Autumn in Kamakura - Temple Day!

Today I went to see temples in Kamakura. My friend and coworker Randy is in town from Seattle and knows all of the great tourist places in the area. He was my tour guide for the day. Kamakura is a city about a 20 minute train ride from Yokosuka. We started at North Kamakura at Engaku-Ji, which is a huge temple area, thingy. The fall colors were incredible and today was Jodo-e: The memorial of Buddha's enlightenment, which means the temple grounds were ridiculously packed with people. Regardless of a bit of overcrowding, the temple grounds were still very quiet. The day couldn't have been more beautiful, bright blue sky, red, orange, and yellow leaves vibrant against it.

After spending a few hours exploring the vast grounds of Engaku-Ji, we walked a little further down the road to Meigetsu-in, another historic temple site. This one was founded in 1160 AD. The buildings have been rebuilt, but some of the tombs and statues are centuries old. A bit further down the same road, which I am beginning to think of as North Temple, is the Kencho-Ji Temple. This place is the top-ranked of Kamakura's top Zen temples. This place was exceptionally notable because past the beautiful temple buildings there are stairs and a trail leading up to the top of the hillside overlooking Kamakura with panoramic views. Lovely! It was a super steep short hike, but totally worth it. The staircase led up to a few buildings comprising the protective shrine of Kencho-Ji. The shrine is surrounded by statues. Lions guard the stairways and bird-men-warrior statues.

The fourth temple was a Shinto temple right outside downtown Kamakura. I seem to have lost the ticket stub for it so I have no idea what it is called. It is quite lovely though. There are frequently weddings there and was one going on as I walked past. I tried to watch, but it seemed like a very solemn affair and I had no idea what the rituals meant. So, I moved on to look for food. We picked a restaurant with a pretty generic menu. The little old lady almost through us out for not speaking Japanese even though they have a plastic menu. Then she ignored us the entire time we were there. Randy tried three or four times to get her attention to try to get a drink. I think its the worst service I have ever received and VERY out of character for the Japanese. However, she managed to get in a yelling match with another patron who was highly entertained by the whole transaction among the three of us, so I think she was just having a bad day. Randy was wearing a shirt that says "I am a serious foreigner." It made all the Japanese people laugh. Tons of them wanted pictures. So I hope that it doesn't have any weird connotations.

After the bizarre dining experience, we hopped a local train to Hase where we visited the Great Buddha. Turns out there are lots of big Buddhas, but this one is pretty great especially surrounded by all the fall colors. For 20 yen (23 cents ish) you can climb up into his chest. With my indecision, by the time I decided it was worth it, the line was nearly 100 people long. So, I gave up and we came home.

In other news, strawberries are just coming into season and they are AMAZING here! Also, I created a flickr account so I could show more of my pictures. I just started uploading pictures, but check it out: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kelseyintherain/

Ships, Mikons and Plastic Food

This weekend was stocked with adventure, not in the least being learning the train and subway systems. I did a little exploring in Yokosuka on Friday. The naval base takes up an entire peninsula to maximize pier space for ships. There are several destroyers here, big surface craft that Puget only rarely sees. I've now seen Japanese submarines as well. They are small diesel boats with huge sails, seeming very strangely proportioned to someone used to the sleek American nuke subs. The base is an experience in itself. Since the ship I'm here for hasn't yet arrived, my boss decided we needed to explore the mall and train station for the second half of the day. Aren't you glad our tax dollars are put to such good work? Paying me to browse the mall is a much better use than petty war!! :D After walking a pretty boardwalk with naval base views, a friend and I wandered some side streets and ended up climbing some steep stair cases. Upon a little investigation, we realized that the stairs were the only access routes to the homes built into the hill. There were absolutely no roads up. The people who lived there had to haul everything they owned up those stairs: propane tanks, beds, furniture, etc. Lucky for them, most Japanese homes are minimalist.

Saturday was a seriously long and adventurous day. A group of Space Control Team people decided to

take a trip to Tokyo. The day began with learning the trains. If you haven't seen a train and subway map for Tokyo, it looks like a bowl of moldy, rainbow spaghetti. You have to know where you are, where you want to go, which color train to get on, which train line, and where to make transfers. Saturdays are still work days in Japan and the trains were crowded. We stood and tried not to tip over the

entire way there. The first stop of the

day was Asakusa, home of a big red lantern and Kitchenware Town. The big red lantern hangs from the gate to a big market place full of trinkets, food, and gifts. I ate my first octopus-on-a-stick and octopus ball

(dough, octopus meat, shrimp). Very chewy, but quite tasty. Past the market is a 5-storied pagoda, Asakusa shrine, and Sensouji Temple. The temple is Japan's oldest Buddhist temple and I'm pretty sure it brings in a ton of cash. Japanese people come to pray and burn incense to their ancestors, both of which cost money. I bought a temple book. Its a little blank book that can be taken to different temples and stamped with calligraphy. Each temple has its own individual mark, with lovely, hand-written calligraphy. Hopefully I can fill the book up while I'm here.

