Any Colour You Like

Dave is a little bit obsessed so we missioned it out to Tokyo ice rink today to have a nose around and see if there is any local ice hockey scene. It turns out that there probably isnt, but we thought we would have a skate around anyway – if just to get out of the rain and the cold(!). It costs 1800yen including skate rental which is a massive twelve quid. And we didnt stay very long because they had about twenty pro figure skaters intimidating us in the middle with their tripple lutz combos and goodness knows what else. Even worse, they were mostly about seven. And me and dave like to think we are not the most terrible skaters in the world…

But tonight was Sushi again and in Tokyo you cannot go wrong.?It was ammmazing and sweet and tasty and lush and I cannot bear the thought of going home and leaving it behind.?Tomorrow, provided it is not typhooning too hard, will be disneyland in order to go out with a bang. Cant wait!

See you all Wednesday night x

Yesterday was an interesting mix. We decided to do a walking tour of Shinjuku tower block district but didn’t realise that tower blocks are somewhat closed on Saturdays. We therefore tragically missed out on the toilet museum(!), the Pentax museum and the tokyo metropolitan government offices.

Worlds largest grandfather clock =)

We did on the other hand get to see a world record breaking 29m tall grandfather clock, weaseled our way up to the 51st floor of another skyscraper and had an exquisite sandwich in a very expensive deli.

After that was the Japanese sword museam which was very cool. They tried their best to explain the metalurgy to me but I think some extra research may be needed. There is certainly some eutectic martensitic equilibrium stuff going on, along with a soft springy core and a hard outer blade. Did I mention that as well as a zen garden I will be requiring a katana sword for my future house?

Then there was Roppongi – a legendary district in Tokyo we had heard so much about. Mostly bad stuff obviously. But it had to be sampled for ourselves. So the first bar was Gas Panic and we were their first happy hour customers which made the bar staff very happy. Dave came to suspect it was a gay bar, but with no one else about we had no way of telling. We made a hasty exit none the less.

Next up was Propoganda which does not share anything in common with Friday nights at the academy in brizzle. Instead it was a quite busy pretty cool cocktail bar on the second floor. From there we nipped over to Kingston Jamaca to finish the night.

This morning we stumbled across some weird dance/marshal arts festival parade thingy in Harajuku. Nice costumes, funny slippers and massive flags. Everyone also seemed to have some Japanese version of castenets on the go. I am now sitting in Tokyo’s pizza express as I thought it was my duty do a comparasson with the one in corn street Bristol. For my pizza conneseur friend: the dough is more spongy than back home, and there is no theo favourita. The pizzas also seem to be smaller so no real competition from overseas!

Hello, back in Tokyo for five days or so. Celebrated by going to an awesome music bar in electric city and buying some random gifts. Then went to Tower Records and listened to Japan-Pop. You should check out the Radwimps, they are very cool =)

It has been quite an eventful period since last post. The aquarium in Osaka was great – I haven’t been to an aquarium in about ten years so it was a timely visit. And fortunately Osaka has the biggest fish tank in the world so I got to see a pair of whale sharks up close. And they are massive! There were also japaneese river otters which were cool, a sloth which was random, some massive freaky crabs, and some large dumb fish with no fins on their sides only on their heads and tummies.

At 10pm we wandered up north in Osaka to the Umeda sky building. The best way to describe it is two boxes of cerial with an aerobie frizbee across the top. From the front it looks like a modern 176m tall arc d’triumph but the viewing gallery is a ring on the top. Anyhow, it costs 700¥ to go up any you get your money’s worth form the scaryness of the elevator ride. This is somewhat perched on the outside of the building with a bit to much of an expanse of glass and nothingness for comfort. The top is awesome though. Photos will come soon but the skyline is stunning and the city (like all japanese cities we have seen) seems to go on forever.

Hiroshima A-Bomb Dome

We weren’t really sure where to go for our last day of ‘free’ rail travel on our rail cards. But somewhat spontaneously we jumped on a train to Hiroshima. We therefore got some more good contrast to the holiday. The a-bomb dome is a building that was at the epicentre of the blast and was therefore not completely flattened. It has been preserved as a monument to Hiroshima’s continuing aim for world peace and it is extremely poignient amongst the high rise modern buildings. Likewise the peace park with it’s flame of peace that will burn until all nuclear weapons have been decomissioned. The most moving though is the museam. It takes you through what Hiroshima was like before the bomb and the reasons it was chosen as the first city to suffer nuclear attack. There are harrowing displays of the distruction, death, injury and suffering the bomb caused and you frequently don’t want to read any more but are somehow compelled to. And it finishes by discussing the current state if nuclear proliferation and what can be done. It will really open your eyes and everyone should go.

Go Carp!

