This entry stretches back a bit, so bear with me. Two weekends ago [which would have been the last weekend in February] myself and my dormmates headed to Tokyo Disney! It's a lot smaller than Disney in Florida, but it has mainly the same rides. Small World, Space Mountain, The Haunted Mansion, Dumbo, Pinocchio, Snow White....all the same....well, kinda. We went on the Snow White ride, which is basically a car that moves through the various scenes of the movie. The last scene is the dwarves moving up a mountain, and the witch is positioned over the door you need to pass through to end the ride, with a boulder and a stick. She cackled something in Japanese and pushed the rock as if to crush us with it. Then the doors open and we're greeted by a smiling Japanese woman who welcomes us back in Japanese. We get out of the car and I kind of look over to my dormmates, who are silent for a few seconds. The first thing out of my mouth was "Did--did we just die?" I can't find the ending for Snow White anywhere online, and its been forever since I saw it, but in traditional Disney style, doesn't she ride off into the sunset with the prince?

Then Sunday two of us met up with two others from the Ontakesan dorm, and we all headed to Ibaraki prefecture to see the giant standing Buddha. The one I posted previously was the seated Buddha, who is located in Kamakura, Tokyo prefecture. Everyone thought it'd be a great idea to walk to the Buddha...yeah....two hours and seven miles later, we end up at the Buddha. It was kinda cool, but we vowed to take the bus back. We went inside the Buddha, which was like a museum with facts about the statue and Buddhism. There were also windows in his chest and back so you could see just how far up you were.

We ended up having to make a mad dash for the bus back to the station, though. We made it, but just barely. On the way down, the driver pointed out where he had seen us walking during the course of the day, which was kind of funny. We stopped at a sushi kaiten in the station for dinner and went our separate ways after that.

This past weekend we went to karaoke for Bernadette's birthday celebration on Saturday, and on Sunday three of us headed out to the Ghibli Museum, which is a studio founded by Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata. Miyazaki is comparable to Walt Disney, only for Japan. The museum was more like a funhouse and less like a museum, so it was quite enjoyable. Before we left they showed a 20 minute feature that is exclusively shown in the museum. Quite fun!