Cherry Blossom Adventures

• I arrived safely in Australia last Wednesday morning! 
• I know I have been slack and haven’t blogged in awhile but hopefully wireless internet will be set up in the next couple of days at my dad’s place and then I will be able to use my own computer to do everything. I am sure my google reader is overflowing!!! I havn’t read any blogs in almost a week, but I still love you all I promise! Will be around soon!
• My dad went into hospital this morning so I have the house to myself for about 2 or 3 weeks. I am not very good at living alone so I might come and go between my dad’s place and my mum’s place!
• So much has happened since I got here. Here is a couple of things. Bought a second hand car, a corolla, to run around in for the year. I went to see a friend who work for Julia Ross temping and she found me a job starting tomorrow which will go for two months as a student advisor doing admin work at the PA and Greenslopes hospitals. Basically got to make sure the medical students complete their prac and get their timetables and stuff….good money, regular hours and easy to get to, so I am happy. Might have an interview with the Japanese consulate in a couple of weeks also for a billingual admin person which would also be great!
• Went out for Japanese food last night with my dad and it was so yummy! We went to a place at portside called Sono I think it was! Staff and food were great!!!!
• I am missing Shun a lot but we have spoken everyday since I got here and he is doing ok in Tokyo and I am doing ok here so we are ok! I get so excited when I talk to him though cos I have so much to say about what is going on….He will be here in about 7 weeks!!!!!
• This deserves its own post but on our last weekend in Tokyo, I was supposed to have a goodbye party that I thought I had organized. Turns our our friends had organized a surprise engagement party, with about 50 people including Shun’s parents, brother and his wife, and we had no idea!!! Cat and James took us to Roppongi for cocktails and then I thought we were going to meet Koki to have some photos so we jumped in a taxi and we got there and they blindfolded us and took us upstairs above a restraunt into like a courtyard where all these people were waiting for us! It was amazing, and reminded me yet again, just how fantastic our friends are. Leader, Cat, James, Mai, Junni, Erika and Panni did a great job organizing everything….they even got in contact with Shumpei’s mum to get photos of shun when he was little and James contacted my brother to get photos of me growing up and they made a slideshow *(and yes I cried!). There was speeches made by others, and me and Shun, in which Shun proposed again, properly in front of everyone. It was simply one of the best nigths of my life and I have been smiling ever since. I will put photos up once I get internet set up properly on my computer.
• That is all for now…hopefully by next weekend at the latest I will be back up online properly and I will be around to check out what everyone has been doing!!!

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I am back from my golden week trip down to Kobe to meet up with Sarah! Sarah and I had never actually met in real life before although we have been blogging, email and facebook friends for awhile now! It was great to finally meet her and she was exactly how I imagined she would be (I wonder if I am like what she thought I would be?!) We got on really well and to look at his you wouldn`t have known we only had just met I don`t think!

I had so much fun! Sarah kindly let me stay at her place with her and her husband Ryohei (Who is a crack-up!) and we met up just after 5pm on Friday. I had taken the Shinkansen down, and after a bit of a mix-up in Tokyo, (I thought my train was 11:22 but turns out it was 10:10 so wen I got there just after a 11 I was in a bit of a panic but luckily they told me I could still catch the next Shinkansen and just sit in the open seating area!) I got to Kobe just after 2pm and I put my stuff in a locker and went exploring. I had never been to Kobe before and it actually reminded me a little bit of my home town Brisbane…obviously not as big as Tokyo, but the central area, Sannomiya, was still fairly busy and I am not sure why it reminded me of Brisbane but it just did! (I guess the fact that it is still a big city but that it is kind of small and not quite as busy as some, similar to Brisbane)

I grabbed a map from the Tourist center and made my way up to Ikuta jinja only a short walk from Sannomiya station as I had a couple hours to spare before I met Sarah! I am glad I did because they had one of those little rows of red torii! I love Torii!

