Fantasy Vacation

Last day....

2008-04-21T04:23:00.000-07:00

We are leaving tomorrow (sad). Today we just finished up shopping for little things before we go and visited Ginza briefly. We were going to go to the big fish (Tsukiji) market but couldn't wake up early enough. No sushi for me, but I wasn't in a fishy mood at 9:30 in the morning anyway. I lost the map yesterday at Crayon House, so we didn't really know where anything was in Ginza. There was a nice toy store though, where I found a funny stuffed owl. I don't really know why i didn't buy it.

Then we went back to Shinjuku to visit two modeling agencies that were interested in Jack. One of them seemed really confused about us being there, maybe no one told them we were coming. On the way home, we found a posh beard papa (japanese cream puffs) and had one with a mango apple filling. really nice.

For dinner, we went to a shabu-shabu restaurant, which we had been looking forward to. You sit at a table with a built in hot top and get a big pot of broth. Then they give you a plate of thinly sliced, marbled beef, and a plate of fresh veg, along with two dipping sauces and rice. You toss in all the vegetables and let them cook for a while and then take a piece of meat and swirl it in the hot broth for 3-6 seconds and then eat it. It cooks really, really quickly, and I was trying to eat mine as raw as possible. I am a carnivore. When we ate everything in the pot, they spooned the broth into little bowls with seasoning and spring onion as a little miso soup to finish. It was a nice meal, but the most expensive, and not the most exciting or delicious. i think there were only westerners (round eye) in this resturant. The people next to us were american and wearing fanny packs and hiking boots and one of them was reading harry potter during her meal. let me remind you this was a fancy resturant. obviously we were the best westerners there when we left, our waitress said to me "you are very cute!"

Finally, we went to the Park Hyatt hotel to visit the new york bar on the 52nd floor. This is the hotel, and bar, in lost in translation. They even had a cheesey jazz-lite band playing. The view was amazing, but the bar was packed and I felt picture taking might be a faux pas, so i tried to be discrete as possible. I had a L.I.T. (lost in translation) cocktail with sake, cherry blossom liqueur and something else. It really felt like being in the movie, but we talked about it a lot and maybe the people next to us heard us and thought we were lame.

Sunday in the Park

2008-04-20T04:41:00.000-07:00

On sundays in Harajuku, all the cosplay kids/ gothic lolitas gather on this bridge near the station for people to admire their outfits and take their pictures. I was really looking foreward to this part of the trip, but when we got there, everyone was wearing lame 1990s mall-metal anime outfits. And a lot of them were wearing bands of fabric ties over their noses, like a blindfold, but for your nose. There were even some westerners there that were dressed up, which seemed really inappropriate. The whole thing was really disappointing. I guess maybe the area isn't cool anymore and the cool kids have gone else wear.

We walked over the bridge and headed towards yoyogi park, where there are supposed to be japanese rockabillies. The first thing we saw was a biker dressed all in black leather with the biggest hair i have ever seen. It towered at least a foot and a half above his head and didn't move at all. You could probably stack books on it.

There were three groups of rockabillies - two leather clad biker gangs and one more 50's teenager sock-hop style. They spent an hour warming up, taping their shoes, listening to music, drinking and chain smoking. Then they had a gang meeting.

Then they all started dancing, and didn't stop! It was amazing! I wanted to get my picture with them but they never stopped twisting. They were, by far, the coolest, most bizzare people we had seen. I loved them and I want to join their gang.

We grabbed lunch then walked through the cemetary in Aoyama. All the graves were mini shrines, with little altars, which i thought was really nice. There was a gaint raven there too, and a bunch of cats sleeping on the graves, how poetic.

Then we heard noise, which we though was a parade, but as we got closer and saw all the japanese hippies, figured it was a protest. As it turned out, it was a bunch of stoners celebrating 4.20.

We went to an organic resturant called crayon house that was really cute. I had some amazing pork with japanese mustard that was so succulent it would fall apart when you touched it with your fork.

The silver beats and some eats

2008-04-19T04:58:00.000-07:00

I can't believe we did so many things today! We woke up, ate good morning toast (really thick rice bread) at doutor then went to the kannon temple in asakusa, which has a giant red lantern at the beginning of a long walkway to the temple, lined with shops.

At the end of the walkway there is burning incense, surrounded by people cleansing themselves with the smoke.

