Unfortunately the time to say "bye-bye Japan" has come and it's been almost a month now since I left. So I won't have any more exciting things to post in the future. But since I still have a lot of unfiled pictures and quite a lot of time on my hands (since I don't have a job at the moment), I thought I would post some interesting pictures in retrospect. Duno if this makes a lot of sense, but here goes:
So my last trip before leaving Japan was to the majestic Fuji san. It was one of the things on my to do list while in Japan and since Fuji san defeated me almost 2 years back (basically I ran out of time and had to return to the bus before getting to the top), I though I'd tackle him again before leaving Japan. When I announced this to my friends some of them said they'd join me on my last journey before leaving.
Essentially there are two ways to climb Fuji san. One is to climb it during the day to see the sunset from the top and the other one's to climb Fuji san at night to get to the top for sunrise. We chose to start climbing Fuji san at 9pm to get to the top in time for sunrise.

The crazy climbing crew

Fuji at night from the 5th station

Station 7
Since this was the last possible climbing date befor the end of the official climbing season, so there was a big crowd
Sunrise at around 5am
(Unfortunately I fell asleep, waiting for the sunrise to start, so missed some of it - this is a friend's picture)
After sunrise it took me about 2 hours to get to the top. Not because I am lame, but because of the crowds.

Finally at the top
The crater at the top

At the very top
Picture into the valley on the other side of Fuji.
The END

It's been more than a month now since I last updated my blog, so it's time to write again. Hmm, where to begin? Well, after spring had set in and the cherry and plum trees had started blooming in Kanazawa winter came back mid last week and dumped loads of snow on us:

Event wise, the most recent thing happened yesterday. I went to do tea ceremony. I learned how to ceremonially prepare and drink Japanese green tea. Here is a picture of the teacher and a couple of others listening to instructions on how to drink the tea.

Here I am being taught how to prepare the tea.

In February Some friends an me went to Hokkaido for a couple of days.

We left on a Friday to go to a lake (Shikaribetsu Kotan) in the middle of Hokkaido.

Every winter this lake freezes over and the locals construct a village made of snow and ice to attract tourists.

A view from the hotel room on Saturday morning.

The main building had 2 floors, a bar, a seating area, a lounge, a chapel room and a movie theatre where they screened the "building of video"

The chapel room.There bar (Picture taken through a hole in the ceiling from the 2 floor)

The bar.
Me having a drink at the bar.

The lounge.

The equipment.
The video.There was even an outdoor Onsen complete with changing rooms entirely made of snow and ice on the middle of the lake (Our hotel is in the background).

Me taking a bath.

One of the many igloos.The access walk to the lake.
While we were there they were constructing a wedding chapel for real weddings. The workers told us that it would take about 5.000 snow blocks to build it.
The igloos were lit up from the inside.

Night view from the hotel room.

On Saturday we took a train to Sapporo to go to the Yuki Matsuri (Snow festival). Here are some of the many pictures I took during the Festival.

A sculpture commemorating the Japanese Antarctic expedition of 1958. During this expedition several dogs were left behind at the research station in the Antarctic (thinking that they could be picked up later, but the weather conditions made it impossible for the researchers to retrieve the dogs) and when the researchers returned the following year two dogs were still alive.

The Kingdom of Dreams and Magic.

Hikone Castle.

The Chakri Maha Prasat Grand Palace (Thailand)The Imperial Palace (China)

Some of the smaller sculptures.

The Ice sculptures.

Night pictures.

Sapporo Tower.Pictures form the top of Sapporo Tower

Two weeks ago the students at work took their last batch of exams before the end of the school year. So now the students don't really want to work and neither do the teachers, so a lot of the classes are cancelled in order for the students to participate in activities such as school cleaning and sport events. There's not really that much for me to do at the moment till the beginning of April, so I will try to make several posts regarding life in Japan.