It's bittersweet.

I'm writing this now because I figure I'm probably not going to want to be on the computer tomorrow since it's MY LAST DAY. T_T To anyone studying abroad, some more advice: do not take anything for granted. Your days are numbered so you want to make sure to make the most of every second you have wherever you're going. Hang out with friends and family a lot; that's really important. 

I left off on the day before yesterday, so I'll start on the 31st, which is good because that's mostly what I wanted to talk about.

Thursday started off normal enough. I made my 30-minute trek to school on my bike, however I had to get there a little early that day so I could give a short good-bye speech to the teachers. That was... okay. I was super nervous and I'll admit I hadn't read the thing through very much, so I made some mistakes... but I did make them laugh when I apologized for not doing homework, so that was good. 

After 3rd or 4th period (I can't quite remember), my math teacher poked his head into our room and asked if he could have a few words with me. We started off towards the teachers' room, so I thought I was in trouble. And on my last day! Instead, we ended up sitting in a conference-type room and he started asking me about the differences between Japanese math programs and American ones. I thought it was a little odd... was he planning on borrowing some method from America to use in his classes? Even though I thought it was a little weird, I ended up getting really into talking about the differences, and for a good 7 minutes that happened. -____- At the end of the passing period, my homeroom teacher came to get me. As I was walking up to the classroom, I notices that my friend's scarf had been draped over the sliding door to the room, and my teacher asked me to go through the other door. By this time I realized what was going on (I'm really slow, in case you couldn't tell >_>), but that didn't take away from my surprise when I opened the door and streamers were popping all over the place, landing in my hair, blinding me, with everyone screaming "Happy birthday!" at me. Now, I've mentioned this before, but I'll remind you that I cried at a Dove commercial. This was too much for me. While I was standing there, crying from being so overwhelmed with happiness, someone handed me flowers 

 and that just set me off even more. Good stuff. Everyone had brought a snack of some sort, so there was a table completely covered with Japanese candy. Since I was crying, I guess everyone figured that shoving food in my face would make me stop. It partly worked. And I know it sounds like I'm saying it was a bad thing, but it was anything but. It was so sweet because everyone clearly didn't want me to be crying. 

Then I gave my speech that I'd written earlier this week for just my class. Surprisingly I didn't cry during that, but I think I did hear my voice shake a few times. I also gave them my parting gift, which, after what they'd done, was pretty pathetic. It was Skittles! Everyone likes Skittles, right? And I haven't seen them here... I still felt really lame giving them that after what they're already done.

As if this weren't all enough, after my speech, I was sat down and blindfolded. When that blindfold was removed, a cake had been set before me.

 What can I say? I lost it again. Everyone sang Happy Birthday and I just sat looking really stupid because I was in such a state of blissful shock that I didn't quite know what to do. After singing, it was time to cut the cake! But wait, no knives? No problem! Just use a spoon and scoop it all onto plates in giant heaps for all to eat together!

Here's mine:

Beautifully cut, isn't it? It was also more than I was able to eat, unfortunately. It was, however, incredibly delicious. :)

Here's what everyone wrote on the board:

 We ended up playing bingo, and everyone gave me presents, which I 100% wasn't expecting. My favorite, however, is probably the notes that everyone wrote me that my friends compiled into a scrapbook-type thing. I'm planning on reading it on the plane rides home and crying my eyes out some more..

Getting home was interesting, with the flowers and various bags and whatnot, but somehow I managed...

The 31st was the last day we could use a coupon at the local spa and pool complex for an ice cream, so we (host mom and host siblings) did that almost directly after school. I honestly wasn't at all hungry, but I ate my strawberry one anyway. Not too special, but it was a nice outing. 

Dinner that night was... drumroll.... cheese fondue! Okay, so, I kind of copied my host sister when she requested it in November, but it was so delicious that time that I just had to. 

Come ON. Is there any way you could resist that? (Mom, I know what you're saying, and no, I don't think you could even though you're lactose intolerant) Oh, that's a piece of bread covered in cheese, by the way. Bread, potato, tomato, sausage, shrimp, some oden ingredients that I can't remember, little eggs, broccoli, carrots, and probably more that I'm forgetting. Basically happiness.

After dinner, we had cake. ^_^

 Best cake you've ever seen. It was my second cake of the day, so by this time I was feeling pretty exhausted, but I plowed through. I also like that my host mom got a chocolate cake. It's been the only chocolate cake thus far!

