I Think I'm Turning Japanese

We've been reunited with Debbie's computer charger, which means it's time to update y'all on our ongoing travels in Japan! It's Corey at the helm this time - I know, I know, very disappointing indeed. Perhaps you'll bear with me anyway.

We left off on March 23rd, our first day in Tokyo, which was Day 1 of a whirlwind 4 day span that saw us visit 4 different cities (Tokyo, Osaka, Nara, and Kyoto). After an exciting but exhausting first day in Tokyo (Debbie's first blog post from the trip), we headed south on the Shinkansen bullet train to Osaka. It took us about 3 hours to get there, where we were greeted by our friend Daniel, my former Oxy roommate (now a resident of nearby Nara). The three of us located a restaurant for lunch, featuring the Osaka specialty Okonomiyaki (a pancake-style, omelette-esque dish). Daniel's Japanese-speaking skills came in particularly handy at that joint. Next, we headed over to Osaka Castle for some sightseeing. The 8 floors of exhibits within the castle were a beast by staircase, but pretty interesting. We followed that up with a venture to some town whose name eludes me, where we settled in for a kushi-fest of fried skewers. After strolling around a bit, we took a train out to Daniel's apartment in Nara and called it a night.

Debbie's beef and vegetable okonomiyaki pancake

A view of the beautiful Osaka Castle, from inside the outer moat

 The following day, we ventured out to a nearby grocery store to pick up lunch (and so Daniel could explain various local foods to us). In the afternoon, we roamed with the deer in Nara Park, a beautiful green landscape. Now I know what it's like to be licked by a deer! The polite/well-trained ones would even bow to us, hoping for food in return. Around 4:30, we reached the nearby Todaiji Temple - we barely made it before the 5:00 closing time. But we were very glad we did, after viewing the massive Buddha statue and other fantastic objects. At night, we gorged ourselves on all kinds of yakitori at a terrific restaurant in Nara. We considered a late-night karaoke outing, but decided it was wiser to get back to Daniel's and get some sleep.

Fresh green tea dango (mochi-like dessert) being pounded in a wooden bowl. Debbie bought one for a yummy snack!

Deer diary: today, I kissed a human. (It's late, forgive us...)

The large Buddha in Todai-ji Temple, surrounded by many mini Buddhas.

On the morning of Monday the 26th, we worked on some logistics for the trip. For one, we finally realized Debbie's computer charger was missing, so we had to call the hotel in Tokyo - Daniel's Japanese skills again saved the day, as we discovered that the hotel still had the charger and would hold it for a few days until we returned to Tokyo. Then we ate a light breakfast of tomago and croissants, booked our final hotel of the trip (for our last 2 days in Tokyo), got directions to our Kyoto hotel, said 'Sayonara' to Daniel, and hit the road. The JR trains eventually got us to Kyoto Station, where we had a quick udon lunch before walking about 15 minutes to our hotel near the Gion district. We checked in around 3:45, and realized that our original itinerary (a trip to the Golden Pavilion) wasn't feasible since the Pavilion was pretty far away and it closed at 5:00. So we took our time settling in to the hotel, and walked out along the Kamo river to the geisha district of Gion for the evening. The streets were lit by brilliant red lanterns, many of the restaurants seemingly didn't even have signs or names, and the shops were buzzing with people. Toward the end of the main street, we stumbled into an unbelievable restaurant offering an all-you-can-eat shabu-shabu experience for about 2,000 yen a person (or $25 USD, tax/tip included as always in Japan). Considering the exorbitant prices for just about everything here, this was like finding gold at Sutter's Mill, especially since Debbie had been wanting to try shabu-shabu all trip. We actually went for a yaki-shabu combination instead, which gave us the option of grilling (yakitori) or shabu-shabu (a steaming pot of broth). Between the two of us, we went through 4 beef platters and 2 vegetable platters. The restaurant was traditional in the sense that we had to remove our shoes, and we sat on the floor at a low table - but it had the added benefit of a large hole underneath the table where we could dangle our legs. It remains our favorite meal of the trip. We walked back to our hotel afterwards, content but tired, and called it a night.

Sunset along the Kamo River between our hotel and the Gion district.

Lanterns lined the streets in Gion and the Geisha district.

Yaki-Shabu = foodie-heaven.

