Day 1 – Arrivals
We went out to a restaurant with a bunch of Pete’s co-workers, where I had a pizza and sashimi and Japanese beer. After a while I got quite tired and we headed back to Pete’s place. After a long and busy day, it was great to finally get there and relax, I think it took me about 2 minutes to fall completely asleep.
Day 2 – Exploring Tokyo
The keep and moat at the imperial palace
In the morning we went to “mister donut” and bombed around Tokyo where Pete finished some items for work. After all that, we went to the Imperial Palace of Tokyo and visited the Imperial Gardens. They were really nice, but I was disappointed that we didn’t get explore much of the palace because it is blocked off to the general public. I found it quite interesting that there was no imposing main entrance like in European fortresses.
After that we visited the center of Information Technology for Tokyo, an area called Akihabara. There you can buy pretty much any sort of electrical equipment. In fact, you can probably build a computer from scratch just from the individual parts… and I mean the very smallest parts. It’s kind of similar to a cross between an Arab medina and a Radio Shack. There was an entire 6+ story building devoted to video games, each gaming system had its own floor. Plus, they had cellular phones that we could only dream on in North America, and they were practically giving them away. All in all it was a pretty cool place.
After that we decided to get a movie, so we headed back to Pete’s place and rented “Remember the Titans”. Once we realized that we had rented “Return of the Titans”, we turned it off and looked at pictures of previous trips that we had taken. It was quite odd to look at the pictures that we had taken from atop the World Trade Centers, it just seemed like it was from a completely different era.
The streets of Akihabara
Then one of Pete’s roommate’s girlfriends came over to visit, and she made us fresh sushi and sashimi was great. I’m not usually too huge on seafood, but that went down properly which was wonderful. I really wish that I could learn to make rice as tasty as the rice that she made, but it seems to be beyond me.
Anyhow, we are leaving in the morning, are flying out to Fukuoka.
Day 3 – Traveling In the nick of time
Today was a very exciting and full day. We slept in a little bit later than expected because of our late night sushi, and so we were in quite a rush to make it to the airport. We made it just in the nick of time, and took our good fortune as a sign that our trip will be a successful one. We made the train, subway, and monorail within seconds of their departure each time, and arrived at the airport only 20 minutes before the flight departed. A very helpful woman skipped us past the lines and we raced to the gates. Within a few moments of getting on the airplane it took off. Looking back, we realized that if we had missed any one of our connections we would have missed our flight.
Anyhow, we arrived at Fukuoka after a comfortable ride in the near-empty Boeing 777. The flight was less turbulent then the flight into Tokyo. After lunch we immediately left by bus for the city of Nagasaki. It took about 3 hours or so, and was quite comfortable. The land between Fukuoka and Nagasaki was incredibly green and luscious, with a lot of farms and forests.
Once in Nagasaki we checked into our hostel and went out on the town. We went up to a hill that overlooked the city and saw a gorgeous view of the city at night. To get there we took one of the trolleys and run across the city and then walked to the tram, which brought us to the summit. It was amazing how few people were out and about, we were one of the few travelers out that way.
After that, we headed back to the hostel, but not before stopping to get some Ramen noodles at some hole-in-the-wall restaurant. It was yummy. I had never tried it before and didn’t know the customs, so I made several faux pas while there, including trying to put mustard in the Ramen, and unscrewing the lid of the pepper shaker. Heh. Anyhow, it was very good and fairly cheap.
Hrm, I’m quite enjoying my stay so far. I find Japanese culture to be quite astounding. It is very similar to home in a lot of ways, much moreso that I expected. The vast majority of brands are in English, despite the fact that very few people actually speak it. Also, there are a lot of American brands here. McDonalds and 7-11 seem especially prevalent, though I’ve seen AM-PM, Wendy’s, HMV, and others as well.
I am also impressed with the friendliness of the Japanese people whenever we go around. When I was by myself and looking very confused there was no shortage of people offering to help me find my way. And they have helped us by drawing maps to places, and other cool things. Plus, I think the general level of trust here is really cool. People just leave things around unlocked and unguarded, and just expect them not to be stolen. For example, bicycles are left unlocked in bus stations while the people go to work. Somehow, things do remain unstolen, much to my surprise.
