Our trip's intention was to visit Sayaka, a student at Fushiki High School who stayed with my family for a week last spring when her school sent students to my high school, and her family. I never met Sayaka because I lived in Nashville at the time and was knee deep into tax season, but my parents and sister adored her so I couldn't wait to meet her, her family, and experience Japan in a non-Tokyo way.
We arrived at the cute little airport and were greeted immediately by Sayaka, Shota (another FHS student who visited Luers), and Shota's mother. Sayaka's father, our ride, was sneaking this picture of Karen and Sayaka's reuniting hug. I'm the one lugging the suitcase, of course.
Shota, Bear, Sayaka and ME! We're here! The peace signs are killing me.
Sayaka informed us on our drive to her house that for lunch we were having pizza and doughnuts. Karen got excited, and I was trying to send her mental messages that the pizza was not going to be anything she was used to. We swung through a Mr. Donut to pick up a dozen (standard), and then came home to three pizzas. The first was seafood (shrimp, crab and calamari with veggies). The second was a margharita (tomatoes, basil, mozarella). The third was egg pizza, and it had a scrambled/deviled egg concoction that was clumped on each piece. I was in heaven, Bear did what she could. Here we are enjoying lunch in Sayaka's living room:
We unloaded our stuff into Sayaka's room and then hopped in the car with Sayaka's father, mother and brother to go siteseeing around Toyama. We drove along the coast (Toyama is a small fishing town almost dead west of Tokyo, on the sea rather than the Pacific) which was beautiful, and then visited The Great Buddha. It is the third largest Buddha in Japan.
Shota, Bear, Molly, Sayaka, and Sayaka's brother in front of the Buddha with no belly.
Underneath the Buddha is a temple. Immediately inside there is a shrine. Before offering prayers, you are supposed to beat this bowl-shaped metal situation with a bat-shaped rubber situation. The best translation Shota offered was: BONG! It works. Here he is showing us how to do it:
Molly bonging the bong:
Karen bonging the bong:
After we'd had enough of the Buddha, we visited Zuiryuji Temple. The temple belongs to the Zen sect of Japanese Buddhism. It was built 360 years ago (that's older than America!), and is made up of seven buildings. Here we are walking to the Sanmon building:
Another building was called the Butsuden. This building's roof is made of lead, it was thought that the roof could be used to make bullets during war or as protection instead of the obvious castle.
Sayaka's dad was acting like paparazzi with his fancy camera. I didn't know he took this one until he gave us copies. Here I am walking through the Sekibyo:
After siteseeing, we were dropped off at the bowling alley. Everything about this alley was the same as those I've been to. Here are the players:
Well, everything was the same except the shoes. The shoes were fantastic.
I'm not much of a bowler. And my book was really good.
Shota left us after bowling, and Sayaka's dad picked us up to go to dinner. SUSHI was on the menu. I was so pumped. I would live in Japan just for the sushi. Bear had never had it so I was so excited to see her reaction. This restaurant was set up really efficiently. The chefs were all in the middle, the people sat around them in a big square, and they put the sushi piece on different colored plates and set them on this conveyer belt that went around and around. The guests just picked up whatever looked good. Each plate color was a different price and when you finished, they just tallied all of your plates. So cool!
A different angle for you:
Karen does sushi: take one.
Take 2 (I had her start with shrimp because it was cooked and recognizable):
Take 3: I didn't notice there was already wasabi on it (Japanese horseradish).
Not a wasabi fan, she settled on chocolate cake. 
After dinner we went back to Sayakas to snuggle into our nice, warm beds. By nice and warm, I mean hard and cold. The whole city seemed to heat their homes with space heaters. It was below freezing out! It was charming, but I couldn't do it every winter forever. Here I am, dressed in layers for bed:
and Bear in her scarf and mittens!:
We slept the best we could, grateful for a bed, and geared up for Day 2 in Toyama. Sorry for the delay, getting back into the swing of things was harder than I thought it would be... and I have new students! Stay tuned.
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