There’s construction being done around the entire Eifukucho Station area, but I was pretty impressed with what they’re doing with it. The scaffolding has artistic designs on it that also double as advertisements for the new building under construction, and the detour was lined with children’s art from local elementary schools. Even the worst ones are better than anything I could do!

Here is a fresh fruit and veggie stand near one of the exits, and also there are two of me in this picture and I hadn’t noticed at first.

The surrounding area is pretty well-stocked. Lots of restaurants, big drug stores, convenience stores… you’d have it pretty easy out this way.

This particular coffee house was really cute. The sole worker inside was a dapper older gentleman in a sharp bow-tie.

I really liked the lines this building created and how it utilized space with its arch designs and small bricks and zigzag metal staircase and… actually, I don’t know what I’m talking about. I just thought this looked cool.

Though I do not often find myself in need of buying flowers, I thoroughly enjoy walking by flower shops.

This machine says Hojicha, a type of tea, but I’m not really sure what it does. Oh well! Sort of looks like a giant shaved ice machine.

All of a sudden, we made a left turn and here was a large, quiet Inari Shrine. Shrines dedicated to Inari are all over Japan, and usually you see random tiny ones along the road peeking out from in between houses or buildings. I haven’t usually seen ones this big.

Inari is usually depicted as a fox.

Off to the side there are very small boxes of shrines dedicated to various figures for different purposes, like Sugawara no Michizane, patron saint of learning.

I hope I’m not boring you!

A building covered in Ivy. I wonder what the Japanese equivalent of the Ivy League would be? The Wisteria League? Cherry League? Haha, this is dumb, sorry.

…wait, I’ve got it! Kudzu League!

If I told you this nice example of traditionally-minded architecture from the 70’s offered lessons in something, what would you guess that would be? Tea ceremony? Calligraphy? Karate?

Answer: Tap Dance! (seriously)

The first floor of the building that the new Oakhouse is in has this bakery called Again, run by an NPO called Madoka. We were merely eying the menu and a woman cheerfully came out and invited us in!

They were making pound cakes at the time, and they explained to us all the different things they make and all the flavors they use. It was very, very pleasant.

Oh SNAP, chocolate chip madeleines fresh from the oven!

We definitely bought some stuff.

Seriously, if you come to live in this area, pay them a visit. You’d be living right above a bakery and I don’t know if I can stress just how cool that is.

After we checked out the house (I’ll show you in the next entry!), you come out of the neighborhood and upon this river.

Take a rest and sit on a snail shell or two, I guess!

A part of what I’m sure is a lovely winding nature path, and the back of our Chinese language correspondent!

Part of the Izumi campus.

So nice to be around all this green! I DO wish there were more trees in the city.

This building was impressive; would be more so if I could have fit the whole thing in the frame and gotten something else for scale.

View from the footbridge.

Okay, so now it’s lunch time! What to eat?
I found this Okinawan restaurant that looked good! …
…but alas, I’m not in the mood today–just had some soki soba two days before!

(That said, Okinawan food is seriously awesome and you should all try some now)

Aww yeah, Turkish kebabs! This place also seems to sell pizza and ice cream, which I will not complain about. But still: it’s extremely hot and need to be chilled from within!

Here’s a supermarket, at which I briefly considered buying and consuming an entire watermelon by myself before I saw that they were 700 yen.

There were some options in this wavy building, like a Wired cafe and an Italian place and I think there was one more? But I was on a budget today.

I eventually settled for some cold udon at a noodle shop nearby, which was pretty much 100% perfect at that moment. 😛

And here’s the station, and Alice again.

Pretty chill town! I’m sure it’s got areas tailored to be a college town but I have yet to discover them. I’ll try to when it cools down!

Next time: Oakhouse Meidaimae!