New friend, Taizo-in, longweekend in Tokyo

It seems that it's already been a minute so I'm back. PSA that there should now be a little "Follow" button on the main page which some people were asking me how to do. I think if you just click that and put in your email you can get notified when I post things and also should be able to comment (though I think you should be able to comment anyway with a Google account even if you're not following).

ANYWAY. Moving on.

I went to Tokyo for the long weekend! Firstly though I met a new friend named Aiko who is half-Italian half-Japanese. She's in CASK which is a student group at Doshisha University (where the Stanford Center is located) dedicated to hanging out with us Stanford students and planning nice events for us! What the heck! And I went on a field trip to Taizo-in which is a temple where I'll be doing my Zazen Buddhism class.

in front: Aiko, me; behind: Thanh, Kelechi, Janice, Catherine

The CASK students also planned this nice pizza picnic for us but the sun sets at 5:30 so it was fully dark. Oh well still fun anyway.

This is a statue in Taizo-in it was very peaceful. Way more peaceful than the other Zen temple I went to where there were a million tourists

I made this if you can believe it. The top part is meant to be Fujisan (Mount Fuji) and the bottom means Peace, Harmony, Japanese. In the left corner is my name (Sa-ma-n-sa), and in the right corner is the Taizo-in stamp.

Matsuyama sensei, who is a Buddhist monk and will be teaching the Zazen class, showed us around the temple grounds. Apparently when you're in training to be a monk you only get to sleep for 3 hours a night for like 2 years. Yikes. This is the garden, which was designed by a world-class garden designer. Who knew that even existed! The bottom part of the pond is meant to be shaped like a gourd. There is a classic question in Buddhism asked to monks in training: how can a man catch a catfish in a gourd? There's a whole story that goes with it it's not just that. But I guess this is the answer; there are catfish in that gourd pond.

After the field trip I headed for Tokyo! I took the Shinkansen aka Bullet Train and the ride was sooo beautiful.

There were like a million people in Tokyo station (behind me are some of them: Kelechi, Laywood, Diego, and Kayson)

Went out exploring in the Shibuya/Shinjuku areas

And the sky looked crazy

This was the moment I was like whoa. We're in Tokyo.

We had a wonderful Korean meal with our new friend Lee and I ate an entire bibimbap which iykyk that's a lot of food.

 

Let's just say we took an early morning walk the next day... :p

Japanese cemeteries, very beautiful

I went to the National Garden in Shibuya which was huge and very beautiful, lots of nicely circularly trimmed trees

In case you forgot what I look like this is it

Harajuku - there were a craazy amount of people there. Just kind of a shopping area but I didn't buy anything besides dinner.

Our Airbnb host ended up offering to take us on a drive around the city that evening! We went up Tokyo Tower and that's where this picture is from though you can barely see anything.

The next day I tried to go to the Imperial Palace but I didn't realize the grounds aren't open to the public. The part around the grounds was very pretty though

Then I really wanted to see Fujisan so I went up the Tokyo Skytree after getting a ticket and coming back a few hours later for my timeslot, waiting for about an hour in line, only to realize it was too cloudy to see :/ Oh well.

That evening I went to the Teamlabs Planet Museum which was soooo cool you go barefoot! There are lots of Teamlabs museums all over the world so I really recommend you go to one if you're ever closeby. I can't really explain it so you just have to go. 

Case in point

Flowerby

Thennnn unfortunately I got sick :/ I navigated my way onto an earlier train back from Tokyo on Monday (in Japanese!) and was in bed from Monday to Thursday :( 

I've been trying to go out on a little walk every day though and I discovered this cemetery nearby the student residence. There is also a grocery store called Fresco nearby which I love dearly I've been going almost every day. 

Today I was feeling a bit better so I went to the Kyoto Botanical Gardens

And saw this lovely tortoise

And this arch

And these nice trees

And these fluffy things

And this HUGE leaf!

So that was good. Then I had an ice cream pop and bought the best pillow ever at Muji.

Otherwise I've just been doing my best at my Japanese homework... I am still in school you know.

Bonus content for today's post: Japan is obsessed with butter apparently

And this neighborhood is called "Tea Water"

That's all for today folks. Hope you have a wonnnnnnnderful day and try to comment something on here so I can feel like a celebrity (or just like I'm not speaking to the abyss)