Thoughts of Little to no Consequence

Spent the last few days wandering around Sydney.  Went on a hike on Sunday around part of the harbor, and got to see some rather interesting trees and birds.  My camera isn’t too great for taking bird pictures, but I tried.  Yesterday I intended went out to the Blue Mountains near Sydney, but fell asleep on the train and got off at some random town instead.  That was okay, the town was quite nice and quiet; they had a book store and a coffee shop so I had a nice time sitting around enjoying the sun.

No real plans for today; most likely some more Sydney wandering.

On Thursday I leave for Melborne for a few days before flying out to Bangkok on Sunday.  The cheapest flight to Bangkok transferred through at Melboure anyway, so it made sense to visit there along the way.  I’m excited about Bangkok, but know nothing about it.  Maybe that’s why it’s exciting .

[Pictures]

[Pictures]

Arrived in Sydney this morning after the overnight flight.  The flight went fine; but had a hour and a half stopover in Gold Coast where they made us get off the plane and go through security again, and somehow our luggage took 50 minutes to come off the plane.

I guess that’s the price you pay for a low-price ticket.

Staying with Douwe and Tonja for a few days.  We went for a little walk to the harbor from their house, and across the bridge.  Apparently it was built around the same time as the Golden Gate bridge, but the design isn’t really as interesting.

Now recuperating from not having slept on the flight by spending some time watching TV.

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[Pictures]

In Kobe yesterday and today; I leave for Sydney tomorrow night.  Have been relaxing a little bit since i got here; just visiting some of the shops and sitting and drinking coffee and enjoying eating all sorts of food.  I wanted to give me knee a little while to simmer down so I can hopefully avoid screwing it up again.

People in Kobe seem even more interested in shopping then the Japanese in other cities.  There is one gigantic covered shopping promenade that must run for half a mile with all sorts of a little botique stores and restaurants lining the walls.  Sadly, I can’t think of anything that I want to buy, other then a pair of sandals.  I do enjoy sitting in the cafe with my book for an hour and just watching the river of people flow by.

Smoking is still very in here; I’ve gotten so used to California and not having it around that I’m rather sensitive to the smell now.  People aren’t rude about it or anything, but the scent still drifts.  It is very easy for me to distinguish my clean clothes now; if they don’t stink of cigarette, they’re good to go.

I think I’ve stemmed the shirt loss epidemic; or at the very least, I haven’t noticed anymore making a run for it.  I also took some time to do a better stiching job on my pants, so I no longer look quite as much like a bum.  Still, hardly a work of art, but it’s not like using a half stocked hotel sewing kit while watching television is the easiest thing in the world either.  Plan B was to wander around looking so tattered and distraught that someone took pity on me and fixed my pants for me.  Fortunately I haven’t had to go down that road yet.

Probably going to watch a movie tonight and then visit another onsen tomorrow before heading out to Sydney.  My flight leaves at 10:30pm and arrives at Gold Coast at 7:30am; I would have much preferred a daytime flight, but you can’t be too picky for $350.  Once I get to Sydney I’ll spend some time with Douwe and try to figure out the rest of the trip.

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[Pictures]

Continuing on.  It started raining, and then pouring, and then just raining again for the next 5 hours or so.  I retreated into a coffee shop for a little while and read some bad fiction that I had picked up at some point.

Walked along some of the vacant streets of the town, went into an empty arcade and played some video games, which was more entertaining then I expected it to be.  Grabbed some ramen and headed back to the hotel, figuring I’d go to bed early and try to catch a bus to somewhere slightly less… wet.

As I got back to the hotel I noticed a blinking sign had been put up outside; it was announcing that some kind of reggae dance club was going in the basement.  I thought I must have had the wrong building until I went back to my room and heard the dull thudding of the dance floor percolating upward.

I figured this had to be worth checking out; for those who know it, this felt like the equivalent of a night club in Black River Falls.

I was pleasantly suprised – the music ended up being good, and I ended up dancing and looking silly for a few hours.  Some of the local kids started imitating me, which I felt was a tragedy waiting to happen.  All in all it was a fun time.  Unfortunately, when I woke up yesterday morning my right knee was swollen and cranky.  Oh well.

