Rain, Samurai, and Volcanos too!

So this last weekend I went to Shimabara, and Shimabara castle. It started off with riding the bus to Morimachi, and then walking to Sumiyoshi, in the rain. After that I got on another bus, took it up to the stop by the school, and climbed up the mountain the school sits on, in the rain. Once I got up there I spent about 15 minutes trying to dry myself off before I sat in the bus for two hours. After I got on the bus, and we left, we ended up stopping at the bottom of the hill for a student who had overslept and was coming in a taxi. After she arrived, we were able to leave after losing 20 minutes. The bus was comfy, I had the back row of seats to myself and I was sitting in the middle seat so I could stretch out. The girl who arrived late cause she had been out partying last night asked if she could sleep in the 2 seats on my right side, and then later another friend of mine came back and asked if she could sleep in the seats to my left, as she also didn't get enough sleep. I played a few games with Trevor and Jesse of Metroid Prime Hunters on our DS. After we were done playing, the tour guide was still talking up at the front of the bus and was rather loud. She was nice, but loud...especially when we were driving aside the ocean, she shouted "Ume, Ume desu!". Which means, "Ocean, it's the ocean!". We stopped for a bathroom break, and I bought a small paper kite for like 315 yen. We hopped back on the bus and she continued her monologue about Shimabara and random other stuff.



We eventually arrived at Shimabara Castle, and the lame thing was that after they got done explaining some of the history of it, we only had like 30 minutes to look around before the bus left to our next location. However, there were many cool suits of armor on the second floor, along with katanas, wakazashis, and a tanto or two.



The top floor had a gorgeous view of the city, as well as a full view of the cloud covered Mt. Fugen that I climbed. After taking a lot of video and a few pictures, I went back down to see if there was anything worthwhile buying in the gift shop, nothing really drew my interest, but I forgot to get a cell phone charm of Shimabara castle, I like to try to get one of unique places I've been to.



After our bus left, we went down and looked at an old house of one of the samurai that lived in this city, it was pretty interesting, though I think I liked the gardens more than the house.



Unfortunately, after that last picture, my camera battery died. I was able to take pictures with my camcorder, but the quality is significantly less than my camera, and I haven't gotten around to uploading them. Anyways, after the samurai house, we went to a place featuring houses that had been partially buried by the Ash that was washed down when the volcano erupted. We went and had lunch after that, and it was pretty tasty. After that we went to the Fugen Disaster Memorial Museum. That place was pretty cool. They had all this footage of the volcano erupting, mudslide, and simulations of the pyroclastic cloud over the city. This museum even had one of the cinematic theatres that showed footage of the volcano through a helicopter, and the floor moved. In the theatre they kinda took you on a ride as the volcano erupted, and I must say it was quite interesting and enjoyable. After that we looked around the museum some more, went up to the observation deck, and then had to leave to go home. Hehe, I bought this little owl, which almost has the composure of a hackeysack, except it's not meant to be used that way. It's pretty fun tossing it around though cause it always lands right side up, because the bottom is weighted. I'll use it to get someone's attention or something, I'll be like, "Hey!" *Throws owl at them* "Pick up your garbage!". Or in this case, I put the owl on top of the bottle of Shimabara shyochu(Japanese Sake) I bought for my host dad and I to drink when he comes home. I plan on keeping the bottle, cause I wouldn't have bought it otherwise. Remember kids, the owl says "Don't drink and drive, or I shall dive-bomb you!"



Ok, well that about does it for the Shimabara trip. That night I managed to catch this Japanese Moth, and it really suprised me because it's much bigger, and it actually looks quite unlike a moth. The only reason we knew it wasn't was because I happened to catch this thing at night as it was flying into the glass pane door towards the light. Don't ask me how I can keep moths and butterfly's on my hand, it's just a natural gift. I also finally got around to taking a picture of the work of art hanging in Kiyoko's tea room. It's a tiger and it's made out of all stone. Pretty cool, huh?



On top of all that, I shaved, and it really suprised Kiyoko and all the people at school.



Yesterday was Nozomi's birthday, and we celebrated it along with his mother's birthday(which was on the 17th of June) with a nice grand supper. We had gyoza, sashimi, cake, chicken, shrimp, sushi and rice!



We had lots of fun, and now Nozomi is 8 years old. Monday was nice because the weather was just gorgeous, it was cool with a breeze and no humidity or rain. Now, for the moment I've all been waiting for!



I made this picture, using the one of me from Shimabara castle, and a picture I took back in Golden Week because it looked like a fuedal Japan. The combination is perfect, muHa! Till next time!