nara- koen

yesterday we spent a day

sightseeing with our friends in nara.

we focused on nara-koen,

an amazing park that is home 

to about 1200 deer who just roam free,

eating grass and attacking tourist who

buy "deer biscuits". 

i literally had two separate deer bite me,

once on the butt and another

on my leg
 putting a small snag in the 

fabric of my only skirt...

to escape the deer attacks

we visited some of the many shrines, 

temples, and gardens that are encompassed

in this great park.

a highlight was seeing the Great Buddha statue (Daibutsu)

which is housed on the worlds largest wooden structure

Todai-ji. 

these pictures don't do it justice...

-e

iga

an adventurous day with our friends continued...

after seeing some ninjas,

they took us to another town

where we played with ceramics.

we got to create anything our imaginations

and capabilities could allow us

on a potters wheel.

none of us are very talented but we had a great

time laughing and creating some pretty

nonfunctional bowls...

-e

ninja museum of igaryu

on sunday we met up with

some friends in nara.

we know them from 

edmonds community college 

where we were conversation partners

with a class of japanese foreign exchange students.

thanks to the magic of facebook

we've stayed connected.

we jumped into our friends car and told them to show us some 

of their favorite sights.

the first was a ninja museum

where we saw a ninja performance

(where they demonstrated several different ninja weapons)

as well as a traditional ninja house,

where we got shown all the intricate hiding places

ninjas would create.

it was definitely geared towards children,

there were even little "ninjas" 

running around everywhere,

but every adult was having just as much fun...

-e

attack deer

steven got

attacked by a deer tonight.

probably because

he's so handsome...

-e