Day 1&2- Kyoto
Out of the blue, my traveling buddy, “Adam from Alaska”
called and asked if I wanted to go to Japan…in 3 weeks. I of course agreed, and
without much research or preparation, we were off to the country of the rising
sun, the home of used panty vending machines, the islands of hi-tech
toilets, the land where my big sister
lived. I’m not quite sure why Ilana ever left. Japan seems perfectly suited to
her: Everyone is ultra-polite and friendly, dedicated to perfecting their
cuisine/craft of choice, and the whole place is immaculate. Not a shred of
trash on the ground or graffiti on the sidewalks. I’m a big fan of bowing too
versus the handshake- I say we bring that to that States. Handshakes are
unhygienic and often aggressive to boot; with one party trying to grip harder than the other, or someone
preemptively gripping your fingers and shaking it like a British nanny with a
baby. Although, not speaking a word of Japanese myself, perhaps I just didn’t know better. They could have not
been saying a friendly ‘hello’, but ‘death
to whitey’ with a smile and I would never know better. Or maybe my bow was not
deep enough ...or too deep and I was dishonoring my family name by doing so and
expected to commit hari-kari to atone for my social sins.
But I digress. Our first stop was Kyoto. After getting ourselves oriented, we traveled
the city by bike starting our exploration with Ginkaku-Ji/Silver Pavilion on
the east side of the sprawling city. Built by Shogun Yoshimasa in 1482, he
planned to cover the estate with silver (like Golden Pavilion- we’ll hit that one
later), but never got around to it- however the name stuck. When he died, the
non-silver Silver Pavilion was converted into a temple.
The Gardens were immaculate, staffed by dudes with tweezers
that would pick the smallest debris from spoiling the pristine grounds. An army
of gardeners picked up every fallen leaf daily, resulting in an immaculate,
almost unnatural rolling green bare mossy landscape- leaving the tree trunks
looking naked for lack of cover.
After strolling around a bit, we biked south along a canal
walkway passing by a myriad of small cemeteries, temples, and gates; whose significance and history was lost to
us due to our complete lack of understanding of the Japanese language/culture/people.
Without big sister there to help, we were like miso without soup…..dashi
without bonito flakes…sumo without the silken thong thing. You get the picture.
After a long day of biking and off-and-on drizzling, we
stopped for dinner at an udon noodle soup place and a torrential downpour opened
up; like buckets being emptied above us.
I guess we planned our vacation smack dab in the midst of a series of typhoons.
We biked back in flooding streets and completely drenched- laughing manically
the whole way at the ridiculousness of it all.
Our guesthouse, like most in Japan was a bamboo floor
(tatami mats) with what we would call toddler mattresses for beds. There would be a lamp, but nothing else in the
room. The bathrooms were almost all absurdly small, leaving no room to turn
around with your knees against the opposite wall. The toilets, though, are all futuristic time
machine-like things with all sorts of buttons that do anything from heat the
seat, to spray your butt from half a dozen different angles, to playing fake flushing sounds to cover us your poop noises, to god knows what else.
I was afraid to touch any of them, again, due to my extensive lack of
understanding of Japanese/women/literature/world history/social graces.
Basically what I am saying is that I am
like a book with empty pages.
Day 3- Nara
Rain descended upon us like mid-westerners on a mall during
black Friday the following day and we headed south to the city of Nara. The
first permanent capital of Japan, Nara is the city of deer. About 1500 of them
roam the city streets, as tame as dogs, in search of “deer cookies” from
tourists and locals. In Pre-Buddhist times in Japan, deer were considered
messengers of the gods and retain this status today as National treasures in Nara.
The deer meander around the park, going through handbags of
those who walk by in search of cookies….or biting whatever they can get their
hoofs on. The locals have trained them to bow to you for snacks….which is
adorable!!! But then when foreigners don’t give them a cookie in response they
get a little deer crazy and start going through purses looking for their due
reward. Let us now recite the deer god mantra: BITE, KICK, BUTT, knock down!!!
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| Deer make adorable eee-ee-ee-eeee noises. |
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| Asking a local for directions |
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| and we are off!!!! |
Nara was super quiet at night, partly because it doesn’t
have a large party culture and partly due to the consistent drumming of the
typhoon. However, this made it great as all the sites that were clogged with
looky-lous during the day where all now vacant,…..like a mid-westerners dull
gaze when basic arithmetic is required or when trying to explain to them that
wind is not really god farts.
