A Geek In Japan: Kevin's Online Japan Diary

Sunday, February 8, 2009.

Though it may be a little late in the game (seeing that I'm back in America), but I've figured out a way to make it so that you can now post comments. Click the link below to do so. You can also now comment any most previous posts.

Living Life Differently These Days
10:22 PM

Tuesday, February 3, 2009.

While food in Japan may be weird I got the ultimate heap of weirdness when I got pizza one night. This is the night before the "really big thing" I keep promising to talk about, but I figured this story was worth discussing at least once. This was the night before we were to leave Kyoto. We were looking at nearby restaurants and saw that were in walking distance (of course) of a pizza parlor. Now I knew pizza was going to be different then it was in America, but how different could it be? It was pizza for pete's sake, this was a nationwide favorite. How weird could it possibly weird.

The answer is: Pretty fricken weird.

While I was expecting them to use some unique toppings, walking into this place and looking at the menu was like looking into the human brain. I didn't recognize ANY of the combination's they had! I was amazed at some of the toppings that included (but not limited to) hard boiled eggs, squid, cherry bits, tuna, BBQ sauce (okay, that was normal), and...well, take a look for yourself...

...and I challenge you to name three of those pizzas that are familiar to you. I ordered my pizza custom made, which means it consisted of pepperoni, bacon bits, ham, and parmesan cheese (yes, the parmesan is extra) on a thin crust with red sauce. After paying ¥1,500 ($15) we walking back, I opened the box, and prepared myself.

The pizza was, in all honesty, pretty good. Lite in filling and the sauce tasted more like spaghetti sauce then pizza sauce, but it wasn't as horrifying as I expected it to be. I got one more pizza with the same toppings, when if I ever come back to this country I WILL get a pizza with hard boiled eggs on them! That just seems like too big of an invite to pass up.

Living Life Differently These Days
4:32 PM

Before I write about the rest of my journey, I figured it would only be fair to share some more photos from the Japanese museum I visited. Let's call this post "Japan Museum Part に (Two)." Some of it's interesting, some pretty, and some just plain weird. Some will come with commentary and some will not. Either way, enjoy the pictures.

The big stairway. Believe it or not, we had to go up three of these escalators before we even got into the museum.

Whenever you saw one of these signs it meant you could take a picture of that item. Some items were sacred and they didn't want you to photo them (not that it mattered, I tended to take pictures of anything I wanted to anyway ^_^).

I don't think I'll ever understand things like this, but it's surreal to say the least. Time Burton could find a lot of inspiration for his weird movies just by visiting a Japanese museum.

You might not know this just by looking at the picture, but the room is actually a model. I simply put the camera inside this glorified doll house and took a picture. The detail was so rich that my buddy asked me which room I got this picture in. I decided to be mean and said my ticket was randomly chosen to enter a replicate Japanese house of the samurai era.

Coins and jewelry were always a big part of the Japanese barter system. These days Japan doesn't value jewelry as much, prefering to use the metals for electronics and housing, but oddly enough coins are still the main way to pay for things (as opposed to paper bills, which aren't used as much).

I'm not sure what this is. It looks like the top of the Empire State Building, but I'm not convinced the Japanese had anything to do with production of "Planet of the Apes."

Living Life Differently These Days
3:42 PM

Thursday, January 8, 2009.

Just in case anyone is still checking this blog let me reassure you that, yes, the blog WILL be finished! There are a few more posts to write, I'm just busy recovering from Christmas and moving onto signing up for classes at school. I will say one thing though: I miss Japan. And when I say I miss it, I mean I really miss it. So much so that I'm having Japan withdrawls and I'm planning on going back as soon as possible. My friend told me that if I was in Japan for several months I'd actually be more happy to be in America. He's probably right, but I still want to go back for an extended period next time. Either by studying abroad or by teaching English professionally, I will be back, and I intend to stay for more then a week. Well, I got some more stuff to do, but for your patience here's a photo:

I'll share the story of it in a later post.

Living Life Differently These Days
12:24 AM

Wednesday, December 3, 2008.

So after a day of colds, plays, and sleep, the first real day in Kyoko starts. And what is the first thing I get to do? Why, worry about the camera of course...because it's stopped working. Well, okay, it works, but it needs batteries. Sadly, none of the stores around our area sells batteries that will properly work for the camera. This is enough to frustrate any tourist, so it should come as no surprise this ticks me off. Isn't half the point of this trip to take a lot of pictures? Well, thankfully this is where the vending machines come in handy, as you can buy disposible cameras from these wonderful machines for about ¥600 ($6.00), so I buy one and start clicking. One of my surroundings...

