TOKYO !

Konnichiwa !

We have officially reached the end of our Japanese Jamboree Journey, as of midnight, Unit 8 would have left Japan :(

But never fret, we have ended our adventure with an amazing 4 days in Japan's capital, Tokyo. Here's what we have done !

This is at the Earthquake centre, we got to experience a magnitude 7 earthquake.

In the evening we made our way across Tokyo to a huge fireworks display, despite the bridge in front of us, they still looked incredible.

On Sunday we went up the second tallest building in the world, the Tokyo Skytree. 

After Skytree we explored the local area, Asakusa, where we discovered a 1000 yen Kimono shop ....

We visited another Japanese temple in Asakusa and found some Buddha statues.

On Monday we had the chance to explore a different part of Tokyo before a UKC organised event 'Tokyo Live'. We went to the busiest crossing in the world, in Shibuya, and took an obligatory selfie. 

We then went to Tokyo live and finally got to watch some Sumo wrestling. 

One of the most interesting parts of the exhibition was the Tuna Dissection; three talented men chopping up a fresh Tuna to music. 

After Tokyo live we travelled across the city to Shinjuku, one of the best places for night life in Tokyo. We found loads of arcades, filled with business men, and had dinner at a tiny sushi bar. 

Today we visited the famous Tsukiji fish market, unfortunately we didn't see any of the renowned tuna selling, but we did wonder round the general market.

In the afternoon we tried to visit the Imperial Palace, but it was shut, so we headed off to a place called Harajuku. Harajuku was predominantly unusual fashion shops, but we spent a decent amount of time in the four floor 100 yen shop.

We've also had a laugh at the airport waiting for our flight to Doha, have a look here: 

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10100248958389961&id=277004230&ref=m_notif&notif_t=video_tag&actorid=277004230

So, the last ever Jamboree quote of the day from Adam, 'We come from Bucks and we don't give two flips' 

That's it for now, we're off to Heathrow !

Day 7, 8 &9: Science and Community

Hi Everyone 

The last couple of days have been so busy as usual, so here is a couple of pictures of what we've been doing.

On Tuesday morning, before we went to the Culture tent, the boys took part in a football competition, in which Tabi and I were fantastic cheerleaders.

We then spent a couple of hours in the Culture tent, decorating our ID badges with Japanese gold stickers and doing Crochet in the Finland section.

In the evening we prepared a meal for a Japanese unit from Gifu, the place we stayed for HoHo, however, they forgot .... So we just had a fancy unit meal including caramelised oranges and pears.

On Wednesday we caught the bus early to go to Mine city, a city in Yamaguchu prefecture for the community day. We were greeted by the mayor of the city and watched a drumming and karate performance by local school children.

We then went to another school and watched a Koto ( a Japanese instrument ) performance and then had a go ourselves. 

We also had a go at traditional Japanese dancing before heading to a cave.

On Thursday we went to the beach ! We played dodgebee, volley ball, beach flag and swam in the sea. The whole unit really enjoyed the beach day I think, it was a refreshing break from the heat of the Jamboree site.

So, a final quote from Adam ' I don't like it, I love it love it love it'

PS Alex would like to publicise his sunburn. 'Do you even sunburn'

Day 5&6: Hiroshima and camp life

It's hot, very hot. As in 40 degrees hot, but still we're having an amazing time. 

On Friday we visited Hiroshima peace memorial museum. To get there we had to get the bus at 6 am, which for me, meant getting up at 4.15 to collect breakfast. 

The whole day was focused around peace and hope, with a visit to the peace  gardens, some readings of poems and delivering our peace cranes to the children's peace memorial. 

The picture above was constructed entirely out of peace cranes; inspired by the story of a young Japanese girl who made over 1000 peace cranes whilst sick with 'A-Bomb leukaemia' in the 50s. 

 

On the way back Alex made a new friend....

On Saturday , we were meant to be doing the Nature section of the Jamboree programme, however it was cancelled because of the scorching weather. This left us with a free day to explore the site more.

Behind Amber and I is the whole jamboree site: a small tent city. 

Today was culture day, we got the chance to visit the other units around the site and try some of their foods.

 

I sort of forgot to take many photos but the food was generally good  and the people were incredibly friendly, it was days like that this that we decided made scouting pretty cool.

Apologies for the lack of posts but we haven't stopped since we arrived, and the heat means everything takes longer, plus the wifi doesn't quite reach our site in the far corner of the Jamboree site.

And in the words of Adam Parkes 'who knew raving to Pokemon was a thing'