~Monday Evening Update~

So back to this weekend... Saturday morning I got up a little later than I would have hoped and rushed to get ready for Kyoto. I had planned to meet Steve there for 11:20, but I was embarassingly late. Steve was coming in from way outside the city and was there on time, and luckily I was able to catch a "Super Rapid Express" train which got me there in 23 minutes.

Kyoto's a really famous city here, and most of the locals I've talked to have recommended I visit. It's an "ancient city" that was Japan's capital for over a thousand years (it changed to Edo (Tokyo) in 1868 or thereabouts). Kyoto is definitely a cultural centre of Japan and has plenty of old temples. There's also a geisha district. We didn't go there, but we saw a few women dressed as geishas walking around. The city is is known for being really beautiful in the autumn (turning of the leaves) and the spring (cherry blossoms).

After arriving in Kyoto and taking the subway to Sanjo, I met up with Steve and he took me up to a temple. He's been to Kyoto numerous times before since he's been around since July. The next hour or so is a little blurry in my mind, though I remember climbing a big hill, entering a temple area, seeing some Japanese rickshaws, and exploring a Japanese graveyard. Japanese graveyards are really interesting, the tombs kind of look like buildings and the cemetary sometimes seems like a miniature downtown district, you'll see what I mean when I get some pictures up.

Then we went to a temple with a giant Buddha. The woman at the front said that I had really good Japanese (though I only know a few words, so I'm now wondering if that was some kind of Japanese sarcasm). It was all fairly impressive so far. We walked through the shops of a town that really magnified how different Osaka is from historical Japan. This city was actually really nice ot look at.

There also seemed to be a lot of little tourist-oriented shops all over Kyoto, which was completely different from Osaka. It took me weeks to even find postcards in this city, let alone any decent made-in-China tourist merchandise.

Anyway, we soon got to our intended destination: Kiyomize-dera. It's a really famous temple and was really impressive. It may have been built as a getaway for one of the emperors (though I might be thinking of something else). Anyway, it was a collection of wooden structures with big decks built on the hillside overlooking the city. My descriptions are sounding really bad, so I'll just show you some pictures of everything later. Actually, I'm going to try to attach a picture of it to this post. OK, I tried to do it and don't know if it worked, but you'll probably know by now if it did.

When we arrived at Kiyomize-dera we were approached by a Japanese student from the Kyoto University of Foreign Studies who volunteers as an English tour guide. Her name was Mikki. She was really great, she actually devoted a good hour to showing us around and telling us about everything and had really good English for someone who had never left Japan. Life here is pretty nice... It's great to be able to travel around and talk to locals without them trying to get money out of you.

At the temple complex, I tried to get involved in a bunch of the traditional feats. There was a giant metal pole and if you can lift it with one hand then you will have success in your employment (I think). Anyway, I couldn't even lift it with both hands. Actually, I watched a number of people try to lift it and every single one walked away with a disappointed expression indicating they're going to have a very, very bad life.

I also tried another "feat" where I had to walk from one rock to another with my eyes closed. This one was supposed to indicate whether or not I was going to have success in my love life. Mikki said that if someone needs to help you across then your love life will need help, though Steve said he's been told before that it's actually supposed to mean that you're going to die alone or something like that. Anyway, I closed my eyes and tried to walk it... crashed into about a dozen Japanese people, ranging from old women to little kids (by the feel of it). I had just about made it across when Mikki said something like "OK!", I opened my eyes, then she said "No!" since I was still a few metres away. I failed.

Well my third feat went much more easily. All I had to do this time was drink water from one of three small waterfalls out of a giant metal ladel. I had the choice between the wisdom waterfall, the longevity waterfall and the romance waterfall, I opted for the wisdom. The water was pretty good, though I'm still waiting for the extra bout of wisdom to kick in.

After the temple, we were very hungry. I hadn't eaten since breakfast and it was now nearing 4 or 5pm and I was getting that faint, empty, starvation feeling that seems to happen here quite a bit. We walked into the city and ate at a big Japanese restaurant and I ate rice and pineapple aboard a ground beef patty. The menu was gigantically tall and the restaurant looked like a dark place that dwarves and woodland creatures might eat. Kind of like a Taiwanese restaurant I remember from Hong Kong called Greenland.

I've gone into way too much detail again and my internet time is almost up, so I'll speed through the rest.

We went back to Osaka in the evening. We were meeting up with Steve's friend Rachel and her friend Nathan at 11pm to go clubbing, Steve was going to crash on my couch if we didn't stay out all night so we dropped off our stuff there and headed down to Umeda. We met up with the others, went to a shot bar and drank, then continued to the club, Saza*e, and continued drinking. A lot. The club was really interesting, pretty huge and world class. We all got in free because I had luckily found a coupon in a magazine allowing "free entrance for four foreigners" (instead of the $25 entrance fee) a couple of days before. The club had numerous floors including a big dance floor, some sit-down areas and a pool on the top. We ended up staying there until close sometime after 4am and waited around for the trains to start running again after 5am.

Sunday, for some reason, I got up at 10:50am and went down to Shinsaibashi with Steve, who didn't head back home until that afternoon. We had okonomiyaki for lunch. Okonomiyaki is one of Osaka's specialties and another item that my students have been recommending to me. We had a grill at our table and grilled some kind of pile of cabbage, beef and egg (and possibly other things) into some kind of pancake with barbecue sauce. It sounds like it would have been good, but I was really tired and don't fully remember.

I did a little bit of Christmas shopping and will be sending the package off tomorrow morning. If anyone wants something sent back to Halifax, e-mail me now or else you won't be getting anything, since I only got a few things for my family. I had to get a gift for my sixish year old cousin Courtney (long story) and bought her a stuffed combo of Takoru-Kun and Takobe. I'm not really sure who they are, but are really fashionable among Japanese children. One looks like a squid and the other one a non-descript animal (possibly a dog or bear) and they seem to always be holding hands. The front of the book that goes along with them says something like "Takoru-Kun and Takobe are best friends. Do you love them?"

I had intended to buy her Hello Kitty merchandise but there wasn't really anything in the range of what I was looking for. I didn, however, finding out that Charmming Kitty, who I have seen a lot of since I arrived, is not a rip-off of Hello Kitty, but rather Hello Kitty's pet cat. I really don't understand why a cat needs a pet cat who looks almost identical to it and am somewhat intrigued.

At around 7pm, I went to look through my Kyoto pictures and ended up passing out mid-picture (I was really tired).

Earlier, around 5pm I got a phone call from my father! I didn't recognize his voice at first, but that's what happense when you encounter people out of context. The call was made at 4am Halifax time which officially qualifies my father as a party animal. I also got a call from my mother around 8:30pm and also didn't recognize her voice at first. Since I had been napping, I was in a sleepy and confused state and was barely able to make any conversation, but it was good to hear from both of them since I haven't actually talked to anyone from home at all in the past month.

Today I met up with my third language exchange partner, Ikue. Ikue had spent 3 months in Halifax studying at ILI (English school), though that was just about the extent of her English education. Actually, I think she was pretty scared of speaking English. We went to a shop for lunch where I was able to get some spaghetti and we talked a little bit in English and I struggled with my very limited Japanese. Japanese is becomming a lot more fun to learn now that I know a few very basic sentences and things are slowly starting to fall in place a little. I think I'll soon be able to move it up my list above Cantonese in terms of my fluency... I really can't think of much I can say in Cantonese and not in Japanese.

Wow, I've really gone over my time here at the internet cafe and will have to pay some hefty fees. Talk to you soon,

Ryan