My Japan trip
So, some people wanted to hear what Japan was like so here's my update :) This may be a little photo heavy, but the photos are interesting, so please forgive me.
The flight over there was cool in itself. We flew over Siberia, and did a right-angle around North Korea as to avoid it completely (probably wise). At one point the sun started rising behind us, and I noticed a huge illuminated golden moon in the sky. It was pretty amazing, I wish I'd got a photo.
Day 1: We arrived quite early in the morning into Osaka (Kyoto doesn't have its own airport) and after travelling to Kyoto, we (me and my friend Zan, on my MSc course) checked into the hostel and had a wander around the place.
Osaka train network (I think).
We met up with some of the other people from Edinburgh (staff, phd students) that had also flown over for the conference and tried to find some dinner. Most places were closed early as it was Sunday, but we managed to find one place which was "open". It was a very traditional looking restaurant with sliding doors, so we slid it across and all piled in. It was pretty small, just a row of seats by the bar. I was assessing whether it was too cramped for 10 people or not when I looked up at the woman behind the counter. Her face was a look of pure horror, mouth slightly open and eyes darting quickly from side to side at us all. Zan speaks a bit of Japanese and asked her repeatedly whether the place was open, and no reply. Just this panic-stricken woman who obviously didn't know how to react to a huge group of Westerners in her restaurant. When we realised something was seriously wrong with the situation, we opened the door and all left quietly and stood outside trying to take in the weirdness. Looking back through the window, she was still standing there staring at nothing in a panicked state. I'd kill to have got a photo.
We finally found somewhere to eat and the only choice for food was a strange kind of folded pancake with mystery fillings. It was actually pretty good. These were on the walls:
Take a close look at what's going in in the pictures. These little plaques are usually used to write down prayers and hung outside temples, but I'm not sure what kind of things these might be praying for. Scary.
One point to mention is that most, if not all restaurants in Kyoto had "display food" shop windows. These were filled with fake plastic food that looked uncannily real, kind of like a 3d menu:
Day 2:
I loved this day. We went to Nara, outside of Kyoto, which is full of hundreds of tame deer.
"According to the legendary history of Kasuga Shrine, a mythological god Takemikazuchi arrived in Nara on a white deer to guard the newly built capital of Heijō-kyō. Since then the deer have been regarded as heavenly animals, protecting the city and the country"
This is me and a bunch of the deer. They really are friendly, and their little whiskers are sooo soft. There are vendors about the place selling "deer biscuits" which I think are made of oats, and you can use to feed them. I got ganged up on by three deer once they realised I had food, my sleeves bitten and yanked and headbutted from behind. They also stick their nose in your bag to see if you're hiding anything in there, but when they realise there isn't any, they walk off.
Visited the temples around Nara, mainly Todai-ji temple (supposedly the largest wooden building in the world) which houses the largest bronze statue of Buddha.
Days 3-6 were mainly spent at the EvoLang conference (which was the reason we were in Japan). I did leave for a little bit to shop at the market though. Maybe the weirdest thing I saw at the market was this:
They're called "octopus balls" and are baby octopi stuffed with a tiny egg. I saw someone eating one and it looked disgusting. No thanks.
One of the conference days had a trip to some temples and a special dinner in which they invited geishas. So this pic is for harliquinnraver.
Day 7 (final day): we ended up at another famous temple in Kyoto (I can't remember the name sadly) and arrived in time for some kind of dragon ritual. Supposedly it was meant to represent banishing the dragon from the East or something like that, I can't remember exactly. But it had a bunch of guys dressed up as samurais with others carrying a huge mean looking dragon. It was cool chasing the thing through the area while they were beating drums and marching it through.
I need to give the Japanese people some credit and say they deserve their reputation for having manners. Everyone is so polite and apologetic if even the smallest thing goes wrong. Talking on the phone on public transport isn't allowed, and people wear surgical face masks if they have any illness so it doesn't spread to others. The kids are really well behaved, I hadn't seen one kicking off once while I was there, they are as polite as the adults. Everything runs smoothly there, is on time, and works well. I have to say it made me feel worse about living in the UK because everyone is so rude here, and the services are expensive and shitty.
One last thing to mention: Everything is cute in Japan, even when inappropriate. This illustrates my point:
and a final thing I'm going to leave you with is this piece of wtf found outside a nursery (poor kids).