Nara is also home to Todai-Ji temple, the largest wooden
structure on the planet, which is home to a 55 foot, 537 ton bronze Buddha
(Daibutsu-den). As large as the wooden building housing it was, it is only 2/3
of the original building that burnt down around 1700. Historians believe the
Buddha was erected as a charm against smallpox, which ravaged japan in the
preceding years. We, however, arrived 5 minutes too late to see the big Buddha.
So instead just took pictures of a boat that was in a very small adjacent pond.
No one had any clue why or how it was there.
The temples are part of Nara Koen, a park that occupies the
entire east side of the city. Winding paths were graced with a smattering of
gates, stone lanterns, and statutes- whose significance, again, as a result of
being ignorant gringos/gaijin, was lost to us…..like a deer without cookies or without an old lady to knock down; hallowed be their hoofy name: BITE, BUTT, KICK!!!!.
Day 4& 5- Kyoto again
We headed back to Kyoto at Ilana’s behest, to attend the
Toji monthly flea market and to take in many of the sites we were unable to see
the first day. The flea market was a gaggle of locals hawking goods, from cheap
cotton kimonos to 1000 year old antiques and everything in between. After a
morning of shopping for my honey (that’s you Alex, my little nigiri puff), we
started the day at the most famous and underwhelming site of Kyoto: the Golden
Pavilion (Kinkaku-Ji). Built in 1397 as
a retirement home for a shogun, the building was unnotable- except for its gold
coloration. The surrounding gardens paled in comparison to its sister, the
Silver Pavilion. It may have been impressive had we not previously visited the Silver Pavilion. Kikaku-Ji was also a well-oiled tourist machine,
shuffling a throng a people (who were present even during this torrential downpour)
past the temple and a half a dozen trinket/ice cream shops. There wasn’t much
information there, so basically was just me reading from the guidebook and
being told to hurry on by the guards (who were non-deer worshipping blasphemers most likely)
After the lack-luster temple, we made our way down to the
Nishiki Market- per the guidebook, a plethora of weird and wonderful foods. It
was interesting (and covered from the rains which was a plus), but definitely
not that weird and wicked touristy/expensive (100 Yen= 1 dollar).
We had octopus on a stick (sorry Ilana) and gawked like
tourists with cameras at some weird food items, like baby sparrow or live eel.
On a related note, Seafood jerky is surprisingly good- another thing to bring
back to the states.
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| whale meat for sale...for "research purposes" of course (wink) |
We strolled along the streets of Kyoto during a brief
cessation of the rain, and explored Gion- the Geisha district. There you could
watch geisha walking to and fro, snapping selfies and doing whatever Geishas do.
From my understanding, many of the finer restaurants and hotels hire the Geishas
to entertain and direct events/the meal (no funny stuff). That kind of stuff was way past our budget.
Whilst a
aesthetically pleasing area to walk about it, the hordes of people soon became
too much so we escaped to the top of the space-needle tower for a night-cap
before retiring for the night.
The next day, we headed to the Arashiyama Bamboo grove; A narrow winding path through a dense forest of bamboo.
After time for gentle reflection
on our inner-selves, we went across the river to the monkey park to look at the
free-ranging primates. The signs said not to squat, point cameras at them, make
eye-contact, etc- all of things everyone was doing at the top of the mountain where the troop
would hang out.
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| ol' one eye |
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| the feeding pen (humans inside) |
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| view of Kyoto |
While taking about monkeys with one of the park workers, he
mentioned that they were several different troops and would fight constantly if
the workers didn’t keep breaking things up. Then he said they hate to be
touched and “watch this” poked a monkey and it flipped out getting all
aggressive to him; teeth barred and throwing around its arms all crazy and
stuff. He tossed it a grape like it was
nothing and the monkey quickly forget anything happened- and the guide was like “see.”
As it was getting late and we had a unlimited train pass, we
hopped on the bullet train done to Kobe for Dinner (hour by bullet train) on a
whim; the home of Kobe beef; had some grub and headed back to Kyoto.
Day 6: on the way to Tokyo
Before leaving Kyoto for Tokyo, we walked south to the
Fushimi Inari shrines. The mountain path was littered with about 40,000 of the
picturesque red gates, which originally were meant to pay tribute to Inari- the god of rice, sake and
prosperity. As japan's economy shifted from agriculture to business, Inari came
to deify entrepreneurial venture instead. The gates were donated from businesses from
around the country seeking blessings.
