Leslie Ann Hynes

The Sayonara Party was last night.
This semester has been so fun, but it’s gone by so fast! I can’t believe [...]

Last night, I finally got to do something I’ve been wanting to do the whole time I’ve been here: go to the Tokyo Tower.

Since Thursday was Thanksgiving - which, being a strictly American holiday, passed completely unnoticed by retailers and other organizations (we had class, same as ever) - some students arranged Thanksgiving celebrations for ourselves.

The IES classes here all have field trips to culturally significant locations around Tokyo that are relevant to the course material. For example, the politics class has a trip on Friday to the controversial Yasiuune Shrine.

Although Halloween isn’t celebrated in Japan the same way it is in the United States, with trick-or-treaters and the like, many businesses take advantage of the holiday for marketing reasons and offer seasonal treats and decorate their storefronts to match.

On Wednesday, the IES Abroad Tokyo group left Chiba for Nagano. Nagano is a very “traditional” part of Japan. We stayed in a 旅館 (ryokan, traditional Japanese-style in) and in the evenings, we had the opportunity to drop by as many of the ten nearby 温泉 (onsen, hot springs/baths) as we wanted to.