Hai Sai.

Okinawa rocked, it rocked hard. The whole trip was planned excellently by Shin san and we got a run of incredible luck to boot. Just to start off on why it was so awesome you can just look at the picture above, that was the view from the balcony of our room at the Hotel Miyuki Ill have more on that later. The trip first began with a test of will and a feat of strenth i.e. surviving going into Tokyo on the metro during rush hour in the morning. That was horrible, its crap being crammed into on of the tightest spaces of your life with a couple hundred other people but having to do it with baggage just tops the experience off. I was slopped at a 45% angle for most of it with only the tips of my toes touching the ground it was grand. Well the whole Higashi Funabashi crew plus Andy because he lives so close were able to make unscathed and (semi) on time, with only one near fainting accident between all of us. The group took a 747 ANA flight to Naha airport from Haneda which took about 3 hours, a pretty smooth flight. First stop in Okinawa was the 国際道 or international street. Not much time for the cool crap shops but one guy was flipping out and trying to motion me across the street so he could cut my head off or something, that's all I can gather from his hand motions. Lunch, beautiful, Sam's restaurant we had steak. Sam's is a Teppanyaki restaurant almost like Benihanas but more food. Our chef did drop the bag once or twice but the food was awesome so we didn't bust his chops. Back on the bus , where we were entertained by "Bus Guide-o San," Guide-o san was a tour guide who would not stop talking she would just rattle on about this or that with frequent breaks for bus kareoke where she would sing us traditional Okinawan tunes. Oh and just for the record our bus drivers name was Mr. Miyagi. We tried to get Daniel San to do a crane kick on the roof of the bus for him but he did not cooperate, that ass. Anyways then next stop was the red castle of Okinawa, Shuri Castle. Very unique and beautiful, lots of Shi-sa- which are sweet. Then back on the bus and off to the Hotel Miyuki, our new home for the trip. The room for the trip was Lars, Seth, Zach, and myself, a good crew no scabes each with our own stregnths and specialties. When I walked into the hotel for the first time I was floored immediately by the view out the lobbies back window. The hotels beach and the ocean were so crisp and clear it was amazing. The sky was slightly overcast with blue poking through and the water was an radiant sparkling blue and green. We got very lucky with the weather, initially the forecast for the entire trip was thunderstorms. We hit clouds and sunshine the first day with temperature in the 72 degree area, second day bright blue sunshine and clear sky with comparable temps, third day more sun, last day a bit overcast with light sprinkling. The whole trip was so perfect and relaxing but more on the next three days later. I will try to post the pictures of the trip soon, but by try I really mean try to try.

Vest.

Well tommorrow I am taking a trip with my program to Okinawa. I don't think it will top nagano last semester, actually I hope it doesnt because someone would probably have to die then, but it should be awsome. There will be a lot of teppenyaki, amd champon eaten, and lots of habushu drinken. Habushu is apparently like tequila where there is a worm in it that you eat at the end, but actually instead of the worm its a snake. Our hotel has its own beach and each room is on the top floor with an ocean view balcony apparently. Unfourtunatly the weather forcast looks like there will only be one day of sunshine and then rest scattered storms but the water should still be good.
In other news last sunday we had a first year party at the dorm where the dorm manager provided lots of good food. We all had a good time stuffing ourselves, but then the dorm manager demanded that I alone for some reason drink one of the beers they had stockpiled for this occasion. It was a little early for me but there was nothing I could do so I had a kirin tall boy and of course since someone broke the seal Caleb joined in. Then after the party again I was singled out by the dorm manager and we had a sit down. It was a pretty damn strange conversation and of course he had his wife fetch us somemore beers. He talked a lot about John Wayne and some guy Robert Mitchum, I dont know. I learned a little bit about the ryouchou but then again I never really wanted to learn most of this stuff. I am hoping he passes me down the vest. Though even though I thought we were cool, he still confused me for Caleb most of the time. He thinks Seth is Lars and I am Caleb I just dont get this guy.

Trip report 3.

