Friday, September 12, 2008

We're home!

We made it back to America in one piece, well sort of.

Getting to Osaka International would never have been possible if it were not for Katherine and Abel. The helped carry all our luggage and clean the house on the final day. Thanks so much guys, wow.

The flight from Osaka to San Francisco was eh, not too bad. The seats were impossibly small but they played good movies and a nice flight attendant helped Aaron put his guitar in a closet up in first class because it was too big for the over head bin. So, the guitar rode first class not us.

Landing in San Fan, we got off and had to transfer all our luggage to our connecting flight. First thing that struck me was how rude every one was. I know that working in an airport makes you a pretty stressed out person but, seriously, we as Americans can be terribly rude. And pushy. And demanding. I waited in line for some soup at the food court and I almost lost my appetite just listening to the horrible things people were saying. And there are just SO MANY over weight people. I'm sorry but it's true. I mean, I'm all for healthy, realistic body images....but then there is just plain over doing it.

So, the flight to Chicago not so fun. I feel asleep and Aaron listened to my MP3 player, which made it go pretty fast. Landing in Chicago we got our luggage together and then waited for Andy to pick us up. After a drive home, Andy told us he had work the next day and we were tired so we were just going to go to bed. So, we walk in and put all our stuff down and go to lay down and KABLAMMERS! SURPRISE!

There is our Kalamazoo buddies all sitting in the living room with a welcome home sign and a bunch of beer! haha. Oh boy, what a great night. We handed out some of our gifts for people and then stayed up telling stories and eating pizza!

Aaron and I then slept until 2pm. Woke up and walked to the Crows Nest for breakfast. I got hash browns...real hash browns. With ketchup out of a glass bottle. JOY.

So, we are just now starting to get our things in order. We have almost no furniture right now. Not even a bed. I at least am still feeling the ill effects of Jet lag.

Hopefully soon we will have our car and some cell phones and be able to get in touch with everybody. Till then, take care!
-Kendra

Friday, August 29, 2008

Last post from home


Goodbye Japan!
Sayonara

Well, we don't leave until September 10th, but our internet gets shut off September 1st, so here is one last update from our home. We will try and check our email every other day at the internet cafe though. So, you can still email us if you need to.

For the last update, here are some great pictures from our final time in Kyoto. It's was Ben's "birthday." Meaning not his birthday but whatever, he wanted everything this way so he just pretended it was his birthday.

We went to the Edo Movie Theme Park. Basically, a mix between an outdoor reproduction of movie sets for Samurai movies/gimmicky theme park with haunted house and interactive games/museum of old Samurai movie stars and then add in a giant museum of every single Power Ranger ever made reproduced in full size glory and you kind of have an idea of this place. It was cheesy, ridiculous, but actually pretty fun.

Here we are posing in a giant skillet complete with frying eggs...not sure why it was there.

Oh no! Scary! This is right before we enter the haunted house...look at the fear in our eyes! The house itself was basically a depiction of a slaughter in a villiage...really, really gory. Dead bodies and bloody hand prints all over the place.

Then we jumped INTO THE FUTURE! We got to go on a 3D interactive ride. The premise was really silly but the 3D was great and we acted like fools and had a great time. Plus we look awesome in the goggles.

Because of our poor behavior, Kathereine and I got put into the jail cell. We has a sad.

Ah HA! Litte did they know that Katherine and I have super human strength and we busted out of there in a jify!

Here is Katherine displaying her awesome strength by lifting up this house! OMG!

Afterwards we went and did super awesome laser karaoke. Aaron and I delighted everyone with a barage of bad songs.


So, this is the last post from our house. Not sure what we will do without internet for 10 days...we might have to like, talk to each other...weird.
So, until we get home, byebye!

-Kendra

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Summer Update


Here are some interesting pictures I've been meaning to post. Okay so this one up here is from the Tenjin Matsuri, big fireworks in Osaka, lots of people dress in yukata, summer kimono. And no one in Japan dresses as outrageously as people from Osaka. The trend this year was big, orange hair, I mean big. Huge. Towering piles of hair. This was one of the biggest we saw. Here she is in all her glory in a Lawson conbini. She could hide food in there...or a small dog.


Here is a bunch of us at the same festival...though we don't have giant hair, I think we looked pretty snazzy.
This is at another fireworks show near Osaka. Aaron wore his "#1" head band. The fireworks went on for 45 minutes, it was crazy. Awesome show. Abel somehow pulled out a couple of Blue Moon beers from some magical worm hole. It was great.