And look how pretty my host mom arranged my plate!

All in all, a really great birthday. All my host siblings even thought to get me presents, which I totally wasn't expecting. 

 Needless to say, I went to bed with puffy eyes, but a happy heart.

Today I simply went to the mall for the last time and bought some last-minute souvenirs. At about 4:30 two of my friends from school came and we hung out for a bit, took Purikura, of course. Taking Purikura seems to be an unwritten rule for young Japanese people when they hang out. Because everytime I've gone out with people, it's happened. Not that I'm complaining; so many memories have been documented via puri.

Those have been the last two days. Tomorrow Anna (the girl from Germany that I've mentioned briefly before) is going home, so Andres and I are going to the airport (thanks to my wonderful host mother who's driving us) to say good-bye to her. That'll be... sad. Hopefully I don't cry too much tomorrow or I'll end up spending a good 4 straight days with puffy, tired, eyes. -___-

It's happening the day after tomorrow, guys. It didn't seem like it'd ever end, and yet here I am. It's February 1st, and I'm getting on a plane to Tokyo, to L.A., to Chicago and home in less than 48 hours. Although there may be some things I regret not doing, I don't regret anything I actually did do here. Everything I've done has brought me to this moment, and I couldn't be happier with how I've come away from this experience. It's crazy because before August 24th, Japan was a completely foreign country. I'd never seen it, experienced it, and I had absolutely no idea what to expect. It's February now, and I can say that Japan is a familiar and comforting place for me now. As my mom said in an email, (not quoting exactly) there is now an Ellie-sized space in Japan, and I'll be happy to reoccupy it any chance I get. I'm leaving, but it's not forever. I will be back.

EJDIJXPLOVEOTJAPANDJIDEKIDEOKJRCFI
-Ellie

Full of delicious sushi.

I just had sushi as a pre-birthday celebration, so I'm feeling pretty good right now. Nothing like eating sushi off of the conveyor belt. The only problem is that I end up eating way too much, but I figure that this was probably my last time having it off of a conveyor belt for a while.

I realized recently that this blog turned into more of a diary than anything else, so I'm sorry if you guys have come to learn about Japanese culture and instead get a play-by-play of my life. I'll try to put a bit more of that in this post.

On Monday I had my last Sadou-bu (Tea ceremony club) session.... or whatever you'd call it. To sum up, it was pretty great. Anyone that goes to that school would do well to join it, because the people in that club are just so wonderful. I haven't even been in that club for that long, but we had a Going Away party type thing. Not a conventional one, of course; it's Sadou after all, but I got to do tea ceremony all by myself for everyone. I also invited a friend and they got to see me make some tea. Sounds boring, but it's intricate stuff that's actually really interesting to watch. I ended up performing about as perfectly as I could have, I'm happy to say. I think I forgot to tell everyone that they could start eating their mochi, but other than that, it was pretty good. I'm really mad, though, because I forgot my camera at home that day and so I couldn't take any pictures. -____- I would do something like that. My friend took pictures with her iPhone but when she sent them they ended up really little and I'm not sure that there's a better way to send them. :/ At the end of it all, I gave my gift (a bunch of friendship bracelets I'd slaved over that week) and said my speech. And then everyone surprised me by giving me presents. Like, for real, what is this? I totally wasn't expecting it. My teacher gave me this super pretty bag and coin purse that, whether it was cheap or not, looked anything but.

Then I got some sakura mochi (pink mochi with a white anko bean filling) from some second year, and some of the cake that the first years brought back from their school trip to Tokyo last week. Someone also gave me a stuffed animal (a sheep...) that smells like sakura. It's an air freshener, I'm assuming? And the one that I think I appreciated the most was a letter a first year wrote me (in English!). She even called me Ellie-sempai which she always does but it was especially cool to see it written next to my name.

Best club ever. Somehow I managed to not cry (I tend to not really realize I'm leaving until the day of), but I did get very melancholy when we were leaving.

Tuesday (aka yesterday), Andres and I had to give speeches to the first and second years (the third years were.... if you said 'studying', you were right!). Mine went alright. I messed up a bit at the end, but it's fine. We got really pretty flowers.

