Land of the rising sun and the chicken katsu

I recently spent 11 days in Japan and this is a compilation of my thoughts over those 11 days.

Days 1 and 2

So my first question about Japan is why is it the land of the rising sun, why does Japan have the monopoly on rising suns? It rises everywhere right? So my arrival into the city centre could have been better, I took the express Metro line not the local and ended up in NoIdeaWhereIamI aka Nihonbashi and had to go back on my self and the exit that google maps said I needed didn't exist so I wandered around Ginza trying to find my hotel and find road signs (they are impossible to see). So after landing at Haneda at 520pm, I got to my hotel at 8pm. Room is lovely but small and was once a smoking room so it smells like my grandad's house, on the upside, I am 5 minutes walk from the largest Uniqlo store in the world and the hotel has an amazing breakfast buffet, fish for breakfast indeed! Ginza is the area with all the posh shops, streets and streets of it, the Shisdeido shop is 10 floors, it also has quiet side streets with bars and ramen restaurants so I had ramen, freshly made in front of me, lovely.  I am heading out to explore properly today once my first coffee has kicked in.  Oh another tip, JAL are a far far better airline than BA, great service, food and much cleaner!

 

Days 3, 4 and 5

Greetings from a very wet and windy Tokyo.  Just having my breakfast before heading to the Sky Tree, the tallest structure in Japan and I doubt in this weather I'll see much but the winds are gusting at 50mph+ so that will be fun. So far I've seen the royal palace and the surrounding park (gigantic and very peaceful).  I've visited the Meiji Jingu shrine in Harajuku (and see the local teens dressed as cartoon characters, brides etc. as well as seeing a real Shinto wedding ceremony) I've eaten amazing udon and ramen across the city and it is cheaper here than London for good food.  Yesterday I visited the Tokyo Tower, the Zojoji Buddhist temple, Shinjuku (busiest train station/metro in world), then the Shibuya crossing (famous as busiest crossing in world).  All very intense, loud, bright and yet tame and same.  The love hotels around Shibuya are hilarious, they are so tacky looking ut a room is about £10 an hour... LOL

As I sit here having coffee and trying to block out the loud old Australian women talking about their menopauses and dairy intolerance I am struck that Tokyo is not one city, it is many, it is gigantic, Ginza where I am staying is glitzy, rich, good shops and quiet and the other parts of the city are very different. The Japanese are all very quiet and well mannered apart from on rush hour trains, then they are as bad as Londoners, very pushy with no respect for personal space.  Off to Hiroshma tomorrow.

Day 6 and 7 - Hiroshima and Miyajima

Greetings from Hiroshima. I arrived around 2pm on the amazing bullet train, if only all trains in all countries were that good. It was clean, smooth and comfy and I was able to board an earlier than booked train as they have 3 unreserved carriages. The views of Mt Fuji were amazing and my photos do not do it justice, it is huge and you can see it for hours after leaving Tokyo. Hiroshima is a different pace to Tokyo, it is quiet mostly though the downtown has alleys full of bars, restaurants and what seem to be hostess/karaoke bars.  I've just had dinner, see picture attached and it was amazing and the locals wanted to chat to me so we all had our phones out, including the staff and it was very funny.  Hiroshima is sadly famous for one thing and not to be political, and after watching Oppenheimer, I think it was an act of mass murder, 80,000+ civilians vaporised was not honorable and the people giggling and taking selfies in the Peace Park are morons. I am sitting in my room on the 18th floor looking over the very modern downtown, it could be any big city in Japan, the atomic bomb memorials etc. take up so little of the city but they are worth seeing and very moving. Tomorrow I am going to see the rebuilt castle, and climb up to the Peace Pagoda. I am still jet-lagged and wake up at 3 or 4am wanting breakfast.  

 

I also took a side trip by boat to MiyaJima to see the floating Torii Gate and the herd of deer that call it home. Beautiful.

 

 Day 8 and 9 - Kyoto 

Wow, Kyoto, so many castles, temples, palaces and pagodas I don't know where to start. I tried to see it all and walked over 20 miles in 2 days. It is stunning but it is also a major city with the usual mix of giant departments stores, shopping centres, great food and an affordable metro system. 

Summary and final day

Today is my last full day in Japan, I am having breakfast in Kyoto and should be in Tokyo for lunch. The bullet-trains run every 20 minutes and because the railway system here is SO good and customer friendly, I can get on any train and sit in an unreserved seat, I doubt British trains were ever this good.

I am exhausted, trying to cram in a lot in 10 days. Japan is big and there are so many things I could have done with a few more days but in summary, I loved Tokyo but it is way too big for a 4 day visit, Hiroshima, despite its history is lovely and more managable and the side trip to Miyajima was worth it. Kyoto is SO full of culture my 2 day trip barely scratched the surface; it has temples, shrines, palaces and castles everywhere and in 2 days I've walked 20 miles. I have eaten amazing food everywhere I've been, especially sushi and ramen, food here is not expensive, none of my meals cost me more than £12 which puts London and NYC to shame.

The Japanese are not what you expect, they can be very polite but also very rude, pushy and they love rules so much they will happily remind you if you break them (like standing in the wrong place on the train platform or reclining your seat on the train) but those I've spoken to have been curious and helpful, I made a load of schoolgirls giggle yesterday at the Nijo-Jo castle but I am not sure why.

Visiting here is worth it, I would have done 2 weeks if time and budget had allowed so I may come back though the 13-14 hour flight is not good and it takes about 6 days to get over the jet lag.

Final photo is off some of the amazing food I had in Japan, Sushi, Udon, Ramen and Katsu, none if it expensive, all of it tasty!

じゃあ、また (Mata ne)