Trip diary: March 25th, 2007

The stadium is ejaculating

We were planning to go to various places but one look outside made us change our minds. It was raining pretty hard. As a consolation prize, we decided to go to Akihabara (Tokyo's electronics district).

We wandered the neighbourhood poking our noses into little places and looking around. We stumbled across one of my pleasant surprises of the trip, a cafe dedicated to Linux and Open Source.

We also saw a lot of girls dressed up handing out advertising. There is one exit from Akihabara eki where they seem to congregate.

We didn't buy anything. Our price comparisons basically showed everything to be about the same price as back home. Maybe a even a little bit more expensive. Where the Japanese beat us is in colour selection. We have a choice of black or silver for most electronics but the Japanese market is saturated with colours. A common ad that we saw everywhere featured Cameron Diaz shilling cell phones for a company called Softbank. The ads had nothing to do with the price or features of the service. All the ads were about the fact that the phones came in 20 different colours.

After Akihabara, we went to Kappabashi (the kitchen supply neighbourhood). Every single store in the area sells restaurant/kitchen supplies. It was a Sunday so most of the stores were closed but a few were open. Charles bought some wooden slatted things to use as place mats in his new kitchen. I bought a shirt that said “いらしゃいませ！”. That's the phase that all Japanese stores and restaurants scream at you when you walk in the door.

It was late afternoon by this point so we went back to the hotel to do some laundry and chill out. We had been going constantly since we got to Japan so we were starting to get worn out. An evening chilling in front of the TV was what we needed.

Trip diary: March 24th, 2007

You are not using that as a quote of the day!

We woke up at quarter after six and went down for breakfast. The meal was nowhere as noteworthy as dinner was. The only thing that is worth pointing out about the breakfast was it's size. It was minuscule.

After breakfast we went back to the room to chill for a while then went down to check out. The night cost us $200 each but it was worth it. You gotta splurge every now and then.

We took the hotel bus back to the ferry dock but were too early to catch the first ferry. We had to wait about 15 minutes before they let us through the gates. We sat inside the ferry this time. The ride across only takes about 5 minutes so we didn't really have time to relax. We landed and walked back to Miyajimaguchi Eki.

While the ride on the ferry takes no time at all, the ride from Miyajimaguchi Eki to Hiroshima Eki takes a long time. Especially when you are carrying a heavy pack and there is nowhere to sit. Eventually we managed to get some seats.

We got to Hiroshima Eki and had to wait for Reiko. Reiko studied English in Ottawa and attended our Japanese language group. We met up with her and she took us to get some Hiroshima style okinomiyaki. It was really good, but I noticed that in Japan they don't seem to de-vein the shrimp (or it seemed that I was always getting the ones that slipped through quality control) so they had a gritty texture.

Seeing Reiko again was a very odd experience. During her time in Ottawa the two of us became very close. Very close. Seeing her again brought back a lot of feelings that I had thought were buried for good.

After an emotionally conflicted lunch, we said goodbye to Reiko and got on the shinkansen for Tokyo. As has been mentioned before, Charles and I don't fit well into Japanese seats. This time were crammed into a seat with a Japanese guy who promptly fell asleep. We spent the 5 hour train ride trying to come up with ideas for companies that we could start that would get us coming to Japan on a regular basis. We were unable to come up with anything original.

There was a bit of a commotion at one point. At the front of the car we were in was a “multi-purpose room” that people can use for things like nursing babies, or going to is they feel sick. The door to this room was locked and the person inside was not responding to requests from the train staff to open the door. Eventually the conductor allowed them to unlock the door. There was a big crowd gathered at the door for a long time. One of the staff members rushed past carrying a towel. He was trying to hide the fact that there was blood on the towel but I saw it clearly as he walked past. We never did find out exactly what happened.

We got to Tokyo and found the hotel. The neighbourhood it was in was really scuzzy. Lots of old men wandering around aimlessly and a few very stinky homeless people.

We checked in and dropped off our stuff. We then hurried over to Yoyogi Eki. We were going to go see a Shonen Knife concert but when we got to the bar there was a sign up saying 'sold out'. Charles asked if there was any way we could get in, saying things like “But we came all the way from Canada just to see this show!” etc... The doorman told us to come back after the opening act finished and we might be able to get in then.

We wandered around Yoyogi for a while then went to McDonalds to take advantage of a sale they were having. 5 McNuggets for 100yen ($1). they guy behind the counter was a little shocked when we ordered several of them each. A lot of Japanese people were in awe/scared of our appetites.

After killing time at McDonalds we went back to Zher the ZOO (the bar where the concert was happening) and asked about getting in. The doorman said no but then a guy from the band came up and said “These are the guys from Canada? Let them in.” So we managed to get in. The place was insanely packed. It was a very small room (about the same size as my apartment) with about 200 people in it. It was hot and close.

We were the tallest people in the club so we took spots at the back of the room so as to not block everyone's sight. The show started and we noticed that Japanese people have no clue about how to act at a rock concert. They are so very polite and reserved. No screaming and shoving and acting like morons.

We got super lucky in that the bass player who recently left the band when she got married and moved to Los Angles was in town so she was playing with them. That was a treat.

After the show we got onto a very packed Yamanote line train and went back to the hotel and slept.

Trip diary: March 23rd, 2007

Send that cow over. I want to congratulate it.

We woke up early and checked out of the hotel. We made our last use of the Osaka transit system to take the loop line to Osaka-eki then on to Shin-Osaka eki. We boarded the shinkansen to Hiroshima. It took about 90 minutes to get there. We left Hiroshima eki and walked to the peace park. During this phase of the trip I decided to curse Mountain Equipment Co-op for not having backpacks that fit me. Charles was laughing at me and my “large size” backpack.

On the way to the peace park we made a brief stop at Hiroshima-jo. It was around now that I noticed that the bomb was still part of the public consciousness. There were references to it around. Every tourist information plaque mentioned the A-bomb.

After the castle, which we didn't really explore, we made our way to the peace park.

