Weekend Double Dose- Towers and Flowers

Today I learned a new Japanese word- "overslept."  I woke up to papasan telling me that if I wanted to go to the flower festival we would need to leave soon.  I jumped out of bed and quickly got dressed--but more on that later, first I'm going to blitzkrieg through yesterday.

Yesterday I told papasan that I wanted to go to Goryokaku, so I could see it and meet up with some friends.  He offered to drop me off and also told me roughly how I should take the bus route home.  Goryokaku is a fort that was built with a star-shaped moat around it, allowing for maximum area that could be covered by cannons.  Although it is famous for being the last battle site of the Boshin war (a civil war that was to my understanding between the samurai and the empire) , it has now been turned into a park.  The park itself was not terribly impressive, but only because there are several things inside under construction.  So after having my fill on the small playground inside the park, my friends and I decided to circumnavi...that is, starcumnavigate the fort.

After  Goryokaku, we went to go get lunch at a nearby Lucky Pierrot, although this one wasn't clown themed. Instead it had a super bizarre biblical theme.  All over the front of the building there were drawings of saints and angels, and then on the side of the building there was this blasphemous little gem.  I ordered the chinese chicken burger (their best seller) and it was so delicious I ordered a second.

After lunch it was time to split up, because people had told their host families they would be back soon.  I made a quick stop at the public library and admired how crazy difficult Japanese is to read, and then headed to the nearest bus stop.  I read the bus sign and calculated I had about a 20 minute wait for my bus.  So I waited.

And I waited.  And waited some more, now reading the Japanese-English dictionary for fun.  I was getting sort of frustrated, mentally yelling at the bus sign "Reveal your secrets to me!!" To pass the time I bought a vending machine drink called Milk Coffee, that promised "the perfect balance between rich and milky mouthfeel with intense, high-tone aroma of fresh coffee."

 I soon realized that I had been looking at the bus schedule for week days.  It was a weekend. Darn it!  In total I spent about two hours at the bus stop but at around hour 1.5, I had a moment where suddenly busses made complete sense. And I understood how they worked, and knew how I could get home taking a different bus.  It worked! I now feel like I can get however lost I want and always find my way home on the bus. Yay!

On to today-  As I said, I woke up and found out today is the flower festival! And apparently mamasan was working there, handing out the flyers to people.  It was a blast, and on the car ride there and back papasan and I talked in Japanese and I taught him some more english phrases (although he's already surprisingly good! I guess its picked up from his previous 7 host kids.  Who were all girls by the way, I'm their first host son! But enough writing in these parentheses).

The festival was a lot of fun, filled with colors and flowers and a band playing.  The first order of business was to find mamasan.

Found her! Next Papa-san and I went to go get some food for lunch.  Once more, it was a "Challenji"  to find out what Kurisu (me) could eat.

The one normal thing I recognized was hot dog on a stick.  Everything else...didn't fully understand but I ate it anyway.  The thing that looks like an octopus tentacle on a stick was actually quite tasty. After a bit more walking around, looking around, and eating some professional takoyaki (deeeelishous) we headed home, and I started studying which I need to keep doing now because I have my first test tomorrow. Ah!

High: Learning how to use the bus system!!

Low: The cold wait until the above happy realization.

Hero: My dad! Happy Fathers Day daddio! I miss you!

And of course...What festival would be complete without a robotic squid!