil War, or the last Satsuma Rebellion. Unfortunately for Saigo, who didn't understand the actions of his students, his forces were outnumbered two-to-one, and had inferior weaponry as well. Despite all he had done for the restoration of the imperial family, the government ultimately destroyed Saigo, and he it still revered as a Hero even today.

Or... at least I think that's how it went. Okubo has his own story too, and he is nearly as popular since he was a close friend of Saigo's before they went different ways regarding the modernization of Japan.

After the cave, (which was a really quick visit, like, four minutes before the bus arrived again) we went to the Saigo Nanshu Cemetery, where the samurai who died during the Seinan Civil War are buried, including Saigo. (There is also another museum there, but we didn't have time to visit it as well.

Saigo Nanshu Cemtery, some of the samurai who are buried here were as young as fourteen.

The cemetery is on a large hill overlooking the Kagoshima bay, and you can clearly see the Sakurajima volcano from a little terrace near the gate. There is also a shrine near the cemetery, but we didn't purchase omikuji (fortunes) this time. It's a really inspiring place, and gave me a feeling of awe kind of similar to the way I felt at the Ama no Iwato cave-shrine in Takachiho, although this feeling was more of an appreciation of historical importance rather than an awe for the natural beauty at the cave.

The Tomb of Saigo Takamori

Our final stop was the Kagoshima City Aquarium, which was pretty much the most awesome aquarium I've ever been to. While the Seattle Aquarium will always hold a familiar place in my heart, this place was just really, really cool.

Kagoshima City Aquarium

Not only where the sea creatures we saw here new and exciting, but they aquarium also had a really conservation-y message. Every intro to each area reminded visitors that the environment that these creatures live in is shrinking each day, and that even the rich sea life near the geothermic vents of Sakurajima is at risk.

I'll warn you now that my pictures in the aquarium are a bit lacking, since my camera doesn't photograph moving things very well. Jillian's blog, however, has some better pictures, as well as a picture of a really moving poem at the end of the aquarium tour. (Jill's blog also has pictures of the baby sea turtles, which were my favorite. I took a picture of them too, but hers is infinitely better than mine.)

A big, scary Grouper

Aside from the huge variety of sea life, including, but not limited to, cuttlefish, octopi, tube worms, jellyfish, sea otters, whale sharks, and crabs, part of what made the aquarium so fun was the visitors. There were a ton of kids there, and they were all super excited to be there, too! It was really heartwarming to see all of the children so happy to see all of the seahorses and snails, and a particularly adorable moment happened when we saw this guy:

Oh my, it's a Clown Fish!

This group of little kids were chanting "Nemo, Nemo!" as their parents looked on. I haven't actually seen Finding Nemo before, but I hear it's really good. I'd always liked clown fish as a child because I thought it was really cool how they could live among sea anemones that would normally sting other fish.

Speaking of stinging, this guy is apparently pretty dangerous.

The aquarium, like the museum, also had many interactive stations, like the touch-tank, where kids could touch sea-stars and things, computer games, and a sea lab where a scientist was showing things like jellyfish polyps and shark egg sacs. In particular at the sea lab, I thought this was pretty funny:

I don't see the scientific significance of this, but this fella was in the sea lab anyway.

I keep referring to all of these creatures as "guys" and "fellas," but I honestly have no idea whether they're male or female. Interestingly, I took more pictures in the museum, while Jill took more pictures in the aquarium. I bet you can guess what our academic foci are!

There was also a dolphin show, but we couldn't stick around to see it.

Unfortunately, we weren't able to visit all of the museums in Kagoshima, although the Marchen Fairy Tale museum looked really cool. We also had the skip the art museum, and didn't get to take the ferry to Sakurajima either. Sakurajima is an island-like volcano in Kagoshima bay. It's really, really big, and still active! In Kagoshima, they actually have drills to train people what to do in the event of an eruption, similar to fire or earthquake drills in schools. Sakurajima also has a "magma onsen," that has water heated by the volcano itself!

Sakurajima Volcano, as seen from the Aquarium.

We took the express bus back to Miyazaki and had a food court dinner at Miyako city. (Chinese food for Jill, Okonomiyaki again for me.) After a long, long day, we took the train back to Kibana and finally came home to Shiva. (who was pretty pissed, but seemed to have missed us) Lucky for us, Jillian's friend Erina had fed Shiva while we were gone because she heard him meowing, so he was okay.

Overall, it was an amazing day trip! I'd be more than happy to visit Kagoshima again some day, and was glad to be able to help Tsutsumi-Sensei's class out by getting some visual references to help their study. Next week I'm hoping to travel around other parts of Kyushu, and if things work out, I might be going all on my own. I'm nervous, but also excited!

And... yeah! That's all I have to say about Kagoshima for now! Until next time!