The university is constantly organising various outings and events for all the exchange students, which I think is a fabulous idea. In fact, I am very happy with the support that Waseda is giving us - there's always something to do!

One such event was a day trip to Chichibu, right in the mountains of Saitama prefecture, about an hour and a half by bus northwest of Tokyo.


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I signed up at the last minute, wanting to see a part of Japan *outside* of Tokyo, and was lucky enough to be picked as one of the forty-or-so students to attend.

We set off early in the morning (8am... not good) and took a bus directly from the university itself, and it wasn't all that long before we reached our destination- a rather large farm which grew, somewhat peculiarly, grapes. I was very confused and surprised when I first noticed this, because I was unaware that grapes were even grown in Japan! The way the grapes were grown, too, intrigued me...


For whatever reason, the individual bunches were wrapped in perforated plastic bags - rather odd, I thought. I was told it has something to do with the humid climate they are grown in, but I think it might also be due to the peculiar Japanese custom of wrapping everything. Seriously, in a supermarket the peaches are individually wrapped in foam and they give you a bag for everything! Even in a 100-yen shop, the staff lady took care to individually wrap my 100-yen glasses (for reference, 100 yen is about $1.30). I know this is side-tracking a little, but those 100 yen glasses were actually decent! Made in Japan (not made in China? What is this?) and certainly superior to anything you could buy for a similar price back home.

Anyway, where was I... oh yes, soba making! Once at the farm we were divided into groups and given the task of creating soba from scratch! I should briefly explain what soba is - it's a type of noodle made from buckwheat flour and shaped much like spaghetti, except somewhat more square (look at the picture above for a non-perfect example -_-;; ). It can be eaten either hot or cold, and is traditionally served plain (as above) with a bowl of broth on the side which you dip the noodles in before eating.


We were given a little help while making the soba, but no matter how hard we tried, my groups' still ended up looking like they were cut by a child with a pair of toy scissors. Still, they were edible, and we enjoyed a lunch of our own hand-made soba!



While it was incredibly tasty, I thought the meal was somewhat lacking. While wholesome buckwheat soba, a light soy broth and a few slices of spring onion may be the stuff that sustains remote mountain hermits to live for decades, I, a growing (I can hope) young man, needed something a little more meaty and as such spent the rest of the day hungry. Luckily there were plenty of things to distract myself with!

After lunch we had some time to walk up the hill behind the farm and admire the views and rest in the hammocks:



Our day did not end with soba-making, though. After an hour of free time, we boarded the bus again and headed to a nearby river. Here, were were treated to the experience of riding on a boat down a river with scenery that had made the place a 'national beauty spot'! Needless to say, it was a magical experience - and oh so different from the neon lights of Shinjuku and Shibuya. There were waterfalls, rapids, 100-year-old railway bridges (still in use!) and even what looked like filming for a TV drama. Fantastic!




What made the trip interesting in another way was that the area is also known as the 'birthplace of Japanese geology', presumably for the impressive rocks to be found there. Much to the horror of one of my Japanese friends, I took a small piece of this rock with me, and it's now sitting on my desk.
I also returned to Saitama on the weekend, but that is a tale for another blog post... (unless something more interesting occurs in the meantime!)

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