I caught a train briefly to Wakayama, but stayed there only long enough to take a picture of a hotel with a Santa on top and do some reading before heading on.  The hotels  and sights were all an hour from the train station, and I didn’t feel up to much walking or bus navigating at that time.

I ended up in Osaka again; went to sleep briefly, woke up tired, tried 2 different travel agencies trying to find a reasonable fare to Korea or Taiwan, and then gave up for the day and took the hour ride out to Nara, which was the old-old capital of Japan back in the 700’s.  It’s got a whole bunch of interesting sights, which I would have seen more of today had not my knee been cranky and had the rainclouds not been following me around.  Nonetheless I got to walk around some parks and saw a whole bunch of deer!  I should have suspected something when nearly all of the various signs about town had some sort of deer or anthropromorphization thereof.  Apparently they’ve been around for a long time.

Still feeling rather out of it today, despite getting 10 hours of sleep; need to figure out where to go next, but oddly enough, because of these guys it’s cheaper for me to fly 8000km to Australia then  1500km to Seoul.  I met end up flying out to Sydney tomorrow night if I can’t find something more reasonable to do around here.  Or I can venture north, but that’s costly as well.

If only I weren’t so cheap…

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[Pictures]

My original plan was to go west to the coast, and then south.  That changed when a bunch of people informed me that the west coast was boring, and I should instead head to the east, which buldges out from Osaka.

My again flawless planning led me to not reserve a bus ticket ahead of time.  Instead I got up at 7, got to the ticket counter and was informed that the first 2 buses were full; I’d have to wait for the 12:20 bus instead of catching the 8:20 like I expected.  So I bumbled around Osaka in the morning, feeling tired and trying to nap; unfortunately Osaka has a tendency to heat up to 90 degrees by 10am (or so it seems).

I eventually boarded the bus and it started out towards the coast.  We stopped for a break after about an hour; I got out and got to look out on a beautiful scene of what appeared to be a valley that had been mostly decimated by random large buildings.  Nonetheless, interesting viewing.

We then kept driving.  It turns out that the bus ride was 3 hours instead of the 2 I had for some reason assumed it would be.  Eventually I got off and appraised Shirahama.  What I had originally thought was going to be some quiet town (it’s population is 20,000) actually turned out to be some sort of resort area – decent sized hotel buildings were encroaching along the coastline.  Strangely, despite the weather being quite good, the area was very quiet.  I booked a room in a hotel that despite being as far as I could tell, quite empty, refused to give me a single room.  They also gave me a smoking room, but I don’t believe they had any other kind there.

I wandered around the beach for an hour and then spent a half hour soaking in the public bath, which felt like a good way to end the afternoon. 

Then it started raining.

Argh, I put the keyboard in Japanese mode and don’t know how to go back… more later.

Well, my *brilliant* plan to buy a last-minute ticket to Taipei worked about exactly as well as I expected.  It turns out that tickets cost a lot more if you try to buy them for a flight 2 hours later.  Who would have guessed?

So anyway, I’m in Osaka for today; I didn’t do too much, just poked around a million different little shops.  I found a new camera last night, and the memory card seems to work fine, so more pictures are coming.  I know, I know, you’re all ecstatic about it.  Had some delicious takoyaki today (battered and fried octopus balls).  I’m also developing a disturbing addiction to McDonald’s apple pies, which I know I should resist, but they’re everywhere and they only cost a dollar.

My current plan is to take a bus or train out to the west coast and go south from there, eventually getting back to Hakata; from there I can catch the “Beetle” hydrofoil to Pusan, Korea.  My rail pass expired yesterday, which means I actually have to pay for my train tickets now.  Less shinkansen, more slow-poke trains ahead for me.  That’s okay, because I can’t really say I’m in a hurry to get anywhere.

I managed to lose the hat I bought 4 days ago; I think I left it in a cafe.  This is continuing a succession of losing things; I left my notebook at the last hotel, and my shirts are evaporating at a rate of one every 2 days.  Fortunately I’ve sewn up my pants, and I still think I’ve kept all of them so far, so I’m not to worried about running out of clothes yet.  I can find shirts in my size pretty easily, pants are harder though.  Shoes… I think mail-order is the only bet.

