Thursday, April 14, 2011

Tradition amidst the chaos. (混乱の中で、伝統。)

Really, the title of this post refers to the content in relation to the rest of my blog, and not the content itself. I know, I know, I apologize--you went in to this with such high hopes, didn't you?

Anyway. Chaos, of course, means my regularly scheduled random wanderings among topics. Tradition, of course, can only mean 花見 (hanami, flower viewing), as of course it is that time again.

And because I'm so very busy lately, honestly I wanted to take a break with a bit of picture spam attempt to make up for my neglect with pictures of Kyoto nature at its finest.


Oh, dear. These are in complete backwards order. Curse you, blogger.

Anyway. This is a lovely bamboo-covered path up near 北山 (Kitayama) on the 鴨川 (Kamo river). I basically walked up the 鴨川 from 今出川 (Imadegawa), just pretend I walked the other way and he pictures will seem, for all intents and purposes, in order.



Or. Well. They're in order except for that first one.

... admittedly, the first one is quite nice. A good lead-in, you might say.

Well played, blogger.

Anyway, this is the true beginning of my journey--just after walking down onto the river pathway at Imadegawa. Ah, the sakura-lined 鴨川. Lovely.


I particularly like these willowy ones.


I was trying to get the 大文字 (daimoji, big character) in the background there, but I guess it didn't turn out so well.


Looking down the river towards  三条 (Sanjou...)


Still down, with the lovely lining effect.



And turtles! You can cross the river every now and again on stone paths, occasionally dotted with adorable turtles. Or boats, even. I like the turtles. These guys are at the crossing just north of Imadegawa.


What, non-sakura flowers? Blasphemy!


Ok, ok, that's better.


Ooo, aaah.

(Again, those white flowers. I thought they were nice, ok?)



Aaah, surrounded by blooms.



And then we get Edo's foray into the world of artsy shots.


This one is technically blurry because of a breeze, but I actually really like it.


I for some reason associate "close-up" with "artsy."



Ah, bad lighting. Also "artsy" in my brain.


Some college kids doing the same thing I was, just with better cameras.

At least I didn't have a backpack, so ha.




The falling blossoms. This one actually turned out better than I expected.



A lone tree on the opposite bank. I guess that guy liked it, though.


Nice stone stairway in the background there.


I particularly liked the reflection of these pink sakura in the river, so I had to get a shot.


Ah, there's that bridge again. Lovely.


A better view of the tunnel. Unfortunately, none of my wide views are very pretty.


And another nice close-up to round things off. Ah, sakura in Kyoto. I'm just too good to you readers.

This is Edo, signing off with cleaning to do and professors to e-mail.

3 comments:

Japan Australia said...

Love the first picture with the bamboo framing the Cherry Blossoms.

Japan Australia

Anonymous said...

Hi, I have a question about the JET CIR program regarding being an alternate. What's the likelihood of being upgraded? When do you get notified that you won't be upgraded?

Thank you

Edo said...

Anonymous-

I am not the best person to ask, as I was not, as you can probably guess, upgraded, and when I called the consulate to ask whether my being on vacation during the summer and out of contact would work against me, I was told "not to worry about it."

Mind, I was going through the LA consulate, which probably has one of the biggest pools. The fact of the matter remains, however, that CIR upgrades are rarer than ALT upgrades, simply because there are so few accepted. Don't cross your fingers, basically, and have something else planned.