What an amazing day!

Kyou wa totemo suteki deshita!

After our Japanese lesson with Raku san (who was so wonderful!), myself, Samantha, Yano san and Raku san went to Kitakyushu. Kitakyushu is a city famous for their steel factories and for Kokura Castle, which is especially beautiful in the Spring!

Firstly, Yano san treated the three of us to lunch at a wonderful restaurant that specializes in soba noodles. Soba noodles are made of buckwheat flour and are eaten cold dipped in soy sauce or hot in a soup (don't forget to slurp loudly!). The Japanese eat SO much and SO quickly. Yano san was done before I was half way through and then ate Sam's extra food (she ended up getting two meals because they initially brought her the wrong one - they gave her what she asked for complimentary to the wrong meal - amazing!)

After lunch, I tried explaining to Yano san what a "food baby" was. It went like this:
Olivia: "How do you say 'pregnant' in Japanese?"
Yano san: "Ninshin."
Olivia: "I am ninshin..."
Yano san: "Congratulations!"
Olivia: "....with food."
Yano san: "errr.....oh?! Haha!"

He eventually understood that it is an expression for over-full and bloated as opposed to actually carrying a child.

We then walked towards the Kokura Castle where sakura viewing parties (hanami) were in full swing! Samantha and I were stopped by a particularly outgoing Japanese woman and asked to take a photo with her. "Together! Want a picture with beautiful Japanese women?" I couldn't resist, she was too funny!

I took far more pictures than necessary of the sakura, the castle and the Kitakyushu area. But now I'm beginning to understand the hanami. The sakura flowers have a certain something that make you want to just look at them forever. Perhaps it's the knowledge of their temporary beauty, the flowers only last a couple of weeks. The Japanese treasure the time of the sakura blooming and they use the season as a reminder that beautiful things in life don't always last forever and to treasure the great things in life while you can.

The last bit of the day we spent walking around the Kitakysushu area. It was really nice! Kitakyshu is all hustle and bustle, with great smells from sushi restaurants to cafes to bakeries all stuffed into narrow streets. We went for tea and I had my very first real macha, where green tea powder is frothed with a bamboo whisk. It's pretty intense, healthy and high on the caffeine Richter scale, yippeeeee.

Finally, we found a purikura machine. Easily one of my FAVOURITE things in Japan. It's like a photobooth gone totallllly wild! The machine takes 6 pictures, and then makes your eyes really big and you can decorate it with stamps and words. Then it will print out multiple copies for you and your friends to share. They're cheap too, only 400 yen! You can't have a better time than when exposed to purikura with Yano san....unless you've got wigs.

And we had wigs.

I lent Yano san my sunglasses because without them he "looked like Andy Warhol".


The Japanese know how to have the most fun.