天気：晴れ
I’m on the local train to Amagasaki, to change over for 姫路 (Himeji – lit. “Princess Road”); I’m with Rachel, Rachael and Sarah. I got up at 6:30 this morning, showered and had porridge for breakfast; and a very hasty breakfast that was. The four of us left for the Hirakata station at 7 by bus, and then took the train to Kyobashi. There, we went to the JR ticket office and picked up an all day rail pass to Himeji, which was really convenient and saved a bit of money too. We’re at Amagasaki now…
8:58am 新快速
Now we’re on the “special rapid” (never been on one of these before) to Himeji; just got to sit down. It’s a beautiful sunny, warm day today, and it may actually end up being too hot; especially since the line to get into the castle is going to be very long. Oh well, it’s definitely going to be worth it. I’m going to do a bit of study now; well, try too…
5:00pm 新快速
We’re back on the special express now, home bound! My feet are very sore, but it was definitely worth it; I knew it would be. The only problem is I’m too tired to write about it now; I’m going to doze for a bit…
10:51pm セミナーハウス
Feeling a bit better now that I’ve had a nice hot shower and I’m lying down. Today was… gosh I can’t even describe it, but I know I have to. I just have to say right now that I’m so, so glad that I decided to go; it really was an amazing experience…We arrived in Himeji at about 10, and after I picked up the second volume of Reborn from a book store in the station, we made our way through an underground shopping arcade, and up onto the main street. Already, we could see the castle, standing proudly at the end of the busy main street; I already had both cameras out. Walking there, we past many interesting statues, an information centre with a cool model of the castle, and also got some food from the convenience store to eat when we got into the grounds, since there aren’t any food stalls within; I just got some onigiri, anpan, and a bottle of orange juice. Getting c
loser, we noticed the remains of the outer walls of the original castle town, now not much more than grassy mounds topped with ancient trees, with stone skirting their bases. Soon enough, we had reached the end of the street, the castle looking increasing grand; a huge moat, and stone walls surrounding the bailey; the “White Heron” proudly standing atop a cloud of pinks and greens ~ it is sometimes referred to as 白鷺城 (shirasakijo – “White Heron Castle”) because of it brilliant white exterior.
We crossed the white arching bridge, and entered the gate to the bailey, and were soon surrounded by 100s of sakura trees. We really had come at the perfect time! Just about all of them were in full bloom, or just past, which meant that we not only got to appreciate them at the height of their glory but also, when the wind blew, the petals would be caught in a flurry, before landing silently on the ground; it was truly a magical sight. And believe me when I say, I got my cherry blossom fill today; there must have been at least a thousand trees on the grounds if not more. Since it was still relatively early in the day, we decided to tour the castle first, before eating lunch. Already, a patchwork of blue tarps skirted the sakura, families and business colleagues enjoying their meals and the shade; it was actually getting quite hot. Waiting in the line-up to purchase tickets proved to be relatively short. Upon entry, Rachel bumped into one of her classmates, and they chatted for a bit with we planned our next move. After passing though another gate, we decided to check out the gardens first, before entering the main kee
p; cherry blossom heaven. I noticed that the palace was nearby (like the one at Nijo castle, this one was also called Nishi no Maru), and asked if the girls wanted to walk through it. It was free to go in, but when we got to the entrance, we had to take off our shoes and carry them with us in plastic bags; this was understandable, but odd. The interior was all wooden, and at some points very low or narrow; the stairs, which were almost ladders, were especially scary. “Stone throwing holes” were one of the cool features of the castle, which was a long curving structure of interconnecting rooms, almost all of them offering a view of the main keep.
Exiting at the other end, we put our shoes back on, disposed the plastic bags in the designated bins, and then made our way back through the garden; I found some pin dispensers on the way, so now 
I have two more. Even though they were doing a lot of construction work already, for the most part it didn’t obstruct the beautiful scenery. There was a giant crane set up next to the main keep, but even then you could easily take photos that didn’t include it; they had positioned it at an ideal angle and distance away. Unlike the line to the admission booths, the line to get into the main keep for far from short; our “siege” didn’t seem very dramatic at such a sluggish pace. When we
finally found the end of the line, we were in a small courtyard with a well that someone had apparently been thrown into for being “naughty". By this point, it was very hot in the sun, and my bag was feeling heavy, but I endured; we were soon in the shade of the trees and the wall. In the same way that I couldn’t get much study done on the train this morning (because I was too distracted by the scenery), I didn’t have much luck reading Reborn. Even going at that pace, there was so much to see so in the end, while it took about an hour to get into the keep, it was far from boring; incidentally, I noticed Natalie in the exiting lane about halfway up.