Hope this entry wasn't too picture-heavy for people but I wanted to share :) if it's too spammy though let me know and I'll put it under a cut. The whole photo gallery is here if you want to see more: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150735880542254.454865.679027253&type=1&bef=10150735928057254
The flight over there was cool in itself. We flew over Siberia, and did a right-angle around North Korea as to avoid it completely (probably wise). At one point the sun started rising behind us, and I noticed a huge illuminated golden moon in the sky. It was pretty amazing, I wish I'd got a photo.
Day 1: We arrived quite early in the morning into Osaka (Kyoto doesn't have its own airport) and after travelling to Kyoto, we (me and my friend Zan, on my MSc course) checked into the hostel and had a wander around the place.
Osaka train network (I think).
We met up with some of the other people from Edinburgh (staff, phd students) that had also flown over for the conference and tried to find some dinner. Most places were closed early as it was Sunday, but we managed to find one place which was "open". It was a very traditional looking restaurant with sliding doors, so we slid it across and all piled in. It was pretty small, just a row of seats by the bar. I was assessing whether it was too cramped for 10 people or not when I looked up at the woman behind the counter. Her face was a look of pure horror, mouth slightly open and eyes darting quickly from side to side at us all. Zan speaks a bit of Japanese and asked her repeatedly whether the place was open, and no reply. Just this panic-stricken woman who obviously didn't know how to react to a huge group of Westerners in her restaurant. When we realised something was seriously wrong with the situation, we opened the door and all left quietly and stood outside trying to take in the weirdness. Looking back through the window, she was still standing there staring at nothing in a panicked state. I'd kill to have got a photo.
We finally found somewhere to eat and the only choice for food was a strange kind of folded pancake with mystery fillings. It was actually pretty good. These were on the walls:
Take a close look at what's going in in the pictures. These little plaques are usually used to write down prayers and hung outside temples, but I'm not sure what kind of things these might be praying for. Scary.
One point to mention is that most, if not all restaurants in Kyoto had "display food" shop windows. These were filled with fake plastic food that looked uncannily real, kind of like a 3d menu:
Day 2:
I loved this day. We went to Nara, outside of Kyoto, which is full of hundreds of tame deer.
"According to the legendary history of Kasuga Shrine, a mythological god Takemikazuchi arrived in Nara on a white deer to guard the newly built capital of Heijō-kyō. Since then the deer have been regarded as heavenly animals, protecting the city and the country"
This is me and a bunch of the deer. They really are friendly, and their little whiskers are sooo soft. There are vendors about the place selling "deer biscuits" which I think are made of oats, and you can use to feed them. I got ganged up on by three deer once they realised I had food, my sleeves bitten and yanked and headbutted from behind. They also stick their nose in your bag to see if you're hiding anything in there, but when they realise there isn't any, they walk off.
Visited the temples around Nara, mainly Todai-ji temple (supposedly the largest wooden building in the world) which houses the largest bronze statue of Buddha.
Days 3-6 were mainly spent at the EvoLang conference (which was the reason we were in Japan). I did leave for a little bit to shop at the market though. Maybe the weirdest thing I saw at the market was this:
They're called "octopus balls" and are baby octopi stuffed with a tiny egg. I saw someone eating one and it looked disgusting. No thanks.
One of the conference days had a trip to some temples and a special dinner in which they invited geishas. So this pic is for harliquinnraver.
Day 7 (final day): we ended up at another famous temple in Kyoto (I can't remember the name sadly) and arrived in time for some kind of dragon ritual. Supposedly it was meant to represent banishing the dragon from the East or something like that, I can't remember exactly. But it had a bunch of guys dressed up as samurais with others carrying a huge mean looking dragon. It was cool chasing the thing through the area while they were beating drums and marching it through.
I need to give the Japanese people some credit and say they deserve their reputation for having manners. Everyone is so polite and apologetic if even the smallest thing goes wrong. Talking on the phone on public transport isn't allowed, and people wear surgical face masks if they have any illness so it doesn't spread to others. The kids are really well behaved, I hadn't seen one kicking off once while I was there, they are as polite as the adults. Everything runs smoothly there, is on time, and works well. I have to say it made me feel worse about living in the UK because everyone is so rude here, and the services are expensive and shitty.
One last thing to mention: Everything is cute in Japan, even when inappropriate. This illustrates my point:
and a final thing I'm going to leave you with is this piece of wtf found outside a nursery (poor kids).
Hope this entry wasn't too picture-heavy for people but I wanted to share :) if it's too spammy though let me know and I'll put it under a cut. The whole photo gallery is here if you want to see more: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150735880542254.454865.679027253&type=1&bef=10150735928057254