It was kind of funny waiting at Sannomiya station for someone I have never met! But we recognized each other straight away and very quickly fell into a casual conversation! I am really surprised at how quickly we completely forgot that we we just met! We headed back to Sarah`s place to wait for Ryohei to come back so that we could head out for dinner! We ate yummy yummy Hiroshima Okonomiyaki! Ryohei was a sweetie also! He is really funny! Ryohei is not really how I imagined though, although all I knew about him was what Sarah had talked about on her blog. I guess I figured he would be shy like Shun (Shun is really shy around people he first meets) but Ryohei didn`t seem to be shy at all! They both made me feel extremely welcome!

On Saturday we woke up fairly early (For me anyway….I am lucky if I get out of bed on Saturdays before lunch time!) and Sarah made blueberry pancakes! We didn`t actually leave very early because we were going to Sarah`s friend Miranda`s house to meet baby Toshi! They live right near the water, which I am guessing is part of the port in Kobe! It was such a nice area and despite the heat it was a lot cooler to be closer to the ocean! Miranda made me feel extremely welcome also….she basically said when I walked in `My home is your home`! We ate lunch there and sat around talking for a couple of hours. I guess it is always nice to meet other foreigners who are living here and are married or engaged to Japanese men because I guess it makes me feel like there will always be people around in similar situations to me! Here is baby Toshi!

After leaving Sarah and I headed back into Sannomiya for a couple of hours before going to Osaka for another of Sarah`s friends Birthday parties at the Hardrock cafe! In Sannomiya though we walked upto Kitano which is where a lot of old foreigner settlements are….European style houses and food! It was a bit of a hike up (in 26 degree heat!) but on the way down we did enjoy a lovely icecream. It was nice too because there was a mini festival happening…..People from dfferent countries had made designs and pictures out of flower petals, bark and dirt. Here is my favourite photo from there, although there are more over at my flickr.

We headed into Osaka at about 4:30pm and met up with Sarah`s friend Muriel who was having a birthday party at the Hard Rock Cafe. I have never been to one before but there was definitely an American feel about the place…I had forgotten what meals that size looked like! It was great fun and while I am still on my no alcohol diet, I stuck to water and pigged out on a salad, burger and cheesecake instead (So giving up alcohol is doing nothing as you can imagine!)….It was great to meet another new bunch of people but by the time we left I think both of us were feeling a little sick from over eating! hehehe! It was very yummy though!

On Sunday, we got up early and headed to Nara! I have always wanted to go to Nara and Sarah was kind enough to come with me on my journey! It was on my list of 101 things in 1001 days so I will be able to cross it off! Yay! It was a super super hot day (about 28 degrees….I can`t believe it is just May!) and it was a bit of a hike to get to Nara from Kobe but I am so glad we went. I think we both had a great day despite been a little tired and weary by the time we got home!

We didn`t get to see everything but we did see the three story and five story pagodas inside the Kofukuji Temple grounds (Which is also where we spotted our first deers of the day!). This is part of a Buddhist temple complex! I love pagoda`s (almost as much as red torii!)

We then walked up through the park (Inside this park is where the deer run wild and also where most of the main things to see in Nara are) towards Nandaimon gate which would talk us to Todaiji where the big Buddha is! On the way we stopped to pet some deer! It is not really surprising that these deer as so tame considering the amount of tourists which come through Nara each year (they are much nicer than the deer on Miyajima Island down near Hiroshima!)

Todaiji, which houses the great Buddha of Nara, is apparently the largest wooden structure in the world! The building which stands now is not quite as large as the original but it still very impressive! It was amazing to see the inside of the building and the Buddha as well! I took heaps and heaps of photos but here are a couple of my favourites.

Sarah and I both like Japanese gardens and on the information we had it mentioned that Isuien Garden was a nice Japanese style garden so we went to check it out. It was lovely and cool inside with a couple of traditional Japanese tea houses thrown in amongst the gardens…all of the buildings inside had thatched roofs which was really cool to see! The garden is meant to represent the design of gardens during the Meiji Period (1868-1912)

After our day out in Nara Sarah and Ryohei cooked Nabe for dinner, Niigata style! It is the way that Ryohei`s family cooks it and it was yummy! It is kind of more like shabu shabu because you dip everything into ponzu sauce before you eat it!

