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Hiroshima Part 2!

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That evening, we went to Sushiro, which is the conveyor belt Sushi and it was amazing! It took us a minute to figure it out, but once we did it was so cool! You order it through your phone (or the giant screen next to the table, but we didn't figure that out until the end, oops) and it comes on a little belt right to your table. And you keep eating and ordering until you are sated! TPU-F had a dish-stacking competition with the kids at the table next to us, both giggling as they tried to beat the other. It was very cute, though I they definitely beat won the competition. The next day, we took a ferry to Miyajima, an island about an hour boat's ride away from Hiroshima. It's a big tourist destination, and is known for a spectacular view of the surrounding area, a float shrine island and... deer? Yes, there are deer all over the island, and they just wander around or follow you hoping for foot scraps. Claysie was very excited to see the floating shrine island (Itsukushima), b...
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Hiroshima

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The next day, we took the Shinkansen to Hiroshima. This is a high-speed training that can basically take you all across Japan in a shockingly short amount of time, traveling at speeds of up to 200 mph/320 kph, kind of like the German ICE! And you wouldn't know it based on how smooth the ride is. The seats are comfortable and recline, and you can even order drinks or snacks if you are in the Green Car (which is kind of a first-class type thing), and of course you have Wifi. The scenery is really cool, but you're moving so fast and there are so many tunnels that it's kind of hard to see everything. We didn't get to see Mount Fuji because it was cloudy, but the landscape of Japan is stunning. It's mountainous with villages strewn throughout, and all the mountains are covered in trees. It took about 4 hours to get from Tokyo to Hiroshima, which is a whopping 800 km/500 miles! We arrived in Hiroshima towards the evening, checked into our hotel, and picked a bistro for di...
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teamLab Planets

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 It's the moment you've all been waiting for! Blog Entry #4. On the evening of the third night in Tokyo, went went to teamLab Planets in Odaiba. It's a bit hard to describe, but the closest I can come is an interactive art exhibit with other people. Thankfully, a picture is worth a thousand words. And, as a mathematician, that means 10 pictures are worth 10,000 words. And a video is worth... well it depends on the frame rate and length I guess. And resolution maybe? Ok, maybe not a great analogy. Anyway... teamLab Planets! You put all your stuff in a locker and then take your shoes off. The first room is basically a giant pillow that you walk around on and fall down a bunch, especially if there are other people near you. My understanding is that the idea here was that other people create distortions that can impact your own path. The, you walk through some lukewarm, knee-high(ish) water, which is weird. But, then you walk into this huge room with (probably) thousands of LED...
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Tokyo Days 2 & 3

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Samu took us to several neighborhoods over the course of the next two days.  The first area of Tokyo we visited was Ueno, after traversing the subway! Here, we saw our first official temple! Samu explained that the temples with more Indian influence tend to have more natural and earthen colors, while those with Chinese have more red and gold.  Temples have different shrines, each which can be dedicated to many different deities. Businessmen may pray to one specific shrine for luck in business, students to one for luck with their exams, and so on. At the temples, there are prayer boxes (known as saisen-bako) at which you drop coins (traditionally, a 50 yen piece which is the only coin with a hole in it), bow twice, clap twice, then say your prayer or wish and bow once more. You can also purchase charms and prayer bead bracelets for various purposes.   Several temples and shrines had foxes in them, which are the servants of Inari Okami, the god of the harvest. The fema...
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