Yokohama and food

Here are a bunch of pics this week. As usual, read the post first, then go to the pics. I also want to apologize for the straight up scenery pics and video. I don't take too many pics and vids of people or of myself. I'll work on that this week so that you can see me in action or something. Plus it's proof that I'm really in Japan.

Also, if you can not watch the videos, please make sure you have Flash installed on your computer. Please go here to download it.

Well, one thing I forgot to mention earlier this week is that we had another earthquake. I believe this one was a magnitude of 4.4. We hardly felt it. I was in the second story of the TUJ building and the building shook a little, as if a heavy set man person was sprinting down the hallway. We started to whisper to each other and the teacher got annoyed, not realizing there was an earthquake. When we told her, she got all upset and had to sit down. Funny, she was the only Japanese person in the room (class size was 40) and it scared her the most.

The Yokohama trip was interesting but wasn't run very well. Japanese TUJ students led us around, similar to our orientation. They procrastinated and did not plan well, so we ended up wasting lots of time. I liked Yokohama though; it's a big city and the differences between it and Tokyo are stark. If you don't know much about Yokohama, it's south of Tokyo, very close. Population is 3.5 million. Tokyo (pop: 8.5 mil, depending on how you define Tokyo)and Yokohama are pretty much just one continuous city.

First stop was the Raumen (Ramen) Museum. It was interesting for it's recreation of an old Tokyo neighborhood. There are 8 ramen restaurants spread around the "neighborhood, " each serving a unique bowl of ramen. I did not try any, as the lines were ridiculously long (I heard it wasn't anything special anyway). Instead I went to the soda shop with a friend and had an amazing cherry soda vanilla float. Simple amazing that thing. Here's a video walking through the "streets:"


Next stop was this really random walk around downtown Yokohama. That's pretty much all we did, walk around, not being told where we were going and not being able to stop at all. More vids:



Next stop was a little boat ride around Yokohama Bay. Not much to say here, it was just a boat ride. I suppose it was neat to see stuff from the water. Oh, did I mention we waited at the pier for the boat forever? I think half the time we were waiting for something, either a boat, train, people or our guides' brains to start thinking. Vid:


Next we just hung out in a park, walked around, through grass a each other (funner that it sounds). 3 of us walked to a convenience store and I was asked to try these bean paste treats. They weren't bad actually. They had red bean paste between to small pancakes. I forgot what they were called, but they didn't taste like beans. It was more fruity I think.

Exciting huh. Last stop was Yokohama Chinatown. Very cool place, I liked it here. Very happening, full of bright colors and things. 8 of us went into this Chinese restaurant for dinner. We got to eat in a room that had tatami mats (Japanese straw mats) with a table that had a giant lazy susan in the middle. It was a family style restaurant. We had a private room that was Japanese style (strange we were in a Chinese restaurant), with the paper walls, sliding doors, please remove your shoes before going in rule, etc. I thought it wasn't bad, we had plenty of food with plenty of variety: 2 kinds of soup, spring rolls, duck skin that you folded with other ingredients to make a taco like thing, 2 kinds of shrimp, fried rice of course, vegetables, some beef stir fry stuff, some other meat I think, tea, and lots of other things I can't remember. It was great. Plus, somebody had poured out roasted chestnuts for us to snack on which were also good. Video of Chinatown:


Yes, so that was that. I went home after that (which was hard because the people I was with weren't all together on how we were to get home). Sunday I did the church thing. I also went on the hunt for some needed stuff. Couldn't' find hand sanitizer or air freshener, but I did find white vinegar! And Datu Puti at that, an even better version! I was so happy, I tired some right after I got out of the store. They also were selling other Filipino stuff, like spices, Sinigang soup mix, etc. I'll be back. Weird thing about it is that it was a 100 yen store (like a dollar store) were I found these things, and the owners were European. Go figure.

For those who are interested, Jess climbed Mt. Fuji Saturday into Sunday. Some people in my dorm went with her and from the sounds of it, they had a blast. I really wish I had gone. I'm not sure if I'll do it or not; time is running out before winter comes (on the mountain, that's in 3 weeks) and my schedule is pretty busy as well.

That wraps up this post. So, next time I promise a more personal post (in regards to pics, vids), and perhaps a video blog, lol.