Kyoto, Fall colors, and Finding Starbucks

Eikan-dō Zenrin-ji

I recently took a trip to Kyoto looking for beautiful Autumn colors and found them. 

A group of Japanese students and international students decided to go to Kyoto, and I joined them.

The interesting architecture and inclusion of gardens, koi ponds, bridges and stairs in the shape of a dragon were really calming. 

It was a perfect way to embrace the season. Now it has gotten colder and winter is coming- perfect weather to curl up with a book and a hot cup of tea or talk with friends.

It's getting closer to the time for me to return home to America and I am getting a little nostalgic since I've met so many cool cats here. I really do like the Kansai people and many of the internationals here, and know I will miss them.

I will be happy to be home, see my boyfriend and family, and quite frankly there are things I like and dislike about both countries, so I feel like I am having to say goodbye to more than just the people.

For example I love Japan's food culture, but find the 'cute' culture (emphasis and constant use of 'cute' things) to be irritating and ubiquitous and do not feel like I will miss it.

American's are known here and among the internationals as basically doing what we want regardless of the rules and I think that is partially true with us especially compared to Japanese who have a lot of legal and social rules and structure compared to America, which is a vague statement but emphasizes my current feelings.

I really do love the mountains and scenery and emphasis on nature that is prevalent in Japanese culture especially in the Nara and Shiga area.

Finding Starbucks

The last time I went to a Starbucks in Japan was 2 years ago, and it took forever walking around in the pouring rain.

This past week there was a Starbucks grand opening so I asked some internationals if they wanted to go. Little did we know it was going to be a long night searching for the place. 

We even saw a tower that looked like a mini Tokyo Tower, and finally found the mall after about an hour of looking and walking through the city and then the country side area.

After we found the mall, we discovered just how enormous it was, 3 floors and packed with stores.

Then we found Starbucks which was really neat, but the selection of food was really small and expensive, so we ate at a Viking or all you can eat buffet that had various types of foods. 

Yamato Koriyama area is well known for goldfish that were raised by Samurai as a part time job.

We looked around the mall a little and then took a bus to the train station. Then we took a short train ride home and then walked from the station to do all night Karaoke.

It was nice but I didn't even realize it was 5am when we were walking home- I thought it was maybe 11 at night or midnight, but was surprised when an old lady said goodmorning.