Himeji Castle

Well today I had another field trip. It was with the history class this time so it wasn't the whole crew and we went to Himeji castle. Now Himeji isn't actually that far away, I heard that if you just fall asleep on the train you'll end up their on accident but I still hadn't gone. I have been to Osaka castle before so I had an idea of what to expect. You have the majestic castle towering over the vast tree line, the ancient architecture, and the sense of history but what makes the two castles different is that himeji is an actual castle. Osaka castle was destroyed in World War 2 and rebuilt several times before that, the one that is standing now is just a museum on the inside. Himeji managed to survive WW2 with the help of people covering it with black cloth so night raids would think it was a lake or something.

After seeing Himeji I understand just how hard it would have been to take a Japanese castle in ancient times. You have large gates with stone walls, followed by large areas where you could easily be ambushed by arrow fire, followed by more gates and more ambush points mixed in with dead ends and confusion as to how close you actually are to the castle door. The inside was fairly large and with the sliding doors you could easily change the amount and sizes of rooms on a whim. One interesting part is that their are four wooden pillars that run the entire height of the castle, and they are one solid piece.

After the castle we went to kokoen which was a special garden established in 1992 I believe. It was really beautiful, it didn't have the flowers like I was expecting from the word garden but when you think Japanese garden, it was it. Words don't do it justice so please look at the pictures. There also were giant koi fish, and tons of them. very cool

After all of that we split off into groups and me, emily, pac, erin, lela, and laura walked around Hemeji a little and ate dinner. We really had the giggles because we couldn't help ourselfs from the obnoxious laughter which I'm sure was bothering all of the japanese people even if they wouldn't say anything. At the okonomiyaki place we sat at the low table so we took our shoes off and when we were done I teased Emily about how long she takes to tie her shoes and she goes "ok fine teach me how to time my shoes correctly" so Erin crouches down and starts doing it for her and she goes "oh dear God don't do it for me" because here was this 20 year old woman getting her shoes tied for her. We laughed so hard. Then later Lela said that she needed to use the bathroom and I pointed to the train station bathroom and said "I used it, it wasnt terrible" and Emily goes "yeah but you didn't have to take a sh@t" and we all just were silent for a second and started laughing. She thought in her head "you didn't have to sit" but it crossed in her brain as "sh@t" and then added "take a". Oh man I'm laughing just thinking about it. I really do have some good friends here, I wish they were Japanese but they are really fun people.