From the Midwest and Around the World

   Hello everyone! It gets harder and harder to update, especially since I've fallen behind a bit in my posts as well as I've had a few busy weeks recently.    About three weeks ago, I visited Kyoto with some of the Japanese students who were studying English here at JCMU. We visited Yasaka Shrine and Kiyomizu Temple. Because much of Japan is very open (and semi-secular) about religion, but their faith is based in polytheism, there are many shrines (both large and small) and a lot of temples. It is not uncommon to see a very small shrine squeezed in the alley between two houses. As a Christian, I also have not gotten a chance to see inside another religion's house of worship.    Yasaka Shrine has a large white and bright orange gate. When you walk inside, there are food-booths and a lot of mini shrines. There is also a place where one can buy protective charms (usually about $10 or more), "mikuji" (which are fortune sheets...I will talk about t...

   I visited Hikone-jo (Hikone Castle) today. With my student ID, I get in free... Unfortunately, since it is winter here, things are kind of gray and muddy. However, the view was wonderful!      However, the climb up to the main castle was a haul (as it should be deduced due to the view).        The castle was also really intimidating, but in a different way. However, the stairs inside the castle leading to the top were little death traps. They could not be called stairs because they were more like really steep ladder steps. I went up forwards...but I had to go down backwards. With my luck, it was not hard to picture myself falling down flat on my head. But here is a picture of the exterior of the castle. I will probably go again and get more pictures:     It was a really good experience and now I am preparing to Skype with some friends from college who also did JCMU a few years ago. I also ha...

   I hope everyone enjoyed not having to read my blog during my brief hiatus. Well, I'm back to bother you all again. It is Sunday evening after an interesting, restful, and spontaneous weekend. First off, let me tell you about the rest of my week. Before I started class in level two Japanese, I took a lot of walks outside on Monday and Tuesday...and I have not posted the pictures yet...so here they are: This is the road outside JCMU.  This is a view of the beach from a roadside park just between Hikone and Maibara (the next town over) <---- Another view of the mountains across the lake Obligatory picture of waves---> <-----It was really windy this morning and these poor ducks were just riding the waves. Here is a rock that is considered holy or attached to a diety  (forgive the Wikipedia explanation)---> The town you see here is Maibara and the Mountain behind it is Mount Ibuki---> <---Another look at Maibara <-...