In Hakata a server introduced me to a guy he called “Hakata’s Ichiro” (after Ichiro Suzuki, from the Mariners).  The man laughed at the comment; I assumed it was a joke.  But then as I was walking back to the hotel I noticed a giant beer advertisement with this guys face on it!  Who knew celebrities would be so accessible?  Now that I recognize his face I see him all over the place.  I guess I should have gotten his autograph or something.

The Japanese seem to have a need to be constantly doing something; every block seems to have some kind of construction project in progress.

Well, that’s it for now.  Will update more when I know where I’m going .

[Pictures]
[Pictures]

I managed to solve the problem of the missing camera battery charger.  Yesterday morning I managed to knock a bottle of water onto my pants while trudging around my room.  This instantly produced a large amount of very wet money and one expensive paperweight.

I handily repaired the money using the blow dryer, suffering only minor burns in the process.

The camera… still not working so well.

Long story short; any brilliant pictures I may have taken in Nagasaki may or may not have been destroyed by the water; I won’t know until I buy a new camera or card reader.  I’m hoping to do that shortly.

I’m back in Osaka now; today was the last day of my train pass, and it turns out that flight prices are just as strange here as in the US.  It’s cheaper for me to fly 400 miles further from Osaka to Taipei then it is to go direct from Hakata.  Oh well.  I naturally have yet to actually buy my ticket, but since I’m flying out tomorrow I should have plenty of time.

I spent one day in Nagasaki and then when back to Hakata to sleep.  Yesterday I must have suffered some kind of delayed-onset jetlag; I slept in until past noon and still felt tired the rest of the day.  I didn’t end up doing much, just caught a local train out of town and took some pictures while enjoying the sun.

Taking the trains around here is great fun; they maybe go 40%of the speed of a plane, but the seats are much more comfortable and spacious, and I don’t feel nearly as jammed in as I do on an airplane flight; even short flights like SFO to Seattle seem can be annoying.

Not much more to report.  Nagasaki was interesting but of course depressing.  All evidence of the bomb blast is gone; there’s a nice park where the bomb was detonated, a large obsidian slab marking the exact hypocenter.  Scattered around the park are fairly large (~30ft tall) statues, in a very Greek style; they have some significance related to the bomb detonation and nuclear weapons, but it was unclear exactly what they were meant to mean.

I seemed to be the only tourist there; I provided quite a bit of amusement to a group of middle-schoolers when I wandered onto a tram and couldn’t figure out how to pay.  Just doing my bit of service to keep others happy, I suppose.

Caught the train to Hakata yesterday. One odd thing about having an unlimited rail pass is that you can use a $200 train trip as an excuse to rest your legs. From Osaka by train, it’s about a 2.5 hour train ride to Hakata.

I hadn’t really planned out anything to do after Osaka, so I thought the train ride would give me an opportunity to at least figure out what I should be doing. Needless to say, I instead spent the time on the train napping and looking out the window, but at least my feet thanked me for it.

Japanese cities are so compact that they inspire you to walk all over town just idly looking at things, instead of taking the bus or subway. While my brain finds these walks fascinating and enjoyable, my right knee is currently less then pleased with me. But each time I think of taking a slow day, I end up walking around some more regardless. Oh well.

On the way to Hakata, about 25 minutes out, the train stopped at a *town called Kokura (Kitakyushu). Needless to say, being as small as it was, my guidebook had nothing to say about it. But I figured I would get off and worst case stop and drink some coffee before getting on the next train.

It turned out to be quite a nice place; it borders the ocean on the northern part of the island of Kyushu. Just walking around and smelling the sea breeze felt great. They had a nice promenade with lots of restaurants that were all closed by the time I got there, but eventually I found one that let me in.

The centerpoint of town is Kokura castle, which the residents seem very proud of. It has some very nice views of the town from atop it’s tower, but unfortunately the current castle is a replica; the original was destroyed long ago.

