Shrine Sale Shopping!

“Isn’t it funny, that we have a car and yet don’t have a license to drive it even though we are both 26 years old?

…What I said to Nick as we were making two trips on foot back and forth from the commissary and Nex with our arms loaded full of groceries. Being in a new country also means getting a new drivers license for that country. It is frustrating not having a vehicle and having to walk everywhere! Needless to say, Nick and I are getting our exercise!

Today Nick and I went with 3 of my friends to our first “Shrine Sale!” I am not sure if this is exactly what it is called, but it’s what my friends call it…nonetheless, it was quite an experience! The shrine sale happens once a month. It is basically a street sale where Japanese trade old things, kind of like a garage sale on the street!

It was all a bit overwhelming! There was everything imaginable on sale at the shrine fair, from vintage kimonos to antique Japanese furniture. Due to the fact that Nick and I do not have a house yet, I tried my best to only look and not buy. However, I know exactly what I want when we do finally get our permanent residence! There were beautiful scrolls, fans and trinkets that were hard to resist. Nick and I did walk away with a few purchases that we couldn’t live without. We got an amazing old suitcase that my friend helped us bargain down to 2,000 Yen (aka $20). Nick was intrigued by the postcards and bought a few of those as well. The china was abundant, and there were teakettles everywhere. Oddly enough, Nick was the one to purchase our third piece of merchandise, a black cast iron teakettle.

Love, love, love the suitcase!!!

After a few hours of looking through antiques, we all got really hungry. The girls, Nick and I found a yummy little sushi restaurant and had an interesting lunch. I forgot to get a picture, but lets just say I don’t know what half of the things we ate even were, nonetheless, it was all very delicious!

After lunch, all of the heat (the weather in Japan right now is hot and humid…very humid), fish and lack of sleep finally got to me and I made a good decision to not continue shopping with my girlfriends and go home to take a nap instead. We had planned to go to Yokohama to shop, as in shop for clothes…I was really excited about this, but had to take a rain check. (I know shocker...me not go shopping! So you can imagine how sick I must have felt in order to decide NOT to go with the girls!?!)