Tomorrow we plan to see more of Nagasaki and then headed way up to Hiroshima, so it should be another busy day. Like there should be any other kind of day on a trip such as this! =)
Day 4 – A-Bomb Remembrances
We woke up bright and early and headed out into the town of Nagasaki to see the sights. We took the tram to the epicenter of the Atomic Bomb explosion there. Did I mention how the tram system worked? We looked at the city guide for how to use the tram, and we realized that we broke every one of the four rules, completely by accident of course! Regardless, it’s a really neat system that runs across the town, and is cheap and effective.
We visited the Atomic Bomb epicenter, which was a very sobering experience. It is really amazing how quickly and remarkably the area has returned to commercial and residential use. There is a nice “peace park” there commemorating the lives lost in the explosions, and are dedicated to the elimination of nuclear weapons worldwide.
Nagasaki blast hypocenter
We wandered around Nagasaki for the rest of the morning, and then took the train back to Hakata (Fukuoka). After an Indian curry lunch we took the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Hiroshima, back on Honshu, the main island of Japan. It took us 2 hours to cover an amazing amount of distance! However, it was quite expensive.
Atomic Dome in Hiroshima
In Hiroshima, we located our hostel and dropped off our stuff and went exploring the city. We saw the “Carp Castle” and saw the epicenter of the Hiroshima Atomic Bomb blast. There they have a partially destroyed dome structure as a monument to the hundreds of thousands of lives lost there. We wandered the downtown city at night, and ate Chinese noodles at an excellent restaurant.
Tomorrow we will explore more of the city and a famous island nearby, and will probably stay in the city one more night.
Day 5 – We only had to run *once*
Okay, the morning brought an early change of plans. Despite the fact we indicated we wanted two nights, we somehow managed to lose our hostel and thus we again moved onto the next town. Thankfully that fit well with our existing plans, but it certainly was a good shock to begin the day.
Before leaving, in the morning we visited the peace memorial exhibit at Hiroshima. Like in Nagasaki it was again a very sobering experience, it was a testimony to the cause of banning nuclear weapons worldwide. They had exhibits from survivors, and showed the effects that the atomic blast had on the town. It was incredibly devastating, and it was something else to actually see it in person.
We took the tram to the Miyajima station, and from there took the short ferry to Miyajima Island. Of course we made the ferry by frantically running to catch it (by ~2 minutes) before it ferried off. Anyhow Miyajima is an island of religious importance, and contains some beautiful shrines and temples. We explored many of them, and much of the island. Then we climbed most of the way up the mountain before realizing that we were in danger of missing our ferry, so we headed back. Along the way we met an interesting American woman whose husband worked for Morgan Stanley in Tokyo and Hong Kong, and swapped stories. Some people lead really interesting lives!
Torii at ma Island
Anyhow, after more exploring we headed back to our new hostel by Miyajima station and discovered that there is nothing to do near there. So mostly on a whim we took the train to Iwakuni to go see a famous bridge there. After dinner at MOS Burger (A Japanese hamburger chain) we took the bus to the bridge (the stop with kanji that looks like a lamppost, an octopus, and a really scary dude). Somewhat to our surprise, the bridge was actually really cool, and actually is quite famous. It is a wooden bridge that had some historical importance. But it was very pretty to look at, and was oddly surrounded by moths. That’s right, we were swarmed by moths. Ah…
Bridge at Iwakuni
Returning to the hostel, we played scrabble for a while on my computer and then talked with a fellow traveler who is from Paris. Gilles is an interesting fellow, he’s an accountant who manages to take a lot of trips around the world. When I hear the list of places that this guy has been to, it really makes me want to do more traveling around the world.
Anyhow, tomorrow we are heading east to Okayama. Should be another adventure.
Day 6 – Rain, rain, go away
Today has been yet another full and interesting day. We took the early train out of town, and again we barely made it. This time we had planned ahead and arrived 10 minutes early, but for some reason the schedules were confused and it was, you guessed it, 10 minutes early. After some scrambling in our heavy packs we made the train and all was well.
Old Town at Kurashiki
On the advice of Gilles we headed first to the town of Kurashiki. We arrived in the midst of a torrential downpour. Okay, I admit it’s nothing like the rainstorms we get at home, but it was raining pretty hard nonetheless. I bought a $5 (?) umbrella and we explored the quaint “old town” section of the city, which was quite pretty.
