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| Me and Diane in the Todoroki Gorge |
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| One of the shrines |
Last week was, yet again, filled with a lot of first time experiences! I guess that is expected considering the fact that I've only been in Tokyo for 6 weeks and there is SO much to see, do, and experience. The city itself is massive, and very busy, but there are also some very quiet areas as well. I feel blessed to be experiencing a mix of the two. I live about a two minute walk from the train station to my apartment, with little shops and boutiques all around me. However, a big draw to taking the apartment I chose was that it backed up to a gorge, making the view out of my balcony gorgeous and not feeling like I'm in a big city at all. I had been wanting to take a walk through it, but since it gets dark here around 6PM and I've had bigger fish to fry, I kept putting it off. Me and Diane decided to take a walk through it, and I have a feeling I'll be spending much more time there with my journal or a good book! :) Its the only gorge-formed park in eastern Tokyo and its like a little promenade that winds through the woods for about a kilometer, with little shrines here and there, along with benches to sit on. Apparently, when the cherry blossoms bloom, its even prettier! I sometimes feel like I'm camping out, the two times that I've actually been able to open my windows instead of using the AC, I heard animals chirping all night long!
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| Cooking it up! |
As pathetic as this sounds, I finally cooked my first real meal in my apartment last week! Yes, you are probably asking yourself why in the world did it take her two and a half weeks for this to happen!? With traveling, coaching, running errands, and trying to get settled, I just hadn't had the time to make a proper meal! I had cooked eggs, made salads and sandwiches, and always prepared my lunch for school, but was excited to finally cook a nice meal because I really do enjoy cooking! It was also great to have a friend there to share it with, and I plan to cook much more in the future. Figuring out what things are in the grocery store as been quite and adventure, but I am slowly learning!
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| First real home-cooked meal with a friend! |
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| Japanese baseball game in the rain! |
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| Leading the cheers! |
I had my first taste of a Japanese baseball game last week as well. It was a supposed to be a sold out crowd since it was the two Tokyo teams playing against each other, but unfortunately it turned rainy here, and many people didn't show up. In fact, it was the first time I had worn long pants in this country since my arrival 6 weeks ago because of the heat! I still got taste of what Japanese baseball is like, as I sat in the outfield seats among all of the crazy fans, standing on chairs, waving towels, etc! Its quite an interesting concept here; when your team is up to bat, you go wild, with chants for each player who is up to bat. When your team is in the field, you quietly sit down and watch the game, of course being respectful to the other team and letting their fans have a chance to cheer. There is no one team's fans trying to cheer louder than the other, its very civil, but these fans are hardcore, waving towels, jumping up and down, wearing the jerseys of their favorite players, etc. They even have a guy working in the stands with a whistle and leading cheers!
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| Fans standing up cheering for the other team, waving their orange towels! |
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| Which one will work!? |
I've been trying to get my apartment all decorated and put together, and was very fortunate in the sense that a lot of my decorations I was able to ship over. In getting them all, I was eager to decorate my place and figure out what to put where! In the process, however, I hit a road block: you aren't allowed to put nails in the wall here, and when they tell you no, it means no! I was told to get these hooks that leave no mark when you take them off, so off I went to the store to get them. There were so many of these darn hooks that I didn't know which ones to buy, and not being able to read Japanese means you have to go on looks alone. At one store, I literally just parked it on the ground instead of bending over trying to figure out what hooks I wanted to get and sat and studied what I thought would work. Diane thought this was pretty hilarious and as you can see, snapped of picture of me intently focusing. I spent lots of time deciding what to get and how many and thought I was all set, but I have been disappointed because more of the hooks have fallen off the wall rather than stay and many of my frames broke! :( I'm not sure if its because of the humidity that they aren't sticking or what, but I'm in the process of trying to find another solution or getting bigger hooks, not to mention some having to buy new picture frames! I guess if this is one of my only frustrations in life, I am truly blessed!
I think I have finally come to realize what its like living with so many people in Japan...unpredictable! You can't plan things out too much because you never know how much traffic there will be or how long you are going to have to wait in lines! It's good for me, but for those of you who know me, I like to run on a schedule. :) Me and Diane decided to head to a quiet mountainous town away from the hustle and bustle of Tokyo for a day-trip to Hakone her last weekend here. Considering the fact that it was a 3-day weekend, many other Japanese had the exact same idea. What we wanted as a nice relaxing, low-key day, turned into "wait in line over half the day with thousands of other people" adventure. Don't get me wrong, it was a beautiful place, just tainted by the fact that there were people EVERYWHERE, which meant waiting in long lines for trains, cable cars, ropeways, boats, and busses, much worse than Disneyland! We saw a handful of things while in Hakone and one of my favorite stops was at Owakudani, an active volcano zone that has bubbling hot pools, sulfurous fumes, and steam vents! The unique thing about Owakudani is that they use the bubbling hot pools to boil eggs, and sell them at the top of the mountain. The sulfur turns the egg completely black, but the inside of the egg is fully protected by the shell. The Japanese believe that if you eat one of these eggs, it prolongs your life by seven years...so of course I had to try one! Another highlight was the boat ride on Lake Ashi and being able to relax in the sun and take in the scenery. I'd like to go back to Hakone, but note to self...not on a holiday weekend!
I'm learning that there are Hope College connections everywhere, even in Tokyo! I was told by one of my math professors at Hope, Mary DeYoung, that there was a Hope faculty member heading over to Tokyo to teach at one of the universities here for the semester. While I knew of this faculty member and had exchanged a few conversations at Hope with her since she was in charge of the Intramural Program when I was there, I had never really gotten to know her beyond that until last week. I had the privilege of meeting up with Eva Folkert, who is now the Co-Director of Athletics and an Assistant Professor of Kinesiology there! We decided to grab dinner at a local ramen restaurant, where you pick what type of noodles and toppings you want on your soup outside the shop at the ticket station, and then once you get your ticket and pay, you go inside and give the chef your order! It was really fun and something I had wanted to do, and not only was the food delicious, the company was as well. Eva is here through December and we plan to get together many more times in the future. It's so nice to have a taste of home while here, someone who knows my roots and the impact that Hope College had on me as a person. Both came to the conclusion that it must be a "God" thing! :) 