...some stores that looked interesting to me for some reason...

...and a picture of some of the locals. I haven't taken too many pictures of the Japanese because it's considered rude to take pictures of people without their permission. Well, I understand, but this is still a once-in-lifetime thing I'm doing (though not if I have anything to say about it), but seeing as how the digital camera has an automatic flash I can't take the pictures without the worry that it might go off. With this camera though I control the flash, so I took this oppertunity to take pictures of the people that make this country...

...sadly, this day turns out to get worse. See, my guide (who I am still very thankful for letting me tag along) planned to do two temples and a hike. We manage one temple (of which I don't have pictures of yet...sorry), and then the rest of the day is spent on the bus. And of what is probably the most old fashioned train station I've seen here yet...

...and this proves just how far behind Kyoto is in terms of their gadgets and gizmos. On the train I saw a couple of beautiful girls in kinomoto's, and I took a quick picture of them...

...I wish I could have gotten their faces better, but this is the sort of thing people in Tokyo simply don't wear, yet in Kyoto this fashion is more common. Well, anyway, by the time we get to the mountain site it's so dark that we can't hike. I took some pictures, but the quality is a bit bad due to the lighting issues...

...and this is where I started to miss my digital camera. While I can retake a shot of something I'm not happy with digital, with film what I got is what I got, and I won't know if I got it right until the film is developed. I've got mixed feelings about these pictures, but oh well. And these are the pictures that were completely ruined by the dark. We head home and contemplate what a waste the day was. We promise to get more done the next day.

Living Life Differently These Days
11:13 PM

Saturday, November 22, 2008.

Obviously due to me packing and heading home all of the remaining days will be posted next week...or Sunday, when the plane lands. There's more to tell, and truth be told Friday is one of the more interesting of the days, so stay tuned to find out what happens.

Living Life Differently These Days
5:06 AM

Friday, November 21, 2008.

So it’s time to go to the bus station. We have five (heavy) bags of luggage to carry around. I’m sick, and this heavy labor isn’t exactly helping my immune system. What normally would have been a thirty minute walk turned into almost an hour. I had to stop multiple times because I was close to either blowing chunks or passing out. Frankly, I wanted to do both at this point, but if I did we would miss the bus. We make it in time and we are seated in the back, I’m sweating like a mop and on the verge of exhaustion. I feel a fever is coming on. I pray that the rest of my trip isn’t ruined as a result of this. It’s not, though the night is far from over. Shortly after the bus leaves it makes a pit stop. I take this moment to buy lots of grape and orange juice. It’s a good thing I did because I would find myself waking up multiple times in the night feeling sick.

The juice helped a lot though because Japan sells the most pure juice I’ve ever had. It’s literally the fruits crushed in a juice, and I can’t taste any preservations or anything (though the orange juice does have the most pulp I’ve ever had). The bus arrives at 7:30am and we start walking…again. Now we’re in Kyoko, and while I would love to say that there’s a lot to talk about, seeing as how it was the former capital of Japan, there really isn’t. Kyoto was built on the Chinese city models. That means that everything was planned out, it has mostly straight streets, and there’s a ryame and reason to the way everything is set up. Tokyo, on the other hand, was a fishing town that sort of boomed during the economic period, which made it the crooked mess it is today. That said, crooked messes tend to be more interesting in many ways, and Kyoko just came off as a foreign New York in comparison.

Anyway, we get to our guest house and are in for a rude awakening: The place doesn’t check in till 3:00pm, and if we want to check in early it will cost us $1000 per person. Well that’s well over five hours away so we pay him and get some sleep. We stayed in another cramped room, but at least the futons were very comfortable. Though a nice room, I can’t help but feel like this place nickeled and dimed me the whole time. Laundrey? $400. Early check in time? $1000. Use of towels. $200. It was crazy, but at least the guy was nice enough to give us a car ride to the bus station on the way home a couple days later…but I’m getting ahead of myself here.
After we sleep for another couple of hours it’s time to go see a play entitled[insert name]. For obvious reasons I couldn’t take photos of the play, but I did sneak this one…

…as well as took a couple of pictures of the theater…

It was overall a very fun experience. Truth be told, it was like Japanese Broadway…only with an all female cast (something to do with tradition I was told). After the play I was feeling better, but I still wanted to get some rest. So we got dinner, went back to the guest house, and went to sleep. I know, it’s not a very exciting day overall, but just wait, the next day something even bigger happened.

Living Life Differently These Days
5:19 AM