We decided we weren't feeling particularly spiritual today, so we went to the Asahi beer hall, designed by Philippe Stark. The building is called the flame d'or, but everyone thinks it just looks like a gold turd. The interior was boring and tacky, so we had one drink and left.

For lunch we went to an okonomiyaki place that was AMAZING. You ordered what you wanted (we got pork, leek and kimchi) and then they gave you a bowl with batter and you mixed it all up then slapped it on your table grill and cooked it yourself. The end result is a crispy pancake/ omelet thing. With fresh veg on the side that you grilled up to your liking as well. So delicious and such a cool, really authentic japanese restaurant.

Stuffed, we went to Sunshine city in Ikebukuro, ironic because it was raining. Sunshine city is a huge mall with an aquarium, theme park, planetarium, and a dumpling stadium inside. For us, the dumpling stadium was the main draw, boasting 12 different dumpling makers who will fight for your business. Unfortunately, it turned out to be inside the the theme park, along with the 2008 Cheesecake expo we had signs for. We were severely disappointed, and hungry.

For dinner instead, we went to an amazing katsu place called Masien. It used to be an old bath house. It was really really busy and the food was amazing. However, The waiter thought I was really really strange for ordering a beer AND an iced tea, he couldn't understand why i would want two drinks. They gave us the the most delicious special sauce for our pork cutlets, and the portions were huge.

To end the busy day, we went to the Cavern club, which is a recreation of the place where the beatles got famous, and every night japan's best beatles tribute band plays there. They were really good, and most of them had hardly any accent at all. Except one guy sang "you rearry got a hold on me". Charming, to say the least.

super kawaii

2008-04-18T05:32:00.000-07:00

Studio Ghibli museum. Check.

Wow, what an amazing, magical, wonderful place. Sort of an idealistic version of disney. The museum was like a tiny little village out of a forgotten era, much like the films, if you've ever seen one. You weren't allowed to take pictures inside though, which made me sad. There were different exhibits on how animation works and displays of the artistic process, but inside little Victorian country style rooms with books and coffee cups and tiny creatures hiding in the corners. Everything was in japanese though, but it was easy to enjoy. We also got a ticket (an animation cell) to see a short film about a lost puppy. It was (of course) really cute. The cinema was cool because it has this long oval windows to light it, but when the film comes on they close up so it's dark in the theatre. One of the last things we saw was a stuffed version of the cat bus in Totoro, with japanese children crawling all over it. They were as entertaining as they were indestructible.

The hello kitty store was sadly not the kitty utopia we were expecting. Besides a huge hello kitty, there wasn't much in the shop, and what was there was typical cartoon character merchandise; pens, paper, mugs, etc. No hello kitty washing machines to be seen! We did find out about a place called 'Kitty Land' which i think is like a theme park for Hello Kitty, but I really wasn't feeling up to that at the time. I bet they have the washing machines there, though.

Exhausted from cuteness, we foolishly took a nap and woke up too late for restaurant fare, again. We though we could save our stomach with another evening of instant ramen, but alas, we chose poorly. I couldn't even stand the smell of mine, let alone taste it, and jack's came with a piece of dehydrated ham. Fortunately, we bought 7 different cans of beer to get us through the night.

Otaku

2008-04-17T10:37:00.000-07:00

The next two days in Tokyo were dedicated to being nerdy and pigging out. We consumed more doughnuts from the beloved Mister Donut than I care to say, and sampled our fare share of corner shop treats from Lawson and FamilyMart, with an occasional AMPM thrown in for variety.

Wednesday was the day for manga and anime in Akihabara, home to the nerds of japan, or otaku.

There is a whole block of manga shops, each a good 7 stories high or more. Across the street you'll find dozens of stores selling electronic equpiment, computers, video games etc. There are even a few maid cafes, you know the ones where all the waitress are dressed as anime maids with cat ears and bells and serve you heart shaped hamburgers. Jack was pleased to find that all the shops are loaded with vending machines selling pornographic plastic figurines (some assembly aquired).

I thought the best bit though was a store that had a tv out front playing a video of battles bewtween different insects. 30 different fights in total. It was like dog fighting but with centepedes and tarantulas. and lobsters and praying mantises.

Then we investigated Tokyu hands, a huge department store with sub floors (1A, 1B, etc.) divided by product category. They even have a wood shop in there! One of my favorite things about japan is that in a store with so many useful things; towels, pots and pans, glue there are also tons of completely useless things for me to lauch at!

