Exploring Tokyo

For the past few days, I have been exploring a little bit more of Tokyo. There is so much here to see and I feel like it would take a lifetime to see it all. Last Friday and Saturday, Yumi and I went out with his parents to different parts of the city. They wanted me to see an older area of the city that had various shops and shrines, and also a newer part. We started our day shopping at the older area. There you could find almost anything you would want. Food, Japanese style clothing, swords, souvenirs... you name it. We spent some time there just shopping around. Yumis dad goes crazy everytime he sees candy and seems like he wants to buy it all, whereas Yumis mom goes crazy everytime she sees something that has cats on it. I probably didnt mentioned this before, but they have two cats at their home, Popy and Lily, and they are treated like royalties. Haha. :) Popy, for example, cries every night to Yumis mom around 10 because he wants to go to bed but she is still awake. Its just so funny to watch them interacting.

After shopping, Yumis parents wanted to take me on a boat ride to the Rainbow Bridge. I must say that I was impressed with our boat. It was very modern inside and out. It took us about 20 minutes to get from the station to the bridge area. When we stepped out of the boat into this little island, we could see the big city behind us. The picture on the right was taken from the port. As usual it was a hot day here, so we relaxed at this huge Starbucks for a bit before exploring the area. Before the sunset, we all went out and took pictures with this Statue of Liberty that they have, which looks just like the one in New York City and it was also given by France to Japan. Go figure! Later, Yumi and I separated from her parents and went shopping at this local mall. While looking around at the Puma store, one of the Japanese workers asked me in English where I was from. I told him that I live in the US but I am Brazilian. Then, all of the sudden, he asks me `Oh really?` in Portuguese. I just kept starring at him, like, how in the world do you know Portuguese? And then he explained that he went to the University of Parana in Brazil as an exchange student for a year, and there he learned Portuguese. I still think it is so odd how this guy knows Portuguese.. but we had an interesting conversation as he talked about Brazilian women. Haha. Oh jeez. After that, we went to watch the city lights. There, Yumi and I saw an Abercrombie and Fitch that was like 10 stores high. It was crazy, so we decided to go in and check it out. OMG! Why did we ever do that! First of all, as soon as we go in, we notice this huge line of girls.. I first thought that they were waiting to try on some clothes.. but then I realized that there was a shirtless Japanese guy there, and they were in line to take a picture with him. Also, Yumis parents were following us in the store, so I think they were a bit freaked out when they saw the guy. Lol. The A&F of the US usually has some loud music, but this one felt more like a night club to me. The music was really really loud. Yumi and I started going up the stairs. We went up like 2 floors, and those were just of guys, so we kept going up to find some girls stuff. On the third floor, there were two A&F workers dancing around and telling us to dance too. Haha. That was weird. We kept going up and at the 5th floor, it was still only guys clothing.. we were tired of going out and scared of this store, so we just left. Haha. But what an experience! Yumis dad also wanted to take me to this special kind of restaurant and so we went. There, they bring you these really fine cuts of raw meat and also vegetables, and you are supposed to cook them in the boiling sauce in front of you. I must say that the meat was AMAZING! Japanese food has yet to disappoint me!

As I approach the end of my trip, I feel blessed for being able to explore so much in such a short time. Ill try to post some more about the Japanese lifestyle soon. xoxo!

Durante esses ultimos dias, eu estive explorando um pouquinho mais de Toquio. Tem tanta coisa pra se ver aqui e eu acho que precisaria uma vida inteira pra ver tudo. Sexta feira e sabado passado, eu e a Yumi saimos com os pais dela para ver um pouco mais da cidade. Eles queriam me mostrar uma area mais velha e outra mais moderna daqui. Nos comecamos o nosso dia na parte mais velha, que tinha lojinhas diversas vendendo qualquer coisa que voce possa imaginar. Comidas, roupas japonesas, espadas de samurai, souvenirs.. E engracado ver os Japoneses fazendo compras.. Eles ficam doidos com essas coisas bobinhas que brasileiros nao estariam nem ai. O pai da Yumi, por exemplo, fica doido quando ve doce e quer sair comprando tudo. A mae fica doida com coisas que tem gato. Eu acho que eu nunca mencionei que eles tem dois gatos na casa, Popy e Lily, que sao tratados como se eles fossem bebes. Haha. O Popy, por exemplo, comeca a chorar pra mae da Yumi todos os dias as 22 horas porque ele quer ir dormir e ela ainda esta acordada. Aiai!

