Goodbye Japan, I love you and I`ll miss you.

Hello again!

First of all I'm sorry I didn't post anything for such a long time, but I was quite a bit busy and since I don't have a computer myself I have to hope for a computer in the hostels which was not the case for a pretty long time.

Anyway I'm currently already in Seoul, Korea, but I'll let you know about my last weeks in Japan in this post, about Osaka, Kobe, Hiroshima and Fukuoka, with a special feature of my thoughts about Japan and a list of crazy "only in Japan" things ;)

 My favorite place in Osaka was by far the castle park, from the castle you saw at the end of the previous post. I was spending time there almost everyday I was in Osaka.

Near the castle there was this building called Shudokan, which is a martial arts training hall for different traditional japanese martial arts like Kendo, Judo and Naginata. I would have loved to train there but I discovered it too late and didn't have time anymore.

 The next stop after Osaka was Kobe, a port city near Osaka.

 Kobe Port Tower

At the port there were these shops with pretty fun things, especially this one shop just sold from silly pens to skatebords, notebooks and minispeakers everything, very coloured and ridiculously cheap!

 My lovely couchsurfing host chisato and herve, another traveller, I had lots of fun eating Kimchi Hot Pot ;D

 After Kobe I moved right away to Hiroshima where I met a friend from Tokyo again, having fun in a lovely small bar.

 The A-Bomb Dome, where the atomic bomb exploded almost right above it, in 500m height, one of the only buildings, that where still standing in hundreds of meters around.

 In front of this memorial there were school classes singing, which was very beautiful.

 This is the peace memorial monument, which has a stone plates in it, where the name of all victims are written on, it's very impressively situated in the middle of the peace park, definitely a place worth visiting.

Shukkeien is the name of this wonderful traditional japanese garden I've visited.

 My last stop in Japan was Fukuoka, a port city where I wanted to take the ferry to Korea after staying there for  couple of days first. Above you can see the eye-catching architecture of canal city, a shopping mall.

I was looking at the museum of asian art with some interesting pieces of art like my examples here. 

 When I was looking for  place to sit, an old man was taking me gently but firmly to this foot onsen where you just have a table to read or do whatever you want and relax your feet in an onsen. Amazing right?

 I had the chance to have a look at a real sumo tournament in Fukuoka, which was really very interesting, a lot of ceremonies and rituals but also impressive techniques.

My last day I spent with Risa, a girl who lived in Fukuoka, we went to Dazaifu, a small city near Fukuoka and looked at a shrine and the garden, a very pretty place, also called small Kyoto.

Lovely Risa!

After Dazaifu we went to lunch karaoke which is just an amazing thing, I want that in Switzerland, too!

I had the chance to train Taekwondo with Master Tanaka, It was very interesting to see a different style!

We went to eat at those small outside restaurant /grill things and while the night continued to many other places, too! :D

The next day I took the Ferry to Busan, Korea, being quite tired after a long night, but ready for a new experience. Thank you Japan for everything, for every kind person and beautiful place, overall an unforgettable experience.

The "only in Japan" list

They have Onsens, which is amazing.

Karaoke everywhere.

You can declare "drinking" as a hobby and everyone loves you.

Every product is wrapped up at least 5 times.

Toiletseats are heated and toilets are eighter multifunctional or just a hole in the ground.

Public transportation is always perfectly on time.

People are just reaaally friendly, always, everywhere.

If you tip, the waiter will run after you, to return the money.

People are generally well dressed and women have their hair, nails and everything done flawlessly.

They LOVE to dress up and they spent a lot of effort to do it perfectly.

Tattoos are still pretty much a No-Go, especially in traditional places, because of the mafia.

Please make a lot of noise while eating a soup!

Do not clean your nose in public.

Do not show bare feet.

Wearing a face mask all day long is the most normal thing you can do.

Japanese people reeally like chocolate.

Girls try to be cute, all the time. So they giggle, instead of laughing.

80% of men wear suits.

Plastic food in front of restaurants everywhere.

......

....to be continued.

