Adventures in Japan

Empty nest

Our Trevor has flown back to Canada. After the whirlwind of his & Nate's visit, we don't know quite what to do with ourselves. I guess write about all the stuff we did while they were here. That's a lot. Too much to squeeze into one post, so what I'm going to do is type it all up one day at a time and backdate the posts, starting on the 15th. Here's hoping I can get through it all before we leave for Okinawa on the 13th.

But don't hold your breath. I'm awfully lazy.

Decoupling

Trevor flew home to Canada today, but I don't think he'll actually land until tomorrow, which is actually today because of the time difference. Or something like that. According to Nate, the jet lag is terrible. I don't envy either of them.

I rode the train with Trevor out to the airport. Unbeknownst to me, knownst to Trevor but he forgot, the train splits in two somewhere along its journey. Half goes to the airport, half doesn't. It turns out we got on the wrong end of the train and had to run along the platform to switch cars before the train decoupled. If we'd been asleep, we would have ended up in Wakayama (i.e. nowhere near the airport).

Other than that, I think Trev made it out of the the country without incident, but also without playing Star Wars pachinko, seeing a Japanese movie in a Japanese theatre, eating good okonomiyaki, seeing a proper castle, soaking in a hot spring, or snowboarding on a Japanese mountain. Poor kid. He must not have had any fun at all.

Two, Two, Two Posts in One

Last night at Rock Rock was so fun that I'm going to kinda merge my post about it with my post about the next day. Because, really, we didn't manage to get a whole lot of shut eye in. I enjoy using pictures to tell a story, so herewith is a little ditty I like to call Rock Rock: the En-Yellening.


It all started when this tall Australian jerk started plying my lady with booze.


I got so mad that I yelled so loud that people around me had to hold onto their hats and Trev had a mild epileptic fit.


In spite of his mild episode, Trev still had my back when it was time to roll.


The crafty Aussie shut off the lights and escaped into the night. This caused me to yell some more.


So then Trev yelled.


When the lights came on, Trev had stolen my hat (and is already drunk on its immense power) and Che was practicing Tai Chi.

The picto-story was going to be a lot longer, but... I don't photograph well. That's not quite true. My hairline and double chin photograph fantastically, and that's the problem. Trust me when I say that there are some spectacularly unflattering photos of everyone on this trip. The videos are even worse. In one, lord forgive me, I... I... I air guitar. I feel so dirty.

So we drunkenly reveled until 5 in the morning, stumbled home, passed out and woke up at around noon. A teacher from the Bing Bam Boom Club had invited me to some sort of international party or some such. We stumbled into the place and, while I can't speak for the other two, my brain melted. The party was in a smallish room that smelled faintly of urine, filled with all sorts of people, and a dog, some of the people were in costumes, some just dressed weirdly, and "Rocky Mountain High" was playing on the sound system. It was surreal man. My brain still hurts. We were separated and conversated with. Introductions were made, games were played and then we left. The whole thing is kind of a blur. I think there was some hula dancing. And the alphabet song.

Making polite conversation in Japanese or stilted English is much harder when hung over.

From there we went to Club Quattro. The Shins were playing a gig there. The Shins had a song on the Soundtrack to Garden State. I quite liked both the movie and the soundtrack. So much so that I... acquired some more of their music. I'm not saying that I downloaded their music, because that's illegal, but I'm not saying that I didn't. Unless that somehow incriminates me, in which case I totally never, ever downloaded music illegally.


Shonen Knife opened for The Shins. Shonen Knife are a quasi-famous, cute, Japanese, punk band. They've been around for a while. When they got on stage, they looked like middle aged office ladies. Except for the drummer, who was far younger. And, we all agreed, was amazingly cute. Trev and I were somewhat smitten. I really like some of the shots my camera took that night, but there's not a really good shot of the drummer.


She was SO CUTE! And totally in to her drumming. She was just grooving man. Not that I should ignore the older ladies, cuz they might curb me. They may not be young any more, but they can still rock out. There is something about punk music when it is being played Japanese ladies that just makes it sound better.


The Shins also rocked, which was a bit of a surprise to us. The few songs of theirs that I had heard (and legally paid for) were kind of light and acoustic. They played some acoustic stuff, and played it fantastically,


but they also played some faster, heavier stuff.


I will never be a music reviewer. I say that as a way to avoid having to talk any more about the show. It was real good. The one thing I wanted to mention is that the bassist looked a bit like my Uncle Frank, but much, much younger. Here's sum pitchers (they have nothing to do with the just mentioned bassist).


