Well you all heard about the first 24 hours of my Japan experience... Now for the rest of the story.
Tokyo and the remainder of day 2.
The second night in Tokyo was truly an adventure. After an hour or so of walking in the rain we ended up at this really cool restaurant which was on the 3rd floor of a building, This was common because in Japan everything is higher instead of wider. We had intended to meet up with some other SAS'ers for dinner, but we got lost while wandering around the city. We all knelt around a table and instead of a waiter, there was a touch screen tablet that would place your order whenever you felt like it. There was only one problem with this system..., none of us currently read any Japanese! Well being the adventure'ers type that we are (inside SAS joke), I took charge and started ordering stuff…, big-big-big mistake for the rest of the table. But it was really quite an hilarious dinner. Of course we ordered a ton of food, and some of it was actually pretty tasty. We got Sushi and a whole bunch of different types of noodles, squid, rice, bread with dipping sauce, vegetable tempura, feta tempura, endameba, and multiple types of chicken. I actually ordered (quite accidentally) this Beer and Ginger combination for my friend Kyle. Kyle didn’t really like the taste of it at all. I did however like how "Sustainable" (the theme of our voyage) this restaurant was and the touch screen tablet was a perfect application for that technology. After dinner (which by then was well after 00:00) we decided to call it an early night. We were all tired and wet and had to wake up at 6am to go to our next city.
Day 3 - Kyoto
My Blackberry alarm went off at 6am. In order to catch the 7:30 Bullet Train to Kyoto we had to get cleaned up and out the door by 6:45 ish. We really loved the Bullet Train. This particular line is called Tokaido Shinkansen, it was the first high speed train in the world (1964). Like most things in Japan, it was very fast and quite efficient. On the train I ate a pork sandwich with some tasty Japanese sauce on it that I would absolutely recommend..., if I knew what it was. It had a nice zesty aftertaste which lasted for most of the hour and a half ride to Kyoto.
We disembarked around 9am and immediately set off on another adventure to locate the Youth Hostel that Jenny had found in her guidebook. Well, it turned into a repeat of our escapades from the previous night. We wandered around the city in the pouring rain (which don’t get me wrong was pretty fun) until we finally found our destination. But not before this wonderful man from a noodle shop we had just stopped at, walked us about half mile down the street to show us the way to the hostel. There are a lot of very nice people in Japan. Many of whom just seem to be following us around to help us out. LOL
We went into the hostel and asked about the rooms, the lady at the front desk told us that they only have rooms for five people. This was perfect because Kyle, Eli, and Oliver had to meet up with the ship in Kobe that night and wouldn’t be staying. So it was Sara, Jenny, Casey, Lindsey, and I..., in the first room. We booked a second room for some friends who were going to meet up with us later that evening. That would be Andrew, Bow and three more girls. The proprietor lady then showed us an example of what our room would be like... and wow... believe me the room was sick! We are talking a traditional Japanese style room complete with a tea table, five mats to sleep on and enough authentic robes for all of us.
The poor guys who had to leave were very jealous. But they had an SAS trip to Hiroshima in the morning and had no other choice. We then walked around Kyoto for quite a while and saw some sweet Temples and Statuary. Lunch was at this cute little family owned shop called the Kitchen Bar. It was by far The Best lunch I have had on this trip. A nice sized salad with a great dressing (I have no idea what it was). Fried chicken with lice and hamburger meat. A Perfect lunch! Afterward we walked around some more and by this time it was pouring rain and kind of cold. So half our group decided to go to a Café and warm up while Oliver, Casey and myself went to see one more alleged hot spot. This turned out to be an amazingly massive cemetery on a hill with a great big Buddha statue! While we were there, a real life Japanese comedian asked us to have our picture taken with him for his show. We did it, even though he was surely going to make us the butt of some rude joke.
When we met back up with the rest of the group they said, “HEY... we're all freezing our butts off, lets go to a Japanese Bath House”. So we did and lets just say that after that day in Kobe, we were pretty well“cultured” in the ways of the Japanese. We had been to their temples, eaten their food, stayed in a their hotels... AND... bathed in a traditional bath house. It was quite the experience.
(I did not accually take this Picture...hahaha)
Buddhist Sayings
- Do not speak- unless it improves on silence. - You can explore the universe looking for somebody who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and you will not find that person anywhere.
Interesting Links:
Tokyo Menu - http://www.krishna.jp/govindas/e_govinda/Menu.html
Bullet train - http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2018.html
Touch screen menus - http://www.whynot.net/ideas/2439
Kabuki - http://www.blogger.com/goog_1266365916925 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabuki
Check out our current position or other info about my voyage:
http://www.semesteratsea.org/
Email me at Nicholas.a.tomkins@gmail.com
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