Gas pipe access cover in Sendai

I'm on the bus on my way to Aizu-Wakamatsu, but will be staying with a family in Aizu-Bange. The couchsurfer(Christopher)'s mother will meet us at the station, by the statue of a big red cow, at 16.30 after work, and drive us to the house. I think Christopher gave me their house number and address, but I don't have it written down. I do, however, have the address of the nearest registered hostel, just in case.

Then on Wednesday we will take local trains to Niigata, but first go to Kita Kata to have ramen for lunch. At Niigata we will stay with Ryoko, who has said that she will give us our own key because she is busy. But she will meet us at the station at 8pm, outside the south exit - in front of Subway and Mode Off. Her car is small and green, with a white stripe. We have decided to have (and maybe make) dinner together that night because according to the schedule she gave me, it's the only time we can eat together because she leaves very early each morning and comes back late.

We will leave on Saturday 12th - by bus if we can get the ticket when we arrive on Wednesday, otherwise by local trains - and go to Sendai. There I will meet Rachel, from Kent but studying in Beppu and won't be there when I go (likewise I won't be in Tokyo when she goes there). We will all be staying in the same hostel: Miyagi Guesthouse, 2-1-35 Kakyouin. I didn't have time to print the map, but I've drawn it in my journal and forwarded the email to my phone (JPEGs are compatible).

I think Aaron will leave to go back to Tokyo the following day because he is flying back to America on Tuesday 15th and hasn't gotten a re-entry permit yet. And Rachel and her friends leave on 14th. Then I leave on 15th, finally alone, to go to the snow festival I am travelling all the way to see: the Kamakura snow festival in Yokote. But the details for my stay there haven't been finalised because the person I will be staying with was on a business trip last week. She's said it's fine for me to stay with her but we haven't arranged a meeting place yet or swapped contact details.

Then I will take the coach on Thursday night, 23.30 from Yokote station to Shinjuku, arriving at 7am.

Lunch sizzling on a hot plate. Waseda canteen standard.

On Monday, Rachel and I decided to make the most of our commuter passes and meet in Mejiro. My timekeeping has been atrocious recently. I spent too long doing little things about my room and ended up leaving some 15 minutes later than I should have to meet her on time, then realised that it'd be best if I didn't leave paying my rent until the evening since I didn't know what time we'd be back, so I did that before making my way to the station. After paying my rent I met Jessi, who I hadn't seen in weeks, in the lobby and we walked to the station together. She was on her way to buying shinkansen tickets for her getaway to Kyoto, where she's going to see in the new year.

As the train pulled in to the station I saw that Rachel was sat on a bench on the platform and ran to her ready to apologise feverishly but she said that it was alright, that she had been testing out the different modes on her camera and asked me to take a photograph of the Christmas present given to her by her host family: fluffy black leg warmers with a ribbon-bow. Mejiro is one of the quieter stops along the yamanote: it's only known for Gakushuin University which is attended by most of the current Imperial family and some famous persons. So we simply walked up the main road outside the station one way, stop in a Thai restaurant for lunch, then walk back to the station to check the map for anything interesting that the guidebooks might've missed out.

We decided to walk to the next stop on the Yamanote, Ikebukuro, and along the way visit a shrine. We wouldn't have found the shrine if I wasn't looking every which way but the way ahead as we followed Meiji Dori. The shrine was, I think, for childbearing, according to the map. The sign at the shrine itself told us about how the roof was an innovation of the time and another sign was for the gingko tree that might be the largest in Tokyo.

If you're a collector of commemorative stamps, you'll want to come here. Unfortunately I'd forgotten my journal on this day and will have to return another time. But I'm afraid to do so on my own because the large tree and the others surrounding the shrine made the area very shadowy.

When we got to Ikebukuro, we saw the Seibu Shinjuku terminal. Rachel had never seen a yellow train before we went to Gwynnie's for dinner a couple weeks ago, so she wanted to take photographs of these. Around this time we received an email from Jenna saying that she was at the travel agency on campus and asked if we wanted to take up the deal to go to Odawara castle and stay in a hotel on the coast in Atami the next day. We didn't know where either of these places were but we didn't have any plans and the cost was reasonable, so we agreed to go. We both wanted to more about this sudden trip but I didn't want to be sending emails back and forth when she was busy, so Rachel and I got on the train and went to meet her. On the way I remembered that I'd planned to go to my old dorm, in Nishi Kawaguchi, to return the key and officially move out on that Tuesday morning.