It was a maze of gates and people- all jockeying for that
one picture without some other tourist in the frame.
Next, we got on the Shinkansen bullet train to Tokyo, a
sprawling mass of 35 million souls. The district centers were a cacophony of
light and sound with a corner for everything: from maid cafes (all the staff
dress as sexy maids) to Tokyo Goth (life is pain, man).
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| "school girl" handing out flyers |
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| bowl of snot at fast food joint...mmmmmm |
But we came to Tokyo for one and one thing only: Sumo.
Day 7: Tokyo
There are 6 sumo tournaments a year, each lasting about 2
weeks. Tickets are sold out way in advance as people travel all over Japan to
witness the spectacle. For die-hard fans (or unprepared travelers like
ourselves), they have 300 nosebleed seat on sale the day of each event.
Although the ticket gates open at 7:30, there was a good hundred people ahead
of us when we arrived at 6am. Once you get the tickets, most people head out
and spend the morning in the city despite the fact that the sumo matches start
as early as 8:30am. This is because, these are the preliminary bouts (the
stable boys/apprentices) and the fights continue through 6:00pm with the best
fighters last.
Each “stable” is run by a retired fighter and divides its
members into 3 categories: the
apprentices/stable hands, the Juryo, and the top tier: Makuuchi.
So, with ticket in hand we decided to hit up the Tsukiji
Fish market first for some sushi breakfast. The market is the world’s biggest,
supplying over 2000 metric tons of seafood for japan a day. Although the Tuna
auction (also hard to get into) was well over by the time we arrived, we
strolled through the crowded stalls eating possibly the freshest sushi we have
ever had and tasting all sorts of dried/pickled goods the venders were
displaying.
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| Stuffed Polar bear at the fish market- dont ask me why |
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| I've got my eyes on you! |
After which, we excitedly headed back to the Ryogoku district
for Sumo. We arrived just as the amateurs were finishing up. The rules are
simple: no hitting below the belt, no closed fists, no messing the hair up. If
any part of you touches the mat other than the bottom of your foot; you lose.
If you step out of the circle; you lose. Everything else is fair game.
As a multi-hour event involving lots of drinking, as the
matches progressed, the crowd got rowdy-er and rowdy-er. It all culminated to
the final match of the two best fighters and the people lost their s&*t. The
previously reserved crowd (for a sporting event) was now throwing their seat
cushions into the ring and getting all crazy and stuff.
Day 8 & 9: Gifu/Takayama/Hida
We arrived in Gifu during a Hawaiian festival for kids.
There were cops with a minibike presiding over the event, and when they say us
ogling the mini-bike, they insisted we take a picture riding it. It was very
representative of Japanese culture.
If someone on the street had a snack we
were looking at, they gave us some without us asking. At a restaurant, someone
practicing their English would insist we taste some of their meal. If you were
in a store and unable to buy something (what you wanted was too expensive),
they would often give you a token gift for free. Purses and wallets were left
unattended on the train, hotels left their lobby unlocked and unattended with
laptops sitting out. This was the only country I’ve been to where you could
leave your luggage outside a shop, come back 15 minutes later certain that it would
still be there. Beyond their reserved politeness, the Japanese were extremely honest and generous.
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Cop ASKED us to take a picture on his mini-bike with his hat.
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Our purpose in Gifu was to head to smaller towns just north via train that were renown for their Sake brewing. And we did just that. The following morning, we hopped a local train to the base of the Northern Alps. Our first destination, Hida, was a cobblestone-lined town speckled with Old Merchant home with latticed bay windows. Waist deep moats dotted with giant koi skirted the worn main streets. We arrived at the Sake breweries to be disappointed- Sunday there were no tours, only tastings….for all of the breweries. Our ace-in-the-hole brewmaster contact we were acquainted with via a friendly host in Kyoto (and only chance of circumventing the no-tour rule) was away as well. So we left, empty-handed except for the bottles of sake we had in our hands. So not really empty handed....sake handed, I guess.
With a full day’s worth of travel in head of us, we headed
back south to Takayama (also home to breweries that did not do tours in Sunday)
for a meal. With an hour to kill before the next train, we marched around with
our backpacks in the blaring noon heat to see the folk village of Hida no Sato
just south of the train station (Home of the Teddy Bear Eco village and Forest
of Squirrel). We had just enough time to walk there, give a 'we-made-it' high
five, turn around, and waddle back down to the train station. With a little
more time we would have been able to appreciate the A-frame traditional houses,
weaving and ceramics crafthouses, and watch the rice harvests be brought in by
hand and sickle.
