Today we went to Kintai Bridge and Kintai Castle. The cherry blossoms were in full bloom, so the park around the bridge was beautiful. We took a ropeway up to the top of the mountain and hiked up a path to the top to tour the castle. When we got to the top, we were all pretty thirsty so we decided to try out the vending machines. This was challenging since the labels were all in Japanese, but I ended up with a bottle of what I hope was green tea (though for all I know it could very well have been a bottle of refreshing horse urine).

Japanese people go absoulutely crazy for babies. Every where Leah went with Zach, there was always a huge crowd of Japanese people exclaiming “kawaii!!”, which means “How cuuuute!” Some of them even wanted to take pictures of him, which seemed odd since Japanese people otherwise seem very reserved. It was an interesting contrast.

I had my first encounter with something that I had very much been dreading: squatty potties. Instead of “western-style toilets”, these are porcelain holes in the floor that you squat over when you need to use the restroom. Between squatty potties and “western-style toilets” with heated seats and other odd features, Japanese restrooms are pretty weird.

Today was also our first real experience with Japanese food. We started with some chicken on a stick from a vendor near the Kintai Bridge, had some crazy flavored ice cream in the park (green tea flavored.. yumm), and ended up at a sushi-go-round restaurant. The restaurant was pretty cool because you sit in a booth while a conveyor takes around plates of various types of sushi around the restaurant. You pick out whatever you want and then just pay based on the number of plates you end up with at your table. The restaurants are apparently pretty popular, though you have to be very careful about what you pick out because sometimes things aren’t what they appear to be.

All in all, a great first day of our vacation!