I woke up early and used the wifi again. Breakfast, mmm. A nice buffet spread with traditional Japanese stuff and Western things. Stuffed myself again, but surprisingly enough I’ve lost weight since coming here. All the walking?? After checking out, I headed off from the hotel back to the Kencho building. One of the first days I left my hair down. It was cooler out from all the rain.

A guy biking rather quickly passes me on the sidewalk. Then I heard a large crash. I spin around to see two guys and their bikes completely tangled up on the ground. The fast guy must have driven into someone! Another ALT is walking behind and saw it as well. He told me that after passing me, the guy turned back around to check me out and then drove into the other guy! I knew I should have put my hair up this morning. Seriously?? We had a good laugh about it. We both stopped at 7-11 before heading to the Kencho. I had gotten horrible blisters yesterday that were just getting worse and needed band-aids ASAP.

We had some really useful workshops this morning, i.e. what to do in case of a natural disaster and how to keep your apartment clean (all the mold and bugs). Lunch today was easy as well because they had pre-prepared some things. I ended up getting salad and a hamburger and potato wedges. The afternoon workshops were culture classes! I had signed up for koto, shodo, and buyo.

Koto is a thirteen stringed instrument. We got to listen to a concert first and then play a song ourselves! It was rough. They had the strings labeled, but it was in Japanese of course, just like the sheet music. Shodo was calligraphy. We got to practice. I ended up drawing some random kanji from the newspaper covering the table. It was hard to make any type of pretty stroke. Buyo was a dance class! We had to remove our shoes when we entered and then pick out a yukata! I picked a dark blue one with red butterflies and gold ribbons. My obi was red as well. It does pretty amazing things for your posture when it’s tied off so tight. My lower back was kept very straight. We also got to pick a fan to dance with. We then got to follow the experts and try different songs. The first song was very fun, a Gunma-chan song! I think that my past Zumba experience definitely helped with following moves on the fly. This was much slower paced. My favorite workshop!

After closing remarks, I accompanied M to her supervisor so she could ask about the fire festival in Namoku Village tomorrow. K and I planned to ride up to Shimonita were she would pick us up. Then I ended up splitting a cab with two other ALTs back to the station. Anything to save my poor feet. One of ALTs spoke decent enough Japanese to tell the driver where to go and made conversation with her on the ride over. Buying my ticket was easy enough at the station. I had some time to kill so I decided to visit the McD’s there. Got my hands on some fries for dinner! My weakness. Quite expensive, 270 yen for a medium. There were two other ALTs eating there so I asked about ordering. Apparently all I had to say was potato, M, and then point for here or to go. Success. They were delish.

I ended up finding more ALTs while waiting for my train so I sat with them. Back in Takasaki, I tracked down the Starbucks for my last chance at wifi. I almost bought a drink but the prices were also more expensive as per usual abroad. Once again I had to exit the station and re-enter for the private line. It was easy enough with all the signs for Tomioka Silk Mill haha. I accidently bought the wrong ticket from the machine there, but it was okay since it was one stop further on the line and the same price. I got home shortly after 7 pm and scrounged up some more food. That night, there were some fireworks I could see over a nearby house. I later saw a message that said there was a festival in Kanra (nearby place). Can’t wait till I get my phone and stop missing things.