Kobe

Today I went to visit some friends studying abroad at Kobe university. It's much easier to get to Kobe than I thought - there's something called the Hankyu line that goes to Osaka, where you can change super quickly to the Kobe branch. In the end it took just over an hour (and only 600 yen!).

I always really feel how packed together Japan is when I get the train. Whenever I get the train in the UK, London stops and it's all fields, interspersed with towns around each stop. But the area between Kyoto and Osaka is just more Kyoto and Osaka. They just kind of merge. Then when you turn right along the coast, there's no noticeable break between what's Osaka and what's Kobe. The only difference along that bit is that the habitable area is much smaller, so whereas the mountains are pretty far away going down to the sea, the view from the way to Kobe is pretty much all upward slope. And until the mountains get too steep, there are houses everywhere.

... anyway, Kobe!
My friends met me at the station and we went for a wander around the shopping district to Kobe's China town. It was much bigger and livelier than London's China town!

We didn't stop for food there because we were planning to have something more filling later, but I'd love to go back, because they have cute panda-decorated meat buns.

This is a cute little doorstop outside a restaurant. The rabbit was so small you might not even notice it walking along!

From China town we went wandering up to the old foreign district. This is a Chinese restaurant that we think used to be an embassy (maybe...?)

This is a building called 'Ben's House'. Apparently it's marked on a lot of the tourist maps. We're not sure who Ben was or why his house was so important, but apparently it's been there for over 100 years. So.

Just next door there was an old British embassy or something similar, and it's become a pub, also the Kobe Sherlock Holmes museum. That's pretty darn British.

On the way back down (Kobe has two directions: to the mountains, and to the sea. Makes it very easy to navigate) we came across the back of the big shrine in the shopping district. I think that this little one was for the god of rice - I heard that foxes are supposed to be the messengers of the god of rice, and there were these fox statues standing by the shrine.

 While we were eating the rain started coming down harder, so I couldn't get the panoramic view I was hoping for - this'll have to do for now (glorious weather):

So Kobe was really fun, a lovely break before the two (two!) exams I have this week. Hopefully I can go again on a clearer day!

And just quickly, a ceramics class update: I finished the tea cup and saucer I was working on! Here they are (I'm pretty pleased with them):