For lunch we went to a restaurant that we thought specialized in spring onion. we were wrong, they specialized in pork and tongue and mucous yam soup. Still, we were able to have a good lunch, although I had severe stomach ache afterward, but i think it was just my tights being to...tight. Ignoring that, we went to toto superspace, a toilet showroom on the 27th floor of a building. in japan, toilets are either miles beyond what we have in the west, or porcelain holes in the ground, aka squat toilets. surprisingly, it's not uncommon to see the two next to each other in the same public restroom. This one will analyze your...deposit, and tell you how much salt, sugar, alcohol, etc. is in your body.

That evening we had amazing tempura that tasted different than any other kind i've had (it was darker in color too) and went to office, a bar themed like an office, for drinks.

hello geisha, goodbye kyoto

2008-04-15T10:07:00.000-07:00

Last night we tried to find a garlic restaurant that Jack had been to before, but some how it alluded us. Instead we had japanese pizza from Pizza La with asparagus, japanese mayonnaise, pepperoni, and corn. It was really delicious, although not as exciting as a restaurant devoted entirely to a species of onion.

In the morning we decided to stroll though the shopping arcade/ market area and then onto Gion, an older bit of the city where you can sometimes see geisha. Sadly, we didn't but we crossed the road and found a little stream with a crane and then surprise two geisha! It's supposedly very rare to see them ever, especially in the day time, even the local Japanese people around us were really excited and taking pictures. I think the two we saw were actually apprentice geisha or maiko.

For lunch I had unagi, or grilled eel with a barbecue sauce and rice. Since, jack doesn't eat fish, I didn't want to eat in at the restaurant so they wrapped up my meal in the nicest wooden box with printed brown paper, so lovely. The restaurant was amazing though and apparently the best for eel in the city.

Before we left kyoto, we did a whirlwind visit to the palace nijo-jo. my favorite part were the nightingale floor boards. everyone equeaked when you walked so no one could sneek up on the emperor. the sound was actually quite nice though. and jack told me about how no one was allowed to come with in a certain distance of the emperor so no one could execute him and how there were secret doors with guards behind them waiting to pop out. he has a degree in japanese history so he was basically in his element.

then we took a bullet train back to tokyo and i drank a sake juice box.

I've also decided to call hotel edoya 'hotel adorable' from now on. It's so cute and lovely, even the parking lot down the road has an impromptu flower garden.

Costa del suck.

2008-04-14T04:06:00.000-07:00

Kyoto has been a strange mixture awful and wonderful things. Our ryokan styled hostel is on a charming little back street, but that's basically where the cuteness stops. The building is in dire need of a little tlc, I tried to ignore it but the ceiling drip that woke me up during a downpour last night made that impossible. Then there were our futon mats and duvets with what seemed to be unwashed covers. ick, we asked for new sheets, which we were given rather unapologetically by our charming host, Mr. Grumpy. I think he is nursing a 5 year hangover/ just had a hardcore botox treatment. If you look hard enough you can see the little black raincloud hanging over his head whereever he goes. Oh, and no towels, soap, anything, and the hot water is only turned on 2 hours in the morning and 2 at night, which meant when we arrived yesterday, reeking of 2 days of travel, all we had to look forward to were cold french showers and old t-shirt dried skin. i officially hate costa del sol. what a stupid name. I was much happier sleeping in the park and eating japanese pastries.

BUT we also ate amazing instant ramen last night that came with little mayonnaise packets to put on the noodles (japanese mayo is delicious) and then had real, unadulterated (no round eyes to be seen) version today at a tiny little place packed with japanese people. yum. Then I ate icecream inside a rice-styrofoam heart, whose flavor escapes me.

All the feasting was to prepare for a bus ride up to the top of Mount Heiai to explore the many shrines and temples. It was beautiful and peaceful and of course the view was breath taking. I rang a giant bell and lit some incense to say a prayer. Then I had to say another prayer because I tried to take a picture of one of the inner shrines and felt really guilty afterwards.

Funny things.

2008-04-14T03:17:00.001-07:00

Where to start.

The "F-Cup Cookies"? Bust enhancing treats to make your wildest cup size dreams come true.

Finger slimming creams, the expected Engrish signs and of course, azn babies.

