hiroshima

falling into the routine of daily life has been a blessing. the first few months here were trying becuase i often felt like i was on a long vacation or at a summer camp. that sense of temporary living was in the back of my mind constantly; it was stressful. it was a constant subconcoius feeling that there was an end to anticipate, but the lack of one made every day seem strange and unreal. how, i don't know, but the feeling has changed and i feel more comfortable if not a bit more permanent.

the downside to this is that i sort of forgot where i am and why. i was beginning to experience the regular daily feelings of work woes and 'i should get more exercise' or annoyance at people who eat on the train and the high prices of fruit. hosting house guests and traveling around the country reminded me that i'm not reading a copy of lonely planet or pooring over maps after work in ohio or michigan, but that i'm actually here. i've moved.

so, enough of that. after four days of walking around fukuoka, visiting, cooking, eating and playing euchre amanda, marshall, john and i set out on our trip north. we traveled by shinkansen (why did america abandon passenger trains?) to hiroshima first. we stayed at a very nice hotel right next to the station.

the first day we traveled by local train and ferry to miyajima. it is the home of one of japan's 'most beautiful sights.' it was indeed gorgeous. the weather was cold, but the sun was bright. the shrine sits in a small bay on an island south west of the city. it is built on stilts so that at the highest tides of the year the ocean rises nearly to the floor of the shrine buildings and they appear to rest on the water. at the lowest tides of the year, one can walk out to the great toori (the shrine 'gate') that rests far out in the sandy bay appearing to float for most of the year. during our visit, tide was low so that we could see the stilts of the shrine, but the massive orange toori still seemed to drift in the sea.

it was only the 3rd of january so there were hundreds of new year's pilgrims there praying. the crowd was thick and after john had his fill of tourist food - much like fair food at home - we headed back to the city. we had an early night so we could get up early the next day to take full advantage of the decadent western style breakfast buffet. by eight o'clock we were stuffed and on a bus on our way to the mountains north of hiroshima for a day of skiing and snowboarding.

in the morning the temperature was above freezing and there was no snow in sight, so we were a little worried about the conditions. as we wound our way up through the mountains (along steep cliffs next to long drops on a narrow road in a tour bus. . . ) snow appeared in the shadows of the woods and eventually became so thick on the roofs that it was difficult to distinguish houses from boulders. shortly before we reached the slopes, it began to snow in thick dry flakes. perfect.

i wasn't quite sure what to expect here as we were renting both snow clothes and equipment for the day. the equipment, as i should have guessed, was in far better condition than any rental equipment i've used in the states. the rental wear was quite nice too. being of average japanese size john, amanda and i had no problem finding snowpants and coats that fit well. they were even fairly stylish considering. marshall however didn't have quite as big a selection to chose from. no, in fact, the outfit that he rented was probably purchased on a whim in 1987 when the coked up resort manager entertained ideas of his resort becoming the no.1 spot for hip western tourists in japan. marshall was instantly transformed into a character from 'better off dead.' the only thing he lacked was the ability to emit music by inxs or depeche mode as he entered the scene.

anyway, we hit the slopes and it was beautiful. it was amanda's first time skiing since middle school and she only fell into one compromising position the whole day. the snow was so fluffy and fresh that i tried lots of little tricks to take full advantage of the fact that falling is actually fun in powdery snow. we never had to worry about losing marshall when he sped ahead becuase his flourescent orange snowsuit allowed us to spot him through the snow from miles away.

we finished the day with a nap on the bus and baths at the hotel. we stayed up late playing euchre and got ready to leave for kyoto.

2006

well i'm back to my 'usual' life. it was a relief on saturday to return to work and hear my students complain about me speaking too quickly and complicated. after just two weeks with amanda and marshall my speech started to regain some of its native characteristics. i was afraid i was going to need to take english classes myself after living here and teaching conversational english as a second language. i had almost stopped questioning the validity of words like 'sanitarized' and 'relaxfullness.'

the new year's holiday was lovely. we spent the 31st visiting and cooking and drinking coffee to counteract amanda and marshall's potential jetlag. fortunately they both adapted quickly to the time change without anything more than a bit of drowsiness. we played some euchre after dinner and left the house before midnight to watch hanabi (fireworks) at the harbor for the new year countdown. with a little champagne to help our decision, we headed downtown instead of to bed and ended up at a darts cafe.



although they sort of miss the idea of celebrating halloween here, they do bring out costumes for new year's eve, apparently. when we arrived at the darts bar their celebration was already in full swing. there was a cheerleader and an s&m wo/man and a whole lot we failed to identify. we played darts as they (the staff and other customers) proceeded with shots and sleeping at the bar. hah. after marshall kicked our butts at darts we moved on to karaoke. marshanda was indeed impressed with the karaoke booth and sang with abandon.

as expected, we slept late on new year's day and woke up slowly with lots of coffee and a big breakfast. we took turns in the japanese tradition of taking hot baths on new year's day and drinking spiced sake in the bath. the sake really wasn't that good so we all had an obligatory sip and saved the rest for the drain. by evening we were ready to leave the house so we strolled to kushida shrine to pray, another tradition.

the japanese pray for good luck and health in the new year at shinto shrines on the first day of the year. many people wear traditional kimonos and nearly everyone (christian, buddhist and shinto alike) journey to the shrines to pray. we waited for about 20minutes in line to pray ourselves. the prayer includes ringing a large bell above the shrine's altar, giving money to the prayer box and a mix of claps and bows.

before getting in line ourselves we observed the pilgims from the side of the shrine to try and memoize the bow-to-clap ratio. it seemed that everyone was doing their own routine so we gave up the idea of offending the gods and got in line. it went fine for all of us save john, who stepped on the door frame (a definite offense) while waiting in line. he observed, "uh-oh, the frame has been stepped on," while amanda observed that it had indeed been stepped on by john. well. we gave him some extra yen for his prayer to perhaps make amends. hopefully it worked and he'll have a fine year. . .