In Japan, Days Three, Four, AND Five
So yeah, I've been kinda lazy with the updating. ^^; I might get better. We'll see. XD
On with the
Day Three:
Had a quiet day. Great adventures on my own to the supermarket for groceries and the home electronics store fore a lightbulb. Went for a walk and meandered for about an hour in the process of lightbulb fetching. It's a pretty area, I must say. Ash and I spent the evening hanging out at the kotatsu, watching a strange TV show that features a guy who's TERRIBLE at video games, but tries to beat one every week. He even has interns to a) play from a restart point to where he died and b) play through a level that he just can't possibly beat. XD It's totally hilarious, and the narrator is really melodramatic. We had sukiyaki for supper, which was totally awesome. [A hotpot style meal, with really thinly sliced meat, shitake and enoki mushrooms, chinese cabbage, leek (they're super long here!), tofu, and noodles cooked in awesome sauce, that you then dish up into a bowl of raw egg before you eat it] It was very tasty! Although I'm not a fan of tofu. It's just kinda strange. XD And we have a bunch of ingredients left over, so we're going to make it again before I go! mmm. After supper we listened to a bunch of Radio P.S.I. recordings, then turned in for the night. A nice relaxing day! [and part of the reason I didn't update sooner. XD I figured you'd want something interesting to read!]
Day Four, written on the train home from Kyoto:
Today was more eventful. I spent the morning...well, until about 1, doing half of the translation I had left to do. Did last night's dishes, there were a fair few. XD Mostly just did quiet homebody stuff until Ash got off work. I packed up a few things and met her a station over, then we headed to Kyoto! Our first stop was an awesome bakery...the building it's in looks like a castle, to the extent that it has turrets on the front corners. Seriously. We're planning to go back again before I leave, so we can a) buy more cake and b) get a picture of the place while it's open. Japanese desserts are very pretty~ They really know how to do presentation. So we took our box of cake and wandered into the UNIQLO clothing store next door, and poked around for a while. Soooo many cute things! Very much my kind of style, too. Another place for me to remember to spend money before I come home! hehehe~ After that it was off to the place that prompted our excursion, the onsen a couple of doors down. We went in and grabbed supper, where I again indulged my newfound katsu obsession with a bowl of katsu don - rice topped with katsu and a raw egg (it gets cooked b the heat of the rice/katsu) - very yummy! Then it was into the baths! It's a beautifully done place~ Both indoor and outdoor baths, one of the indoor ones has jets, and there's an iron mineral bath outdoors, among others. There's also a stone bath, which are really cool. The hot water is piped across granite slabs, and you lie down on them...it's very awesome, if strange-sounding. Once we were finished we decided to try out the "Doctor Fish" - they're little fish that eat the dead skin off of your feet. The first five minutes or so tickled something terrible, but then we got used to it. They're very effective little guys! My feet are still tingly, even a good hour and a bit later. After our fish-feeding experience, we started to head home, given that it was about 10pm. Heh. ^^; We took the bus back to the train station, then headed home~ Definitely a fun day, and the next time I have the opportunity to enjoy Doctor fish again, I'm totally taking it!
Day Five, written at the end of the day:
Today was an odd day. It was nearly midnight when we got home last night, and then we stayed up a bit longer winding down. <.< It was a pretty late night. And I was up sometime before 8:30 thing morning while Ash got ready for school. So this morning I was a bit out of it...too awake to go back to sleep, but too tired to function well. Got my act together around 12 and translated for an hour or so, then grabbed some food and headed out on my first solo adventure: the Osaka Aquarium! Thanks to more wonderful directions from Ash, I got there just fine, although taking a local train (the slowest possible one) for the first part of the trip meant that getting there took a while. The walk to the aquarium from the station is really pleasant. It was super-sunny, and warm, with just enough of a breeze. The aquarium itself is really cool! A lot of the tanks are multiple stories tall, and the route through sort of winds down around them like a corkscrew. So as you go down, you get to see the tank from all sides at a bunch of different depths. Very nicely done! I took lots of pictures of fishies~ I picked up some presents in their shop, then wandered into the mall next door. I spent quite some time drooling over things in the shop that sold traditional textiles made in interesting ways. The $30 hats were incredible - I may go back and buy things once we're back from Tokyo, depending on how my shopping goes and how much money I have left when we get back. There were all sorts of other neat shops in there, and I didn't go any further than the first floor. There are another two.
So I got home fine too, then decided to try Takoyaki [balls of batter with a piece of octopus, then topped with sauce, a little mayo, nori(seaweed) flakes, and some other stuff] for supper. I'm not a huge fan. :/ There's some kind of taste to it that I don't like, although I know it's not the octopus, entertainingly. ^^; Actually, octopus is pretty tasty! Sorry Kelly, just not my thing. <3 Passed out at like 9, 'cause I was super tired.