Sarah and I talked almost non-stop the whole time we were together about our plans for the future (family vacations together!) and how we felt about staying in Japan. When I come back to Japan next year Sarah will most likely be living in Kanto from August 2009 so I am sure we will be able to see more of each other then! I really can`t say thank you enough to both her and Ryohei because they both made me feel so welcome! I really had such a great time and I can not wait to see them both again!!! Next time we meet up Shumpei will be coming with me (he spoke to them both on the phone while I was down there)! I actually think him and Ryohei will get on well because they have similar sense of humour…Shun is a little bit shy but once he gets to know people he really warms up a lot so I am sure they will get on great!!! Like I said already too, Sarah and I got on really well also and I am glad our online friendship transcended into a RL friendship so nicely

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In an effort to improve on my writing I have decided to sign up for Encyclopedia of me which started over at Bella Dia (and which I found out about by reading Laura`s blog here...)C is for… will not be posted for a couple of weeks although it has already been written…

This is technically my fifth post…(Although I just realized this is also my 250th post on Cherry Blossom Adventures)

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Have you ever had a year where you could consider it the best one of your life? March 2004-Feb 2005 was like that for me. I have no way of knowing if it will be the best year of my life for the rest of my life but for now it is definitely number one.

I came to Japan for the first time ever in March 2004…I had studied Japanese in my first year of university….but my Japanese was considered basic at the most….I had applied to go on exchange and was accepted based on my grades…I turned 19 just before I arrived in Japan. The first few months my Japanese didn`t improve at all and I struggled but once I got into the swing of things I never wanted to leave… (For those of you who every wondered…I only studied Japanese 8 months before coming here and could barely say my name and where I was from when I first arrived here…so when I say basic I mean BASIC)

It was my first time living away from my family and I consider it to be the year I grew up a lot also… I have so many wonderful memories of that year…It truly was the best year ever. We all wish (meaning those of us that were on exchange together) that we could go back to living in the Seikei University Kaikan (International dorm)…there was always something happening, always people around and so many life long memories formed!

I had so many great experiences and formed many great, lasting friendships…(and relationships…Shun!).

Seeing my first cherry blossoms, trips to Osaka, Kyoto, Hiroshima and beyond, izakaya experiences, summer fireworks and yukata, my first view of snow, my first attempts at snowboarding, reggae bands and clubs, Fuji Kyu Highland and Disneyland, meeting Shumpei at a house party and then having to say goodbye a month later…

I made a slideshow of photos, which describes my year a lot better than I can put into words!(You will need Macromedia Flash Player to view it…oh and the photos do have some weird names like tobesorted 472…because I am lazy and have never gone through and named them all)

I had to go through over 5000 photos last night to choose some to put in the slide…I hadn`t seen some of those photos in over a year and it was a good chance to look through them and reminisce about that year. Anyone that gets a chance to go overseas, and experience another culture and step out of their usual surroundings should jump at the chance…If you could go for more than a holiday, even better! If it is something you have thought about doing and put on the back burner for now well pull the idea out and play with it a little bit….what have you got to lose?

Going on exchange changed my life…If you had asked me 5 years ago when I had finished highschool if I had thought this is where I would be today I would have answered with a `No way`…It is funny what can happen in a short amount of time…I never thought I would be living in Japan at 22, or planning to get married to a Japanese boy and live in Japan…I never even thought that I would be a kindergarten teacher. Coming to Japan on exchange in 2004, changed the path of my life that I thought I would follow.

Do I have any regrets? No, now, I couldn`t imagine my life any other way!

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Firstly, I still hate skiing…I did have a great time away for the weekend though! I have come to the conclusion that snow sports are not for me…

We went to an awesome place in Niigata in which we had to leave our car at the bottom of the mountain and catch a crazy snowmobile up the mountain….our ski ryokan was literally on the side of the mountain…go outside and you are in the middle of the snoboard/ski path! It was great….

Check out my photos of at flickr here…

Here are a couple of my favourites though…

Due to the heavy snowfall in Niigata, Nagano, Saitama and Tokyo it took us nine and a half hours to get home….(to give you some idea I think it took us 3 and a half hours to get there in the early morning on Saturday) The drive home was an experience…Junni lost control of the car at one stage and we ran into a snow bank….luckily we were not going very fast and there was no damage! Just a bit of a shock!!!! I know how to put snow chain on the tyres now though!