Along the way we saw a car drive past. I noticed that the license plate was simply 7. I giggled and said '7'. Charles said, 'Yeah that was a RX-7'. I said back, 'Didn't you see the license plate?'. 'No'. It was just “7”'. We were making comments on some people's egos. At that moment a RX-8 with the license plate '8' drove past. We shook our heads and laughed.

We found the A-bomb dome and were totally awed by it. We stood and looked at it for a long time. The more I stared at it the more I could feel that I was having to fight back tears. There are a several things that can make most people feel like a bag of shit. Seeing this building up close is one of them. Anyone who is not seriously affected by this needs a hard slap. As of this writing it has been nearly a month since we were there and I am having trouble writing this because of the emotions running around my head. The place messed me up pretty good.

One of the other things I wanted to see in the area was the hypocenter. This is the point where the bomb actually exploded. It was marked by a small stone monument on a back street and not no one seemed to care about it.

We walked through the park and stopped at the cenotaph. It contains what looks like a coffin. What is in the coffin is a list of the people who died in the bombing. While we were there we saw a police officer walk by. He stopped in front of the cenotaph and did a very long and deep bow before moving on.

We sat on a bench and rested for a while. We both commented on how it felt very strange to be there.

After resting we started the trip to Miyajima. To get there we had to go to Miyajimaguchi eki which is pretty far out of town. Getting there was a little convoluted. From where we were we had to walk for about 30 minutes to a streetcar station to catch the streetcar over to Hiroden-nishi-hiroshima eki. From there we took the Hiroden-miyajima line to Miyajimaguchi eki. From there we had to walk down the street to the ferry dock. Along the way we went to 7-11 and got lunch.

We got lucky on the timing of the ferry and got there just as boarding was getting underway. We took seats on the second level outside and sat down to watch. the water go past.

Along the way we saw a lot of floating platforms out in the water. I was puzzling over these for a long time. I figured out what they were over dinner when Charles mentioned that the area is famous for oysters.

We landed on Miyajima and saw the hotel bus waiting for us. We hopped on and sat back for a thrilling ride up the side of a mountain, whipping around hairpin turns on streets only wide enough for one car with long drops just a foot away. The driver had run the route many times and had the bus under perfect control.

When we arrived at the hotel (Miyajima Grand Hotel), a porter met us to take our bags. Did I mention that this was a top of the line super-duper fancy and expensive hotel? offered to carry the bags ourselves but he insisted on taking them. We handed them over and saw him almost collapse under the weight. He put on a brave face and carried them away. When we saw him again during check-in he gave us a dirty look as only a Japanese person can give.

At the checkin counter we were helped by a young lady named Ishii. Her English was nearly perfect. After we signed in and got our key she took us over to a table and showed us a map of the island and all the tourist spots. She explained that while the hotel is very close to the ferry dock the main street is closed to cars so the bus had to take the road up the mountain.

She then took us to our room. She made us tea and fed us apple slices. She explained the rooms amenities. She also took our dinner and breakfast orders. She then looked at us and said she would go get the hotel's biggest yukatta (robes). She grabbed the ones that were already in the room and left. A few minutes later she returned with some larger ones.

She left us then and so we went and sat in the sitting area and looked out the window. From our room we could almost see Itsukushima-jinja (the shrine that is built out over the ocean).

After relaxing for a while we decided to explore the island. On our way out we noticed that the hotel has automatice massage chairs. That was nice. We spent a few minutes getting squeezed and prodded by the chairs before moving on.

Our first stop on our journey of exploration was a fried-things-on-sticks place. Charles got some chicken and seafood things on sticks and I got chicken and corn-on-the-cob (not deep fried). We took in the sights of the area and looked into the small tourist shops. We also saw the worlds largest rice scoop. Charles saw a place that was selling grilled oysters in their shells. He almost broke down and bought some but didn't because oysters featured prominently in our dinner orders.

It was approaching 5 o'clock by this time and the stores were closing up. We started looking more at the tourist spots: the temples and pagodas and such.

We returned to the hotel around 7 and went to the restaurant for dinner. The meals were included in the price of the room.

What followed was probably the most photogenic meal I have ever eaten. It was amazingly beautiful and the taste was devine. Portions were minuscule but there were 13 courses. I have never had a meal that good before. After dinner we retired to the room and I got to use one of those toilets that washes your butt for you. That was... interesting.

We went out again to explore the island by night. The place was not nearly as interesting as during the day. We were both tired and sore at this point so we went back to the hotel to partake of the hot bath.

We grabbed the yukatta that Ishii-san had brought us. Mine barely fit and Charles' didn't fit at all. We went down to the hot bath rooms and got undressed. We then went over to the wash stations and got cleaned up. We then got into the hot bath and sighed with relaxation. At that point all the Japanese people got up and left. I guess they didn't want to be bathing with us hairy, uncouth foreigners.

After the bath we went back to the room and kicked back for a while. We watched TV and caught the episode of 'Eigo do shabera naito' where the female host was leaving the show. We also watched a game show in which contestants had to make randomly selected audience members laugh. We both decided that the Japanese have no clue about good humour. After watching TV for a while we decided to hit the hay.

Trip diary: March 22nd, 2007

When it vibrates think of us.

We had previously made plans to meet Asuka again on this day. Her family lives in Akashi so we made our way over there. She was right on time. The plan for the day was to go to Himeji so we caught the train over there.

Our first stop was Himeji-jo. Charles had been to Himeji-jo before but it was my first time. We explored the grounds a bit. I was wearing a shirt that said “Zetsurin Pawaa!” (which is a little on the rude side in Japanese) so a lot of old women were giving me the evil eye. I would giggle whenever someone gave me a dirty look.

The castle grounds were a little sparse because spring was not in full force yet so the trees were not as full as they could have been. The inside of the castle was as small museum. Climbing the stairs was a chore. The steps were very small and the headroom was almost non existant. Charles and I had to squish occasionally to get through some places.

After Himeji-jo we went for lunch. We started walking down the street hoping to find somewhere to eat. We stumbled across a place called Dreams Cafe, a devision of Study Light Corporation. It was their grand opening that day. We decided to go there for lunch. They were still trying to figure out how everything worked so the service was terrible. Also the food was not anything too great. We were their first foreign guests. Whee!

