Visiting the mayor

Today I went to pick up the students at the train station to walk them to city hall for their meeting with the mayor.

This was one of the easier mayor visits I have been in charge of translating for because Kojima-san was there as well so she did all the translating into Japanese and I did all the translating into English.

It is a little more nerve-wracking to translate into English when you are around a ton of bilingual people though. If I make mistakes when Kojima-san or Kikuchi-san or Ijiri-san aren't around it's no big deal because no one knows (^_~). But when they are there they know what I am saying and if I am saying it wrong.

At the mayor's office they all received a bunch of gifts, as is the usual custom, and sat around and chatted for a little while before taking a commemorative photo.

After the mayor's visit I changed out of my suit and we all went to Kyoto station. The group is staying at a hotel in Kyoto for the next few days so we left their luggage to be delivered and went to get some lunch. The mayor had suggested ramen so I took them all to a ramen restaurant in the basement of Kyoto station. There were 10 of us so we had to split into 3 tables and since none of them could read the menu I had to go back and forth to help them order. Ok, what I should really say is that I was a control freak and chose to go back and forth to help them order. They could have done it themselves.

After lunch we had about 30 minutes of free time so some of the group and I decided to go up into the catwalk in Kyoto Station (which I didn't know existed until today). We went up about 7 or 8 escalators to get to the top and then we walked across the top of the station. Unfortunately it was very poorly designed and there was hardly any visibility. We couldn't see out into the city or down into the station so it was really just like a regular hallway.

But it was good because we discovered a whole section of restaurants that I had never seen before and some of them looked really good.

Then we met up and headed off for the actual event of the day, a visit to the Kyoto University of Art, Sculpture. We had to go by subway and then taxi (3, since our group was so large). The building itself reminded me a bit of Frank Lloyd Wright...The main building came down to the street, with a long, wide staircase leading up to the entrance, but behind that were a few other buildings set back in the woods. The buildings all really utilized the nature around them, whether with the trees coming up through the staircase or terraces outside. The buildings all stood out because of their uniqueness but at the same time seemed to blend in with the surroundings.

We took a tour of the buildings and watched one of the teachers working on shaping the trees in the garden. We also got to watch some of the class performances. The school has a special class where students from all different specialties get together and have to put on a performance each week. It helps them branch out and learn more about each other. I thought that was a pretty ingenious idea.

After walking around we sat down for a lecture from one of the professors at the school. He had worked in LA, I think, for a few years and studied in America so his English was very good. He discussed different types of landscape architecture and things that you should keep in mind when designing spaces. As it was a subject I know very little about I found it pretty interesting.

After we finished the lecture we took the students back to their hotel room. On the way, we lost Marla. She got stuck on one of the subways. When the subways are crowded and you have to get off, you simply have to push your way off and she was too nice. So she overshot the stop and had to come back. Luckily she had a working phone AND she had studied Japanese for 3 years so she was ok.

Speaking with her made me realize just how phenomenal my program at Wash U was. She studied in college for 3 years. I studied in college for 3 and a half. Now I have had the added benefit of living in Japan for nearly a year, but there was a marked difference in our abilities. The program I had was almost full immersion. It makes a huge difference.

We got them all checked into the hotel and they all went straight to the beer vending machines. They got themselves watered down whiskey and beer and talked about where to go out that night.

I almost got talked into going out with them instead of going to taiko practice. But I thought about going to a bar with 10 foreigners in tow...and I thought about taking the last train home and going to work hungover...and I thought about hanging out with a bunch of drunk college kids...and I realized that I had NO desire to do any of that. So I went home. I went to taiko practice. I went to sleep at a decent hour.

Turns out being the responsible adult was the right thing to do. I got a call later in the evening from Kojima-san saying that because of the "outbreak" of swine flu in Osaka, they could no longer go to Osaka tomorrow and that I would have to take them to Nijo Castle, Umekoji Park, and Higashi Honganji tomorrow...by myself.