As usual, apologies for the delayed blog post. I have the good fortune to have a lovely Italian grandmother who reminds me exactly how long its been. (Love you, Nanny Ree!) and I did not mean to keep anyone in suspense nor did I mean to go this long between blog entries, but as is life, it gets busy and you get caught up in it and time goes by way too quickly.
Unfortunately since Japan my life hasn't exactly been the globe trotting adventure which would be a far more significant and compelling read (and a far more significant and compelling thing to live as well). However, I do try to keep myself busy and do new and different things each weekend.
This past weekend, Pat's rugby team had 'ladies day' on Saturday. Essentially what that means is ladies drink wine and champagne for free all day and you can watch the guys play rugby. Nanny Ree, of all people, I know you would appreciate objectifying the gorgeous men in short shorts. When Pat invited me I specifically remember being thrilled at the idea of 'all you can drink' wine and champagne. Pat let me know that if I was in the mood to not be such a selfish asshole, I could show up early too and watch his game, considering I had never gone to any of his games at Stanford, which he claims to have invited me to, though I don't recall an invite to a single one. Regardless, I let him know if there was an opportunity to essentially have an alcoholic drink buffet AND objectify him in short shorts, I was there. I brought a few friends along and it was an absolute blast. Unfortunately, Pat's team lost but after the game he was able to come join us. The thing about that was, it was 'shit shirt' day meaning the guys were all supposed to wear their dumbest or silliest shirt and whoever had the best one won a bar tab for the night. All 6'4" of Pat rolled up after his game in a shirt that proudly proclaimed 'No one knows that I'm a lesbian'. Sadly, I think the guy in the twilight shirt cut off to show his belly button had Pat beat.
It is at this point that I must apologize for the lack of photos in this post. I just switched to a mac and I am by no means literate with this piece of equipment yet. It's already almost had multiple flights off the balcony, suffice to say, it may be awhile before me and my mac have a civil relationship.
The next day, Lindsey had made plans for us to go ice skating at Bondi beach. I had told her about my past 'ice champion' days and I think she was anticipating a much bigger performance from my end on the ice. (Incidentally Mom, now that I am old enough to appreciate how much effort went in on your part to get up in the wee hours of the morning to drive me to the rink so I could practice before school everyday, I can only say thanks. Thank you very much. It's practically inconceivable to me at this point that ANYTHING, much less the little satan spawn I'm likely to produce, would compel me to get up that early day after day. And Ben, thanks for not complaining too much when you got dragged along for the ride). Anyway, once we got to the rink, it was obvious that the ice capades would not be happening that day, since the rink had a circumference of about 5 feet and they'd managed to jam the entire population of Prussia on it. However, it was beautiful and it was right on the beach, which provided many amazing photo ops. I'd post them here but please refer to the above paragraph if you want to know why that's not going to happen.
After we were done taking copious amounts of photos, we decided to do the Bondi to Bronte walk, which is a trail that leads you from bondi beach to bronte beach. It was beautiful and it was right at sunset but probably the highlight of my evening was when we were walking, (I had my Gators sweatshirt on) and a group of other twenty somethings passed us the opposite direction. A few seconds after they passed, I heard 'Go Gators!' get yelled behind me. I spun around to see a few of them doing the gator chomp. Something about that moment, being so far away from home, but crossing paths with people from UF on the other side of the globe, really hit home to me. I spent the rest of the walk with a slight smile on my face.
So I hope you enjoyed my update. I will try to make my next post a little more interesting (thus will try to have a more interesting life in the interim).
Seeya next time!
Sunday, July 25, 2010
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Housewarming Hoe Down!
Though I'm still behind in my blog to actual event occurring ratio, now that I've gotten Japan all sorted, the gap is closing. Though it is not possible to ever completely close the gap as the event has to actually occur before I write about it. Kind of like that joke from Mitch Hedberg...
"One time, this guy handed me a picture of him, he said,"Here's a picture of me when I was younger." Every picture is of you when you were younger. "Here's a picture of me when I'm older." "You son-of-a-bitch! How'd you pull that off? Lemme see that camera... what's it look like?"