What I think about Japan

It was difficult for me to build an opinion about Japan at first, I kind of needed an other country to compare with first, which I do have now, and I can say, I really love Japan. It is a very special place and people are really exceptionally nice and polite, they take their work very seriously and respect is a big thing in all fields. They're pretty quiet, too, you can be in a huge city like Tokyo and don't feel overwhelmed by everything. As a foreigner this is a great thing, because you get treated nicely in all places and you basically get to know all the good sides of the country. That's because you're never on the working side and don't get to see that people are really working very very hard, night and day and vacations are almost non-existent or very rare. On one hand this is just their culture and they're used to it, but on the other hand, together with lots of rules and regulations of japanese culture it can make you feel unfree and not happy. But still japanese people have this happy nature I think, or at least it looks like this to me. Anyway there are a lot of things I'll miss from Japan and I had a great time there.

Tokyo, Sapporo, Ito, Kyoto, Osaka

Hello everyone!

A lot has happened since my last post, that`s why it`s going to be pretty long this time. After my first week in Tokyo I travelled by train to Sapporo in Hokkaido, stayed there for 2 days at a couchsurfing hosts place, then I moved on to Akita, a small town where I had quite a not so pleasant adventure. From Akita I took the Shinkansen to Ito, a lovely small town in Shimoda, west of Tokyo. After Ito I moved to Kyoto for a couple of days and now I`m in Osaka. So this was a very long story in a few sentences, but I want you guys to know that however hard I try I`ll never be able to really let you know how it feels like where I am. You just have to imagine things being even better than they look :D

Oh and I changed my traveling plans from going to the Phillipines to going to Vietnam, as you may have seen, this is ainly because I heard that there are quite many places there which are kind of dangerous and at the sime time I heard that Vietnam is a wonderful place to visit! :)

My phone got broken last week, I had to get a new one and it took me quite some time to get the pictures from my old phone. However I`m just gonna start now, hope you enjoy!!

Soo.. you may wonder what this prison-like room should be, and this is a traditional japanese capsule hotel, mostly for people who work in the city and couldn`t catch the last train, mostly business people. But however, since there was a misunderstanding with my host, I decided to go there, I wanted to try it anyway.

My own precious capsule

Me in a Yukata in the capsule hotel, they even had an onsen! (Hot spring)

This is the very famous skytree, #1 tourist spot, because you can see all over Tokyo, but I wasn`t too impressed by the building itself, looked pretty much like a TV tower to me :D

I decided to go with the ship from Asakusa to Odaiba, unfortunately it wasn`t that one;)

This is the so called Rainbowbridge, connecting Odaiba with Tokyo-city, which I crossed afterwards.

They even had a small beach there! :o

This is the Daiba park which used to be a battery, right next to the bridge.

The magnificent view from the rainbowbridge over Tokyo while the sun was about to set.

A shrine in the imperial park

In front of shrines there are always wells with holy water to clean yourself before entering.

Harajuku is a very popular shopping area, which has very fancy and expensive shops, but also a street for the geeks who dress up like crazy, with colorful skirts and dresses, they sometimes even wear lenses which make their eyes look bigger and coloured, unfortunately I have no picture, google Harajuku girls and you`ll find it :D

I decided to go to Sapporo and while travelling about 7 hours with the train i got to see stunning landscapes.

Sapporo was very cold because it is located in Hokkaido in the north of japan. But it was very clean and had nice architecture.

I stayed at a hosts place with a traditional futon on tatami mats in a room with paperdoors, which I enjoyed very much.

I went to a volcano called Mt. Usu by lake Toya, where I went to an Onsen, or a hot spring the first time and I just felt so comfortable and relaxed coming out of the onsen like never before. After that I took a stroll to the lake side with such a wonderful view. Heaven!

Swiss flaaag you see? A little bit of home ;)

A very funny thing I saw in the train magazine, advertisements for the most curious things like an instant face lifter which you wear under your hair, or a whistle for exercising your abdominals... just hilarious!! :D

* Funny or more nerve-wracking story in Akita by the side *

When I arrived in Akita a fairly small city between Sapporo and Tokyo I found out how to get to my hostel and took the bus for 20 min. When i arrived there and wanted to pay for my room, I realized I didn`t have enough cash and they didn`t take plastic. Well no big problem I`m just gonna take some cash from the next ATM in the convenience store 5 min from the hostel. Sure thing i went there and found out that that ATM was for japanese cards only. Well great. It was already about 8:30pm and I was in the middle of nowhere. The employees there recommended me going back to Akita station, and so I did. Another 20 min with the bus and I got there. Thinking that at the train station there is definitely going to be some international ATM. I looked everywhere but there was nothing to see. So I thought I`ll go to another convenience store near the station, there has to be SOME place. But no not in shi*** Akita. To clearify my situation it was about 9 I had about 20 francs and my luggage was still in the hostel, there were no buses anymore I`d have to take a taxi. But I kept on going. I went back to the station and asked the staff there but they couldn`t really help me either. Then from nowhere came this super nice and kind japanese man, who apparently just decided to help me and we went together looking for an international ATM. He had the Idea to call his american friend who could speak english and maybe know where to go with international credit cards. And luckily he could help me and I found one in 7 eleven and finally got my money. Happy End after all!