A mess of sweat and sake, we made it back to the train and
started our 7 hour journey to Hiroshima.
Day 10 Hiroshima
The peace memorial radiated an aching sorrow from the stones
of the city-scape. Twisted metal married with dull square modern skyscrapers. With the harrowing “A-Bomb” Dome in the center of it all. The dome was the only
standing structure in the area after the atom bomb and has been left largely
untouched from when Little Boy detonated some 75 years ago. As we arrived
around midnight, the park was empty but for our presence- only further lending
to the weighty feeling of the memorial.
Day 11: The Road to Aso (dont be such a...)
We woke up early to go through the Hiroshima peace museum and learn
more about its pre and post destruction. The museum, while having powerful
imagery, was largely devoid of novel information. I’m not sure what I was
expecting, but it left me wanting.
The most powerful story in the Museum was of a little girl
who got cancer due to the residual radiation. She thought if she could fold a thousand origami
cranes that the gods would allow here to live. She died just short of a
thousand and her classmates finished the rest. Ever since, strings of paper
cranes have been used throughout Japan
as a symbol for peace and can be found at shrines all over the country.
After the morning at the museum, we hopped a train for Aso.
Aso is a quaint mountain town in the far south-west corner of Japan renowned for
its active volcano. However, we quickly learned that an earthquake had taken
place in the region that day and the train lines were not running. So we hopped a local
bus instead. It was much longer, but we actually made it to town and walked in
the dark to our hotel. I had booked it online without looking at pictures and
it was not what we were expecting. A 8 story building with all-you-can-eat
gourmet food (inclusive), on premise
Onsen (public bath house), and complementary Fugata (a kimono-like bath robe).
Everyone was strolling around in their robes; having dinner, outside for a smoke;
in fact, I’m in a fugata right now as I type this.
Day 12: Mount Aso
After waking from the food-coma of the night before, we set
out to climb Mount Aso. With the recent earthquake, we were hoping the volcano,
already one of Japans most active, would be even more angry than normal. Mount
Aso (Aso-San) is located in the world’s largest caldera, 80 miles in circumference
and up to 15 miles wide in some places. The crater area is made up of 5
volcanic cones with the sulfurous stench of its belches readily apparent from
the distant web of the hiking paths.
Adam, feeling a bit sick, opted to take the bus up to the
top and hike down, but having missed the bus by 1 minute and hours until the next one, he was vetoed and we
started the long climb up on foot.
The trail was paved with no trailhead marking (hard to find)
and was not marked on their local pamphlet maps. The day was beautiful. Dramatic
clouds clashed with the bright sun creating pockets of light and darkness
speckling the entire valley.
After the 8 mile hike up, we arrived at the base of the main
volcanic cone only to find out that all the trails around the craters were closed due to an
increase of volcanic activity. It was a bit disappointing, but the hike up was
well worth it with all its dramatic scenery.
You could also see the damage the earthquake had caused with
many gravestones topples and tiled roofs asunder.
But dont you worry, in case of a cataclysmic eruption,
safety helmets were made available to keep us safe from the tidal wave of magna
and noxious gas that would ensue. Thank goodness (but dont forget to return them after).
Rather than beeline back, we hiked up a neighboring hill,
much to Adam’s chagrin (earning his nickname of Pokie). All the hills were
awash in a sea of tall grass nourished from the nutrient rich volcanic
soil. From the top of the hill there was
supposed to be a trail back down to town according to one map on the interwebs, but alas there
was nothing. In lieu of backtracking down, I somehow convinced Adam to take a
Hobson shortcut (we know how those always turn out) as it looked like the
ridge line had a game trail that connected to a dry river bed, that connected to
the paved back back down the valley.
Starting down the ridgeline was slow going. Large swaths of land had shifted (perhaps in
the earthquake), making the ground reminiscent of tectonic plates separating-
leaving 1-4 foot crevasses in-between each mass. As the tall grass often masked
these crevasses, it was arduous going. I was loving it; snapping pictures,
hopping around- and then I would look back at Adam- all sick and glowering,
wondering how I keep convincing him to take these shortcuts.
The steep and ankle-twisting grass field gave way into 10 foot thicket.
The thicket gave way into a mudslide ravine.
