The Spirit of Okinawa: July 17-20, 2010

Alright, 2 years behind in updating awesome times abroad in Japan, but I will finish this before my trip next week!

I can't end my Japan blogging without talking about bright and colorful Okinawa.

This island definitely had a different feel from Kyoto. Weather was hotter/muggier, the overall pace was slower, people were very chill.. and the food-- Not super healthy tiny little portions like everywhere else in Japan, but actually tummy-filling yummy food.One of the first things we saw when we hopped off the plane in Naha was Okinawa's mascot, the Shisa (some sort of lion/dog). Looks rather Chinese to me. First thing we ate in Okinawa-- Blue Seal ice cream. I had the sugar cane and Okinawan salt cookie flavors. Ube (purple yam) was also really good, but once out of the airport, everything started melting like crazy.

On the monorail from Naha airport to downtown- What's up with the Hawaiian shirts?







It was a rather gloomy, overcast late afternoon/evening when we landed, and as we walked around looking for our hostel, we noticed that the streets looked rather like a scene from a post-apocalyptic movie..

But! Naha's popular street, Kokusai Doori, was teemed with life. Lots of people walking around, lots of bright lights and colors, souvenir shops..
We tried taco rice for the first time, which was one of the popular dishes in Okinawa. The name is self-explanatory-- it's stuff you put in a taco. Over rice. Kind of like a Mexican-Asian fusion? But damn! It was good. Really good.
The next day, we woke early to take a bus tour to famous sites around the island. The city seems to look better during the day.
One of our first stops- a famous historical site. Forgot the name, unfortunately, but beautiful nonetheless.







There were a couple of other stops, but the one I really looked forward to was the Churaumi Aquarium, supposedly the world's 2nd largest aquarium (the first being Georgia. Is that true?!)
But my god, it was absolutely breathtaking!

Our last stop was a pineapple plantation, which I will not elaborate on. It was mainly a tourist trap..Lots of pineapple flavored food and drink. At night we had Okinawan soba (can't find the picture), which tasted kind of like thick ramen. The chashu was pretty good! I still prefer normal soba though.

On the 3rd day, we went scuba diving here. The instructor gave us a quick lesson at their scuba center on scuba basics, and then off we went to dive into the sea...
Kind of scary since we didn't get much prep, but such an incredible experience. Another thing off the bucket list :)
After that, we got dropped off at another beach, which we later found out was nothing compared to the other beaches we could have gone to, but we still had a good time swimming and tanning.

Took the taxi to American Village---felt just like home!




Had a real burger there, none of that fake healthy Mos Burger stuff (no offense to Mos Burger fans), root beer, boba (their Quickly's sucks though).. Nice to see some familiar things, but I came to Japan for Japan, so this was nothing special.

So many cities have a ferris wheel..

Fourth and final day- one last stroll down Kokusai Doori to buy some more souvenirs. I got insanely addicted to chinsuko (traditional biscuit..sweet and salty) after this trip, which meant that I pretty much ate all the souvenirs I got... Luckily, a friend found a store in Kyoto that sold chinsuko, so I had something to bring back home (and more to eat!! >:D)
Also, finally ate a popular Okinawan dish- champon! So. fucking.good.
Had to skip couple days of school for this trip, but totally worth it. Should have skipped more.
Hopefully next time I will get to go to another part of Okinawa, perhaps the more rural part!

Hiroshima Day 1 - 6.5.10

I took the yakou bus with a bunch of girl friends to Hiroshima for the weekend since there was a festival at that time. Every city I've been to has a very different feel.. It's kind of hard to describe the sense of peace I got when I was in Hiroshima. Somehow I feel like time stopped there and everything is very still that morning we arrived.



We took a boat to Miyajima to see the Floating Tori (gotta see the Floating Tori!), which was a very touristy place but well worth the visit.
The island is just gorgeous! It was a great day to visit the place..sunny blue skies. Let's get a closer shot:
One of the must-see places in Japan!


After lunch, we went to see some of the temples there, which were thickly encompassed by trees. Lots of greenery, lots of blue skies and fresh air.


Too many photos for this trip! Long story short, we took the cable car up a really high mountain, hiked the rest of the way up, and saw the amazing blue.
Then some of us were frugal and decided to hike down rather than take the cable car down. Took 2 long, painful hours. My feet died.

