Dejima, Gunkanjima, and a Fabulous Dinner!

今日の日本語の言葉: issho ni (一緒に) - together (as in, "shouldn't we go together?")

This word was brought to you by the fact that we went everywhere together today. Breakfast to dinner.

Today has been a very long day, and I got back pretty late. It's pretty late now, actually, so I apologize if the quality of writing and the length of the descriptions aren't quite up to par. It's almost 11:00, and though I usually go to bed later, I'm just really tired today. It's been quite a full day!

We started off the day with breakfast (which I'll document tomorrow), and then we left for Dejima! I took a picture of the description sign below, because I knew that by the end of the day, I would be too tired and too lazy to explain to you guys the history for myself. You can also google search Dejima, which yields some really cool pictures and facts.

Of course, being us, our first stop was actually the gift shop. There were cute castella themed things everywhere! I was so tempted to get an adorable plushie, but I already have so many plushies anyways, I didn't want to have too many (but it was so tempting!). There was also a cool furoshiki collection with cats on it as part of various famous Nagasaki dishes. They captioned each dish, and turned it into a "nyan" word instead of its original name: ex. "chanpon" became "nyanpon." I really wanted to buy that too, but what would I do with it?

When we were out of the store, it really was time to explore Dejima! I was so excited! There was a garden area and a small model of Dejima that we wanted to start off our exploration with. It was actually a very nice area, and the bridge is so picturesque. If I ever have enough money in life to design my house to how I want it, it's going to definitely be so Japanese influenced. It's just so beautiful! I don't know what attracts me about it so much, but it's... gah! SO NICE.

Anyways, we got our picture taken in front of the small model by this guy whose job was to take pictures for tourists. However, when I gave him my camera, he looked at it and asked me how to use it. You would think that if it's your job to take pictures, you would have encountered an iPhone by now. He also took about fifteen pictures, which you can probably string together to make a flash movie. He was really confused, and Shannon later explained to me why: my phone was on silent.

Now this may not sound too weird to some of you, but to me, this was so different: Japanese phones cannot silence their cameras. No matter if you put it on mute or whatever, there is no option to silence your camera. I think Japanese iPhones are built that way too. This is so that people can't get creeper shots of others and be perverted and stuff. You always alert people that you're taking a picture when there's that noise. But since my phone is American, silent mode means silence, so therein lies the poor man's confusion. Isn't that a cool fact, though?

When we got out of that garden area, we were brought to the main part of the island, where people lived and the trading got accomplished. For an island so populated (I mean, when you think about it, all the foreigners at the time were forced to live here), there really isn't that much space. You could run from one side to the other in about one and a half minutes? Maybe less if you're not me? It's just so tiny!

What's so cool about it though is that for a period of time, this was the only outlet and inlet between Japan and the outside world. All of the modern technological advancements and modern medicine and stuff made their way from Dejima into the rest of Japan. The Dutch and Portuguese traded here especially often, and thus, Nagasaki has a lot of Dutch and Portuguese influence. Isn't that cool?

An old Dutch workstation 

They think this is cow that was used to help make vaccines 

These guys made me feel like I was back in time. 

Old Japanese Dejima plans. 

I'm sorry I haven't talked much about Dejima in my post so far. There's just so much to say, and so much that I don't know. If you're interested, please look into it! It's got such an awesome history, and I really am very interested, I'm just so tired! Maybe if it wasn't 11:15 right now, I'd be writing more, but as it stands, you'll probably be getting as many words out of me tonight as the American people got out of Coolidge. Gomen!

This is a local bank's mascot. It feels weird to see this
right outside of Dejima's gates. 

More castella! 

After we finished with Dejima, we went off to find some lunch before heading on the ferry to Gunkanjima. We took a taxi to the terminal area (we love taxis, and CIEE doesn't seem to mind; it's only about 100 yen more than the bus ride would have been, and it's a lot faster and easier to work out). We settled upon eating at a cafe called The Attic, which serves youshoku, which is a combination of Japanese and Western food. I ended up having a Japanese salad (with the addition of "Western" corn?), an attempt at French onion soup, and a very good spinach cream pasta dish.

I also ordered a vanilla cappuccino, just for the coffee decor. Shannon ordered one too, so we got the two faces that The Attic is known for putting on their cappuccinos (though they don't do it unless you ask, and luckily, we were in the know). I don't drink coffee, though, but it was so awesome to see. Do they do that with a mold or something? Probably, but how? So cool! (Ian ended up drinking my cappuccino, for which I am forever grateful). I also got an unbaked cheesecake to go along with it, and it turned out to be like, a cream cheese mouse, almost.