But I digress... The weekend after I got back from Japan, we had our housewarming party. The weekend we had chosen happened to be 4th of July weekend. Despite being the only american in the household, my pleas for a 4th of July/American themed housewarming were not only heard, they were embraced.
We sent out a Facebook invite and I was immediately bombarded with people's ideas for costumes...A few ideas that particularly stuck out...A competitive eater, The Statue of Liberty (as a guy), Obama, An American Gladiator. Seeing people's enthusiasm for this theme warmed my heart, even if their intentions weren't completely aligned with my hometown pride.
To fully embrace 'America', I knew we had to get a few things for sure for this party. A keg (they're not very common over here because they're so expensive), red solo cups (you can get them virtually no where here but Aussies LOVE them) and beer pong (this is practically unheard of by Australians, but every one of them I've introduced to it has immediately become enamored with it). Fortunately Lindsey had a friend visiting from the states who brought over the red solo cups, we found a place that delivered kegs, and after much work, and almost purchasing a full-sized ping pong table for sheer lack of other options, we managed to find two cheap, outdoor tables that could serve as a beer pong table. My flatmate, James, managed to get two turn tables and a bunch of vinyl records (even though in true-to-American-form, we just ended up plugging in an iPod to play music all night). So overall, everything was perfect!
As far as the flat mate costumes went, I decided to cop out and go for a daily duke/country girl-esque costume. Naturally, it was a little trampy, as all good American costumes are.
My flatmate James claimed he was a 'contemporary Uncle Sam' with cut off jean shorts, a jacket with the sleeves cut off, an obnoxiously giant red bow tie and red, white and blue paint making up his 'Uncle Sam beard.' He also insisted every hour, on the hour, all of the Americans scream 'WOOOOO!' as this is something, I guess based on the movies and TV he has seen, he believes we all do. He would actually stop the music every hour, on the hour, to announce it was time for the 'WOOOO'. We happily obliged (which I believe was more of a result of the copious amounts of cheap beer being consumed and less a result of 'WOOO'-ing being part of our cultural heritage).
This is what other countries thing of us...
My other flatmate, Fin, decided to go as Clint Eastwood from 'The Good, The Bad and the Ugly'. I've included a shot of Clint Eastwood with Fins picture for reference...
The party was a huge success! Our apartment essentially became the United Nations for beer pong, and I, the beer pong ambassador. Once we introduced the game to them, they got so competitive. I never thought it would warm my heart so to see so many other cultures so fully embrace our drinking traditions. We also introduced flip cup to them, which they loved as well. Below I've included a few additional pictures of some good costumes I saw at the party.
Ironically, one of the most fun times I've had since I've been back here was emulating an American party. Go figure!
"One time, this guy handed me a picture of him, he said,"Here's a picture of me when I was younger." Every picture is of you when you were younger. "Here's a picture of me when I'm older." "You son-of-a-bitch! How'd you pull that off? Lemme see that camera... what's it look like?"
But I digress... The weekend after I got back from Japan, we had our housewarming party. The weekend we had chosen happened to be 4th of July weekend. Despite being the only american in the household, my pleas for a 4th of July/American themed housewarming were not only heard, they were embraced.
We sent out a Facebook invite and I was immediately bombarded with people's ideas for costumes...A few ideas that particularly stuck out...A competitive eater, The Statue of Liberty (as a guy), Obama, An American Gladiator. Seeing people's enthusiasm for this theme warmed my heart, even if their intentions weren't completely aligned with my hometown pride.
To fully embrace 'America', I knew we had to get a few things for sure for this party. A keg (they're not very common over here because they're so expensive), red solo cups (you can get them virtually no where here but Aussies LOVE them) and beer pong (this is practically unheard of by Australians, but every one of them I've introduced to it has immediately become enamored with it). Fortunately Lindsey had a friend visiting from the states who brought over the red solo cups, we found a place that delivered kegs, and after much work, and almost purchasing a full-sized ping pong table for sheer lack of other options, we managed to find two cheap, outdoor tables that could serve as a beer pong table. My flatmate, James, managed to get two turn tables and a bunch of vinyl records (even though in true-to-American-form, we just ended up plugging in an iPod to play music all night). So overall, everything was perfect!
As far as the flat mate costumes went, I decided to cop out and go for a daily duke/country girl-esque costume. Naturally, it was a little trampy, as all good American costumes are.