What sticks in my mind the most though, is a moment we experienced when walking up the hill to our Tokyo hotel one night. We were walking behind some of the Spanish tourists who were also staying at the hotel, a mixed group but the one you should imagine was a fairly big girl. Hips, bust, keester. Unexceptional looking but buxom. So, walking up the hill and in the other direction is an elderly Japanese man in a suit. As he approaches he purses his lips and raises his eyebrows in an expression of incredible excitement. Its the big girl. He wants her so bad, hes enchanted with her generous curves. As we walk past hes rooted to the spot and looking back at her. This is for you old man.

Please excuse my not being able to find the apostrophe key and my username. It harks from darker days.

nice things in kyoto.

2008-04-14T01:07:00.000-07:00

but i don't really understand them.

chillaxin'

2008-04-12T16:14:00.001-07:00

we arrived in kyoto at 5.30, an hour before schedule, so not only were we deprived a valuable hour's sleep (the night bus was fairly accomodating), but absolutely nothing was open. after wondering about the station in a state of hungry desperation, we decided to bite the bullet and have breakfast at mc donald's. i don't think i've eaten at a mcdonald mc donald's. i don't think i've eaten at a mcdonald's in about 7 years, but maybe it doesn't count if i'm in japan. plus, we had an amazingly healthy dinner at a korean resturant.

kimchi and ten different kinds of leaves which we wrapped around sea bream sashimi and grilled pork with peanutty spicy sauce. and i had a cocktail made by a dancing bartender.

after some rainbow boss coffee (hot in a can from a vending machine), i felt like i had washed away the poisonous food. we saw a beautiful shallow brook that was lined with small shrines and flowering plants and then came across this amazing internet cafe. you get your came across this amazing internet cafe. you get your own little wooden booth (i think there are even different luxury options) with a computer and a big cushy chair. The lights are really low (actually it7s just one huge paper lantern)and there is a see-through glass floor with a zen sand garden underneath. The computers are in a central atrium that7s surrounded by thousands of manga books all neatly organized on shelves and a free drink area. This place is so classy. But there is a japanese man in the cubicle across from me sleeping on the floor and i across from me sleeping on the floor and i can see his face peeking out from under the door. and jack just told me there is a shower room.

oh and please excuse my poor spelling on this blog. there is no spell check.

grey market?

2008-04-12T02:30:00.000-07:00

japan is kicking our collective asses. we've been waking up at 6 am and going out at 7 after hotel breakfast, only to realize most things don't open until 9, 11 if it's a cool shop, only to be completely exhausted by 5 pm. We have yet to make it to a bar because of lack of energy. but that being said, we are extremely tired because we've been out doing extremely fun things all day. tiredness + annoying (fat) travel group from the west invading our ryokan and the only computer in the hotel is my excuse for lack of blogging.

today we went to the black market, ameyoko, and there was nothing black about it. I really wanted to buy a fake chanel bag, but the ones there were either real designer with real prices or just cheap random shapeless sacks. nothing seemed dodgy or illegal, the only thing fishy was all the fish being sold.

I was a bit sad. surprisingly, the foodhall in the basement of a nearby department store was absolutely amazing, offering every kind of japanese food (and other nationalities) that you could imagine. all the women behind the counters shout at you in ultra squeeky voices as you walk past.

the national museum was nice, and it was a great day for a walk in the surrounding park. everyone was having big picnic lunches and i was jealous.

we are leaving for kyoto in 4 hours but have nowhere to go in the meantime since our bus leaves at 11 pm and we have checked out of our hotel. i think we will go to a resturant and be the slowest eaters imaginable, either that or spend the evening in a bar, a bar themed to be like an office...

Jack's big day

2008-04-11T00:20:00.000-07:00

we walked around harajuku/ cat street today and found the duffer st. george store. duffer is an english chain, i suppose, but they've opened a shop in tokyo and jack is THE model. But not in london. jut in japan. so we went to the shop and they had a big tv with all his pictures from the look book and then look books propped open all through out the store. Jack told the girl he was the model and she got really excited and had the company's PR guy come and meet us (he was just down the street) he was so nice and spoke really good english and told us if we need anything just to give him a call. He also gave us two fancy mugs because the store is celebrating it's fist birthday in tokyo. aw.

After seeing so many pictures of himself, I thought Jack need a spiritual cleansing, so we visited the Meji Shrine. There were huge barrels of sake all lined as offering to the gods.

Before we went inside we had to clean our hands and mouth before praying. You wash your left, then right, then take a sip then use the rest of the water to clean the ladle.

