katybug

Marrying an outdoorsman pretty much guaranteed me spending quite a bit more time outside than I previously had. Luckily, my own passion for hiking had developed fairly quickly after moving here from the American midwest, where I was excited by small hills. The mountains that Japan offers are WAY more exciting and offer a pretty good diversity of courses and seasonal possibilities. The one thing I had never done, however, was hiking in the snow-covered mountains, because I always know I didn't have the right equipment for it. That's where my husband came in! We had a weekend off and I was DYING to go snow-shoeing, but our spot to go (Nikko, where Ma-kun has friends who own a guest house) reported back poor snow conditions that were no good for snow shoes. So we had ... read more

It's not that I haven't been doing anything or traveling - on the contrary, I've been all over the place these past 8 months. The problem is instead that I have hit a point in my time abroad, the phase I once found called the "dissonance" phase, and for those at this phase, there are two possible trajectories: assimilation or departure. Either the person assimilates completely and assumes the societal values and norms, or they do not, unable to merge their own beliefs and moral code with that of the new culture. It's not much of a secret which path I will take. Japan, as an experience, has changed me more in the past 4 years than almost anything else in my life has changed me. It's not bad - it's amazing. I have grown and ... read more

Anyone who knows me knows about my near-obsession with Tudor history. Therefore, my time alone in London was planned out to allow me to see the most historical Tudor sites as I could, given my limitations with time and transportation. My first day back in jolly old England, I headed out to Hampton Court Palace - an absolute must-see for any Tudor enthusiast! Obviously, I knew all about Hampton Court Palace's storied history, but I bought the guide book anyway because it was a great souvenir and I still learned things I hadn't known. After a coffee and a pastry, I set off on my tour, using my book to get around all the famous areas. The rooms I liked the best were (obviously) all tied to Henry VIII - the banquet hall where he dined ... read more

We were nearing the end of our bus tour, and while I was mourning the end of it, I was also getting very tired, as we were running on full steam each and every day to see everything. The bus took us into the Netherlands, and we arrived in Amsterdam by the early afternoon. Our first stop was not the hotel, but a cheese and clog-making farm, where we got to meet some cows and chickens, and watch how they make both clogs and their famous cheeses. We also got to sample some of the amazing kinds of cheese they had available! I loved the clogs and the whole place, it was so cool to see, and I bought some little things to bring home as souvenirs with me. After dropping our things off at the ... read more

On the third day of our bus trip, we headed into the beautiful Switzerland. Our destination was a town called Interlaken, nestled in the Swiss Alps. At first, the scenery looked just like that of France, but as we neared the city, we began to get the breath-taking sights of the mountains outside our windows. The hotel we stayed at is owned by a downhill ski world champion named Urs Raber. It was a quaint, unique place, because Urs has a lot of rules for people staying there, such as absolutely no electronic devices in the dining room during meals! But I loved the hotel and the homey feel to it. :-) We hit first an ATM so those of us planning to do the optional excursion the next day could get Swiss Francs. Luckily, the ... read more