FOOD
on the request of my best bud in Nofo (shout out to Marika C!!!!!! I MISS U GURL) I will now do an entire post about food.
OMG FOOD. SO GOOD. SO UNHEALTHY. SO WONDERFUL.


to illustrate what I am talking about, here is a picture of the Japanese food pyramid:

this is basically what I eat everyday. tons of white rice, soba noodles or udon. some pickles or deep fried veggies to accompany them. Lots of fish and eggs at every meal as the main course. no dairy and fruit in moderation. vegetables are not even included here. The Japanese version of vegetables is either deep fried or pickled, so basically awesome.  Because we are living in dorm, the program gives us a generous food stipend so we can go out to eat for every meal. 

AND WE DO. its more food than I have ever eaten in my entire life and its SO good. 

I still do not have a favorite dish, but some of the local specialties are pretty awesome. Here are a few of my favorites. 

sushi and udon lunch specials for 10 bucks

nishiki market that is full of beautiful candy like this...

and this..... its always an adventure. A great place to go for lunch as long as you don't mind not knowing what on earth you are eating. 

okonomiyaki: grilled cabbage in a batter with seafood or meat, smothered in teriyaki sauce and mayonnaise. 

this thing. 

which we plan on eating as a part of our final hurrah before leaving kyoto. 

green tea flavored soba, the specialty of Uji. 

anything flavored ice cream, but especially green tea. 

tofu tofu tofu. especially Arashiyama tofu, that is though to be the best in the world. 

so yes. These are the meals I have known and loved. There are many others too, but these are a few that have photos and were also awesome. 

Another great thing about modern Kyoto is that the locals love something called "bakery pilgrimage" where you walk between multiple bakeries all day and sample a different treat at each stop. 

this is first on the bucket list for this coming weekend. 

for now sleep, and I will catch you all up on last week's Kyoto adventures when I wake up. 

practical life
(aka Im supposed to learn something occasionally)
so as it is apparent by second week at Kyoto, we basically have two full days of work, or qazi work really because I have recently discovered that Linguistics is kinda a silly subject, and the a GIANT never ending weekend.
the weekend is the interesting part, but let me actually talk about the boring bits before I start in on this giant epic awesome saga that is the majority of all days.

so Linguistics as a study, is rather silly. its all about finding rules that are supposed to govern a language and it's writing system and allow us to create universal grammar. sounds great right? I love rules, and I love data so this should work out?

well a whole lot of what I ACTUALLY study is "avular fricatives" and "devoiced consonants" and how pronunciation works is the most BORING way possible. I read a whole chapter today on what sounds are viable or not in Japanese, which would have been interesting if I where an alien life form and had never heard the language before, but as a human, with ears who has been living here for a few weeks it is super BORING.

I am much more interested in studying the writing system, and the evolution/use of kanji characters in Japanese. Unfortunately this class is taught by our own Carleton professor (also in charge of the program) and his teaching style can really only be described as "Dad".
He likes to tell long rambling stories that never seem to have a punch line or pertain to what we are supposed to be learning about, and he always inquires first after how we are, what we ate for dinner, how we sleep ext before actually getting around to teaching. Normally I would love this teaching stlye, because almost half of the class is taken up with formal greetings, check ins, funny stories and general pleasant conversations, but this is actually the only interesting class I have and the other teachers do not teach this way.

But really I can't complain too much. the teachers are nice, I have very little homework and only three days of class per week. Also my fourth class, on Japanese culture and society is fantastic. Last week we read several chapters from the Tale of Genji (the national epic book written in the Heian era) and got to visit the place where the book was set as a 'field trip'.
The funny thing about the tale of Genji, is that everyone loves it. They love Genji and they love the writing and the story. But really the whole thing is terrible. Its a several thousand age novel that details the life of a womanizing court tramp who goes around raping women, harassing them, cheating his friends and generally just being a scalywag. However, because he is SO charming and beautiful, for some reason everyone still loves him, both in the book and in real life.
really the book did have some interesting parts, but the general purpose and character of it I did not agree with.

For this week we are watching and getting a lecture of Kurosawa's 'Throne of Blood', a really fantastic movie, so it should be great.

so yeah thats school life. Not much else to say about that. It seriously only takes up about 20% of my time, and thats mainly because I have to be in class periodically.
NOW ON TO FOOD.

Kyoto: doshisha university, keshikan and neighborhood explorations
Tokyo is to New York as Kyoto is to San Francisco minus the hills. The city is mostly residential, dotted with parks, school and other necessary things  that makes one feel more like your living in a city than a giant rat maze. It also is not filled with nearly as much overwhelming stuff. For example, the part of town we live in does not have a Kareoke place for a mile in any direction, much to our disappointment. It is FULL of temples, and historical places and many other wonderful places, but its just a lot slower by comparison. Also, the city is like San Jose in that it is surrounded by rolling mountains on every side, and it feels like you are being cupped in the hand of Buddha when the sun shines between the mountains at sunset.

Our living situation is now a dorm (a really nice dorm) just a few minutes from campus. Unfortunately the other Doshisha students have been forbidden to come visit us (I guess they are trying to quarantine the awkward) so if we ever do make freinds, it will have to be on campus. The rooms are tiny, but nothing we can't handle. My roommate and I are getting along great :)


By far the best thing about the neighborhood is that we are a two minute walk from the entrance to the old Imperial palace of Japan. Its a HUGE stony walled complex perfect for morning runs and lunch picnics. The cherry blossom trees are just coming out too, which makes for a truly spectacular show. Half of me is actually more interested in the people taking pictures than the actual trees, but the flowers are undeniable gorgeous.

The big central river is also just about an hour away from us by foot, and we went down there yesterday for almost three hours just sitting in the sunlight. Its a beautiful place with many children and adults alike playing in the river. 

the school is small but nice, but I really dont think we will be spending that much time there at all. 

jk gotta go to class, ttly.