Mais tarde, os pais da Yumi me levaram num passeio de barco ate a Rainbow Bridge. So que o barco nao e o barco convencional dai do Brasil, claro. E um bem mais moderno por dentro e por fora. O barco nos deixou numa ilha pequena e quando olhamos para tras, podiamos ver a cidade dali. O dia estava quente, como de costume, entao nos decidimos relaxar num Starbucks antes de seguir em frente. Antes do sol se por, nos tiramos fotos com a Estatua da Liberdade daqui, que e igual a de Nova Iorque. O porque que o Japao tem uma estatua tambem, eu nao sei. Depois de tirarmos fotos, Yumi e eu fomos passear pelo shopping da ilha. Nos entramos numa loja da Puma e um cara japones que trabalhava la ficou me rondando e depois me perguntou em ingles de onde eu era. Eu falei pra ele que eu morava nos Estados Unidos, mas que eu sou brasileira. Logo ele vira e diz `serio?` em portugues. Eu fiquei sem reacao quando ouvi. Nunca esperava que ele falasse portugues... Eu o perguntei aonde ele aprendeu e ele falou que fez intercambio por um ano na Universidade do Parana, e acabou aprendendo o portugues la. Depois ele comecou a conversar das mulheres brasileiras.. ficou falando que tinha uma ex namorada que era brasileira e que um dia ele ainda se casa com uma brasileira.. Eu comecei a ficar sem graca com esse papo dele e antes que ele me considerasse uma de suas opcoes pra casar, eu corri de la. Haha. Eu hein!

Depois disso, encontramos com os pais da Yumi e fomos pra cidade. Eles queriam me mostrar como era a noite com as luzes das lojas todas ligadas, as tvs nos predios e tudo mais. Muito legal. O pai da Yumi queria me levar a um restaurante japones em que eles te trazem um corte muito bom de carne e te trazem vegetais, e voce os cozinha numa agua fervente que fica na sua mesa. Nossa, particularmente a carne foi a melhor. Adoro comida japonesa!

Logo, logo terei que ir embora e pelo pouco tempo que eu fiquei aqui, vi muitos coisas diferentes e conheci tantos lugares maravilhosos. Se eu ainda tiver tempo, vou postar algumas coisas do estilo de vida japones. Um beijo!

Kyoto, Nara and Hiroshima

Last week Yumi and I took some time to travel around Japan. It was a great opportunity for me to see a little bit more of her country. We traveled by Shinkansen, the Japanese `bullet train.` As you might have figured, it took us no time at all to get there. The train traveled 340 km in like two and a half hours. Wow! Anyways, our first stop was in Kyoto. We spent about two days there mostly going to shrines and temples in the area. The first picture on the left was taken in one of these shrines called Kinkaku-ji, or Temple of the Golden Pavillion. Everything is so well preserved in these shrines and the fee to visit them is not expensive at all. Each temple charged about 500 yen per person, which would be around 5 dollars. Not too bad! Kyoto was the place I liked the most in our trip. There were also a lot more foreigners there than here in Tokyo, so I felt more part of the group than an outsider among the Japanese. :) Along the way, we also got to try some amazing food! Ive gotta tell you, there has not been one time that I have complained about the food here. Everything tastes so good! I love how they use a lot of vegetables in their dishes, and how fruit here actually taste fresh (unlike in the United States...) While in Kyoto, Yumi and I were fortunate enough to be placed at a hotel right above Starbucks! Haha. So we HAD to make daily trips. The Starbucks here is also a bit different than the US. The drinks tend to be a bit more expensive, and I feel as if they have less options here. My favorite Japanese drink from Starbucks is Hojicha Tea Latte, which is a sort of roasted green tea drink.

Continuing on our trip... On the third day, we went to Nara. It was raining a bit in the morning so that made the trip unpleasant sometimes. But Yumi and I made it fun. Nara is known for having all these cute deers around. People want to take pictures with them and they are very sweet. However, they can be wild too. If you leave your purse unnoticed, they might reach for some paper to eat. Yumi and I saw this happening a few times to some people who werent paying attention.. :/ Nara also had a lot of shrines and temples for us to visit. One of the prettiest to me was the Todai-ji temple, which had this huge (I really mean HUGE) Buddha figure inside of it. We also visited a brand new temple which I cant remember the name of, but which was really pretty as well. Most temples have an abundance of gold in them. Those that do not have some type of meaningful thing, like a dry garden, for example.

For the fourth and fifth days of our trip, we left the Kyoto area and went to Hiroshima. However, we stayed at a Japanese style hotel off of the coast of Hiroshima, in the Miyajima area. To arrive there, we had to take a the Shinkansen to Hiroshima, an area train to take us to a port and then a boat to Miyajima. The most famous thing of the area is the Shinto Itsukushima shrine, which has that sort of red gate in the water. It is as pretty during the day as it is at night, when its lighten. The area is also known for these little cakes filled with sweet beans, and they are really good. Since we were at an island, all of our meals at the hotel included fresh seafood, which I loved! That night we relaxed at the hotels hot springs before heading to Hiroshima the next morning. Honestly, the whole Hiroshima area surprised me. I expected the whole area to be preserved as it became after the World War II. However, there were only a few spots left. We learned that hours after the bomb hit Hiroshima, its citizens were already making efforts to reconstruct the city. It was so sad hearing from a guide of all of the stories from the WWII. The A-bomb Dome is pretty much the only thing that they preserved and I looking at the damage made to it (basically only the base of the building is left), I cannot imagine what that bomb did to the whole city. That afternoon was filled with learning and sadness. The museum covering the details of the war had so much information that took us almost 3 hours to go through the whole thing. After that, we were exhausted and headed to the train station to get a Shinkansen which in 4 hours would bring us back to Tokyo. Pics from this trip are posted on Orkut and Ill soon post them on Facebook as well.

