Japan - 2 weeks at Alice's
Trip Start
Aug 17, 2005
1
14
31
Trip End
Jul 01, 2006
Mobara,
Japan
Wednesday, January 4, 2006
Ima wa Nihon imasu. Arisu san wa kerai e to hostess sugoy! Ima nihongo wakatta kore sawa nihon tabemono tabete mai nichi
Thanks Alice - unfortunately, even after 2 weeks we are not quite at that standard in writing Japanese (although our spoken is almost perfect).
Japan was decent, hi-tech and busy how we were expecting it, and a great change from the dirt and noise of India. When we eventually reached Tokyo, we had been on the road for 5 days, and were absolutely knackered but checked into a great hostel with sauna and jucuzzi so it wasn't all that bad!
After a night out (Tokyo is renouned for it's clubbing apparently), one of the guys at our hostel suggested we go to the fish market (this was at 6am), as it's there that you find the best and freshest sushui
1 - sumo
. It was a really interesting place, loads of hussle and bussle, and loads of strange looking creatures from the sea. Eventually finding a sushui bar, we decided to each pick a random dish from the menu, as it was all in Japanese. A risky move, but we still had the dutch courage and fancied putting our stomaches to the test of raw blow fish and octopuss! The waitress looked at us fairly strangly when we ordered - a worrying sign - and when the food was served we were certainly shocked. Onion curry, onion omlette and deep-fried luncheon meat. We had managed to randomly pick out the only 3 non-sushui dishes on the menu. Superb. After more hunting, and full-up with onion we did manage to get the fresh sushui we strove for. And it was good. But maybe not after a night of clubbing!
Went to a few art museums and walked around Tokyo (massive), crossing the world's busiest pedestrian crossing several times as we had no idea where we were going.
After requesting to stay a few days at Alices (a freind from University who is teaching English out there), we fully went there with the intention of not out-staying our welcome and pushing on after a few days
2 - sumo
. Japan is an expensive country though, and our wallets didn't strech very far in Tokyo, so somehow, we ended up staying 10 days at Alices - Thankyou!! This obviously means we didn't see much of Japan, but did get to know Mobara (the small town where Alice lived) very well! Visiting a few temples, getting to shop in Supermarkets again and cook our own food (bizzarly something we had been missing) and watching 12 films in the flat. It was great to stay in one place again for a good length of time and relax and know we had nothing to do and nowhere to go. We did get to go to Alice's school though, which was great fun and we were treated like pop stars in the corridors, with school girls screaming and wanting photos with us - great for the egos! We also attempted to help them with their English, but they were mostly too shy to speak to us.
The onsen was also a highlight of the stay - basically a spa that you went into naked. After the initial embarrasment, it was great and relaxing and so good to be warm (as Japan was in the middle of winter). The Japanese men were slightly too intriuged for our liking by 2 western guys in there, but you soon get used to it.
We also got the chance to see a day of the Emporer's Sumo Competition in Tokyo, which was a great day - although started pretty early for us, our bodies weren't used to getting up before sunrise
3 - sumo
! Got into the stadium at 9am, when only the lowest ranked Sumos were fighting - but there was no-one there, which meant we could sit really close to the action. After that, we went to our real seats (as far back as it was possible to be), to watch the main players - including a Bulgarian who is Sumo's equivilent to Beckham. Everything in the event follows strict traditions, which includes high-pitch wailing by the referee before the fighting, and much salt throwing and stamping of the feet. Great fun!!I think that's actaully all there is to say about our stay in Japan - not massively packed, but just a nice relaxing time of watching films and getting up late.
Thank you Alice.
