More festivals?

Okazaki fireworks. Convenience stores were packed.

You can still see the fringed taste buds!!!

Minori and Takuya

At takuyas BBQ

Went biking this morning. Found a little bamboo road.

Back at Okazaki.

Beautiful colors

Those lanterns kept moving while tegu floated, it was cool

Osu Kannon!

Going home from Okazaki. Found a feller sleeping.

Look right? I thought it looked so ghostly.

Cosplay weekend at Osu Kannon

Went to my town's biggest shrine today. Osu Kannon!

Minori, Jaciel, even John thought these two were real. I had to point out the playboy rabbit on the soldier's shoulder, and tell them that the NYPD had no reason to be there before they believed me.

There's a reason that there were so many photographers. It's the same reason I took the photo at this angle.

Apparently you can be a power ranger well into your fifties.

Who?

That mid area man is a man.

Do you wanna take the subway....

How's he going to eat his food...

The characters were endless

Red bean fish ha ha ha

Pictures

Photo dump. My phone needs more memory so I'm putting these online.

Two things

- cicadas are everywhere here, louder than freaking car alarms. They are huge. Minori lives them, saying they chirp about the coming of summer, while I just keep thinking of car alarms going off.

- that's what school yards look like.

T'was on a train, noticed a road lined with sunflowers. Plus I love rice paddies

I know it's just sweet red bean, but has anyone seen snow piercer? Lol

Went to a sushi conveyer belt place. This is normal, where you are given cups, and then you put a small dash of green tea and water in.

Just chilling while Minori drove about

Found a great priced Yukata/kimono shop. There were tons. That small clump there is for particular events. Not like normal kimono

Some freaking expensive kimono.

Wow

She keeps making me lunch!

Went out to dinner with Minori michiyo and Mihoko. The dinner cost as much as a round trip flight to Korea. This is some egg pudding I tried.

Veggies about to be boiled

It was a sushi/boiling restaurant. They gave you the stuff, and you put them in one of two different stock flavored water, and chose how long you wanted them to boil. I always love the amount if dishwater used for meals. And I learned another batch of eating etiquette. Will I ever use chopsticks correctly? Ha ha

Oh, had a Jehovah's Witness knock on my door today. Interesting

Ha ha ha ha!!!!

I confused the hell out of poor Takuya last night lol. I sleep-walked. I awoke to barking, but I thought it was some of the school kids being loud. So I shouted HEY as I run down the stairs. When I saw Takuya with the dogs, we both looked at each other pretty confused. And then I only confused him more by going off about "oh! I thought they were the kids!" 

And then things got a lot clearer. It dawned on me that I'd just leapt out of bed, thumped quickly down the stairs, and shouted HEY in a dead silent house full of sleeping people. Not to mention I'd tried to logically explain something to Takuya which was really just gobbledygook from whatever I'd been dreaming about. Takuya speaks English, but not too fluently, so he was quite confused. At first I was like "......ahhh." And then,".....oh no. This is embarrassing." And it all ended with me plopping back down on my futon, laughing as quietly as possible.

Ha!

K first things first One of my students has a prominent government official for his pop.

As I was approaching my door after work, I saw some adds sticking through the mail slot. I could see a large image of a man's face. I had a quick wonder about how cool it would be if I got an add  about Hayato's dad. I swear that's what I was thinking! Because I know it's going to sound like a lie when I say that the add turned out to be an dad promoting Hayato's dad after all ha ha ha

Fireworks

There were lots of food stalls. I tried a super long cucumber and some Hiroshima-yaki. Lots of cabbage in there.

Then we went through the crowds to find a spot for fireworks. There were people who'd brought their dining room tables and full fledged meals out there, what a fantastic idea!

We found a spot to stand, but after ten minutes, a family on one of the tarps came over and said,"Americanjin?" And then we got invited to sit on their tarp! They had arrived at six am to reserve their spot, so we were really lucky to get to sit! I hadn't realized how many gifts I've gotten here just because I'm American. Anyway!

Jaw-dropping awesomeness. At first they were doing these small ones one by one, which made me think it wa going to be lame, but then Minori told me that the first part of the show was a memorial to those who died in the river that year. After that...boom!

By halftime I was telling Minori to never visit America during the fourth of July because fireworks in America suck compared to what I was watching just then. Best fireworks I've ever seen!

I was planning on uploading some videos but apparently I any from my iPod. So...here is a bad photo of something I was calling "the mushroom" all night. It's a raised botanical garden. It was on the far side of the lake. I'd never seen one before so I kept pointing it out. At first I'd thought it was a UFO lol

Fireworks had four stages. The memorial stage, three Stages of fireworks, and some fireworks sent up by sponsors. After the show we made our way home through the crowd. Yukatas everywhere!

Because I was already stuffed with Hiroshima-yaki, I passed on the giant squid. But there's another festival tonight, so I'll try it then!!

Toyota City

Did I mention how much I LOVE Japan?   

A LOT of firsts, yet again. I stayed at Minori's for the weekend. I love it there! I woke up at five thirty with the sun out brighter than ever. When I went downstairs  I found that we were going to have a traditional Japanese breakfast. I also learned where you place each dish, how to hold your food, and how to wrap your rice in seaweed with only chopsticks. Impressive stuff. For breakfast we had chopped cucumber topped with a special seaweed shaving, some egg rolls , miso soup, rice, and dried fish. I remember one of my fishes had it's charred eye popping out of its socket, and it later got mixed in with my rice. A funny moment. They were crunchy  yet tasty. Mom and Pop, imagine jumbo sized almond fish and that's what I had.

After breakfast, Minori and I went to the mall to look for some flowers for my hair. The amount of new stuff I'd not seen before was overwhelming. I accidentally knocked over a shelf of flowers, and broke my sunglasses in all the distraction. After we found a our hair decor, we browsed for an hour. I was searching for presents for two blondes I happen to know, but it was all so much, I arrayed getting stressed out and mad so I gave up. Next weekend. Ooo I got to try a special grape smoothie, yum. After browsing we drove home and cooked some ham rice. Now I know how to cook it Japanese style. Then we got ready for our yukatas and meeting John at the station. Minori being the sweet person that she is, had bought me a cute fan.