Tuesday the 27th was our first full day in Kyoto, and we packed our schedule pretty full. With most of our desired destinations only open from 9:00 to 5:00 or so, and with the added strain of fitting the Golden Pavilion into an already-full schedule, we knew we had to hit it early. So we were up by 7:30 and on the road by 8:15, reaching Ginkakuji (the Silver Pavilion, which is ironically not silver at all) a little after 9:00. This scenic temple was the first in the mile-long stretch known as the Philosopher's Walk. We caught 5 or 6 temples along the way, spending the most time at Eikando Temple. Although less-hyped than its brethren Ginkakuji or Nanzenji, we were blown away by the views, the pagoda, and mostly the interior shrines and artwork - no pictures coming of that aspect, as they were not allowed for religious reasons. The Philosopher's Walk, including exploration of the temples, took us about 4 and a half hours. We desperately wanted to fit in another sight for the afternoon, so we hauled ourselves to the subway and raced to Nijo Castle. In the interest of spending more time at the Castle (which started to shut down at 4:00 and closed for good by 5:00), we snagged a packaged lunch from a nearby 7-Eleven and wolfed it down on the street in 10 minutes flat. We got into the castle around 2:30, which proved to be ample time to see the gardens, moats, and artwork that make it such a popular destination. We met some English-speakers and debated what country they were from - Debbie thought Germany or Russia, I said Poland. Eventually we asked them - I was right, of course, Warsaw all the way. Most interesting to us was the purposely squeaky wooden floors, called nightingale floors, designed to alert the residents to any unwanted intruders. After an hour-long break at our hotel, we bussed up our street to a popular shopping and restaurant area to look for dinner (for all 3 of our days in Kyoto, we took advantage of a 500-yen bus pass - roughly $6 per day but much better than the prevailing 220-yen-per-trip flat rate). Debs chose a terrific conveyor-belt sushi restaurant (137 yen a plate), while I opted for something more familiar, an all-you-can-eat-and-drink dinner at the nearby Shakey's Pizzeria. After finishing her sushi (with some stashed away for later), Debbie found me at the Shakey's and eventually we headed back to the hotel together. We were asleep by 11:00, as we planned for another big day.

Rock garden and the Silver Pavillion (Ginkakuji)--which isn't silver at all!

Corey standing in one of the many beautiful gardens we strolled through along the Philosopher's walk.

Pagoda at the top of the grounds of Eikando temple. We took a few-minute break here and listened to the sounds of Kyoto.  Debbie even got to practice a small bit of yoga (it seemed fitting in such a serene location)!

Bridge over a peaceful pond on the grounds of Eikando Temple.

Exterior moat and guard building at Nijo Castle.

Conveyor belt sushi (Kaiten Sushi) at its finest!

Wednesday the 28th took us first to Kinkakuji (the Golden Pavilion), which outclassed its 'Silver' compatriot by actually being made of the promised material. It was shorter than we'd expected, without much additional land to explore, so that gave us a chance to visit the nearby Ryoanji and Ninnaji temples. Ryoanji hosts a world-famous rock garden that the signs hilariously claimed looked like a tiger cub and its mother crossing a river (what????). On our bus to Ninnaji, we met a guy from San Diego who had flown business-class in order to spend a whopping 3 days in Kyoto on vacation. Apparently being a Philosophy Ph.D. who considers surfing his 'full-time job' has its perks. With a successful morning behind us, we hopped on the bus down to the Imperial Palace and snagged a quick udon/soba noodle lunch at a local place. We planned to take a 2 PM English tour of the Palace, but couldn't manage to locate the starting point of the tour within the 25 minutes we had allotted. As it turned out, we probably would have needed reservations anyways, so we failed to get the tour and we were locked out of the interior Palace as a result. However, exploring the scenic Imperial grounds was a worthwhile substitute, as the plum blossoms were exquisite. And it gave us time to hit one more location for the day, the breathtaking Kiyomizudera Temple. Between the crowded line of shops leading up to it, a cool orange gate and a red pagoda, the entrance is hard to beat. Once we were in, we were bombarded by the smell of incense, nice views of the city, and a few minor shrines. We came back to our hotel around 6:00 and tried to find a restaurant that would show the Mariners-A's game at Tokyo Dome, the first game of this MLB season, which started at 7:00. We found one, a nondescript Irish pub with a friendly bartender and not much else. Still, our food (an Irish stew and a bolognese pasta) was better than expected, and the game moved quickly. We left at the 7th inning stretch and got back to our hotel by the top of the 9th - it turned out our hotel TV had the game after all. However, in an affront to sports fans everywhere, the local TV station pre-empted the end of the game in favor of a bizarre dating show at 10:00. We went to sleep shortly afterwards.

Kinkakuji, the (aptly named) Golden Pavillion.

Miniature version of Ryoanji's rock garden. Do you see the tiger cub and its mother? Yeah, neither do we...

 

Plum blossoms (and their admirers) in Imperial Park.

Cold beef soba (Debbie's) and beef udon (Corey's) lunch.

The stunning gate and pagoda at the entry to Kiyomizudera Temple.

