At the Kiyosumi Gardens, we just walked around the perimeter of the huge ponds, where we saw lots of (ugly) hungry koi and sunbathing turtles. Osada sensei went to buy a packet of fish food (or more specifically, pieces of bread) for us to feed the fishes. It felt rather like a nature trail to me, reminded me of MacRitchie Reservoir!

At the end of the trip, a couple of us who didn't have lessons in the third period went for lunch with the teachers. After walking for quite a while - which, I may add, is not an ideal activity for feet in heels - we finally sat down to lunch. I have to say that while waiting to start eating, we have the habit of looking at others' food:

One thing I love about Japan is the myriad species of flowers that I can see at the roadside. In Singapore, roses are something you only see in florists, or in a bouquet someone is clutching, not growing from someone's garden, or from a plot of soil by the pavement. And there are so many different kinds of flowers sprouting everywhere, it's almost like Tokyo is one huge garden! At home we only see the flowers that are hardy enough to thrive in our tropical climate (read: bougainvillae), and too bad for us, it's hot all-year round, so the types of flowers we get to see never change. I absolutely love the colours here. :) Another reason why I like a country with four seasons!

I'd barely been in my room for 10 minutes after the Japanese class outing and lunch before I got called out to meet someone who's here from Singapore. I groaned inwardly when my dreams of plopping into bed, enjoying the aircon and giving my aching feet a break was smashed into smithereens. I'd thought we were meeting later, for maybe two or three hours to hang out a bit and have dinner together! Frankly, we don't know each other very well, having only been in one Japanese class together for one semester, sitting at opposite ends of the classroom at that. Outside of that, we only took the bus together to go to the NUS Open House together once, at his request, and met up once for 5 minutes for him to pass me something to bring to Japan. Considering we aren't the closest of friends, I was rather surprised he wanted to meet me when he came here, and at the same time a little reluctant to drag myself out into the heat. However, since he was already in the area, I had no choice but to slip into a pair of flats and go out to meet him.

Since he didn't have any place in mind to go, and no suggestions, I suggested someplace I wanted to check out - Ueno. The park itself wasn't very spectacular, and I didn't realise that I'd actually been there before a few months ago in winter at night. Being there again in summer in the day was quite different. Instead of having icy cold hands I had warm ones, and instead of shivering I was perspiring. Most of the ducks disappeared from the pond, and the main "ducks" I saw were those that were actually boats being paddled around by couples/friends.

Then I found one on the grass! It reminded me that I'd seen ducks on snow, ducks on water, but maybe not ducks on grass. Also, I'm suddenly struck by the thought that... aren't ducks supposed to be yellow? That's the colour they always were in our story books, and when I think ducks, I think yellow. Maybe that's some kind of stereotype I have, just like how I'd always thought cows were supposed to be black and white, until I went to Malaysia and saw my first cow which was all brown. What a disappointment!

There were also some street performers at Ueno Park, and this not-so-young man dressed youngly in floral print attire and heart-shaped glasses was a balloon artiste, of sorts. I was rather impresed by the minnie mouse he blew and twisted into shape in a mere five minutes or even less! That aside, he was doing some other things and telling jokes simultaneously, and I thought it was quite funny because I could actually understand the jokes. Understanding them made me happy too. :)