Still having tons of fun! I'll try to update again before I head to Tokyo on Friday night. I probably won't post again until we're back here on Wednesday though~
On with the
Day Three:
Had a quiet day. Great adventures on my own to the supermarket for groceries and the home electronics store fore a lightbulb. Went for a walk and meandered for about an hour in the process of lightbulb fetching. It's a pretty area, I must say. Ash and I spent the evening hanging out at the kotatsu, watching a strange TV show that features a guy who's TERRIBLE at video games, but tries to beat one every week. He even has interns to a) play from a restart point to where he died and b) play through a level that he just can't possibly beat. XD It's totally hilarious, and the narrator is really melodramatic. We had sukiyaki for supper, which was totally awesome. [A hotpot style meal, with really thinly sliced meat, shitake and enoki mushrooms, chinese cabbage, leek (they're super long here!), tofu, and noodles cooked in awesome sauce, that you then dish up into a bowl of raw egg before you eat it] It was very tasty! Although I'm not a fan of tofu. It's just kinda strange. XD And we have a bunch of ingredients left over, so we're going to make it again before I go! mmm. After supper we listened to a bunch of Radio P.S.I. recordings, then turned in for the night. A nice relaxing day! [and part of the reason I didn't update sooner. XD I figured you'd want something interesting to read!]
Day Four, written on the train home from Kyoto:
Today was more eventful. I spent the morning...well, until about 1, doing half of the translation I had left to do. Did last night's dishes, there were a fair few. XD Mostly just did quiet homebody stuff until Ash got off work. I packed up a few things and met her a station over, then we headed to Kyoto! Our first stop was an awesome bakery...the building it's in looks like a castle, to the extent that it has turrets on the front corners. Seriously. We're planning to go back again before I leave, so we can a) buy more cake and b) get a picture of the place while it's open. Japanese desserts are very pretty~ They really know how to do presentation. So we took our box of cake and wandered into the UNIQLO clothing store next door, and poked around for a while. Soooo many cute things! Very much my kind of style, too. Another place for me to remember to spend money before I come home! hehehe~ After that it was off to the place that prompted our excursion, the onsen a couple of doors down. We went in and grabbed supper, where I again indulged my newfound katsu obsession with a bowl of katsu don - rice topped with katsu and a raw egg (it gets cooked b the heat of the rice/katsu) - very yummy! Then it was into the baths! It's a beautifully done place~ Both indoor and outdoor baths, one of the indoor ones has jets, and there's an iron mineral bath outdoors, among others. There's also a stone bath, which are really cool. The hot water is piped across granite slabs, and you lie down on them...it's very awesome, if strange-sounding. Once we were finished we decided to try out the "Doctor Fish" - they're little fish that eat the dead skin off of your feet. The first five minutes or so tickled something terrible, but then we got used to it. They're very effective little guys! My feet are still tingly, even a good hour and a bit later. After our fish-feeding experience, we started to head home, given that it was about 10pm. Heh. ^^; We took the bus back to the train station, then headed home~ Definitely a fun day, and the next time I have the opportunity to enjoy Doctor fish again, I'm totally taking it!
Day Five, written at the end of the day:
Today was an odd day. It was nearly midnight when we got home last night, and then we stayed up a bit longer winding down. <.< It was a pretty late night. And I was up sometime before 8:30 thing morning while Ash got ready for school. So this morning I was a bit out of it...too awake to go back to sleep, but too tired to function well. Got my act together around 12 and translated for an hour or so, then grabbed some food and headed out on my first solo adventure: the Osaka Aquarium! Thanks to more wonderful directions from Ash, I got there just fine, although taking a local train (the slowest possible one) for the first part of the trip meant that getting there took a while. The walk to the aquarium from the station is really pleasant. It was super-sunny, and warm, with just enough of a breeze. The aquarium itself is really cool! A lot of the tanks are multiple stories tall, and the route through sort of winds down around them like a corkscrew. So as you go down, you get to see the tank from all sides at a bunch of different depths. Very nicely done! I took lots of pictures of fishies~ I picked up some presents in their shop, then wandered into the mall next door. I spent quite some time drooling over things in the shop that sold traditional textiles made in interesting ways. The $30 hats were incredible - I may go back and buy things once we're back from Tokyo, depending on how my shopping goes and how much money I have left when we get back. There were all sorts of other neat shops in there, and I didn't go any further than the first floor. There are another two.
So I got home fine too, then decided to try Takoyaki [balls of batter with a piece of octopus, then topped with sauce, a little mayo, nori(seaweed) flakes, and some other stuff] for supper. I'm not a huge fan. :/ There's some kind of taste to it that I don't like, although I know it's not the octopus, entertainingly. ^^; Actually, octopus is pretty tasty! Sorry Kelly, just not my thing. <3 Passed out at like 9, 'cause I was super tired.
Still having tons of fun! I'll try to update again before I head to Tokyo on Friday night. I probably won't post again until we're back here on Wednesday though~