With the disappointing lunch behind us we caught a bus over to the base of a mountain to get a cable car up to Shoshazen Engyo Ji. Basically this place is a giant temple on top of the maountain. It is divided up into a bunch of smaller buildings, each with it's own purpose. Different shrines dedicated to different things.

From the cable car landing point we had to walk uphill for a long time until we got to the interesting part. There is a bus that does the trip but we decided to walk it.

At one of the buildings we had a surreal moment. We were in the dormitories for student priests and up on the balcony over-looking a courtyard, when we suddenly noticed that the area was totally silent. No wind, no rustling trees, no bird, no animals, no insects. Nothing. We stood for a few moments to listen to the nothing.

We explored the whole complex for a while and then headed back. The walk down was a lot easier than the walk up. The ride down the cable car went by with nothing to say about it. Charles and I have a friend who comes from the area that we were in and he said we should try the peaches because the area is famous for them. In his honour we got some peach juice from a vending machine.

We caught the bus to Himeji eki. There was a mix up with the bus fare but the driver was scared of Charles and I so so he didn't say anything to us but he forced Asuka to pay extra.

From the station we walked down a covered shopping street and went to a Mister Doughnut. MisDo (as the Japanese call it) has a point card system where every time you buy something you get points. You can trade the points in for various things. Free coffee, discounts, small trinkets etc. At the time they had a special on where you could get a vibrating cushion for 150 points. Asuka really wanted one of these cushions. We were poking fun at her for obvious reasons.

We got our doughnuts and by the end we had 50 points to give to her as a starter. She only needed to get 100 more points on her own. She was crushed. That is a lot of doughnuts for a Japanese person to try to eat. The cushions were a limited item. Only 144,00 were available for all of Japan.

We went to a Yoshinoya for dinner and went back to the station to head back to Akashi. We said goodbye to her there and left. She said she wants to visit Ottawa some day but she never gave us her contact information so even if she comes to town, we will never know.

After she left we made a vow not to get so attached to the people we meet again.

We got back to the hotel and got everything packed up ready to go to Hiroshima the next day.

We were both exhausted. I barely had the energy to go to the washroom before going to bed.

Trip diary: March 21st, 2007

Putting lumber in my bag doesn't help.

After Charles' morning caffeine injection we made our way to Shin-Osaka eki to pick up our rail passes and get shinkansen (bullet train) tickets for Kyoto. The guy who helped us was an old hand at the process. He had our passes and tickets ready in no time flat.

When two people get tickets together the normal assumption on the part of the ticket agent is to give seats next to each other. That is not a good thing when both people are the size of Charles and I. Especially with the size of the seats in Japan. We were pressed in tight together.

The ride to Kyoto only takes 15 minutes so we had barely had time to complain about the tight quarters.

Our first stop in Kyoto was the market, Kobo-san. This market is held on the 21st of every month. It has been in operation for about 700 years.

Entering the market we went looking for some food and found a stall selling takoyaki (octopus balls). We had been told to eat takoyaki many times so we each got a 6 pack and sat down to eat. They were good but I felt that bonito flakes were too much.

We went looking for stuff and I bought a kimono for my friend Robin and Charles bought a noren to put over the door to his living room.

After we had seen all the stalls and looked though all the knick-knacks we headed out to find a certain temple that was supposedly having a display of Noh chanting. We went to the area where the temple is and tried to find it. We couldn't find it. Even the locals we asked had never heard of the place. By this time we knew that we had missed the chanting so we went looking for lunch. We tried to find something good that wasn't overly expensive. Unfortunately this was a very touristy area of town so everything was more expensive than normal. We gave up on the search for good and just settled on 'not expensive' and went to KFC. I don't know how it is possible but KFC is even worse in Japan then it is here in Canada.

Our next intended destination in Kyoto was the Taiko Centre. It is a store that sells taiko related stuff. It wasn't very far from where we were so we walked down there. We were greeted by a closed store front. It was a national holiday in Japan that day so most stores were closed and this was no exception. As we stood there cursing our luck we noticed a delivery van making a delivery to the side door of the store. Charles walked over to the people doing the deliver and asked if the store was closed. The answer was affirmative so Charles proceeded to lay it on thick. “We are from Canada and came all this way to come to the store. We can't come back tomorrow because we are leaving.” The woman looked at us and asked what we were looking for. After we told her we just wanted bachi (drum sticks) and such she let us in to look over the merchandise. We bought some bachi and shoes and CDs and such. It was an expensive stop for us.

Our next destination was Otagi Nembutsu Ji. It is not very well known. It has 1200 statues there which are all kinda silly and odd. It's very different from the normal Japanese temple where everything is very serious and sombre.

To get there we had to take a long slow and hot street car ride to the outskirts of town. On the street car there was a guy who kept clapping in front of his mouth. His mouth made the clapping sound really weird. Neither of us could do it right when we tried it. We then had to walk through a bamboo forest and a very up-scale touristy area filled with expensive shops.

The walk was mostly uphill. We came to a place called Nembutsu Ji so we paid 500¥ to get in. The place was just a big grave yard. We were confused. We asked at the ticket gate where Otagi Nembutsuji is and they pointed up the hill.

The steepness of the climb was increasing as we went higher. We were starting to get annoyed at whomever decided that the tops of big hills was a good place to put a temple.

We found the place eventually and went in. There were very few people there. The place is not very well known even among Japanese people (we met some locals who had never heard of the place). We spent the next little while looking at all the statues and exploring the area. We had the place almost to ourselves. There was a family looking around and some people washing the temple but that was it. We took lots of pictures of statues we found interesting or funny.

Eventually we had seen all we needed to see and went out of the temple. There was a bus stop across the street so we went to wait for the bus. A local walked past so we asked him when the bus came and he said it would be there in about 45 minutes. Our feet were killing us but we decided to walk back down to the street car. On our way back we passed a rickshaw with two geishas sitting in the back. Those were the only geishas we saw on the whole trip.