Without internet
to check our location versus the trail, we kept wandering down the meandering
riverbed following the footsteps of our deer brethren (bite, butt, kick, knock
down!!!!). And Lo unto the blessed Horned one, biter of cookies, butt-er of
tourists; the deer did not disappoint. They led us right back to the trail
intersection (welp… not right to, we had to climb up a damn and bridge),
hallowed be their inspiring deer song- ee-eee-e-e-eeee-ee.
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| rhino beetle in the riverbed trial |
Adam, was a little less than thrilled. He crawled exhausted back on the hiking trail like the non-believer he was. It was a short jaunt back down to the hotel, past CUDDLY
DOMINION, a nightmarish animal amusement park. The brochures had cute bubble
lettering of “happy Monkey” and “smile mountain” and have pictures of suicidal
monkeys doing tricks with photoshopped giant fruit surrounding them. Their
little faces on that pamphlet still haunts my dreams….but I digress. I just
love the name, which was always all caps- CUDDLY DOMINION. It looked like what it probably was: A nightmarish hellscape for monkeys….. and a
petting zoo. I surmise this is where bad monkeys' souls end up when they die:
Doing tricks for all eternity in a place with all florescent colors, fake fruit, and bubble
lettering.
With a thundercap announcing its arrival, we spent the rest
of the night at the hotel- Adam sleeping off the horrors I put him through that
day and me soaking in the onsen and doing emails for work.
The Onsen is a public bathhouse (segregated by sex). Nudity
is required and the waters are always uncomfortably hot (for me at least). Taking off your fugata, one would rinse off
thoroughly (on little stools), soak in one of the sulferitic pools, rinse off
with a bucket of cold water, soak some more, then shower again before
putting your fugata back on to have a meal, beer, or simply stroll around the
hotel.
We then sat down to figure out where we wanted to go in the morning (we haven't planned more than a day in advance so far) and hit the sack for some much
needed rest.
Day 13, 14 & 15: Tomonoura
After another all-you-can-eat breakfast we started our 6
hour train ride back past Hiroshima to the sleepy port town of Tomonoura. All
we knew of this town was that it was inspirationally beautiful and often used
as the backdrop for movies (like ‘Wolverine’ most recently).
A fleet of shipping ships harbored in its mellow coves, and
rows of old-styled house houses corralled the narrow winding streets. Tomonoura
is also home to a particular brewing product: Houmeishu. Houmeishu is a sweet
“medicinal” liquor steeped in over a dozen types of herbs. The base is either
sake or shouchu (distilled rice wine) to which they add additional molded rice
(Koji) and polished glutinous rice (mocha gome) to add sweetness. The
rice/alcohol mixture then sits for 2-3 months to fully absorb all readable
sugars and flavors, then the mixture is filtered and the herbs added for an
additional month or 2. The brew houses all had ancestral recipes that included
the same herbs, but at different proportions. The end result is a 12-16%
alcohol similar to an aperitif. They claimed a shot before each meal would
keep you strong, but I think it was just a good excuse for some good ol' fashioned day-drinking. Houmeishu has been brewed in the area since 1659 (first recorded
permit), where it fell into favor with local feudal lords and became a
profitable export (whose popularity in Japan has since waned).
After sampling a few of the local homebrewers and getting my
health on, I headed out by ferry to the nearby Sensui-Jima Island. As a result
of the consistent thrumming of the rain, it was a near vacant 3-4 square mile
island filled with beaches, hiking paths, and one café. The island was also filled
with one other thing: spiders. I couldn’t walk a dozen feet down a path in
Spider Island without getting a face-full of cobwebs. It puzzled me why these
paths hadn’t been cleared out by prior hikers, but then it dawned on me- all the
other hikers I saw were Japanese and at least 4 inches shorter than me. Hence,
from the chin down, the paths were clear, but from the face up I was spider
bait. That’s when I met sticky™: my trusted stick, which I waved in front of me
madly like obsessed Harry Potter fan the entire duration of the hike. Sticky did a good job
clearing the near invisible labyrinth of spider silk, but every so often would
be discarded and replaced with a fresh stick when a spider would lodge itself onto the waving limbs
(in search of human blood no doubt).
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| Giant Japanese hornet!!! |
These weren’t cute cuddly spiders either, but giant yellow
and black stripped monstrosities with a mandible full of nasty and an attitude
to boot.
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| searching for human flesh , no doubt |
After bringing my waving arm to near exhaustion, I cleared
the brambles of arachnids and made my way to one of the small beaches. All to
myself, I stripped down and floated in the luke-warm sea, with the gentle rain
caressing the ovulating surface. It was truly wonderful; Cinderella-esque in fact. Fish of different shapes and sizes would circle around me, skirting in and out of view, checking out
what they would probably consider a very odd-looking gaijin fish (gaijin= slang for foreigner… like
Gringo).
