_valerian

All day Saturday, Kamakura (a historical and now tourist-embedded town of temples and gift shops) was rocked hard by the presence of me, some other teachers and 223 Senmatsu Jr. High eighth graders.

The weather was better than you could try and ask for- clear, slightly cool and crisp. A year ago I was wasting a day of my life by waking up at 4am to get to my part time job at best buy the day after thanksgiving ringing up crap people did not need with money they did not have for like 12 hours. One year later (this year) I was spending the day walking around a seaside town with my posse of six 13 year olds, camera in hand.

Ahhh sweet, sweet vindication.

TAKE THAT, part-time retail hell.

The students made their own plans for the day- the first temple we went to was actually not in Kamakura, but in Ofuna- and from there another 15 minute bus ride follwed by a 10 minute walk up a hill. It had a waterfall nearby, which is usually why people make the trek up to the temple, but I ended up taking a picture of this:

I had a pretty good idea of what it was, and once I looked at it from behind the true form popped out into plain view (yes that was a pun):

This is indeed what you think it might be– a stone fertility symbol. Later a teacher told me it is to aid in makin’ babies (well, praying to it or something, as I doubt it is actually used in the process). I stood there looking at it, and nervously touched it once.

Saturday was one of those days where I got to play tourist. “Tourist Mode” works as cover for photographing, as I am just another guy with a camera around his neck. There was a lot going on all day- tonight I will try and develop five of the fifteen rolls I shot. I like to do 5 rolls (in one tank) per night while listening to NPR’s morning edition in the evening. Inbetween the actual shooting of film, and the actual looking at the negatives in their sleeves, I keep trying to imagine what the prints will look like. Usually I can be pleasantly suprised AND terribly dissappointed with the same roll of film.

The students were dismissed from Kamakura around 3 or 4pm but Mr. Inoue and Mr. Kurotobi and I hung around to pick up some souviners. Since we were all beat we paid an extra 7oo yen to ride in a “green car” all the way back to the Tokyo station. A Green Car is neither really Green, and only a car in the railway sense. But it did have soft reclining seats that we all clicked back to their maximum horizontal position. This was a much better option than standing in a packed regular train car for over an hour.