However, it was difficult to truly enjoy it under the rain conditions, so we took shelter in a restaurant. Because all of the menu items were only listed in Kanji, we made a guess at our lunch, and it was a delicious Udon and Tempura as we expected. It was delicious, however I declined to eat the head of the prawn as I remain a chicken at heart.
After lunch we headed for Okayama as planned and headed towards the hostel. The directions given to us by the tourist office were, well, rather poor to put it mildly. We wandered about aimlessly for quite some time until we ran into Jay, a traveler from Australia, who was also headed for the same hostel. Eventually we managed to find the exact location of the hostel, and all was fine (again).
We dropped off our bags and headed into town. Okayama is famous for it’s Crow “Black” Castle (which will contrast with the white castle we will see tomorrow at Himeji) and we walked up and saw it from up close, which was quite stunning. The castle was a reproduction of the original that was destroyed in WWII like many of the famous buildings of the
era.
Okayama’s Black Castle
After that we visited the city garden (”One of the top 3 gardens in Japan”) and it was breathtaking to say the least. Unfortunately we were again stuck in rain, which made it difficult to truly appreciate the full beauty, but it was a great sight indeed. After that we had Italian food for dinner (believe it or not, but Okayama is somehow famous for their Italian food). Then we headed for an Internet café for some much-needed Internet surfing.
Tomorrow we are headed to Himeji, then onto Kobe for the evening. If all goes as planned we will be staying in a capsule hotel tomorrow, which should be quite interesting.
Day 7 – A beautiful, sunny, bewildering day
Well, to begin: I’m writing this entry from the depths of my miniature capsule at my ultra-super-deluxe capsule hotel and spa. To explain how this comes about, I’ll have to start at the beginning like usual.
We woke up in Okayama and moved onto Himeji as planned. Jay (our Australian friend) accompanied us there. We emerged from the hostel to find a gorgeous and sunny day outside, a remarkable change from the night previous. This made the day’s trip much more enjoyable all by itself!
Himeji’s White Castle
Well, we dropped off our bags at the Himeji hostel (after much complication) and made our way to the ‘White’ Castle, which was an original construction (one of the few that survived WWII). It was a really neat looking castle, and we went inside and took the full tour of the large building complex. After much walking we grabbed some lunch in the town at some random joint.
After that we headed towards Kobe, as previously planned. Peter has an acquaintance in Kobe, Ian, and we arranged to meet him in the evening. After a short and uneventful train ride we arrived at the station again explored the town. One of Pete’s friends suggested that we try to find the panda and giraffe at ‘Harborland’ – that’s all she said. Not knowing anything better to do in Kobe we decided that this would be a decent course of action. So we took the subway to that part of town and began exploring.
Sure enough, we found a metal giraffe and a inflatable panda and were certain this was it. However, on our way back we discovered the true reference that she was making. At the carnival section of Harbourland they had a mechanical children’s toy that one could ride. They don’t have wheels but instead lumber about like animals. I had quite a lot of silly fun riding the giant panda. If only they would have these devices all over the place.
moto panda
After that, we decided to explore the city until Ian was done work. We wandered up to the expensive part of the city and saw some of the nicer houses (not to mention some swank looking cars). We met Ian outside of the synagogue in Kobe, and he showed us a couple of the sites that we had missed in our travels. After that he took us to a favorite Thai restaurant, and we had quite a good feast. Then Jay took off back to Okayama.
We went up to a neat viewpoint in the city with Ian and his girlfriend, and got a cool look of the city at night. It’s quite gorgeous! At this particular viewpoint, the locals go up there in couples and attach locks to the bars, symbolizing their love. It seems kind of quaint, but there are a lot of locks attached to the bars there!
Anyhow, after a long walk back into town we arrived at our capsule hotel and spa. It wasn’t much more expensive than any of the others, and it included free roam of the spa. Have you ever been to a Japanese spa? We hadn’t either, and had no idea how it all worked. It was quite interesting to see how it all worked actually. Regardless, it was very relaxing, especially after a full day of walking and the poor nights sleep the day before. But I’m not going to go into much detail about the Spa.
Capsules at the super-deluxe Kobe Sauna and Spa
Anyhow, after that I returned to my little capsule. If you are asking yourself ‘what’s a capsule hotel?’ you need to use your imagination a bit. Imagine a room full of plastic containers. Each container is about 6×2x4 feet large, and contains a mattress/pillow/sheets, a tv with headphones, and a light. That’s about it. And that’s where this entry was written.
