The Yuki Matsuri

The city of Sapporo, Japan is world famous for its beer, and its annual Snow Festival, the Yuki Matsuri. Tisha and I were there this year, and we have plenty of pictures, videos and stories to share.




Because I am an unemployed slob, I decided to take off for Sapporo a few days before Tisha; and also to travel by sea instead of by air. My trip started with a 24 hour ferry from Maizuru (a port near Kyoto) to Otaru (near Sapporo). This was an interesting experience, as the path of the ship took us far out into the Sea of Japan, which made the trip my first real ocean voyage. While on board the ferry I spent most of my time messing with my laptop, and reading "Guns Germs and Steel", which I highly recommend.

The ferry to Hokkaido was 5 minutes late, and I barely caught my train and made it to my hostel in Sapporo before the front desk closed up for the night. In my rush to the hostel I met, Vivian, a Swedish college student who hadn't booked her accommodations yet. I suggested she try looking for a bed at my hostel, and luckily they had an opening.

The next day I hit up Odori Koen, the site of the snow festival. The sculptures were amazing. Some were huge, check out this video of an ice sculpture of the old Sapporo train station:



Others, such as this bear (Relak-kuma) were smaller:



There was a whole gallery of international sculptures. Here is Thailand's entry:



.. and Sweden's (one of my favorites):



Of course anytime you go out in Japan you must expect the unusual:



After getting my first look at the festival I headed back to the hostel, where I ran into Vivian, and an British gal named Rosie. Rosie and Vivian had spent the day checking out the sights together. The three of us decided it was time to check out the Sapporo nightlife. This led to a fun filled night of ramen, beer (both Sapporo specialties) and of course karaoke. The three of us had so much fun, we stuck together the next day as well.

After making snowmen, drinking sangria, and enjoying even more karaoke (this time with some Japanese salary-men) it was time for Rosie and Vivian to leave Sapporo. Fortunately, Tisha and a group of English teachers got into town the same day. The English teaching group was staying at a very nice hotel north of Sapporo, complete with an indoor pool and Japanese Onsen. It should surprise nobody to find out that I immediately bailed on my hostel to crash the hotel.

With Tisha in town, the good times kept on rolling. We met a fellow traveler named Megan, and made more snowmen:





We also went to an historic village outside the city where they transplant old buildings from the early 20th century. Here is a turn of the century police officer in front of his outpost:



And at the village, we also got to try cross country skiing for the first time! I was a bit nervous, but it went great:



All in all, this was quite a memorable trip. We met some great people, who I hope to keep in touch with, and saw one of the most amazing winter festivals in the world. If you ever want to visit a winter wonderland, I highly recommend Sapporo's Yuki Matsuri!

Slideshow:

Photos: Dinner with our English class

Tisha and I teach an English conversation course on Wednesday evenings at the local community center. Last December, we had dinner with the class to commemorate the end of the Fall course. It was a wonderful time, with food, drink, great conversation, and even an impromptu magic show! Here are some pictures from the event.

All the pictures from the vacation

It's hard to believe we've already been back for 2 weeks, but pictures from our trip are finally ready. More after the Jump.





Below you'll find several slideshows from our trip. Clicking on the slideshow will take you to the actual album (where the photos are higher quality).

First off, our first batch of pictures from Sydney. These were already linked in a previous post, but we'll through them in here just to be complete:



Next, Tasmania. We posted some pictures of Tasmania before, here is a complete album:



Now it's off to beautiful (and hot) Cairns for pictures of SCUBA diving:



We returned to Sydney for some New Years fireworks and fun, and stayed for a couple more days:



Finally we stopped for a few wonderful days in Hong Kong:



So that's all the photos! Stay tuned for some written recaps, and of course, videos!

Videos from Sydney

Our first two days in Sydney have been incredible!

