After we said goodbye to our cousins, we went to our new house in Kyoto where we were going to be for the next two weeks.  We got to our new house and were so happy. We had two Japanese toilets that had heated seats and a lot of fun features.  There was also a tatami room. A tatami room had mats on the floor called tatami mats. They are made of rush straw grown in a certain part of Japan.  A tatami room is peaceful and quiet and is used for calm activities like tea ceremony or relaxing, sleeping, or meditating. You sleep on a futon mattress on top of the tatami floor.  It is very simple with hardly any objects or furniture. The windows are made out of shoji. They are wooden sliding windows with paper covering the wood. It was really nice. I slept in that room for two weeks and loved it.

Almost everyday in Kyoto we did the same things: school, went to the park, went to a historic site or did an activity, then got some groceries for dinner and breakfast and went out for lunch.  But when I woke up today I was excited! It was my birthday!! But not just any birthday… I was turning 9 on December 9th. This means it was my GOLDEN BIRTHDAY. And I bet you can’t guess what we were doing…

CODE: _ _    _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _             

HE     HERE COLOR    LA DALLAS LEAVES            

HE=WE

HERE=WERE

COLOR=GOING

LA=TO

DALLAS=NINJA

LEAVES=TRAINING

 WE WERE GOING TO NINJA TRAINING!! 

Anyway we went to ninja training and learned how to be ninjas!  We got to learn how to throw Ninja Stars and shoot blowguns!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was awesome.  They knew it was my birthday so they gave me two ninja stars. They are made of heavy rubber. This is not what the real ninja stars are made of.  The real ones are made of metal and are very dangerous, so we can’t use those to practice. After that we went to a ramen place it was sooooooooooooooooooo yummy.  I got smoked pork with great onions there and it was great. Then we went home and played for a couple of hours. After that we had a sushi dinner and then a chocolate cake that we had picked out the day before at a little bakery down the street from our house.  After that I opened presents from Mom, Dad and Anna: I got cash for college, a cool coin from Osaka Castle that said: Happy Birthday Cole?Anna and I also got an ancient gold coin from when they were building the Torii gates in Japan. I got a candy bento box sushi set.  It was awesome! I also got little statue cat that when you rub it gives you luck and the luck in the cat never runs out. I had a great golden birthday!!

One thing we did a lot of in Kyoto was visit Shinto Shrines and Buddhist temples.  Shintoism is a Japanese religion that has strong family traditions, loves and holds nature sacred,  and worships and honors their gods and ancestors spirits called Kami.  Before you go into a Shinto Shrine, you have to purify yourself. The way you purify is this: 1.) You have to be quiet.  2) Go to the chōzubachi  and pick up the ladle in your right hand. 3) Wash your left hand and switch the ladle to your left hand.  4) Then scoop more water and wash your right hand. 5) Then switch back and scoop some more water and pour it in your left hand and use that water to rinse your mouth.  6)Then spit the water outside of the chozubachi in the rocks. 7)Last, get one more scoop of water in the ladle and raise the ladle so the water runs down the handle to cleanse it for the next person.  

The last thing Im going to say about Kyoto is that the in the fall the city is very beautiful.  I hope I can come back for every season in this city because I heard that each season is really beautiful and different here. Even though its a city, there is so much nature right in it, that you feel like you are not in a city in so many places and that you are out in nature.   We spent a lot of time in parks and gardens and on little hikes.  

Today we had to leave Kyoto and go to Tokyo.  But I was SO excited. We went to Kyoto Station and got on a Shinkansen, a bullet train!  But not just any bullet train, this was the Nozomi and it is the fastest train in the world, almost 300 miles/hour (but not for long, one is being made that will go 600 miles/hour).  If they go on the highway, they’re going to get a ticket for speeding!!! When I was on it, it felt faster than any train I was ever on, but smoother than any train.   It was just as quiet as the other trains because nobody talks on the trains in Japan. Or on buses. Or subways. It was a nice train ride and best part was we got to see Mt. Fuji on the way!

GOODBYE KYOTO!!!!!