With 15 minutes to kill before the next ferry, I patroned
the local café. They didn’t have any food or tea. I’m really not sure why they were open. They spoke no English; and my Japanese ended at ‘hello’ and
‘DELICIOUS’ (must be yelled exaggeratedly). After a brief time talking at each
other like 2 ships passing in the night and some free food (the samples in the
display), I caught the ferry back to
Tomonoura to meet back with Adam. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, Adam was sick
and whiny and threw out his back in the morning, so spent the day laying down in our very, very small airbnb (like 6’x8’ in total)
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| Me and Tanuki- a raccoon dog trickster (real animal) |
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| Best Ramen of the trip |
Day 16 & 17: Wakayama and Shirahama
After thoroughly walking the small port-side town, we made
our way back to the Kii peninsula and closer to the airport. After a full day
of travel, we arrived at Wakayama. A nondescript beachside city with the
prerequisite castle, shrines, and temples that all mid-sized cities had in
Japan. They had a zoo, which was ultra
depressing- solitary animals looking neglected and in small enclosures- and they
had the Porto Europa!!!!
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| gravestones...not Porto Europa |
Porto Europa was a ‘Europe’ themed amusement park that consisted of a stocked fishing pond (fishing for $120), a block of fake houses made to look like the narrow alleys in Venice, a defunct log roller coaster ride, a non-functioning Ferris wheel, and a tourist fish market.
The whole things seemed like a hallucinogenic nightmare, but
we weren’t there to sit on the broken log ride, we were there for the daily
tuna cutting show at the fish market. It was all in some foreign language, so
don’t ask me what the dude was saying. My guess is something about the Deer
gods providing for the bounty of the sea with probably a 'bite all the humans' mantra
thrown in (bite, kick, butt, knock down!! Blessed be thine mighty call;
EE-EEEE-E-EEE).
But I digress. An under-excited fast talking host cut
and swirled parts of a whole fresh 100 lb tuna waving around different parts
for picture opportunities. He scraped some scraps from the ribs for free
samples which could have been cool/delicious had a horde of 100 hungry tourists not descended upon it like a zombie horde to the feast. Tuna scrapings
were not risk the jostle of the thriving mass of humanity in front of me, so
instead we hitched a bus back to the train station to head further south to
Shirahama.
Shirahama was a laid back resort town with a pristine white
sand beach. "But japan is volcanic and thus shouldn’t have pure white beaches" you say- well you would be correct. All the sand was imported from Australia. The din of near
constant rain had stopped and the sun shone clearly on the warm waters. It was
an absolutely blissful way to end the trip. Floating in warm waters, basking in
the sun; on a nearly empty beach with absolutely no worry that anyone would
steal your unattended stuff (everything was left unlocked in japan). Wishing
for some goggles to swim with, we stumbled upon a scratched up pair on the
beach. It was all sunshine and puppy dogs for us (figuratively): Cold beer in
hand, frolicking with the waves, and fishies.
Crime appeared to be close to non-existent in Japan, so the
cops were very board. Earlier in the trip a drunken student was sleeping on a
train bench and 6 security people excited got their whistles and jostled for
position to be the one to ‘bring him in.’ In Shirahama, some old guy was
fishing off some rocks outside the roped area (for your safety) and they sent a
full team of firemen, EMT, and 2 trucks to bring him to justice. Hilariously,
all 8 people couldn’t figure out how to get to him from the cliff edge, so they
just yelled at him over a megaphone until he politely made his way back behind
the rope. Every available person in the vicinity had gathered to watch the
spectacle. This was crime in rural Japan.
After walking around and looking at stuff we made our way
back up to the city of Wakayama for our final supper- which due to a language
barrier (and a no pork dietary restriction) ended up being 1 skewer of beef, one
egg, and some fishy-rice that wass left out all day at room temp….mmmmm. But that was half
the fun, you never know what you’re going to get; so you’re bound to win some,
and lose some.
With the light of japan fully waned, we packed up our stuff,
headed to the airport, and made our way back to the States; content in the fact
that we went a full 2 weeks without killing each other. And as before, I’m
sure, seven years down the line when we have forgotten how much we bug each
other, Adam will ask me out for another trip and I’ll say….’ok.’
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