Japan! part 1

Here are some images from our time in Tokyo.  My first night there was a birthday night, so we went out to dinner and the students surprised me with a donut cake and gifts.  The students and faculty performed at the Tokyo University of the Arts, so it was a great chance to see Tokyo, learn about Japanese music as well as share Korean music, and meet up with and old friend (Hiroko from my Korean class days at Indiana U.)  We stayed in Shinjuku, and did brave the subway/train system once.  Tokyo is an incredibly crowded and busy city. Some highlights include eating at a sushi boat restaurant that was literally in the shape of a boat--you could fish for your own dinner, but still had to pay for it (at least give a discount, people).  Still, quite an unfair fight for the fish as I don't think it was that challenging to catch one, despite the fact that several people stood there for  what seemed like hours waiting for a catch. I also enjoyed visiting Tokyo University of the Arts.  The faculty was very nice and took us on a tour of the school.  We got to sit in on a koto and shamisen lesson and got to hear some great music.  I am very jealous of their gamelan --they have two--one from Bali and one from Java. What we'd give too have just one!  I shared a room with Yi Ji-Young and took some photos of her playing her kayagum.  It was such a great opportunity to see how these traveling performances work behind the scenes and to also strengthen connections with a university overseas.

Yi Ji Young and I actually shared the same birthday this year.  She follows the lunar calendar and I follow the solar.  This year, our birthday dates collided.  It was fun to share a birthday!

 Blogger has updated its blog applications I suppose to make things easier.  I find it more difficult to post, so not sure if it has actually made anything easier.  I've tried resizing some images, but it usually disrupts the order of the photos and takes me a long, long time to get the photos back in their proper place.  Also, inserting text above and below certain photos also seems to result in moving the photo to a different, unintended location.  Since I tend to post diary-style, this is really, really annoying.   So, I won't add any more text to the post below.  If you want to see a larger image of any of the photos, just left-click on the photo and it will appear in a new window. Be sure to hit the back button to take you back to the main page of the blog. Enjoy the photos!