Thursday, October 04, 2007

Gods of stone and visionaries of metal

So here I am, week 4, on the other end of a nice 3 day "weekend". I started things off by taking a few pictures of Fujisawa Tuesday morning.
This is my room. You can see the bookshelf/desk/filing-cabinet I bought from the 100 yen store (the pieces were 100 yen each, it cost me, maybe $20.) It's modular construction means I can add more pieces later, or rearrange it as needed. You can also see my floor pillow, my fan, and futon stacked up. That's all there is to my room. Nothing fancy, but I like it.
This is the exterior of my apartment building.
This is the view up the street towards the train station.
The area around the train station has a lot of shopping and is often quite busy.

After my stroll to the station I hopped on the train to Ofuna (the next stop up the line.) My intention was to check out a giant white stone head built on the top of a mountain which is visible from the train on my way to work. Long story short, I found it, but they wanted 300 yen to get close and take pictures. I decided against it and walked around downtown Ofuna for a while before going home and relaxing the rest of the day.
The head of the Goddess Cannon made out of white stone in Ofuna. (Seen from a distance because I'm too cheep to spend $3 to get closer.)

Wednesday I decided to go to Kamakura, the one time capitol of Japan. I took the local train called the Enoden (which I used to get to Enoshima earlier) along the coast to Kamakura station. I had it in my mind that the most famous thing in Kamakura, the giant Buddha, would be close to the center of town. Boy was I wrong. After a 2km walk through a residential area I did manage to find it. Unlike the previous day I did pay the 200 yen to see this.
The giant Buddha of Kamakura, cast in bronze in 1252, which has survived tidal waves and earthquakes alike. Also a locus for tourists, foreign and native.

After the 2km hike back to downtown Kamakura I recharged on a lunch of delicious curry. It is just after lunch that I noticed something... every japanese school kid who ever attended school anywhere in japan for all time was in Kamakura. I thought that by going on a week day I'd avoid crowds, and indeed the tourist crowds were thin, but waaay outmatched by the number of kids. After a little more walking around I went home and crashed out for the rest of the afternoon.
Have some Tori.

Today I got up, and not being certain what else to do, walked along the river that runs along by my apartment until it emptied into the ocean. Again, I think today's walk was about 2km long. The river flows out right near Enoshima. Near the end I noticed a large white dome on the top of a mountain and decided to go have a look. It turns out that the dome is part of a large temple complex.
The Stupa I saw from a distance. It sits on the top of a very large hill. In the center sits a golden Buddha.
Also in the temple complex, a large pagoda.

After wandering around the temple for a while I caught the Shonan-Monorail back to Ofuna (then the train home.) The Shonan-Monorail is just like a train sized roller coaster. It zips in-out-and-over the mountains near Fujisawa/Kanagawa.

I now sit writing this and doing laundry. It's been really nice to have a few days off, especially since I've been working a lot in the past month... wow, it's already been a month. Anyways,

Jaa Mata Ne!

posted by Dockett @ 2:50 AM

1 Comments:

At 6:15 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thanks for the posting and the pics! Glad to see you're all settled in now and having some fun exploring the area. I'm back from Ireland and will update you soon on the MomCat adventures abroad.
Talk to you soon. Mom

 

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