Enoshima Videos

So I think I figured out how to post videos. We'll see. I think all you have to do is press the big play button to do it. So exciting. Still wish I would have found out about this earlier... Me and my inept at technology...



I took about 40 pictures on this side of the island. It was really pretty. Just rocks and waves splashing against them. So what. I'm a hippy, I know.



Right before I took this one I got splashed and some old ladies laughed at me. You can sort of see the old birds in the video. After the video I jumped across the little cavern and almost fell. good times.



This was at a buddhist service going on in a temple on Enoshima. I had never seen an actual service with regular people participating before. The air was really really thick with incense. I felt kind of weird taking video and pictures, but I'm sure I wasn't the only one. From what I could understand, the guy in the middle is the "Grand Buddhist Master" of the temple. Oh and the picture of the demons I took yesterday were right outside this temple.



Here is a video of the beach. On the far right is Enoshima. To the sort of left centre is Kamakura.

Enoshima Pt. 1

Today it was nice and sunny I decided to make a trip down to 江ノ島 (Enoshima). Enoshima (which litterally means "bay's island") is near Kamakura in Kanagawa prefecture. I tried to find a map to compare that with Tokyo, but alas, I couldn't find anything.

Oh and also. This is another 56k-modem-unfriendly post with lots of pictures. Just a warning. And also speaking of pictures, I'd like to say that I figured out that my camera can do videos. Which makes me kind of mad that I am just now finding this out. I mean how many times have I thought to myself "ahh..I wish I could take more than a picture, even just 10 seconds..". Oh well. I haven't quite figured out how to post videos on here but I'll figure it out probably.



This it one of the stations to get to Enoshima. I thought it kind of odd that it looks this way. It's not even that big of a station.


A sign pointing you to the right direction.



A picture of Enoshima from the past. Edo period I'm guessing.


I should have thought earlier to try to take a picture like the one above, but this is the closest thing to it.


The entrance to the island.


not quite sure what these are. Some sort of shelled animal. I saw people grilling them later on.


This is on the right side of the island.








On the way up to the other shrines there was this thing. I've seen this on TV shows a lot in Japan. It's a replica of the one in Italy where Audrey Hepburn had her "Roman Holiday". Every Japanese guy that went past it put his hand in his and acted like it was caught and every time his woman would do a girlish scream. Like in the movie.


A torii gate leading up to the other shrines.


A mural of buddhas being buddha.


A fountain with some turtles.


Some "Ema" (the boards you write your wishes on) near a shrine.


The view of the bridge leading to Enoshima.


Scary statues of Japanese "Oni" (demons).


In one of the washrooms was this sink.


This was the sign for that washroom. Notice the elaborate pictures of "man" and "woman". i guess stick figures weren't good enough for the dragon sink.

I'm going to post another one tommorrow. I figured you might need a break. Afterall, I took 95 pictures...haha. So stay tuned.

Hell hath no fury...

...like an old lady on a train.

Seriously. I think the rudest people in all the world may be Japanese old ladies on the train. If you are in their way, they will push you without saying a thing. It's not even a race thing, they will do it to other Japanese as well. Yesterday this crazy old bird practically hit a group of high school boys to get to a seat. This is all somewhat ironic because you often hear from the older generation here about young people today being so rude. But really they need to have a manners class for crazy old women on the train.

Tastes

To continue on this theme of food, two disturbing things happened yesterday that I thought I should report.

Yesterday in my daily trip to the QQ (the 99 yen store), I saw a thing of Natto and decided I should give it a try. I had tried this food once before in high school when our teacher brought some for us to try. Natto is easily the most offensive food of Japan. (Here's a link to tell you more.) It's like fermented soybeans and smell somewhat like rotting garbage and it's really stringy. Anyway, so I hadn't had natto since I'd come to Japan, so I wanted to give it another try. And well...I actually kind of liked it. The thing is, I know how it tastes. I remember when I tasted it 4 or so years ago, you can't forget that taste. So this means after 7 months or so of Japanese food, my taste has changed so much that I can not only stand natto, but semi-enjoy it.

And if that isn't disturbing enough, here's another changing tastes story. Also in QQ yesterday they had Dorrito's "nacho cheesier" type crisps. Being that they are my favourite, I bought those up fast. I was pretty excited about seeing those cuz I had been missing that kind of flavour. But sadly, when I ate them...they weren't that good. Which afraids me cuz I wonder what will happen when I go back and eat all this food that I haven't eaten in a year. I had better still enjoy Taco Bell.

That's all I got.