We had snow in mountains in Kyoto. From our office at University we can normally see mountains called Mt. Hiei (Hieizan) clearly. The sky is not clear today but we could see some snow on the mountains for the first time this year. In this year it is quite a warm winter and we had a longer autumn than usual, but these days it is cold in Japan, including the Kansai area where Kyoto prefecture is. In Kyoto city, we have several snowy days a year, but the amount of snow is much less than Hokkaido or the northern parts of Japan. In those areas, they have heavy snow on the roads every day during winter. When I was a student, I used to go skiing in those area, and would stay there for two to three months in winter at a skier's lodge to work and practice skiing almost every year. Today's snow in Kyoto reminds me of the old memory of my active period of life, which I can not do now.
It was good fun to be away from home and to stay in a snowy area; to put myself into nature at a lodge surrounded by deep snow and mountains. I really felt that I was free and also had unique experience even though it was a hard time. I woke up at 5 am to prepare the breakfast for customers who were staying at that lodge. Then my duty as a staff member was cleaning rooms, making beds and removing snow on the roads in front of the lodge. After lunch, I could have free time to ski for three to four hours. For the first few weeks, I really enjoyed skiing to develop my skills of skiing, but I used to get tired of skiing because I used to the same slopes, saw the same scenery and had the same things to do: going up by lift to the top of the mountain and going down on skis twenty times a day almost everyday. I was, however, interested in meeting new people who stayed in the lodge and we could ski together. After skiing I worked for the lodge until night preparing the customers' dinner and there was a party sometimes.
There are many ski fields and resorts across Japan, mainly in Hokkaido and in the northern part of Japan. When the Japanese yen is weak against foreign currency, some resorts in Hokkaido have a lot of travellers from Australia who come to ski and some travellers from different Asian countries because Hokkaido has good snow called powder snow, nice Japanese food, seafood and vegetables, and hot springs called "Onsen". Now the Japanese yen is quite strong against the US dollar and other currencies but if you have a chance to come to Japan, I recommend a ski resort in Japan for you to relax and you can have a Japanese experience such a many Japanese are enjoying in their vacation.
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