After our delicious lunch, we departed for Gunkanjima, which, again, I am far too lazy to explain about in detail. It's basically an island which was all based on mining for coal. It's pretty tiny, actually, and the whole settlement really did revolve around the coal industry. Thus, when petroleum started to take handle on modern technology, coal fell to the wayside, and so did the island. In fact, it was abandoned so suddenly that when people went in there to do a documentary, they still found calendars on the walls from the 1970s, and whole televisions still there, etc. It's like the place was abandoned in days, in a rush, too. These people didn't have much besides coal, after all.

They bathed in boiled sea water, and when they bathed, they bathed with their clothes on, in order to wash all the black dust from the clothing too. There wasn't much to do for recreation, so some of the regular activities were to stand at the top of the whole place and watch the waves, or to jump from the island into the water over and over again (which was very dangerous, because the water was so choppy, and there were tons of rocks, but the children still did it anyways). 

When we went, it was raining, and you can't use umbrellas there, so we had to buy rain ponchos. I just wanted to protect the castella in my backpack from getting wet. I usually love rain, so I normally wouldn't mind. The castella was just there though, and I had to protect it. But my shoes were soaking wet, and when I walked, it squelched. I could feel the water moving up and down when I shifted my feet or pointed my toes up and down. When I got back to the hotel later on, I blow dried my tights (and I got really sea-sick when the boat was just docked at the island and we were waiting to get off, since it rocked so much; I can still feel it now, and I'm still woozy, which is probably part of the reason why I'm tired).

Fun fact: it's named Gunkanjima (which translates into Battleship Island) because it looks like a battleship if you look at it from the side or from above.

First view of Gunkanjima! 

I think this might have been my favorite picture of the day. 

That hanging staircase is so eerie~

When we got back on land, I was pretty woozy. Luckily, no matter how nauseous I've ever gotten from motion sickness, I've never hurled. So I was pretty sure I was safe from that, despite my terrible feelings. We went into a nearby department store in search of warmth and comfort, and naturally I migrated to the stationery section. They had these static electricity testers to see whether or not it was safe to touch a door, and if not, it'd destatic it. Only the Japanese... -_-"

We ended up going to Starbucks where Shannon got some coffee and we all ate some sweet, not-so-delicious Starbucks pastry. And then it was back out to the rain, and back to the hotel. We all needed a rest, a shower (and I finished the last episode of my current drama, which means I'm in search of a new one, but I'm not ready to let the old one go. I still have the main couple as the background on my computer. It just finished so quickly!).

When it was time to head to dinner, we decided to hit up some of the places we tried yesterday but couldn't get into. The first place we tried was that cool place yesterday I told you about where you had to take off your shoes and you got to sit on the ground. We made it in, and I was so excited! Sunday nights definitely aren't as packed.

This place reaffirms my belief that when I get a house (if I ever get to that point), it will have a great Japanese influence on its decor. It's just so simple yet so beautiful, and there's just so many earth tones! I've never loved wood more.

The place served kushiyaki, which is like yakitori (meat grilled on skewers), except it encompasses things that aren't meat, in addition to things that are deep fried (which we definitely got). We started off the meal with a nice sashimi set, then we moved on to some edamame. We ordered two seafood platters and a seasonal platter (which looked like it was just vegetables, but it actually had meat (like bacon hidden between the asparagus and the panko crumbs)). Thus, Ian couldn't participate in that part. But Shannon and Ian got dessert, while I got myself some meat skewers. No yaki meal is complete without meat, and that kalbi beef was utterly divine.

Well, that's all, folks! I'm so excited to be going to bed soon. And I'm missing school tomorrow, because I don't get back until late at night—which also means that tomorrow, you might be receiving a similar blog treatment, for which I am sorry in advance. Have a good daylight savings day, many of you, and I shall see you on the morrow!

Oh, before I go, we were having an interesting conversation at dinner that somehow turned to birth control and pregnancies in Japan. First of all, did you guys know that the age of consent in Japan is thirteen? That's so... young... Is it that young in other places, and America is just special, or is it the other way around?

And did you know that they only legalized birth control in Japan a few years ago? People have so many abortions here, but rarely use birth control still. And the only reason that they legalized birth control was the women's protest that came with them wanting to legalize Viagra. If they were going to legalize Viagra, they had to do birth control too. Isn't that just an odd reason?

Anyways, with that nice topic, I leave you here, and I'm off to bed.

おやすみなさい、
マギー