September 12, 2021

 Sunday - Hot and Sunny, gorgeous day

I went to bed quite late last night and so getting up this morning was quite difficult. F tried to wake me up before my alarm, but I’m afraid I wasn’t having any of it! When my alarm did go off, I got up and got dressed. We left the house somewhere around 10:30 and first off went to F’s sister’s house. We dropped off some veggies from his aunt and then went off to Yuza.  We drove past the place that sells nashi and went to a cafe that a friend had told me about. 

The cafe was lovely. It was in an old house. We had to pay first and then were able to choose a couple of O-Yaki. As we had the lunch special, we had a great salad, the O-Yaki and a drink.  We sat on the engawa, which is rather like a porch or veranda, under a tarp so we were out of the sun. There was a lovely breeze so it was cool. The food was great and we were able to relax and enjoy ourselves and our lunch.

I had hoji-cha, salad and a curry and an old chicken O-Yaki. (Old Chicken just means that it wasn't 
tender chicken, it was a little tough.)

After we finished lunch, we went to the nashi farm that we had passed earlier. Sadly, they had sold out (and it was barely 2 pm.) Fortunately, we drove a little further down the road and another place had some on sale.

After a quick stop in a drugstore, we drove to Asahi Village. Just to let you know, Asahi is in the complete opposite direction to Yuza! We drove there as F wanted to check out some places he needs to drive to for work. We found this very cool clock tower in one place. Sadly, the clock wasn't working, but maybe we were just there at the wrong time!

We ended up at a temple, Dainichibou Ryusui-Ji. We went in, I thought we’d just do a quick tour of the temple and F would ask if anyone knew where his place was. Well, that’s not what happened!  It was a beautiful temple. We were invited to sit down and a that a priest would be with us soon. He came and prayed over us for 10 minutes or so. He shook some kind of duster on a stick over us and then we were allowed to sit on stools and the priest talked at us for a few minutes.  Then, another priest took over and took us to another room.

In the other room, there was a mummy. Yamagata-ken has quite a few mummies: priests that have chosen to become living buddhas to help other people reach Nirvana. That priest allowed us to sit on stools but spent about 20 minutes or more talking at us again. My butt was getting really sore from the stool and I was more than a little bored! F bought a couple of things from the priest, one of which was an omamori which he gave to me. I didn’t want it! I found out later that inside the omamori there is a piece from the mummy’s clothing. Apparently, they change his clothing every 6 years and the piece of clothing is going to protect me. I just hope Customs doesn’t ask me what it is!

We took a few pictures outside the temple and then went back to the car. I was really glad to get off the stools! 

A fountain, normally for hand washing and mouth rinsing, but not these days.

The view looking down at the Temple Gate.

The view from the temple gate looking up at the temple.

Looking up at the roof of the gate. It was thatched and I believe it was made without nails, at least, I couldn't see any.

We stopped at a road stop after a while. We had an ice cream cone each which was very delicious. We walked over behind the buildings to see the waterfall and just to stretch our legs. It was gorgeous there and we were mostly by ourselves!

We came back to Tsuruoka and bought a bento and some groceries for the next couple of days. The bento was for K’s dinner. F suggested going for yakiniku buffet. I was okay with it, but it is expensive and the place isn’t always that good. It is also really easy for the two of us to overeat there. F’s tolerance for meat isn’t that great so not a good idea. 

We bought our groceries and then came back to the house. We gave K her bento, I put the groceries away and put some stuff away upstairs. Then F and I had a little chat about where to go for dinner. He decided not to have yakiniku buffet, but to go to a place near the station and Foodever. I said it was a good idea, if the yakiniku restaurant was busy or full, we could just go to Foodever.

The restaurant wasn’t terribly busy so we were able to get a seat. We had a set plate of meat and added some veggies to grill and a kimchi assortment plate, plus some oolong tea for both of us. Our final bill came to a little less than the cost of the buffet for both of us and was really good quality, so we did well I think.

We kind of wanted dessert afterwards, but didn’t want to stay where we were. I suggested going to McDonald's as we could hit up the grocery store afterwards. Yes, we already bought groceries, but we forgot to get milk! I remembered it after we went through the checkout at the other store.

We went to McDonald's and I was hoping to have a flurry but they didn’t have ice cream tonight. Boo! I had their Tsukino pie, it has anko and mochi in it, so I wasn’t a huge fan. It was okay, but not great. F and I sat there for a bit and then left. We couldn’t get the wifi to work.

We picked up some milk and some rice and a few other things at the grocery store and then came back to the house. We had a quiet but companionable evening. 

This is going to be a busy week. I have class on Tuesday, I’m getting my second vaccination on Wednesday morning and F and I will celebrate our 20th anniversary this week too. We’ll probably go out for dinner on Friday (unless he really did cancel our reservation) and I’m not planning to cook on either Wednesday or Thursday. I’m not sure what kind of reaction I’ll have to my shot. Some of my friends have had not great ones. 

Anyway, that’s it for today. Come back later if you like and hear about my Monday. Until tomorrow….