Atami, the onsen city

Atami, the little city on the eastern coast of Japan.
熱海 (Atami) means "hot sea", and is mostly known for it's hot springs. Tokyo Institute of Technology had organized a short trip for us foreign exchange students. We arrived in Atami, in the evening, after a stop at the Asahi Brewery.
The hotel we stayed at was really nice, called Heartpia. The rooms had tatami floors and most things were included. After settling in and going to the onsen on the top floor once, we were treated to a very nice dinner!
After the dinner and a lecture with discussions we went back to the onsen once more before going to bed.

This view is what we woke up to. Pretty beautiful ain't it?
Guess what we did in the morning, before the breakfast buffet.. That's right, we went to the onsen for a third and last time. It's been a while since I stayed at a hotel, and this whole experience was really nice.

We were given the great opportunity to meet the mayor of Atami, Mr Sakae Saito, a previous student at Tokyo Tech. He told of his student life, him studying abroad and how that gave him a better understanding of the importance of an international outlook. Few of his friends, and in general few engineering students go into politics.
Atami, like many other resort cities, have faced challenges like how to attract more people to visit. Urbanization means people move into bigger cities, which is one reason for fewer residents in smaller cities like Atami. Many families and couples visit, for instance to honeymoon. Personally I think more people would visit this nice little getaway, just one meagre hour away from the busy life of Tokyo, if they only knew what was available.
Though bath houses, spas and similar activities are not too difficult to find inside Tokyo lately which may also affect peoples desire to escape the big city.

After the memorable lecture we were given a guided tour around the hillside city. All the way down to the beach. We were divided into groups and each group were guided by a Japanese student.
The shore is crescent-shaped and has both harbors and a beach. It's sad that there weren't that many people walking around. Though I can just imagine what it's like here in the summers!
The weather this day was a little cloudy with a few drops of rain, but it made for some nice pictures I think.

Summers should attract more people. Though I've heard that beach visits aren't as popular among Japanese people as it is for some Swedish people back home, so I'm not sure.
I will probably go back for a day visit then.
Now we visited in late December - probably not the coldest couple of days during the year, but this is not high-season for a resort like this. I wish Mr Saito good luck and I hope Atami will see more visitors in the coming years.

As always, more pictures can be found on my Tumblr

These last couple of months

Ok, so I haven't written here in a while - a long while. Therefore this post will include a lot of miscellaneous bits and pieces from my recent months here in Japan. I'm sorry for that, but for those who want to be more up to date on my journeys in Japan can follow my tumblr - I'm better at updating that page.

Last year Mount Fuji became a world heritage, and most people here in Japan are proud of that.

I am very glad to have been lucky enough to visit Mount Fuji (Fuji-san). A few weeks ago my dear friends of the Toyama family brought me on an adventure! The original plan was to get up really early to go to a fish market/festival, but due to previous bad weather, the event was cancelled.

I had been with friends and stayed up late the previous day, and figured I wouldn’t be able to get up early enough for the festival anyway, so when I woke up on that day I had no idea what adventure was waiting.Turned out that the Toyama family had plans, great plans! They wanted to take the car to visit Fuji-san. The weather was great and the feeling of being that far above sea level was refreshing.

So now I have been here for about 3 & ½ months, and I have about 8 more months left.

Asakusa

I've done a lot, visited a lot of places and kept myself busy for most of the days. For instance I visited the Edo-Tokyo Museum where I got to hear some traditional japanese music played by some nice ladies. The instrument is called koto (箏).
I've tried to partake in as many activities as I have had time for and one of them was an orienteering organized by SAGE at Tokyo Tech. That was a good way of getting more used to the Tokyo train system and to see a bunch of new places.
Like Asakusa. There really are a lot of people in and around Tokyo. Wherever you go... I personally don't mind, but some days maybe - especially when thinking of the trains - you wish that there would just be a little less people around.

I have also gone with friends to various events and places. Like the Tokyo Motor Show in Big Sight, Odaiba. Which was loads of fun! The next event I am hoping to go to in Big Sight is the Tokyo Internatioal Anime Fair this March.
We got to see soo many cars, bikes and everything that has anything to do with motors. Tokyo Big Sight is really amazingly large. And there were several wings to explore. 

There have been parties organized for us international students, and there have been class trips. We have visited Fujitsu, Asahi brewery, Asahi glass and the city of Atami.

The days during the semester are spent in school. In different classes or in the laboratory. So when the short winter break finally arrived I immediately took the opportunity to get out of Tokyo for a few days. First I went to Takayama, Shirakawago and Hidafurukawa. It was nice to experience some snow, because in Tokyo there's no snow. It's quite unusual I hear.

I made a little christmas collage from that three day trip.

I came home on the 24th of December, spent the whole night videochatting with my relatives back in Sweden to celebrate christmas with them. And the next morning I left for Atami together with the YSEP people.

First stop was the Asahi brewery where we even got to drink fresh beer (!). See the nice christmas tree they had in the factory?

Then we got to spend an evening, a night and a morning at a really nice hotel in Atami, a city about an hour from Tokyo. Most of us enjoyed the onsen - some of us enjoyed it three times. We were given a really nice dinner, and attended a few lectures. The most interesting one was given by the mayor of Atami!

In the next post I will write more about our visit to Atami.

After returning from Atami I went together with some friends to Tokyo Disney Resort! Specifically DisneySea. It was a day of adventure, rides, screams and a whole lot of laughs.
It was my first time visiting a Disney resort, and I had so much fun. I didn't expect it to be as fun for people above the age of 20, but man was I proven wrong.

We went to DisneySea on Dec 27, so after that there were a few days where I didn't have many plans. I went to the Shinjuku Gyoen to enjoy the nice winter weather in Tokyo. I made another winter collage here. It looks a little different from the other winter collage, right?
I also went shopping, went exploring and enjoyed my free time in Tokyo. I'm looking forward to the next break, when I am planning to go outside of Tokyo again - hopefully to Kyoto and Nara.
I also went to the Tokyo Tower! Now I've been up in Yokohama Landmark Tower, Roppongi Hills and the Tokyo Tower!

Ameyoko street in Ueno

New years was celebrated in a traditional japanese way. I spent it together with my japanese family here (Toyama family, that I mentioned earlier), and I also met friends from my laboratory to go to the Meiji Jingu in Yoyogi park.
On the new years night I got to ring the gong, and then we went to a shrine for hatsumode. The following days were spent eating lots of great food and cakes, while meeting a lot of very nice japanese people. I'm super thankful for the opportunity to spend new years with my japanese family here, and for the fact that they actually treat me like family. Most japanese people I've met so far have been really nice to me.

So.. now I've briefly told of the highlights of my stay here these last months - in the country with few trashcans and English speakers, Japan.