Here's a little catch up post and a few pictures. It kind of outlines the fun stuff so far in Japan.

I am still waiting for my alien registration card to come in, they say I
can pick it up on the 24th of August.  It's a real pain not to have it
since I cannot set up or even request a phone or internet connection
without it.  Since it's coming on the 24th the internet company I will be
going with says that I should be able to be hooked up 6 days from then.  So
I will hopefully be online in my house on the 30th (the 29th where you
are).

This was a long weekend since it was the Japanese holiday Obon.  It's
like memorial day and veteran's day wrapped into one.  So that was from
Saturday to Wednesday.

So on Saturday we went on a mini vacation to a beach that's just a ferry
ride away from Molly's town.  Alot of the other Okayama JETs came along so
it was a real good time.  I got a little sunburned and stung by a jellyfish
but I think I'll live.



We swam out to a raft and I had a pinching feeling in my lower back.  I
turned around and there were a whole bunch or really large angel fish in
the water so I figured they much have bit me.  After hanging out on the
raft for awhile we started to see baseball sized, transparent jellyfish,
then I realized I had been stung.  It wasn't a bad sting, they would have
closed the beach if the jellyfish were killers.  But we stayed in the more
shallow water for the rest of the day.

On Tuesday morning we hopped on a train to explore Hiroshima, since it is
only a 2 hour ride away on the slow train. First we went to the Hiroshima
Peace Museum, it was only about a 5 minute walk from our hotel.  It was
really crowded but a good exhibit on the pre WWII history beginning at the
start of Hiroshima up to the deployment of the bomb.  Then the exhibits
went on the show the after-effects and at the very end of the museum there
was an exhibit encouraging getting rid of nuclear weapons.  It was a pretty
good sight for only 50 cents.

After that we walked through the park outside the museum with numerous
memorials to all the types or people that died.  There was one for just
about everything.  Even children soldiers, I guess during the war Japan
trained and used highschool aged kids for domestic defense.

That night we walked around in downtown Hiroshima and saw a short
Japanese concert by the riverside.  It was pretty boring, some traditional
Japanese music called Enka.  We then walked past another park where they
had a building called the A-Bomb Dome.  It was directly below the bomb when
it exploded, so instead of being hit from the sides by the explosive force,
it was sort of pressurized into the earth.  That allowed some of its walls
and other structural features to remain intact, including the dome that
topped the old civic center.  Hiroshima decided to preserve it in the post
bomb condition.  All the metal and even brick is melted in places and then
fused back together as it cooled.

After seeing the A-bomb dome we headed back to our traditional Japanese hotel for the night. That means it was cheap and we slept on floor mattresses. It was cheap though, only about $120 for the three of us. Oh, the third person is a friend from Michigan along that Molly and I met in Tokyo. When we fist met I held up my two hands like sister showed me and said "That's where my little sister goes to college." Kaisa (that's her name) replied Northern Michigan eh? I said yeah. Anyways... On Wednesday we left the hotel early and took a ferry across the bay from Hiroshima port to Mia-Jima island. It is famous and the view up the coast with the floating torii supposed to be considered "one of the 3 best views in Japan". So we had to check it out. A Torii is like a doorway that is outside of all shinto shrines that has to be passed under in order to enter the shrine. This one is unique in that the monks decided to build it out in the middle of the bay so that incoming sailors had to pass under it during high tide in order to enter. Around the base of the main mountain near the shinto temple there were plenty of overpriced shops and all the same kind of tourist trap stuff you would find in America but it was way cheaper. I enjoy that price gouging in Japan in 50 cents over the market value on anything. From there we walked behind the temple and started our hike to the top. It was very green, most of the trees were similar to those in America. A bunch of broad leaf trees along with some (very old) cypress and bamboo thrown in here and there. There were tons of animals that we saw. Nearer to the bottom were deer that were almost tame. You could pet them and they would just sit there, even with their fawns running around. I gave one a koala yummy. Further up we say blue, green, and brown lizards. They ran away fairly fast. The hike all the way to the top took nearly 2 hours and was about 2 miles and 2000 vertical feet, so we got out exercise for the day. At the top of the mountain there were alot of monkeys, I didn't really like them as much. They were kind of gross. Also at the top were some better things to look at, there were a few temples that were decorated for an upcoming festival. There was also a shrine that housed a flame that was supposed to have been lit by a shinto monk 1200 years ago. I kind of believe it. The carbon from the flame was so thick on the surrounding walls that it formed in needle-like carbon crystals around the room. From the top we took the tram down, it was a great view, so I'm glad we did. Even though I was all for hiking down. After we got off the tram we headed to a ferry terminal and then hopped on a train home.