My friend also gave a speech (in English) to us basically wishing us well and such. This girl is one of the funniest people I've ever met so it was almost unnerving seeing her so serious. Speeches to guests seems to be something that Japanese schools do on a regular basis. Anytime we've had speakers come and bore us into sleeping sitting up, we've always had a student stand across from them onstage and give some words of thanks.

Today was a normal day. I had my last day of shodou. Again, none of this 'leaving' concept seems to be sinking in. I don't think I've totally wrapped my brain around the fact that I'm leaving soon. Unfortunately that means I'll probably be mistaken for a faucet tomorrow. Pretty much directly after getting home, the entire Hattori household (minus the dog) piled into the car and went out for sushi! My host father has a work party tomorrow so we couldn't go then (for my birthday), so we went today. Hey, whatever. I got my sushi! Tomorrow we'll have cake, though. And I get to pick what okaa-san makes for dinner... which I still haven't decided...

I'm going to go back in time for a second. On Sunday, AFS had a Farewell Party for everyone leaving on the 3rd of February. I had to give a speech there too. I was the only one that had known beforehand, so I was the only one to have already written my speech. Ironically enough, I felt kind of uncomfortable rather than relieved I was prepared. It went alright. We ate, gave our host mothers flowers (that AFS gave us to give to them...), took a group picture,

and then everyone left. I ended up going to machi with my friends (that's where I always hang out when I say downtown), which involved purikura (of course), and karaoke. My last karaoke! T_T

That's the latest. I'll try to update before I leave. That one probably won't be too long since I'll be getting ready...

OFJIERJVNOPGKTOKO
-Ellie

The Last-Minute Grind.

I know it's been 9 days since I last updated, but these last few weeks have been the busiest ones yet. Between trying to get 6 speeches written out and trying to figure out how I'm supposed to show everyone my gratitude for everything they've done at the end of this (still have no idea how that can be humanly possible) things have gotten really hectic in my brain lately.

And since I only have some 12 days before I head home (泣), I thought I'd do a post for anyone who reads this that may be considering studying abroad in Japan or anywhere else, really.

1. Don't pack important clothes. My goodness I wish I'd thought about this sooner. This goes for people that go to a country with a school uniform. Seeing as you wear it most of the time, I find that I didn't need half of the clothes I ended up bringing. I suggest that before leaving your home country, you make a trip to the second-hand store and stock up on whatever you need to bring. That way you won't feel like you absolutely have to take it all back home since you spent $1 per item. That would have saved me a lot of money and grief about having to pack a box with mostly clothes. -____- Plus, you end up doing shopping in your host country and all you want to do is wear those anyway.

2. Expect to gain weight. So, I know I've mentioned it a few times, but I'll say it again. And I think this applies more to the girls studying abroad. That's just an observation, so don't hold me to it, but that's what it seems like to me. I honestly wasn't expecting it, but I looked in the mirror the other day and was just like, "WHAT DID YOU SAY?" Even though my reflection hadn't said anything... This may not even apply to you, so if you end up losing weight don't hold me to it.

3. Put your heart and soul into learning everything  you can about the culture, language, etc. This is huge. Especially if you can study the language before you leave. I would say the same about culture, but I feel like that's nearly impossible if you're not in that country. Knowing how to communicate in the language more before I came would have come in handy... like a lot. Not saying that I think it took away from my experience, but I think I would've been a lot more outgoing in the beginning. Plus, it's much more pleasant for the people in your host country if they can use their native language. As for culture, as soon as you step off of that plane and into the airport wherever you're going, think like a sponge. Become the sponge. The culture is the water. Or whatever you feel like metaphorically soaking up. Take everything in. Watch what others do, ask questions about it (this is where that language thing comes in handy) and mimic.

4. Try everything. I hate singing. In front of people, at least. It's terrifying to me and I've never been a fan. But, since I'm in Japan, I decided that I'd do karaoke (because if you come to Japan, you HAVE to) and I ended up loving it. That goes for food too. Not to say I've liked everything I've eaten. Quite the contrary (nattou >__<). However, I can go home and tell people about these foods that I'd always heard about (and the ones that were totally obscure).

5. Savor every moment. That's really corny. But I mean it. Be nice to everyone even if they're driving you up the wall and talk to everyone a lot. Your time is limited (even if you don't realize it), and you have to take advantage of every opportunity you have with your host family and friends. It's in these last few weeks that I've really realized that talking about even the little things that seem insignificant are actually super important. Build relationships. If you end up wanting to come back to the country (which you probably will, trust me) you now have connections. It's crazy to think that five months ago, Japan was a country that I had never been to let alone had anyone there that I knew. Now I have a life here. It's not a huge island that doesn't hold sentimental value anymore. I have family and friends here now.