After the temple and its beautiful garden surroundings, we walked to Kitchenware Town, which is exactly what it sounds like. It's an area of a few city blocks of shops full of cutlery, cookware, and best of all: plastic food! You can buy plastic hamburgers, beer, ice cream, noodles, sushi, rice, etc. They good menus for those of us who can't read Kanji. Point and nod, you generally get what you want. On the way there, we encountered a few ninjas!! Well actors doing a very silly show of a sensei and his student, but we took a photo with them anyway.

Akihabara-the electronics district- was calling our names. We took the subway over and explored an 8-story building full of, well, stuff. Seriously, this color-riot of a place contained aisle after aisle of anything you'd find in an electronics or toy store: printers, phones, DVDs, CDs, toys, laptops, etc. The top floor was food; hooray, something I was interested in buying!

Leaving that building and walking around the block led to a 5 or 6-story costume and lingerie shop, 4-stories of toys (action figures galore!), more electronics, and a ton of people.

A quick stop in Ginza finished our day. We visited the Sony Building. It was full of fun things, my favorites being a dancing mp3 player robot ($400!!)

and a camera that recognized smiles and wouldn't take a picture unless it saw one. So fun! The ride back was

uneventful except for one old gentleman who stared at me like I was growing a second set of arms.

Today (Sunday) I picked mikons (mandarin oranges). The place was all you can eat while you're there for 650 yen. Anything you pick and want to bring out, is 550 yen/kg. Little pricey but fun. I think I ate 12 mikons in an hour! Can you OD on Vitamin C?? A little walk on one of the beaches finished the little excursion off. There were windsurfers everywhere! They're way braver than I am since it was probably 40 degrees with the wind chill. Brrr!!!

The Hello Lodge

After a fairly exhausting day of travel, during which 17 hours vanished across the international dateline, I arrived in Yokosuka, Japan. The flight into Nerita was a 10 hour 40 minute tolerable ride over Alaska and a lot of ocean. We landed in the rain amidst thick clouds that I couldn't see through until just before we touched. Then came immigration in a very warm room, collecting baggage which seemed to take forever, and customs. The bus ride from NRT to Base was around 2 hours, but sorting the people onto busses was a joke. I ended up on one without underneath storage compartments. All luggage occupied the front several rows. Those happened to be the heated ones. The passengers all froze their tails off in the back of the bus. We arrived and checked into our hotels around 9 pm. Long day!!

The food here is pretty much fantastic. I ate at a minuscule Thai restaurant with a few of my coworkers upon arrival in Yokosuka. I was so impressed by the people who ran it. They were polite, courteous and very friendly, not to mention proud of what they do. I've had some amazing noodle dishes and some tasty candies. There are drink machines with all sorts of concoctions. Each contains arou

nd 30 types of beverages, some hot, some cold. The orange Calpis is so yummy!

I'm staying at this cute little hotel called the Hello Lodge. I was greeted with a sign reading "Dear Mr. Kelthy Hansen Welcome to Hello Lodge!" Not quite my name and really not my gender. The owner apologized and blamed it on my orders. The cookies made up for it anyway. :) So, Japan is a very minimalist society. Hotel rooms are generally really small containing a bed that's about half a twin, a toilet, shower, tiny desk and a microwave, if you're lucky. Seems I am one of the lucky ones. My room is the largest on the floor. It houses a full bed, decent sized desk and a kitchenette. I also have free internet. Thank goodness!

My room contains the most over complicated toilet I have ever seen. Seriously! Look at the picture below. It has a warm water bidet with 3 different settings for positioning and 7 for strength of water jet. The top is a sink to rinse your hands which drains back into the toilet for the next flush. All of the water is used twice. The shower is its own little room and contains a deep, but short tub and a sink. My little kitchenette has a small fridge and microwave, a single burner and a sink. I also have a nice balcony with a view of, well, several tallish buildings.

Work has been a lot of touring, training and walking so far. When the ship arrives, it'll be much more chaotic. I will be working swing shift beginning next week so I'll have mornings free to enjoy a little daylight. I think I'll like it here for the duration. My boss seems like a really good guy and I hope that I'll enjoy it.