angelhill.net/life

The journey is almost at it’s end and all throughout me and Karin have been so busy that we haven’t even had time to blog. Seriously it’s been one city after the other and generally we just didn’t have time to go to internet cafés to make funky blog entries. So I will just have to make a big one when I get back.

Here are all the towns we visited in order: Tokyo, Matsumoto (Utsukushigahara onsen), Nakatsugawa, Magome, Tsumago, Osaka, Beppu, Senomoto, Kurokawa onsen, Aso, Kumamoto, Hiroshima, Takamatsu, Uwajima, Osaka, Tokyo.

What a list! Anyway, we’ve had a great trip with a ton of fun and crazy stuff. The heat however has been very very strong indeed. Sometimes it defeated me. It was horrible. The other day it was 41 degrees in Kyoto and Tokyo. In the shadow. We were walking around. In the sun. It was kind of like when we stepped out of an air conditioned bus into the Sahara desert in Tunisia, but this was in Kyoto. Caught me by surprise.

Now we’re gonna try to haxx Karim’s psp a little… or a lot.

On my previous two trips to Japan I had little to no trouble with jetlag… However this time I have suffered more then I expected to. I believe that my preparations (sleeping very little before the flight ;)) were either insufficient or maybe too excessive. Anyways I will attempt a new strategy next time.

It’s about 11am and I just woke up. As I write this Karin is bent over a bucket trying to get rid of some of the food she ate last night. I dunno, maybe she doesn’t wanna gain weight!
Usually that is where spent my mornings after an evening such as the one we just had, but this time the tables are turned. Although I have never been in this position myself on my previous Japan trips.

Last night me, nisse and Karin went to watch some serious fireworks in Yokohama along with half of Tokyo if not more. The commotion was immeasurable. The trains were packed with Japanese returning home from work mixed with kimono- and yukata-clad youngsters on their way to the event. They had all kinds of extra personnel working to make sure that people could get in to the trains, out of the trains, off the station and into the station. Lot’s of hand-held voice amplifiers produced many kudasais. There was also quite a police force on the site, with a situation tent and everything.

Our host for the evening, Ino, had been to the site at 9am the same day and booked (by taping a sizeable piece of blue tarp with her name on it onto the asphalt; we subsequently spent the evening on said tarp) a very nice spot close to the action.

The party was epic in nature. Which it has been almost every time with those crazy people. Although I myself was not drinking anything the entire evening, for the others the beer and sour (aka saawa; japanese plum wine mixed with soda) flowed. Japanese people know how to party in most conditions and one of the best kinds of parties is on the street.

All hail the blue tarp! Used by partying Japanese as a “table” and by homeless Japanese for building make-shift shelters.

This particular tarp served host to many different foods and drinks (both literally and figuratively). We ate food, we drank liquids. From around 19:00 to midnight. Please note that the tarp was the only thing between us and solid asphalt for 5 hours straight.

Anyways, a bit after midnight we caught the last train to Shibuya and since in Japan all trains stop going by 1am, we had to walk the rest of the way to our place of sleep on foot. The train ride took about an hour and then we walked for another hour and a half and arrived home around 3am. So much for fighting jetlag

The woman who takes care of the inn where were we are staying (Elegant Inn Yasuda) is super-nice. She has on numerous occasions let us call her in the middle of the night and opened the door for us. I guess some hotels have no curfew which is nice, but at least in Yasuda the external door is always locked so only other guests can walk out with your laptop while you’re out enjoying Tokyo. Her mother complained to me this morning saying that she is very sick and that we should stop coming in so late. She doesn’t look sick, but I certainly don’t enjoy waking up people in the middle of the night. Sick or not.

Anyways I hope Karin can finish her romance with the bucket soon so we can do some aimless wandering around Tokyo.

conteplative,
originally uploaded by zeraien.

We arrived at last.

I feel wonderful, the weather feels great and the air smells good.
I might never go back.

We had a nice lunch at shimuro ramen where we have eaten a few times before. It is sort of a tradition these days. Great ramen.

Now time to get a room somewhere.

In about 30 hours I am going to Japan. For the third time.
I totally look forward to meeting my friends, both Japanese and Swedish. Yo Nisse, that includes j00! (Ueno at 10am :))

This time I am going with Karin, my girlfriend… I feel a certain trepidation since August is not considered to be the best time to go to Japan, so I fear I might frighten her off. I myself know the greatness of Japan, but for a n00b, the climate of August might be a turn-off. I’ve heard it described as Hell by some. Let’s hope for the best!

On the bright side, Nisse, who is a hater of all things hot and a lover of cold weather has now been living in Japan for a month and has not complained about the weather.

Anyway, when the trip is so close I always get frustrated because I just want the time to pass so I can be on the damn plane. Or better yet, at the destination

Now to further pack and clean.

PS: I’ll try to blog a bit this time too.