DAY 82 - Nara, Japan

Hello there. Last posting from Japan today. I've had a fantastic time here, but I can't wait to get to Sydney. I've had enough of rice, polite smiles, temples and bottom-washing loos to last me a few years. Australia will be familiar, English speaking and rice-free (well, at least there'll be an alternative). I've just discovered though that my two favourite pubs have both closed down, which has put a slight damper on it.

 

On Sunday we arrived in Beppu. It reminded me of Eastbourne in winter (coastal, wet, with a faded seaside glamour - but hot). The draw there were the thermal baths (Onsen) and volcanic springs. Each spring cost Y400 to have a look at, but the quality varied considerably. The places that only really had a small pool of coloured water or spring to look at tried to jazz up their attraction with displays of fish, animals or gardens, which were invariably rubbish. The most disappointing was the geyser, where we waited 20 minutes to see a small column of water strain to raise itself a couple of meters above the ground. Was a bit like watching a sink backing up. The best had fantastic Japanese gardens and lots of hot bubbling pools of varying coloured liquids and mud.

 

We had two main meals in Beppu. On the first night we had sushi on a conveyor belt - only i hate fish. Luckily they'd branched out of just seafood and had little burgers on rice and chicken nuggets on rice too. Very civilised. The second night we had all you can eat and drink for £14 which was a big mistake. Not saying anything else.

 

We also decided that this would be the place where we gave up the hotels and stayed in a Ryokan, a traditional Japanese Inn. The room had paper walls and dividers, and you had to leave your shoes at the main entrance and wear slippers everywhere (provided, but for people with feet considerably smaller than mine). Also, there were no showers in the rooms - we had to use the communal onsen on the ground floor and wander around in a dressing gown the whole time. All very interesting but two nights was enough. One peculiarity was the camera outside the room so they could see when you went out. Twice a day they'd pop in to change the table to a bed and back again, moving all your stuff around in the process. Grrrr....

 

Final destination in Japan is Nara. It took a while to get here and it's a nice enough place, but it's main draws are... you guessed it.... temples. We saw one set today and gave up. The flight goes at 21:50 later tonight and we've another day of temples to get through until then. Groan...

 

Rich.

 

DAY 77 - Kumamoto, Japan

There's a story "doing the rounds" that a Japanese / Korean / Chinese (delete as appropriate) bloke was opening a new shop and he wanted to print its name in English as well as Japanese / Korean / Chinese on the sign above the door. He thought he could save a bit of money by putting his shop name into a translation website. He did this, then had the full size sign made and mounted. On the opening day, someone pointed out that "Translator Server Error" probably wasn't the correct translation. The English in Japan are better than in China - but not by much, and you can't help but wonder where they get their translations...

Matsumoto is a small town in the Japanese Alps. It's a much nicer place than Morioka: more cosmopolitan, with more going on and fantastic mountain views from almost all street corners - a sort of Windermere to Morioka's Croydon. We got a very expensive bus up into the mountains, but any idea that we might be one of a few souls striding around the isolated hills Heidi-style was soon dispelled. There were literally hundreds of people there, all being herded, military-style onto and off the buses. The routes were all marked out and took advantage of the only flat bit of land for miles. Despite the easy access and remarkably unchallenging terrain, the Japanese were taking their days out very seriously. Most had all the gear on, heavy boots, waterproofs, walking sticks, etc. The walking sticks were mostly of the ski pole design and were handled almost like offensive weapons - on numerous occasions i came that close to having my feet skewered by some granny looking at her own feet (instead of where she was going) and charging along like someone who felt the countryside was something to endure rather than enjoy. And just to destroy any hope of getting back to nature, there were the ubiquitous convenience stores and vending machines every mile along the route. That said, the mountains themselves still managed to retain some majesty and there were even stretches (at the furthest distance from the bus station) where you could walk a few minutes without running into a tour group.