I would have been very difficult for besiegers to even get to the main keep; the castle is such an intricate complex of paths and walls. The walls themselves have holes of alternating shapes in them, and each one could potentially have a rifleman on the other side, poised to fire. When we did finally get to the entrance, we went through the same procedure as the palace. Carrying my bagged shoes in one hand and my video camera in the other proved to be a little unruly especially when climbing the stairs. The central tower was six storeys high, and there were a few historical artefacts displayed throughout, including samurai armour, scrolls and rifles and spears; it had a very different feel to the museum-like set ups of Nagoya and Osaka castles. It was lit only by natural light, which meant that it 
was actually quite dark in many places. Like the palace, it was relatively unfurnished. It was quite crowded and near the beginning, Rachael and I got separated from Rachel and Sarah. We ended up getting to the top first, because the other two got stuck in the crowd at the bottom of the stairs on one of the lower floors, in order to limit the number of people in the top. At the top, we took in the amazing view of the grounds and the city beyond; it was very impressive. Interestingly there was a shrine, 刑部 (Osakabe), on the top floor, which was actually originally situated on the hill that they built the castle. They ended up moving the shrine during construction, and then relocating in inside the tower when they were finished; I think that’s really cool.
Going up the stairs was a bit worrying, but coming down was even worse. Like the palace too, these stairs were precariously steep, and I had to bend over to get under the crossbeam near the top. Going back down though, I had to basically climb under it, which was no easy task, especially when the stairs were slippery and I was in socks; Rachel, tall like me, had a similar struggle. We met up again on the 4th floor, and then made our way back down, past more interesting artefacts; including a model of the original castle town. Again exiting from a different side, we made our way back out of the main keep, our descent much faster than our climb. Feeling very hungry, after a few more photos we exited out into a park and 
sat down on a rock for lunch, watching playful pigeons. After a bit of a rest, we continued exploring the grounds coming across 姫路神社 (Himeji Shrine), which was absolutely beautiful; I could understand why I would be a popular location for weddings. We walked through more gardens, and climbed to the top of the wall surrounded by the moat, finding a fiery ginger cat sleeping in the top of a water feature; it wasn’t running. We were now on the east side of the castle, were the construction work was much more obvious. It had gotten cloudy, and subsequently cooled down, so walking back around to the fr
ont of the complex was much more comfortable. To the left of us was another park filled with people enjoying the sakura, and to the right, a zoo. Once we got to the south east corner, we took our last few photos of the castle, with two shachi (tiger-headed fish) in the foreground. It was about 3:30 by this point, so we decided to call it a day, and headed back towards the train station; the castle would be closing at 4 anyway. On the way back, we past a market, and went over to a convenience store so Rachel could pick up some food; she hadn’t eaten yet.
Finally, we went to a ダイソー (Da
iso), a100 yen store. It was basically three floors of cheap goods, most of them 105円; cause of the tax. Sarah was looking for gyoza press (which she found), and ended up buying a whole heap of other things; reminded me of Mum a discount shop. I found a big teddy bear to cuddle and some children’s books, one of which was kobutorijisan (the story we read in Reading and writing); I didn’t end up buying an
ything though. Before leaving for the station, both Rachael and I bought bread from the grocery store on the first floor. We made our way back to station, and were soon riding the special rapid back to Amagasaki. I was so sleepy and dozed off a couple of times. Rachel on the other hand, was too intent on seeing the sea to sleep; understandable since she lives in the middle of America. Once we got to Amagasaki, we hoped platforms and took the limited express back to Kyobashi; not that it made much difference since it stops just as frequently as the local. I read a little bit more of Reborn and now I’ve only got about 10 pages left; glad I bought the second volume today. Once we got to Kyobashi we went over to the Keihan side and Rachael suggested that we try to use the all-day passes that we got today on the Keihan line. So, I went up to ask one of the station attendants if we could use the ticket, and he said no. But he directed us around to an office, and said we could exchange the all-day JR ticket for an all-day Keihan ticket; very cool. So we relinquished our JR tickets, which were stamped twice, and then we received the Keihan tickets; so we ended up saving 320円.
After getting back to Hirakatashi, Rachael, Sarah, and I took the bus home, while Rachel decided to walk; she does like to walk. Getting back, I dumped my stuff in my room (Hugo-less) and then went up to make dinner. Ash was there, and I talked with her about her day; she had gone to Shinsaibashi and bought some magazines and a costume of one of her favourite anime characters. Sarah soon joined us, but just as soon left; I hadn’t even started eating dinner. I mixed the leftovers from last night with the rest of my pasta, and it turned out very nicely. It was very quiet in the kitchen (everyone was out), and apart from Ash and I, there were only about 4 other people in there, including Sam. He had wanted to come today, but hadn’t woken up; I wonder if he’ll go tomorrow with Jazz? Katie was next to join us, and she recalled her wonderful day in Kyoto, seeing the Philosopher’s Path and 平安神宮 (Heian Shrine, which I still want to go to), all transformed by the sakura. I think that seeing Himeji castle during sakura season tramps almost everything else, so I’m extremely glad I went; can’t say that enough. Katie soon left, and Rachel replaced her and we continued to chat for a while going our separate ways. To end this post on a rather dramatic note, I found out something from Ash tonight that I couldn’t believe; this was later confirmed in an email from the CIE. One of the students from Kansai Gaidai was arrested for the possession of marijuana!!! Who in their right mind would be stupid enough to think they could get away with something like that, especially in a country like Japan that has zero tolerance of drugs; obviously someone who isn’t in their right mind. Ash and I were speculating who it might be, but it might be someone we don’t even know; so many questions left unanswered. Needless to say, there will be severe repercussions for whoever did it, including detention without bail for up to six months, and deportation from Japan for up to 10 years. Absolutely crazy…
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