Insert your own Whitesnake light show joke here. Man! That was tasteless.


The show started at seven so it was done in time for a late dinner. We could have stuck around and got our pictures taken with Shonen Knife or talked with the guys from The Shins, but we were kinda peckish. We tried to find 1for81 again, but were still without luck so we had all you can eat Shakey's. Trev and Carla both agree that corn mayonaise pizza is surprisingly tasty.

Futon fiasco

Beautiful weather! Temperature close to 20°C. In January. Yay!


Trevor and I went to the Umeda Sky Building and actually paid to ride the elevator to the top. For some reason I expected there to be a garden up there, what with it being called The Floating Garden Observatory and all, but no. Still a nice view though. We saw... stuff. A lot of bridges, many airplanes, trains, and a few rooftop swimming pools.

After a stop at NHK for more Domo-kun stuff and a walk through Den Den Town where Trevor did not buy a digital camera, we ended up back at The Hub for happy hour, where I discovered the wonders of the Strong Bull (double vodka, beer, cider & Red Bull energy drink). It was oh so tasty, and made me rather giddy. Good stuff. I'd almost pay full price for one. So feelin' real good, we met up with Tyler in Umeda and had some drinks at the stand-up bar. Then we went home and dumped our stuff. While we were there, we drank some more. Then it was off to meet Ben the Aussie & Che the Kiwi at Green Leaf where, believe it or not, we consumed alcohol in beverage form. Also, Ben gave me some funky socks.

All this led up to another thoroughly enjoyable yet mostly forgotten night at Rock Rock. What we've been able to piece together is that a girl with a beehive was having a birthday party, we met a VERY tall German studying biochemistry, and drinking at Rock Rock results in videos of singing & dancing almost as funny as karaoke. Ben disappeared at some point, but the rest of us stayed until first train. I think a strange man was laughing at us as we drunkenly ate our breakfasts at Yoshinoya.

You probably all think we're alcoholics, but I'm pretty sure we're not.

Christ On!

Trevor went to the aquarium, saw some art, and rode an enormous ferris wheel. Tyler & I went to work. I had a surprise new student today, a very shy 4-year old with her mom & little brother. They joined my regular 3-year old and her mother in a tiny, tiny classroom. The new arrivals threw me for a bit of a loop. I was so nervous I was shaking, but by the end everyone seemed to be having fun. I don't know how much they actually learned, but at least no one was crying. Actually, that's not true. The little brother was crying when he left. I don't think he liked it when we put all the toys away. He really liked that banana.

After work, we all met up with David for some nabe (a communal pot dish that we cooked on the table in front of us). It was rather more expensive than the shabu shabu we had the other day, but also much more flavourful.

From there we headed to Christon Café. We seem to pass it all the time when we're in Umeda. Tonight was the night we actually went in. It was surprisingly large inside. Bigger than most Japanese bars we've been to. The decor was cathederalesque, with Jesus and/or Mary statues everywhere we looked, and what seemed to me like a lot of chandeliers. Even though the drinks were expensive, I kind of enjoyed it. We didn't stay long, though. Had to catch a train.

Beef is beef

Back to Kobe! This time with a Kobe beef destination that came personally recommended. First, though, we visited the earthquake disaster museum. I think it's actually called the Disaster Reduction and Human Renovation Institution, but the parts we saw were all about The Earthquake.

We started out watching thunderous recreations of the earthquake projected onto the walls of a little theatre (the kind with no seats) then were ushered through a reconstruction of a devastated city street to another theatre (this one for sitting) where we watched a short film about the experiences of a survivor (with English translation through an earpiece). Have I mentioned that earthquakes are terrifyingly destructive? Because wow. That all kind of blew my mind.

After the presentations, we were given little bar code readers and left to roam the displays on the next floor. Each bar code that we scanned brought up an English translation of a personal earthquake account that someone had submitted to the museum. Some of the entries were very positive, some were bitter, and some were just sad. It all made for interesting reading. At the far end of the hall, we could have printed out all the stories we'd scanned and taken them home, but we didn't know that until it was too late. Instead we spent our time reading as we went along, and talking to the museum volunteers. At that rate we hardly got to see anything before it was time to go (we wanted to make double, extra sure that we made it to the beef place before Tyler had to leave for work). There was lots more earthquake stuff to see (like science centre style displays that show how earthquakes work & stuff) and a whole other building with "human renovation" exhibits that we didn't make it to. I was a little disappointed, but beef is beef.

