Our Final Day...

As it was our final day, we decided to take a daytrip to the famous Nara Koen (Nara Park). Its so huge. Crazy huge. It comes complete with its own mountain to climb. There were so many temples there, and pretty cool ones too! I expected it to be a collection of small fairly recent temples but there were some that took you back. There were a ton of deer too, but they werent as nice as the Miyajima ones. Of course mixed in with this are a jillion souvenier shops, all selling deer-dropping chocolates. And I thought that the Japanese were better than that.
So off we went exploring as much of the park as we could. We even climbed that mountain, dotted with snake warnings. Seems you cant go up a mountain in Japan without being at risk from something! The view from the top wasn't so good as Nara is kinda smoggy but there was an alternative walk down which we took....and got charged for at the bottom. Seems someone should have been posted at the top selling tickets...and they werent. Yet there was a ticket collector at the very bottom of the mountain. That was a little sussed. But I guess it wasn't that much and the walk was nice.
We went to a yakisoba restaurant for our final dinner in Japan. We were the only ones in there until a couple of Americans came in. I wasnt so impressed with them, they started asking him if they could have theirs done in a special way and were very fussy. On top of that the waiter didn't speak English so it wasn't much fun to watch. And geez, it was only about 600 yen (£3) for dinner anyway!
The wait at the airport wasn't so bad, we were treated politely by the check-in staff, as opposed to when we arrived! And it had wifi! Which would have been good if the laptop was charged!

In all, we were really sad to leave Japan and didn't really want to come back. And now with the cold Winter and recession here in England, I wish we hadn't.

Back to Osaka

So today we had to leave Taizosan's place and get back to Osaka. It was pretty sad! He even bought a platform-entry ticket so he could stand on the train with us until it left. But at least that meant he must have liked us! So we got on the tiny train back to Osaka. We went back to the first youth hostel we stayed at, J-Hoppers. It was not too bad this time as we werent jetlagged and not placed next to the bathroom. In the evening, we headed out for a wander around denden town again and to strange avenue next to a canal. The street was full of huge signs, mechanical crabs, sex shops and cheap restaurants. It was a lot of fun to walk around and summed up Osaka pretty well.

Mie WWOOF Host.

Friday, Oct 31st
Today we went straight to our WWOOF host in Mie. The host, Taizousan, picked us up from the station in Kameyama and drove us to his farm where he grows and processes green tea. It was a really nice place, and we seem to have been designated half of his parent's house which is an old style tatami-mat place. Our room is really nice. After a short rest, we went with him to the factory to collect his processed tea, tons of it. Then back at the house, his daughter Nonochan and her friend came over to play. They helped us set up our futons (although they didt get it quite right) and we played Othello. They won.
After, we went to their house for dinner. They have a really nice house with a GIANT HDTV so its nice to not be back to basics for a while.
In the evening, Taizousan invited us to come to the public bath with him. It seems odd that within hours he invited us to come have a naked bath with him and others but its not so much of a big deal here. Though, when we got there, the other Japanese were not too pleased that foreigners had come to their public bath. Its not being naked thats embarrassing, its that they were all staring at us, not so happily.
So I am pretty happy to be here, the family is really nice, and tomorrow we are going to their son Toyakun's school to see him sing in his school's music fair.

Saturday, Nov 1st
After our breakfast of cornflakes and toast (not rice, fish and miso soup), we headed with Nonochan and Taizousan's wife to the school. It was really strange, because as soon as the parents saw their child do their bit, they just left. And some even came in halfway through, watched 5 minutes and left. We werent an exception though, which was good because they were having a competition with every class singing the same song (a long one) to see who was best, which is a little harsh maybe.
In the afternoon, we went to help move fertiliser from a pig farm to Taizousan's green tea field. The bags were heavy and he insisted we wore the provided overalls instead of our own old clothes which was nice, apart from they were hot and the bags of fertilisers just slid down them making them very hard to carry. But we got to have a vending machine drink for our break and I had a drink apparently made from 50 lemons. Im not so sure about that one.
Then, we went to the public bath again. Taizousan seems to really enjoy it, I think he likes having somebody to go with. After the bath, we went to his cousin's organic cafe and had a drink. It was more of a hippy-cafe than an organic one but it was really cool.
In the evening, we headed over for dinner again and afterwards we played Super Smash Brother's on the Wii with Toyakun and Nonochan. Toyakun was way too good though.

Sunday, Nov 2nd
Today we were given a day off to go to the festival in the town of Seki. We started off walking with Taizousan's wife and Nonochan but they decided to leave after a while and let us explore. It was really fun. It wasn't like crappy Kurama Fire Festival, everyone was actually happy and enjoying watching the parades. The floats (omikoshi) were HUGE and they looked heavy as the people holding them had to take breaks a lot. There was also dancing, drumming and singing. We went to have a look at a shrine and the priest came out, who happened to speak English as he was a sailor. He talked to us for about 45 minutes and even invited us inside to look around and what was in the shrine which was really cool. He even offered us sake. Shame on him drinking in the daytime. After my Okonomiyaki lunch, we walked around some more and then phoned Taizousan to come and pick us up. After, we walked the dog and took some photos, Nonochan came over to see us and do her kanji homework. I showed her the Japanese I had been studying and she corrected the kanji I got wrong for me. She really likes to help and she has made us cookies a few times now as she wants to work as a cakemaker.
Taizousan made us dinner again this evening and gave us copies of the photo she took. Tomorrow, we have a long day of fertilising. My arms still ache from yesterday!