In Ito I was in the most wonderful hostel I`ve ever been to, It was a Ryokan hostel which means it was in an old traditional japanese building and it was right next to a small river where I could chill on the balcony and enjoy the sun. Just perfect!

Since Ito is quite near Mt Fuji a dutch friend and I went to hakone, a city where you`re supposed to have a good view on Mt Fuji. First we went to a volcano where you could eat either black eggs which are boiled in sulfur water or the red bean cream you see above, a typical japanese thing, delicious!

Here the black eggs where boiled, each egg is said makes your life 7 years longer.

There was steam coming out of the ground on different places, and with the colourful nature it looked magical.

Sulfur was everywhere, in the air in the water and as stones on the ground.

Unfortunately that was the best picture I could take from Mt Fuji but at least I was lucky to have a chance to see it!

While waiting for the boat for Hakone we saw those cats lying in the sun and it looked like pure cozyness.

With this fantastic ship we crossed the lake...

...and got to see this wonderful sunset.

One of the favorite places i`ve been to is Mt Omuro, a small very green volcano, where you can have a wonderful panorama view over all the surrounding area and the sea, it was very tranquil and peaceful,too.

My favorite city until now in Japan is Kyoto. It`s difficult to say why, but when I arrived at the train station I just had this positive feeling about this city, I liked it already. And this positive feeling got confirmed, it turned out to be a wonderful city with lots of things to see and do.

As already once mentioned plastic food is very popular here, but it looks pretty fantastic, I have to admit. :D

In front of temples, shrines or other traditional sightseeing spots you can see many men and women dressed in traditional kimonos, which look very beautiful with the different fabrics and colours. Here it`s apparently a schoolclass posing for pictures, as they always do ;)

Kazu, a japanese guy, offered me to show me around in Kyoto and he showed me many nice places, like the food market above.

In a kimono shop I got to see many wonderful kimonos in dazzling colours, the ones above are for marriage so they`re even more extravagant.

Kimono posing time!:D

There was this huge entertainment hall where you could play heaps of games and there were these photo machines which automatically make you prettier and cuter, they even lend costumes and of course I had to give it a go! Unfortunately I lost the pictures though :(

At the riverside I had to use the space and do some taekwondo moves :D

We also visited a traditional japanese garden which was very beautiful.

As you see japanese people like to take pictures of people and my guide was no exception!:D

This is the majestic golden pavilion which is surrounded by a wonderful garden, but it was kind of difficult to enjoy it, because of the hundreds of thousands of tourists around there. ( Yes I`m exaggerating a bit, but still)

Near the golden pavilion there was another temples who had a Zen garden, but it wasn`t completely clear what it was good for, they said that themselves!

But still the surrounding garden was quite marvelous.

I was for two nights at a hosts place and he took the time to go to the bamboo forest with me, which was really nice because it was very peaceful and quite, a very nice place.

Near all kinds of touristic places you find those shops who sell all kinds of delicacies, where you get the chance to try a couple of things when you`re lucky.

Another beautiful sightseeing spot in kyoto was the Fushimi Inari temple and the endless red gates.

The red gates were built reaching kilometers to the top of the mountain, in the forest, a brilliant thing to see.

Next stop Osaka, Halloween. Crazy, just crazy! The second biggest city in Japan, and Halloween there is just wicked, they dress up with the funniest and most extravagant costumes, but since it was so busy there it was difficult to take cool pictures.

Daylight again in Nipponbashi, a very busy shopping district for electronics and food.

The next day I went cycling through Osaka which was a brilliant decision because this is just the best way to get around in the city. First I went to a pagoda and then to the castle park which was splendid! I loved that park, I went there a second time the next day.

In the park there was an curious festival going on, there were people making music and dancing on wooden vehicle and food stand and people watching. It looked great but i just had no idea what for!

To end with, the wonderful castle of Osaka by sunset, an unique view I got to see there.


Lots of love from Osaka!
Valerie