I certainly would have rather been in that museum than on the bus we took back downtown. It was packed to the point of severe physical discomfort. The kids behind me didn't care. They were all feet & elbows. I had to lean over and brace myself against the bus window to keep myself from being repeatedly knocked onto the little old lady sitting beside me. Shovey little brats. They may have soured me on public transit forever. Grrrr.

We were pretty pressed for time, but we managed to squeeze in the Kobe beef experience. The place we ate was nothing fancy, but we were each able to get a tasty steak lunch for a somewhat reasonable price. It was cooked on sizzling plates in front of us (oh, did that smell good!) and came with lots of garlic, and tasty little dipping sauces. It was definitely delicious, but the general consensus was that we've all had meat that was just as good back home in Canada. Western Canada, that is.


After Tyler went to work, Trevor and I wandered around Kobe for a bit, but we couldn't find anything we were too keen on doing, what with the weather being kind of crap & all. But you know what's great about Japan? It's full of warm department stores that have toilets with heated seats. They're great for a browse when you're tired of wandering the cold, hard streets. I almost typed cold, dark streets, but I haven't seen too many of those around here. Especially not anywhere near a department store.

Eventually we got tired of Kobe and caught a train to Kyoto. We had a bit of trouble finding Tyler, then the three of us had a bit of trouble finding Moonwalk, the bar where we were supposed to meet Ayako, Tyler's cute yet worldly co-worker. There are at least five bars named Moonwalk in downtown Kyoto and we weren't entirely sure which one was which. The one we ended up in this time had a big window and a nice view out over the river. Only one table, though. As is our habit when we visit bars named Moonwalk, we sampled cocktails with interesting names (but no descriptions). At one point I asked for an Irish Coffee, which apparently caused the bartender some distress. Irish Coffee wasn't listed in the menu, but I figured that someone working in an establishment that offers such variety would be familiar with the drink, or at least have a bar guide behind the counter. Guess not. I think he called around to a few of the bartenders at the other Moonwalk locations before he finally cam back to me and asked if I wanted coffee with whiskey in it. In the end he brought it to me iced instead of hot, and it was actually pretty good. Poor guy. I didn't mean to cause so much trouble.


Not learning from our last Kyoto drinking experience, we almost missed our last train again. As it turned out, we got a train out of Kyoto all right, but once we got to Umeda, it was too late to catch a connecting train the rest of the way home. I really wasn't feeling up to walking all that way, and I don't think any of us wanted to stay out all night, so we decided to cough up the cash for a taxi. We got lucky. The fare we ended up paying turned out to be pretty reasonable. Apparently the trick is to seek out a little yellow taxi. According to our driver (who didn't speak any English) they're much cheaper than the big black ones. Who knew?

Buy what you catch

I can now truthfully say that I've been fishing in Japan. Tyler & Trevor, too. We didn't catch anything, but that was probably for the best. I mean, what were we going to do with a freshly caught, live & wiggling fish way out on the other side of Kobe? The other side of Kobe being the Suma Marine Fishing Park, about an hour and a half from where we live. We were a little cold when the sun wasn't shining, but the scenery was nice. We saw a lot of huge ships on the water, distant islands, the longest suspension bridge in the world, and some guys on the beach playing air guitar for all they were worth.


Once we were done with the beach and the fishing, we had a long wait for a train to take us back to Kobe. That made us late for lunch (only served until 2:00 at most places) so we didn't get a chance to try Kobe beef like we'd planned. We ate consolatory beef bowls at some fast food chain or another, and then Tyler had to go to work. And then I went to work, where one of the customers gave me the name a place that serves Kobe beef for a reasonable price. Nothing beats the advice of a local!

After work I met the guys at Green Leaf to celebrate the real Australia Day with a small group of real Australians. I think we may have even eater a real Australian meat pie or two.

Anthropological study

We really didn't get up to much today. Just kinda hung out around Namba & Shinsaibashi, Eating, shopping, and people watching. Some items of note:

• A hot dog in a crêpe is not a good idea.


• Potatoes with a hard candy coating aren't enjoyable, even if they are from 551 Horai.


• There are a lot of women in this city with questionable taste in footwear.


• There are a lot of women in this city with questionable taste, period.


• People who hand out fliers on busy street corners meet with more rejection than I would have thought.


• People who recruit ladies of the evening on busy street corners aren't always rejected.