Monday, Nov 3rd.
We had a full day of work today but it was a lot easier than yesterday. I guess my arms got used to it. Taizousan seems to have learnt the word 'pissing', I guess from his previous American WWOOFers. He often told us he was off for a piss, which was strange because he doesn't seem to swear otherwise. We had an instant ramen lunch which was good and then carried on working til about 3. After work, Nonochan came over to see us and she managed to link our DS's so we could play Taiko no Tastujin together which was pretty fun. Afterwards, we went to a Kaiten (revolving) sushi restaurant. It was really fun, stealing sushi from the belt. It was also really busy because today is a National Holiday. I think Toyakun ate his weight in revolving melon. We also went bowling afterwards and I came 3rd (out of 5) so I didnt do too badly. Taizousan was really good at bowling, he took it very seriously changing his ball about 3 times and practicing his bowl motion. It was pretty funny.

Tuesday, Nov 4th
This was our last full day of work, and our last full day. After work, we headed to a fancy Onsen where we tried out the outside baths which were good. After the onsen, Nonochan came over to play DS. Its her birthday and she made us both cushions as presents which was sweet. We then had a birthday dinner with the family and a friend's family. Dinner was followed by some games of cards (I didnt win) and then we played some Super Smash Brothers again on the Wii (I did win sometimes). I think Im getting the hang of Super Smash Brothers now.

Kyoto, at 6am.

Kyoto is pretty dead at 6am, even the salary men arent up yet. However, its a good time to go look at some temples before it gets crowded (if you can open your eyes enough). So we walked to some near the train station but they were all a little under-constructiony. Not so good for taking photos. I really was starting to dislike Kyoto at this point. A few temples and parks after, Kyoto started to wake up so we went to the museum of costume which had a small but really interesting exhibition on the Tale of Genji (some slightly seedy Japanese tale) and the costumes people wore. There was also an opportunity to play dress-up with some full-scale clothes so I got to make myself look important for a bit.
After lunch, we went to check in at our 'Bola Bola' guest house which is a pretty nice Japanese styled one (tatami floor futons, sliding doors) which I quite like. The woman gave us a map of the neighbouring town which had a lot of sightseeing places so we headed over after a rest. It was more like the Kyoto I had imagined. Old houses, small winding streets, forests and more temples and shrines than you could ever need. This started to bring my opinion of Kyoto back up. The main town with the station, is a bit of a hell hole, but it seems going outwards away from it, you can find some really nice villages. This one even had a bamboo tunnel!
In the evening, we went to a grill-type place for yakisoba and okonomikyaki. The okonomiyaki seemed to have legs (well tentacles) coming out of it in all directions so I got most of that to myself, which suits me. I was also quite pleased with myself to read the handwritten menu in Japanese and find something that both of us would eat.
So today has definitely been one of the better days in Kyoto, and I wish I had of stayed here the other 2 nights rather than in the center.

Last day in Tokyo (for a loooong time)

Today we had to keep ourselves busy in Tokyo til 10pm when our nightbus was. We checked out as late as we could (11), dumped our bags in lockers at Tokyo Station and then made our way to Shinjuku to see the I.C.C (fancy communications place) where they had some really good interactive media exhibits. It beat my University Degree Show my miles. On the way there, I saw the Square Enix building across the road. They make my favourite games. Their place was actually pretty small.
The plan for the afternoon was to go to a planetarium which turned out to be ages away from the main Shinjuku station and also impossible to find. So that was a few hours wasted but we had a lot of them to spare today.
It was getting dark when we got back to Shinjuku so it was a good time to see the view from the top of the Tokyo Metropolitan Building. It was a good view but they seemed to have built a 'Toy City' right in the center of the observatory so you have to walk around a toy shop to see Tokyo's most sophisticated view which was a little odd. It was quite popular too and there were some interesting gadgets in the toy shop, so I enjoyed it.
For dinner we headed to a vending-machine ramen place in Tokyo station's subway/department shop. We had butter-corn ramen which was good but not as good as the one in Sapporo. But it was a lot cheaper too, so in a way its better if you dont mind sitting in the middle of a load of single salary-men.
The night bus was pretty interesting. I didnt plan to sleep much so I kept my Nintendo DS on me. However, I didnt expect them to do a lights-out at 11.15pm. So I abandoned it and tried to sleep which was a bit difficult when they turned all of the lights back on for their 2-hourly stops. There wasnt much leg space either but I guess that serves me right for booking so late. Apart from that, it went pretty fast and we arrived in Kyoto earlier than planned, which would have been good if it wasnt for the fact that nothing is open at 5.55am.

Nagano

The plan today was to go to Nagano and find Yudanaka monkey park. But due to Nagano's backwards Dentetsu bus/train service, we never made it onto the bus. However, we decided to explore Nagano anyway where we discovered Zenkoji Temple. It was really popular and pretty huge. Within about 5 minutes of arriving there, a woman who volunteers at the temple approached us and offered us a tour of the temple. It was really kind of her, as she gave it in English and she showed us around the whole temple complex and even translated all of the signs in the museum for us. The strangest/funnest part of the temple was walking through a secret pitch-black tunnel under the temple, touching the wall for guidance and inching along as to not tread on someone. Halfway along was a handle you could twirl, underneath a Buddhist statue, which was something or other to do with paradise, so twirling it couldnt do much harm.
We got back about 6ish and decided to be boring and rest as we have a big day tomorrow -entertaining ourselves until 10pm when we will get a night bus. We have to get the night bus to Kyoto as our next WWOOOF host is nearby. Which suits us as that also happens to be near Osaka where we will leave Japan from.