My flatmate James claimed he was a 'contemporary Uncle Sam' with cut off jean shorts, a jacket with the sleeves cut off, an obnoxiously giant red bow tie and red, white and blue paint making up his 'Uncle Sam beard.' He also insisted every hour, on the hour, all of the Americans scream 'WOOOOO!' as this is something, I guess based on the movies and TV he has seen, he believes we all do. He would actually stop the music every hour, on the hour, to announce it was time for the 'WOOOO'. We happily obliged (which I believe was more of a result of the copious amounts of cheap beer being consumed and less a result of 'WOOO'-ing being part of our cultural heritage).
This is what other countries thing of us...
My other flatmate, Fin, decided to go as Clint Eastwood from 'The Good, The Bad and the Ugly'. I've included a shot of Clint Eastwood with Fins picture for reference...
The party was a huge success! Our apartment essentially became the United Nations for beer pong, and I, the beer pong ambassador. Once we introduced the game to them, they got so competitive. I never thought it would warm my heart so to see so many other cultures so fully embrace our drinking traditions. We also introduced flip cup to them, which they loved as well. Below I've included a few additional pictures of some good costumes I saw at the party.
Ironically, one of the most fun times I've had since I've been back here was emulating an American party. Go figure!
Monday, July 12, 2010
Himeji
The last and final day in Japan. We packed up our bags and took a train to Himeji to do some day time sight seeing before our flight that evening. Fortunately for us, in Japan at pretty much every rail station there are lockers of all different sizes available for rent, so we were able to leave our bags at the station while we walked around. Also, we needed exact change to use the lockers, so I ended up buying a hot coffee from a vending machine. It actually came in a can and was pretty hot. Didn't taste too bad either. Unfortunately it happened to be one of the hottest, muggiest days that we'd had in Japan so hot coffee was about as appealing as a shiatsu massage from a porcupine.
The main attraction in Himeji was the Himeji castle. Unfortunately we weren't able to go in the main castle as it was under construction until 2011, but we were still able to explore a lot of the grounds and go in some of the other buildings.
There were some cool stories about the castle that we heard. For example the picture below is something called Okiku's well. There had been a maidservant named Kiku who was the employee of Aoyama, the chief retainer of the lord of the Himeji Castle. Kiku was also the lover of Kinugasa, a loyal retainer of the lord. She found out that Aoyama was planning on having the lord killed and so she warned Montonobu and the plot was not carried out. However Aoyama was understandably a little PO'ed at Kiku for throwing a wrench in his plans and he falsely accused her of losing a valuable family dish. The appropriate punishment for this was death by torture and then they threw Kiku's body in the well. Sucks for Kiku. Sine then there have been rumors of her spirit still haunting the well and the castle.
We spent the rest of the day, wandering around, going into 100 Yen shops (like dollar stores) and we even decided to buy the equivalent of a Mike's hard lemonade from one of the street vending machines, just to say we did it.
Finally we collected our bags, took a train a few hours to Osaka and got ready to head back to Sydney.
Overall, I'd say this was one of the best trips that I've been on. Japan was so foreign, and it was very difficult to get around, but that much more rewarding because of it. I will say I would never want to do anything like this completely on my own, as there were full days that went by that we didn't see a single other white person. Sometimes as you would pass another white person on the street, you would meet eyes and just give them a knowing head nod. Like you're in the same club of not knowing what the eff is going on or what anyone is saying. It didn't matter that they might also be completely foreign to you and not even speak English. All that mattered was that you were acknowledging you were both way out of your element. Had I gone on a trip like this without Lindsey, it would have been incredibly lonely and isolating. Though I'm yet to see the movie 'Lost in Translation', I'm sure watching it now and having had the experience that I did, I will have a much greater appreciation for it.
The main attraction in Himeji was the Himeji castle. Unfortunately we weren't able to go in the main castle as it was under construction until 2011, but we were still able to explore a lot of the grounds and go in some of the other buildings.