Plus we saw an old man wearing Playboy branded mukluks, and this random poster on the street:


Actually, we did get up to a bit of something once Tyler got off of work. We went out for shabu shabu, a communal cooking experience popular in winter (everything here has a season). We ordered three people's worth of shabu shabu fixins, but once they arrived at our table we weren't quite sure what to do with them. Eh, we muddled our way through. We started by dumping some vegetables into the pot of bubbling broth in the middle of the table. Then we cooked the thin slices of meat, one at a time, by picking them off the plate with our chopsticks, swishing them around in the broth, dipping them in mystery sauces, and eating them. Once the meat was gone, we started picking the vegetables out of the soup and eating those too. Once those were done, we tossed in some noodles, cooked 'em up, dished em out, and ate 'em. The whole experience was kinda fun, but the food itself was disappointingly bland. I wish I'd been more adventurous with the sauces.

So many monuments

We'd been to Kyoto. We'd been to Nara. Next on the list was Kobe. Trevor & I wandered along pretty much the same route Tyler & I took last time we were there. We saw many statues of naked ladies, and a guy trying (unsuccessfully) to catch ball on pole.


After much searching, we found the earthquake memorial in Meriken Park. It included a stretch of waterfront preserved just as it was right after the big earthquake in 1995, along with photographs, video, and statistics relating to the disaster and the following reconstruction. Wow. That earthquake brought down a lot of really big stuff. Devastating, really. And not just the physical damage. The local economy relied heavily on Kobe's status as a major international port. With the waterfront in ruins, they were in big economic trouble too. But the city looks great now. You wouldn't guess it had been almost completely destroyed 10 years ago, other than most things look pretty new. Quite the recovery.

Once it started getting dark, we headed in to the shopping (but mostly dining) complex alongside the pier. We ate some overpriced dumpling things that were kind of like takoyaki, but made with egg instead of batter. We thought they were the source of the delicious aroma we smelled as we walked by. Turns out we were wrong. They did a bit to tide us over until we found a proper meal, though. Our proper meal consisted of meat on sizzling platters, served with paper splatter guards that served the dual puprose of warning us, very politely, that the plates were hot (because the loud sizzling might not have tipped us off). It wasn't exactly "Kobe beef", but it was still really tasty. I also took a chance on a weird gobo-potato-mayonaise-on-lettuce salad and was pleasantly surprised. Hooray!


After that we rode the ferris wheel, because it just had to be done. Then we toyed with the idea of riding some ratty-looking walking animal contraptions, but thought better of it.


Feeling the need for yet another ride to an even loftier view of the harbour, we took a (free!) glass elevator to the top of a shopping centre-type building, where we discovered probably the most scenic karaoke rooms in all of Kobe. Or so the ad out front would have had us believe. Karaoke just wouldn't be the same without Tyler, so we gave it a pass.

Other than breakdancers in an the underground mall, that elevator was the last thing I remember clearly. The rest of the evening was spent wandering around (mostly uphill) and getting horribly lost. (Stupid free visitor's centre maps.) We finally gave up on our vain attempts to figure out where we were and tried to catch a cab to a train station. Except none of them would pick us up. Not even the ones sitting by the side of the road with their passenger doors open. And then it started to rain...

We did make it home eventually. And I guess the train ride did us some good, because by the time we got back, we were rarin' to walk 10 blocks for Domino's pizza. Their pies are about ¥700 cheaper if you pick them up. With a discount like that, we could afford the mille-feulle. Creamy cheese is the perfect accompaniment to shrimp, squid, tomato, broccoli, garlic, olives, parsley, basil, bacon, pepperoni, ham, and mushrooms. I'll bet it even goes well with corn & mayonaise.


Then I think we stayed up drinking and watching TV.

Wow, that was a long day.

Flea Market With Ink Sauce

Even with such a late night full of aimless wandering, we managed to get up and out of the Orange House by noon. We met Ben and he guided us to a big, open-air flea market. It was pretty nifty. Japanese people, on the whole, are pretty fashionable (if you ignore the orange mullets) and the flea market made for some great people watching.

It was fun to walk around and look at all the cool looking clothing on sale, on display, and on the people walking around, but it was basically all a big tease for me. Nothing there had much of a chance of fitting me. Kinda sucked. Spent the whole day going, "Kim would like that... Kim would like that... Kim would like that. " Sometimes being a gangly goof has it's drawbacks.

No such problems for Ben though. He bought a whackload of clothing. And some toys. I bought an odd little clay head from a gaggle of giggling girls.


It was only fifty yen, and it seemed to make the girls giggle even more than usual.

It took us a few hours to get through all of the Flea Market, so we decided to unwind (and warm up) at a nearby mall. We shopped for a bit and then decided to grab a bite to eat. I forget what everyone else ordered, because I was too busy admiring my own plate of food.


Look at that. Is there any way to make that look even more appetizing?