Semana passada eu e a Yumi tiramos um tempo para viajar pelo Japao. Nos viajamos no Shinkansen, o `trem bala` japones. Como o nome ja diz, o trem e rapido mesmo. Viajamos 340 kilometros em duas horas e meia. Ta doido! Nossa primeira parada foi em Quioto. A area e famosa pela quantidade de templos e nos passamos a maioria do nosso tempo os visitando. A foto a esquerda foi tirada em um dos templos chamado Kinkaku-ji, ou Templo do Pavilhao Dourado. Tudo e bem preservado nesses templos e o ingresso nao costuma ser caro, por volta de 500 yen, ou uns 5 dolares. Quioto foi o lugar que eu mais gostei de visitar nessa viagem. Principalmente porque por la tinha muito mais estrangeiros do que aqui em Toquio. Tinha mais franceses do que tudo, e uns americanos rabugentos tambem, claro. Nos tambem comemos muito bem nessa viagem. De tudo que eu ja comi aqui, nao posso reclamar de nada. Tudo de muito bom e eles usam bastante legumes e verduras quando cozinham, tipo o Brasil assim. Alem do mais, as frutas daqui nao tem o gosto ruim igual as dos Estados Unidos. Yumi e eu tambem demos uma sorte danada de ficarmos num hotel logo acima do Starbucks. Entao e CLARO que nos tivemos que dar uma parada por la todos os dias. Minha bebida favorita aqui e o Latte de Cha de Hojicha, que e um tipo de cha verde.

No terceiro dia da nossa viagem, nos fomos a Nara. Estava chuvendo aquele dia e nos tinhamos que andar de um lugar para o outro, entao as vezes divemos que parar e esperar a chuva passar para podermos continuar. A regiao de Nara e conhecida por ter um monte de veadinhos. Eles sao bem doceis e os turistas adoram tirar fotos com eles. So que tinhamos que ficar atentas, porque eles adoram pegar pessoas destraidas de surpresa e comer papeis ou qualquer outra coisa que eles viam. Em Nara, nos continuamos a visitar os templos japoneses. Um desses templos, o Todai-ji, tinha um Buddha ENORME dentro. Um outro templo que nos visitamos, o qual eu nao me lembro o nome, tinha acabado de ser construido e era muito chique dentro, com muito ouro e muitas pinturas japonesas. A maioria dos templos possui muito ouro, enquanto outros que nao tem tanto ouro tem outras coisas que sao de importancia aos japoneses, como os jardins de pedra.

Nos ultimos dois dias de nossa viagem, nos fomos pra Hiroshima. Pra chegar la, tivemos que pegar outro Shinkansen, um trem local e mais um barco para chegarmos a ilha onde passariamos a noite, em Miyajima. O templo Shinto Itsukushima e a atracao dessa regiao, que consiste do portao vermelho na agua da foto a direita. O portao e bonito de manha e a noite, quando esta iluminado. A regiao tambem e conhecida por ter esses bolinhos recheados de feijao doce e mesmo que voce nao acredite, eles sao bons! Ja que estavamos em uma ilha, todas as refeicoes do hotel tinha frutos do mar, incluindo o cafe da manha! Aquela noite nos relaxamos no spa do hotel antes de irmos a Hiroshima na manha seguinte. Eu fiquei surpresa com Hiroshima. Achei que eles fossem preservar a regiao toda que foi atingida pela bomba, mas nao. Eles praticamente preservaram um predio, e o resto e tudo predio novo. Um dos guias nos disse que horas depois que Hiroshima foi atingida com a bomba nuclear, as pessoas que sobreviveram comecaram a ajudar a reconstruir a cidade, pouco a pouco. Aprender sobre a guerra mundial na escola e ver com os seus proprios olhos sao duas coisas bem diferentes. Principalmente escutar as historias de quem estava la, presente no dia, foi muito triste. Yumi e eu aprendemos muita coisa sobre a cidade e o povo, que hoje em dia fala de Hiroshima com muito orgulho. O museu local sobre a guerra abrangia tanta informacao que demoramos tres horas pra ver tudo. Depois de irmos ao museu, nos comemos e ja estavamos exaustas, entao fomos a estacao de trem e pegamos o Shinkansen que nos levaria de volta a Toquio em quatro horas. Ja coloquei algumas fotos no Orkut e logo colocarei algumas no Facebook. Beijos!