When the captain begins his morning message about arriving in port for Akita with the phrases “ . . .it is snowing, essentially the most I’ve ever seen,” you realize that may’t be good. And it was actually happening. As we pulled into port, it appeared like we have been touchdown in Siberia (or a minimum of that is how I imagined it, gloomy, cloudy and snowy, with industrial wind generators spinning and an influence plant spewing plumes of smoke).
I had some fairly adventurous plans for right now, however scaled again as a result of climate. We left later than we meant, the snow had stopped and the blue sky was breaking by the clouds. After taking the shuttle into city, we walked to the practice station. Akita is sort of a giant metropolis, (300,000) full of contemporary buildings, accommodations, procuring malls, and so on. Sure, that is the place the Akita canine originated. You see photos of canine and stuffed canine toys in all places. There may be even a GIANT Akita canine in the course of the practice station. After reviewing the schedule on the station, I assumed it too dangerous to attempt to get to and from Kakuodate with sufficient time to see the samurai quarter, so we reverted to plan B.
First, we spent a while shopping for tickets between Kobe and Kyoto for the following week. The Japanese host on our cruise ship suggested us to handle it on the a lot smaller and comparatively quiet Akita station. Not solely is Kobe greater, nevertheless it ought to be cherry blossom peak with numerous practice visitors. I am glad we bought the tickets, as a result of it wasn’t very simple and it took us longer than we thought to verify if we made it.
We took the bus meaning to take a experience however determined to get off and discover Senshu Park. There have been only a few others within the park so we had a really peaceable expertise wandering the grounds the place Kubota Citadel was. Right now, the gates, tower and guardhouse have been reconstructed. The snow started to soften and fall from the citadel gates and you possibly can see the bumps on the branches of the soon-to-bloom cherry timber. We knew we would not see any blooms on this a part of the nation, however guests shall be in for fairly a present in mid-April.
Strolling again to our bus cease, we discovered ourselves in the course of the commencement ceremony at Akita College. All of the younger males have been in neat darkish fits with ties, and the ladies largely wore conventional kimono garments. There have been loads of smiles, flowers and images. They have been a powerful bunch.
BTW, even if Japanese college students examine English for about 10 years, we discover only a few who communicate it proficiently. Plus, everyone seems to be well mannered and useful, and since we’re all fairly expert with numerous translation apps – we handle to speak!