Next day we had a look around the town and the very impressive castle. It was a reconstruction as most of the big old buildings in Japan were knocked down the the late 1800s as Japan industrialised. There were a lot of steep steps. Many buildings here have wooden floors and they make you take your shoes off before entering. This is fine, but some places, as here, make you carry them around with you. It's very difficult to navigate the stepladders through the building with a pair of shoes dangling from your arm, and twice as hard for the army of pensioners that descend on these tourist attractions every day. Bottlenecks form and tempers fray. Mine mainly.

Nagasaki was next. As well as the obvious draw of the atomic bomb related sights, the place has an interesting history as Japan's "Gateway to the West". For several hundred years it was a foreign trading post for the European powers, so it has some interesting colonial-style architecture (which didn't get destroyed in the war) and gardens.

The food is still a on-going source of experimentation and amusement. Dan seems to be living on a constant stream of curry donuts and Iain eats anything and everything non-stop throughout the day - and is still losing weight. We've diagnosed a tapeworm.

Had a bit of horse last night. Tasted like beef jerky.

Now in a place called Kumomoto which has (another) castle - this time not as impressive as Matsumoto. I almost caused a diplomatic incident by taking my shoes off the wrong side of the line which (rather arbitrarily) divides the inside from the outside of the building. The Japanese can be rather anal when it comes to these things. It was an honest mistake but judging by the fuss, you'd think i'd burnt the place down or something.

The weather here is really oppressive - very hot and very humid.

Today we took a train, then bus, then cable-car up a volcano and oww'ed and ahh'ed at the steam and gas coming out of the top. That was as far as many of the other tourists got - they promptly took the cable car back down again after 10 minutes gawping. We decided to have a hike around the rim and climbed up one of the neighbouring peaks, naka-dake, for a better view. We had a picnic at the top which was all very civilised. Dan appears to be worn out by the beauty of the countryside cos it's only five in the after noon and he's asleep already...

To sum up Japan - fantastic countryside, really ugly cities.


Rich.


*** For maps, pics and stuff, see www.energiser.net ***

DAY 70 - Morioka, Japan

We had arranged to meet Dan's friend Iain Runcie at Tokyo airport where he would be joining us for the next three weeks while we're in Japan. He used to live here and speaks and reads some of the language which should be quite useful. He also has a number of friends in Tokyo and, after one of them picked us up from the airport and drove us to the hotel, we went out for some food with a group of locals. The restaurant was very traditional with no English spoken (or on the menus) and was the sort of place we would never get to try on our own. The flip side of this was that we had to take our shoes off on entering. This definitely affected our appreciation of the smell of the food given the extended washing cycle our clothing is operating under. Everyone was very polite though.

Japanese people are sooo polite. It makes you want to be polite back. It can be quite embarrassing at times.

Over the next couple of days we did some of the usual tourist sites in Tokyo. I've been there before but didn't mind seeing a few places again like Asakusa (temples and stalls) and Shinjuku (light pollution and mobile phone shops). I also got to go to the National Museum this time (which was shut on my previous visit). One new "experience" though was to go to a Karaoke Kan. My singing is renowned throughout England for its deep resonant quality and the expert tonal control i have, so it was an opportunity for Dan and Iain to have a private performance. You basically hire a small room (think broom cupboard) with a TV, large remote (to select your songs), a couple of microphones and lots of flashy lights. You then get one hour to scream to high-heaven and lose your voice, which we did. Great fun. I just hope the rooms were sound proof.

On Monday one of Iain's friends drove us to Nikko, about 100 miles north of Tokyo. It's another shrine complex, but a particularly big one. This was the first time I'd really got out of the cities while in Japan, and the countryside was worth the long drive.

Wednesday we took the train up to Morioka. (We've got rail passes which are only available to foreign tourists and allow you to go anywhere in Japan by train for two weeks for £230. Bargain.) It's a nice place but totally impenetrable. They clearly don't get many western tourists up here. No-one speaks English and although the restaurant names and the headings on the menus are written in English, it's impossible to work out what you're ordering as the rest is only in Japanese. I could hardly expect more: the menus in London aren't in Japanese, are they? It's funny that wherever you look, you see western influences but they usually turn out to be only skin deep. There are a couple of McDonald's, but they're the only American chain here. Almost all the other places sell exclusively Japanese style food. Fortunately most places (even posh establishments) either have pictures of the food or plastic mock-ups of their meals (!) to distinguish random-meat-product-'A' from random-meat-product-'B'.

