Today was a beautiful day, very mild and reasonably warm. I had very few commitments and was able to explore Chigasaki with my host family. But first, our group was to be dressed in Kimonos and participate in a tea ceremony. I will have more photos to post up when I receive them from the group, but for now I will share the photos that Courtney took of me:
Me in my Kimono - front
Me in my kimono - back
We were allowed to choose our own kimono from the pile, but with so many parts it was basically a guess on what it would look like. I believe I picked very well. All the girls looked amazing in their kimonos. The tea ceremony was challenging, because we were supposed to kneel for the entire ceremony on very hard floors, which caused a lot of pain in all of the participants. We were served green tea which was extremely hot and very difficult to drink. However I did have a lot of fun and the Kimonos were very comfortable and warm. The funniest part was that because I have a very large set of back muscles, it took a long time to get the Kimono on me as it had to be adjusted to sit correctly. I did have trouble not showing my knees during the ceremony due to the way it sat and my feet were far too big for the shoes I was wearing. Clearly I was not meant to be a Japanese lady!
After the Tea Ceremony, I went home and had noodles for lunch with my home stay family. We then decided to go for a walk down to the beach and then go shopping. The beach is very different to Australian beaches. Apparently the water is not very clean and they have a lot of litter problems, which means it is not a good idea to walk on the beach barefoot, there is a lot of broken glass unfortunately. On clear days you can see Mount Fuji and we did have a small view of it today, but I wasn't able to capture it very well on camera, the air was just too hazy.
Entrance to Chigasaki Beach
To the North (the beach is the Pacific Ocean)
The step down to the actual beach (pebbles, not sand)
To the South standing on the rocks
Me at the beach - nice day, but completely flat - no good waves for surfing
Mount Fuji is in the background
I changed the contrast to make it easier to see
After the beach we went shopping. The store we went too was a 7/11, but it was like a department store in Australia (a big David Jones for instance), with a huge number of levels and different shops. One of the shops we stopped at was the 100 yen shop, which sells everything for 100 yen, unlike the so-called $2 shops in Australia. The variety of things sold there was amazing, from stationary through to toys for children. We also bought some food for tomorrow and some afternoon tea which was some sweet breads and apple pie. When we arrived home and ate, it was amazing. Consider me well fed today.
Strawberries at the shops - crazy expensive to me, apparently very cheap (about $5.80 for the small punnet, $13.50 for large)
This evening I attended a Welcoming Party held by the International Association of Chigasaki. It was a fun night with lots of food and many people to talk to. I made a new friend named Kana, who is 21 and studying English at University. We also had performances by a live band and learnt to dance the Tanko Bushi or Coal Miner's Song. Finally, we were asked to perform a piece of Australia, so we chose to dance the Nutbush which gained its primary popularity in Australia. Ironically, most of the delegation did not know the dance, but we had a lot of fun teaching everyone how to do it.
With the performers from this evening
In our new IAC shirts
Our Nutbush Dancing
Dancing the Tanko Bushi
As I wrote this blog we had a very exciting moment. An earthquake hit the other side of the country and it was felt here. My host family has an alarm which goes off when an earthquake is about to hit. Having never been in an earthquake before I didn't know what to expect, but it was a strange experience to feel the ground move underneath you. So far everyone is okay, but we don't know everything yet. Hopefully everything is okay.
I do have some other photo updates for you. Firstly, Hotel Asian Centre in Toyko posted up their photo of us and whilst it is low quality, I felt like I should show you:
Wearing Happi in Hotel Asian Centre, Toyko
Mana, the english student from next door who visited last night
We talked alot
Tomorrow is my free day with my host family. I can't wait to find out what they have planned for me!
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