Aomori's Getting Cold!

Winter is slowly coming to Aomori. Last week some people say it was the first snow, I did not see snow, I saw hail. But there snow on the mountain tops and it looks really pretty, I can see the mountains really well from my office! Yesterday going to work it was one degree C. But these days are ranging around 4-10.

So, for Halloween I ended up being a Kingyo-Nebuta. Nebuta is the really famous festival held in Aomori in August, and Kingyo means gold fish. During the festival and all around Aomori there are these gold fish (sort of) looking things hanging around. So I was one of those!

Curling has been going well. I have not practice recently but I went to see the women I practice with place a game, they won. Afterwards they asked me if I was free on the 18th, I said I think so, and then they invited me to play in their next match because they needed a fifth teammate. We will see how this goes....uh oh...

This past weekend my Japanese friend from studying abroad in Osaka came up to Aomori to visit and we did many Aomori touristy things! We went to Osorezan, which is famous throughout Japan. Osorezan is, Mt. Fear, and the gateway to Hell, where people can communicate with the dead, its pretty creepy. Its very barren, cold, gray, and the most terrible stink in the world from the volcanic sulfur lakes.
On Saturday we took a four hour morning ferry from Aomori to Hokodate in Hokkaido (the most northern island of Japan). I was excited I have always wantd to go to Hokkaido and it was beautiful. It was really really cold and windy, but really fun. There was a lot of history, with foreign countries (Perry was actually there for a bit and there are brick buildings so you dont feel like you are in Japan). We ate sheep (because Hokkaido is famous for having sheep), we went to some museums, we went to Goryokaku fort (where the last battle of the Japanese Boshin Civil war was), went up Mt Hakodate via the ropeway and then took the 1130 pm ferry home. It was really cool, felt like christmas with all the foriegn looking buildings, the cold weather, and the lights! I want to def go again!
Then Sunday we did Aomori things that were close, like went to a farm and picked apples (aomori produces 50 percent of Japans apples), we went to Sannai Maruyama (a site with old structures from the Jomon period of Japan) and the Showa Daibutsu, one of the largest, if not the largest Buddah statue in Japan .



















Well, Dad is coming through Japan for business, so he is actually coming to Aomori tomorrow! Crazy! So I might be doing some more Aomori things or taking him to some yummy restaurants.

Other highlights are I booked my flight for winter break, I am going to go to Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore from Dec 21-Jan 9!! Not sure where or what exactly but that is what the rest of this month and December are for!