Hotel Shirogane Kumamoto

After our unfortunately late night last night, waking up was difficult this morning. We managed, however, to get to the train station with plenty of time. The first leg of our ride was about 4 hours and involved crossing between the island of Hokkaido and the island of Honshu via a long undersea tunnel (kind of like the train that runs ...

... en la pantalla. Una de las veces nos dijo: "Maybe one day I'll go". Estupendo. Acaba de enterrar a su marido hace menos de un ano y aun tiene ganas de viajar y vivir la vida. Ole!
Cogimos el autobus que nos llevaba al crater de Nakadake, que paraba justo en la puerta. En la subida vimos el monte de Komezuka, que tiene forma conica. Segun la leyenda, la perfeccion del crater se debe a que los dioses de Aso estaban recogiendo arroz y necesitaban donde almacenarlo. Por ...

... y la que parece ser su hija. Su marido fallecio hace un ano y ayer justamente celebraban el aniversario con 50 invitados. Habian dejado flores y regalos junto a su retrato. Parecian bastante amigables, pero sin pasarse, muy a su rollo. Tienen el hostal, donde ellas tambien viven, decorado con cosas inservibles, como payasos de plastico, montones de posters, memorabilia de diferentes lugares... todo un poco viejo, pero limpio. Por supuesto, tampoco tienen ...

... is voor het maken van thee. Bovendien schijnt het water goed effect te hebben op het lichaam. In de tuin was ook mount Fuji en de Inari Shrine (zie eerdere Blog) nagebouwd. Leuk om te zien. Bovendien was dit de eerste keer dat we een Japanse tuin hebben gezien. Vooralsnog een korte Blog. We gaan nu even lekker uitrusten en strakjes een hapje eten in de stad en lekker van deze mooie zomeravond genieten.

Arrive in Aso-san around 1pm and after a quick lunch we decide to head up to one of the craters - Kijima-Dake which is one of 4 volcanos in the area. The walk up from the bus stop half way up the mountains only takes 45 minutes but it's really steep and very windy on top but the views are fantastic and it really shows how large this calder is (i.e. the original volcano crater) - it's approximately 23km wide - that's a very big volcano by ...

... feeling a bit dizzy. I think you are supposed to soak for an hour or so but I had to get out. On the way home I thought an ice cream would help cool me down. Haagen Daz do a nice Green Tea flavoured ice cream here. Back at the hostel it was another Curry Noodle (perhaps I should get shares in the company?) and a banana in front of the TV with the ladies. The news was on and very kindly the ladies switched the audio to ...

... drove me back down the hill too. Higoji Minshuku, the guest house, is on the hill in front of the Bussharito, a white building that is supposed to house the Buddha's ashes. The hill has an excellent view over Kumamoto. The castle, Kumamoto-jo, is the main thing to see in the city. It is a 17th Century castle, once one of the greats of feudal Japan. The building itself is beautiful as are the grounds it sits in. I walked through the Plum Garden which, despite it ...

... Shinjuku on Saturday - he wants to take me shopping with his girlfriend and me to meet his friends. There will be pictures! So i`m now in Kumamoto, in Kyushu which is far West Japan and well of the tourist track. The trains are not in English at all, and I have no one to ask for directions etc because no one appears to know English. Seriously no one understands me, it took over 45 mins to book ito my hotel and whenever i`m out ...

... Malaysia, Philippines, as well as Pearl Harbor. They could learn however, from modern Germany, which is to be immensely honored for its more unblinking efforts to confront its evil and to enshrine places like Dachau, rather than bulldozing them away. Ego is usually the key culprit. These Japanese museums both say "the war was viewed by Japanese people as a crusade - their natural right to control other places", and it is this ego, this blindness to ...

... and pointed to it, gave a thumbs up and said Thank you. THe laughed and gave me the thumbs up. Once I got home I eagerly opened the package to find it filled with chocolate, and other sweeeeeeeeeeeeeets that will NOT go to waste. (thanks for the package MoM =) Needless to say I was very impressed with how helpful everyone was, even though my Japanese SUCKS, and their english Sucks. Lesson learned today -- ask lots, ask often, and chances are youll get what youre looking for =) Cheers