6. Spend your money carefully. Not to sound like your parents, but I wish I'd done this too. At the beginning of October I did begin logging my spending, but I think I should have watch what i spent my money on more. I don't regret it now because I wouldn't have had quite the experience I did had I not, but for any future exchange kids, I would keep an eye on that. Don't let it get in the way of having fun, though, because that's the point of being in a different country, right? I would also say to be careful of the space and weight that what you're buying will take up. I only say this because it was a struggle trying to figure out how to pack the stuff I'd bought.

I know this is a lame list so far, so when (or if) I think of other stuff I'll add it.

For now, you can take a look at some of the food I've been eating lately. I know, exciting stuff. Try to keep your pants on.

First off, we have a lovely picture that is not rotated. I'm sorry. It's the only one like this, I promise. This is Nanakusa-Gayu. It's a rice soup with a bunch of herbs thrown in. I couldn't possibly remember all the names, but that's what they created Google for.

 Here we have a lovely specimen of stew. Japanese stew. It's more like a creamy soup to me with chicken, corn and carrots thrown in.

 Yakisoba, fried sweet potato, salmon, and rice. Need I say more?

 Fried chicken in a sauce that reminds me vaguely of American-Chinese orange chicken, pasta, potato salad, and rice. That was a good day.

 My host mom calls this omuraisu because it's a combination of an omelet and rice. I know you can barley see is, but there's rice there, with a lovely omelet on top and then some beef-stewy-like sauce on top. I know it's not very Japanese, but I loved this thing.

 The other night we had dry curry, which isn't actually that dry at all, it just lacks some of the liquid in regular curry because there's so much MEAT. I love meat, by the way...

This is kimuchi nabe. It's spicy, it's got meat, it's got cabbage, it's got tofu. And even though I haven't become a huge fan of tofu, I have to say that this gets me to eat it.

 Aaaaand here's today's dinner. My host mom is brilliant and took some of the rice from the omuraisu, rolled it into a ball, filled it with cheese, and fried it. Can someone give this lady an award? The thing was the size of a baseball, not even exaggerating. And then there's two fried potato patties and some cabbage.

 I'm mad you can't see this really. It's mochi with a sauce made of crushed edamame and some sugar added to give it sweetness. I had it a while ago but this was the first time my host grandma made it herself. Apparently it's really popular where my host mom's from (Miyagi-ken). I know it doesn't sound too appetizing, but it's one of those things I can see myself liking after eating it a few times.

So yes, there you have my majestical menu. Of course there's been other stuff, but I haven't had my camera at the time. Funnily enough, all the stuff I took pictures of is stuff that's not too Japanese. Honestly, though, where else would you find some of the delicious things my host mom cooks up?

RJILJDSKJOEIFPIJRGHUIJ
-Ellie

Karaoke!

Guys there's only 20 days. You have no idea how sad that's making me. So I won't talk about that.

I'll entertain you with my week instead.

This week there was no 別府 nor any 神社, and to be honest, it was really nice to get back to my regular schedule. Don't get me wrong, winter break was awesome and I got to do so many things I didn't even know there were to do or experience. However, it was really nice to see everyone at school and have some structure to my week. On Monday I had my last trip downtown before break was over with Andres, and then it was back to school on Tuesday. School that day was a little different than usual. We had one huge souji first thing in the morning (which felt really weird, considering it's usually right after lunch), THEN ate lunch and then had an assembly for the whole school. I'm still absolutely amazed at the discipline that Japanese students show at those things. They talk up until the speaker begins speaking and then it's this sudden dead silence. And then when people have to scoot their rows over or move in any direction, everyone moves at the same time, and people still aren't talking, so all you hear is a really eerie padding sound (from everyone's socks). It's going to be interesting to go home to an assembly at my school in the States...