There were some cool stories about the castle that we heard. For example the picture below is something called Okiku's well. There had been a maidservant named Kiku who was the employee of Aoyama, the chief retainer of the lord of the Himeji Castle. Kiku was also the lover of Kinugasa, a loyal retainer of the lord. She found out that Aoyama was planning on having the lord killed and so she warned Montonobu and the plot was not carried out. However Aoyama was understandably a little PO'ed at Kiku for throwing a wrench in his plans and he falsely accused her of losing a valuable family dish. The appropriate punishment for this was death by torture and then they threw Kiku's body in the well. Sucks for Kiku. Sine then there have been rumors of her spirit still haunting the well and the castle.
We spent the rest of the day, wandering around, going into 100 Yen shops (like dollar stores) and we even decided to buy the equivalent of a Mike's hard lemonade from one of the street vending machines, just to say we did it.
Finally we collected our bags, took a train a few hours to Osaka and got ready to head back to Sydney.
Overall, I'd say this was one of the best trips that I've been on. Japan was so foreign, and it was very difficult to get around, but that much more rewarding because of it. I will say I would never want to do anything like this completely on my own, as there were full days that went by that we didn't see a single other white person. Sometimes as you would pass another white person on the street, you would meet eyes and just give them a knowing head nod. Like you're in the same club of not knowing what the eff is going on or what anyone is saying. It didn't matter that they might also be completely foreign to you and not even speak English. All that mattered was that you were acknowledging you were both way out of your element. Had I gone on a trip like this without Lindsey, it would have been incredibly lonely and isolating. Though I'm yet to see the movie 'Lost in Translation', I'm sure watching it now and having had the experience that I did, I will have a much greater appreciation for it.
Well that pretty much closes the books on my Japan trip. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did! :)
Miyajima
The second to last stop we had on our trip was Miyajima. We had to take a ferry to get over. On the way, we were able to see the 'floating gate' of the Itsukushiku shrine. We made a point to come over when it was high tide, cause otherwise we were warned the 'floating gate' looked like it was not so much floating as standing in mud...which is because quite literally, at low tide, that is what it would be doing. However if you did come at low tide, you had the option to actually walk out and walk through the gate, which supposedly would give you luck...or enlighten you. Being that pretty much everything in Japan that we did was supposed to give us luck or enlighten us, I felt pretty stocked up on luck and enlightenment and figured I'd rather get good pictures of it.
When we arrived at Miyajima, to my pleasant surprise, we discovered there were more wild deer on this island. The first guy we saw is in these pictures below. I found him entranced at something and couldn't get him to turn or move from the side of the building to take any decent pictures. As you can see in the picture, I tried to identify what had the little guy so entranced.
It was a reflection of himself! I'd call him narcissistic but if I was that cute, I'd probably stare at myself all day too.
We walked around the area, taking pictures, looking at the shrine and, of course, me being creepy chasing the deer all around. There was one deer that I spent quite some time petting and when I decided to get up and move on, I tried to give it a kiss on the head, which it promptly rejecting by jerking its head away.
"I don't think he liked that." I told Lindsey.
"Well, duh, Emily." She retorted. "It's a wild animal...and it doesn't speak English!"
"...It's a Japanese deer? That's the reason the deer doesn't want a kiss? Language barrier?"
We continued to explore the general area in Miyajima before seeing this sign in our path.
Probably would have been more effective if it had been posted where I got off the Ferry...before I turned the entire island into my own personal petting zoo.
At this point, we were in the last days of our trip. It was sad to know soon we'd be forced back to reality, but as often happens when you are traveling around a lot in a foreign country, we were tired and looking forward to sleeping in our own beds. I was particularly looking forward to not feeling like every trip to the bathroom was a game of Russian roulette, wondering if there would be a real toilet there or just a hole in the ground.
We headed back to our hostel, packed our things and prepared for our last day in Japan that we would spend in Himeiji.
When we arrived at Miyajima, to my pleasant surprise, we discovered there were more wild deer on this island. The first guy we saw is in these pictures below. I found him entranced at something and couldn't get him to turn or move from the side of the building to take any decent pictures. As you can see in the picture, I tried to identify what had the little guy so entranced.
It was a reflection of himself! I'd call him narcissistic but if I was that cute, I'd probably stare at myself all day too.
