Wow, it's already almost Thanksgiving. That happened quick. I suppose that means it's time to update this. Plus a couple people have asked me to... so here goes.

The trip to Mount Shosha a while back with Regan and our friend Mizuto was fun. It's a really beautiful spot not far from Regan's place in Himeji (about 2 hours by train from Kyoto). We took a ropeway up to the top of the mountain and proceeded to tour most of the shrines. The moutain has recently turned into a bigger tourist spot due to the fact scenes from "The Last Samurai" were shot here. The English brochures even have scenes from the movie in them. Anyway, here's some pictures:

View from the top of the mountain of the valley below

View from the bottom of one of the larger shrines

My camera can do some sweet panoramic shots

The next day Regan and I went to the garden in front of Himeji castle. I guess I didn't notice this as much the last time I was in Japan because I was in Tokyo, but autumn here is really beautiful... guess I don't get much of this in Hawaii or LA:

Since then, I haven't been up to too much. Lisa visited last weekend for the Grey's Anatomy marathon. It was rainy the entire time so we didn't feel so guilty about staying in all weekend. We did voyage out and find a really good ramen place however. The staff was super nice to us, but only spoke to Lisa even though I was speaking Japanese to them (Lisa is Japanese-American and looks much less... foreign... than I do). The highlight of the the little conversation when we paid was when he looked at me, then turned to Lisa and said, "She cute. Very tall. Is she from Sweden?" Pardon me? What? I know I'm blond, but really? I like how 5'6" constitutes "very tall" here. Take that, every one of you reading this who has called me short at one point or another. :)

I've also been helping plan the annual Fulbright Thanksgiving dinner. It's one of only two times during the year all 12 of us get together, so I'm definitely looking forward to it. We discovered that the Sheraton Kobe does a deal through the Foreign Buyers' Club, and prepares a turkey with all of the other stuff for about $200. We ordered two. haha. It saved us the trouble of trying to track down an oven big enough to cook the turkey (let alone the very fact that I don't think any of us knew how to prepare the bird properly). Most homes in Japan actually don't have ovens... most Japanese consider going to a nice bakery for pastries and baked goods to be a better experience, I guess.

Rachel gets here on December 2nd and will be here for about five days. I'm super excited! We haven't seen each other since graduation, which we realized is pretty much the longest amount of time we've gone since starting college. We've almost figured out our travel plans to South East Asia in February, which I am also quite excited about.

We decided to call off the trip to Okinawa for now since the high will be around 66... which isn't exactly beach going weather in my book. We'll probably try again in the spring. I definitely still want to go.

Oh, I finally uploaded all the pictures I have taken here, so feel free to check them out at:

http://community.webshots.com/user/haileyinkyoto

I think that's it for now... a little over a month until I'm home!!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone - take care! :)