In any case, the rest of this past week was fairly uneventful. We had another uniform check on Tuesday as well. Those days always make me laugh because you see everyone running around making last-minute checks to see that their nails are cut, skirt's not rolled up, hair is neatly pulled back, etc. The boys were even having other classmates give them mini-haircuts before. Now THAT'S a sight to see. They hold a trash can under their head and the cut hair falls right on in. I imagine that if that happened in the States (at least in Chicago at my school) it would be considered ghetto by at least some people. I just think it's entertaining. This time, when our hair was getting checked (for if anyone had dyed theirs or needed to cut it), the teacher exclaimed (totally kidding), "茶髪だ！" She was basically just (sarcastically) exclaiming that I had brown hair.

On Saturday my host mom and I went to the mall. I ended up buying a bunch of omiyage (souvenirs) for people back home. Gotta say that's greatly reduced my stress level of the past few weeks. And they (almost all) had Kumamon on them! 

Today was probably the most interesting day thus far. I went downtown with two friends from school, which was really nice since I hadn't done that in a while. We went to... wait for it... KARAOKE! Yatto! Finally! I know it's really late for me to have just gone, but that's how it happened. Now, when I first proposed doing this earlier in the week, I really only suggested it because I figured that if I go to Japan, I absolutely have to go to karaoke. After having spent an hour longer than we had intended, I can honestly say that it's one of the most enjoyable and entertaining things readily available for you in Japan. They're EVERYWHERE. We ended up going to one in a side street which made it look really shady from the outside. I'm sure my friends were joking, but they made me go in first because they were too 'scared'. 

It's pretty dark in karaoke buildings. I didn't get a picture of the entrance, but I did get a picture of the room. The entrance had a counter to one side to pay and get your room, and the rest was a bunch of chairs for some reason. I guess in case you have to wait for a room...? There wasn't really anyone there in the middle of the day, however, so we got our room and settled down for our... ahem... beautiful singing.

 That's what you see when you walk in, and then if you turn around to look at the door...

 They're really small rooms, but it makes for a much cozier experience. Before we even went, everyone was saying that they didn't want to sing. That totally turned around when we were in that room. I hate singing in front of people, even if it's not that many. But for some reason, this ended up being totally different. I'm pretty sure that all places have English songs too. This one had quite the selection; and they were all fairly recent! I ended up singing one Japanese song by myself, and then sang along (without a mic; there's only 2) with a few other ones. By the end of the 2 hours that we spent karaoke-ing (can that be a verb?), my throat hurt pretty bad. I readily admit that I'm a pretty awful singer, and I'm certain that I don't actually know how to use my stomach to project rather than just my throat. I'm pretty sure that's also why I was in such pain afterwards. I'd do it again tomorrow anyway. That's how fun it was. As far as the price goes, I'm under the impression that it was a pretty decent price. For 2 hours, the total (per person) came out to 620 yen each, and that included a drink. They have a bunch of meal-type foods too, but we'd just eaten so we didn't need any of it.

The other highlight of my day was this beautiful thing:

Bananas, vanilla and chocolate ice cream, corn flaky cereal, and a whole thing of PUDDING. I was so happy the whole time I ate that.

So yes, there you have my fascinating week. The weekend's not even over quite yet (I don't have school tomorrow), but I figured I'd update this when I had the chance.

もうちょっと！：（

OIEFJFIDJKPOEFPOJERJDO
-Ellie

I survived this weekend!

What's poppin' peeps? It's in this last month here that I've realized how much I miss that kind of talk back home in Chicago...

So this weekend was fun. And I'm not even being sarcastic. Totally for real. We (my host family and I) did so much stuff that it's almost troublesome to have to write it all down. But I'll do it. For this blog's occasional reader.

I'll start on the second of the month, though, because that's when my host brother's birthday was. Who is, by the way, one of my favorite people in this universe. He's one of the funniest people I've ever met and he only just turned seven. So the 2nd was his birthday. Funnily enough, everyone but him went to a gaming store that day because my oldest host sister really wanted to buy some manga. I'm not quite sure why he didn't come now that I think about it... Anyway, the store was GIGANTIC. And they sold EVERYTHING (besides food). Clothes, accessories (phone, hair, etc.), video games, music, manga... the manga. I can't even. It was just.... so. Much. Manga. It reminded me of a Borders (RIP) filled with only manga. They had everything you could possibly imagine, and since the store sold them used (which I actually prefer), they were all around 150 yen (a little over $1.50). Which is RIDICULOUS considering the manga I buy in the States (in English, mind you) is around $10.00 apiece. I spent a lot of time looking at that, and getting lost. I'm serious guys. It was a giant building. And there were so many aisles at weird angles all over the place that I got lost a few times. Carlos, I though of you, because I know you would've been in paradise surrounded by so many video games.