Tomorrow, we are off to Kyoto, which should be really interesting, I’m quite looking forward to that.
Day 8 – On the road (again)
Today was of course another extremely busy day. Breakfast in Kobe, Lunch in Kyoto, and Dinner in Osaka. It was also a very long day, lasting from 7AM until much past midnight.
We woke up in our capsules to the sounds of hundreds of buzzing alarms. It’s difficult to sleep in when that happens, as I’m sure you’d expect. All in all, the capsule hotel thing was a positive experience, and quite fun. I’m glad we shelled out the extra money for that experience.
After breakfast we headed out towards Kyoto, where we found our hostel and dropped our bags off. Like usual we had some difficulty finding the exact location of the hostel (you’d be surprised how hard it is without proper street names) but a helpful local man helped us find it (also like usual).
We took the subway to visit the area of Arashiyama, an area in the hills of Kyoto famous for its temples and shrines. We rented bikes for a couple hundred yen, and explored the area in detail. We were looking for a particular temple that was very famous, but somehow we missed it despite biking up a decent sized mountain. However, we saw a plethora of amazing and gorgeous sites in the area.
After that, we headed back towards central Kyoto and took a train to Osaka to meet Pete’s friend Amy. Because we arrived early we explored the downtown Osaka area a bit. It was interesting how quickly the area turned from a innocent shopping district to an area where, well, yeah. Anyhow, we went out for dinner with her and her co-workers, where they got me to try some Japanese foods that normally I would never dare to eat. Would you believe that I ate half of a pregnant fish? I choose not to believe it either. All in all it was a good experience.
At the top of a really big mountain in Arashiyama
We raced back to our hostel, and after a very long detour we arrived much past midnight. Hence, this journal is actually written the next morning because I was exhausted physically and mentally. Later.
Day 9 – People experiences
Today was a little bit slower than the day before. We woke up in the hostel and met some other people traveling from all over the place, which was really neat. I know I said it before, but one of the best parts of traveling is meeting people like this. Our hostel in Kyoto is mostly a dump, but since the other people staying here are cool, I’m enjoying it quite a bit.
Pagoda by Sanjusangendo temple
In the morning we headed off to see the Sanjusangendo temple that contains the 1000 gold Buddha statues. They looked quite nice and it was beautiful. They say it took over 100 years to carve all of the statues. After that we headed to a very famous temple in Kyoto called Kiyomizudera, famous for its large wooden veranda. We walked around it a bit and saw it very several angles, it was truly amazing to look at.
The, we ate green tea ice cream. It tastes about what you would expect — like green tea, with ice cream.
Green tea ice cream tastes like it says
At this point I was extremely sore and tired from looking at temples and shrines, so I headed to the train station and did some people watching all day. It was quite interesting to see how the different people interacted. Japan is really a wonderful country!
After that we grabbed a quick Chinese food dinner, and headed back to the hostel. There we met back up with some of the people we met earlier and went out for drinks at a English pub, ‘The Pig and Whistle’. Natalie (Britain), Ai (Japan), Nicolas (France), and me and Pete went out, and had a great time. For some reason the place seemed infested with Canadians, as the table to the right of me had a woman from Vancouver and two people from Saskatoon (of all places).
Ai, Pete, Nicolas, and Natalie at ‘The Pig & Whistle’ pub
After staying out much too late we headed back to the hostel, but it in the meantime it had started to rain. Of course, I had only worn a t-shirt because when I left it was quite warm out. We walked back a long ways in the rain, but it was still pretty fun. We stayed up for a while and talked in the hostel, it’s one of the best experiences of the trip thus far.
Day 10 – A very fast train
In the morning we said goodbye to our new friends and made one last stop in Kyoto. We took the very crowded bus to a famous temple that is covered entirely with gold leaf. The temple is also surrounded by a lovely garden. However, I hear that this temple has little religious significance and is mostly popular with foreigners. Despite that, the place was filled with Japanese children out on school groups. The children travel in large packs and tend to swarm the sites all at once — this temple was certainly no exception.
