Day 2 - The Learning Begins

The morning began bright and early with a 6:00 a.m. walk around the neighborhood. The head of the program, Akihiko Takahashi, met a bunch of us in front of the hotel to give us a 2 mile tour of the historic area near the hotel. It was a beautiful sunny morning and not too hot. I can't believe how high the sun is in the sky at 6:00 a.m.!!

Everything is so lush and green with hydrangeas in full bloom. We walked through this beautiful residential neighborhood on our way to a walking path along a little stream.


Even the manhole covers are beautiful!



The bamboo was 100 feet high!


We made our way to the Historic Site of Husashi Kokubunji Temple Remains. The temple, build around the year 750, was both a monastery and nunnery. It was a massive temple that was eventually destroyed by fire but you can see the remains of the footprint of the temple.




This is the gate to a smaller temple on the grounds.
Here is the temple itself.



We walked back up the hill to get ready for our first day at the University. What a wonderful start to our day!


Here is the gang in the middle of our first day. It's quite the amazing group of 30 teachers along with the professors we will be working with throughout the program. It's the largest group that has ever participated. 

Finished the day by wandering around the neighborhood to find a place to eat with 4 other people from the program. Ended up in this charming little place where absolutely no one spoke a word of English and the menu was completely in Japanese. Using Google translate offered a tiny bit of help for a couple of people of them to get chicken and fries. I just pointed to the menu and hoped for the best. I'll eat anything so I wasn't too worried. 

 Apparently, one of them had order each of us these eggs in a wonderful savory broth. Only one of them would try them so I ended up eating 3 of them so the server wouldn't be insulted.
 One ended up with fried chicken...
 and I ended up with the best dish of the night...roasted chicken.
 Here's our lovely server who cut the chicken into smaller chunks at the table.



And here she is waving goodbye. We all had such a wonderful time, even being unable to communicate. Love it!

Good night and see you next time!!












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