My IS Project

I can't believe that I have only a week left! I'll be blogging about my thoughts regarding the passing of time here in Hakodate soon enough, but before I do that, I wanted to show you guys my IS (Independent Study) project. What I did was pretty simple - I visited some famous sights in Hakodate, and painted the scenery that I saw there. It usually takes me about 2-3 hours to finish the painting on the spot, but there was one that I painted off a photo and was a pain in the *** to do. Guess which one it is. I used mostly watercolor, although my first drawing was done in watercolor pencil, a medium that's actually much more difficult to control than it first seems. I also wrote some simple descriptions of the scenes in Japanese with a brush pen - the result is a failed attempt at calligraphy. Oh well.

During my 発表 (presentation) session, I talked a little about the places I went to and the methods I used. I actually got a pretty enthusiastic reaction from the host parents and classmates that attended, which definitely gave my ego a boost. So here are the pictures, five in total (I uploaded two pictures for my last blog, I think, but this is the whole thing):

ハリストス正教会
Hakodate Orthodox Church. Located in Motomachi (where HIF is), the Russian Orthodox Church was one of Hakodate's oldest buildings and is among its most famous. From this spot you can see the hourglass shape of the city of Hakodate - there's the sea on both sides and Hakodate-yama is to the back of us.

函館の坂
Hakodate is famous for its scenic slopes at the foot of Mount Hakodate. These slopes command beautiful views of the harbor. This picture was drawn at Motoi-saka (基坂), a very pretty slope next to Motomachi Park. This was my first painting done in watercolor!

立待岬
Tachimachi Point. Lying to the southwest of Hakodate-yama, Tachimachi Point stands at one end of the peninsula on which Hakodate lies, and directly faces Aomori Prefecture at the northernmost part of Honshu. The scenery here is spectacular, but unfortunately I did not come close to conveying it.

ベイエリア
The Bay Area. The Bay Area of Hakodate is the city's vibrant heart. The red brick warehouses here (赤レンガ倉庫) are historical buildings that signify the first opening up and commercialization of the port of Hakodate. They are now mostly utilized as souvenir shops.

五稜郭
Goryokaku. Perhaps Hakodate's most famous spot, the star-shaped fort was constructed at the end of the Tokugawa Shogunate period and witnessed the last battle of the Boshin War, which ushered in the Meiji Era. The drawing was done on the top of Goryokaku Tower, a building right next to the historical site of the fort that offers spectacular views of the city.

During the speech contest on Friday, I was going to the bathroom when I ran into Li-san's host mom and her daughter, who was about five or six years old. They were both at my presentation a few days earlier, and recognized me immediately. The little girl pointed her finger at me and cried: "テイさん絵がうまい！," which means "Tei-san is great at drawing," and I couldn't help but feel like this on the inside:

Well, that's all about my IS project. One more post coming up!