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.
Some of the smaller sculptures.
The Ice sculptures.
Night pictures.
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.
posted by Flying Tea at
4:42 PM
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