We walked around the area, taking pictures, looking at the shrine and, of course, me being creepy chasing the deer all around. There was one deer that I spent quite some time petting and when I decided to get up and move on, I tried to give it a kiss on the head, which it promptly rejecting by jerking its head away.
"I don't think he liked that." I told Lindsey.
"Well, duh, Emily." She retorted. "It's a wild animal...and it doesn't speak English!"
"...It's a Japanese deer? That's the reason the deer doesn't want a kiss? Language barrier?"
We continued to explore the general area in Miyajima before seeing this sign in our path.
Probably would have been more effective if it had been posted where I got off the Ferry...before I turned the entire island into my own personal petting zoo.
At this point, we were in the last days of our trip. It was sad to know soon we'd be forced back to reality, but as often happens when you are traveling around a lot in a foreign country, we were tired and looking forward to sleeping in our own beds. I was particularly looking forward to not feeling like every trip to the bathroom was a game of Russian roulette, wondering if there would be a real toilet there or just a hole in the ground.
We headed back to our hostel, packed our things and prepared for our last day in Japan that we would spend in Himeiji.
Friday, July 9, 2010
Watch Out World, Mama's coming home!!!!
Interrupting my blog entries of updating you about my Japan trip, I just wanted to go ahead and let you know I have booked my flight home to the U.S.! I only booked the flights to and from the U.S. through SF. I have to fly to Boston the same day I get in, the 15th, because Erica's wedding is on the 16th in Boston, and that is my official reason for coming back, but I am SO EXCITED! I was going to wait another month or so to book it officially, but sure enough, QANTAS emailed me letting me know they had amazing deals back to the U.S. and once I looked at the prices, I realized I wasn't going to do much better. It's like it was meant to be.
Just wanted to share! :)
Monday, July 5, 2010
Hiroshima
Happy 4th of July! The housewarming party was great this weekend and wildly successful. I successfully introduced beer pong and flip cup to multiple cultures simultaneously...and they LOVED it! But that will have to wait for a later blog entry as I am still slowly but surely getting through my trip to Japan.
The next place we headed was Hiroshima. As soon as we got there, we headed to the Hiroshima Peace Museum. I have to say, I was not prepared for what I was about to see. It was a pretty heavy museum, and there were tons of personal effects of people who had been victims and personal stories from survivors. I didn't end up taking many pictures inside the museum because frankly I became overwhelmed, but a few that I did take which I felt were particularly powerful are below. These were aerial pictures of before and after the blast. Over 140,000 people died as a result of the initial blast.
After we left the museum, we were surrounded by monuments and reminders of the bomb. The top image is the Atomic Bomb Dome, a building that was in the initial blast. The city decided to leave it up as a reminder of the devastation that can be caused by atomic weapons and also a symbol for Hiroshima's quest for world peace. The second image is in memorial to a little girl named Sadako Sasaki. She was exposed in the blast when she was 2 years old and later when she was 12, diagnosed with Leukemia as a result of her exposure. She began making paper cranes, believing that if she made 1000 of them, her disease would be cured. Sadly she never was able to make the full 1000 before she died, but her school mates continued her mission and now the paper crane has become a symbol of Sadako and her fight. The other two pictures are additional monuments in the peace park.
Being American, I never really felt up to this point that I had a good understanding of what had happened in Hiroshima. In our school books it is referred to as the bomb that ended the war and besides that there is not much detail given. It never even occurred to me that Hiroshima would rebuild itself and try to make itself an international symbol for an ongoing quest for World Peace. At the end of the museum there were books and books of letters from famous leaders throughout the world who had visited the museum and their thoughts and reflections on it. The only American leader listed was Nancy Pelosi.
After reflecting on the massive historical significance of Hiroshima, we decided to try to do some of the fun things they had available there, too. We decided to go to a beer garden on the roof of one of the buildings. Apparently they have these beer gardens every night, they have them on tons of buildings in the city, they cost about $25 and its all you can eat (good) food and all you can drink beer from 5:30PM til 10. This set up would be massively popular in Australia or the U.S. and presumably that is why this set up doesn't exist in either. As Linds and I pounded enough beers to ensure we got our moneys worth, we noticed that most of the other patrons really were just having an affordable dinner with friends with a few drinks.
It also happened to be Egyptian themed the night we went which led to some strange music and the giant pyramid in the photo above.