Gold-leaf covered temple
Many of them are just beginning to learn English and want to practice their skills on foreigners such as myself. As they walk by they often chant “hello, hello” at you. If you respond back with “hello”, they laugh fiendishly as if this was the funniest joke ever. I think that it’s kind of cute, but Peter is quite tired of it because it has happened to him everywhere he goes. In addition, they are often amazed at how tall Peter is (~2 meters) and often giggle and point when we go anywhere. Heh.
Anyhow, we took the bus back to the station and took the famously fast Shinkasen — the Japanese bullet train. A trip that would have taken 8 hours by bus took only 2½ hours by bullet train, and we were traveling in style. However, it was quite expensive! But I think that it was worth it because we were both tired after our long journey — plus, how many chances does one get to ride the second fastest train in the world?
Back in Tokyo in record time, we crashed at Peter’s house and rented another movie. This time we made doubly sure that the title was actually a movie that we wanted to rent! We made a home cooked meal (very nice after a long time of eating out for every meal) and relaxed. It was great.
Day 11 – Tour of downtown Tokyo
Today was one of my most interesting days of the trip. My new friend Ai took me on a personal tour of downtown Tokyo, which was very kind of her. We visited the old part of town and saw a temple famous for the very large lanterns that it features. We walked around for a bit and grabbed lunch at a local restaurant that serves a specialty dish for the area. The meal is cooked right in front of you on the table, much different than the sort of Japanese food that we can get in Canada! I also tried Japanese sake for the first time, which was interesting as well. It was very nice to have the perspective and aid of a Japanese person that knew the area well.
Lunch with Ai
After that Ai took me to the acting school that she had just graduated from. I was able to watch the class as they learned several aspects of traditional Japanese theatre, including song and dance. This was a part of Japanese culture that I had yet to really see, and it was quite interesting to see how it all worked.
Tokyo Tower
Then we went to the busy part of downtown and went up Tokyo Tower, in the center part of the city. From up on the observation deck of Tokyo Tower you can see much of the city, and it was quite amazing how incredibly large the city is. In every direction that you look, you can see a bustling city as far as you can see. As well, it was neat to see some of the great architecture of the buildings. I find it interesting that Tokyo doesn’t have one “downtown” area like most major cities that I have visited. Instead it has several large centers of business and commerce, but these are spread throughout the city for the most part.
After this me and Ai went to a coffee shop and chatted for a while until Peter and his co-workers were finished their work. Then, in the Japanese tradition, we went to a Karaoke bar. It was very fun to do this, and it’s a popular pastime in Japan. When we finished we rode back on the extremely busy train — it seems that many Japanese try to stay out late and catch the last train just like we did!
Day 12 – The long trip home
Today I had to wake up at the ghastly hour of 7:00AM to start heading towards the airport. To get there took me a full 2½ hours. Train, subway, and then the monorail! I arrived bright and early, which was good considering the amount of confusion that my ticket seems to have caused. After much effort I flew to Osaka where I made a 4 hour layover. It is quite annoying to pay hundreds of dollars to take the bullet train from Osaka, only to fly back in 2 days. Ah well, such is life right?
The Osaka airport is about the same as most other airports in the world. Except this one had a lot of people flying back to Canada, so I had another opportunity to meet some neat people. We Canadians seem to get around the world quite a bit… it’s almost surprising there are any of us still at home. Several were English teachers in Japan, but there were people that were visiting or working all over asia.
This, my final entry, is being written on the plane from Osaka to Vancouver, and all is well so far I suppose. For some strange reason the usually terrible movie selection seems spectacular today. The Coen brothers’ new quirky movie “The Man Who Wasn’t There” is playing — that’s one I’ve actually been waiting to see for some time. And the other two (Ghostbusters, Bandits) seem like good choices as well. After this trip on a normal aircraft, I don’t think I can ever repeat my experience in Europe of flying on a discount charter airplane. The extra leg room is really worth the extra money, I have decided.
As I reflect back on the trip, I have to conclude that it was an intensely great experience. Japan is a wonderful country with a fascinating culture — most unlike any other place I’ve been to in the world. For some reason Japan just makes sense to me in a lot of ways that don’t at home. I really like the polite and friendly people, and the way that trust is such a big factor of their society. If it wasn’t for the difficulty in learning the language, I think I would like to go back for a longer time. However, I am certainly going back someday.
Cheers.