One curious observation we've made is the random use of English on T-Shirts. People walk around - and we've seen this all over Asia - with completely meaningless statements on their chests. Clearly they don't know the meaning of what they're wearing. We saw a girl who couldn't have been a day over six years old with "I am bitch" written on her front. Weird.

Since we got here we've made good use of the rail passes and have been on local excursions to various temples and the like. Definitely suffering shrine-fatigue now though. It's difficult to maintain your interest on your one hundredth temple. There's not a lot of variation in design between one and the next.

On Friday we were going to climb the local volcano but it rained so we went to the cinema instead. Well, it would have been muddy and all that sulphur is a bitch to get out of your clothes...

Convenience stores are a laugh. There are at least two on every street, and they all sell pretty much the same stuff: rice pots, cans of coffee, grape Kit Kats, beer (in at least 7 sizes); you get the idea. The Japanese are renowned for having healthy, long lives. You wouldn't think it possible with all the crap that's sold in their shops.

Today we had another excursion to Kakunodate. It's a small town, laid out on a feudal plan with lots of old Shogun houses. It was very pretty if slightly underwhelming. Had a bit of a hangover from last night. Went to a restaurant where you could have as many drinks as you could down in 90 minutes for 1,200 Yen (£6). The beer is quite expensive here otherwise so this was a real bargain. The locals don't drink much, so we probably drank the restaurant's entire profit for the day away. Oops.

Rich.

DAY 62 - Seoul, South Korea

Hi

Well, i've been to my first war zone now. I'm pretty sure i'm not dead. Not sure what i can do to top that. By the way, there are loads more pics and now even some video on the blog (http://www.energiser.net/).

We flew into Seoul on Tuesday. The airport is so far out of the city it could well be in a different timezone, so it took forever to get to the hotel. There're not a lot of western tourists here which was a surprise and we got some funny looks sat on the Metro with our rucksacks, i can tell you. Clearly the locals aren't used to backpackers. That said, there are loads of American military types. They've got a huge base slap-bang in the middle of the city in Incheon, and it's patrolled by large numbers of security men wielding batons and pepper sprays, looking disconcertingly bored. Another consequence of their presence is that around the base there are lots of western shops and bars selling alcohol (and other 'stuff') at inflated prices - the whole area's quite seedy, actually.

The room in the hotel is small but was cheap. The towels are the size of serviettes and the toilet's in the shower, so every time you use the shower the loo roll disintegrates into paper mache, but at least the aircon works.

On Wednesday we did the obligatory tour of temples, although they're not as impressive as the ones in China. The weather is very hot and humid making long walks quite hard work. Had sausage and chips on a stick for tea. The stick runs through the sausage. God knows what they use to weld the chips to the sausage.

Starting to suffer from The Curse Of Asia. No cheese. We'll, they have processed cheese which tastes like rubber and sticks to your teeth so firmly that you need a chisel to remove it. Will be having cheese on toast every day, twice a day when i get to Australia.

Of course, Korea is probably most (in)famous for the fact it's split in two. There's a 4km demilitarised zone (DMZ) running down the middle separating the communist north from the 'free' south. It says something about the place that despite the ongoing tensions, both sides turn have turned the area into a tourist attraction. We visited on Thursday. There are a lot of rules and regulations when they drive you past all the barbed wire and mine fields (oh yes, they're still there) and in most places you're not allowed to take pictures (which is very annoying), but technically they're still at war, so it's definitely a unique tour.


The UN runs the south side of the zone and they make you sign a disclaimer saying you understand the UN can't guarantee your life while you're on their turf, but hey, its too late to turn back. A South Korean tourist was shot dead on the border by a North Korean soldier a few months ago for wandering off the official path. I carefully placed the other tourists in the group between me and the North Koreans while we were wandering about. It pays to be careful.

