Aoikuni Hotel Ainan-cho

... to the space bar (one reason I haven`t written more till now). The next morning I took a ferry to Yawatahama on the island of Shikoku. I was on the deck by chance to watch the pilot bow to the official on the dock who solemnly bowed back as we chugged out to sea exactly on time.

On the bus from Y. to Ozu: Modern Japan can be incredibly ugly and incredibly beautiful - electric lines everywhere, billboards, signs, concrete building blocks ...

... journey, partly to review my course in Japanese and extract the verbs and vocabulary needed for the tasks of travel, and mostly because I loved this ryokan with its old wooden buildings looking like samurai houses and stone lanterns and paths through plantings, and lit torches at night.

... of the walking tour are the ruins of Usuki castle. The moat and the steps leading up to the grounds of the former castle are the main attraction here. As we ascended the steps leading to the empty ground my friend taught me a wish making tradition. There was a wooden mon, or gate, along the stairwell. If wishmakers can throw a stone up and have it land upon the top of the gate without falling their wish will come true.

My stone landed upon the gate at my third throw.

... a year and see this old wooden bridge so often, but I am still fascinated with it.

The golden lights define the figurative art of wooden structure in the evening. I realize how elaborate the structure of the bridge is, and feel that there could be no other bridges like this.

... in the afternoon, meaning that I had a full two and a half days to explore the city and its surrounds. Naturally, I got lost (but only partially, so I`m improving) trying to find the youth hostel, but it was worth the effort as it is regularly voted the best one in Japan, and I would have to agree that it`s right up there with K`s House in Kyoto. Obviously there is a castle in Matsuyama, and it dominates the city centre like the one in Kumamoto, but this one was ...

... Kabuki (human actors telling stories and dancing) and Bunraku (elaborate puppets telling stories and dancing). Both are exotic and interesting to Westerners, but incredibly boring and normal for the Japanese people. The puppets are fascinating - they move incredibly well and realistically. They have a TV show on sometimes put out in Tokyo where they tell stories of old samurais and famous bits of history. I was impressed. Some of their mouths move, they ...

... impressed. I was, however, disappointed with the parade. It consisted of them blasting the same song, over and over and over again, and every person in the parade did the same dance. This made no sense to me since the parade then consisted of 3 hours of watching hundreds of people doing the same dance, with the same 5 minute song playing the whole time. I still can't stand that song. This parade was weird. I hope other ones around the ...

... nice, and the nice woman who recommended the Chamomile tea brought me another cup without me asking. I don't mind, it's just I'm not sure I can keep drinking all this tea. I'm starting to feel kind of hot actually. I'm considering taking a nap. I have another 2 hrs and 20 minutes before we're due in Taipei. Maybe a quick nap and then the dinner will be good to finish this slew of flights.

... them. It turned out that a moderately famous Japanese chef was cooking that night in the hotel and was giving a private meal to these people, giving them samples of his dishes. The chef himself starting bringing us food out and seemed genuinely concerned about whether we were still hungry. His food was great and the cuisine itself was different than what we were used to having in Japan. And to top it all off they only charged us $6.00 apiece for the meal. People in Japan are so nice!

... was very neat, a sleepy city and yet a proud city. They had their own kind of giant dragons that they made and danced with during their New Years festival that were very cool. You could see the wooden heads of various sizes in just about every shop. Uwajima is also fairly famous for their bullfighting. Yeah, that`s right, bullfighting. They have a bullfight arena right in the center of the city and the fights ...