B for…. in my encyclopedia of me will be coming up soon!

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I am going back to Australia today! I am all packed and ready to go and Shun and I will have some lunch out before he sees me off at Shinjuku station! I am so excited. I haven`t had Christmas at home it what seems like SOOOOO long!

I will miss Shun though…last Christmas was our first Christmas together in the same country and it was lovely too. We made our own Christmas traditions….I wish he was coming with me to Australia today but at least he will be in Australia next year for Christmas!

Anyway blogging might be light while I away! Merry Christmas to everyone that still comes here to read my drivel! Hope you all have a lovely time!

ps: I am just watching the news now and they say it might snow in Tokyo/Chiba area today?!? It doesn`t seem quite cold enough for snow but hey the news said it might happen…And I will miss it too….damn!

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• I don`t exactly have the best reason for not posting yesterday….Although we didn`t have the internet in the apartment yesterday. Turns out we hadn`t paid our bill….Usually it comes off my debit card because when I signed up with NTT when I was living alone in Kichijoji and because I was foreign that was the only option they gave me. But we switched the account to Shun`s name when we moved and turns out cos he is Japanese and they trust him to pay they started sending us bills and we didn`t notice. We kind of just leave our mail in a pile on our table open…But about two weeks ago our mailbox got locked and we didn`t know the code to open it…so we just left the mail in there!!! It took our internet getting switched off to actually finding a way to open it!!! How ironic also that the time it doesn`t get paid is the first couple months it is in in Shumpei`s name!!!
• I love my new mac. I think I love the fact that i can sit anywhere in the house though and use it and the internet the most!!! I think perhaps it needs a cute cover though to keep it clean and pretty!!!
• I finished the purple scarf that Shumpei requested once I started knitting again….Here is the finished product..

• I am over my stomach bug now!!! Although still don`t feel 100%….I feel like I am coming down with a cold now! It is never ending…
• Things have been really good with Shun and I recently….last night we didn`t get to sleep til after 3am because we just kept talking…Talking about the future mainly…Shumpei decided definitely a few weeks back that he was going to come to Australia next year…we will be going in July I think! It was a huge weight lifted off my shoulders because i had been worried that he was going to say he wouldn`t come! I am very excited about the whole thing…We have been talking about things a lot. He has started talking to me a little in English….It is funny to hear him speak English with me sometimes after so long talking in Japanese…But I guess I better get used to it!

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I finally managed to get the couple of photos that I managed to take in Kyoto, before my camera broke, onto the computer. Here are just a couple of the photos from the trip! Shun and I try to take one trip together inside of Japan each year…Last year was Okinawa, this year Kyoto, and next year hopefully somewhere close like Hakone (Because we will be going to Australia in July we will need to go before then…maybe late February we will go for onsen!)

The above photo is of Shun and I at Kiyomizu-dera . This was my first time to visit this temple, and I am so glad I got to see it. I had really wanted to see it when I was in Kyoto several years back but hadn`t had enough time.

We sat in a mini outside cafe and enjoyed tea and cha-dango…This was my first time to try cha-dango….I am not a huge fan of mochi because I always feel like I am never going to be able to get it all out of my mouth…but with the tea it was actually quite nice!

No temple is complete without some kind of dragon! And what better than a dragon fountain!!!

We also went to visit Heian Shrine….I only managed to get two photos before I dropped my camera and it broke…

It was beautiful though!

I had a great time in Kyoto. It was a shame about my camera…I would have loved to be able to show you photos from when I met up with my highschool friend Kanako!!! I did use a disposable camera the rest of the time I was there but I still haven`t gotten around to getting the photos developed!!! When I do I will try to find a scanner and scan some in!

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Three and a half years ago I went to Kyoto. It was my first time there and it was pretty amazing. I was there for about 5 days staying with a friend from high school. This friend, Kanako, is the reason I decided to study Japanese.

See I didn`t get into the uni course that I wanted to get into…in fact I got my sixth choice…my last choice. Which was an arts program at Griffith University…I thought I would do it for six months then transfer into the course of my choice. I was quite shocked at first, I thought getting into a course of my choice would have been easy…my OP was good, my grades had been good at high school and all but my first choice was thought to be well in my range…It just so happens that a lot of people applied to do the courses I wanted to do…people who had better OP`s.

