Destination: Sapporo

Sapporo Classic

It's been a long week and an even longer weekend. One of Japan's many festival days, Tanabata, was celebrated in Hakodate last Tuesday, and so we spent most of that evening running around helping Okaa-san and M-san set up and get ready for all the kids that came trooping around in the bad weather. Then, after two days of speeches (in front of two classes and two teachers) and then an all day midterm-examination, we were finally given a nice long four day weekend. About two thirds of the students in the program decided to take that opportunity to embark on the four and a half hour journey to Sapporo, the capital city of the island of Hokkaido and the namesake of one of the well-known Japanese beers.

We left by bus in the morning on Friday and arrived at Sapporo at around 3pm that afternoon. After checking into the hotel, a group of friends and I set out on the 50 minute walk to the Sapporo Beer Garden, where they have a beer museum and a nice patio restaurant where you can eat Japanese style-barbecue. It was a really interesting exhibit, and, of course, the reward at the end was a draught of the Sapporo Classic beer, which you can only get in Hokkaido. Afterwards, we went back into the city and did some karaoke at a store near the Odori park, where they also incidentally were preparing for a large jazz festival that was going on most of the weekend. On our way home I stopped to talk to some of the people who were milling around and enjoying the scene, one of whom (slightly inebriated) asked where I was from, and when I told him Chicago, he got very excited and shouted "Chicago Bulls!" and then proceeded to do a pantomime of a matador bout with another (slightly inebriated) friend of his.

Astro Boy!!

Shiroi Koibito Gardens

The next day, we trooped out to the Shiroi Koibito (literally translated as "white lover") Factory, which is a local institution specializing in the making of chocolates and candies. The grounds of this place were pretty fantastic; it looked a lot like something you might expect to see at Disneyland, with a garden full of imported flowers and miniature houses that children were crawling all over. There was even one of those fantastic trains that takes you on a tour of the outside of the building. Inside, we were able to watch the candy makers rolling out hard candy and talked to them about how the candy was made. There was also some delicious soft cream (which yes, I did eat). For some reason, the Shiroi Koibito Factory also has a collection of miniatures and toys, so I went and got my picture taken with Astro Boy.

The candy makers; very friendly people

By the time we headed back on Sunday, it had been far too hot for far too long, and I think everyone was looking forward to sleeping on their own futon for a change. I think I slept for a good 2/3rds of the way back, but I did manage to wake up in time to use my new favorite vending machine in the world: the popcorn vending machine. For the low, low price of 200 yen (about $1.50) you can get a cup of either butter, salt, or caramel popcorn! Isn't this country wonderful?

My new favorite thing. 

We are back at school now, looking forward to a few weeks of speech contests and research presentations. I am still going to try to get a few more posts in before the program ends--we have some interesting culture classes coming up in which I intend on participating. Until then, stay cool everyone!

きんようびさっぽろにいきました。なかなかたのしかったです。