Wednesday, April 14, 2010

都をどり

Last night, I made more of my dreams come true. After the anticipation, Melody and I finally went to Kyoto (Gion) and attended the 138th Miyako Odori. For 4500 yen, you reserved 1st floor tickets with and attended a tea ceremony served by the geisha. (Now, when I say Tea Ceremony, this is a very cheesy here's your tea, it was made by a maiko, drink it, eat the snack and get the heck out of this room sort of feeling). You also have the option of exploring the garden at the theater, but we didn't have time to do that. :[ It was really pretty looking too.

We shuffled into the theater and took our seats. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take any photos!! I was SO disappointed because I was looking forwards to getting good pictures of the Geisha, but I could not. Here are photos of what I did get.

Here is the Mochi snack with red bean paste inside. It is tastey with the Matcha. (Green Tea). You can slightly see my ticket and little info pamphlet. I eventually bought a program for 600 yen. It has good pictures and explanations inside.

Here is a photo of the stage with the curtain down before the performance. I like the paper lanterns that surround the stages.

Here is a photo of the balcony and stage on the right side. You can spot a Maiko.

Alas, I think I captured a Maiko staring this way. Haha. This was so impossible it was depressing.

A better photo of the Balcony. On the right side, underneath the balcony, the older, experienced Senior Geiko played Shamisen and spoke the story.

A Senior Maiko, I assume.

The balcony and stage on the left side. Under this balcony, there were many maiko and geiko (I assume) who played percussion and shakuhachi.

Here is the regular entrance to the dances. The crest on the banner is the crest for Gion Kobu. The kanji in the middle is "ko" in Gion kobu's name. The eight circles stand for the other 8 subparts of the city.


Sakura

The entrance for the "Special Ticket" Guests.

Paper lantern including the crest.


The ichiriki tea house! I've read about this place a lot! Can you imagine the feeling of seeing it materialized?

Catch ya later Gion. I'll be back. For sure!

Now, I didn't leave the performance completely up to mystery for you guys. I was a bad girl and took some recordings. Hehe. Please follow this link to hear them: http://drop.io/michiru066

Saturday, April 10, 2010

Sumie Trees and Algorithm dancing.

Not much is really going on aside from school things. I've had to create a Japanese speech (on geisha, because I like them,) as well as a Japanese skit for my speaking class. While I was in my sumi-e class on Friday, I remembered that I had my camera, so I took a photos of the paintings I did this week.




I also participated in a real ohanami. The girls at our house on campus are having one on the 16th! Be sure to go relax under our beautiful trees and enjoy some snacks! (No Sake for you, it's a school event!)

Pretty Sakura

Looking for a place to sit

Our feast!

Sakura above us... raining bugs.. haha.

Other Sakura adventurers.


Sakura close-up


On Tuesday I go to Kyoto to see the Gion geisha dance the Miyako Odori! I'm so excited and a little nervous. I hope I can take lots of pictures! Here's a video of my classmates for your amusement:

Friday, April 2, 2010

Food Stuffs I

So, since this post has to do mostly with food, I'm going to start blogging about some of the food I have here in Japan. I've been a bit resistant to taking photos, but I really would like to share more.
So, this interesting dish here peaked my taste bud interests. The main dish is called Omu Rice. (Omelet Rice). What is on top is some fried shrimp. The soup in the bowl is something like egg drop soup, I assume. It wasn't half bad, except that the soup had something in it to make it a little spicy. What was worse was the Omelet Rice. It was gross. The whole dish tasted like plastic. I threw it away and had a dessert thing instead to make me feel better. I did eat the shrimp though. The red sauce on top is just ketchup. :x

After going grocery shopping today, I decided to cook up some stir fry. I am so glad I did. This stuff was SOOOOOOOOOO (x100 more O's) good!! I was so happy. I really like cooking when I have nothing better to do.

First, chopped up half an onion and a whole red pepper and boiled them in a frying pan with water.

Next I added in the meat, carrots, some strangely delicious (nut flavored) Japanese vegetable, that came in the package I bought to make this. I also added in the pineapple I bought. I should have cut them even smaller, they were still a bit big.

Finally, I added in the sauce that came with the package, as well as mushrooms! Doesn't it look delicious?! Aah~

While all that was going on, I had rice cooking. Tah dah!

Yep. Clean Plate Club.

I even have leftovers. And yes, I was drinking a grape fanta. :p

Tomorrow, supposedly I'll be going to ohanami.