Japan has the best cigarettes. This is Death brand, but it's okay, they are Death Lights. And they only serioulsy damage your health, they don't kill you...but then why are they called Death? Oh Japan, you're so funny.

Here is Mana showing off the Final Fulbright Fellow Farewell party Fuji climb Flag. Everyone who climbed Fuji-san signed it.


Be careful! This is level 10 hot curry from coco ichibanya curry house. It's hot, hot, spicy hot. Most people eat about a level 2 or 3. Most Japanese peole get -1. This is level 10. I ate my way up to it starting at level 5. It was good but damn...it really was one of the spiciest things I've ever eaten.

In other news, we get home around 8 pm on September 10th. We fly into Chicago after stop in San Franciso. Andy is being super awesome and picking us up with all our bags from the airport. What a guy! Cool too since he was the one to drop us off.

My gracious mother tells me that we are having a party on September 27th in Muskegon. It's a welcome home/wedding shower. I never got a wedding shower and I want my toaster and blender damnit! Hehe.

Everyone in Kalamazoo or elsewhere, I am sure we will also have a get together in Kazoo as well sometime. The jet lag is most likely going to be bad. I was sick for a few days last time I came back from Japan as well. So, we shall see how we are feeling. But but all means, please come visit! We want to see you all.

Till then!
-Kendra

Monday, August 4, 2008

Catch up/Highlights

Hey all! Sorry for the wait. Aaron here. Needless to say, we've had our hands full for the past few weeks. Basically, as our time in Japan is nearing an end, we are cramming as much Japan as we can take into our schedule for the last remaining months. Thus, we've been busy. I don't have the time or patience to say everything worth saying at this time, unfortunately. You'll have to get the specifics when we get back to the States, which won't be much longer, mind you. Anyway, I've decided to give you a quick recap up what we've been up to, and a few pertinent snapshots to boot. Here we go. I'm going to try and do this in chronological order.

Okinawa. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures handy from Okinawa. But many great ones exist, and all will be shared with you later on. As for the story, well, I'm sure many of you remember Okinawa as one of the many islands visited by our boys in blue in the Pacific theater of WWII during the island hopping days. Still to this day, a large portion of the island is occupied by American naval bases. Anyway, that's not what we went there to see. We did so much cool stuff--way too much stuff for 3 days. Basically, I swam in the ocean for the first time, tried a local liquor with local poisonous snake in the bottle, ate pig's feet for the first time, saw a castle that was mishmash of architectures from all over Asia, went into a real cave for the first time (like with stalactites and stuff), actually went scuba diving (like with the mask and air tank and everything!), enjoyed some great night life, and spent several hours with a Brazilian-American driver who was used to the right side of the road, and it only took about two hours to fly there from Kansai. Good times.

Right. Gion Matsuri: Okay, there is a really big festival every year in Kyoto called the Gion Matsuri (Andrea, forgive the spelling if it's wrong.) Our local Kyoto friend Andrea took us around town. Even though it was a billion degrees, we wore traditional Japanese summer garb, a special kind of Kimono called a Yukata (again with the spelling.)



It was really nice. We drank some beer, saw a couple parades, and a few hundred Japanese dudes in loin cloths carrying gigantic Shinto shrines on their shoulders, whilst hurling them up in the air and screaming in unison, unintelligable Japanese. Plus, after dark, we sat by the river and enjoyed some dinner beneath a balcony where real Geisha were entertaining some obviously super rich and important men. At one point, they looked down, smiled, and waved at us. In case you don't know. Real Geisha and Maiko pretty much only exist in this particular city, and Kendra is obsessed with them. it's like seeing a professional athlete or something, so that was actually really cool.

Next, Nikko Homestay: Alright. This is a really long and complex story. I'm going to have to cut it down. Basically, we (all the fulbrighters) were invited to go for a three day stay in a city North of Tokyo called Nikko. Kendra had actually been to this city before, on her study abroad with Dr. Covell (The guy who performed our marriage.) I was always jealous, especially of the waterfall she got to see. On this trip, we happened to go to the very same waterfall. Unfortunately, it was so misty, you couldn't see an inch of the waterfall. I'm not kidding. All we could do was hear it. Anyway, we also went to an authentic old-fashioned indigo dying place, where a man who is considered a living heritage icon gave us a lecture on indigo dying from plants. His house was also amazing. One of the oldest buildings around, with an old-school-style thatch roof. The floor was made of clay, with pools of indigo dye. It was really something. We also went to a nearby town famous for its pottery, which we got to sort of participate in. Kendra and I both painted rice bowls, for a small fee. They should come in the mail a few days before we come home. I'm excited. The siteseeing highlight for me, however, was going to the Nikko shrine complex. It was a really misty day, and it was basically magical, with tons of ancient Japanese buildings and thevmost intricate sculptures adorning everything building, wall, and gate. But the buildings were actually trumped by the giant Japanese cedar trees everywhere, compltelely soaked in dew. It's amazing. Any fan of Japanese fantasy would pretty much weep at the beauty of this place. I'll give you one picture that pretty much sums up it's magesty:


And that's just an arch. As I said, we have many more pictures, but I'm trying to be economic here. This complex is also home to a very famous building that has sculptures of monkeys depicting a cycle of life encircling it.


Does this look familiar? Here no evil, See no evil, Speak no evil, right? Yeah. This is where that started. Pretty neat, huh? Anyway, besides the sites, the homestay part of the homestay was just as awesome. We were so lucky. We were placed with a family that consisted of a Buddhist priest, a daycare center owner, a harpsichord player/singer who is studying in belgium, a hand sergeon, and a couple other fellows I never even got to talk to. But guess what, also staying amongst them was an 18 year kid from Australia, a first generation Chinese Canadian, and a French guy that made me feel like a pile of crap. He was 21 and spoke 4 languages. We talked American politics. Always interesting speaking politics with the French. Trust me on that. Anyway, the family was loaded, had a huge house, has a billion important guests, and wouldn't stop feeding us beer, sake, and wine. Basically, it was an international gluttenfest of merryment, in broken English, Japanese, and French. Amazing people. We appreciate everything they did for us so much.

Okay, literally the next day, on to Mount Fuji. FUJI-SAN: This was pretty much the apex of our entire Japan journey. Pun intended. If I showed you a picture of Mt. Fuji, you would recognize it, and I've been to the top. That's pretty cool. It's also pretty cool that it was over 95 degrees at the bottom and near freezing at the top with plenty of snow left over. I think it took us something like 8 hours to reach the top, and something like 4 hours to get back down. We took about an hour sleep break at what they call a "flop house" toward the top. That was around 11:00 p.m. We had to reach the top by 3:30 or something to catch the sunrise, which is the whole point. We almost made it, but we were close enough that it still counts in my book.

Here's a great picture, just before sunrise. It shows you not only how steep this mountain is, but also, that it is above the clouds, made completely of volcanic rock, and so high up that you can see the curve of the Earth. Pretty cool stuff.


Sunrise. This is pretty much the pinnicle of existance for the Japanese. If you recall, the nickname of Japan is "The land of the Rising Sun." Well, we watched it rise from japan's highest point, and I have to say, it was pretty friggin' cool. Hundreds of Japanese men started yelling Banzai! as the sun broke the horizon.

Sometime around 5:00 a.m., we started the descent, but not before taking a glance into the crater of Fuji. It's really interesting actually. Few volcanic mountains have such a defined and complete crater as this one. You can see the glacier-like splotches of snow on the far side. Really alien. Andrea commented that it would make a great backdrop for someone filming something taking place on Mars. I agreed with her.

I think this picture speaks for itself. There's the edge of the mountain before we began the grueling descent. You can see how far above the clouds we were. I don't know the stats off the top of my head, but I'm sure you could look it up if you really wanted to know how tall the mountain is. Though this view was awe-striking, our experience soon went sour as we climbed downward. We quickly had to shed off all our extra layers, as the morning sun, free of any clouds, began to cook us. We basicallyed cascaded down a series of rocky crags for about 4 hours, while inhaling volcanic ash and nearly breaking our ankles. We also found out in the days to come that, despite our liberal use of sunblock, we all got sunburned pretty bad. Japanese sunblock is pretty weak, but it was really the altitude that got us. Did I mention we were doing this on less than an hour of sleep after climbing up for eight hours? But, as horrible as it sounds, I can't tell you how worth it it was. The saddest thing is that the photos will never do it justice. I guess you'll just have to go there and climb it yourself.

Recent Times: Last week we went to see two different fireworks shows as well. We went to see Kobe's special celebration just a couple nights ago. It was down by the harbor, and was absolutely great. We ate a Jamaican restaurant afterwards that proved a worthwhile experience. More exhilerating though was the show we saw the previous night near Nara, which just happens to be the biggest annual fireworks in the world, by the way. That's right. It has the world record, and they broke it this year. Most rockets, over longest duration. We saw the greatest fireworks show that has ever happened. Kind of a cool thing. I think I might just skip Independence day from now on. Just kidding. Asia did invent fireworks, afterall. Unfortunately, none of our pictures really turned out. It was yet another, had to be there, sort of thing.

