Random

The view from Cindy's apartment!

Takamatsu - the capital city of Kagawa-ken

Cindy - ready for an ill-fated night on the town!

Anne

24 Eyes and the shrine...

So another of Shodoshima's claims to fame is that the movie 24 eyes was filmed there. All about a school teacher who taught the only 12 kids in this little village! Apparently quite a moving flick. Anyway, so we visited the village where it was filmed and everything was kept pretty much the way it was in the movie. Kind of creepy with this music track of little children singing playing over and over and over again! Very interesting...

Movie poster for 24 Eyes

I tried to get the beach in the background of this pic! But it's all blurry! Boo...

A hawk/eagle(?)

We also visited a shrine in a cave! We went in, wrote down our prayers/wishes and had two monks chanting/praying for us! It was a really cool experience, the setting was fabulous and in the back of the temple are these windows so you can see how high up in the mountains you are!

Entrance to the Cave Shrine

These are the windows in the back of the temple

Olive Garden and Soy Sauce Factory

So Shodoshima is famous for two things, soy sauce and olives! The Mediterranean climate is perfect for olive growing and a visit to the Olive Garden was a fantastic opportunity to buy the coolest olive omiyage imaginable!

Not quite at the Olive Garden! This statue is second in size only to the one in Murakami. Niigata wins again!!

The Entrance to the Olive Garden! Everything has a distinctly Greek theme.

These are some recently graduated High School students we were introduced to!

Souf Efrican Chicks! Cindy, Anne and me

Soy Sauce Factory

Anne and Cindy

Shodoshima Angel Road

Angel Road is a stretch of beach connecting three small islands to the larger Shodoshima. It is only accessible during low tide. Cindy and I went at sunset, the light was stunning, the weather was gorgeous and the scenery was amazing!

I really hate...

... any school vacations. It's soooooooooo boring being an ALT when there are no students around to be entertained by unique clownish ways!! Sighhh.

Oh well, at least I had a bit of a minibreak last month. I went to visit my good friend, Cindy, on her little island of Shodoshima in Kagawa ken, which is situated in Shikoku. Gorgeous place. Shodoshima has a lovely Mediterranean climate! The weather is mild enough to grow olives! In fact, that's their "thing". You know that "thing" you have to find that defines any little town in Japan?! Shodoshima is famous for its olives! I visited the Olive Gardens and bought a whole ton of olive products! Some olive chocolates for the staffroom (as you can imagine, that was really well-received! The weirder the omiyage the better. What can I say?! I give kewl omiyage!)...

As I am typing this at school I don't have access to my pics! But rest assured, those will soon follow.