More Spring Flowers

I wanted to send out collection of spring flower photos that have been languishing on my little point-and-shoot camera.  Some of these photos are from the Botanical Gardens, some from Hokkaido University, and some from private gardens near our apartment.

Yellow Star of Bethlehem

Two photos of hyacinths

A carpet of primrose

A yellow swamp flower that I don't know the name of.

More primrose

I think this is a trillium

I don't know this one

"Wild" growing tulips on campus.

A distant garden near the orchard on campus.

Below are two close-ups of the tulip garden.

Not a flower...  A bust of William Clark, founder of Hokkaido University

The three below are from a garden on my bike ride into my office.

That's all for now.

-Bre (and Kyle)

Ohanami ~ Cherry blossom viewing party

We went to the Hokkaido International Outdoor Club's Hanami party this weekend.  It was a blast.  Hanami is an important cultural event in Japan.  It seems like everyone goes to one of these cherry blossom viewing parties.  The O at the beginning of Hanami is just to make it more polite.   Hanami and Ohanami are pretty much the same word.

The party was organized by our intrepid leader Leon and it was well attended with both foreigners and Japanese.  We grilled all kinds of things on two charcoal grills.  The food was awesome, but I feel a little smokey.  I took a few photos, but missed all the best parts of the party.

The most memorable parts of the Hanami party, in no particular order were:

1-The local Yakuza club next to our picnic spot.  We later learned after we ran to get out of the rain that they have been having their Hanami party at the spot we were using for 20 years and were not happy to have it taken from them by a bunch of foreigners.

2-There was a drunk American at the party who managed to blend profanity, belligerence and flirting in a way that brought me to a new low view of Americans everywhere.

3-We taught Leon about the magic of Tim Tams and tea.  The back story behind this is first you have to understand that Leon is from New Zealand.  I went to New Zealand several years ago I learned about Tim Tams and tea.  Tim Tams are a cookie, or as they say "biscuit," that can be made into a straw.  The trick is to have hot tea or coffee.  You bite off both ends of the Tim Tam and suck the hot liquid up through it.  The hot liquid melts the chocolate and infuses it with the tea or coffee flavors.  Once the cookie is starting to melt you have to shove the whole thing in your mouth right away.  It is messy and totally delicious.  According to Wikipedia this is called the Tim Tam Slam.  Anyway I could not believe that there could be an actual New Zealander who doesn't know this trick.

4-And last but certainly not least there was the TV crew from NHC who wanted to interview us.  They started out very politely asking who we were and what we were doing.  Then they asked why we were breaking the law.  We had (unknowingly because I can't read Japanese) set up our barbecue right behind a sign that said no fires.


We made new friends and tried new foods.  Tripe is actually pretty tasty, I was surprised to learn.  The little fishes that we grilled, photos at the bottom, were tasty and not as bony as you might think.

That's all for now,

-Kyle (and Bre)

Mt. Moiwa

We took a trip up Mt. Moiwa on Monday.  We got there just before sunset for a great view.

The photo above is of downtown Sapporo just after the gondola car left the station at the bottom of the mountain.  You can see the giant ferris wheel in Susukino on the left and the TV tower in Odori park on the right.  I like how this photo gives you a sense of the concrete jungle that is modern Japanese large building architecture.

Here is a photo from the gondola looking down at the station that we left from at the base of the mountain.  The cable system that the gondola uses is different than what I am used to.  You can see on this photo that there are two lines.  As one gondola car goes up the mountain the other is going down on the other side.  The two large cables are track cables that support the gondola.  The smaller cable is the haulage cable that actually pulls the gondola up or down the mountain.

Here is one of the gondola towers.

As we were going up the gondola car passed over a cemetery.  It is fascinating to see from the air.  There is such order, symmetry, and maximal use of space.

The gondola passed over this giant cow mural.  It seems whimsical to put a cow mural in the forest.

This is a photo of the Peace Pagoda, a well known Sapporo landmark on the side of mount Moiwa.

In the photo series above you can see Mt. Teine, a ski resort near Sapporo.  Teine is still open for spring skiing in May!

The very last part of Mt. Moiwa can be climbed on foot (15minutes) or by a special mini cable car called the Morris Car (2 minutes).

We had our photo taken at the top of the mountain by another visitor.  If you use your imagination the hazy lights behind us become the city of Sapporo.

Jared rang the bell at the top of the mountain.  Not sure about the significance of this bell, but I like the photo.

That's all for now,

-Kyle (and Bre)

Maruyama Zoo

We went to the Maruyama Zoo on Monday with Mom, Jared and two other visitors from the States, Hannah and Sid.  It was a great day, sunny and warm.  The Red Pandas were out eating their bamboo shoots and leaves.  They are awfully cute.  For my non-native english readers out there there is a funny english grammer joke involving a Panda who eats shoots and leaves.

The joke goes something like this:  A Panda walked into a cafe, ordered a meal, then took out a gun and shot up the place.  As the Panda walks out the surviving waiter asks in a trembling voice, "why did you do that?"  The Panda responds, "don't you know that a Panda eats, shoots and leaves?"

At the risk of killing the joke I will explain that with a comma removed from the last line like so: "don't you know that Pandas eat shoots and leaves." changes the meaning of the sentence so that it now means Pandas eat the shoots and leaves of a plant.  With the comma in place it signifies a new idea or action.  So with the comma in place it means that after eating, the panda takes out a gun and fires it (shoots) and walks away from the cafe (leaves).  In this joke you can only tell whether the Panda is a gunman, or an eater of bamboo by the placement of the comma.

I took this photo of Jared watching a crocodile.  The glare from the window was too much to get a good photo of the crocodile.  I like how it looks like Jared is hugging the crocodile in this photo.

This guy is a Water Monitor.  She seemed to be keeping a close eye on me.

Here is the water monitor's cousin, a Cobalt Tree Monitor.

This turtle was my favorite animal at the zoo.  I think he is a broad shelled turtle.  You can see a video of him swimming (taken by someone else) here.

The ever humorous Japanese/English signs.  In this case the sign is warning you of the deer that may turn into dangerous dinosaurs and bite your fingers.

This sign needs no translation.


That's all for now,

-Kyle (and Bre)