Anyway, that's just a taste of what we've been up to. We can't wait to get back to the States and tell you all more of the details. We also have a few thousand pictures. The next few weeks will be chaos, as we prepare to leave, so I don't know when I'm going to post again. But, until then, stay cool everyone!

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Sorry for the absence

Hey all, sorry for the long delay!!! Aaron and I have been traveling extensively since July 12th. We went to Okinawa, Utsunomiya, Nikko, Tokyo, and then climbed Mt. Fuji! Sheesh. We are soooo tired.

In between all that, I had to give a 40min. speech at my school.
AHHH!

So, we have lots to update on, but just wait a bit.

Will write more soon.

-Kendra

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

quickie

Hello, just short update, things are hectic this week.


We just got back from our trip to Okinawa. In just a few days I have to write a speech, pack up stuff to send home, organize a farewell party, go to Nikko for a home stay, climb Mt. Fuji, oh god the list just keeps going!

You get the point, things are busy here. I just wanted to relax and take it easy these last couple months but no, it's going to be madness!

So, we will update with Okinawa stuff soon. In short, it rocked. Scuba diving is my new obsession.

peace,
Kendra

Friday, July 4, 2008

Mom and Jason's visit pt.4

MOM AND JAYSON VISIT PT.4
EATING OURSELVES TO DEATH IN OSAKA

Sorry for the long delay again, explanatory post will follow this one.
This leg of our journey finds us in the never sleeping city of Osaka. Osaka is a mecha for all things food, drink, and merriment. It's an old merchant town and it certainly lives up to its reputation for as a city that knows how to party. Showing us around was good pals and fellow Fulbright Fellows was Mana and Ben S. They showed us a great time.

Lunch was at an Okonomiyaki restaurant; one that clams they were some of the first people to be making and serving Osaka's version of these yummy concoctions. I've never had true Osaka style before so it was a new experience. We've mainly had Hiroshima style which means usually noodles in the pancake and an egg on top. Osaka style had TONS of scallions and bonito flakes in it. Both have their merits though.

After lunch, Jay almost bought a Louis Vuitton handbag, but no go. Mana and Ben then showed us some really cool places all around Osaka's older districts.



Here is a great one of us on the very colorful street leading up to Osaka Tower (Spa World is right down the street the other way!)

Osaka tower is famous for this little guy named Biliken, the god of things as they should be, or something like that. He's lucky, got to rub his feet. So he has these deep rub indents on his feet from years of people rubbing his little feet.

After the tower we stopped at a traditional style Osaka bar/eatery. What you do it sit a the counter, order beer, then you can order any number of things on sticks, they deep fry them, then you dip them in the sauce and eat. Oh and did I mention you also get all-you-can-eat cabbage with this? I guess it makes you feel not as greasy if you eat a ton of raw cabbage while eating all the deep fried items. It was quite an experience.

Here is the other side of the table.

So there is the cabbage right in front, then next to it is the sauce trough. That meat on a stick back there is pork that is cooked in this kind of "miso gravy." It was kind of odd...

Here we are at the top of Osaka Tower again. Oh aren't we just so cute.

Later that night we went to the Umeda Sky Building, which has an open air observatory on the top. We've been to this building before for the Beer Festival way way back last November. But we never went inside. I could go on forever about this place, though! It was simply amazing. One of the best buildings/views ever. We had a great time.

They even had these high powered binoculars you could use for free too! all I could see was a kind of pasty, whiteness though....not sure what was wrong.

The view.


Our time here is coming to an end soon though. We have to start thinking of coming home and packing, all that stuff. It's no fun.

Okay, I promise I will catch this thing up before I leave though!!
-Kendra

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Mom and Jason's visit pt.3

MOM AND JAYSON VISIT
PT.3

JOURNEY TO THE CASTLE

Hello everyone. Sorry for the delay. It's hot here...we spend most of the day complaining about the weather, so there is little time to update, or move in any way for that matter. Here though, are pictures from Himeji Castle, and the garden's next to it that we visited when Mom and Jay were here. Enjoy!

In our search for food, which was Subway incidentally, we had to make a bathroom break. And check this place out; even the toilets are welcoming to the tourists in Himeji! What a town!

Ah, sorry these are out of order. This is the view from the very top of the castle. You have to climb up a ton of narrow stairs but it's worth it.

