Kyoto...mainly

Something is seriously wrong. I can't upload photos! Argh!
Well, I know I haven't written anything in a while so I'll just fill you in on the last three weeks.

My trip with Tim and Min was pretty cool and crazy. I have to show you the photo of all the soft toys we won from the UFO catcher machines...although I might be giving them away soon, unless some of you back home want them :). Anyway, we went to this place called Fuji Go-ko (meaning five lakes around Fuji) for 2 days. It was terrible, because the weather was terrible. So not much to say there, except we went to these bat caves, which I mistakenly and stupidly thought there would be bats inside, but...no. No bats. Just a wet cave with really low ceilings, which is why I guess they gave us the helmets to wear before we went in.

We left for Kyoto in the afternoon on the 20th. On the shinkansen (bullet train) I sat next to this really nice 50-year-old lady who couldn't speak any English. I can hardly speak any Japanese, but I tried with all my might... and it paid off! She bought an ice-cream for Mini, hahahaha. My Japanese lessons are not to no avail! So Kyoto was cool, I'll let the photos do the talking, but we did get to visit some really nice temples. In retrospect, there's so much that we missed because there are literally hundreds of temples in Kyoto, and they all look really cool in the brochure, hehehe. Have to go back there again, anyone for a holiday?

We took one day to Nara, a 40 minute train ride to the next-door city. In Nara, we basically went to this famous temple called Todai-ji, which is the largest wooden building in the world. That's a great fact, although we didn't actually go inside and see the giant, giant Buddha statue they have there. Missed that. Anyway, there were tons of deer in Nara, just tons! I have a video of Tim being salivated on by the deer, hehehe.

The only really bad thing about the holiday was that I fell sick, and in turn, got Mini sick too, (sorry Minzo!) It was freezing up in Kyoto so my body was battling that while dealing with being sick...so not fun. We spent three days in Kyoto and came back on the 23rd/Nov. Ironically, we had gone to Fuji Go-ko to get a view of Mt. Fuji, but we ended up getting a view of Mt. Fuji at an observation deck in an office in Shinjuku! Though small, it was pretty impressive.

Anyway, I took Tim and Min to Yokohama...and that's where the soft toy fun began. We went into one of the arcades to play the usual games (Mario Kart, and maybe Smash Tennis) but we saw a lot of people trying their hand at these UFO catcher machines (the claw grabbing machines, you know the ones). Anyway, the key in Japan is to actually 'push' the soft toys into the holes, not grab them with the claws. So the staff place the soft toys enticingly at the edge so people will try their hand. It's actually quite difficult. We started one night with a Relac-Kuma (Relax Bear). That was our first try and it was expensive; it cost 1400Y. Not a proud moment...hahaha! But after that we went crazy. I think that night we got 5 toys in total, some for 200Y (one grab). Funnily enough, the next day we went back to that area in Yokohama and won a couple more toys; it was insane. The coolest one I have is a motorised Cookie Monster that rides on a see-saw. I WILL show a movie, its very kawaii!

Anyway, last Sunday was my first Sunday off, and I got to go to church! RAA!!!! Was so great, just being in that atmosphere, I had a great time. Heard a great message too from Pastor Ray, Dennis' friend. So I'm really looking forward to going back there this Sunday, should be able to meet more people; the bad thing is my Japanese sucks, and there are lots of Japanese in the church. All the foreigners there already know how to communicate in Japanese. But it'll be a welcome challenge!

That's me for now, thanks for reading my long blog!