Kamakura

Kamakura was the destination for today. Its a little way out of Tokyo (about an hour) but is home to an open-air giant Buddha statue which is pretty amazing. You can even go inside it for 20 yen but its nowhere near as special on the inside as it is on the outside. We had our 100-yen shop breakfast of chocolate and crisps (readily-prepared vegetables are really scarce in Japan) but I have been eating healthy Japanese food a lot so its ok to eat junk one time. Nearby, there is also a really good temple, complete with giant golden statues and a cave of tiny statues. There seems to be a focus on unborn children there and there was a shrine with offerings such as Mini Mouse toys and Pocky sweets. I didnt think thered be such a nice temple so close to Tokyo.
Later on, we headed to the beach where a HAWK decided to attack and swoop in to grab half of a sandwich with a little warcry. Bastard almost took my fingers off! But it was pretty funny.
The evening train back got pretty crowded with miserable Tokyolites as we got back towards the enter of Tokyo. It must be pretty hard to live here. Luckily, we havent been or seen anyone being pushed onto a carriage with a shield yet. But inside, everyone is pretty much squished together if youre not luckily enough to be seated. You can see why groping is a problem here.

Yoyogi, Akiba and Shinjuku

Today, as its a Sunday, we decided to head back to Yoyogi park to see the music again. This time, the music wasn't so varied and good (though there was still lots to choose from) but there seemed to be more Harajuku Cosplayers on the bridge, but just as unsociable before. We went for a walk around the Harajuku shopping streets and saw part of a Disney Halloween parade.
In the afternoon, we went to Akihabara as I wanted to do some shopping. I managed to loot a Neon Genesis Evangelion umbrella, some chocobo mobile phone chains and a few Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy mini figures. I also got myself some DS accesories as Yodobashi Camera. Walking around Akihabara is strange as you can walk into an innocent toy shop and then spot figures of octopuses trying to gain...entry...to naked anime girls. A bit gross but hillarious to walk around. As long as youre not by yourself, that makes you a pervert.
In the evening we met another Skype friend of mine, Soichi, for dinner. We went out for a tenpura dinner which was really good (and pretty cheap) and I got to try some Conger Eel which didnt really taste so fishy but it was good. After we went to a traditional (but modernised) tea house a little walk away for a drink. Its nice to know local people as they know some nice places to go that you usually wouldn't be aware of.
So today I spent quite a lot but I feel better for it. I could easily spend so much more in Akihabara if I had it to spare.

A Day at Ueno Park

We planned to go to the Tokyo National Museum this morning and elsewhere this afternoon. But we got a little distracted by all the entertainment in Ueno Koen on a Saturday. By the time we finished the museum (which was huuuge and had tons of ancient things in) the park had filled up with various art performers. Musicians, acrobats, comedy shows...they all appeared from nowhere. So I grabbed a bento from the nearest convience shop and we watched some. It was a great place to take some low-quality videos with my camera.
In the afternoon we went to Ueno Zoo. Im starting to feel that for a nation that goes crazy over cute animals...they dont half treat them like crap. Ive seen monkeys in small cabinets in shop windows, kittens tied up to benches outside shops to draw people in, overcrowded elephant enclosures and polar bears pacing insanely at the zoo. It had a lot of animals, including ones I havent seen at zoos before. It was just a shame that they couldnt stick to having a couple of them and had to put loads of them in the same enclosures together.
In the evening we wandered around some streets in Ueno to find something to eat but it was mostly fish based so I couldnt stop as Ed wont eat fish so we headed back to Sukiya, a cheap place for rice bowls and curry. But I think I might head out myself one night for some rotating sushi...

Castle, Cozmos and Capsule

This morning we headed over to Himeji to see Japan's most famous castle, Himeji Castle. Seems that Japan's ancient castles, as impressive as they are, seem to all be 'original, refurbished' castles with some parts being completed this decade. Himjei Castle was still cool though, and easier to climb than Matsumoto. The museum inside it was really interesting.
After that, we got our bento lunches and headed on the train to Tokyo as we planned to go out in Shibuya and sleep in a capsule hotel. We checked in at the capsule hotel which was a lot easier than I thought it would be. The capsules were big enough to sit up in, but you couldn't lie completely straight, which isnt a problem as I tend to bend my legs a little when I sleep anyway. The only bad thing about it was the door was a curtain rather than one that closed. And when all the capsules are men-only close-together and with free porn on the television, this can leave you feeling that you wish you (but mostly the other guests) had more privacy.
The club wasn't too bad. We found it easily enough, it was an international bar with an open-mic night going on. I think calling your bar 'international' is an excuse to call Guiness and Carlsbergs 'imported beers' and charge £5 each for then. But although the drinks were expensive, the musicians were really good ranging from guitar players to jazz through to experimental bongo music. It was really fun.
Sleeping at the capsule hotel wasnt as bad as I thought. I didnt really plan to sleep but it was quite quiet midweek. I couldnt really hear the others so much with my earplugs in. It was quite comfortable too.

