GSO retreat, Part one: Saga

The weekend after my trip to Fukuoka there was a trip with GSO, Global Support Office for international students, on the 29th of Febuary through the 2nd of March with the other international students. There were 41 of us international students on the trip, so needless to say we took up a lot of room where ever we went and we had a tour bus all to ourselves.

We first headed to Saga. It is a little prefecture in the northern part of Kyushu right in between the Fukuoka and Nagasaki prefectures. We visited the Saga castle which was recently reconstructed about four years ago. In side were also Hina Matsuri dolls which I will talk about later.

Hey guys! It's a hall way.

The castle had exhibits and displays showing how it was reconstructed and it's durability. They sure knew how to made things last back in the day, the castles are built to with stand earth quakes and typhoon. Just don't light a match any where close, they are rather flammable being made mostly out of wood.

Lots of paper and wood....
This castle met is end in flames originally.
Burning seems to be a technique when conquering your foe here.

A video game in a museum.....?

This exhibit I thought was pretty amazing. I have seen several of these sort of "game" exhibits here in Japan. It is a full virtual model of the castle which you can walk through with a joystick and press buttons to open doors. All they are missing is ninjas and samurai and you would have a full on video game. In a museum in Kagoshima you could play as a young student in ancient Japan. Pretty interesting I think.

Oncer we left the castle we made our way down town to see the hina matsuri dolls. They are dolls that represent the imperial court and are displayed at this time of year. Hina matsuri is on the third of March and is also know and girls day. They are very expensive to buy so most sets that you see are old privet collections or owned by a company. Now heres some pictures~

These are actually in the Saga castle.


These dolls depict an old Japanese folk tale of the princess found in bamboo. (also in Saga castle)


And these are my favorite because they are made of flowers~

Once we finished seeing the hina matsuri dolls we headed down to Nagasaki where we were to stay the night before continuing on our adventure. Once we got there we ate a traditional Japanese style meal and headed over to the China town. I believe Nakasaki is famouse for it's China town and population. For one thing I see a lot of Chinese objects and symbols on Nagasaki omiyage, as well as a few exhibits showing the festivals they have there. It makes since, as it is the area closest to China.

In the morning we ate another Japanese style meal, and headed over to the peace park. Which shall be talked about in the next installment of my blog~