Let us not forget about the food! Some of the famous foods: oyster over fried rice cake, Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki (has soba noodles)..YUUUM

At night we walked around the festival, but to me it was like other summer festivals..lots of little food/game booths, many people in yukata, more food.. Very fun, action-packed day though :)

6.3 Umeda Sky Building

OSAKA UMEDA SKY BUILDING

40-story building, fancy dim-lit lounge areas, 360 degree breathtaking outdoor view on the top. Definitely a stunning night view of Osaka, but I realized too late that it was an ideal spot for couples, as that was all I saw.

5.29 Uji

Genji + matcha green tea everything + beautiful nature = Uji is amazing.

Being a fan of green tea and natural scenery, Uji is one of my favorite places in Kyoto.

Despite feeling hungover and sleep-deprived from the night before, I was rejuvenated by the lovely blue skies and greenery in Uji.
A group of girl friends and I took the train to Uji station and head toward Byodoin (famous temple), passing through the main gate that had Genji and one of his ladies (probably Murasaki) on top.

Since Uji is famous for its matcha green tea, we ate matcha soba for lunch. I personally didn't like it as much as I thought I would have because it didn't taste like anything to me, but apparently some of my Japanese friends love it so I guess it depends on the person. There is a refreshing slight matcha kick at the end of a bite, I suppose.

The matcha ice cream we had near the temple we were going to was to die for! Super rich and creamy, had a deep green tea flavor, and powdered with matcha...!!!











After eating the best matcha ice cream in the world, we went to see the Byodoin. We couldn't enter the actual temple, but we got to see the museum, which had lots of statues, architectural pieces of the Byodoin as it had used to be, etc.





After Byodoin, we started heading back by taking a loop around, crossing a bridge on the way and seeing more pretty sites.

So much nature!

I really liked this spot along the river. I think it was the second place where I said I wanted to die here or have my ashes thrown here (the first being Arashiyama). Gorgeous--Pictures don't do it justice.
We ended the day by going to a small restaurant by the river. The place was an elevated wooden home with a tatami floor and Japanese style seating. We had a nice view of the river as well. The food was a bit expensive, but we ordered the dessert set, which included a small stick of matcha mochi balls, a senbei, and hot matcha tea (all very delicious).

Shops there closed really early though, but luckily we found a souvenir shop that was still open at that time (it was probably 5pm or so..sometime in the early evening) to buy stuff we wanted.
Uji-- definitely a worthwhile place to go for green tea and/or nature lovers.

5.15 Nara

I haven't updated my blog for 5 months and it's already been 2 months since I came back from studying abroad in Japan, but I'm going to try to finish blogging about my study abroad experience!

So one weekend in May, my girl friends and I went to Nara for the first time. Our friend Ryosuke and his friends guided us, bringing us first to the famous deer park. After buying senbei, the flat crackers that the deer eat, we passed by a large pond full of turtles and koi fish as we walked to the park.
The deer park was considerably large, and many deer lazed around letting tourists feed them and take pictures. This one looked particularly sleepy..

According to Ryosuke, this temple is the 興福寺の五重塔.

We also saw Nara's mascot, Sento-kun, across the park in front of a large administrative-looking building. Sento-kun is such a creepy and poorly designed mascot.. I'm not very fond of him, but since he's a popular symbol, we took a picture next to him.

After the deer park, we went to see the Todaiji, which is famous for its large buddha statue. There were two large fearsome guardian statues at the entrance. The buddha inside Todaiji was indeed very large..There was a smaller buddha statue situated to its left. Inside the temple smelled strongly of incense...
There was also a thick wooden pole inside the temple with a hole at the bottom where people lined up to try crawling through it. You supposedly either get good luck or good health if you're able to crawl through the hole in the pole.

This is the outside of Todaiji.



(Below) The main buddha. I forgot if it was a bowling ball or a human head, but one of them is suppose to be able to fit through the nostril of this statue.


(Right)The buddha left of the main statue
Though it was interesting, it was a relief to get out of the crowd and the incense-filled temple!

After Todaiji, we took a break and later went to the Nara Park, where the late afternoon sun cast lovely shadows on the beautiful grassy field.

Nara didn't really have a food it's famous for or any characteristics that was extremely impressionable to me, but I felt that his city had a very calm and slow-paced vibe. There was a lot of historic value, especially with the Todaiji temple, but it definitely didn't seem very Japanese (the buddha statues looked like Chinese ones!). I still enjoyed my Nara trip- it was worth the visit!