Kurama Fire Festival

This morning, the manager of the ryokan gave us a lift to the station with two Australian guys. Nothing kills a conversation like hearing "Yes I recently went to Tokyo to attend a conference on CONCRETE". What can you say? "That sounds interesting" would be obviously untrue.
We got to Kyoto in the afternoon, it was pretty rainy. Not ideal for a fire festival. But we decided to go anyway, with an umbrella borrowed from the hostel. We had to take 3 trains by 3 train companies to get there, not so easy. When we got there we had a wander around and its a pretty nice town. We got there about 2 hours early to make sure we could see it but it seems there was no point. Youre not actually allowed to stand and watch it. You have to continuously move. So after being moved on about 5 times for standing and watching the festival we looped around like they asked. Everyone had an umbrella up so it was hard to see, you got splashed a lot and poked in the face by the spokes often. It wasnt so enjoyable. So we walked down the parade route to find that we then had to loop around in a queue if we wanted to walk back up to watch the parade more. So we queued and went through again. We got to see a lot of huge heavy torches being carried around but that was pretty much it. Then we had the choice to queue and loop around again to carry on or take the road to the station. So we queued for 40 minutes and then were able to chose the path to the station. LOADs of people chose to go home rather than carry on trying to watch this poorly-organised festival. With about 300 volunteers I dont know how they got it so wrong! Oh well.

Matsumoto Castle!

Today we went to Matsumoto to see the castle. It was really cool. Its nowhere near as high as you'd imagine but you can walk around the castle grounds (featuring a moat full of carp) and even go inside the castle, climbing up the stairs. The stairs were very steep with low ceilings so you had to go really slow, but it was fun to get higher and higher. It was full of white tourists though. Maybe its because we just got back from Hokkaido where you dont see any but I think they just ruin the atmosphere and make it less Japanesey. After the castle we headed to our accomodation, a ryokan on the ourskirts by a river. It is such an improvement on last night! Theres a hot spring bath, green tea and hot water in our room, and nice yukatas and futons. And wifi! So Im happy. Its nice to have a quiet place after spending a day on trains and sightseeing. We went out for ramen this evening, I think my Japanese is now good enough to get by at train stations and ramen shops. Important I think.

Tacky Takayama

Today we went to the old fashioned town of Takayama famous for its 'olden day street with authentic traditional shops'. In reality, it was an old fashioned street overtaken by souvenir shops. However, the area was nice to walk around in. Our accommodation (Zenkoji Temple' was questionable though. We booked a 'private twin room with bath' in a temple inn. We stayed at a temple before in Koyasan and it was an amazing experience. But this lied somewhere along the lines of a cheap-hostel with a grumpy-old-man receptionist. It wasn't much of a temple experience as you weren't allowed to see any of the temple, just the accommodation. The guy who organised it also gave the impression that it was a pain to have guests. Our private bath consisted of a shared male toilet that haven't to be broken and we were asked to use the shared toilet on the first floor. In the bathroom, we weren't permitted to use the bath but we could use the showerhead hooked onto the wall next to it. In our private room, the sliding door to the next room had warped and no longer closed properly leaving a gap that got wider as you headed upwards (so we could hear and also see a little of the people in the room net to us). So we decided to spend as little time as possible in there and headed to the Takayama Museum of Art which was expensive but had some nice stuff. Not stupid contemporary art that people like to see is priceless for reasons they cant explain, but it just had nice things to look at.
In all, I like Takayama as its nice to wander around, especially when the tourists have left. But its not the ancient village its made out to be, and definately stay clear of Zenkoji Temple.

Abashiri

Today we headed to Abashiri to see the museum of Northern Peoples. However, Ed (who insists it isnt him, and instead that every single Japanese person cant draw a map) thought it was 3km away and we didn't need a bus. 5km later we reached the Abashiri prison museum which was about halfway there. We settled for the prison museum.
The museum was pretty good, but the English translations seemed to come straight from Babelfish. So we trekked all the way back to the station and headed to Sapporo for a rest for the night.

Lake Mashu

Today we went to explore the Mashu area. Turned out that the only thing to really see was Lake Mashu - 11km away. Ed said we could walk to it in an hour and a half, liar. We got there after walking along a really long obscure road (with things like 'Cow Shack', 'Milk Shop' and a Blair Witch shack) alongside it. So many tourist busses must have passed us, I think they had the right idea. The view of the lake was really amazing though, but I hurt my leg a little getting up to it. I dont understand alot of Japanese tourists though. They come to Hokkaido to find peace and spend time in nature, but in reality, they hop off a coach with their huge tour group, take a photo in front of a sign, rush a long the view, and then hop back on their bus to the next stop. Kind of defeats the object.
The hotel we were at had a public hot spring bath which I used to help my leg recover a bit.
I seem to be getting a lot of exercise here in Japan.

Escape to Kushiro

Today we made our escape from the crazy house. After breakfast, I wrote a polite note saying that we got the dates wrong and had to go. It was better than saying "your dad cant run a restaurant to save his life. This place is dangerous to customer's health". So off we went on the bus to the local crain center. It was out of season so the really friendly guide gave us a tour around the the captive craines - in English! It was a really interesting place and I learnt a lot about the craines. After we headed to the hotel in Kushiro. Kushiro town is a little bleak. Its mainly a slow fishing town with a major train station in so there are lots of roads....just nobody on them. But at least our hotel room is really good.

