Sup everyone. In this installment of the amazing adventures of Kafherii-san (how I have to spell it in the darned phoenetic alphabet they use here), our hero takes a trip back to his old stomping grounds in the Gunma prefecture, where he spent a year.



I arranged to meet Miyuki Hoshikawa, one of the voluteers I taught with, and she took me around again. It was great to see her, she spent a lot of time in Australia and her English is really good, and we talked a lot. She drove me all over the place.



First, to the schools I used to teach at. This is me at the entrance to Toyoaki Elementary School, where I used to spend one day a week. This is where Miyuki used to help out - she was a volunteer, and that was okay since she was only doing it once a week. At Kanashima Junior High, where I spent 4 days a week, I would help out an actual English teacher in the classroom.



Nice to see the old places again.



Next place we went was up to Mt. Haruna, the biggest mountain overlooking the city. This is a photo taken from near the summit - it was nice to see the surrounding landscape in autumn, when the trees are at their most picturesque. It's really nice right now, I'm looking forward to Kyoto, it should be spectacular and right at the peak of the season.

That's the hot springs resort town of Ikaho there in at the bottom.

This is Miyuki, she's really nice.

The lake at the top of Mt. Haruna, with all the boats for rental.

View from the summit, we took a cable car up to the top

The Ikaho Ishidan (stone steps) - the town is kind of built around them, they are a relic from the Edo period. Been refurbished since then, of course, but still there. There are lots of little shops lining the path, too, and a shrine at the top.

The steps were built at various times, and the height and width of them varies. There aren't handholds everywhere, either, and I bet it's slick when it rains. I hope there aren't many accidents.

They were constructing an additional series of steps at the bottom of the existing set - it makes me wonder if they have plans to continue doing that. If I were to come back in 50 years, would it be stone steps all the way to the bottom of the valley?

She took me to Mizusawa-dera too, a Buddhist temple nearby. It was nice to see the place again, I'd only been there a couple of times.

A giant bell, with the kind of horizontal log ringer that you swing up against it. I remember when the ALT's got together at New Years when I was here for a year, and there was a line an hour long at midnight to ring the bell. Yes, we waited, and yes, we rang in the New Year properly.

Well, that was a fun day! I'll post again soon. Hope everything is going well back in Florida, cheers!