I have taken to walking to the bakery every morning with one of the girls on the trip with me. It's a lovely, peaceful walk, oddly enough, even though you're inches away from a city bus whizzing by-- the streets and sidewalks are super narrow in certain parts of town, yet there are no collisions, no honking. So, every morning we make the 10 minute walk to the bakery and buy something warm and fresh and delicious. America needs more bakeries. Fresh. None of this same-doughnut-sitting-out-all-day business.
After class, we visited Little Tokyo, which is an area that has many old, 400 year old or so buildings. One notable stop was the Shinto Shrine, tucked in a back ally. Shinto was the major religion in japan before Buddhism made it's way over from china. In the entrance to the shrine, there were little side paths made out of different shaped pebbles and logs to walk across. I and two others walked across. It hurt, let me tell you. The rocks were so jagged!
So, after my feet were fully zen from the pointy rocks, we had a little bit of free time in Little Tokyo. There were many shops and I ended up buying myself a Japanese hair comb. It caught my eye right away--a simple pedal with three pearls. The man at the stand was quite a character-- broken English, a goofy nervous laugh, and he kept saying "YES! So bootifal!" as Kayla and I tried different combs in our hair.
I tried some octopus for 100 yen (about a buck), but didn't like it that much. The only thing is, in japan, there are literally no garbage cans anywhere. The mystery is that there is also no garbage! Hm. So, that's how I ended up with octopus in my pocket for a good 20 minutes.
I met one of my goals at the end of the day--to use a public bath (sento). It was relaxing and wonderful and gloriously warm under the Japanese night sky. Some things are worth public nudity.
April
April
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