As classes begin, life still doesn't slow down...

I have been so busy ever since I joined my group in Nara. We stayed there for a few days, took a day trip to Osaka to see a bunraku puppet performance, and then went to Kyoto to finish our week of traveling. I have done so much lately that I'd never be able to catch you up on everything, but I'll do my best to summerize. While in Nara, we took a day trip to a nearby city to visit a shrine. We had the option of taking the train home or following a five mile trail through the mountains back to Nara. I opted for the trail along with about 10 other students. We set out. The first 10 minutes of the hike went well. It seemed like we had things under control, until we ran in to a farmer who directed us away from the path and back into the city. Aparently, we had never been on the right path to begin with. After wandering throught the city for awhile, we eventually reached another trail, and things were looking up, but we ended up walking along the highway all the way back to Nara for much more than 5 miles. Many of the people in the group were very upset, but fortunately, the group had split in to two, and I was in the more carefree group that was perfectly fine with being lost. It was actaully a pretty good time. It was much more fun than visiting another shrine. We finally got　back to the hostel after walking for 4 hours or so.　
Our last day in Nara, I went for Kareoke with my new friends and had a wonderful time!
In kyoto, of course we visited more shrines, more temples, and more shrines, and more temples, but we were able to make the most of it. Our last day in Kyoto, I rented a boat with my friends Micah and Nick and we rowed up and down the river for an hour. Then we went to climb the monkey mountain, where there are many japanese monkeys that I fed apples and made funny faces at. When we descended the mountian, Nick thought that it would be a good idea to hike along the river. After crossing through a few back yards, we found a small path that went along the river and followed it for a few hours until evenually we ran out of bank. However, there was a train bridge that went across the river and through the mountains on either side, so rather than boringly backtracking to our point of origin, we climbed the side of the mountian up to the bridge and ran across it. We descended the opposite mountian as far as we could, but we reached a cement ledge that had a 30 foot drop off. So we walked along the cement wall (it was about 3 feet wide) until we reached a point where there was a 30 foot drop on either side, at this point we were getting worried, but shortly there after we found a ladder and descended to the flat land of a different set of train tracks. We walked along them until we reached a tunnel. We seemingly had no escape from our journey. At this point, backtracking was out of the question, it would be dark in a few hours, and we needed to reach civilization quickly. Well, we survived. After a few pleas for rescue, Micah swimming across the river, and Nick and I navigating the pitch black train tunnel, we made it back to civilization. We had our hollywood ending on the bridge at sunset as Micah ran toward us, shoeless and soaking wet, we had survived. Things have calmed down since then. Life down revloves around classes in Iida and puppet rehearsals, but we are planning to go camping in the mountains soon, and hey mom, don't worry!!!! I'm always super carefull!!! I was hking the river in a skirt and I didn't even get it dirty!!!