Barbecue in Saitama!

This past weekend was Inga's birthday, so a bunch of our camp co-workers decided we should go have a barbecue in rural Saitama, followed by a trip to an onsen!



We left Tokyo on Friday night after choir practice and headed to Tokorozawa, where Inga, our co-workers Peter and Makoto, and I stayed at our other co-worker, Dai's, apartment for the night. The next day, we headed out to the mountains after meeting up with another group member!

The place we visited had old railcars that you could stay in!

A pond near our barbecue area

The leaves were just starting to change colors -- that hasn't happened in Tokyo yet.

Dai and Inga at our barbecue site.

BUBBLES!

Bubbles forever!

The amount of food we made was ridiculous.

Like, seriously.

I only had one meal the entire weekend.

It was just TOO MUCH FOOD.

Only Makoto was in the mood for photos. :'(

Getting the fire started

So that meat you see by the peppers? BACON CHUNKS.

No such thing as too many bubbles!

焼餅 hooray!

Also steamed donuts, courtesy of Atsuo!

We were right near this river! It was very pretty, despite the clouds.

And a cute little group shot to end the epic meal.

After the barbecue, we drove another 40 minutes out to an onsen, which was absolutely GORGEOUS. I didn't take any pictures there, since I didn't want to interrupt the times of the other guests, but Dai was able to get us to take one more group shot using his cell phone. I have shamelessly stolen that picture from his Twitter so I could repost it here.

And one last group shot to close out the day!

All in all, it was a really awesome weekend trip! I used the last few days to recover a bit -- I had homework and sleep to catch up on -- so I hope you all can forgive me for a picture-heavy, light on commentary entry.

This week includes more tests, my first meeting for individual voice work with one of the more experienced choir members, a reception for the recipients of the Bridging Scholarship (a great scholarship for studying abroad in Japan -- if you're considering going abroad, then definitely take a look at this scholarship) on Saturday morning/afternoon, and then shopping (where I'm actually going to BUY something instead of just look around and turn into an indecisive mess) in Harajuku on Sunday. With luck, I'll post again soon with a wrap-up of my week and some observations about my experiences I haven't been able to share yet!