This morning we said an emotional goodbye to our bunny friends (as well as a few nice old ladies) at Okunoshima and took a few different trains to arrive in Kurashiki. Today was a free day, so we split into groups to get lunch and do some sightseeing. My group (Lisa, Corey, Will, and Lindsey) got a bit turned around looking for somewhere to eat, but we eventually found this really good sukiyaki place and we ate three pots of delicious meat and vegetables. Will might have cried a bit.
We decided to just walk around and look for interesting things instead of going anywhere specific and so we headed to the historical district. There was a really nice store that sold traditional paper goods like origami, notepads, and artwork, and the women who worked there were so nice. They asked us where we were from and how we learned Japanese and seemed pretty impressed when we told them we have been learning since freshman year. As we left they gave us each an origami person and told us to study hard, and it had a similar feeling to leaving your grandmother's house. The older ladies I've spoken to these past few weeks have been so incredibly nice.
We passed through the historical district into the shopping arcade, and somewhere in the process we entered the twilight zone of bargains. There was a shop that sold fried food for less than 100 yen, and needless to say we went a bit wild. Besides that there were tons of unique shops and we joked about how we came close to eating the entirety of Japan.
Our last stop was the department store, where we picked up Valentine's Day chocolate to exchange over dinner. We ended up doing more shopping than sightseeing, but we got to interact with so many different people that it was really worth it. At dinner we all sat down for a feast of traditional Japanese foods and got ready to get going the next day. I'm looking forward to Himeji castle and Tokyo!
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