3 weeks since my last post. Being a student (I've had to write two papers, one after the other) has gotten in the way of experiencing Japan.. Especially now that I've moved to a dorm less than 10 minutes walk from campus and taking the train isn't a necessity. But it's winter break now and Jenn and Hannah (also from Kent Uni and doing an exchange year, but in Kansai Gaidai) are in Tokyo for a few weeks!! So I get to play tourist again :)

On Thursday we met up in Akihabara and wandered around. It's so tall. Two thirds of the buildings are either electronics shops or arcades. すごい！ To get to this brightly coloured area you take the exit out of Akihabara Station to 'Electric City' and it does live up to it's nickname. Two thirds of the buildings are for stores selling electronics (in every sense of the word), or anime and manga merchandise, games arcades, old games and maid cafes! Down the side streets are small shops selling computer parts and half of the goods they're selling are in boxes and baskets stacked outside the shop, because the shops themselves are so small. They are so space efficient here in Japan. You can find restaurants that are only slightly wider than the length of my arm span. Shops are also stacked one on to another without the result being a small shopping centre but more like a departmented office block, perhaps. My favourite place to eat is beneath the home of the people that run it.  Upstairs there is only a curtain that separates the restaurant from the family kitchen.

Anyways, back to the excursion. After stopping in a Tully's Cafe by the station for somewhere to warm up - the day had started off very warm but windy, and it gets much colder in the evenings, we walked to where they're staying. I'm not sure how long the walk took because I enjoyed their company so, but you can check on a map: we walked from Akihabara Station to near Kikukawa Station. Along the way we walked past a restaurant that had a large hairy pig hung outside, behind a cage (I'm not sure whether it was real but in the dark it looked like a giant rat), and a shop that sold sumowrestler-sized clothing! Oh :)

The next day, Friday, Christmas eve, we met outside Toyokawa Inari. A mixed Shinto and Buddhist shrine with many statues of foxes wearing red bibs and, because foxes are believed to be good for business and Akasaka is an office building hub so there were many red banners showing who or which businesses have sponsored the shrine. [Photos to be added.] Afterwards we made our way towards Hie Jinja, stopping outside a koban to eat lunch under the trees (that were tagged with ID labels) on the way. I'd bought a curry pan and ate that, Jenn brought home made onigiri and trail mix (this was simply peanuts and raisins, but it's really any mix of dried fruit and nuts and it makes a great snack to help you last the day) and I don't remember what Hannah had.. By this time it'd gotten quite cold, so much so that Hannah needed to put her gloves on while I was determined to hold out since it was still only the afternoon.

Hie Jinja is where I went with some people in the first few weeks of arriving here and saw a show on a night of the full moon; I think I'd told you about that. It looked different to the first visit. Not only because there were no rows of seats for an audience and no stage for a performance, plus it was late evening when I went the first time, but I'm sure there wasn't as much gravel and more bamboo. In the centre of the enclosure a portal had been erected. Like the torii, it signified that we were entering a special place (except we came in through the side entrance and not the main). We saw one man turn around and bow to the main building as he passed through the portal on his way out and he turned again to bow after stepping outside the gate. We couldn't see into the main building because a thin curtain black curtain had been put up but you could see there was something going on. There were a few people, including a young woman in a kimono, sitting around something, and there was drumming.

We left by the main gate and stepped out into the sunshine! Because Akasaka is mostly tall, shiny buildings, we were in the shade most of the time, and so I had to stretch my arms out and bask while I could and whenever there was a gap between the blocks. From here we walked to Tokyo Tower. On the way we saw two shrines, a shop selling samurai armour (take that as you will), plenty of coffee shops, government buildings, a red-brick building.. Nothing particularly interesting.

still to come:

- Tokyo Tower

- illuminations at Roppongi

- dinner at Tendon Tenya

- celebrating Christmas by going out for all-night karaoke

- photos (*headdesk*)

Late night snack. Not sure what the filling is. Mayonaise and something tasty. Only had one of the pieces. The other will be part of my breakfast.