The List Continues

So here I am, back at school... back at work. I had a wonderful weekend during which we were able to get some furniture to fill our house. We climbed a mountain, which was the tallest in the area, visited an old battlefield and visited a historic village created with old relocated Meiji era buildings; very cool. In Japan there was a famous battle called the Battle of Sekigahara it was here that one of the most influential battles in all of Japan was fought. I think this happened around the year 1600 but, pretty much up until that point Japan was broken into a bunch of little different feuding states. This Sekigahara battle was where this one dude Tokugawa Ieyasu fought these other clan leaders ending a civil war and pretty much unifying Japan under one Shogun. I don't have any pictures, which we took at the time due to not having the camera with me but I will tell you I enjoyed myself a nice tuna rice ball as I sat alone overlooking this valley. I've included some cool Japanese pictures depicting this battle.

We also took a trip to visit a place called the Meiji Mura (the Meiji Village). Japanese history around the 1860's: Japan had been in a self-inflicted national isolation, which restricted foreigners from entering the country and Japanese from leaving. This actually started as a result of the above-mentioned unification of Japan. Well, for 250 years Japan sat isolated while the rest of the world experienced the renaissance, and other scientific/artistic breakthroughs. In 1862-ish an American Navy Commodore Matthew Perry sailed his boats into the Tokyo Bay and pretty much told Japan they would destroy the city with cannonballs if they didn't open up for trade with America (not a lot has changed in the past 150 years since then). As a result, Japan opened up and figured they had a lot of catching up to do. The Meiji period was the time period from this event to about the time of WW2. So, what happened during this time is Japan goes through a metamorphosis. Adopting the western style way of life. Their architecture changes, literature and fashion changes. Science and medicine changes too... anyways, this town is made up of all these old buildings that were build during this time period and brought and rebuild to make this historic city... like the Pioneer Village at Lagoon. They've got the Grand Imperial Hotel from Tokyo designed by F.L. Wright, old time Japanese theatres, etc.

My computer at work is broken, again and so I am writing this letter on a borrowed computer. See you all later.