The Last Weekend

This past weekend was in many ways the last time in which I could truly call myself a tourist in Japan, as of Monday I became a student. I'll bore you with the details of my classes later as my last weekend was far too much fun to not share.

On Saturday, I decided to go on a tour of the areas of Asakusa and Ueno. Older (or more experienced) TUJ students came to the dorm and escorted us through the complicated (but gradually easier to understand) train system to the area of Asakusa first. Now, being honset here I didn't know too much about Asakusa but the area was a pleasant surprise to say the least.

Asakusa is home to the famous temples and buildings of old, though the Sensoji-Temple is the most notable of them all. It is the oldest Buddhist temple in Japan, having being built back in 628. It is in excellent condition and naturally has become quite the tourist spot. I was able to undergo the cleansing ritual before going in, which made it quite the legitimate experience and even caught a Buddhist ceremony while inside. Being respectful of the customs, I opted out of taking pictures of it, not wanting my camera to be snatched away. 

In the area of the temple where a number of statues, structures and shrines dedicated not only to Buddhism but also to Shinto, the native Japanese religion. It was interesting to see the two religions be intertwined in one place, but any education to Japanese culture or history one would realize that the Japanese have no problems practicing both in some capacity despite not strictly being that religious in the first place. 

The not so pleasant surprise of the Asakusa excursion was the massive crowd. Leading up the to temple are a number of shops, stands and other services where you could buy...well just about anything really. Sadly, getting around was a bit difficult. It seemed that this particular weekend, Asakusa was hosting a parade, fair...thing celebrating Brazilian culture. Why? You probably could guess better than me. I didn't take any successful photos of the parade itself being that I am too short to get a good shot. Really all I did was able to take a masterful picture of the back of someone's head. The shops and stands were great, having a bunch of things I wanted to get but decided against it since I needed to hold on to some money for my commuter pass to school.

After Asakusa was done, my little tour group was supposed to be brought to the Ueno area...except there was no guide. Everyone that decided to go on the tour was supposed to meet up at the main gate of the temple at 3pm. There was no one there at 3pm. So my little group of friends decided we would go to Ueno ourselves. And that we did.

Ueno is home to a number of things. The area we saw was mostly home to museums and the Ueno zoo. Not really in the mood to stare at pieces of art for a couple of hours, we chose the zoo.

Now I took a lot of pictures of animals at the zoo. Probably more than I did of the temples. But this was personal favorite shot:

The Ueno zoo had lions, tigers, polar bears, pandas, red pandas, birds... and much, much more. It was a crowded zoo but being that I haven't been to a zoo in years, it was refreshing if a bit tiring from all the walking in the heat we were doing. Failing to see any of our study abroad students, we wandered Ueno to find some dinner, found a fairly priced place to eat, enjoyed our food while watching some Japanese students get drunk and fall out of their seats. Following that, we went home to get some sleep and prepare for our next trip.

Sunday was spent going to the beach at Zushi. It was a long trip, a good hour train ride to Zushi before getting lost in the area before we actually found the beach. Funnily enough, I found a quick direct way when heading back. 

Hindsight aside, Zushi beach was crowded. I mean really crowded. All my trips to the beach in my younger years and I never had that much difficult to steal a spot. 

But it was worth it. The water was absolutely perfect, pardoning some patches of seaweed and we even meet some members of the navy at one of the stands nearby. Food and drink was a bit overpriced but it was a fun day to enjoy before heading to classes. I opted out of enjoying dinner with everyone else and navigated my way back with one of my dorm mates. Luckily, we didn't get lost. I consider that my official initiation in understanding the train system. Now all I have to do is understand the bus routes and I am set.

This week is my first week of classes. I will likely update the blog then when I get a better feel for everything.

Till then.