Misatos birthday and some basketball

Had a big weekend since it was Misatos birthday, went to a nice dinner where we had Fugu, the poisonous blow fish. It may have some booze type affect where I felt kinda drunk but Im not sure if that was just in my head because I knew it was blowfish or not. Also had a big party for Misato on Saturday night. Then I got to play in an FHI basketball tournament this weekend. Apparently being 5'11" ish and able to jump makes you a center. Our team was doing awesome pre-tournament and won 6 of 7 games, once the tournaments started we were ranked 1st, but lost in the first round. Misato got some good shots of me with my best lay-up/drive to the hoop.

Misatos Birthday Weekend

Kyoto

Had a meeting down in Nagoya last week and decided to take the 30 min train down to Kyoto. Lots of stuff to do there and I definitely was not prepared. Saw a few maiko (Geisha in training). Saw about 4 or 5 shrines, and went through the fushima hike where there were thousands of torii gates. Apparently the gates are bought and left normally as a prayer type offering to a specific god, there were also little stores along the 'hike' at each god that had sake to leave for an offering as well. I definitely need to go back and see the golden shrine, we saw the silver shrine but it wasnt so silver, had a nice garden though.

Tochigi Central Park and Oarai

I made some Onegiri for the first time this weekend and took them to the park for a light lunch. This week was golden week where a lot of people have off for 5 days so Misato and I went to Oarai to see the beach and aquarium. I didnt get the whole week off because Im working for a US company here, but I took 2 days vacation instead. This park was really nice and Oarai was very pretty as well. We stayed in a house that was converted into a hotel where dinner and breakfast were included, only 5 rooms if you look at the pics you can see how small our room was, but it was big enough for the 2 of us for 1 night. The other rooms were about double the size of our room but a whole family of 6 stayed there. We took the train down to Oarai which took about and then rented a bicycle for the day. Bike rental was only about 2 bucks, and the train was super cheap too. Not as if I had any doubt, but after seeing the traffic jam in Oarai it was far better, cheaper and faster, to take the train and bicycle around. We biked over to a fish market where I had the biggest and best Oysters I have ever tasted.

栃木県中央公園 大洗

Moshico Round 2

Went back to Moshico to pick up the pottery I made a few weeks ago. Also got a few coffee/tea cups. I enjoyed the city much more this time not having unreal expectations of the small I had originally imagined. I also went and looked at motorcycles a few weeks ago so hopefully I can figure out a few more details and get one so I can cruise around Japan and see the countryside doing my favorite hobby. Getting a license is pretty tough here though! Had a house party this month also which turned out pretty good. My coworkers (Boeing) came and so did my new Japanese friends. One Japanese girl had about 2 sips of alcohol and was wasted on the floor. Luckily her boyfriend was here to take care of her. Japanese style normally do not have others over to their houses so coming to the party was a different experience I think. I made some enchiladas... kinda using whatever ingredients I could find. They turned out pretty decent, but definitely not as good as using NM green chili. My new favorite drinks are vodka and grapefruit juice (preferably fresh squeezed) or vodka and ginger beer. The ginger beer doesnt have any alcohol, but tastes slightly different from ginger ale. Link below to pics from Moshico.

Moshico Part 2

Hanami Party

Hanami Party is a celebration for the cherry blossoms in Japan. People are cherry blossom crazy here because it only last for 1 week. Work set up a small party just outside the FHI campus and provided food and drinks for only about $35. Afterwards I went out with my Boeing coworker to a bar that put on a little show where the bartenders flipped the bottles and blew fire. I overheard some guys talking about us in Japanese and I looked over and they invited us to sit down with them. We ended up hanging out with them all night and they showed me another sweet bar. For such a small town they sure do have a ton of bars here, and once again I have met some very friendly Japanese people. Misato and I went to the shrine the next night and then a park that had a "family fun center" to view more cherry blossom festivities.

Hanami Party

Kinugawa

Kinugawa hot spring last weekend. Kinugawa is a small city north of Utsunomiya built around the hot springs. Went on a little hike with Misato saw some monkeys caged and wild. There are a bunch of little statues around called Oni, which is a little demon guy. From what Misato said Kinugawa means something like evil river because a lot of people used to kill themselves there, hence the demon figure guy. Great place for a resort! Click Oni picture below for a link to more pictures.

Kinugawa

Moshico Pottery Town

Went to a town called Moshico, which is supposedly a very artsy town with a lot of pottery. I was a little disappointed though because it seemed a lot more commercial than I was expecting. I did get to sign up for a pottery class and made a flower vase and a big serving bowl. I have to go back in a few weeks to pick them up. In general it was pretty good. I am having computer problems and am now booting my OS off my external hard drive, which is not that great. Hopefully Ill get my new hard drive in the mail and will be back to my normal computer soon. I really need to get my pictures and music off my old hard drive... I am going to an Onsen soon. Check out the pics from Moshico. There are some that are awesome, especially of Tanuki, which you can see in the picture he has huge testicles, yeah those are not his feet!

Moshico