But after that we really needed some light relief, and what better way that cheering along to Japans most popular sport. Well we could hardly not go and see the Hiroshima Carp baseball team squash the Yakult Swallows 7-6 at the Mazda stadium. The whole town was going and we were kind of sweped along. But it was cool and everyone was terribly enthusiastic. I thought it was quite exciting at the beginning and end but there was a bit of a dull patch in the middle. The game was 4 hours long after all… But it was good cause we ate noodles and drank beer and even tried to copy some of the supporter chants. Not really sure how that went but we should get points for effort on the Japaneese speaking, no??

Hello. I’m in a Mac store and surprisingly they are much the same over here as anywhere else. We are just off to visit the aquarium now which should be sweet. Osaka castle isn’t much to write home about but the city is crazy and the neon makes it brighter at night than during the day. Went to ‘Penguin Bar’ yesterday which served expensive white russians to a back drop of every Britney Spears single in existence (on infinite loop). Quite a night out! Hiroshima tomorrow and then back to Tokyo on the Shinkansen.

Our first task in the ancient capital of Nara was to find some breakfast. So like the sensible people we are we went to the tourist information to get a map and ask where the cafes are. We had the ‘cafe street’ enthusiastically pointed out to us and off we went…

Unfortunately it took us more than half an hour of walking to find even one cafe (!) but the croisants were good. We then headed out to the park area to meet the local sacred deer. And there were many, and they were everywhere.

Todji temple was staggering; it is the worlds largest wooden building and it had to ne because it housed a 750,000kg bronze Buddha statue coated in 150kg of gold leaf. From there you can wander through the park to the shrine with 3000 lanterns leading up to it.

Next stop from Nara was and is Osaka. And believe me I have heard nothing but great things. Can’t tell you much cause I have only been here thirty seconds, but I did notice one important difference from the rest of Japan. In the railway stations the people stand on the right hand side instead of the left. I would like to think that that displays a rebellious streak that will become evident over the next three days =)

Today was a zen oriented day with the added bonus of a guided tour of the imperial palace in the morning. The palace won in terms of scale, but the most beautiful buildings and gardens we visited were the zen inspired creations. The zen gardens with their bamboo groves, secret walkways, maple trees, moss gardens, pebble seas and hidden meanings were far more inspiring than the earlier shogun gardens. The golden pavillion shimmering over the lake of reflection was one of the most amazing sights I have ever seen. I won’t say more because you will have to wait for the photos =)

As an extra travellers tip: if you leave the imperial gardens by the north east exit your nose will lead you to a stupendously good bakery. You would be foolish to miss it!

See you in Nara

1) Politeness is a virtue
Even when you walk into a fast food restaurant and order a burger you get a formal bow, a greeting, an extra polite ‘aragato gozaimas’, and another bow in acknowledgement of your thanks. An not just from the member of staff serving you but from all of the members of staff. Nothing is better for the self esteem and feeling of importance.

2) The Japanese have a sense of humour
They have a coffee house chain called Excelsio Cafe. The logo is circular and pretty familiar, the colours are blue and green like a somewhat famous international competitor, and even the font is a direct copy of starbucks. The best bit is everything is a bit cheaper and a bit better than starbucks.

3) Conveyor belt sushi is cool
I discovered that this evening by getting far too excited and eating far too much. It was still pretty cheap and good value though. Not quite gormet sushi, but tasty, fast paced, competitive and fun.

4) One bonus observation
The Japanese are very bad at cycling. Watch out if you are walking down the cycle path!

It turns out that Kyoto is a lot bigger than it’s maps would have you believe. We thought we were walking a mere 4 blocks to the Toji wooden pagoda but it ended up taking well over an hour in the muggy heat. It was worth it though. The halls of wooden statues covered in gold leaf were amazing. Each one was carved out of a single block of wood and the biggest had to be over 3m in diameter. We also visited Nijo castle and walked around it’s beautiful gardens. I thoroughly intend to create the same effect with my own garden at some point in the future. The actual rooms in the castle palace were rather strange. There were many and they were huge, but all were empty save tatami mats on the floors and beautiful paintings on the sliding walls. The best bit was the design of the floor boards in the hallways. Each plank was suspended on a metal cylinder in order to make a sqeaking noise whenever any unexpected visitors walk by…

Well I wanted to be adventureous so I ordered something weird from the menu. Weird in this case turned out to be cold soba noodles in a cold curry soup with cold fried tofu. And not just room temperature – actually actively chilled. Umm the flavours were good but somehow the whole thing was just a bit too weird.

Anyhow, we went for sake in a random bar on the second floor of a strange back street afterwards. There was only space for ten people and the bar tender was very friendly and wanted to impress us by playing ‘english’ music. This turned out to be tv show themes from the seventies on 45 vinyl…