Akanko WWOOF

Thursday:
Today we spent the day travelling from Sapporo to Akanko Onsen where our WWOOF host is. We had to transfer from train to bus at Kushiro city. The busses were every 3 hours, we had to wait just over an hour but it gave us a chance to grab a Lawson lunch. Kushiro seemed a bit of an odd place. It was fairly big as it seemed the transport hub of Eastern Hokkaido but it seemed a little under-constructionish. We got onto the bus and it took about 2 hours (and 2600 yen each!) but it was worth it because it was an amazing place when we arrived. A huge clear lake, traditional music, calm streets of souvenir shops, speed boats, hand baths and a load of stuffed bears.
We got a bit of an odd welcome, we met the host's father in a shop who hurried us over to an old woman who hurried us into a building with a slightly younger old woman who handed us over of a young Korean man. It wasn't the usual "are you hungry, here's some tea, are you tired?" welcome we usually get from hosts. On the way up the stairs to our room the Korean guy introduced us to another English person staying here. He was in his 50s and a bit socially awkward. Ed deemed him a paedophile in hiding. We went down for dinner and spoke to him some more. He was very negative and slow speaking. We think he might suffer from depression but he let us know how things work and about the area so we got on well enough.
After dinner, we went for a walk around the area. There was a whole street of souvenir shops and a stuffed bear with a motorised jaw. It would probably scare children. We noticed that there is a green mascot for the area, some kind of green balled man. Literally, he seems to have one giant lump between his legs that doesn't need to be there.

Friday:
Today was our first day at work. It started at 10 we headed over to the tourist information place for a map. We got some other things aswell and learnt that the green man is made up of algae balls called marimo. Apparently Akanko lake is the only place in the world that they grow so big and spherical. Exciting stuff. We also found out that there are mud geysers around the area and town mountains to climb. With Ed being mountain inclined, I guess thats our day off sorted. There also seem to be Ainu tribal dances held somewhere.
Work was really strange. For the first hour, we stood around watching the dinner ladies set up in a hurry before having a coffee break and being sent for lunch. After, we were allowed to help set up and clear away but the manager has a bit of OCD it seems. He only likes one thing to be put onto a table at a time. So when there are about 8 people laying things down in his special decided order it takes a lot of stopping and starting. It makes sense to have everyone do one of the things (a bowl, the chopsticks, cups etc) each but he seems to hate that. Then I got to wash a load up. The upstairs kitchen would be closed down so fast in the UK. he dishwasher throws its dirty water onto the floor where a gutter runs down the center. The floor is slippy with dirty water and oil (you have to wear wellington boots in the kitchen), the dirty-pots sink is less than a meter away from the chef's main wok and the cupboards are really low so you bang your head a lot. We didn't get any introduction to safety in there, it was really bad. The manager likes everything thats used every day to be put into storage and then taken out again in the morning. He's crazy. At least we are only working 6 hours a day though.
Afterwards we went out in the evening and found a new street - full of souvenir shops again. But at the end was a studio Ghibli Shop and an Ainu village. I got myself some cheap Totoro things and then we went to see the Ainu dance which was a lot of fun. It was really interesting to see their crane and plate-taunting dances as strange as they were. As we left, a procession of Japanese people with flaming torches gave up through the Ainu village. Seemed we were in time to see the climax of some festival. They put all their torches around the center of the village and then everyone paid some money to drop some algae balls into a fish tank. Was a bit of a mix of a promote-the-Ainu and save-the-algae festival. Was fun to watch though.

Saturday:
Today was really good weather so we went to see the view of the mountains while it was clear before work. Work was strange again. The manager had selected random tables and chairs that he decided were to be cleaned. So we cleaned them. And then the manager double-cleaned them to be sure. Then we sent them upstairs in the elevator....to be put into storage. Right. So then we helped tidy away one of the floors of the restaurant and went back downstairs...where the manager had decided that now he only wanted each table to have 4 chairs as opposed to 6 so he asked us to clean those ones and send them into storage. But after 10 minutes he decided that we should go upstairs and wash up. This was the last I saw of Ed for a while as he stayed down to help...and then disappeared. After 2 hours of washing up (which I could get paid £5 a hour to do at my regular job) I was asked where Ed was. I assumed he was working with the manager so I looked all over 5 floors of the restaurant, ran back to the house to look for him, then checked the 5 floors again to make sure he hadn't hurt himself and was unconscious in a toilet or something and still couldn't find him. I was majorly pissed off to find that the manager had told him he had finished and Ed has disappeared to take a bath without letting me know where he was going. But the manager was taking us all to the top of a mountain so I had to pretend that I didn't want to kill him. The mountain had a really good view from the top and after we stopped off a a dump where the manager took some of a bigger hotel's dumped plates which he felt would look really lovely underneath some sashimi. Nice. We went for another walk after dinner where Ed bought an Ainu instrument known a Jew's Harp. Is fun to play but I got my spit all over it as you put it in you mouth to add an echo when you twang it. We stopped off a hotel lobby and used their PC to book a night in a Kushiro hotel so we can leave here a day earlier. We are enjoying ourselves as its such a beautiful place to walk around in our free time which we get a lot of, but the manager (whose intentions ARE good) is going to drive us crazy making us adhere to his OCD.

Sunday:
This morning we took a look at the small eco-museum. Unfortunately it was all in Japanese but it had a few interesting things. Work was bizarre again. We were cleaning the 'new' plates the manager found yesterday but they were mostly chipped. The manager wasn't around so the staff were a bit manic and all telling us contradicting things to do, its getting annoying. Luckily, we got to finish an hour early so we went on a walk towards some of the other lakes. After dinner (which was fish) we went for another walk around town with the other grumpy English guy who wanted internet access even though he had before told us that he had 'nobody to keep in contact with'. So after moaning that his boots take so long to put on, we walked him over to the hotel. He seems to need a little spoonfeeding. We went on for a stroll around the Ainu village before heading back to our room. We have run out of things to do at night because its not really safe to walk around the mountain trails in the dark. We got the day off tomorrow so we can go mountain climbing then.