When we got back to Kyoto station we took time to explore the station itself. The building is really cool. It's about 10 stories tall and open concept. We took escalators up to the roof top and looked out over Kyoto. It was a very nice view.

I'm told that Godzilla destroyed this building once. They Japanese are very good at rebuilding after Gozilla related incidents. They have had a lot of practice.

We grabbed dinner at a restaurant in the underground mall at the station. It was OK but not very remarkable. The most interesting part was getting the panties shot. It was taken surreptitiously while the waitress was taking our orders.

We went down to Osaka and went straight to the hotel. Our feet were telling us that they planned to make our lives miserable if we persisted with this silly walking idea of ours.

We slept soundly that night.

Trip diary: March 20th, 2007

Was that her pet duck?

I woke up early as usual. Charles woke up at about 7 and after he had had a few coffees we went out to find somewhere to have breakfast. We went down to Tennoji eki and went looking for breakfast places.

We settled on going to Mos Burger. When we walked up to the counter there was a frantic discussion amongst the staff about who would have to deal with the strange looking foreigners. Eventually one girl lost out and came over to serve us. We got some ham sandwich things (with mayonnaise!) and sat down to watch the rush hours crowds run through the station.

That kept us amused for a while.

After breakfast we returned to the hotel. On the way we turned down a small covered street and found ourselves in a pedestrian shopping mall. Kinda like Namba, but less trendy and more scuzzy.

We were supposed to meet Asuka, a girl Charles met on the plane ride over from Vancouver, at 11 but she was late. Then there was a mix up as to what exit she should use at Shinimamiya eki. Eventually we hooked up and went to go down to DenDen Town, Osaka's electronics district. We wandered in and out of stores looking at prices and were sorely disappointed.

We went for lunch at a “things on a stick” type restaurant near the base of the Osaka tower. Apparently this place is quite famous for not allowing double dipping. Asuka got a little bit drunk and started telling us all about her life and how it is seriously messed up. We coined a term that day: The Asuka Syndrome. It means “a Japanese person who wants out of the Japanese life”.

We spent a long time in the restaurant. We talked for a lot longer than any of us planned.

Eventually we left the restaurant and made our way over to Kobe to meet a friend of Asuka's. There was some confusion with the trains and we were late getting to Kobe. The friend was waiting for us even though Auska called the wrong number to say we would be late.

The friend's name was Saho. She was a very quiet and shy girl who didn't say much over the course of the evening. Apparently she is a Opera singer. At the time she was staring in Carmen. We tried to convince her to sing for us but she didn't.

Asuka took us to a Brazilian restaurant for dinner. The meal was good. Lots of meat.

After dinner we went out to admire the Kobe skyline by night. It was amazingly beautiful. I decided right then that Kobe was the best city we had been to. I am still awed by that sight.

At about 10 o'clock we made our way back to the train station so we Charles and I could go back to Osaka. We arranged to meet Asuka again on Thursday to go to Himeji. We invited Saho to come with us but she couldn't come because she was teaching opera that day.

We returned to the hotel and went to bed.

Trip diary: March 19th, 2007

Put it on a stick and I will eat it.

Woke up at 4 in the morning and couldn't fall back asleep so I played with my PSP. Charles got up at about 7 and left to go to see the sumo fights. I took a leisurely shower and wrote the journal entry for the previous day.

At around 9 I made my way out of the hotel with every intention of getting lost in Osaka so I would have to figure out the city. I took the subway to Nipponbashi eki which is connected to a huge underground shopping mall. I wandered the shopping mall and took an exit that I didn't know from my previous visits to the mall.

I found myself in a parking lot. Turning left out of the parking lot and taking a few random turns brought me to a major intersection. I turned left again and started walking.

I was in a business section. Lots of tall buildings everywhere. I think I was the cause of quite a few discussions around the water cooler. I haven't mentioned yet that I had decided to wear my kilt that day. Under normal circumstances Japanese people stare at me but in a very polite way. They try don't want me to know that they are staring and whispering to each other. With the kilt, all pretence of politeness went out the window. They openly stared at me. They pointed and giggled.

Walking along this major street I saw a sign saying “Osaka Station” with an arrow pointing straight ahead. On the train trips to and from Kobe the day before we spotted a building that we dubbed 'Funky building' that was near Osaka eki. We were thinking of going to get a close up view of it anyway so I kept walking in that direction.

About an hour after I first saw a sign for the station I made it there. Osaka eki is huge and complex. You can get lost very easily. I had been here on my last trip to Japan so I thought I remembered how to get around. I was mistaken. The station has changed quite a bit in the past 5 years. I got lost and then found something I remembered but everything else around it had changed. I then got lost again and the process would start over.

Eventually I made my way out the north exit of the station and saw Funky Building. It was still a couple of blocks away so I looked for a way to get to it. Between me and it was a large industrial section that I had to take the long way around. The whole neighbourhood had a bit of a blue collar feel to it. It was very different feel from the big business feel on the south side of the station.

Keeping 'Funky Building' in sight I weaved my way towards it. It looked like it was really close but no matter how much I walked it never seemed to get any closer until suddenly I was right there.

Funky Building's real name is Umeda Sky Building. Trivia point: this building was one of the buildings you could get in SimCity 3000.

I didn't feel like going up to the observation deck because by this time I was regretting my decision to wear the kilt. My inner thighs were chaffing like mad and I was tired. The combination of pain and sleep deprivation was making me cranky.

It was about 11:30 by this time and I was getting hungry so I thought I would get lunch at a Yoshinoya I passed on my way to Osaka eki. I walked back to Osaka eki and made my way through without any problems this time.

I walked back down the major street until I saw the Yoshinoya. It was at this point that I learned a major axiom of life in Japan. “Never ever go for lunch at around lunch time”. Yoshinoya was packed. And there was a line up. Every food place had a line in front of it. I kept walking and passed the enterence for an underground shopping mall. I went in and found the area of the mall with all the restaurants. There were people everywhere. I went out and kept walking down the street.

