I can hardly believe that I am writing about my final night in Japan. This semester has definitely gone by the fastest out of all of them. Being in Tokyo, going through the interview process at Goldman, meeting tons of new and fantastic people, living with my host family - the list goes on and on... It has truly been an incredible experience.

My last day in Japan was pretty hectic (hand to cancel my health insurance, close my bank account, go fulfill gift requests). Something that really surprised me was how easy it was to cancel my health insurance here in Japan. I know another TUJ study abroad student who had an awful time canceling theirs. I basically walked in, told them I was returning to the US and that was it. First, anything involving the government never goes this smoothly. Second, Japanese society loves tons of arbitrary paperwork. Both of these elements were lacking... maybe I caught them on a good day? Canceling the bank account wasn't too much of a hassle either - however I had to do the entire process in Japanese. Regarding gift requests, well.... I'll have to explain that one when I get home =p.

My last night in Japan happened to coincide with my host dad's 68th birthday! We spent the first half of the night celebrating (I even have pictures!). There was a ton of delicious sushi that we used for temaki (I will do a post about sushi after I get home explaining this). It was kind of funny because instead of the traditional green tea we had coca-cola to drink. So odd! It was absolutely delicious. The sushi was followed by a small birthday cake and green tea.

I hadn't really intended on going out last night because it was Hirao-san's birthday, and I felt like it would be nice if I spent some time with them since I am leaving in (... 6 hours as of this post). However, they both said that since it is the last night I should go to see my friends in Shibuya. This made me feel less guilty, so I let everyone know I would met them at our traditional spot - Hubs. My entire plan was to go and see everyone for an hour or so, say my goodbyes then come home and get a good nights sleep. Oh how things never turn out the way they are planned. Everyone insisted that I stay out and party all night and catch the first train home in the morning. I was actually fairly reluctant but somehow I was convinced to go to Club Camelot and spent my last night in Tokyo with my friends doing what we do best.

At about 5a.m., once we were done at Camelot we went to get Soba Udon at a place called Fuji Soba (it's right near center-makku in Shibuya if you ever want to go!). A bowl of steaming hot udon at 5 a.m. is surprisingly refreshing. After the bowl of udon Nicky was still hungry, so we went to the kabob place right around the corner.

It was very odd walking around Shibuya at 5 a.m. this time since I knew that I wouldn't be coming back any time soon. After all the nights of staying up until first train, this one was definitely different. I will really miss that part of Tokyo -- I can't wait to come back and see what kind of new and crazy fashion styles the Japanese pop culture comes up with.

Once we got to the station everyone said their goodbyes and made the walk to their respective trains. We even had some Japanese girl take a picture of us - this is an awful picture of me since my eyes are closed and I have no idea why my arm is over Cliff's shoulder, but it doesn't really matter since I'm hyaku pacento (100%) positive I'll see everyone again.

Overall this semester has been an incredible experience - regardless of my opinion of TUJ, Japan is a wonderful country with a lot of things to see/do/experience, and I'm sure I only barely scratched the surface.

Until next time Japan... sayonara.

For 3.5 hours my buddy Tomas and I walked around Chidorigafuchi(千鳥ケ淵) - the huge park surrounding the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. It was also probably the last day of the cherry blossom season, as there was quite a bit of green coming up on the trees (as you'll see in the photos). This incredibly scenic area was joined by the most beautiful weather I've seen in Tokyo so far - about 65, low humidity, sunny. Talk about a great way to round off the cherry blossom season.

Today also was my first real trip into photography. I had briefly messed around with the settings on my camera, but never with the purpose of setting up a specific shot or effect. Tomas is a photography nut, and brought his $2,000+ camera... talk about getting shown up! He gave me a lot of great tips though, and seemed fairly impressed at how some of the shots were turning out from my point and shoot. I took well over 300 shots during the walk around the park, and I've posted around 100 of them, largely unedited other than some minor cropping on a few of the photos. The rest of the post will be broken down into the secquence of pictures on my web album, so if you have that open while reading, it should hopefully make this post a bit more interesting!

We started out at the Hanzomon entrance to the park, where the bulk of the cherry blossom trees are. It was very apparent that we were at the end of cherry blossom season, but there were still a decent amount of flowers left on the trees. I can't even begin to imagine how beautiful this area is when the trees are at peak bloom - it has to feel like you're walking through some kind of fantasy land.

