The farmers market In Takayama

Yesterday morning I was sitting in the lobby of my hostel and I began conversing with some people. It turned out they were from Israel. There names were Noa and Matis. They were husband and wife and had been travelling all around Japan together. Like so many other Israeli's I have met they were very friendly and very easy to talk with. After conversing for a while we decided to head to the local market together.

The farmers market was held right next to a large river that crosses through the town. The river is very powerful and very scenic. The farmers market had a whole foray of different foods. I got a hida beef bun (similar to a pork bun but had beef instead) and I also tried some marshmallow thing.

This market was obviously very used to tourists because the owners at many of the stands were very friendly. They weren't freindly in an agressive way where I felt obligated to buy something. Instead they just enjoyed conversing. There english was limited but good enough for general conversation.

It was really fun meeting some new people and going around the town with them. I might meet up again with them in my travels. They invited me to come to Israel and I as well returned the favor and told them if they ever come to northern california I can show them around. The best part of all of this is that Noa had a great camera and I asked her to take some pictures. Also today I plan to get a camera.

Training in Takayama

This post is coming a little bit late. On July 13th I trained in Takayama. I found out about the dojo from receptionist at the hostel. According to the website the training went from 1:00 to 2:30. I got there a little bit before 1. There was another person there that was waiting. She spoke English. She was actually from San Francisco and had just started training a few months ago. She was visiting Japan because her family lived here. She was fluent in both Japanese and English.

1:00 came and nobody showed up. But we decided to stay for a little bit. Around 1:10 the sensei showed up. He was an older man. I was not able to get his name. He was probably in his late 70's or early 80's. Pretty soon another 4 students showed up. This was a very small class.

The training was pretty laid back. I was assigned to work with an older man (probably in his 60's). He was good to work with. He did not speak any English. I don't speak any Japanese. But this didn't stop him from communicating with me in Japanese. It was kind of funny. We would do the technique and he would speak to me like I was fluent in Japanese. I would nod my head and watch his gestures to understand what he was saying. He basically showed me if I was doing the technique correctly through grunting and thumbs up.

The training at this dojo was slow paced. The sensei would show the technique and then comment about it. Then we would do the technique for a little bit. Then we would all go back to the line and with our partner we would go do the technique 4 times while everyone else watched. During this time the sensei would make any necessary corrections. It was interesting to train like this. My issue with it is that it slowed down the training a lot.

This dojo was good to train at because it was a different experience.