On the first day we explored downtown, which is gorgeous, and full of character. We took a little walk on a trail in north Sydney, and Tisha got to see some lizards! We wrapped up the day by taking the ferry back into downtown, and were rewarded with some amazing views of Sydney from the water. Sydney waterfront has a variety of street performers, and this guy was our favorite:



His group is called "The Web", and we loved the music so much, we bought the CD. We do not do that often! The CD, "Spirit of the Land" is a great album by the way. If you enjoy electronica, world music, or just something good, I recommend it. Check it out, here.

The big highlight of day two was our visit to the Sydney zoo. This was by far the best zoo we had ever seen. For starters, it had spectacular views of Sydney. In addition there were loads of animals from all over the world, and they had wonderful habitats for them. We saw a bird show that was quite memorable, and the meerkats were the definition of "cute". Tisha also got to see lots of reptiles, which she just loves. We also made friends with a few African transplants.



After the zoo we took another ferry back into downtown, and decided to check out the world famous Sydney Opera House. The nutcracker is running here for the holidays, and we weren't surprised to learn it was sold out. But wouldn't you know it, some people who arrived late sold gave us their tickets and we were able to see the second act! Yes, we know we live a charmed life.

I would love to write more, but it's two in the morning and our flight to Tasmania is quite early.

Cheers!

Slideshow (will post more photos later):

Universal Studios Japan

It sure has been a long time since we posted, but don't think we haven't been up to anything! Far from it in fact. Way back in September we visited the theme park of movie company, Universal Studios with our friends Anneleise and Yukari.



USJ was not exactly an authentic Japanese experience, but it was a lot of fun. We spent the whole day at the park and hit the big rides including Jurassic Park, Back to the Future, Spiderman, and a new roller coaster called Hollywood Dream, which was awesome. One ride that sucked was Backdraft. It wasn't even a ride, we just walked around and saw a bunch of fire.



Towards the end of our day we were standing near the front of the line for Shrek 3D when we spotted some characters from Sesame Street hugging and/or terrorizing Japanese children. Like most 28 year old Americans, I was practically raised by Sesame Street, and I really wanted to get my picture taken with my childhood idol, Ernie. I was a bit hesitant for fear of losing my spot in line, but Anneleise ordered me to seize the Muppet. I'm glad she did too!



It was a great day at the theme park. It was especially good to see our friend Yukari, who likes theme parks so much that she moved to Orlando to work at Disney World for a year!

Nara

Our latest adventure took us to Nara, Japan's ancient capital. I have been to Nara twice before, once with my parents and once with a good friend. While I have seen most of the big sights I still wanted to take James there.

Flashback to before the trip:

Me (calling the youth hostel): "So you are all full on Saturday night"
Hostel: "Yes, that's right, we have such and such sports camp and there isn't any room...
Me (turning to James): Hmm, the hostel is full, what about camping? I found a campsite that says it is only a 30 minute train ride from Nara OR Kyoto and a 20 minute walk to the campsite...
James: Sure, we have a great tent we might as well use it!

It sure seemed like a great idea at the time. It was cheap and seemed convenient! Maybe we could use this place for a Kyoto trip too! After many transfers, we finally arrived at Nagaike (Long Lake) Station. After walking a bit I asked a local construction worker if we were heading the right direction. He said yes, but is was another 3 kilometer... uphill.

When we finally got to the place, we had two choices for camping. A gravelly spot, or a mosquito infested one. We opted for paying a bit extra, staying at the lodge and then getting out of there as early as we could. OK, it wasn't such a good idea...

That behind us, we still had a great time seeing the sites in Nara, the most famous being Todai-ji, which has the largest Buddhist statue in Japan, and is the largest wooden structure in the world! At least that is what is said on the ticket.


We also visited a very beautiful garden nearby that I hadn't been to before.


Of course no trip to Nara would be complete without feeding the tame deer that roam Nara Park, living off of handouts from tourist and scaring small children. James still thinks watching the crying kids is more entertaining then the deer.

