warming up

This spring scenery
has been properly prepared:
moon and plum blossoms

Basho Matsuo

So a couple weeks ago was a little thing called Hinamatsuri, which is the Doll Festival here in Japan. Now this is generally a festival geared towards females, but my friend Daniel's host mother invited the Swedes to come over for a dinner to celebrate the festival. One of the Swedes couldn't make it, so I filled in as the surrogate Swede.



The dinner had rice, fish, pizza(?yeah, weird), chips, chocolate, green tea, and naturally, sake. In addition to the regular sake, there was also a thick, milky white drink. I'm not sure what this was, but I do know it involved alcohol.

The dinner was nice and Japanese was spoken the whole time. My Japanese is not nearly at the level to be able to participate in the conversation, but I was able to float along the river without getting caught on too many rocks. It was good listening practice, and fun.

From left to right: Niklas, Daniel (not the Daniel), Daniel's (different from previous) host mother, Yukka (a Japanese friend of ours), and me with a bad bad bad hair day... eee!)

Hannah-chan, a little doggy who sat around the table while we were eating and whined and whined for food. She never barked, she just sounded like a little child making a closed-lipped "awwwww" sound.

dinner

Daniel's host mother serving us matcha (Japanese powdered green tea).

Afterwards, we went to play pool down in Hirakata.



But after a game we thought we'd try karaoke (which we could do at the same place). And so it was that I discovered karaoke. A little clarification probably needs to be made here, as my parents were a bit confused about this. Karaoke (there is no "e" the pronounciation -- or in the spelling -- kah rah oo kay) in Japan is found in two forms. One is the kind that you might find in the US -- a bar where people get up in front of all the bar-goers and sing a song. The second kind, which is the most common here, is where you and a few friends go to a room and sing songs (think the karaoke scene in Lost in Translation, minus windows). This is less intimidating and more fun. I mean, I know it sounds kind of, um, pathetic... 6 people in a dark room doing bad version of Beatles classics, but it's actually quite fun, especially when the Swedes do Circle of Life from the Lion King.... in Swedish.

After maybe 3 hours of karaoke, I came home and got an e-mail from my friend Nari. Apparently he and some others were going hiking in the morning, and well, even though it was already 3am, I wasn't going to pass up the opportunity, so I bunked down and got a few hours of sleep before getting up to go to Kurama (a town north of Kyoto).



We actually began from a town near Kurama called Kibune. Here, our guide, the trustworthy Nari led us up the mountain while telling us about Tengu, a spirit, who had taught him how to climb the mountain. Nari also told us of a great warrior who was buried here after having been slain by his brother. It was a gorgeous day for hiking, sunny and at least 20˚C. It was probably the warmest day we've had yet, and after the taste, I'm ready for spring and for the warmth it will (hopefully) bring.







Now Nari had been telling us about a cafe we would find at the end of the hike where we could eat a traditional Japanese sweet. This sounded good so we stopped at the place and had a thing called Mochi. Now, this was not my first encounter with Mochi, but it was a unique one. Mochi is essentially rice gluten and it is super sticky and gelatin like (only with a viscousity about 70 times that of regular gelatin). This is a very popular thing here, and while it tastes pretty good, it's a bit hard to swallow (literally!). But it was good nonetheless, as every new experience is always worthwhile.

This is a Japanese mythological creature called a Tengu. Interesting, eh?

The next week was classes. And then this past weekend was pretty easy going. On Friday we did another 3 hours of karaoke (of which I have video, but gosh, that'd be awful). The only downside was I lost my wonderful hat. Yes, my hat, the cool one. I went searching for it Saturday, but to no avail.



Saturday was spent relaxing and reading, and then I met up with some friends and we made chocolate scones, watched a movie, and then went out for a few hours.

Originally I wanted to go to Himeji on Sunday to see a castle, but Kara insisted that was too far (about 2 hours) to go on the weekend before midterms. So instead we went to Nara that evening for Omizutori, a festival where monks light giant torches on fire and run across the balcony. Additionally they pray for the forgiveness of the sins of humanity and for world peace and happiness. This is a festival that's been held since 752 or something like that. Yes! 752 C.E. Like 1255 years!

We got there about 1 hour before it was to start, which was good because it afforded us a good spot to watch and we also got to meet a Japanese couple from Rokko (a town at the base of Mt. Rokko, which Kara and I had ascended a couple of weeks earlier). They were very nice and the husband spoke English and was trying to help us by speaking with us in Japanese. This was nice, but he spoke mainly to Kara because I was a bit too tall (he didn't say this, but I think it was just easier for him to talk with someone at eye level).

The temple before the sunset and the fire began.

The festival was spectacular. I have video of it, which eventually y'all will see (though maybe not in internet form). It also explains to me why so many of these temples that I'm visiting were at one point in their history burned down by fire... because of foolishly awesome festivals like this. As they'd run across the balcony other monks would be ferociously sweeping the embers off and when a large chunk would drop they would run and pick it up with their hands and throw it over the edge. It was crazy-awesome. It was really cool.

My friend Kara can draw really really well. Here's some sketches she did of me and Daniel. You can probably identify me by my hat, may it be warming some other head now.

Well, that's about all for now. It's midterms this week, so I'm a bit busy with all that. Friday is the beginning of spring break and I'm going to Tokyo for about 5 days. After that I'm going to the Izu Peninsula to unwind, read, and hit up some onsen (hot spring baths).