rest of the weekend

On Sunday morning, after waking up at noon, chad and I went down to the showers. The next stage in our fun time at the nanner house involved us having to use our t-shirts to dry off after we took our showers. lawl. I also had a weird moment where I didn't realize a person had started using the shower next to mine, so as I was rinsing out my hair, I saw soap go rolling by under my feet and I was trying to figure out how it bounced off the side of the wall or whatever. It was only later that I figured out that someone was in there, whoops!

We then headed on out for Kyoto, as we were going to go to Heian-jingu for the day. The trip takes about two hours if you include the walk from the nanner house, but it was a nice way to just relax and enjoy the day. Chad and I laughed at mistakenly saying 'good morning' to people instead of 'good afternoon' because we had woken up so late. The ride was nice and relaxing on the way there,one of the benefits of starting from the osaka end was that it isn't difficult to snag seats on the express lines.

We got to our stop, and gave alberto a ring and were able to meet up with Haruna and Alberto, which included chad and I getting a hug in the middle of a busy street from Haruna, which was super adorable. I think we'd all forgotten just how awesome she is.

So Chad and I grabbed some lunch (it was nearing 3 lol) from a conbini and then we made our way over to the temple. We caught up with Haruna and also enjoyed the beautiful scenery (as well as the nice weather, lucky ducks down in Osaka) as we made our way to the temple.

Once there, we started snapping photos of pretty much everything, and then chad and I sat down and had our lunch. Afterwards we made our way into and through the temple grounds, laughing like fools and snapping pictures the entire time.

We got some great ones that included the scenery and just us having a great time through and through. It was a good way to spend a couple of hours on a Sunday afternoon.

Afterwards, we made our way to the train station and bid farewell to Haruna, then Alberto, Chad, and I meandered Kyoto for several hours. We started by just wandering around the city to see what was going on and such. Along the way, we had a great time walking along a path down by the river that snakes through the city. while doing this, we found a spot where rocks had been placed through the river so we could hop across. This led to a frenzy of silly pictures and general shenanigens in the middle of kyoto river and us just having a great time. We paused for a rest on the other side next to a group of japanese and french chatting and playing the guitar and violin. It was a good way to pass some time, for sure.

After this, while walking along the banks, we saw a couple standing at the front of a room (their backs to us, as they were back along the windows and we were behind the building walking) who were at what appeared to be their wedding. I decided it would be fun to snap a picture of them from down where we were, and I set up my camera (set to night settings) so i could get a nice exposure. I pressed the button, and then FLASH! which prompted a yell of 'CHEESE IT!" from alberto and us sprinting away like fools. Ahahah.

This led to a ton of laughing by us and then we finally made our way to an okonomiyaki place for dinner. The best part of this dinner was either alberto finally breaking down and throwing his ice cube on the hot stove to watch it melt, and then as it's boiling having the waitress come up with our food and alberto having to look really guilty, or the lady refusing to let us put the sauce on our own food and alberto telling her 'i can do it myself' several times. Also great was that there was a contingent of what we figured must be engineering majors at the store, who all decided to leave at once.

Afterwards we made our way to a conbini and snagged some crepe's as dessert (there was a crepe store in it) They were really delicious!

After that we made our way back to the station and started to head home, since it was about 2 hours to make it all the way back to Osaka. We got back with time to spare and went to bed around midnight since We had to leave the nanner house by 8:30 in order for me to make it to Kyoto in time to catch my bus. Unfortunately, I had a terrible time falling asleep that night, as a combination of a hot bed, and mosquitoes in the room pretty much drove me insane. That, and I had only been awake for 12 hours when i tried to crash. Things were made worse by the fact that my phone, which was going to serve as our alarm, died at 5am.

But then I was finally able to get some sleep, and Japanese technology came to the rescue. The phone turned itself on to set off the alarm, and then shut itself off again since it was so low on battery. awesome.

so we got up and headed on out by 8:30 and made our way to Kyoto station. It ended up actually being a bit of a close call, as we got into kyoto station with just 15 minutes until my bus left, and this station is HUGE. Luckily, Chad's Japanese skills saved the day as we were able to ask and get directions to where we were going, and I got on the bus with time to spare. I bid chad farewell and made my way home. The layover in Nagoya was a bit long, but I was able to pick up some cookies for the staff as a gift, and I also got to ride on buses that were larger this time, so my knees were very thankful that they had some room this time. I got in at just around 6 and started to walk home.

I was surprised by one of the ladies who was on the bus with me stopping and asking me if I wanted a ride home. Turns out she is the wife of one of the teachers (I'm pretty sure that's what she said!:P) and she was kind enough to take me home. Awrw!

All in all, I had an exceptionally great time this weekend haning out with old friends, and I laughed harder than I had in a while. Greatness. :-)