Monday:
Today was going to be the first mountain I climbed without a cablecar. Mt Oakan was meant to be the easiest mountain in the area, said Ed. Turned out he got it wrong and it was the most difficult one. The views across the lake at the bottom are amazing but the views disappear behind the trees as you begin to ascend. It wasnt a spiraly easy path either, we were cimbing in all directions using tree roots for steps and climbing over trunks. It was quite fun but really exhausting. It took us about 3-4 hours of scrambling up things to get to the top. The view was really nice so we stopped for lunch. Getting back down was faster but really dangerous as their seemed to be a lot of loose gravel hidden under the leaves so we both fell over a few times. But the path got easier and we made it out in about 2 hours. I feet and legs really killed by then!
In the evening we decided to try and walk around at nights for about 5 minutes but got distracted by some fiery torches lining the path - the fire festival had began. So we made our way over to the Ainu village where long lines of people carried torches to light up the area and then we were able to buy tickets to see the special Fire Festival dances. These were mainly the dances we saw the other day with more music and fire. So today was a really fun day but my legs aren't going to thank me for it tomorrow.

Tuesday:
Today was pretty crap. The manager hadn't got a clue what he was doing, he spent the whoe day running around. Literally. I very rarely saw him walk anywhere. He was badly disorganised and asked me to set the tables in a room out as in the example he left me. Funnily enough, he laid his example out wrong. So when he returned he almost had a stroke to find a room full of tables...with a plate on the wrong side! Its just so petty. And he has an obsession with this little piece of paper he keeps under the main plate. He doesnt seem to care so much if a person is missing chopsticks...as long as that piece of paper is there. Hes such a retard, I was ready to leave. However, it is only 6 hours a day so maybe one last day wont kill me. Im also going off the food here a little. Rice with cold side dishes 3 times a day gets a little boring. I want pizza...
Ive realised this place is nothing to do with living organically and exchanging cultural things. This place produces so much waste per person. As for cultural exchange...Its been 6 days now and they dont even know our names. I should probably report it to the WWOOF website as they have been pretty deceptive (it also said you didnt need to know japanese but the only person who speaks english just had a baby and cant be bothered with guests right now).
In the evening we made an application to the JET program to come and teach here later next year, Ed also went souvenir shopping and wanted to go into most of the shops to compare prices for his £2 souvenir. Not as if we had anything much better to do though and its always quite nice walking down the streets at night with the Marimo song looping on the loudspeakers.
Ah well, just 6 hours tomorrow and we will be free again.

Wednesday:
Today was a pretty samey day. Except I ate venison, which I didnt really want to do. The chef set a sample for me and Ed to try aside so I pretty much had to. He said it was Bambi's mother. I also got me my Akanko souvenir - a marimoman-in-ramen strap. Now we are just waiting til tomorrow to do our great escape from this towering shack.

Sapporo

Yesterday wasn't worthy of a blog entry, was about 12 hours of trains.
Today we got up at our cheap hotel and headed out to find the open-air architecture museum. Well, we headed out but Ed hadn't got very detailed directions so we had a stroll around but didnt find it. In the afternoon we had lunch at Odori park which was very pretty and then headed to the botanical garden for a walkaround. It had a small Ainu museum as well, but it was literally just a few cupboards and a video on loop. Walking around Sapporo wasn't majorly exciting but its a nice city, the weather was good, and its laid out on a grid pattern so we appreciated being able to find places quickly.
We are heading out tonight to find Sapporos famous corn and butter stock ramen. Sounds really good! But I have a feeling we will end up with a cheap eatery dinner which I also like doing.

WWOOF - Miyagi

Tuesday -
We got up today about 7.30am and sorted through some firewood before breakfast. Luckily, Chieko is interested in cooking and likes diverse types of food so we get some variety unlike at the last wwoof host. Then Chieko's brother came over and we helped build a drying rack. I think I hindered rather than helped but Ed seemed to do ok.
In the afternoon we started to clear an overgrown field with scythes. I had a lot of fun wielding a scythe, Ed won't come near me after deeming me too dangerous and mental. I had fun though.
In the evening, Chieko's English friend Gavin and his family came over. Gavin has a Japanese wife and 3 kids, though I don't really understand what language they speak. I don't think they do either. They speak to them in both English and Japanese and switch between them randomly. We had a fun dinner drinking beer and talking about Japan and we offered to come and build a self-sustainable house with him on Thursday.

Wednesday -
Today, I started by helping Chieko cook breakfast. We had some sort of fish-bread and pancakes with figs that her neighbour had brought round. After, we finished clearing the field (my wrists and shoulders ache a lot now) and then we helped install a sink in her bathroom (a pedestal on bricks with a metal bowl on top). Chieko has an old style bathroom and toilet which means recycling bathwater for a few days and the dreaded hole in the floor. I like the idea of hot spring baths where the water constantly pumps through but an ofuro (a tub filled with water and then reused between people for a few days) is not so exotic. Mostly just gross.
In the evening, we went to the nearest supermarket to pick up Chieko's shopping and then had dinner with some of her friends. Her friends were really nice and seem to have an infatuation with earthenware bells, which they unleashed from a bag and let us choose our favourites as souvenirs which was nice of them.
At 8.30pm we finally got some free time. Im a little concerned because although the work is fun, it's meant to be for 6 hours a day with a day off. We seem to be on the go from 8 til 8. Im glad that we have a lot to do though as it makes the day go by fast, Im just pretty knackered!

Thursday -
Today we went to Gavin's place to help buid his ecofriendly house. It was mostly shovelling gravel around but the landslides made it fun. In the evening Gavin invited us over for some thank-you drinks. We had a few too many and stumbled home in the dark.

