Convenience Stores

Convenience stores surprised me when I came to Japan.

In my first week in Japan I was in Aizu and a friend cheerfully suggested we go to 7-11 for dinner. In the United States I very rarely go to a convenience store that is not part of a gas station, and then only when I am driving. Because of this I was very confused about why my friend wanted to go.

When we went I was very surprised at what was inside the store. Unfortunately, now I can't remember very well what it was that surprised me. I have gone to convenience stores in Japan now more that I ever could have imagined. Because I go so frequently here, and would go so rarely back in the United States, I can not remember the American ones very clearly anymore.

Many stores here have hot foods, and 7-11s have doughnuts. These things have been popular with some of my traveling companions, but I prefer the rice-based foods pictured below. Pictured are four rows of Onigiri, a kind of rice ball. When you purchase them you can have them microwaved by the cashier while you pay, then walk away with a hot one.

Japan is not the only country with Onigiri in the convenience stores. I talked to a Taiwanese friend about it and he was very surprised to hear that they didn't have this in America.

One of my favorite parts of the convenience store are the Bento. Some of the ones available can be eaten cold, but as with the Onigiri they can be quickly heated while you pay. Many times when I am going to travel, or have a lot of work to do I will buy a Bento for dinner and then eat it while I do other things.

Pictured below is a snack I bought one day. One the left are some chocolate sticks, the middle are corn-flavored potato chips, and the right is a free coke I won when I bought the chips and chocolate.

There are a few further things that I like about the convenience stores here. Many of them have machines that grind and brew coffee to order. They also have large selections of instant ramen and a lot of kinds of canned coffee.

One difficulty that I had in Japan was because of the popularity of a convenience store called Lawson. Pronounced using Japanese sounds, Lawson becomes ro-son, while Larson becomes ra-son. For the first few months I would sometimes confuse these sounds and either say my name wrong, or hear people talk about the convenience store and think that they are talking to me.

Busy Week

Lately I have been very busy here in Japan, and so I have not had time to write so many blog posts. I have a few planned and coming up, but none to post now.

I have only about three weeks left in Japan. My airplane ticket is set for August 5th, and so I'm starting to prepare to leave already. I've started thinking about packing to return home and which things I don't have room for in my suitcase. I've also purchased parting gifts for several people here in return for their hospitality during my stay.

It's easy for me to be distracted by the present and to not think about leaving Japan very seriously, but I already know that there are many things that I will miss. Probably more things I will only be aware of when they are gone. I certainly miss my family and friends back at home, but a year is a long time to be away. I have close friends and places that feel like home to me on both sides of the world now. Wherever I go in the future I can be close some people that are meaningful to me, but must also be far away from others.

Last week I shared Robert Frost's The Road Not Taken with the kind lady who has been teaching me Japanese for the last few months. In the US it seems like this poem is universally known, but in Japan it is not. Ending my time in Japan I feel a little like the person in the poem. I'm going back to the United States but I'm not really going back. I will continue going forward and trying new things, and the places that I have been will become a part of me.

Ending my time in Japan leaves me with a long list of things I didn't get to do here, but that's okay. I hope to return to Japan in the future, maybe not to live here for too long though, and to be able to revisit old places and see new ones. I've had a good time, but I am looking forward to what is ahead.

Steam Locomotive to Niigata

This past weekend my girlfriend and I took a steam locomotive from Aizuwakamatsu to a city on the west coast of Japan called Niigata. There was a google street view created that allows you to see inside the train, so I have embedded it below.

The train we rode on is not a regular train on this line; It is a sort of specialty train. There are a lot of trains like this in Japan. JR East is the company that runs most of the trains in this part of Japan, and it has an English-language website for these special trains.

Riding on the train was a lot of fun. It was very comfortable inside. So comfortable that some people fell asleep quickly.

There were a lot of pretty views out of the train window. Pictured below is the big mountain near Aizu, Mt. Bandai, covered in clouds.