{"id":1545,"date":"2009-01-12T03:52:00","date_gmt":"2009-01-12T03:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/?p=1545"},"modified":"2009-01-12T03:52:00","modified_gmt":"2009-01-12T03:52:00","slug":"the-power-of-the-lucky-branch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/?p=1545","title":{"rendered":"The Power of the Lucky Branch"},"content":{"rendered":"

O what power ye wield green plastic branch. Years ago, received a lucky branch<\/a> from a far away shrine in Nishinomiya, and if you are the type to believe in these kinds of things there is plenty of evidence supporting the power of the Nishinomiya Ebisu lucky branch. <\/p>\n

The trick with the lucky branch is that if you go to the festival again you need to throw away your old lucky branch, and then<\/span> buy a new one. So on our day off this weekend we traveled together back to Nishinomiya and waited in a line worthy of the pope himself to get a new lucky branch for the new year. After getting a branch we walked through the matsuri sampling a variety of foods. Usually there are pretty traditional stands: takoyaki, crepes, grilled corn, yakitori, castella, fish on a stick (which is a lot different from fish sticks), taiyaki, and cotton candy. This year there seemed to be more foreign foods available – turkish kebab sandwiches, chinese fried dumplings, even a ramen place. After walking around for several hours we headed off to Sumiyoshi to meet Antoine and Miwako and see their new place.<\/p>\n

Sumiyoshi is a small upscale part of eastern Kobe, situated on the hillside of Mt. Rokko. The neighborhood is generally nicer the higher up you go on the hill, and after meeting at the station Miwako drove us pretty far up the hill. They are living in what Japanese people call a “mansion” – what Americans would probably call apartments. They are generally fairly large in terms of floorspace (the same as a small house) but on one level in a larger building. The downside of mansions is that they are much like renting an apartment in that you are still living close to lots of other people, you responsible for shared areas and you are somewhat limited in terms of what you do with your place. The advantages are that because of the high density design of the buildings they can be placed in areas that would normally be quite expensive for a house to be built, and they are usually pretty convenient as far as shopping and train stations go.<\/p>\n

Antoine and Miwako had just gotten back from a short honeymoon in Okinawa and were getting ready to get back to work. They suggested that we drop in since we were on our way back from the matsuri, and so we brought a cheesecake and relaxed in their living room. The interior design of the place was pretty close to what we are in the process of building, so it was that much more comfortable. Antoine gave us the grand tour, and let us check out the balcony where they had a beautiful view of eastern Kobe from the hillside. <\/p>\n

We had a nice time chatting with them, and sooner or later we’ll have to have them over once we get settled into our new place. We walked back to the station from their place since it was all downhill and made it in about 20 minutes, so they are not too far away from the JR line which is very convenient. Antoine’s work has him using a station that is a little closer, so it should be a good homebase for them from now on. We were really impressed with the place, and they both looked very happy coming back from so much time off.<\/p>\n

Kuniko and I caught a train back to Okubo and I had to do a little bit of thesis work for Nozaki sensei before bed. She is getting close to wrapping things up, and it will be a relief for her (and me) when it is all finished. I feel like I know more about vocabulary acquisition among Japanese high school students than I really ever wanted to know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

O what power ye wield green plastic branch. Years ago, received a lucky branch from a far away shrine in Nishinomiya, and if you are the type to believe in these kinds of things there is plenty of evidence supporting the power of the Nishinomiya Ebisu lucky branch. The trick with the lucky branch is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pOpl7-oV","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1545"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1545\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}