Friday -
Today Ed was not so well after drinking too much. Luckily, Shiinasan didn't mind and he lied in while I helped out, not feeling my best though. Lunchtime was really difficult though. Shiinasan's neighbour had brought over an entire squid for me to eat. It was a looong rubbery hangover lunch. In the evening we went over to her artist friend's house and we started looking in her design books and chatting. She played crystal ball sound effects as we went to sleep. I didn't find them especially relaxing but it made her happy.

Saturday -
Today we helped the artist in her field which was nice. Shiinasan seems a bit lazy when it comes to other peoples farms, we all sat down on the riverside for 20 minutes when we were meant to be helping. Not that I cared! She also took us to her studio which her and her friends built. It was really amazing.

Sunday -
Today was community-work day! In the morning, everyone gathered together to do the gardening and cleaning along the Marumori roadsides. It was fun and everyone was really friendly. Everybody was rewarded with a bottle of cold green-tea to drink afterwards, I'm a little fed up of that stuff though, you get overfed it at farm hosts and cheap Japanese diners. However, in the afternoon Shiinasan took us to her friend's ramen shop for a really nice lunch. Her friend played Sakura Sakura on the koto (some instrument) as we ate, it was a lot of fun. Afterwards we helped Gavin again with his house. We met a Japanese woman who spoke English. Her baby really took to Ed for some reason and spent a worryingly long amount of time in his wheelbarrow of gravel

Monday -
Our last day here we definitely didnt get a break, even though it was raining. We were cleaning windows the cheap non-chemical way. I think they were cleaner before we started. Afterwards, I was not so impressed, as Shiinasan made me sharpen her lifetime collection of pencils, then asked me to arrange them by colour and then arrange them in a box beautifully. Not exactly thrilling. We also spent a lot of the day making a curry for a curry party Shiinasan decided to have. The party was a lot of fun. I was a little dismayed to see Shiinasan let a toddler play with all the pencils I had sorted and dump them on the floor. But I wasn't asked to resort them so I didn't care too much. When everyone left, Shiinasan gave us a gift - a pretty dishcloth. A strange present but it meant a lot as she didn't have a lot of money.

A Little Lost

Today we packed up and headed to our next host in Miyagi prefecture. JR at Tokyo train station are a real pain in the ass. We wanted to exchange our Hokkaido rail passes for when we needed them and to buy a special offer JR East pass. These are supposed to be available from any midorimadoguchi (green window offices). In Tokyo station, there are about 8. However, each one is operated by different parts of JR (East, West, Kyushu) and although they are meant to be the main place to go for english-speaking travellers, they spoke appalling broken english and didnt seem to know which office we needed to go to. So after following assistant-drawn maps to about 5 of the offices, we finally got our East pass and were told to exchange our Hokkaido pass when we were in Hokkaido. But of course, not every train station in Hokkaido has an office, which renders having a Hokkaido pass useless until we discover one. I was not so impressed.
After we got to our destination, we were concerned to find no phone at the rural station to phone our guests. We explored and found some Japanese builders who said there were no phones in the area and our destination was over an hours walk away. So we headed back onto the train, went 2 stops down and used the phone at a busier station to contact the host. The host came to meet us halfway along the walk to hers, so we found her after about half hour. In all, we wasted about 2 hours by not being able to phone her from the station. I was getting very fed up of today.
Eventually, we met Chieko and she was really nice. We ate some great Thai food and talked a bit. Then we got an early night because it was already dark by the time we got back to the house. At least I don't have to face JR (Japan Rail) again for another week!

Harajuku Girl Time!.....or not.

Today we set out to explore Harajuku and Yoyogi Park, hoping to see some cosplay. It didn't quite go to plan. We got to Harajuku and headed over to the cosplay bridge but didn't see any weird fashion, just some photographers sat down waiting. In the meanwhile, we headed to Meiji shrine which was next to the train station. It was an interesting place and we got to see some weddings taking place. However, I'm feeling a little templed-out. Compared to Koyasan and Kyotos temples, shrines like this get dwarfed. After strolling around the temple (filled with Americans and Australians saying things like "Can we go get a Coke now?", we headed back to the bridge. More photographers had gathered but nothing to photograph yet. So we decided to head to Yoyogi park for a walk. Yoyogi park was amazing. It was full of food stores and crammed with various music bands. The first act we came across was a solo painter-club-music-dancer club-music-dj performer. He attracted a lot of attention with his soulful hiphop dancing as he painted some pretty-ok paintings. Then we started to head towards the music. We saw a great band called the Loovees who seemed to do 50s style music mixed with para-para dancing. It was good fun, they were really enjoying myself. Then we strolled back along to the bridge, passing piano ballad artists sandwiched meters apart from rock bands and heavy metal bands. We got back to the bridge and still saw nothing, we figured they appeared after lunch. We went to get something to eat and went back into the park to eat it. Afterwards we got drawn to some 40-65 year olds dancing around to 1950's Grease/Elvis type music. It seemed that they were part of various tribes that form and gather in the area on Sundays.
About 3pm, we headed back to the bridge. Some cosplayers had arrived but it was such a letdown. It was just a load of lolita/goth types that were more interested in taking photos of each other and turned their backs to the many photographers that had come to see them. In fairness, it was a lot of fat white men with cameras dangled around their necks and old couples come to see the freak show. But I thought they could have been a little less antisocial.