Kanako had attended my high school on exchange for my last year there. I hadn`t studied any Japanese since it was compulsory in the eighth grade…I remembered nothing. Luckily she spoke awesome English and we were in the same roll group and we became fast friends.

So when I ended up in an arts program at Griffith I decided that studying Japanese and doing some media courses for six months while I waited to get into a program of my choice would be a good idea. A second language had worked well for Kanako…and at that time I had been thinking of going to visit her later in that year (2003) and a bit of basic Japanese would help right?! Thing is, I hadn`t anticipated that I would love Japanese so much…and six months later instead of transferring out of the course I was applying to go to Japan on exchange. I was told my chances were pretty slim since I was still a first year student and my Japanese level was minimal….but I got in, and even got a scholarship grant from my uni.

I arrived here in March 2004 and 2 months later I went down to see Kanako in Kyoto. We had both changed a lot but it was great fun to see her again. I haven`t seen her since but we still catch up by phone occasionally and mail back and forth when we have time. She is set to finish university in the Spring….she will go back to Nagasaki, her home town, and be a junior high school English teacher.

I decided that before she went back to Nagasaki, which is really far away, that I would go see her in Kyoto, and see the autumn leaves at the same time. So Shun and I have taken a day off work and will be going down to Kyoto for two nights the first weekend of November.

I am really excited because I haven`t seen Kanako for 3 and a half years. I will get to meet her boyfriend and she will meet Shun for the first time too. Plus Autumn has begun and I am hoping that I will get to see all the beautiful temples and shrines surrounded by autumn foliage. I went to Kamakura last year to see the autumn leaves which was amazing and beautiful and I suspect that Kyoto will be just as amazing and beautiful if not more.

A couple of photos from my Autumn trip to Kamakura last year…

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We survived our train ride to Shanghai….We shared our room with a dutch couple who were lovely (and experienced with train travel across china!)…and while I slept Ok, I have decided that I am just one of those people that do not deal well with overnight sleeper trains.

We arrived in Shanghai and it wasn`t that we were tired, we just really wanted to have showers and lay down for awhile so after lunch our guide took us back to our hotel and we had the rest of the day to ourselves. Shanghai was much like any big city….I guess to me it seemed a lot like Tokyo or Sydney…lots of big buildings, traffic and lots of people. Compared to other places we visited in China, Shanghai was a lot younger so history wise there wasn`t as much to see.

On our second day in Shanghai we headed to Old China Town which is also where Yu Garden was. I really liked this area…with its traditional looking buildings and Chinese tea and Chinese sweet shops everywhere. We also visited the Yu Garden which was apparently built in 1559 by a private citizen although it is now owned by the government. It was amazing to see such a nice little garden in a big city like Shanghai…I loved how all the bridges were zigzagged…this is because Chinese people believe that the devil can only go straight…it can not go left or right. They also believe the devil can not jump which is why that many openings to temples have quite a large step to step over to get in. It is similar in Japan.

We also went to the Jin Mao Building…which I think is the third tallest building in the world (Or maybe it is northern Hemisphere)…The view, while a little bit smoggy, was great. I could see the river that flows through Shanghai and the different areas North and South of the river.

We walked along The Bund which runs along the Huangpu river. It is near a lot of banking buildings. From the bund we walked along Nanjing Road, a famous shopping street in Shanghai. It was actually hard to shop in China I found…maybe it was the heat (or lack of money on my part!) but I didn`t think the shopping was all that great….we went to a market in Beijing and I just can`t handle having people grabbing me and yelling at me to look at their handbags, shoes or whatever it is they are selling. I like to just walk around and look but most of the time it was impossible!

At night we saw an acrobatic show…Some of the people in this were really young…maybe the youngest person was 5 or so. I have no idea how they manage some of the stuff they did but it was definitely interesting to watch. I love watching people juggle too, there is something about it that makes me want to giggle.

