Twenty-Third Post

November 18, 2018

Today I woke up early to go to Arashiyama with two of my classmates. It was super fun. First, Manami and I went to Arashiyama station to meet our other classmate Honoka, and then we crossed a bridge where we met an old lady who asked me (in English) for directions on how to get to two different places. This was hard for me to explain because I had no idea where to go- I was following my friends. Thankfully they were very nice and helped her out a little bit. After, we climbed up a mountain for around 20 minutes to go see monkeys at the top of the hill. There were so many of them and they were really cute! We got lots of pictures. The next place we went to was the main city area- where there were tons of small shops and food stops. We got some okonomiyaki and got to meet a nice family and got to talk to them a bit. We went to an omiyage store where I bought a t-short that has Japanese on the back. I can actually understand what it says! Then we got some tapioca drinks and went to the famous bamboo forest. There were so many people. 

We parted around there and I went back to my home stay for a few hours before I got ready to go to Kyoto station where I met up with my two friends, Tomoya and Nao! 

We went to a place called ‘Rolly’s’ where they sell rolled ice cream. The lineup was really long, but I think it was worth it. Te process of making the rolled ice creams was really cool to see, and it tasted delicious! We couldn’t find any tables to sit at or any spots that were available right away so we all went outside and sat on the edge of a garden. We took lots of pictures! We wanted to see koyou- which means ‘autumn leaves’ in Japanese, so we took the train to a temple called ‘Byodoin’. It was dark out, so there were lots of lights that lit up the temple and showed it’s complete and flawless reflection on the pond surrounding it- as well as the red and yellow autumn leaves. A camera would never be able to perfectly capture the true essence of it. We took our time through the paths and then walked to a restaurant for dinner. After some yummy food, we are now on the train to go home and get ready for another week of school. The thing I can be excited about for that is that Friday is a holiday in japan/ thanksgiving labour day’ is what Nao told me it was from google translate, and then on next Monday it’s my 17th birthday! Super stoked :)