By this time I had adopted the 'sumo walk' to keep my thighs from getting any worse. The sumo walk is the walk I noticed all the sumo guy doing. It involves holding your feet further apart than is normal. The stance makes you walk a little bit more with your hips and a little less with your knees.

At around 11:50 I passed a Mos Burger that wasn't overly crowded. I studied the menu for a little while and decided on a chicken burger. The only seats available at that moment were at a table that had tall stools around it. I took a stool and sat down. I then realized that I was probably flashing all the people on the other side of the restaurant. I tried to close my legs but the chaffing was so great that I couldn't do that without pain so I stuffed the fabric of the kilt down between my legs and made do.

I sat at the restaurant for a while hoping that the pain would recede a little. It didn't. I reluctantly got up and started making my way back down the street. I passed a subway entrance so I decided to take the subway back to the hotel.

I went in to the station and looked at the subway map. Stroke of luck! The line that goes right in front of the hotel stopped at this station. I bought a ticket for the ride and walked through the gate. I needed to take the Midosuji line to Dobutsuenmae eki, which has an entrance directly in front of the hotel. There were signs that said “Midosuji line this way” so I followed them. They led me down a long corridor and some stairs to a platform, but it was not the platform I wanted. At the far end of the platform there was another sign saying “this way!” so I went that way. Up a flight of stairs and another long hallway and down some more stairs and I was at another platform. Still not the one I wanted. At the far end of the plat form was another sign saying “just a little farther”. I was just about ready to punch someone but I kept on. Some more stairs and another long corridor then some more stairs got me to the platform I wanted, just in time to see the train pull out of the station. Whee!

I waited a few minutes for the next train to come and boarded it with all haste in an attempt to get a seat. All the seats in the car were full so I had to stand.

At Dobutsuenmae eki I managed to exit via the wrong exit. Not a big deal. Just meant a little bit more walking.

I got in the hotel and bought a drink from the lobby vending machine. I went up to the room and put the cold bottle between my legs to cool the burning caused by the chafing. I turned on the TV and flipped through the channels. I found a cool show for kids to teach chemistry called “Super Chemistry”.

I soon fell asleep out of shear exhaustion. Next thing I know it is late at night and Charles came back to the hotel. We chatted for a little bit and I fell back asleep.

Trip diary: March 18th, 2007

The sumo guys are laughing at me.

Didn't sleep well. The futons at the hotel were very thin and it was little better than sleeping on the floor. Because I sleep on my side I had bruises on my hips. And the pillow was very thin as well. And I was fighting the affects of jet lag. I woke up at 5:00 and lay in bed staring at the ceiling for a while. Eventually I decided to go down to the lobby so I could walk around and not disturb Charles. The same guy who was working the night before at 11 was setting things up. He must have worked the night shift.

Charles came down at about 6 and thought I was all ready to go so was surprised that I was still wearing my slippers and hadn't brushed my teeth or anything. I went back up to the room and got ready. When I came back down I saw that Charles had found the complimentary coffee and was drinking it like it was ambrosia.

We went to Tennoji eki (for those not versed in Japanese, eki means 'station') and caught the Osaka loop line to Osaka-jo (jo = castle). We wandered around the castle grounds for a while but everything was still closed as it was so early in the morning.

We went back to the Namba area because the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium is near there and Charles wanted to buy his ticket for the next day's sumo fights. We found the arena and went in so he could buy his ticket but they didn't start selling next day's tickets until 10 o'clock so we had an hour to kill. We went to Namba Parks (a shopping mall) and sat on a bench until 10. Charles got his ticket (way up in the nose bleed section).

We decided to explore the same areas that we did last night with the added benefit of daylight. The area looked a lot dingier in the day. We found an electronics department store and went in to compare prices with the prices back home. In general we found the prices in Ottawa were lower. Usually $10 less on most things. There goes that myth.

By this time Charles was feeling the affects of only having one coffee that morning so we went to a Mister Doughnut. While eating doughnuts we decided to go to Kobe, which is really close to Osaka. We hopped on an express train at Osaka eki and sat back for the ride. Our primary purpose for going to Kobe was to visit Ikuta shrine. Supposedly it is one of the oldest shrines in Japan (nearly 1700 years old). The shrine is very nice. It's a popular place for girls to go to pray for boyfriends. This tradition is fairly recent. Two big Japanese celebrities got married at that shrine so it has now become a place associated with romance in Japanese people's minds. To quote Asuka (you will meet her later) with regard to this practice:“Japanese people are easily led. A celebrity does something and the next day everyone else has to do the same thing.”

We decided to see the Kobe Earthquake Memorial at the harbour so we walked in that direction. Along the way we walked into China Town. There was a public demonstration of Chinese dancing going on so we watched that for a little while. Us being the size we are, no one behind us could see anything so only disinterested school kids who were not there by choice stood behind us.

We continued on our way after two dances. Lunch was some deep fried things on sticks bought from street vendors and drinks purchased from a vending machine.

The memorial is a harbour pier that was destroyed in the quake that happened in 1995. The pier was never repaired. Instead it was left exactly as it was after the quake hit.

After viewing the memorial we walked around the area and found a swap meet. We didn't find anything of interest.

By this time our feet were killing us so we decided to take a ferry back to Osaka. Looking at our map we noticed that the ferry going where we wanted was near the station where we arrived in Kobe so we went back to the station and started walking south to find the ferry dock.

After walking for 20 minutes and complaining endlessly about our feet we looked at the map again. The map said that we had only walked about 1/3 of the way to the ferry. We also noticed that there is a train that goes from the station to the dock. After cursing our own stupidity for a while we decided to stuff the ferry and walked back to the station to take the train back to Osaka.

We decided to do a Lawson dinner. Lawson is a convenience store chain in Japan. They sell various pre-made meals there. We went back to Tennoji eki and started walking because there was a Lawson between the hotel and the station. We forgot that the Lawson is actually across the street from the station that is on the other side of the hotel. We could have saved our feet an extra 15 minutes of walking by simply remembering that fact. Heading back to the hotel from the store we discovered that there is a soup kitchen next door to the hotel that all the homeless people in the area go to. Lots of smelly insane people were wandering around.