Pictures 1-60ish

As we entered the park proper, we were greeted by this statue in the middle of a water-area. It really seemed out of place to me as this kind of art reminds me more of Italy and the Renaissance, and not Japan. There were also 3 or 4 pigeons camping out on the statues which was hilarious. I especially like the one who is asleep on the statue's head. Fat little birds! (Note: There is one shot that has a bunch of white spots against a blue background. This is my attempt at catching the peddles falling off the tree.) Around the statues is a large pathway that is lined with cherry blossoms (Sakura - 桜). You can see there are still a fairly decent amount of people doing hanami, although the numbers are down quite a bit from about a week ago.

Hanami is a pretty big event in Japan-- the best translation is "cherry blossom viewing" except it is more akin to having a picnic under the sakura, drinking, singing, and having a great time with friends and family. Ueno park is particularly well known for how crazy the people get with hanami.

As we walked along the path we came to an area overlooking the river and sakura. I really wish the sky wasn't overcast in that direction because it would have added some fantastic contrast to these shots. There are tons of pictures on the internet of the river + riverbank + the sakura that line it. None of my shots of this area really came out that well, but I didn't want to emit them all as this is one of the cooler scenic shots.

Pictures 60ish-110ish

As we were walking, Tomas made an interesting comment about how this park flows really well with the city proper. There are streets that go through the edges, which helps blur the line between park and city. It was a pretty interesting observation, especially since while you're in the park you can't hear any cars, sirens, or other common city noises.

We finally came to the huge, and I mean HUGE field area of the park. I hope some of the photos are able to express just how large this area is, because it was really terrific. It was also perfectly manicured --- さすが日本！There is a picture of a single, unimpressive tree - the reason for this picture is because it was the most green tree I had ever seen; it was so bright that it almost looked neon! There were way fewer sakura, but the ones that were here were in full bloom. Accordingly, Tomas and I took advantage of this by taking a ridiculous amount of pictures of these two trees. This is probably my favorite picture of the day:

From 千鳥ケ淵

We continued walking and were able to see some traditional Japanese architecture, which caused me to nerd out for a bit because I love old Japanese architecture.

From 千鳥ケ淵

This photo is way overexposed, and needs a lot of photoshopping and editing, but I think it has some awesome potential.

The gate was also pretty neat due to how big it was. It would have been awesome if we would have been able to go inside and see the architecture... oh well.


Photos 110ish-End

We had made the transition from Chidorigafuchi park to the Imperial Palace grounds at this point. If you have seen my pictures from the '07 Japan trip, this area will look a bit familiar. When going through the album, you will notice a long string of pictures of sky scrapers. If you cycle through them fast it will give you a panoramic 180 degree view of where I was standing. I'll stitch all these images together later and post it as one gigantic image.

Tomas was extremely eager to take the famous bridge + palace picture, so we headed to the spot were you can get the view needed. He was psyched to say the least when I pointed it out to him. Of the pictures I took, I think that the best one is:

From 千鳥ケ淵

Again... damn overcast sky in that direction! The colors in this one pop out the most in my opinion.

There are more pictures that are overexposed, and need some photoshop love, but I think a lot of these pictures came out pretty well.

Picture 163 is probably my 3rd favorite picture. If only that couple wasn't standing there, it would easily be my first. I have a feeling I'll be able to do some photoshop magic though since I have other pictures from this exact spot to fill them in with.

Picture 167 is pretty neat as well, despite the sun being crazy bright.

I have to get one of my Japanese friends to explain picture 176 to me. The sign is basically counting the number of dead people - from what, I'm not totally sure.

Overall, today was awesome. The fact that classes are over and I had zero stress while walking around this beautiful park was the icing on the cake.

Just uploaded a bunch of pictures to my hanami album in picasa - it was kind of overcast so there is poor contrast in most of the pictures between the sky and the cherry blossoms. Some of the shots came out pretty nice though; I'm going to do actual hanami on Sunday, and the weather should be great, so expect way more, and much better pictures then!

Also, I should be uploading some of these to my deviantart page: http://heijoshin.deviantart.com/art/Akasaka-Sakura-159279592

Not sure if you need an account to view, but figured I'd link anyway.