Three posts in the same week? What the hell?! Okay so now I know what you are thinking a) Ari must be very bored b) Ari must be procrastinating hardcore c) Ari knows his memory is so bunk he just wants to get this all down. What may surprise you is that all three are true. I am a bit bored now because I have been trying to conserve money since the trip so have been staying in mostly (minus one bunk failed foray to tsukiji but that is another story) I am probably going to blow this all out this weekend since there is just too much cool stuff to be done. BUT with that in mind I now intend to finish off describing my Golden week trip extravaganza. Well I guess I left off right before I went to Osaka. Osaka in my quick superficial assessment seems like it would be an awesomely fun place to live. It just has that vibe to it. Well things I did there, I went to Den Den town (the poor mans akihabara except they actually let you haggle), dotonburi, America mura, Osakajo and its park, the kaiyukan which is the biggest aquarium in Japan, and some other good places. The aquarium was really neat but crowded as all hell. It was the only place this whole break where I really felt it was golden week because I was suffocated with people, at least I am a head or more taller then everyone but it was still kinda ass. Dotonburi was fun it was were I experienced most of the best parts about Osaka, the food. First off on the topic of food, I had for the first time different kinds of Takoyaki, I had experienced the run of the mill variety many times before but I ate one night at a restaurant near Toms place where we got Cheese Takoyaki, and Roast beef takoyaki, both h good both weird. In Osaka I had the best Okonomiyaki ever and for cheap. One night I just walked into the cops box and asked where cheap and tasty okonomiyaki was to be found and they sent us to an awesome restaurant, that is the only use for the cops in this country. Another night was shabu shabu tabehodai with Caleb and Amanda at a very hip restaurant. The food was awesome fast, and the tabehodai was way cheap especially since we stayed until they closed. After Osaka I went back one half day to Kyoto, where we went to Arashiyama. Arashiyama is a beautiful mountain area with some nice temples, an incredible bamboo walk, and a monkey park. The monkey park was a schlep up a hill but totaly worth it since there are about a 100 wild monkeys at the top waiting for you. They were sweet and would occasionally attack each other for no reason, just the way I like my monkeys. Well that was about it for the trip, there was one more day spent but it was very low key most of the day spent watching dbz on toms comp and playing dbz the game on his ps2, then a quick flight from Kansai International to Haneda Tokyo and I was home. Overall a good trip. And with that no more posts about trips, plus I put up the second batch of pictures so you can look at those by hitting the pictures link and sort by newest. Pictured here is Robbie, Me, Duy, Ced, Stephan, Glico man...

Trip report 2.

Sooo here comes the second installment of my kansai trip. I was planning on putting this off even longer but then I realized I was quickly forgetting everything so I decided sooner is better then later. I guess I left off with Nara, and the Todaiji. After Nara I spent two days in Kyoto. Kyoto was beautiful, but it should be noted it is not the ancient city that comes to be pictured in mosts minds. To begin with Kyoto station I believe is the biggest train station in Japan, it was huge, also the city looks basically like most other modern cities in Japan, plus even though it avoided bombings in WWII a lot of the city has been destroyed by insane pyromaniac monks at some point. The amazing part is that you can walk about 15 minutes in any direction and you will hit some sort of temple or shrine. The places I visited were the biggest pagoda in Japan in Toji temple, then I saw 1001 statues at sanjusangendou temple. The 1001 statues had me awestruck, they all had like 10 too many freaky arms and they were all in the same position with the same clothing but each statue had a different facial expression. Plus there were some statues representing various buddha dieties each with their own specialty item. You could make a sweet fighting game out of those guy, specially the guy who carries around the dragon. I then hit my favorite temple kiyoumizudera temple or pure water temple. It is on a hill or mountain, which is covered in these awsome big green trees. By the time we got there it had started to rain a bit but it just intensified the green and made the air crisper. It was great to walk around plus there was a freaky bunny statue and a love rock. Later we walked around Shijo and ate awsome okinomiyaki at a place called Mr. Young Men, gooood stuff. The next day there I hit up the shoguns castle Nijo castle, whose floor is built so when you are walking over it it sounds like 1000 birds or some bullshit like that it was a nice effect. Plus the castle had a really boss garden. I also hit up the golden temple, kinkakuji, and one of the most famous zen rock gardens at ryouaji temple, it was ass crowded but I was still able to reach enlightenment which is a good deal. F you samsara. Had some more awsome food of course, and saw some horrible to sweet ranging movies at Tom's. The worst being NinNin (smap sucks), and maybe tied with Juon 2. Well that was almost all of Kyoto except I spent one more half day there but I am going chronologically and that was after the Osaka days. Until then enjoy this picture of the freaky bunny.

Trip report.

OKAY, so just to keep everyone up to speed last week was a very special time in this country called "Golden week." Basically there are a bunch of holidays for no reason, for example one was "midori no hi" or Green day, and they are all in the same week so if you take off a day or two more from work or school you basically have a big 9 or 10 day vacation. Since this was the case I took the opportunity to visit Kansai, since I have done little traveling around Japan proper. I just returned after 8 days last night and I am not sure where to really begin describing the trip, so I think I will make this easy and just break this into installments starting with the beginning. In the beggining there was Shinkansen. I took the bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto, and from there went on to Nara, where my friend Tom lives. I mooched hard and crashed the whole time at Tom's place. First few days were spent in Nara, saw the biggest baddest ass buddha, fed some deer, who are mooching jerks, walked up a hill saw a good view, did lots of good stuff. The budda was sweet but it kind of makes everyother buddha I see look like crap in comparision. I mean when youv seen the biggest even a huge one doesnt look that cool anymore. Okay I am now tired of typing I shall add more at my soonest convenience in the meantime I put up the first batch of pictures. Pictured here is a stupid deer eating a box.