Koyasan

Nearly 1200 years ago, a young Japanese man named Kukai traveled to China to study Buddhism. Kukai spent two years in a monestary. His master became deathly ill, and on his deathbed he asked the young monk to return to Japan, and spread his teachings. Kukai returned to Japan and founded the town of Koyasan in 816 AD.

A rock garden at Kongobuji temple

Tisha and I recently took a three day trip to the mountains south of Osaka to visit this beautiful town. Like many westerners, I am quite unfamiliar with Buddhism, and so this trip was particularly fascinating. During our visit we saw many Bhuddist Temples, and a beautiful cemetery. We also took a lovely hike, and stayed overnight at a temple.

(In order to maintain some semblance of brevity, I'm just going to run down the highlights of our action packed trip)

Funicular: The Ascent

Just getting to Koyasan is an adventure in itself. After a few hours and a few transfers on the train we finally arrived at the mountains south of Osaka. Koyasan sits in a valley amongst these mountains, at a height of 3000 feet. The final stretch of our journey was far to steep for mere trains... this, as we all know, was a job for a funicular!


Riding the funicular, feelin' the flow.

After the excitement of the funicular, we needed to simmer down. Fortunately we still had a short bus ride into Koyasan.

Temples

We were finally in Koyasan, and it wasn't long before we got some sweet Buddhist temple action. If you're looking for temples in Japan, then Koyasan is the place to go. There are small temples...



...big Temples...



...and stone temples...
There's the pilot on top.

The most impressive temples are at the temple complex of Danjogaran. As always, our Lonely Planet guide gave us the lowdown:




And here he is!

We liked Danjogaran so much, we decided to toss the old pie plate a few times:


Filming your sweet trailing edge catch: priceless

Lodging

We spent our first night in Koyasan at a hostel, which was affordable and nice. Our second night in town we spent at Henjoson-in. Henjoson-in is one of many temples in Koyasan which offers shukubo style lodging to religious pilgrims (and tourists). The staff of these temples are all young Buddhist monks, who earn their keep by running the establishment. Shukubo provides a very authentic experience which includes distinctive vegetarian meals and morning prayer service. Henjoson-in also featured men's and women's Japanese baths, which were quite extravagant. Of course, this was Tisha's favorite part of the trip, and even I must admit that I enjoyed them, despite my well-known aversion to bathing. For photos of Henjoson-in, see the slideshow at the end of the post.

I See Dead People

For our final day in Koyasan, Tisha and I visited the town cemetery, which is located in the forest east of town. This cemetery is actually the main attraction in Koyasan, especially for the religious pilgrims. The most striking feature of the cemetery is its forest setting. Many of the cemeteries I have visited or seen in America are devoid of trees. None of them come close to presenting a native ecosystem, which is what is exactly what has been done in the Koyasan cemetery. I am particularly fond of forests because they are so alive. Walking through this place reminded me of the strong links between life and death. The fallen logs, gravestones, wandering children, and young saplings illustrate that without death there would be no room for new life.


I also realized in this hallowed setting that without mosquitoes there would be no need for bug spray. Fortunately, Tisha was prepared as always.

He is The One

The Buddhists actually believe that one guy has been holding on to his spot in the universe for almost 1200 years, and may not ever give it up. That man is Kukai himself, and at the far end of the cemetery there is small, and I suppose ancient, temple where he's been chillin' like a villain all this time. Of course, nobody gets within 100 meters of Kukai's final dwelling, and photographs are strictly forbidden. That said, Tisha loves candles, and has no shame:

Sadly, my wife will be reincarnated as a meal worm

I've Seen Enough to Know I've seen Enough

After seeing Kukai's mausoleum, we weren't exactly sure what to do next. Then we saw this...

Forget about Iran! The Buddhists have ICBM's!

... and we knew it was time to go home. As sad as we were to leave Koyasan, we knew we had one more thing to look forward to...

Funicular 2: The Descent


Those poor suffering soy beans


A near miss

Slideshow