I didn't think there was, but I guess I was wrong. You might want to wipe the drool from your chin, you don't want to wreck your computer lusting after my Squid Ink Spaghetti. Believe it or not, the best part of the Squid Ink Spaghetti story is still to come...

January 26th is Australia Day down there in Australia. Seeing as a whole heap o' Ozzies come to Japan, one of the nearby bars had an Australia Day Barbecue this evening. Trev comes to visit us in Japan and gets to experience some Australian culture. We sat in a loud, crowded, smoky bar and ate BBQed kangaroo. Plus we drank some XXXX and some Crown Lager. Also plus: Carla abused the free vegemite on hand. I declined. We saw kimono girl and Skeezy Kiwi again. Poor, poor kimono girl.

David met up with us and then almost immediately took off again. He had buggered up his foot and it was starting to pain him. We Left Tin's Hall not long after and headed over to the Green Leaf, the guy manning the barbecue (it may well have been Tin himself) tossed us some complimentary grilled lamb. It was tasty. And hot. The Green Leaf was much less crowded than Tin's. We drank some non-Aussie beer and ate an Authentic Aussie meat pie. We finished the evening off by scuba diving near the Great Barrier Reef and hand feeding wallabies with eggplants we had picked earlier in the day.

Nate left and we immediately stopped taking pictures

Nate has gone home to Vancouver. If he'd stuck around another day, he could have partook of our little unplanned/unintentional pub crawl. Guaranteed jet lag preventative.

It started simply enough. We (including Trevor, who's here for another week) were going to meet David at the stand-up bar in Umeda, have a couple drinks, and go home. Except the stand-up bar was full, so we wandered around for far too long looking for somewhere else to drink, but everything else was full too. Eventually we ended up back at the stand-up bar and found a free table. Usually when we drink there we eat tiny servings of Japanese-style pub food. Today we ate soup. Chanko (the stew sumo wrestlers eat) and chige (spicy Korean soup). Each came served on its own little heating apparatus, complete with an intensely hot candle-like thing at the bottom. Maybe not ideal for the tiny tables at the bar, but oh, they kept us warm!

We hung out at the stand-up bar for a while, then went to Café Absinthe because David wanted Guinness. Having learned my lesson last time we were there, I avoided any drink with foul, green liquor in it, and everyone was happy. We didn't stay there too long because we had plans to meet Ben back at the Green Leaf. The plan changed en route to the last train back to Abeno, whereupon we found ourselves in a bar in a basement somewhere in Shinsaibashi. As I recall, we were only went in because one or all of us really wanted to use their toilet. There were no other customers in there and I think the guy behind the bar was itching to close up so we didn't stick around, but we ate some really good complimentary chocolates before we left.

From there we went to some other bar with nice decor, but kinda lousy music and I fell asleep for a while. That's pretty much all I remember about that place, except the guys said our waitress was hot. I don't even remember ordering a drink.

I don't remember why we left that place, but next on our travels was a bar that may or may not have had something to do with charcoal. We sat on tatami mats in a loft-type space with a low, slanty ceiling and drank what I remember as being rather nice drinks and a really yummy, crunchy yet creamy, chocolaty dessert. Plus another dessert that while not at all bad, wasn't nearly as good as the chocolate one. I think the music was pretty good too, but my memories are pretty hazy at this point. I just hope I remember the place well enough to find it again. It was pretty cool.

Then we stopped to eat, but I'm not sure that any of us were hungry. I know I wasn't. I ordered a full set meal anyway. Then we caught a train home. And then there was a bit of sleeping.

Sorry

We've been way too busy having fun to even think about blogging.

But I have a special guest blogger here.

hi all, look at me i'm blogging i'm blogging. carla says a retarded monkey can do it so i might find this difficult. we are having very much good times big shot. good job! japan is wacky and fun and the people are very trendy, stylish, and very friendly. very nice people, and the women have feet of steel to walk in the shoes they choose to wear. osaka is huge. the orange house (where we live) is kind of a dump,but it is really cheap. the streets here are narrow and confusing and there are really small cars and scooters and bikes and people everywhere. they come at you from all directions. you can't let your guard down for a second, cause if you do... "BAM" ya got a bike tire in your ass. thats all for now.

Thanks Trev. Back to us in the studio.

Beginning of the End

So today was Nate's last full day in Japan. Of course I had to work a full day. It sounds like I didn't miss much though. Mainly they did laundry.

But we were going to make up for the lack of daytime excitement with an evening of boozing and carousing. We started the evening off at a yakiniku joint. The same one we wrote about a while back. If y'all recall, yakiniku is like an indoor barbecue.