Haha, this is Aaron doing his best impression of the creepy girl from "The Ring." Why? you may ask. Well, see the well behind him...it's called "Okiku's well." The legend goes, there was a maid in the castle named Okiku. She was in charge of guarding these 10 sacred plates. One day, she overheard a plot to destroy the Lord of the castle. She told him and saved his life. In retaliation, the man who she over heard stole one of the sacred plates. Once the Lord of the castle found out that one of the plates was missing, he killed poor Okiku and tossed her in the well...or something like that. Story goes that you can hear her sad voice counting the plates up to 9, then starting over. The Japanese novel "Ringu," of which the Japanese movies and the American movies are based, draws some inspiration from this well.

Here we are at the gardens. Cool bridge. There are hundreds of Japanese carp, koi, in the ponds here. Some are HUGE! bigger than my arm for sure.

Mom and I resting on a rock.

This is in the tea garden. Jayson is a very bad gaijin who can not read signs. (it says "keep of the grass") They clip the grass in this garden with scissors...I've seen it.

Wowie! That's pretty. The pretty hanging purply flowers are Japanese wisteria. So pretty.

This is in the garden that is famous for having these awesome black lava rocks.

Now, we are back to the castle grounds. There is the castle keep in the background. Behind that fence I am leaning on is the inner moat.

There was way too many bees hovering around us here...I ran away as soon as the picture was done. (look up info on the Japanese hornet and you'll know why)

Aaron by some cool old samurai armor.

Back at the gardens now. Jay and I lounging on a rock in the middle of the pond.

Nice little resting spot,ne?

I should have cropped this one. Jay and I are making some weird faces and pointing, but Aaron's face is the best. I'll have to post it later.

Jayson is trying to be all crouching tiger, hidden dragon or something.

Okay after we got back that night, we drank a lot of screw drivers. Jayson is brandishing a banana at me!

Looks like Aaron is putting in the Best of Christopher Walkin DVD. Nice choice. Oh and on the grill are some rice balls! yummy.

Someone is showing us some grilled chicken on a stick.It kind of looks like it is stabbing Jay in the head...Is this before or after Jay wrote that email to Andrea confessing his undying love for her?

Oh nope, he's okay! and eating cabbage...with his mouse hood on. Oh boy.

Well, that's all for now. I'll post our trip to Osaka next.
Hope all is well at home. Drop us a line on here. Anyone still reading this thing?

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Mom and Jason's visit pt.2


Oh hello there. Welcome to...

MOM AND JAYSON VISIT:
THE EPIC JOURNEY
PART 2

This part of our tale finds us in Kyoto. After short rest back home in Kobe, we rode the train over to Kyoto, about an hour and a half journey. Andrea picked us up from Kyoto Station and we went back to her place before setting out. These pictures are out of order again, sorry. So, I will write under each one to tell where they are from.

This is from the dinner the first night we were in Kyoto. We went to a great modonyaki place called Fuji's. We've been there before and damn, some of the best modonyaki ever. Also really great nama-beer. We had a great time.


This is the Golden Pavilion, see because it is gold, right?
This was one of the last places we visited. If you look close on the patch of land near the bottom left corner you can see the crane! or is it a heron? some kind of Japanese bird!

This is Kiyomizu-Dera. A really famous, and beautiful, temple in the hills of Kyoto. We visited on the first day of our trip. This place is famous for having the water that is supposed to make you have eternal life.

This is the skyline view from Kiyomizu-Dera. That big tall thing is Kyoto Tower. Lots of people in Kyoto don't like it. They think it is too tall, ruins the skyline.

Here we are on the steps up to Kiyomizu-Dera.

This is at the first temple we visited called Sanjusangen-do. It is famous for several reasons: it is the longest wooden building in Japan, it hosts the very famous archery contest every year for the coming of age ceremony, and it has the mysteriously beautiful 1,000 Kannon statues. Each statue is about life size and each one is slightly different from the others. Very magnificent. In this picture I have apparently spotted something very interesting in the water...I think it was a crab or something.

Pretty Kyoto style garden.

Here is that photo from up there, only I am looking at the camera instead of the mystery water creature.

On the subways in Kyoto...I got sleepy and took a nap on Jay. I don't think he liked it.

So he responded by attacking me!! The fiend!

After resting, the next day we went to the Falafel garden for lunch. Mom had never eaten falafels before. Tasty as always.

Here we are the Golden Pavilion.


So Kyoto was great. Good weather and Andrea was a great host/tour guide. Though mom and jay had some difficulties sleeping on the floor, they got over it...after a day or two.

Up next will be our trip to the castle at Himeji!
See you then!