The morning after Karaoke was not as exhausting as expected and the breakfast, provided some welcoming nutritions, albeit not as high in variety as you would expect it from a hotel. Our plan for the day was to visit Lake Yamanakako, located southeast of Kofu City, which would take us about an hour to reach, passing through numerous mountains en route. Among the five major lakes surrounding Mt. Fuji, Yamanakako is the largest. For this excursion, we split into groups for exploring Yamanakako. Our group, consisting of Sorn, Joram, and myself, named ourselves Team Flying Fish, while the girls Pam, Antonia, Celine, and Maria formed Team Frying Pan. Other group names included Team Flying Dragon and Team Flying Rabbit. Each group was assigned a local Student as a tandem partner. We were fortunate to be assigned Fuka and Sui, who were exceptionally open, friendly and patient with us.
When we arrived at Lake Yamanakako, we had to take care of some organizational matters before we could begin exploring.Since lunch was not provided by our accomodiation in Yamanakako, our first goal would be some place to eat.
Originally, we planned to rent bicycles to ride around the lake, which would have given us more flexibility than relying on the public transportation system. We could have rented the bicycles first and then rode to any restaurant we desired. After eating, we could have easily continued our bike tour around the lake. However, we soon found out that the bicycle rental shops were temporarily closed due to bad weather in previous weeks. Unfortunately, we only realized this after walking for 20 minutes on empty stomachs. Hunger became a pressing issue, so we decided to take the next bus to any restaurant that we could find. To my surprise, despite being in a remote area, the restaurant had an automatic robot waiter that served us the meals we had ordered on a tablet. Digitization in Japan sometimes baffles me both in a positive and in a negative way. After our late lunch, we decided to go on a peddle boat tour on the lake. However Celine and Antonia had an online exam which is why they could not attend the tour in full. As the group split, the rest of us decided to go to an observatory viewpoint before we would need to get back to our accommodations.
As we arrived in our Hotel, dinner was already prepared and i have to admit it looked extraordinary. However, due to the covid situation, which in Japan is still taking seriously, everyone had his own palette of food and we were sitting quite distant to each other, so it did felt a bit lonely in comparison to sitting together in the cafeteria. After that, i came to get to know my roommate for one night a little bit better – Tarou. He introduced himself as Yoshi, but his given name, Tarou, actually means “first born son” – so in a sense we are both Tarous. We talked a little bit about his Master thesis, as he writes about hydro energy and also wandered off to other alternative energy sources. I learned, that after the earthquake of 2011, nuclear energy as a source is kept to a minimum, and regulations are now stricter. Although nuclear energy is a good solution, due to the many earthquakes in Japan, it should not be considered a main source, even though Japan has to import a lot of energy from abroad. Hydrogen energy might be a good alternative, however the storage and catalysts seem to be quite expensive. At one point, my new friend accidentally exclaimed “I love nuclear weapons!” in his excitement, when he actually meant nuclear energy. We called it a day and went to the in house onsen together. In the evening, most of the exchange and local students sat together drank and talked or played cards. I was excited to get the chance to converse with “real Japanese people”, however i couldn’t muster more than, where they come from, what they study, what they did throughout the day and maybe what they like. Nonetheless, i feel that practicing speaking makes one more confident in that language.
Fun Fact, the Samue is traditionally clothing for the working people in a temple but just developed into everyday life, just as the the jeans did.