It was pretty touristy (i mean full of tourists), but there was a nice flower arranging exibit that no one seemed interested in.

After being spiritually cleansed, we decided we could go for more photos of ourselves and went to this place full of photo machines and teenage girls. Each one has a different theme I guess, but in the end you customize your own photos so it doesn't really matter which booth you pick.

In the evening we went to a baseball game at the tokyo dome between the giants and the swallows. Jack was so excited, I was cranky. We were cheering for the giants, the home team. There was a small blimp flying around inside and hundreds of these 'beer girls' wearing what looked like brightly colored football kits carrying kegs on their backs to dispense beer for anyone with a fiver.

The giants won in the end, thanks to one of the few american players and i think the only black person on the team who threw some really intense fast balls and struck the opposing team out completely in the final inning. The cheering section was amazing.

rain rain, go away!

2008-04-10T16:55:00.000-07:00

It's been pouring all day. Still, we headed off to tokyo bay this morning to visit the museum of emerging sciences. The man-made industrial/suburban island is worth visiting, if not just for the compulsory yet amazing monorail ride over the city, but for the small replica of the statue of liberty and 7 story malls, with wonderful and useful stores... like Captain Santa.

The museum of emerging sciences wasn't all that great, but we did see the most amazing robot. It's perfectly balanced and can walk, even run, almost just like a person. We also saw ourselves though a heat sensitive camera and discovered that my nose is green, while the rest of my body is orange (i.e. much much colder). The museum attendant, who spoke very good english was explaining the camera to us and said "we use in airport so if you have bird flu, we find you!" then laughed maniacally.

in the future, we will drive our cars using over sized coffee cups.
There was a huge group of school girls coming into the building as we were leaving. I said to Jack, 'I dare you to wave to them' and he did. The response from the over excited preteens was overwhelming. they waved at us through the huge glass window for about 3 minutes.

sole searching

2008-04-09T16:14:00.000-07:00

Jack and I decided to walk to the tokyo dome today, since we were wide awake at 6 am today (though i have to say that our futons and concave foam pillows are extremely comfortable) we figured nothing would be open so early so we might as well take our time walking. We went to the nearby garden, Kintanomarn Koen, and were early enough to catch the gounds keepers weeding and cutting the grass by hand! It was really charming. The garden was beautiful, with blossoming trees and every watery bit filled with huge carp. We followed the paths all around the garden, many of which were steep rocky steps; unfortunate for me as i was wearing heels because i wasn't expecting to do any hiking in the inner city. At least I looked glamorous doing it.

The rest of the day consisted of many japanese hip-hop shops around shinjuku and harajuku as we sought out new trainers and the APC jeans so coveted by Mr. Fantasy.

At about 5 my feet were aching and my heels were looking worse for wear. we went home to nap, but woke up at 9:30, too late for tempura, but just the right time to try a MOS burger, which was a bit like a chilli cheesedog, but a burger. And delicious.

As we were walking home we saw a completely wasted japanese business man emerge from a bar, looking like he had just won the lottery. He was dancing (or swaying?) in the street while hailing a taxi.

arrival.

2008-04-09T09:29:00.000-07:00

we arrived in japan yesterday around 3.30 pm. The flight (ANA) was one of the best i've experienced; tv screens on every seat, with a wide selection of films (we watched golden compass) and even a few video games, decent food, and very friendly staff. We sat next to the asian version of Patsy from Ab Fab, who threw back glasses of cava and chardonnay non-stop with her gold and diamond encrusted talons. The landing was a bit rough due to wind, and I was certain I would be sick (it really wasn't that bad I just have a horrible constitution) but luckily we left the plane vomit-free.

Our hotel, Hotel Edoya, is not only easy to find but extremely charming.The room is a traditonal ryokan with tatami matts and lots of sliding doors. It's very minnamilst and very japanese.

We also get an amazing (free) breakfast every morning. Today I had rice, miso soup, japanese omeltte, some random pickled things, and a bean salad.

Last night, jack and I went to a kushi-age resturant in Uneo called Hantei. They bring you 6 different dishes for each course then ask if you want to continue. We had an assortment of fresh veg with an amazing miso dipping sauce, and a bunch of tempura fried morsels; lotus root with meat, scallop, shrimp, whole, little fish, tofu, and squid with some sauce which was the worst thing i've ever tasted in my life. It was, otherwise, delicious, and jack even tried a scallop, shrimp, and fish, despite rampant seefood-phobia.