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After a full week of feeling kinda blah and having a voice that a lot of the mom´s in my baby class referred to as ´husky´I am finally feeling much better and, knock on wood, my voice is returning to normal. A hoarse voice is a hazard of the job I guess when you talk for 6 hours a day! So after returning to the land of the healthy I really wanted to make the most of my time off this week.
Friday it was off to Osaka where I visited the Osaka Human Rights Museum, there wasn´t a lot of English here but a friendly little Japanese man followed me around and translated whereever he could, nice and endearing for the first 30 minutes, kinda annoying after an hour or so. So after the museum I braved the Osaka city bus system to make my way to the Amerika -Mura area. Amerika Mura translates literally into America Village and is fully of trendy little shop and restaurants and Japanese teenagers who lseem to ike pretending they are in the U.S. The fashions here were crazy!!!! I thought I´d pretty much seen it all in Japan, Kobe hair on women,
stylish mullets on men, knee highs and high heels and gold and silver everything, I can´t even describe the fashions I saw on Friday, I have to go back for more photos!
Sunday we headed to the Hozugawa River which is north of Kyoto. One thing I´ve learned is that while Japan is a country primarily of cement and concrete structures, if you are willing to look hard enough you can find a little nature. This is exactly what I found along the Hozugawa river. Nestled between urban sprawl the area is lush of lush greenery, high mountains and low valleys. The boat trip takes a little less than 2 hours and seems to be incredibly popular with Japanese people. Marita and I were the only gaiin in our boat which contained mostly salarymen wearing fully suits despite the soaring temperatures!!! No one else talked at all so we tried to keep things light by waving at people on the shore or letting out the occassional yelp as we went over the smallest of rapids. The wooden boat wasn´t powered by a motor but instead by 3 strong and overworked Japanese men who rowed the entire time. There were
a few small, extremely small rapids in the river which many people had previously described to me as ´dangerous, very dangerous´. They were only little hiccups in the water but seemed to be being enjoyed by any of the friendly rafters we passed along the way. Towards the end of our journey we were approached by another boat selling assorted snacks, all the sake or fried octopus you could want!
The boat trip ended in Arashiyama, a scenic area outside of central Kyoto where we were able to stroll through beautiful bamboo groves. I had no idea that bamboo grew so big and tall. The grove was very dense and beautiful and cool which was a welcome escape from the heat of the day.
It felt great to be out exploring again. Now back to work for another week...I´m already dreaming about what I want to do on my day off!
Take care, hope you are well. Please keep in touch.
love, Melissa
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Connie
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bamboo
Hi Melissa! The bamboo trees...grasses... are much bigger than the bamboo materials we see in CANADA. I enjoyed seeing your name in lights--- you always have lit up the world! Take care. Love: Mom and Dad