We ordered one of their meat combo plates and a bunch of drinks. Nate got himself a bottle of that there cheap Korean hooch I mentioned in this post. As is the Japanese custom, Carla kept topping up his drink without asking his permission. Needless to say, Nate became very happy in a very short amount of time.


As the en-happy-ing was happening, the meat tray was brought to our table. The meat tray contained many different kinds of meat. We think it was all from the same animal. We can't be sure. We aren't really up on our Japanese cuts of meat. Most of it was good, some of it was tripe and some of it was liver.

The beefy, meaty, steaky bits were just fantastic. I love stuff cooked over an open flame. We had to pace ourselves, to make the good meat last. You don't want to finish off an evening of delicious dining trying to choke down liver.


Trevor ate most of the liver. He's such a trooper. I tried one piece. I ate it all, but just barely. I know now that I will never, ever, in the span of my entire life, enjoy liver. I covered that miniscule cube of dark brown 'meat' in chili sauce and garlic and I grilled it FOREVER but it still tasted like something I don't like the taste of. But it's not just the taste of liver that I hate, I despise the texture of liver. If grilling and garlic can't improve the taste of something, then it doesn't need to be eaten, that's what I say.

Hell, I ate grilled tripe and liked it and I still can't stomach liver. That's a bold statement right there. Some might be shocked, but it's true. Grilled tripe is tasty. A bit chewy, I'll grant you that, but tasty. The gooey blobs of slimy white that shrunk when we cooked 'em were also more edible than liver. I just wish we knew what we were eating.

We were all a little tipsy and reeked of smoke when we stumbled out of the establishment. In fact Trev was so drunk that he left his wallet behind. We might not have noticed until much later if not for the fact that our waitress followed us for three city blocks and returned Trev's wallet. Japanese people rock.

A drunken plan of action was decided upon. We would catch a train to Shinsaibashi, where you can't walk two feet without finding a bar or nightclub, and stay there until the trains started running again in the morning. Cunningly, Carla suggested that we change into clothes that didn't have food and grease splattered all over them. Stupidly, we agreed. As soon as we got back to the Orange House, the sheer amount of cheap alcohol in Nate's stomach caught up with him. He fell asleep kneeling on his futon, hugging his giant Domo-kun. So our big night out was over before it ever really began. Well played Carla, well played.

Keepin' the culture police off our tail

I don't think any tourist can come to the Kansai area without visiting Kyoto. It's the big attraction 'round these parts. Or so everyone says. We couldn't not take the guys to see it. Plus, you know, Tyler works there. So off we went.

We started off at JR Kyoto station, which is something like 10 stories tall, with a glass-ceilinged concourse in the middle. There's a continuous stairway all the way to the roof, where the view might've been nice if it weren't such a dreary day. Pretty impressive for a train station. Did we take any pictures? No. But we do have a picture of Nate posing with a blue thing.


From there we hopped a bus to Kinkaku-ji, a temple almost completely covered in gold leaf. I thought it was pretty gaudy, but impressive nonetheless. I mean, that's a lot of gold. Plus there was a lot of green in the surrounding gardens, even though it's winter. That's a big plus in my books.


From Kinkaku-ji we public-transited ourselves to Nijo-jo, just in time for Tyler to leave for work. Poor guy. But at least today he had a really short commute.


Nijo-jo is a castle that was built with special "nightingale floors" that squeak no matter where you step on them. I guess the shogun really didn't want anyone sneaking up on him. (That's right, we're talkin' ninjas.) He also seemed to really want to impress visitors. The walls of all the audience rooms were covered in gilded paintings. As we squeakily shuffled past them hundreds of years later, they were dimly lit and I gotta say, not all that interesting. But to be fair, I was finding it hard to think about anything besides how cold my feet were in those ill-fitting vinyl visitors' slippers. The gardens around the castle were very nice, though. Especially when the sun was out.


All Kyoto's cultural stuff shuts down around 5:00, so we had some time to kill before Tyler got off work. The three of us ended up at a little hole-in-the-wall coffee place called Kokuma. It means baby bear. It's also the name of the proprietor, who was awfully nice to us, and made really good, labour-intensive coffee & tea. His English really wasn't too bad, either. He talked to us about this and that, gave us some free snacks (even some to take home!) and played for us some jazz records on his giant stereo. Like I said, nice guy. Too bad he doesn't seem to get much business. The whole time we were in there drinking free refills of the already quite reasonably priced coffee and/or tea, the only other people we saw were a cab driver that left shortly after we arrived, two neighbourhood girls that stopped in for some free candy, and Mrs. Kokuma. Pity. That place was pretty cool. Naked ladies on the walls and all.


