The Ancient Capital

Last weekend was the history classes' field trip to Asuka. For starters, biking around a beautifully rural little town on a perfect seventy degree day? Amazing.

I could have done without the 7 am wake up call required to get to the meeting place on time, but the delightful little bakery at Tambabashi station was enough to make up for that. I bought lunch, melon bread and a croissant there and went with the rest of my class down to the platform to take the long train ride to Asuka. When we got there, we were greeted by the waves and smiles from a group of Japanese college students doing a similar trip: biking to the historical sites. Hearing people yell "Hello" at you never gets old.

With a quick test drive of our bikes around the parking lot, as some people here are like me and haven't ridden a bike in years, we headed down the street to the first site.

The spread of sites we went to see were excellent, and I don't think the history teacher could have planned a better trip. Everything worked so well, despite a few minor bike accidents, and the scenery was absolutely worth the trip on it's own. For those of you planning to study in Japan, Asuka is a must-see, especially by bike.

As if seeing the oldest Buddha in Japan and joining in prayer with a Buddhist priest weren't enough, the drunken Japanese man just put a metaphorical cherry on top of this most fascinating day.

After being lectured time after time by the CIE staff and our concern professors at Kansai Gaidai that drinking in public is seriously frowned upon, I was a little surprised to smell beer when I got on the train with my class back to Tambabashi. It turned out that a middle-aged Japanese man had spilled his beer all over the seat next to him and the floor and the train attendants were in the middle of cleaning it up. I figured it was no big deal, so I had no problem sitting next to the man with my friends Julius and Cynthia sitting on either side of me. Well, I don't think any of us anticipated just how many beers this man might have had BEFORE the train.

He was drunk and wanted to talk to the fascinating foreigners, so he did. Probably an hour later, after we were given his phone number and an invitation to go to Tokyo together, he finally left the train, smiling, waving and swaying the whole way.

The Japanese lose all inhibitions when they're drunk...