We had wanted to go to a baseball game but unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate with us in the next few days. I particularly wanted to go because the team was called the 'Hiroshima Carp'. Apparently they really suck, but I was just stoked that they actually picked that fish (albeit a shitty fish) to be their mascot. However I managed to get a picture of one of their signs so really that's all I needed.
The one thing I regrettably did not get to see in Hiroshima that I really would have liked to were the love hotels. They are hotels that, as the name hints, can be rented by the hour, but apparently all of the rooms have different crazy themes or the overall hotel has a theme that all of the rooms are outfitted to look like. Though it would have been really fun to see, Lindsey and I couldn't justify paying for an hour in the hotel just for 2 minutes of picture taking and 58 minutes of awkward standing around.
Nonetheless, Hiroshima was very cool and I really enjoyed learning about the history of the A-bomb there. After Hiroshima, next one on the list was Miyajima!
The next place we headed was Hiroshima. As soon as we got there, we headed to the Hiroshima Peace Museum. I have to say, I was not prepared for what I was about to see. It was a pretty heavy museum, and there were tons of personal effects of people who had been victims and personal stories from survivors. I didn't end up taking many pictures inside the museum because frankly I became overwhelmed, but a few that I did take which I felt were particularly powerful are below. These were aerial pictures of before and after the blast. Over 140,000 people died as a result of the initial blast.
After we left the museum, we were surrounded by monuments and reminders of the bomb. The top image is the Atomic Bomb Dome, a building that was in the initial blast. The city decided to leave it up as a reminder of the devastation that can be caused by atomic weapons and also a symbol for Hiroshima's quest for world peace. The second image is in memorial to a little girl named Sadako Sasaki. She was exposed in the blast when she was 2 years old and later when she was 12, diagnosed with Leukemia as a result of her exposure. She began making paper cranes, believing that if she made 1000 of them, her disease would be cured. Sadly she never was able to make the full 1000 before she died, but her school mates continued her mission and now the paper crane has become a symbol of Sadako and her fight. The other two pictures are additional monuments in the peace park.
Being American, I never really felt up to this point that I had a good understanding of what had happened in Hiroshima. In our school books it is referred to as the bomb that ended the war and besides that there is not much detail given. It never even occurred to me that Hiroshima would rebuild itself and try to make itself an international symbol for an ongoing quest for World Peace. At the end of the museum there were books and books of letters from famous leaders throughout the world who had visited the museum and their thoughts and reflections on it. The only American leader listed was Nancy Pelosi.
After reflecting on the massive historical significance of Hiroshima, we decided to try to do some of the fun things they had available there, too. We decided to go to a beer garden on the roof of one of the buildings. Apparently they have these beer gardens every night, they have them on tons of buildings in the city, they cost about $25 and its all you can eat (good) food and all you can drink beer from 5:30PM til 10. This set up would be massively popular in Australia or the U.S. and presumably that is why this set up doesn't exist in either. As Linds and I pounded enough beers to ensure we got our moneys worth, we noticed that most of the other patrons really were just having an affordable dinner with friends with a few drinks.
It also happened to be Egyptian themed the night we went which led to some strange music and the giant pyramid in the photo above.
We had wanted to go to a baseball game but unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate with us in the next few days. I particularly wanted to go because the team was called the 'Hiroshima Carp'. Apparently they really suck, but I was just stoked that they actually picked that fish (albeit a shitty fish) to be their mascot. However I managed to get a picture of one of their signs so really that's all I needed.
The one thing I regrettably did not get to see in Hiroshima that I really would have liked to were the love hotels. They are hotels that, as the name hints, can be rented by the hour, but apparently all of the rooms have different crazy themes or the overall hotel has a theme that all of the rooms are outfitted to look like. Though it would have been really fun to see, Lindsey and I couldn't justify paying for an hour in the hotel just for 2 minutes of picture taking and 58 minutes of awkward standing around.
Nonetheless, Hiroshima was very cool and I really enjoyed learning about the history of the A-bomb there. After Hiroshima, next one on the list was Miyajima!
Friday, July 2, 2010
Nara
From Kyoto, we took a day trip to Nara to see some more temples. Lindsey had been able to sell me on this leg of the trip particularly because I was informed there would be deer that we could feed little rice cakes to.