Apart from that trip, the 2nd was very laid back. We had sushi for dinner which totally made my day, though. And then there was cake of course...

That was by far the best birthday cake I've had here so far. There was even a little mini cheesecake on it!

So then, on the 3rd, my host parents decided we should all take a walk, "for our health!". It wasn't until we (host parents, siblings, and myself) were already a good ways away from the house that someone told me the walk was 3 kilometers one way. I wasn't exactly dressed for that kind of walk, so it was kind of a struggle, but it ended up being really fun. We walked to this small mountain (yes, in Japan, there IS such a thing as a small mountain) that we climbed straight up (there were stairs of course). A daunting task it seemed, but we made it!

Yaaaaaaay! There's my little country village. Look at all them farms...

So after the climb (.... I did not just make a Miley Cyrus reference...), we started back down a different way. On the way down, we came upon a little park that we, of course, had to stop to play on. What was funny about this park (to me, at least), was that it was all on a very steep hill. WOAHHHH! I know, crazy, right? Well, in Illinois, everything's pretty flat, so I'm not used to that kind of thing.

 Yeah... I know you can't really see the park, but you get the idea... hopefully.

Going home wasn't as bad as getting to the mountain; it warmed up a bit and thanks to all the walking it was much more bearable.

The day after that, we were off again. This time by car to Aso!... again. Which is completely fine with me because I've come to love car rides in Japan. And not the ones in the city. The ones in the country. And I'm talking few to no houses and mountains everywhere. EVERYWHERE. And trees. And in the winter, a faint sprinkling of snow on the mountains. Doesn't get better than that. I'm serious.

Last time we went to Aso was when we went to that spa with the dome rooms on the Aso Farm resort, and the Aso volcano. This time, we chose to forgo the volcano and instead opted for a shrine. Shirogawa shrine, to be exact. Apparently it's also home to the origin of a river that flows all the way back to Kumamoto (aka, civilization). There was a part of the stream that you could drink from, even.

Then we got to do omikuji, which is random fortunes written on pieces of paper that you fold up and tie onto a string. If you watch anime or read manga, you know what I'm talking about.

I still am not quite sure what mine was about, since my host parents don't speak much English and the fortunes are really obscure Japanese that even my host siblings didn't fully understand. All I got from it was that I should study... Only Japan, people.

Onward! We went back to the Aso Farmland Resort because they had a bunch of Christmas lights set up that my host parents wanted to take us all to see. It wasn't as elaborate at the one we went to see by car, but it was pretty anyway.

At the very end of the resort there's a bunch of little dome-shaped buildings that are apparently used for people who pay to stay. Like a hotel, basically, only 20x cuter. I was too busy being astounded to take a picture.

 

 So that'll have to do. It's off of google, but that's pretty much what they look like. Dear Lord are they cute. I want to come back to Aso just to stay in one.

On the way back, we stopped by that giant crater we went to the last time and found that this time it was covered in snow. It wasn't much, but it was enough to make my host siblings really excited. There's a huge pond there that froze over as well and the kids really wanted to see it. So see it we did. Not only did we see it, we walked on it. It was something like 10 cm thick, though, so I was terrified the whole time that it was going to break under me and I'd go down into the icy water. Even my host dad, who's six feet tall, was able to walk around, albeit with a constant crunch of ice cracking underneath him. 

 

That was it, really, for the 4th.

The 5th we (host parents and siblings) left for 大分 (Ooita) to meet up with my host father's parents and do some sightseeing.

We picked them up in 北九州市 (Kitakyushu City) and stopped by a church headed by a friend of my host family's. We didn't even sit through a service, just stopped to talk to the priest (pastor? I'm not sure what you call that person in my host family's religion) and some friends that were there. We were there for about twenty minutes, and then were back on our way to Oita. We stopped again a few hours later to see yet another shrine. This time, walking up to the actual shrine was much more difficult because it was on a hill.

This was the entrance...

 And here's a tree that's some 200 years old. It might have been 800... I'm not sure why, but I'm getting those two numbers confused. :S

In any case, it was a really old tree. What's fascinating about this (and pretty much any) shrine is that any place that people throw money to as an offering is within grabbing distance, and yet no one ever takes any.