There was only so much coffee we could drink without getting the shakes, so eventually we moved on, and met up with Tyler not long after. We went for drinks with a couple of people that he works with, and ate some izakaya food. Not used to the extra travel time associated with a night out in Kyoto, we almost missed our train back to Osaka. We had to catch a cab to the JR station to catch the last train that would get us back to Umeda in time to transfer to our last train home. Oops.

After a long ride back to the general vicinity of Orange House, we somehow mustered enough energy for karaoke. Or rather, Trevor and Tyler did. Nate spent most of his time playing with the futuristic karaoke controls (with a bit of singing here & there) and I pretty much sat back and recorded their performances for posterity. That is, until the battery on Tyler's camera died. Right in the middle of a Shatneresque rendition of Rocket Man, too.

As we were leaving, Trev arm wrestled a guy in the lobby. I'm not sure why.

Happy birthday mom!

Tyler already said that we took the guys to Osaka Castle and waited outside while they looked around. What he failed to mention was that we waited in the rain. Serves us right for being too cheap to pay to see the museum again. But rainy days are well suited to museums, so once Tyler caught his train to work, the rest of us went to the Osaka Museum of History. We didn't actually spend much time there, but I thought it was pretty cool. Spiffy dioramas & displays going about the illustrating the history of the Osaka area. My favourites were the scale model reconstructions of old style towns with all the little people going about their mercantile business among all the 16th century buildings & canals. I think I probably dug it all because I actually live here and I read a bit of Japanese. Maybe Tyler would like it too. I'll drag him there one of these days. Maybe then we'll have some pictures.

The history museum is attached to the Osaka offices of NHK, Japan's national broadcaster. It's kinda like CBC, except more like the BBC. Most importantly, it's the home of Domo-kun, a brown, cube-like thing with a huge, toothy mouth. He's kinda like their mascot. I think Nate & Trev were more excited by the NHK gift shop than they were by the museum. They took a lot of pictures and bought a lot of stuff.


By the time the museum closed, it was just about time for me to go to work, so I took the guys as far as Umeda and set them loose. I'm not sure what they did, exactly, but they managed to find and buy more Domo-kun merchandise. And I guess more importantly, they found their way home again before the trains stopped running. Good job!!

Good Job!!

In the morning we all trundled off to see Osaka Castle. Carla and I waited outside whilst the boys paid the entrance fee and poked around. Then I went to work.

I feel bad about not being able to hang out with the fellers more but their visit is going to leave us poor enough as it is. Plus Nate ain't at his best anyhow. He's been needing naps on a daily basis. Poor guy.

Plus, the hours of commute kind of suck. But I get reimbursed for all travel expenses so I just look at them as paid naps. Plus sometimes teaching kids is way fun. Like today. I had to teach a two year old boy. I know! The Japanese start training their kids pretty young. I kinda agree with 'em though, young brains soak up knowledge like you wouldn't believe.

So my co-teacher warned me that this kid was a little shy and might be hard to teach. I say teach, but with two year old kids, you just play with them and speak English and get them used to how English is supposed to sound. I get paid to play with toys. We get to the lesson and the kid won't let go of his mom. He won't even play with any of his many cars or trucks. Just as he's about to cry I show him some pictures of Jerry's tractors and the like. He lets go of his mom and plops down next to me. He points at pictures and I tell them what they are, he repeats what I say. It's pretty cool. Then we play with his cars. As we're doing this, he tilts his head, leans back, puts his fist to his mouth and laughs like this: "Ooooh-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!" There's a few seconds of stunned silence then me, the other teacher and his mom all start laughing our asses off.

Seeing this, the little kid stands and up runs around the room for a bit, in that way that only small children can: like a cross between a waddle and a seizure with that crinkly diaper sound. He then stopped in the middle of the room and proceeded to do a dance. Lots of twisting and arm swinging and leg kicking. After the dance he gave a double thumbs up and said, "Good job!"

I think I cried with laughter.

P.S. Happy birthday Carla's mom.

Nope

Tyler may think I can fill in the details of today's activities, but he's often wrong.

Best I can recall, we did Namba & Den Den Town again. This time Nate stuck it out to the bitter end. I think he even bought something. Ummm, then we came home and everyone went to sleep. Possibly without supper. We were all very tired.