We hopped on a few trains and when we got off at Nara we saw the majority of the touristy looking folks headed to a bus that was free. Naturally we assumed this was the way to the temple with the giant Buddha (also an attractive factor in Nara) and the deer.
We got off the bus and were greeted by a very open field with no deer in sight. We'll refer to this as hint number 1 we were in the wrong location. Still, we just assumed the deer were at some other location and we walked up to the large building we assumed was the temple with the giant Buddha.
NOT the temple we were looking for.
Lindsey noted that there were supposed to be warriors at the gate of the temple. I wondered if 'warriors' was code for some kind of column or tower since we saw nothing that resembled warriors. In retrospect, this was hint #2. Finally, we went into the 'temple' and in the center of the room, I noticed a structure encompassing something. I circled around to the front, certain that here I would find the giant Buddha and our earlier concerns would be assuaged...
NOPE! Hint #3, no giant Buddha. We hightailed it back to where we had caught the bus and searched for someone to direct us where to go. The first person we approached didn't speak a word of English and, as so many conversations with non-English speaking people in Japan had gone before, it quickly turned into a giant game of charades, ending with him physically pulling us to a guide that did speak English. The English speaking guide confirmed what hints 1, 2 & 3 had foreshadowed. We were in the wrong place.
After getting directions, we hopped on a bus for 'Take 2' of our attempt to see the giant Buddha and the deer. We quickly realized that unlike the buses in Tokyo which had alternated scrolling the stops in both English and Japanese characters on the screens, the ones in Nara showed only in Japanese. If our earlier conversation could be likened to a game of charades, this journey could be likened to a cross between Pictionary and matching. We looked at the stop that we needed to be getting off at...the characters looked like a little house, star, small person, BBQ or whatever came to us first when we looked at them. We then started intensely at the screen and called out the symbols as they scrolled across...Big tree! Penguin! Dumbell! Ultimately, I looked out the window, saw deer wandering around in the park and we pulled the signal to get off the bus. We figured we were close enough.
It was awesome. There were literally deer just hanging out in a park. They weren't enclosed, and they were perfectly happy to let you come over and pet them, though they were happier when you brought them rice crackers which you could purchase from vendors on the street. Though a sign warned that the deer are wild animals and do occasionally attack people, based on the sign, I believe they primarily attack old women and little girls.
We watched an older man with a handful of rice crackers get mobbed by the deer, which was wildly appealing to me, and not so much to Lindsey. The same guy, once he finished feeding the deer his rice crackers actually went and bought us a stack. I relished in all of my glory as the deer came up to me and I divided out the crackers to them...well, until a rogue one with antlers rammed me in the butt for not paying attention to him. Pushy jerk. He did not get a cracker.
Guy getting mobbed by the deer
Linds not enjoying the experience as much as me
After about 934028490382 photo ops, Lindsey was able to peel me away from the deer long enough to get us to the temple. Though there were still deer all along the walk up to the temple, just hanging out. I also noticed a person whose job was to sweep up all of the deer shit that was on the pathway, presumably all while reflecting on which bad decision he had made in his life that had led him here.
Shitty job.
We continued forth to the temple. Finally seeing the warriors that guarded the temple at the entrance way. Inside the temple we finally found our big Buddha...and he was BIG.
Wandering around the temple, we came across a small hole in a pillar. This hole was supposedly the size of the Buddhas nostril. Anyone who could fit through supposedly would be enlightened. Studying the hole, I doubted even my thigh would be able to be enlightened. Several school children delighted in squeezing through. Lindsey toyed with the idea of attempting it before deciding against it because, let's be serious, how embarrassing/HILARIOUS would it be if she got stuck in front of all of these people? Plus, it's not like there were a lack of cameras in that place. She pretty much would have secured her place in at least 45 people's vacation albums.
After the giant Buddha, we went to another temple that was essentially a series of orange gates uphill. It was definitely one of the cooler, more unique looking temples we had seen during the trip, which was good cause at this point after seeing so many temples, the temples really had to have some spectacular element to them to stand out. Kinda like once you get to the top 15 in American idol.
