Catching Up on Posts: Tuesday 4/27

Okay, up to tuesday now. Taking the bus to school made a little more sense, but I was still a bit confused by all the scribblies known as kanji. My first day of class went well, though Ujie sensei told me that I barely made it into the class, so I need to work hard. curse those particles... The teacher is very nice, and we're mostly doing review stuff.

Today at lunch I got my first chance to eat real Ramen. The store was in the bottom floor of a department store- in Japan, the bottom floors of department stores have restaurants, grocery stores, etc. You ordered the ramen by computer (choose type, toppings, etc.) then you got a ticket which you showed to the cook, then he cooked up your ramen. It was really good, though i wasn't a fan of the seaweed(?) on top that I would've not ordered if i had been able to read the thing. Afterward I got to wander around the stores in the food court. Mother's Day is a big holiday here, and there were flowers and candies on sale everywhere. I found some honey from New Zealand that was $80ish dollars for a small bottle. Who would buy something like that? There was also a french-style bakery, with some of the most delicious looking food i've ever seen. i bought a chocolate coronet, which is a croissant with chocolate stuffed inside it. YUM. YUM YUM YUM.

After lunch I went to Kenrokuen, Kanazawa's main landmark and one of the most famous gardens in Japan. The place was very beautiful, especially since it was raining, giving the area a bit of a misty quality. There were a bunch of workers out in the rain and clipping the grass into submission with a pair of tiny scissors, like nail clippers. We also got to take part in a Japanese tea ceremony. For all the concern over it, it was a really short ceremony that didnt seem all that complicated. We sat down on mats, and two bored-looking ladies in kimonos came over and gave us this pink and green cookie-type thing that was very good- it tasted a bit like sugar cookie dough. After that they gave us green tea, that we had to turn around twice and drink. The whole thing took five minutes. There's a class at W&L for this?

Some other random thoughts:
1) I MISS TYSON!
2) Japanese have to sort their garbage at home into compost, combustibles, non-combustibles, recyclables, etc. They also don't have curbside pickup, they have to take it to a neighborhood station. Despite the fact that there's no trash on the sidewalks or streets, there are no public trash cans. Ujie-sensei says this is because after the Sarin gas attack in the mid-90s in Tokyo, people were afraid people could put bombs and such in there so they removed them.
3) Japanese houses dont have central heating, which is why I guess they have the obsession with warm stuff. Sensei said that this is because it's too expensive to install heating or AC.