Don't Ask Me

I worked for the bulk of today, so I can't really tell you much of what went on. I was only with the guys for a couple hours and Nate was already needing a break. I'm not saying that to make him seem like a wimp, the dude's in way better shape than I am, I'm just saying that he is still a bit under the weather. Hopefully Carla can fill in the details a bit more.

I can tell you about my day at work though. My train stopped for a good half hour on my way to work. I'm not sure why, but the teacher I was with today was fairly sure it was because someone committed suicide on the train tracks at some point along the line. Kinda gross, I know. But that's not for sure. What is for sure is that I didn't want to be late for my classes, so I, along with everyone else, tranferred to another train. I was packed into a train car filled with Japanese schoolgirls. That may not mean too much to you, but it means a lot to Trev and Nate. Rest assured, I gloated.


Also, I got my first ride in a Japanese car today. The cars here, for the most part, are small and boxy. That's how they look on the outside. On the inside they are super roomy. And most have super cool navigation systems. I want one.

Fan-Fugu-Tastic

I don't have much to add to Carla's post. Sushi was fantastic. Whale and Fugu are expensive delicacies over here and we got to eat them for free. Probably the best sushi experience in my whole life. Whale sushi looks like beef. The chef, who always had a cigarette hanging out of his mouth, wouldn't tell us what it was before we ate it so we all assumed it was uncooked beef of some sort. Nope, it was whale. We were floored. There are very, very few places in Japan that even sell the stuff and one of them happens to be a block from where we were all staying. Thanks Nate, for making us eat there. Good job!!

As further thanks to Nate for his awesome sushi call, I will recount his natto experience through both words and pictures.

This first picture is of the natto rolls themselves. That's them in the foreground. There's some sahimi(salmon?) in the background and some sliced pickled ginger off to the side. Nate took this picture, so props to him.


Here's Nate going for the gusto. Gambate!!


Here's Nate immediately regretting his decision.


Chewing.


Still chewing. Note his expression: almost like a small child just winged in the head with an eraser by someone he trusted.


Here's Nate asking God when this torment will end.


This is Trev after eating one natto bean. A bean that left a thin stringy trail across the table like a diarrhetic spider.


And, just to be fair, this is me after eating a natto roll.


Here's a nice picture of the oyster (or was it mussel?) soup we got for free. Another Nate original.

Scientifically proven to be delicious

Tyler, dedicated educator that he is, went in to work bright and early this morning. The rest of us bummed around for a bit and then walked to Den Den Town. By the time we got there, Nate wasn't feeling well and wanted to go home. So we all caught the subway back (ride one stop, transfer, ride one stop, transfer, ride two stops, get off, walk) then Trev and I headed back out to Namba, near the far end of Den Den. I don't think we ever made it back to the discount electronics shops. Instead we found happy hour. There's a bar called The Hub down a little side street among the shopping arcades in Namba. The interior is cozy, the food is good, they have imported beers on tap, and the cocktails are interesting (some with a lot of kick). I probably wouldn't have given the place a second look, except that all their cocktails were on for half price between 5:00 and 7:00. Well that's not a bad deal. Plus, they have an all you can drink special with food for ¥2300, which I guarantee that we will try sometime. Probably.


We eventually made it back to Orange House, where Nate was up and about again. We sat around and waited for Tyler, then we all headed out for something to eat. Nate made an excellent call when he suggested we try the sushi place down the street.

We started out by ordering pretty ordinary things, stuff we had tried before and knew we would probably like. Then, because we are cruel and horrible people, we ordered Nate some natto rolls. Natto, as you may recall, are nasty, smelly, stringy fermented soybeans. Yum! But Nate ate one like a trooper. I guess the guys behind the counter were pretty impressed by that, so they brought us a present. They wouldn't tell us what it was until after we ate it, but it turned out to be sea cucumber. Really good. That was followed by jellyfish, also quite nice, which the chef identified to us (after we ate it) by drawing a picture. So cute! Then he brought us fugu (poison, poison, tasty fish), which is, like, crazy expensive, but for us it was free. Ty, Trev & Nate said it was really good, but I couldn't really taste it. I'd just eaten a whole lot of some rather hot wasabi before he brought the dish to our table, but I didn't want to insult him by not taking some of the mystery fish when everyone else did, so I ate it while my tongue was still burning. Once he told us what it was I was pretty disappointed that I'd missed out on its supposedly delicate flavours, but I'm still pretty stoked that he brought it for us. We also had fugu skin in there somewhere, and whale sashimi, which was really, really good. Best sushi experience of my life!

Turns out it was just a clever ploy to steal Tyler's gloves.


That other white guy in the picture is Aussie Ben. He showed up later for some beer. Good times.