After stopping by this shrine, it was straight to 別府 (Beppu -- the town we were staying in) and our hotel.

That night, we all stayed in a 旅館 (Ryokan -- Japanese-style Inn). The truly nice thing about this place was... it had an onsen! That you could use whenever you wanted. Say WHAT? So happy. I ended up going twice that night: once right when we arrived and again after I took a bath before going to bed (the bath was the same room as the onsen).

Dinner last night... guys, it was a lot. So I'm just going to post pictures of it and explain each one briefly.

Here's an individual pot with rice in it. It cooked for most of dinner and we ate it towards the end.

 The plate of meat was for shabu-shabu, and then the other big plate was... dun dun duuuuuun... blowfish (hence the title of this post). I was terrified I was going to die. At least I would've died eating something delicious.

Here's me making my shabu-shabu. Everyone got their own thing to cook their very own. 

 That's some delicious sauce I dipped the pork in after I cooked it.

 This is eel (that's been mashed, I'm pretty sure). I wasn't a huge fan of this one.

 This is crab. Like, an entire crab.

 Yup, definitely a crab. And you can eat the whole thing! It was pretty good, actually, especially the legs.

 This was dessert. Some jelly thing with Kinako on it.

 And here's the rice. It wasn't white, but it was just as good.

If I hadn't done that in pictures, it would've taken an eternity to explain.

Here's the basic gist of what the room looked like. 

 It was all tatami and we got to sleep on futons that they kept in....

Those closets.

The next morning we all got up too early to eat breakfast. Somehow I was able to drag myself out of bed and put myself together for that. Not too sure how that happened.

Shortly after everyone finished breakfast, we were off to our first destination of the day: 地獄めぐり (Jigoku Meguri -- A bunch of natural onsens). The first onsen we looked at was called 血の池地獄 (Chi no Ike Jigoku -- Blood Pond Hell). Why is it called that? I'll tell you, friends, even though it's pretty obvious from the picture below. The clay in the pond is red! Didn't see that one coming, didja? Apparently (according to my pamphlet) the steam is supposed to be red too, but it wasn't.

I'm mad I can't teleport you all to the pond because the picture does it no justice. The steam stretch so high up it was surreal. And it smelled. So maybe you wouldn't want to be teleported.

Next up was a geiser.

I think it was somewhere around 105 degrees CELSIUS, it came every 30-60 minutes, and lasted about 6-10 minutes each time. The one that we saw was probably one of the longer ones. This one was called たつまき地獄 (Tatsumaki Jigoku).

Next up was 海地獄 (Umi Jigoku -- Ocean Hell). This place was very big on 鬼 (demons), so that's why all the names have to do with hell. Plus, they're all HOT.

Here's the Ocean one. Can't remember quite how hot this one was, but it was definitely too hot to touch or anything. It was so blue, though, that I kept finding myself tempted to jump it. This one smelled particularly bad...

This was the last one we saw (though there were more): 鬼石坊主地獄 (Not really sure how to translate  this one... The kanji mean: demon-stone-monk-lord/master-hell).

The pictures of this one don't do it justice. It was basically this thick-looking grey goo that was bubbling in certain spots. It was really fascinating to watch.

Lastly, there were a few animals on display. It was almost like a mini-zoo or something... The most interesting one, however, was this elephant.

There was a family there before us that was feeding it crackers. The kids would throw them (there was a fence to keep spectators far away enough from the elephant) to the elephant and she (or he... I'm calling it a she) would pick them up with her trunk. Typical elephant. But then if she couldn't reach the cracker, she'd let out a huge breath and blow the cracker back to the kids so that they could try throwing it again. Coolest thing of my life.

After seeing those four hot springs, we went to eat lunch at a restaurant called 西洋料理 (Western Cooking), even though it felt very much like an American Chinese restaurant.

Then we dropped my host father's family off at a train station and continued on our way home.

Our last sightseeing spot was a bridge in Aso (or near Aso... can't quite remember)... was this monstrosity:

I don't know how, but I wasn't afraid the entire time we crossed that thing. To give you perspective, they had a picture of the bridge and godzilla next to each other; the bridge was taller!

That's pretty much what happened to me this weekend. Leave it to my host family to come up with awesome places to sight see. I think they're planning on taking us to some monkey zoo soon... stay tuned for that, since from the sound of it, it sounds pretty interesting...

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-Ellie