Pictures

It's getting chilly outside. Probably still warm to some, but the south has thinned my blood. Time for some pictures.


Here is the package for the Pee Pole. That is right, a pee pole. It was for urine collection for our heath check-up at the Uni gym. but of course everything in Japan has a cartoon charachter on it and is cute. Bodily fluid collections are no exception. Even stranger is that the two blob things are themselves peeing on the pee pole and vaguely anatomically correct.. Oh Japan.



This is a street on Roppongi. Roppongi is the party district for foreigners in Tokyo. Pretty much dirty and skeazy. Well not really dirty for skeazy, just for Japan it's dirty and skeazy.



Here are some elementary school kids in the train station from the other day. They all had on matching yellow hats. They may have been hard hats. I've seen quite a lot of kids wearing hard-hats here. This wasn't the elementary school thing I went to yesterday, none of those photos showed up. Just some rando kids at the station.



This is the american pool table at the billards place we went to friday. This is in tokyo, I promise I didn't have leftover pictures from waco.



This was at the Pool hall. This is Aki and Miho, respectively from the left. Aki is an exchange student here from Leeds. And Miho is a student from Hosei, the one that showed us around friday.



This, again at the pool hall, is Attila and Quentin. Atilla being the one shooting at the time. Shortly thereafter he got too into the game and broke a glass. It was his glass of redeye (beer and tomato juice), that he had ordered thinking it was red bull (an energy drink). So it didn't smell too well...




This was the big sign in the restaurant we went to friday. It said "I love New Yorl" on this sign but I think it said "I love New York" everywhere else.



Miho and I at the Shirokiya.



Quentin (left) and Daniel (right) at the Shirokiya. In Japan when you take a picture everyone does the peace sign. I have no idea why. And after a while, even the westerners will do it.




Here is a street on Shibuya. The pool hall and the Shirokiya were at Shibuya. It's another party sort of town, but much less trashy. And less creepy foreigners.



This was out in front of our dorm friday night when we got back. One of those "you had to be there" situations. Quentin had put a bag on his head instead of getting an umbrella in the pouring rain.



This is a sign in Shinjuku that says not to smoke and walk. Most of the ku's (the wards of Tokyo) have laws aimed at stopping people smoking and walking. I've seen plenty of people break this rule, but there are signs all over nonetheless.



This was a small amusement park in Ueno yesterday.



This was the first temple we went to yesterday. No one could read the kanji for the name, so we never figured out the name.



This was the main part of that temple. There is a white sheet in between the coutyard and the inner temple. I'm not sure what exactly this is for. But it is somewhat like a protecterate for the sacredness of the inner from the outer.



This was a statue dedicated to peace I think. All those colourful bands of paper are 1000 little origami cranes. When you make 1000 origami cranes and make a wish it comes true. I think that is the legend. And often the wish is for peace. Obviously whatever deity told us that has lied, because I'm pretty sure there were more than 1000 cranes there and I have yet to hear about peace.



This is a place at that temple where you buy a piece of wood for 500 yen and write your prayer/wishes on it. It can be things like good health, money, good grades etc. It was neat becuase there were people from all over the world that had written up something.



This was in between a temple and a shrine. It was a little alcove probably dedicated to an ancestor of someone. You see these a lot in the countryside of Japan. Not so much in Tokyo.



This was the entrance to a shrine. When there is a gate like this, be it orange or not, you can immediately tell it is a shinto shrine. I thought this one was very pretty. It was in stark contrast to the green mossy nature around it.



This was at that shrine. It was a place where you could cleanse yourself before entering the inner shrine and praying. I think this is a shinto thing only, but I remember seeing cleansing stations like this at temples. Not sure. Basically you take the cup and wash your hands and gargle the water to show that you cleanse yourself of all you have done today and all you have said.



This was a huge field of some type of greenery and at the end of that was big city life.



This was some type of statue on the side of the road. Not sure what it was, but it had insense burning and was pretty.




This was at a temple. Inside the stand thing was a bunch of insensce burning. You are supposed to wave the inscense over the part of your body that is hurt or you would like to improve. So if you have a sore back you wave the inscense over your back and if you would like to preform well at yoru next test you wave the inscense over your head. This is kind of like the cleansing thing at shinto shrines.

The pictures didn't do the shrines and temples justice. That or I just can't take pictures. I'm off to prepare for another monday of doom. The hardest classes of the week, bring them on.