Coffee

Coffee.

Club Day Band

The band from Club Day. Again, I wasn't that into them, but whatever. You can also get a good idea of how big this Club Day thing was, this whole area was only half of it.

Club Day

So five of my friends and I took a 45-minute train ride out to our school's campus in the countryside, where they were having their beginning of the school year club day. The Japanese school year starts in spring and ends early winter, so this is the start of a new year for all of them. My school has a few different campuses, but this one out in the country is where all of the freshman and sophomores are, and clubs are the biggest rage. So we figured we'd check it out, and we were very glad we did. There were clubs for EVERYTHING it seemed. Most of the people advertising for them at the booths were sophomores or juniors, and a lot of the people walking around were freshmen looking for clubs. The were clubs for pretty much every sport (not hockey), students that have been abroad, cover bands, "original" bands, magic tricks, theater, tea ceremony, ikebana, various volunteer projects, and even just social clubs. A lot of the kids have club jackets, with some of them seeming fancier than others. The group/jacket thing reminded me of the movie Grease, since it would just say one word or so on the back usually, like "Hearts" or something. Here are some photos I got, but these don't even capture all of the clubs that were there, it seemed like it never ended.




There was even an airplane club! I wonder how long you have to be a member in order to fly, we didn't bother asking for some reason.




I had a video of one of the bands that I tried to post, but for some reason it wouldn't load. Either way, they weren't very good, and if anything, convinced me not to join their club. If I ever get the video up, I guess one can admire their enthusiasm, but they really didn't seem like the kind of people I'd want to make or listen to music with.

Moo.

Moo.

Hungry.

Hungry.

My street.

My street.

These Days/Explanation

These days have been long, and the weeks even longer (duh). Hmmm, where to begin? The music. Every department store, classy place, cafe, or whatever seems to only play instrumental versions of pop songs, Japanese and Western. The first thing I thought of was the first page of Haruki Murakami's Norwegian Wood, where, Toru, the main character recalls a girl from 20 years earlier when he hears a string version of The Beatles' Norwegian Wood when getting off of a plane. Of course, Toru's plane had just landed in Germany, but this was still a Japanese novel, so it kinda makes sense for a string cover to appear.
Many of us UC EAP students bought bikes two days ago, so we've been terrorizing the streets (not really) quite a bit. My general philosophy is to just follow other Japanese people that are also on bikes, so I figure if they do it, it should be okay. Unwritten rules of the sidewalk seem to always overrule posted signs. I've noticed pretty much zero regard for signs with bikes crossed out or signs that say "get off your bike" (自転車を除く）. If I am ever stopped, I suppose I can say a few things, first and foremost since I saw so many Japanese people riding in those places it should be okat. The second would have to be that the phrase is not in the command form, so it would be like a sign in English saying "to get off your bike". As long as I have my "gaijin card" I should be okay :) Here's a picture of my bike, it's exactly what I wanted. Smaller wheels and a basket.

I also bought a sweet grey wool jacket for 3,000 yen (about $35 maybe) at a military surplus store in a shopping district. No, not Japanese military, apparently US military. I think they call it "surplus" but it doesn't all seem like it would be. Whatever, I got a good jacket for good price, and the old guys working there were really nice. I had walked in a few hipper stores and dealt with pushy salesman trying to sell me ridiculous jackets with bad music in the background. Enough is enough, ahaha. Here's a picture of my jacket and my bike.

I took that next to the river today on my way to school. It's been pretty windy here, and with my eyes as sensitive to wind as they are, I've been wearing my "fake" glasses. I don't like to call them fake since they do serve a purpose for me, protecting my eyes from the wind, but indeed, they don't improve my vision at all.
Explanations: I think I should probably explain, or atleast give some context, to the previous four or five photos I put up (part of my one word series).
The vending machines are down the street from my apartment, if you look closely, you'll see Tommy Lee Jones in the ad for Boss coffee. I just might make that my brand of coffee because of him, TLJ rules.
"Shinkansen" means bullet train, and my friend and I were eating at a Kaiten-zushi restaurant that used one to deliver sushi you order. At those kinds of sushi restaurants, sushi goes around on a track and you grab the ones you want, and then they calculate your order when you're done based on the number of plates you have. That place had pretty good prices, 105 yen a plate, so we could eat quite a bit and not break the bank.
My lunch that day was sushi rolls, inari, and Jasmine iced tea. It felt like a pretty Japanese lunch, so I felt like taking a picture of it :)
If you couldn't tell, that is a cherry blossom tree. Right now is flower viewing (hanami) season, and they're just starting to bloom. Temples and shrines will light them up at night and it's absolutely beautiful. So beautiful that I feel like people's overuse of the word makes it harder to convey exactly how beautiful it is. That's why all the tourists are here in Kyoto right now, it has the best flower viewing in Japan. I just might go so far as to say "you're in idiot" if you're in Japan and don't come to Kyoto during flower viewing season. But I would say it in a loving way :)
That monster of a building with all those tiny people at the bottom is Kyoto Station. Those people aren't small, I was just REALLY high up. It is very awkwardly huge. From the outside it looks more like it would a convention center, not a train station, but that makes it that much cooler. It has a lot of shops, restaurants, tourists, and of course, trains.
"Mizu" means water in Japanese. That water show was in one of the corridors of part of the shopping center of Kyoto Station. There was even more to it, but that little part was enough to wow me. A simple fountain in a mall will never be good enough for me anymore.
Well, I'm gonna go make myself some udon. Wish me luck!