On top of the world

YAY

Yes, that sign says Mt. Fuji 6th station. Meaning you drive your car up to "level 5" and you walk the rest of the way. It doesnt sound to bad, but its rocky, and dangerous. But so beautiful, and the air so clean. As a matter of fact Ive got a massive bruise on my back side, and i scraped up my leg.

Ouch....

I probably fell because I was wearing a skirt.....

But when I was up there, I forgot about the pain. I was too busy trying to catch my breath, not from the climb, but from the beauty.....

It gave new meaning to the quote " Got your head in the clouds"

I certainly did.

This is one place you should go before you die.

Kyoto

Ok so here is the start of my day.....

Then Ayu, Harry, Grandmother (Obaachan) and I went to a Buddhist temple....

This is how Japanese people PARTAAAAY

This is one of the Buddhist Temples I went to.

And this would be my cute buddy Ayu, who happened to be wearing green flip flops, and the bottom of her feet turned green....a photographer is always ready!

More of the Temple.

So one of the temples is on a mountain. And you have to walk up this steep hill to get there, and then walk up MORE steps. But college students in the area, as a part time job, run people up and down the mountin in the little cart behind us. We didn't ride it, but the guy was as cute as a button, and so i asked to take a picture with him!

The cool thing is, that when you see them running past you, and you put your camera up, they strike a pose lol they love being photographed!

And although I almost died walking in that hot sun, up a mountain....the view was well worth my time.

And I realized, there is nothing like being behind the lense of my camera...

Awsome night

Well I went to see the HANABI (fireworks) with the other exchange students today. The International Board of my city arranged for all of the Gaijins (hahaha foreigners) to meet, and go together. My goodness you can tell an American when you see one....and by how we act LOL. We were the ones hooting and hollering and screaming YEEHAW at the hanabi lol

This video I think we were being well behaved and quiet. I was recording so I didnt want to scream and mess up my own video hahaha.

This is really great....

Can't get enough of Nagoya

I went back to Nagoya today; this is the castle. It was raining cats and dogs. But the day turned out to be ok. I went with my Indonesian friends, and my host grandmother, uncle, and cousin.

Then we went to this building....to the top. Its called Midland Square, but the top is called something like "Sky Promenade"

You have to pay to see the view...it was pretty impressing. And scary...

So on the way to buy the tickets to go to the top of the building, you walk through this cool....thing. LOL The lights blink, and change ect.....

This is Nagoya castle, from the top of the other building....pretty cool huh?

Scary....I know

Another cool looking view.....to my artistic photographer eye lol

Met some Sumo wrestlers

Thoes are my buddies Ive been talking about!!! Ayu, and Harry.

This is my host dad......

And this is what he likes to eat for dinner....raw octopus.

I decided to try it......

I had to wash that down with some good ol' Sake(j/p)....I mean green tea hahaha

Today was so fun, and its days like this that make me estatic because I still have 7 more months of this great adventure left!

This is the stuff dreams are made of....

An update from the last couple of days......

Two years ago my host family had an exchange student from Indonesia, and shes back to visit, and this time she bought her little brother along! It is so wonderful, and she has been helping me with my Japanese alot! I feel so special to be able to have an expereince like this; in Japan, at our host family's home, speaking japanese, eating Japanese food....An American girl, 2 people from Indonesia, sharing the same love for our Japanese family. Its really wonderful when you think about it....

Tonight for dinner we ate Somen noodles. So imagine thoes "make it yourself" taco kits( Same concept) but Japanese style.

we choose from steak, cucumber slices, and egg then add it to a bowl with ourchilled noodles and a brown sauce!

See? Yummy!!!!

It took some getting used to....at first i didnt like cold noodles, but it grew on me and i love it! Such is the case with many new foods, its just so different, but I try everything, and most times I end up liking it!

Ok so last Sunday I went to NAGOYA, which is 10 times bigger (and more awsome) than my small city of Toyohashi! This place is called SAKAE. The outside looks cool, but the stores are underground!!! lol There is a Starbucks (yay), a pokemon store, shoe stores, resturaunts....Its quite nice...

And last, but not least, this is my cute little host mother. Her shirt was crazy, it had a little hood, with little ears on it. We had to take a picture. I feel so lucky that I got this host family. I wouldnt change for anything, even if I was told that I could go live smack dab in the middle of Tokyo (which is what i orginally wanted) But I am happy in my small little city.

Im like a celebrity, everyone knows who I am!

Got Rice?

I do!!!

So, this is the rice field...in front of my house!!! I have watched it grow, and its getting so big, and green and healthy lol

I love this little rice field! GAMBATTE little rice!!! It is the little things I will remember most about Japan, and this is one of them! My own little rice garden!

Hey this is fun....

Well I will put some pictures up soon. Summer vacation is about to start! I am so happy because I need a break badly!

I went to Nagoya on Sunday with my American Exchange student friend Kassia! It was lovely!
Living in America, we take for granted that at any given moment we can see someone of a different enthinic origin, or nationality. In Japan, in the smaller cities, this is not the case. So it is annoying being one of few. BUT when I went to Nagoya, it is so diverse, it reminded me of home. And that felt nice......

Finally starting a real blog

Well Hello,

I apologize to all of you who went the the first website I was using as a blog, only to be disappointed that I did not update it much. It wasn't user-friendly, and I couldn't put all my pictures there so I'm going to give this one a try.

So far Japan is lovely, and interesting.
My host family is so awesome.
Ill try to write as much as I can, maybe once a week to let everyone know how i am doing.

All my love,
Paris in Japan