This week is Silver Week here in Japan. Basically, Silver Week is what would happen if in the States they moved holidays around so that Labor Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day and President's Day were on Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday. Several minor holidays in a row set up so that office workers get a 5 day weekend.

Because I haven't been able to find a job yet, we've spent Silver Week near to home, instead of heading to Kyoto or something, but we've still found some interesting things to do. On Sunday, we headed to Tokushima to go to a Stuff Swap, where I picked up some clothes and we got some books, then we went to eat at a hotel cafe called The Agnes for our one-year anniversary dinner. The food was decent enough, but the service was amazing and the bread they kept bringing was unbelievable.

Today, Tuesday, the two of us and one of the other Naruto ALTs, a girl from Portland, biked out to the Naruto German House to attend the German Festival. The festival itself was a bit disappointing, but we could have been there at a bad time. It was mainly food vendors selling German products. They were, however, giving away free samples, so I got to taste some German wheat beer, some mango sparkling wine, and a variety of snack foods. We also picked up a jar of bratwurst that we took home and cooked. Delicious! I never thought I'd have bratwurst in Japan.

After the German House, we biked a bit further to the big Shinto shrine in the area, Oasahiko. It was amazing. The tree the shrine is built around is gigantic and really interesting looking. The thing that sticks out the most, though, is the number of giant spiders we saw. They are everywhere and they are huge.

We have one day left of Silver Week, but we don't have any plans so far. However, we have plans for early in Octobor to head to Himeji, and possibly Osaka. Really, I'm out of things to say, since this post was mostly just to post some pictures!

Silver Week 2009 online photo album

We are scheduled to get home internet on September 5th! Yay! Hopefully they can install the cable through the air conditioning vents, if not, we have several more weeks of waiting to go.

This last weekend was pretty busy for Brent and myself. Thursday evening, we went to the beach with Brent's fellow JETs. There was lots of seaweed and potentially a jellyfish. On Friday, the last of the Naruto JETs arrived, and we all went out to an izakaiya and had a great dinner with drinks. I didn't bring my camera, though.

On Saturday, we bummed around in the morning, but in the late afternoon we went and visited some places on our street.


This shrine, Kyokai, is less than a five minute walk from our apartment. One of the priests was very nice and gave us a personal tour--in Japanese. We understood some of it, like that they just got a new copper roof. They aren't a very tourist-y spot, so I think they were a little shocked that we were there.

There are several other shrines on our street, both small roadside shrines, and larger ones. There are also lots of amazing Japanese cemeteries. It's just after Obon, the Japanese festival for remembering the dead, so there were lots of decorations on the graves.

More religious places around Naruto






On Sunday, we biked about half an hour to Bando Station, dropped off our bikes, and walked a few blocks to the first temple on the Shikoku 88 Temple pilgrimage, Ryozenji. It was amazing. It's probably not as impressive as the larger temples in Kyoto or Nara, but I loved it. It was also

From Ryozenji, we walk a couple of kilometers to the second temple on the pilgrimage, Gokurakuji. Gokurakuji is an Amida Buddhism temple, which excited me, because I remember learning a lot about those types of temples in the Japanese architecture class. (That class is also why I took so many pictures of brackets and roofs at the temples.) This temple was more impressive and beautiful than the first one, but also felt more impersonal.

More picture of Gokurakuji



After getting home from the temples, we headed out to a Tokushima Vortis soccer game. The stadium is in Naruto--it was built by the Otsuka company, the same people who make Pocari sweat, which, by the way, I find to be amazingly delicious. The company was founded in Naruto. The game itself was pretty boring, but there was an amazing sunset to watch. And a huge Sudachi-kun I got to take my picture with.

Updated Naruto album, with beach and game pictures



In other news, I applied for my gaijin card last week, and will pick it up on Monday. After that, I can go to the prefectural office and apply for permission to work, which they may or may not grant. If they do, great, I plan to start going around to all the English schools with a resume and saying that I'm available for a part-time job. If not, I plan to start going around to all the English schools with a resume saying thati'm available for a full-time job, but I'll need a new visa.

But for now, I stay at home during the week and study Japanese by watching television. And using my textbooks, of course. I bought the level 2 Genki book. I used level 1 in my university Japanese class and liked it, so I thought it would be a good way to continue to study. I could have put off the purchase, though, since I'm still reviewing Genki 1. I think I know more Japanese than Brent at this point, although that doesn't matter since he's still way more comfortable than I am speaking it. I'm hoping to find a Japanese conversation partner in the next few weeks to start to feel more comfortable speaking.

Well, the are other things on the internet I need to do, and limited time in which to do them. Hopefully I can start to make posts from home soon!

Information for those curious about the area in which we are living:

We will be living in Naruto, a town of just over 60,000. Naruto is located in the prefecture (basically Japan's version of a state) of Tokushima. The capital city of the prefecture is Tokushima City, our closest big city neighbor. There are about 260,000 people in Tokushima City. Tokushima Prefecture is located on Shikoku, the smallest of Japan's four major islands.

We're living in an area called the Inland Sea (Naruto is labeled in red.)The Inland Sea is supposed to have the nicest weather in all of Japan, with low rainfall, moderate temperatures, and little snow.

By crossing a few bridges, and the island of Awaji, we can get to the Kobe/Osaka/Kyoto metro area. It is about an hour and a half of travel time by bus, and takes us across the world's largest suspension bridge. There are over 18.5 million people in this metro area, making it second in size only to Tokyo in Japan. A bit further away is Hiroshima (about 3.5 hours away).

Some notable things in and around Naruto:Naruto is famous for it's whirlpools, which can reach up to 20 meters in diameter.

It is the start of the Shikoku Pilgrimage, a journery around the island to visit 88 Buddhist temples.

Naruto Kintoki sweet potatoes are famous around Japan.　　The picture is the regional Hello Kitty, where she is dressed up as a sweet potato.

Every summer, Tokushima City hosts the Awa Dance Festival, where people do choreographed dances while parading down the street. Many places in Japan hold dance festivals during this time, the traditional Buddhist Obon festival, a time for honoring one's ancestors. It's fairly similar to the Mexican Day of the Dead. The festival in Tokushima seems to be a little less serious than other dance festivals of its type, and Awa Odori is sometimes translated as "fool's dance." This will be our first major festival during our time in Japan, so I'm sure we'll take pictures of it.