Once back in the hotel we watched a Japanese game show that I forget the name of while we ate. Soon after we went to sleep.

Trip diary: March 16th and 17th, 2007

The Departure

Woke up at 6:00, checked email and fed the cats. It hadn't quite soaked in that this was the day.

I knew that I couldn't sit around until it was time to leave so I went back to bed to cuddle the cats a bit more. Normally, I am not excessively emotional but my cats are one soft spot for me. I was tearing up as I said good-bye to them. I always miss Esme the most when I am separated from the cats for a long time. She is special to me.

I left the apartment at around 8:00 and stopped in at Subway for breakfast.

Arrived at the airport at around 9:00 and stood in line at the NWA counter for 40 minutes. The people who run the NWA counter are also the people who do the boarding for the NWA flights so they are constantly running back and forth between check-in and departures.

Got into the security area and was randomly selected for a search. It wasn't a problem but the guy doing it should think of buying me flowers next time he intends to get that personal.

The wait in the departures lounge was long, boring and uncomfortable. Whoever designs airport chairs must have a strange idea of what comfortable is.

The flight to Detroit was boring (seeing a pattern develop?). The only interesting part of the flight was when the flight attendant, Jess, accidentally rubbed her butt across my arm. Polyester pants never felt so good.

We landed in Detroit on time.

In the terminal waiting for the flight to Osaka there was a 'Welcome to Detroit' announcement on a TV. The accent on the guy doing the announcement made it sound vaguely threatening. 'Enjoy your stay or your kneecaps will be broken'.

I only had a 20 minutes wait (just enough time to go pee and write in my journal for half a page) before they announced they were starting boarding.

I was in a seat on the right-hand side of the plane. At first I was seated next to a hyperactive woman who kept getting up to go see friends in other parts of the plane. It wouldn't have bothered me except I had the aisle seat. Early on she decided to switch to a vacant seat near her friends so I was left with three seats to myself. That was freaking sweet.

I have trouble falling asleep on planes. I can never get comfortable. Even with three seats to stretch out across. There is always a lump in the wrong spot and the seat handles are too pointy. I only managed to doze off for about an hour of the whole 15 hour flight. That served only to re-enforce just how tired I was at that point.

The movies they showed were 'The Prestige', 'Flushed Away' and 'Man of the Year'. The first was blah, Flushed was cool (yeah Aardman!) and MotY had a few good jokes but was too over done for my tastes.

When the pilot announced we were beginning our decent into Kansai Airport felt like singing.

It is pretty scary to look out the window when landing in Kansai. the airport is an artificial island and the runways go right to the edge of the water. Watching through the window all you see is water getting closer and closer all the time, then just as it looks like you are about to do a water landing the land appears and about half a second later the plane hits the runway.

Going through security I was again selected for a random search. Two random searches in the trip already didn't fill me with hope that going home would be easy. The guy who frisked me this time was much more gentle than the guy in Canada. He asked permission before he grabbed my privates.

Got through security with no more incidents and met Charles in the arrivals area. We caught the train to the city. It was delayed because of an 'accident'. For those who don't know that is often code speak for someone committing suicide by jumping in front of a train.

We had to take a local train so it was a long ride, about 90 minutes. On the way, a drunk old guy told me I was handsome. But that was more than made up for by a cute girl who kept smiling at me whenever our eyes met. Unfortunately she got off the train before I could talk to her.

We got to the hotel and checked in. The room was small and a bit Spartan but passable. The door to the room was ludicrously short, we both had to duck to get in the room. The bathroom was yellow. Going to the wash room usually involved a few verses of 'We all live in a yellow submarine'.

We went out to wander around Namba (the night-life area of Osaka) for a couple of hours. There were people everywhere. It was starting to sink in that I was in Japan again. Dinner was had at Yoshinoya - a Japanese fast food chain with food that is actually good. I had curry and rice and Charles had gyuudon (beef and rice in a bowl). For fast food, it was awesome.

At around 10 the shops started closing up and the crowds started dispersing so we went back to the hotel and crashed.

< img src="flicker set" >

Here is my Flickr photo set of pictures from my trip.

I took many more but this subset are the ones I like most.

EOF

I'm home.

It's good to sleep in my own bed again. And to hold the kitties. I missed them a lot even though they acted as if I had never left.

I now have about 600 photos to go through to pick the good ones to show to friends.

PS for those of you who didn't get it the Hachiko story was posted on April 1st.

Hachiko->getStolen();

I just read in the paper this morning that Hachiko (wikipedia link), the statue of the loyal dog that is one of the major social points of Tokyo was stolen last night. Police suspect that it was stolen by metal theives to be melted down and sold in China. I saw the statue a few days ago so I was lucky. It is probably gone for good.

I also saw an article about the company that makes the brand of cat food I buy has found rat poison in some of their food. Fortunately it is in the cuts-and-gravy style food. I don`t use that type of food so my kitties should be safe.

EOL

This is it. I leave Japan tomorrow. My flight is at 4 in the afternoon and I get in at 11 at Ottawa. It will be about 20 hours of traveling/layover. It will be trying. I almost went bonkers with boredom on the trip over here.

The last two days have been really nice. Meeting old friends who moved here. Yesterday we met Krista and today we met Yuki. Yuki brought a bunch of her friends with her who all used to live in Ottawa. There were 7 of us in total and we wandered around Shinjuku park and then went to an izakiya (half way between a bar and a restaurant).

We are both very tired and our feet are killing us. When I get home I am going to give my cats a big hug and then go to bed.

need--; need++;

Some things Japan needs less of:

• pachinko places
• stairs

Some things Japan needs more of:

• garbage cans
• benches

UPDATE:
One more thing Japan needs less of: 20 year old guys with BonJovi hair-cuts.

learnNewThings();

A few things I have learned from being in Japan for the past week and a half:

• There are manga dedicated strictly to teaching golf techniques.
• Women in kimonos are Hot. That is hot with a capital h.
• While generally more polite then their North American counterparts, Japanese homeless people are just as insane and smelly.
• 3 days in Tokyo is enough to turn your snot black from breathing all the crap in the air.
  

