Academics at KGU

For students who are planning to come to KGU, I'll give you a bit of information about what to expect with your classes. This might not be interesting to everyone, but read on if you're planning to come to KGU!

Martial Arts at KGU

Last week, for our Special Lectures on Japan class, the lecturer took us to several of the dojos on campus to learn about the martial arts that are offered as extracurricular activities at KGU. We went to four different dojos, and students are joining most of them.

I'll start where we started our tour, the Kyudo dojo:

Australia Week Taiko Performance

This September 16th to 23rd was Kumamoto Australia Week, which was put on by the Australia-Japan Foundation. One of the events was a taiko performance by the Australian group RINDO. Graham and I and a few other students went to see the performance at Kumamoto Castle on Saturday. 




This particular video is of a collaboration between RINDO, the Kumamoto Prefecture #2 High School Alumni taiko group, and the Kumamoto Hitsuyuukan Municipal High School taiko group.

Orientation Week at KGU

Now that we're good and settled in I figured it was about time for a blog post about stuff that has gone on since we've arrived here in Kumamoto. For this post, I’ll be talking about our first week at KGU, which was our orientation week. Our orientation ran from Wednesday, September 11, 2013 to Wednesday, September 18, 2013, excluding the weekend of course. There was a different activity or two for us on each day, so it was quite a busy week for us. After the cut, you'll be able to read about each of our orientation days detail.

Fujisaki-Hachimangu Festival

Yesterday was "Respect for the Aged Day", and also the day that the main events of the Fujisaki-Hachimangu Festival were held. In the downtown area, there was a huge parade, lasting most of the day. People dressed in festival jackets ("happi") danced down the street, and people chanted from floats. The focus of the parade was the horses that "danced" down the street. I posted a short video in the entry about Suizenji Park, but here it is again.

Another feature of festivals in Japan is food stalls (屋台）! People set up stands to sell various fried or frozen treats and drinks. There are also games to play and toys for sale. I was most looking forward to takoyaki and taiyaki, and I got to try both! The takoyaki was so great that I didn't get a picture of it before devouring it, and the taiyaki was cold and soggy, so I was disappointed and didn't take a picture. 


Graham and I both enjoyed some shaved ice though! I had mango flavour with condensed milk, and Graham had cola flavour.

I also took a video while we walked down the street with the food stalls. You can see some of the interesting things that were offered. Have a look!

We didn't get much good video of the actual parades, but some other students did, so if I can get a hold of one (or a link), I'll post it here!

Anyway, in the end it was a very eventful weekend, going to Suizenji, shopping, the castle, restaurants, the festival and more shopping. My legs still hurt, but we made a lot of good memories. We're back to orientation now, and classes start on Friday. I or Graham will write a bit about orientation soon, and we'll keep updating as interesting things happen! Stay tuned!

Kumamoto Castle

This weekend, in addition to going to Suizenji park, Graham and I also went to Kumamoto Castle with a few of the other students who didn't do homestay. 

Check below for more pictures and details!

Suizenji Park in September

Today, Graham and I and a few other students went to Suizenji Park and the downtown shopping area. Before we entered the park, we heard drums down the street and went to see what was happening. This coming Monday is the Fujisaki-hachimangu festival, which includes a huge parade of people, portable shrines, lion dancers, and decorated horses. All around town, we saw groups of people and horses practising for the festival. The particular group we saw at Suizenji was performing for the seniors of a nursing home. 


 
They get the horse to "dance" by pushing it around a bit and running with it. It might look a bit stressful, but the horse seemed fine, and it was pet and fed carrots by the seniors afterwards. I heard that in the past they used to get the horses drunk...? Not completely sure if that's true or not!

We'll be attending the festival on Monday with a group of students and friends. It will be extremely busy downtown then. 

There are a lot of shops and restaurants around Suizenji park, selling specialty products from Kumamoto (a ton of Kumamon-themed products) and other knick-knacks. I bought a little Kumamon to dangle off my backpack. Within the park, there are also souvenir shops, a large shrine, tea house, and a place where you can get good-luck charms and fortunes. It's an interesting place! We took a lot of pictures.


The best ones are here. 

After the park, we went to shop in the downtown shopping area. Tomorrow we're going to Kumamoto Castle, so we will have lots more to post about!