While on my way back to the train station in Kokura, a lady stopped me on the street and said hello. She was just curious where I was from and what I was doing in Japan. (I think I was literally the only Caucasian in Kokura that day, so I got some funny looks). She also asked me how old I was, which seems to be a common thing here (like “so what do you do?” in the US). When I told her I was 28, she almost fell off her bike.

She said I looked so much older! Not exactly what I wanted to hear. I told her it must be because I hadn’t shaved in a few days. That’s at least what I was hoping. I ended up buying a razor at the train station and shaving there; I didn’t want to waste any time!

Headed down to Hakata for the night. While wandering around I saw a bar/restaurant that looked interesting – seemed to have a blues focus. I walked in and ended up spending several hours there singing and playing guitar with a group that was hanging out. One of the people was a professional guitarist, and another a professional shamisen player, so needless to say, I didn’t spend too much time playing myself . I felt a little bad; they knew more Beatles songs then I did!

[Osaka]
[Kokura]
[Hakata]

* Town of 1.5 million people.

Spent a half day in Nagoya and then moved on to Kyoto. Kyoto is sort of the tourist mecca for the Japanese themselves, so it’s a little hectic visiting places.  I opted to only spend one day there, since Karina and I visited for a few days the last time I was in Japan.

I actually was lucky and found a nice small temple a few blocks from my hotel that was completely deserted.  I could walk up and sit in the tatami room and just think for a while, which was very peaceful.

Sadly, in true Russell fashion, while sitting cross-legged, I managed to tear a 3 inch hole in the crotch of my pants, which wasn’t quite as amusing as it sounds.  I then spent another 10 minutes in a not-so-peaceful state of mind, debating how best to get back to my hotel without getting arrested for having ugly underwear.

For dinner I had some really tasty but really greasy skewered meat, which tasted great with a beer.  The waitress recommended I try the beef heart or intensines, but I thought it would be better to stick with something I could keep down.

Today I got off at the wrong stop trying to get to Nara; instead I ended up at Fushimi Inari.  The temple complex is sprawled out over an entire hill; you walk a few miles, going further up the mountain, and walking through thousands and thousands of torii.  There must be hundreds of individual shrines as you go up; I think if I gave 10 cents at every one, I would be impoverished by the time I got through.  Maybe that’s the intent .  Towards the top they have tea shops that for a few dollars you can rest and enjoy a cup of tea or soda and look down over the town.  Sadly, the fog and bright day made my camera unhappy, so it doesn’t really do the view justice; you have a commanding overview of Kyoto from atop.

Tonight I’m staying in Osaka, we’ll see if I can stay awake long enough to get something to eat.

Pictures

• Nagoya
• Kyoto
• Osaka

Left Tokyo early this morning and traded in my rail pass voucher for a 7 day pass; now I just have to think of enough places to go so that I can make proper use of it.

Caught the train down to Shizuoka; it’s about 110 miles from Tokyo, and on the way to Nagoya where I had my hotel for the night.  The trains are pretty fast; even with a few stops nearby Tokyo it only took an hour to arrive.

For some reason Shizuoka is entirely absent from my guide book; I found this odd since it’s a city of half a million people; you would think at the very least there would be an entry that said “don’t go here, it’s boring”*.  Fortunately the train station had a tourist office and the lady there dispensed approximately 5 pounds of various maps and guides on me.  The fact that they had English pamphlets, much less such comprehensive ones was surpising, since I saw all of one non-Japanese person while I was there.  I’m starting to suspect that the Japanese may be doing these things for their own entertainment value, or so similarly nefarious reason.

In any case, I spent the day in Shizuoka napping in the nearby park and visiting the requisite statue of one-time shogun of Japan.  Sadly the statue was undergoing maintenence once I actually got to there.  The city hall building had some fantastic views of the surrounding area from it’s observation deck.  Unfortunately some fog had moved in by the time I got around to there, but it was still nice to see for miles and miles.

Then hopped on the train to Nagoya; here now.  Slept rather poorly last night so I’m going to try napping again and then go out to dinner.

* The book has actual entries that say this, albeit in a slight less abrubt fashion.

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