The Sword and the Onesan

Greetings, True Believers! I know, I know, it has been many weeks, AGAIN! This is due to all the projects, presentations, and work I've had to deal with, not to mention all the awesome trips I've been on. So in another effort I plan to have these last few blog entries up in a matter of days instead of days. It's hard to believe that a whole semester in Japan has flown by just like that. But sadly things must come to an end I am seeing the last bits of work ahead of me (a.k.a Final Exams, the bane of all college student's lives). 

Another adventure begins one week for me from now and it is China. My mom is heading over to China to meet up with me and I am super psyched. I have all the travel arrangements and itinerary ready for Beijing. Then, we will head to Tokyo for a few days before departing for the United States. I should be home by the twentieth of December, depending I decide to conquer other lands of Asia.

So back to the blog: What have I been up to besides school work? When I'm not experimenting with cooking, I have traveled the country, seen the sights, and learned about the culture. One workshop I went to was how to handle a samurai sword. The man in charge was named Tetsuro Shimaguchi, a weapons expert from Japan (in the first picture, he is the man in the white robe). For those of you who are old enough, he was Miki, an assassin in Kill Bill Vol. 1. He is famous in Japan for his choreography fights, samurai roles, and choreographed the entire last fight of Kill Bill (one epic movie, watch it when you are OLD enough!!!). So that day, I was working with a movie star.

When I picked up the sword, or in this case a bokken, wooden sword, I knew what to do. For those of you who don't know, I took several years of martial arts known as Tae Kwon Do and part of my training involved a sword. As soon as I held it, he KNEW I had some training under my belt. Wow was all I could think, before I even began to train. He instructed us in several stances, strikes, and helped us perfect our techniques with his two assistants. He gave us a look at how to choreograph a samurai fight and even allowed us to go up and try it ourselves. Here are my results from start to finish:

The night overall was very enjoyable and a lot of fun. I was able to use a sword again and it felt nice to practice my skills. At the end, he allowed us to get pictures with him in traditional robes and pose "Hollywood style." I asked him some questions about more advanced techniques and more and more people stayed behind to learn some more even after everything was done. Hopefully I can continue my training again someday.

The very next day was our trip to Nikko, a rural area of Japan, home to many temples, monkies and onesans. The day started late because we waited for a late student who never showed up and we got stuck in Japanese traffic on the bus ride (Japanese traffic is ten times worse than American traffic any day of the week). 

We arrived in the afternoon to Nikko Toshogu, a national treasure for Japan. The area was all hills and greenery, which was a great change from the grays of the city. The weather that day was perfect at the temple area. The group I was with traveled up a long gravel path to the top of a hill, where the main temple was. We entered three main areas of the Temple and saw the area was under reservation as well. The most fascinating aspect of the temple was the details to all the buildings. This was one of the most detailed temples I have ever been to and I tried to take as many pictures as I could. It was quite a sight, so here are some pictures for your entertainment.

After spending two hours at the Temple, we took the bus up the mountains to see the Kegon Waterfall. We had to travel through the Irohazaka Mountain path, which is famous for its snake like roads and monkeys. At the Temple, one would notice a lot of the detail featured monkeys and a cage for some as well. Unfortunately, we did not see the monkeys up close (but I did catch sight of one from the moving bus). This area brought up fond memories of Boone, NC because of how much it reminded me of the mountains I drive through to get to school. Here are some more pictures, along with the Kegon Waterfall we stopped to see, along with wooden statues for sale in the area.

The last thing my group did was travel to the Yashio Hot Springs, which is where I experienced an onesan. An onesan is a sort of resort, where people relax in Japan's famous hot springs or get massages. The area and resort were very beautiful and the onesan I was in was outside in the cool Fall weather with beautiful mountain scenery. The one important point about onesans that many people were unaccustomed to was that you had to be completely naked to be in them. No cloths, just a small towel. Naked. Was it a little uncomfortable? Yes, for me it was; but I got used to it quickly and everyone took the dive together. We respected the culture, did not make a big deal of it, and had a nice relaxing time at the onesan.

That's all for now. The only other thing that happened on the trip was having a karaoke seccesion on the bus to little success. The only English songs they had were two relatively known songs and a few Beatles selections (Japan loves The Beatles). I have my hardest final tomorrow, which is Japanese. But once that is out of the way, I'll have plenty of free time to finish up my blog in Japan. I am counting down to China and the many adventures I'll have there, too. More entries up soon and I am excited for what the future holds. Stay tuned, True Believers!

"Hope is a waking dream" - Aristotle