UPDATE: One more thing added to the list

• Walking for twelve hours straight is enough to give one a case of crotch rot that would rival a jew lost in the desert.

$shaking = false;

Some of you may have heard about the earthquake here in Japan and are wondering if I am OK. I`m fine. It happened in a totally different part of Japan than I am in. No need to worry.

//Downtime

I finally have some time to sit and write in this journal.

Japan is amazing. Things are happening everywhere. There is always something to do. I thought I would give quick reviews of the cities we have been to so far.

Osaka: pretty cool, but we didn`t actually spend much time in the city itself. We kept going to places nearby. Comparing it to Tokyo is sort of like comparing Ottawa to Montreal (for you Canadians in the audience). Be sure to turn off the beaten path every now and then.

Kobe: holy crap this city is awesome! The harbor front at night is absolutely gorgeous! I think Kobe is my favourite city so far on this trip.

Kyoto: not much to say about Kyoto. If you like temples and walking uphill, go to Kyoto.

Himeji: half way between a small town and a city. The castle is cool, but if you ever find yourself in Himeji, do yourself a favour and go visit shoshazan-enkyo Temple. Really great place, and the only place I have ever experienced absolute, complete and total silence. Not even the rain was making any noise when it hit the ground.

Miyajima: beautiful and slow paced. Nice for a mid-vacation recharge but you can do everything there is to do in 1 or 2 days. We stayed in a top of the line hotel so we had a very comfortable time.

Tokyo: can be summed up in two words: FUTURE TOWN!

catch (Exception too_tired_to_write);

Sorry I haven't kept you all abrest of what is happening here. I spent the last few days away from an internet connection.

I'm really tired so this will probably end up being in point form.

The A-bomb dome in Hiroshima is incredibly powerful. I almost started crying while looking at it. For those who don't know it is the ruins of a building that was almost directly under the blast that destroyed Hiroshima but somehow wasn't completely destroyed. It is now preserved as a monument.

Miyajima is awesome. I highly recomend it to anyone looking to spend a few days in luxury.

Shonen Knife are really fun to see in concert. I'll upload some pictures when I get home.

if ($busy) {dontWrite();}

Sorry for the infrequent postings to this blog, but I have just been too busy and tired and these keyboards annoy me.

Just about to leave Osaka to go to Hiroshima/Miyajima. This week has been busy as all get out. Between fighting jetlag and walking everywhere I am tired as can be. yesterday we climbed a mountain. I dont want to that again soon.

I'm sitting in the lobby of the hotel waiting for Charles to come down so we can check out and go to catch the shinkansen (bullet train) down to Hiroshima.

We decided that from now on Charles' name will be Tom and I will be Seleck. I'm now 27 instead of 31 and he is 29.

That's about all I have time for right now.

I miss my cats.

Hello all! I`ve made it. I am in the hotel lobby in Osaka. It`s 6 in the morning right now. Charles is still asleep upstairs. I didn`t sleep well at all. It`s a pain in the butt to type on this computer. The Japanese keyboard layout is different from what I am used to so I am reduced to hunt and peck. Aggrivating this situation, many of the keys have had their letters worn off so I keep hitting s instead of d. And the space bar doesn`t always work.

I am keeping a hand written diary so when I get back I will see if I have the energy to transcribe it. Yesterday`s exploits took up 4 pages. I am not going to keep up that pace for the whole trip I think.

My back hurts from sitting on this stool so I will log off now.

Ciao!

ftp>put japan_trip_places.kmz

For those of you who use Google Earth, here is a kmz file with markers for the various places that we are thinking of visiting. Obviously we wont get to all of them but we'll try. There are also a few places that are not on the map. For example, I want to go to Kabuki-cho in Tokyo. Supposedly it was one of the visual inspirations for the movie Bladerunner.

My markers are blue and Charles' are green. Hotels are marked with a little man in a bed.

meet(Places::Osaka);

Last night, Charles drove me home from Taiko class. As he pulled up in front of my apartment we looked at each other and said, "See you in Osaka". It felt awesome to say that. It really made things feel a bit firmer. I will be there soon.

$time = one_year();

Another post with nothing to do with Japan.

My boss called everyone into the board room today for an impromptu meeting. We all thought were were going to get yelled at. But it turns out that today was my 1 year anniversary with the company. They had a cake (with a Batman theme) and everything.

One whole year. Wow.

Buffer overflow

I'm packed. You know how the saying goes, "Go light, come back heavy"? I've thrown that sage advice out the window. I don't think I could go much heavier than I am. After packing enough clothes to last for just over a week, my tripod and my kilt and sporran my back pack is full. To the brim. I won't have space for many souvenirs.

I still have space in the smaller day pack but that is at a premium. After I pack a few books and such I will not have much room left. Hopefully it will be OK.

In other news...

ARGH! IT'S LESS THAN A WEEK! EEEEEEE!!!!!

if (found($group)) {gotoMeetUp();}

Charles found a Meetup in Tokyo that will be doing a hanami viewing party on our last day in Japan so we both signed up for it. Should be fun.

grep -i "excitement_level"

As the clock ticks down, it is starting to register in my brain that I will soon be back in Japan. Just over two weeks to go. Every day the trip looms a little bigger in my mind. It gets a little tiny bit harder to think of anything else. I also keep going over the list of things I need to do before I go.

• Finish cleaning my apartment so that Devin doesn't run away screaming


• Buy cat food and litter so the kitties will have something to eat and poop in while I am away


• Pack, making sure not to miss anything (maybe I should make a list of everything that must come with me).