After Nara, the next leg of our trip would take us to Hiroshima.
We hopped on a few trains and when we got off at Nara we saw the majority of the touristy looking folks headed to a bus that was free. Naturally we assumed this was the way to the temple with the giant Buddha (also an attractive factor in Nara) and the deer.
We got off the bus and were greeted by a very open field with no deer in sight. We'll refer to this as hint number 1 we were in the wrong location. Still, we just assumed the deer were at some other location and we walked up to the large building we assumed was the temple with the giant Buddha.
NOT the temple we were looking for.
Lindsey noted that there were supposed to be warriors at the gate of the temple. I wondered if 'warriors' was code for some kind of column or tower since we saw nothing that resembled warriors. In retrospect, this was hint #2. Finally, we went into the 'temple' and in the center of the room, I noticed a structure encompassing something. I circled around to the front, certain that here I would find the giant Buddha and our earlier concerns would be assuaged...
NOPE! Hint #3, no giant Buddha. We hightailed it back to where we had caught the bus and searched for someone to direct us where to go. The first person we approached didn't speak a word of English and, as so many conversations with non-English speaking people in Japan had gone before, it quickly turned into a giant game of charades, ending with him physically pulling us to a guide that did speak English. The English speaking guide confirmed what hints 1, 2 & 3 had foreshadowed. We were in the wrong place.
After getting directions, we hopped on a bus for 'Take 2' of our attempt to see the giant Buddha and the deer. We quickly realized that unlike the buses in Tokyo which had alternated scrolling the stops in both English and Japanese characters on the screens, the ones in Nara showed only in Japanese. If our earlier conversation could be likened to a game of charades, this journey could be likened to a cross between Pictionary and matching. We looked at the stop that we needed to be getting off at...the characters looked like a little house, star, small person, BBQ or whatever came to us first when we looked at them. We then started intensely at the screen and called out the symbols as they scrolled across...Big tree! Penguin! Dumbell! Ultimately, I looked out the window, saw deer wandering around in the park and we pulled the signal to get off the bus. We figured we were close enough.
It was awesome. There were literally deer just hanging out in a park. They weren't enclosed, and they were perfectly happy to let you come over and pet them, though they were happier when you brought them rice crackers which you could purchase from vendors on the street. Though a sign warned that the deer are wild animals and do occasionally attack people, based on the sign, I believe they primarily attack old women and little girls.
We watched an older man with a handful of rice crackers get mobbed by the deer, which was wildly appealing to me, and not so much to Lindsey. The same guy, once he finished feeding the deer his rice crackers actually went and bought us a stack. I relished in all of my glory as the deer came up to me and I divided out the crackers to them...well, until a rogue one with antlers rammed me in the butt for not paying attention to him. Pushy jerk. He did not get a cracker.
Guy getting mobbed by the deer
Linds not enjoying the experience as much as me
After about 934028490382 photo ops, Lindsey was able to peel me away from the deer long enough to get us to the temple. Though there were still deer all along the walk up to the temple, just hanging out. I also noticed a person whose job was to sweep up all of the deer shit that was on the pathway, presumably all while reflecting on which bad decision he had made in his life that had led him here.
Shitty job.
We continued forth to the temple. Finally seeing the warriors that guarded the temple at the entrance way. Inside the temple we finally found our big Buddha...and he was BIG.
Wandering around the temple, we came across a small hole in a pillar. This hole was supposedly the size of the Buddhas nostril. Anyone who could fit through supposedly would be enlightened. Studying the hole, I doubted even my thigh would be able to be enlightened. Several school children delighted in squeezing through. Lindsey toyed with the idea of attempting it before deciding against it because, let's be serious, how embarrassing/HILARIOUS would it be if she got stuck in front of all of these people? Plus, it's not like there were a lack of cameras in that place. She pretty much would have secured her place in at least 45 people's vacation albums.
After the giant Buddha, we went to another temple that was essentially a series of orange gates uphill. It was definitely one of the cooler, more unique looking temples we had seen during the trip, which was good cause at this point after seeing so many temples, the temples really had to have some spectacular element to them to stand out. Kinda like once you get to the top 15 in American idol.
After Nara, the next leg of our trip would take us to Hiroshima.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