The Future Building

Ed fell asleep before he managed to set his alarm last night so we ended up waking a little late. However we did have time to head over to Odaiba to go visit the Miraikan (future building). Getting there was half the fun. On the way there, in one of the many station>department store>station complexes was a book shop with a book about Ghilbi's latest offering, Punyo. Normally I would not pick up a kids comic book but this had all of the kanji used with furigana so it is really useful for learning kanji for me. And the artwork is great. Also on the way there, we took a strange train that seemed to float through the sky. The track was suspended in the air and the rail was low so it seemed to weave between the Tokyo skyscrapers and across the sea to Odaiba.
The Miraikan in Odaiba was really interesting. It was huge and was home to the Asimo robot. I was excited to go to the demo of it but unfortunately they seemed to be using its technology in another robot and were just displaying how it "could move". Lame. At least I got to see it in person though, even if it was dead inside. I managed to get the last seat of the "cyber human" show in the virtual reality theatre. However, its not as exciting as it sounds. It was more 90s-style-schoolfilm about hospital technology on a huge screen. Not quite virtual reality. So yeah, the shows they held were pretty overhyped but the exhibits were cool.
After we went out to Shinjuku to have a second attempt at finding "Disk Union". This time we found it and I managed to grab used Orange Range, Dragon Ash, Every Little Thing and Bonnie Pink albums for about £5 the lot. Great!
When we went to look for somewhere for dinner, Ed got harassed by a man selling women it seemed. At least I knew enough negative Japanese to get him away from us.
All in all, a fun day but I should stop buying things until we come back here again next month"

Art for grown ups and art for children.

Today was an arty day!
In the morning, we headed to the photography museum which had free admission with our GRUTT passes. However, that was just to the top floor which had some nice old photos if you like that sort of thing. We had to pay a hefty 1000yen (£5) to see the latest exhibitions. They were pretty typical random contemporary art things; Random nudity, decaying rabbits etc.
After the photography museum we went to the Ghibli Museum which was really cool, even the building. It was a house crammed with weird artworks and concepts. They had some pretty spectacular animation technique displays. The free screening of an original short film was great too. All in Japanese but I guess the focus was on the animation anyway. The only bad thing about the museum was the gift shop. It was full of absolute crap. I mean, half the shop was a counter to get a china Totoro dinner plate set. Really tacky. But the Japanese were really loving it, with you hardly being able to move for all the people that were too old to be buying overpriced toys in your way. Studio Ghibli merchandise is available in pretty much any anime or toy shop in Japan, so why everyone went so crazy in there is beyond me.
And so, with me feeling souvenierless, we went to Akihabara. Its fun to look around there, especially in the evening when the otaku come out. They were all running down the stairs of Animate with copies of their latest mangas or suggestive schoolgirl figurines, eager to get home.
So a fun day of art and anime of lots of different kinds, even if I didnt buy anything for myself.

Akihabara!!!

We spent the morning in Shinjuku, trying to find a couple of used CD shops I had read about online. The first was Recofan which we found pretty easily. I managed to grab a M-Flo and Utada album for about 600yen (£3). In the same department building was Uniqlo, Japan's budget clothing chain. We went in expecting to find a clone of Burton but they actually had some pretty nice things in there, especially on sale. I want to head back in there before we go back to England.
Then we spent a little time looking for Disk Union, a store famed on the internet for its cheap hard-to-find CDs. Couldnt find it, even with a map. Finding anywhere particular in Japan is near impossible if you arent local. So we gave up and headed to Akihabara to meet my friend Kazuki, who I had met on Skype. He gave us a guided tour of the weirdest places in Akihabara, he didn't seem too embarrassed by that sort of thing. We had to work out what some of the things on sale were, such as a vibrating cushion to sit on while you play your PS2. Both Kazuki and the actual shops referred to these items as junk, and there were piles of odd contraptions, crappy figures and bits of PCs you could buy in such junk boxes.
After trawling the anime side of akihabara, we headed to Yodobashi department store where Kazuki wanted to buy a new camera. The place was HUGE. About 7 floors. It had an entire section, the size of a shop, to buy mobile phone straps. There doesn't seem to be anything you cant get there for a decent price. Almost wish I had saved up some money to get a new camera there.
After Yodobashi, we went out for Chinese food. It was really fun to hang out with Kazuki and talk about different things.
In the evening, Kazuki headed home and we headed to Harajuku to see the park. However, we never made it to the park because the clothes shops were so much more interesting. They have a lot of second-hand cloth shops where you can by some faded t-shirts if you like but the rest of the stuff is actually pretty cool. Might pick me up something there.
After, we went back to the hostel, with an ice-cream, pretty exhausted. We seem to be getting into a bad habit with buying ice creams every day but the weather is warm even at night, so why not.

SUMO!!!!

Today was sumo day. We headed to the stadium early and picked us up some cheap backrow tickets (200yen/£10). The matches started at 2.30ish so we arrived a little before-hand to see the ceremonies. We could see pretty well from the back and the stadium wasnt particularly crowded yet.
I didnt realise how short the matches last. It was literally 3-15 seconds of wrestling and then preparation for the next match. The preparation was pretty lengthy. It was a bout 3 minutes of throwing salt, singing, drinking and throwing more salt. After about 40 matches, thats 2 hours of watching people throwing salt around. Ed started to fall asleep. It was worth it though, especially to see the wrestlers fall on the rich people ringside. And some of the wrestling was pretty brutal and bitch-slappy too.
In the evening we headed back to Shibuya where there were lots of singers. There was one duet that was particularly good. Singers who pull faces are definitely more entertaining to watch. There was one 'rounded' female fan who seemed to know the words inside out and mimed along as she danced. It was really good fun to watch.