• Buy any extra things that I need


• Cuddle my kitties extra so they know I love them lots


• Transfer money from my savings account to the chequeing account so I can access it from ATMs


• Get out some cash and have it converted to Yen so I have some cash on arrival


• Laundry so I have clean clothes to take with me


• Get Devin over so I can explain the "take care of the kitties" routine


• And probably lots of other things I am forgetting
  

So really I guess this post turned into a simple check list for myself. Sorry for taking up your time.

if (in_slums($hotel)) {explore();}

When people think of Tokyo they think of areas like Shinjuku, Shibuya, Ginza, etc. The glittering, neon-lit areas of affluence. They don't think about the slums. Me being me, I decided to research the downtrodden areas of Tokyo so I could do some exploring. As much as I like the glitz and fast pace of the more famous areas, I am equally drawn to the areas where people are not as well off.

Turns out that the hotel we selected is pretty much smack dab in the middle of one of these areas. The part of town is called Sanya. It has historically been the worst part of town.

In olden times (1600s or so) it was believed that all the evil spirits entered the city via that area. The poor and downtrodden who were considered below contempt were forced to live there. All the slaughter houses and tanneries were located in that area because that was work that proper Buddhists weren't allowed to do so they forced the people with no other options to do their dirty work.

One of the cities most prolific public execution grounds was in the area. The condemned were executed via one or more of the following: Boiling, Burning, Crucifixion, Decapitation, Sawing and Waist-cutting. Fun! The bodies (approximately 200,000 of them) were buried in a graveyard right near Minami-Senju station. Apparently this graveyard is little known and not taken care of. It's considered a bit of a blight on Tokyo's past.

This looks like it might be the most interesting part of my trip.

$Cat->be_cute();

This post has nothing whatsoever to do with Japan. I'm becoming a stereotypical blogger and posting stupid YouTube links. Please help me.

$hotel->MakeReservation($date);

Yesterday after Japanese class and the associated breakfast Charles and I went over to his place and started choosing hotels. We already had a few in mind but we hadn't made any reservations. We were starting to cut it pretty close. We are aiming for hanami season which is a major time for Japanese people to take vacations. Hence the hotels are filling up fast.

Over the past week or so I have been taking the hotels we were considering and placing placemarks in Google Earth where they are along with all the things on our respective "shit-lists" (Charles and I are maintaining independent lists of stuff we want to do while in Japan and they have been dubbed the shit-lists).

Google Earth let us see exactly where the hotels were in relation to what we wanted to do. This is actually pretty hard to do. GE doesn't seem to want to do translations of addresses from English to Japanese (don't blame it), and some hotels were not listing their addresses in Japanese, only English. So then we would have to look at the map on the hotel's website to try to figure out where it is. Those maps are only sort of helpful. They are not even remotely to scale. North as an orientation is optional and they only show major streets. What they really are is a map of local landmarks. "Turn left at the police station and go until you get to a 7-11. Turn right there and walk for 5 minutes." Not exactly helpful when looking at satellite images. Some hotels were much harder to find than others.

We discarded selections that were just too far away. There was one hotel that looked amazing. Absolutely beautiful and not too expensive but there was only one thing on the lists that was even remotely close. So we took it out of the running.

Also we checked on the websites of the hotels. Some listed the availability of rooms. Some of our top picks were already full up.

After we settled on some that were fairly close to various things and not too expensive and not full up we started emailing them to ask for reservations. The first we emailed got back to us almost right away saying they were full up for the week we wanted. Strike it from the list!

Eventually we sent emails to three different hotels (one in Osaka, one in Miyajima and one in Tokyo). That settled we went downstairs and ordered some Chinese food.

We were both in the mood for general tso's chicken so we got two orders of that and some soup (won-ton for me, hot and sour for Charles) and rice. The different versions of general tso's chicken are very diverse. Some are crunchy and some are not. Some are really hot some are not. Some are very saucy and some have just enough sauce to say there is sauce on there. This version was somewhere in the middle.

While we ate we watched a Japanese drama on TV. It had the girl who stared in Shall We Dansu? (at least I'm pretty sure it was her. How many other ballet dancer/actresses with ears like that are there in Japan?) as a ballet dancer who's star is rapidly rising having to put everything in her life on hold when her father is in an accident and left an invalid. On the whole it was pretty standard fare for a Japanese drama.

Afterwards, I headed home and as soon as I got in the door I checked my email. All three hotels had responded saying they had space and confirmed our reservations. Awesomeness.

Damn, this has been a rambling, pointless post. All I really wanted to do was post links to the hotels we had reserved. So here they are:

Osaka (March 17th through March 23rd):
Hotel Chuo

Miyajima (March 23th through March 24):
Miyajima Grand Hotel Arimoto
(The Japanese version of the page is much nicer looking than the English page, so I am linking there)

Tokyo (March 24th through April 1st):
Aizuya Inn

INSERT INTO trip (departure) VALUES ('2007-03-16 12:20:00');

The tickets are bought. The rail passes are bought. Someone is taking care of my kitties. All that's left is to survive the wait until March 16th. EEEEEE!!!! I'm all excited.

Now that I think about it, all that's left is to make reservations at the hotels.

$money->buyTickets($cost);

A few months ago I announced to my friends that I had decided to go to Japan to try to catch the hanami season. I guess that got Charles thinking. My plan is to go in March and it turns out that that is almost exactly when the Osaka Basho (the Osaka sumo tournament) takes place. He decided that he would like to go at the same time to catch the tournament. We are going to together. Cool. We are going to start with Osaka, spend a week there and the surrounding cities then move on to Tokyo and the surrounding area. I think Charles will be a good travel companion. He knows that we wont have to spend all our time together. We can spend some days hanging out and other days doing our own things.

So anyway, Charles has been getting airline quotes. The best deal for both of us is to go on separate flights. Charles, because he is using his air miles points, has to fly with Air Canada. I am flying with Northwest, through Detroit. My flight is about $300 less than flying out of Vancouver. Charles will be arriving in Kansai airport a few hours before me and will wait for me there.

I recently came into some money that I didn't expect to actually have (payback of money owed me from years ago by my ex). That will cover most of the cost of my ticket. That plus my Christmas money and the money the dojo payed me back for buying Christmas gifts for the sensei completely covers the flight with about $100 left over which will go to buying the JR rail pass.

This trip is coming together nicely. I can't wait.