As I write this, I'm on a plane following the same route that I took 9 months ago, the 13-hour flight from Detroit to Japan. There's a lot of time on planes to do things, so what better than to reminisce once again about my 4-month stay in Japan and to finish writing about mine and Jasmin's adventures? I'm actually not returning to Japan quite yet, but am on my way to stay in the Philippines for 2 weeks, and the 5-hour layover in Japan is just an added bonus. Once I get these final 2 entries up, I'll be writing about my time in the Philippines.
We find ourselves in our story returning from Tokyo to Nagoya at Sakae station, 6:30 in the morning on Monday, Nov. 3, about to begin our 6th day. Jasmin and I boarded the first train of the day barely dragging all of our stuff, and managed to avoid a few creepy guys still drunk from the night before. My host parents picked us up in Owariasahi and brought us back, to where our futons were laid out and the storm door closed to prevent light from getting into the room. A perfect combination to knock out immediately.
When we woke up that afternoon we took the train to Aeon, the nearby mall. It's a huge place with 3 stories of shopping, eating, and arcades, so we hung out and took our time relaxing from our trip. Before leaving we had a small snack at the food court, which did not include a certain parfait that I still hear complaints about from a certain girlfriend to this day. :p We had more dinner at home, then Jasmin even helped my host mom make choose balls for a late snack while I got ready for the next day.
On Tuesday, we woke up at my host parents' like it was a typical school morning. Well, break was over and classes were starting up again. The cool part was that Jasmin got to come with me to see the schoolchildren on the way to the train, to ride the train, and to walk with me on my path to campus. While I was in class, Jasmin waited with leftover cheese balls in what we called the exchange student "locker room", and when I returned she gave me an incredible story of how the cheese balls were mysteriously stolen, never to be seen again. My host mom picked her up to go shopping while I was in my afternoon class (Japanese Foreign Policy), and afterward we went to a really good Italian restaurant called Saizeria. This time, it was Jasmin and I who treated to thank my host parents for all their help. My host parents dropped us off at Tooyoko Inn that night - a popular cheap hotel primarily used by businessmen - and gave us info on how to get to school from there.
Our breakfast the next morning consisted of onigiri (rice balls), misosiro (miso soup), and hot chocolate (hot chocolate). It took us a while to find our way to school until at last I recognized the area and had to bolt to get to a test on time. Luckily, Jasmin made it to the locker room in the meantime, and after class we went to Ossu Kannon - a huge shopping arcade that my host parents referred to as a mini-Akihabara. In a lot of ways, I prefer Ossu to what I saw of Akihabara, but we were only at the latter for a few hours anyway. We ate at a placed called Sugakiya for some decent ramen, then walked around the shopping and gaming centers, including Mandarake which remains probably the coolest game/anime/manga/cosplay/fandom store I've ever been to. Now, this was Wednesday the 5th of November, and the presidential election was just ending in the states. While we were in the arcade, I got a text from Van saying that Obama's victory was all but a certainty, and I knew it would be the dawn of a new image in Japan of the U.S. I bought Jasmin flowers in celebration, and we ate at a Denny's, which unfortunately had little breakfast food and lots of stereotypical American dinner food like steak-cooked hamburger. o_o
I went to school alone Thursday, which was a lot easier to find, packed with a bentoo box of ramen to leave Jasmin to do laundry and organize our stuff (by her choice, don't hurt me!). I hurried to eat after class and get back to Jasmin, who was waiting for me in the train station. We took various trains to Inuyama City, where I had been once before with host mom and dad and had a lot of fun, visiting the castle and then walking around the city. Unfortunately, it was getting late and the castle was just closing as the sun was going down. So into the city we went, which is actually a very traditional town. I was looking for my friend, an older lady who is a calligraphy artist, and had called out to my host parents and me when we were walking by to ask if I was an exchange student. It turned out she has exchange students every summer, and ended up painting a wooden name plate in kanji as a present for me! Naturally, I wanted to pay her another visit. This time, her door was closed and lights were mainly off, but I knocked anyway and she was in the back. She invited us in for tea and sweets while we talked, and she gave us a tour of her home which was over 100 years old. Then she offered to make Jasmin the same type of painting she did for me, which was amazing and sooo nice of her. She suggested having dinner at her friend's restaurant by the station, and drove us there for a delicious meal and dessert. Picking up the bill was really the least Jasmin and I could do.
As if this wasn't enough, Jasmin and I went back on the train to a nearby shrine, Tagata Jinja. My host parents had surprised me with this one, not saying anything more than that it was famous across Japan, so I did the same with Jasmin. In fact, this shrine worships fertility and renewal, so it had many.. suggestive male statues. Go check the pictures. XD Unfortunately, the candy omiyage in a nearby store was closed so we went home empty handed, but it was fun.
Friday was, if anything, more busy than the day before. We hurried back after classes to a Book-Off near the hotel, which is a chain of used stores that sell manga for the equivalent of around a dollar, and sell anime, DVDs, games, and American comics for relatively cheap too. We got everything we could possibly fit into our stuff and left with just enough time to get to Nagoya City. There, we waited for a shinkansen, or bullet train, to take us to Kyoto. These trains are really fast (check the video), and it only took us around an hour to get there. Our first mission was to haul our stuff to the hotel, and after trudging through the rain we checked in and then returned to the station to buy returning tickets for the next day. The station already had lights up for Christmas, but the coolest part was all the shops with great omiyage in the area. We went to the top of Kyoto Tower, and though it cost a fortune it was well-worth it for the view at night. On the way back to the hotel we ate at a cafe, and saw some infamous public beer and cigarette vending machines. Silly Japanese and their trusting habits.
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