Our First Full Day

Being on time is very important in the JFMF program. If you are late you may get reprimanded or worse, miss out on the food. This morning we had a large, albeit odd assortment to choose from. As you can see I chose a cinnamon-type roll, ham, french fries, miso soup, fruit, and coffee. YUM. There is absolutely nothing wrong with french fries for breakfast. Oh and salmon too. It really wasn't as bad as it sounds.

After a brief Orientation, we loaded the buses and went to the Diet, which is Japan's House of Representatives. It was very Western in style, it reminded me quite a bit of the State of Illinois' captial building in Springfield. We were not able to take pictures inside, but I was able to get a few of myself outside.

Then we went to a traditional Japanese tempura restaurant in Asakusa. Tempura is fried vegetables, fish, seafood, etc. It is pretty common in the United States, but probably not as good. Again I had miso soup (I love the stuff) and even ate the salad and a little orange thing. A tangerine maybe. We had to remove our shoes so that we didn't ruin the mats on the floor and sat in very low chairs. The food was great, but we did rush a bit so that we could visit the Asakusa Shrine (Shinto) and Senso-jo (Buddhist) temple.


To reach the temple and shrine, you start at the Kaminari-mon Gate (with the big lantern) and walk through a gauntlet of shops (didn't buy anything yet) that are filled with treats and wall hangings, toys, kimonos, and much more. There is even a five story pagoda near the temple.


Before you reach the temple is a small building where you can get a fortune. All you need to do is pay 100 yen (roughly a dollar) and remove a stick from the metal container. The number on the stick corresponds with a little drawer where the fortunes are kept. All of the numbers are written in Japanese characters, but luckily a member of my group knew how to read the characters and found my fortune. Unfortunately, I got a bad one. Luckily there is a place to tie up the bad fortunes so that they will blow away and be forgotten.





Just past the fortunes are places to take in incense and purify yourself before entering the temple. The temple was amazing and filled with so many people even during a Wednesday afternoon. At the neighboring Shinto shrine we saw a family bringing their baby to be blessed -- which is what you do when the baby is 30 to 32 days old. It was amazing to see these two religions being practiced so close together by the same group of people.

Ok -- I need to get ready for today's program so I don't get in trouble. You know I hate getting in trouble. Did I mention I got to sing karaoke last night? See, you have to come back for that. No, there is no video or pictures of that. No one needs to see or hear me singing.