Thursday the 29th brought us first to Sanjusangenden-do, a Buddhist statuary near our hotel in Kyoto. It was absolutely spectacular, with 1,001 Kannon statues lined up in 100 consecutive rows and fronted by all 28 of the Guardian gods of Buddhism. Apparently it is quite rare to have all 28 in a collection, and they were all very cool. There was also a massive Amida Buddha at the center of the hallway, and a monk was actively chanting prayers in front of it, which was neat to see. Debbie and I both lit an incense stick as an offering - she hilariously and inadvertently threw hers into the money slot so the slot was smoking. As Sanjusangen-do is one of the few Japanese structures that HASN'T burned down in the past 700 years, she was careful to alert someone and they took it out. Pictures were expressly forbidden throughout the structure, so this description will have to do. We quickly stopped back at our hotel to pick up our stuff and check out, and we caught a bus down to Kyoto Station around 11:15. I finally caved and picked up some McDonald's for lunch, while Debbie had her leftover sushi from the conveyor-belt place. We ate on the 11:43 Shinkansen bullet train that took us back to Tokyo, arriving at about 2:00 PM. We got a great view of a snow-capped Mount Fuji along the way. We doubled back to our former hotel in Ginza and grabbed Debbie's computer charger - huzzah! Eventually we found our next hotel, the traditional ryokan Hotel Edoya in the Ueno/Akihabara area. Much more spacious than our previous hotel rooms, it features tatami-mat style floors, futon beds and a community bath area. We settled in briefly, and then took off for the Tokyo Dome, about a 20 minute walk from our hotel. We got there around 5:40, in time for the 6:00 Mariners-A's game that originally sparked this crazy trip idea. My impressions of the game were that it wasn't THAT different from a typical MLB game, despite the foreign locale. The stadium was certainly a bit unusual, particularly the short outfield bleachers. The biggest cultural difference we saw was that the beer vendors physically carried miniature kegs on their backs as they combed the aisles, and dispensed the beer from a tap whenever one was bought. The vendors (all of whom were young women) certainly get a workout! So did our feet, because we cheaped out and bought standing-room-only seats for $18 apiece (the cheapest regular seats were around $60). Of course, the Japanese fans went nuts any time local hero (and Mariners star) Ichiro Suzuki was involved. He had a quiet 0-4 night, though he did have a nice leaping catch in the outfield that brought big cheers. A few home runs provided the scoring, with the A's taking it 4-1. We got sandwiches from a Subway across the street for dinner - the guys working there were kind enough to open their doors even though it was 3 minutes past closing. After that, it was bed time.

A picture of a picture... A small view of the 1000 kannon statues inside of Sanjusangen-do.

We finally got to see Mt. Fuji! A clear day provided nice views of the awe-inspiring mountain on our bullet train ride from Kyoto to Tokyo.

The living room area in our traditional Japanese hotel room.

Taking in the sights and sounds of the Tokyo Dome!

One of the four types of beer being hoisted around the stadium in keg-backpacks (by beautiful and leggy young women).

Today (Friday the 29th) has been more relaxed, relative to the pace we'd been setting in Kyoto. We had a complimentary breakfast downstairs, surfed the internet, and drew up a battle plan for the weekend. First on the agenda was a trip to Ueno Park, legendary for its cherry blossom trees. Not so 'b-Ueno' was the lack of cherry blossoms at present - they are literally a day or two from opening up. People are already camped out there in anticipation. Still, the park was nice, and we enjoyed an hour-long row-boating adventure on one of the ponds. Lunch (a turkey leg, roasted corn, fried Japanese yam wedges, and a chocolate covered banana) was provided by street vendors that have popped up in advance of the cherry blossom onslaught - those guys will make a killing as people stream in soon. An unexpected surprise came afterwards, when we came across a series of Rodin sculptures outside a museum in the park. Particularly inspiring was his 'Gates of Hell' piece, which was flanked by separate sculptures of Adam and Eve. Next, we ventured to Kappabashi street, which was way more fun than either of us really expected. The whole street is filled with stores whose sole purpose is to stock Tokyo's restaurants with whatever supplies they need. From industrial-size mixers to giant display cases to plastic food to beautiful knife sets, it's truly a kitchen extravaganza. Like most shops here, the aisles are narrow and the walls are piled high - in some cases, these shops were even 3 stories! After almost 2 hours combing Kappabashi, we took the JR (rail) to Okachimachi, a cool area with lots of restaurants and a maze-like array of shops. We eventually found a restaurant that gave us a memorable meal, mostly due to our close proximity to the kitchen and its insanely fast-paced staff. The waiter/manager/track star who served us quickly became our friend, and he actually gave us one of the restaurant's t-shirts as a souvenir on our way out. He was so nice! It helped that all the dishes (from Debbie's ramen salad and freshly-made tofu to my pork skewer, fried rice and chicken meatball) were very tasty. She stopped by a conveyor-belt sushi place for a supplemental meal afterwards as planned. After that, it was back to the hotel and this (ridiculously long) blog post.

Corey rowing us around the lake in Ueno Park.

Our first glimpse of newly-opened cherry blossoms. This was one of 3-4 trees that had any open flowers. The rest were still buds, although obviously very close to blooming.

One of the larger groups already staking out their cherry blossom viewing site.

The Gates of Hell is an incredibly intricate piece of bronze work. It took Rodin 37 years to sculpt this!

One of the many jam-packed shops along Kappabashi Street.

The incredible wait staff and chefs at tonight's dinner. Our waiter is in blue, behind the counter. The restaurant was swamped, so he jumped back there to help get the food out. These guys were literally running! It was amazing (and delicious)! :)

Tomorrow we're going to the Space Science Center in Yokohama for a visit with Debbie's Dad's best friend's daughter (you follow?) Nan and family, perhaps followed by a night outing in the youth-oriented Roppongi district. Sunday will probably feature the Shinjuku and Shibuya areas, including the Shinjuku Garden, Meiji Shrine, Yoyogi Park, and the government buildings. Hope you all have enjoyed!!!!