I just got back from a lovely (if somewhat short-only 1 day) weekend in Kanazawa. I went up Saturday night after work. My host family ordered sushi to be delivered to their house (in the US people get pizza and delivered and in Japan of course Sushi is delivered). Sunday we went on something called the "Hakusan SupaRindo". Initially I thought it was a roller coaster ride (the Super Rindo), but it turns out to be a driving way through the mountains. It starts in Ishikawa-ken (the prefecture Kanazawa is in) and ends in Gifu-ken. The small windy mountain road winds about through amazingly beautiful mountains. There are waterfalls all over the place and (in autumn) the foliage is incredible! The road closes for the season in a few days so there were lots of people looking at the last of the leaves changing. It took about 3 hours to do the entire drive! Almost as exciting as a rollercoaster =) (and possibly as scary on those narrow roads with large charter buses careening about). I love love love autumn and Japan's changing leaves. On our way home we took a different path and stopped at lots of funny little omiyage shops. The Japanese love giving presents, and everytime you go on a trip you are expected to bring back presents for your friends and co-workers. So to support this custom an entire industry of omiyage shops. They are so much fun! You can't just bring back any old thing from a trip, you have to bring something that is very specific to the area that you visited. You never know what you are going to find in different areas. I ended up buying a huge bag of medicinal tea (it looks, smells and tastes rather like cut grass so I am slightly suspicious) but it was only $3. I also bought an extendable back scratcher for Sean (it extends and retracts so you can carry it in your bag and if you get an itch on the subway no worries....).

This morning before coming back to Fukui (and to work, ugh) I went to my host grandmother's house and picked persimmons. I'm not sure if we have persimmons in the US but they are possibly the best fruit ever! I love the way they look hanging on trees during the autumn (I keep taking pictures of persimmons and persimmon trees). One of my favorite paintings is a Chinese painting called "Six Persimmons." I actually painted it onto a table during college (I wonder who has that table now and if they appreciate the persimmons). So I was very happy to come back home with a large bag of persimmons in hand!