The highlight of the tour is to go into the one building where both North and South Koreans can enter and meet. They use it for negotiations and it straggles the border at Panmunjom. You only get a few minutes there though as the North start to bring their tourists in at the same time, just to be annoying. While you're there the North Koreans soldiers try to intimidate you by unstrapping their guns and staring menacingly at you. However, its the one place where the ceasefire treaty says tourists can photograph them, which is a good, if petty, way of getting your own back (before making a quick exit).

This visit also means i've legally been to North Korean (tick). To take a tour of the North costs a non-North Korean thousands of quid a day for the privilege, and they get cancelled at no notice with no refund if Mr Kim is having a bad hair day.

The rest of the tour (apart from walking down a tunnel the North dug to try and invade the South but which was discovered before they could use it), was an anti climax. They even tried to pass off a deserted railway station as an attraction. Yawn.



Climbed a hill in the centre of the city today and had a packed lunch while taking in the views. It then started to rain, so after a quick visit to an old prison built by the Japanese during their occupation to incarcerate the Korean "patriotic ancestors" (sic), we went back to the hotel.

DAY 58 - Beijing, China

The train from Ulaan Baator to Beijing promised so much but delivered so little. On boarding we found a modern, clean car with three toilets, a shower and even little TVs above each berth. In practice, none of this mattered because we had the most unhelpful, bad tempered, awkward, evil cabin attendant in all train-dom. She kept two of the toilets permanently locked and only opened the other for a half hour at a time at random points on the trip causing massive queues. She kept turning the TVs off mid film and refused to put the air con on for much of the trip. The cow. We were sharing our cabin with two Norwegian girls. She particularly didn't like them because they were better looking than her and could manage a smile occasionally.

I was last in Beijing in 2001 and found the place quite intimidating. There was no English anywhere and i had to count to dots on the subway map to try and work out where to get off. How things have changed. Apparently there's some sort of sporting event going on here. You wouldn't know if it wasn't for every billboard and every lamppost being draped in banners stating "Beijing 2008"; if it wasn't for speakers blurting out the official Olympic theme at top volume in every public park, square and space; if it wasn't for all the little ladies rushing up to help you every time you stop moving for more than 5 seconds. Actually, after Russia, everyone here has been fantastically helpful. Half the population appears to have been on an English course (although most of the official written translations, e.g. in museums, are still rubbish). And best of all on only 14 occasions has someone rolled up some phlegm in the back of their throats and spat in front on me. Compared to last time, that's nothing.


The food here has been very interesting with a huge choice, although we haven't strayed too far into the erm, really different stuff. The Peking duck was ok if a little fatty, but we skipped on the sheep's testicles and donkey dumplings. The night market had the most exotic dishes but the best meal was at a Manchurian restaurant today with massive portions and beer for all under a fiver. The food was very similar to the stuff you'd get in a takeaway back home (except everything didn't taste of fish).

On the first day we had a long walk through the main sights. It was raining most of the day with a particularly heavy downpour in the morning. It was good to see the Forbidden City again outside of a tour, which in 2001 went straight through the middle of the complex with barely a minutes rest to take a breath. We spent the evening in a rather garish bar area by the side of a lake supping the local brew and watching drunks paddle in duck boats. No fatalities witnessed.

I've a particular aversion to Chinese tours as they tend to spend most of the time taking you to shops for a hard sell, but it was the only way for us to get to the Great Wall given our Mandarin is a bit limited. So yesterday we decided to go to the Mutainyu section of the wall rather than the usual Balading section as it was supposed to be quieter. The weather had improved no end, but as expected we had an hour and a half of the "day" tour at the wall and then two shops for the rest of the day. The silk factory was particularly mind-numbing.

For our final day here we went to the Temple of Heaven. The sun was really strong and by 14:00 we'd had enough. We had an early lunch, some beer and and early night. Got a morning flight tomorrow to Seoul...

Rich.