Our last day in Shanghai was a bit of a rush…we ate breakfast and headed back to Old China Town to do some last minute gift shopping and then we went to the Jade Buddha Temple. I had read about this before visiting china and it wasn`t in our tour schedule but I was determined to see it since it isn`t everyday you get to see a Buddha made completely out of Jade.

I had no idea that the grounds were so extensive and we didn`t have time to see it all. But what we did see was awesome. I couldn`t take any photos of the most famous Jade Buddha (The sitting one) but I did get some other great photos of some other sections of the temple and its grounds. I don`t really know the history behind this Buddhist temple but from what I saw I am sure

The big reclining Buddha statue was actually a gift to china from Singapore…like I said I couldn`t get photos of the original sitting Buddha but I did see it. There were quite a few monks around the grounds too, and it was quite busy but I am glad I got to see it.

We got back to our hotel and got a call from our tour guide who had been trying to reach us since 9am. He was ringing to say our flight was delayed and that if we didn`t catch an earlier flight mum would miss her transfer in Tokyo so we had half an hour to have showers, pack (and we hadn`t done any at this stage) and get ready and rush out the airport. It was really rushed and we were running around and our plane was boarding by the time we got to the gate. It was kind of a stressful last day but overall our trip in China was amazing…I am not sure If I would ever get a chance to go back, but if I got the chance I wouldn`t say no!!!

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After Beijing we headed to Xian for two nights. Xian was one of China`s capital cities…it is considered one of the four great ancient capital cities of China because thirteen dynasties were here.We explored a little by ourselves on the first day and it was a lot more relaxing than Beijing had been just because there was less people (and no people jumping on you trying to sell you something!) and we actually had a little bit of time to ourselves. We went to the old bell tower which used to be used to signal the opening of the city wall and start of the day.

Our hotel was directly across the road from what they called the new city square and in the mornings when I looked out the window (at 7am) there were about 60 or so people doing Taichi, some others swimming in the fountain and others playing badminton. And there I was thinking it was way to early for anyone to be up let alone be up and doing exercise.

On our second day in Xian we visited the old city wall which was re-established in the Ming Dynasty (1370) however was originally built something like 2000 years ago. It was built to keep out enemies etc and you could see some of the really old weapons they used and also the windows where archers used to sit.

Before arriving at the terracotta warriors we stopped at a factory to see how they were made. The same process that they used 2100 years ago is what they use today. I found it amazing that 2100 years ago they thought to put the terracotta in a kiln to make it last. I bought a mini one for James as a gift and I also bought a Mahjong set for Shun at the factory (Well mum payed for it!)

The actual terracotta warriors were amazing. There really is no other word to describe them. Only discovered in 1974 when some farmers were digging a well during a drought (The whole area was farmland). The first emperor of the Qin Dynasty, Qin Shi Huangdi built the army to guard his tomb and not one of the guards has the same hairstyle or facial expression as another. A lot of it was destroyed early on when it is said that General Xiang Yu and his army raided the tomb burning a lot of the wooden structures inside and looting many of the other areas destroying most of the army. But despite this when they were discovered in the 70`s most of them were still in various states of preservation…While a lot of them have now been restored you could still see different areas where the army was missing limbs or heads or knocked over. There are three vaults inside and the first one is the biggest with most of the warriors inside having already been restored. They are all lined up in army formation and the whole thing was just so cool to see.

That night we went to see a Tang Dynasty Cultural Show which displayed traditional dance and music from that period. The costumes, staging and lighting was amazing….We walked around the new city square later on that night. We had small children running up to us to say hello and practice there English. There was also millions of people rollerskating around and swimming in the fountain!

We ran out of time on the day we went to see the terracotta warriors to visit the Xian National Museum (Shaanxi History Museum) so we went on our last day. It has something like 300,000 artifacts dating from caveman times. IT was really interesting to see how the way they made things changed through the dynasties but I think my mum liked this museum a lot more than me.

We finished our time in Xian by enjoying a dumpling lunch!!!

Can you see the ones shaped like ducks?

We then boarded a overnight train to Shanghai…I think mum and I both agree that this is the last time we will ever catch an overnight sleeper train in China…It was definitely an experience though! I will try and get the update of Shanghai early in the week!

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