Sunday, August 17, 2008: Kokura culture

I'm spoiling Brandon because today I made French toast (minus the cinnamon and powdered sugar)...still good! We wanted to try the train again (for a trial run) today, so we planned to catch the 2:47 pm one. Meanwhile, we rode our bikes to "GooDay"...the hardware store...just a few minutes away from our apartment. It's got a Home Depot feel to it but also a twist of Wal-Mart (maybe not those low prices, but the added variety of items is similar to Wal-Mart). We saw anything from grills, fans, cleaning supplies, curtains and shoes to pet food, picture frames, home decor and chairs. Very handy for when we want to fix-up a few things in our apartment.

We had an hour to kill, so next stop: "Daiso". It's what they call the 100 Yen store...translation: Dollar Store! Music to my ears...finally a spot to get a bargain! We looked for a while and found just about everything you could find in a dollar store back home...snacks, stationary, kitchen items, toiletries, spray paint, hair accessories...all kinds of stuff. We didn't buy anything because we didn't want to carry it all day long.

We rode to the 7-Eleven next (there are tons of those around), to grab something to eat before we caught our train. I got a Jell-O fruity cup with a piece of chocolate swirl bread (with chocolate chips) and Brandon got some beef noodles meal (they even heat it up for him).

Figuring out the train wasn't too bad...thanks to Brandon. We rode for about an hour and 1/2 and made our one train connection without problems. The landscape is really gorgeous...lots of lush, green fields, rice fields, plenty of tree-covered mountains. Brandon also showed me parts of the mountain where it had been stripped for minerals.

Train ride to Kokura and this is the heart of the city!

Once we arrived in Kokura, it took me a matter of 10 minutes to find my building, extremely easy (which is a rare occasion...to call anything easy over here). We had read about Kokura Castle on our way over, so we decided to navigate and find it before it closed.

Kokura Castle & gardens

It was probably a 20 minute walk from the train station, right in the middle of the city...equipped with a moat and garden off to the side. We were the last people they let in the doors and we had 1/2 hour to walk through.

It was an interactive museum throughout the interior of the castle walls, climbing all the way to the top floor...pretty amazing view of the city...some of the windows were even open, so you could really look down and see how high the castle stands. We were pretty tuckered out by the time we got to the bottom again.

We walked back through this outdoor mall and saw ladies in Kimonos teaching kids how to dance around in a circle. They were playing music and speaking on a microphone, so it seemed pretty lively.

It looked fun, so I started taking pictures...which apparently drew attention to me. The guy on the mic put me in the train of kids and explained the steps (in English) along the way. After Round 1, I was ready to leave my humiliation behind, because a crowd was gathered around watching...Oh no! The ladies on stage wanted me up there with them, so....for another song, I proceeded to stumble through several "High 5's" after my second performance and then they allowed me to dart off, with Brandon laughing and saying how cute I looked. Ridiculous is more like it!

We were almost out of the mall when a little old lady caught up with us. She rambled off all kinds of Japanese while she was motioning for me to come back to the dancing area. Oh no! I wasn't about to embarrass myself again! However, a younger guy met us on our walk back and it turns out, both of them were wanting us to know that we got coupons for a free snow cone. So, my dancing efforts paid off! Both of us were drained by the time we got back home...train ride and bike ride from there.