JAPAN, here I come! (I'm BAAAACK!)

[pcktlnt]

Enjoy the trip! 

[Glitterwolf]

Have fun!

 

Stay away from anything with tentacles.

[knarthex]

Say hi to Gojira!

[Chaoswolf]

Safe travels, and have fun!

 

Remember, I wear XL t-shirts.

[Unit04]

I loved the castles there and the tour of the (old?) emperor's palace in Kyoto was fantastic.  

 

Have fun!

[ShadowRaven]

always bow with your feet together. 

[Cranky Dog]

The easy part is done, I'm at my mother's place. From her time zone's POV, I got up at 1:30am this morning to get here. As usual, the deal is I bring her a fresh filet of cod.

 

Tomorrow, my sister and her family will be over to help clean out the fridge (we're away for nearly three weeks after all).

 

I called my bankto tell them of my travels, but they don't seem to care anymore (same for my mother's bank). Claiming their "advanced automated fraud system" will do the job. I don't have a history of buying anything in Japan, hardly ever buy stuff in airports, our meals and entries are prepaid nearly everywhere in our trip, and my plane tickets were purchased indirectly from my bank accounts. So... I have some reserves. The only positive sign is that I purchased some Yen from my bank last month, so there is one clue somewhere that indicates that Japan will be somehow involved.

 

On 10/5/2017 at 9:07 PM, Clearman said:

I saw about a dozen of the Japanese Kit-Kat at the Japan pavilion at Epcot this summer.  The only one I remember is green tea. 

I hear that green tea is currently one of the most popular flavors.

 

On 10/5/2017 at 9:05 PM, NebulousMissy said:

Have fun, good luck, and don't get lost in any haunted forests.

 

Remember, not all kit kat flavors are created equal. Some are better than they seem at first glance.

Though I'm willing to try anything once, flavors like baked potato or soy sauce may not be my top choices. But a quick search does reveal a ton of tasty ones. It's just as varied as ice cream flavors.

 

On 10/5/2017 at 9:20 PM, Pegazus said:

Have fun! And remember, if you’re going by bus, and they make road stops, the snacks and gifts you see inside might be the only place you see them. So, I’ll give you Pegazus’s First Rule of Japanese Souvenir Shopping:

 

You see something you might like? BUY IT NOW! No! Do NOT debate about it. Purchase it now. You may never see it again.

 

I still regret missing out on the little alien worker toys from my first visit. So sad.

 

Bonus? Okay. Pegazus’s Second Rule of Japanese Souvenir Shopping:

 

Keep as many 100 yen coins in your pocket as you can stand. The toy vending machines are gold mines of weird and fun figures. And see the First Rule if you have any doubts.

 

And if you get free time in Akihabara and want to, there’s a tiny little miniature figure store in a back alley. Miniature Park. Close to the McDonalds; maybe directly behind it.

I read that souvenirs are unique in each region of Japan. Sounds like it's a common experience to a lot of travelers.

 

I'll keep in mind the 100 yen coins. Right not, smallest denomination I have are 1000 yen bills.

 

Don't know if we'll drop by Akihabara.

 

Some souvenirs I'm interested in (granted, most can be found anywhere on the internet) are:

• Personalized stamp
• Quality decorative chopsticks
• Fruit flavored sake (it seems they don't export it, but you can buy some for yourself).
• Daruma doll

I got a bunch of niece and nephews I also want to find souvenirs for. Any tee-shirt or night gown with Japanese characters will probably do. Though one of them asked for "one of those diapers sumo wear".

 

22 hours ago, EvilJames said:

Watch out for unnecessarily huge hornets.

Sparrow hornets are on my "NOPE!" list.

[Pegazus]

Loft would be a good department store for chopsticks, possibly the stamp. I think they have the daruma dolls too. That’s where I got my Godzilla inside the famous tsunami woodcut prints. They’ve got a bunch of things, possibly even that knife you want. 

 

Tokyo station has an interesting shopping area as well. Tomy car store, Ghibli store, and a couple of other cutesy kid stores. And I would t be surprised if the NHK store would have mawashis. Or at least a sumo wrestler wearing one. 

[EvilJames]

 

Spoiler

This whole story this comes from is quite good, but this is my favorite part.

1 hour ago, Cranky Dog said:

Sparrow hornets are on my "NOPE!" list.

Just make sure they don't put you on their "NOPE!" list. They like to cross things off it.

At any rate, super jealous as other than a brief trip into the Canadian border decades ago, I've never left the country.

Edited October 7, 2017 by EvilJames

[Pingo]

7 hours ago, Pegazus said:

Loft would be a good department store for chopsticks, possibly the stamp. I think they have the daruma dolls too. That’s where I got my Godzilla inside the famous tsunami woodcut prints. They’ve got a bunch of things, possibly even that knife you want. 

 

Tokyo station has an interesting shopping area as well. Tomy car store, Ghibli store, and a couple of other cutesy kid stores. And I would t be surprised if the NHK store would have mawashis. Or at least a sumo wrestler wearing one. 

 

Ah, that reminds me. If you spot them, Tomytec makes Tomix brand model railroads which are N scale which is CAV scale.  They sell a wide range of modern buildings and Japanese-style urban terrain, some in kit form.

Edited October 7, 2017 by Pingo
ARRGH, brain freeze, it was CAV scale!

[Doug Sundseth]

48 minutes ago, Pingo said:

 

Ah, that reminds me. If you spot them, Tomytec makes Tomix brand model railroads which are N scale which is 28mm scale.  They sell a wide range of modern buildings and Japanese-style urban terrain, some in kit form.

 

N Scale is 1:160, which is generally about 10mm figures. HO is 1:87.1, which is about 20mm.

 

28mm figures are probably in between S Scale, which is 1:64 and rare (because it's not very popular with model railroaders) and O Scale, which is 1:48. (I make them closer to S Scale, but YMMV.)

 

(I know nothing about Tomix, btw.)

[Pingo]

4 hours ago, Doug Sundseth said:

 

N Scale is 1:160, which is generally about 10mm figures. HO is 1:87.1, which is about 20mm.

 

28mm figures are probably in between S Scale, which is 1:64 and rare (because it's not very popular with model railroaders) and O Scale, which is 1:48. (I make them closer to S Scale, but YMMV.)

 

(I know nothing about Tomix, btw.)

 

GAH!  You are correct.  I apologize for conveying wildly inaccurate information.

 

N scale is the same as CAV scale.  It is nowhere near 28mm scale.

 

I have corrected the earlier post.  Thank you!

 

That’ll teach me to post technical info in an insomniac haze.

[Cranky Dog]

I'm back!!!

 

Great trip, killer jet lag. Details in another post.

[Chaoswolf]

Welcome home!

[Cranky Dog]

Hi gang, hope everyone had fun at ReaperCon (all signs point to: “YES!!!”).

 

I’m splitting this in several sections (trying to split over several posts)

 

First, let me speak of what I didn’t like about my trip.

 

TLDR: Organized sight-seeing tours aren’t for everyone.

 

It was pretty obvious early on that it was a sight “seeing” tour more than a sight “visiting” tour. We saw a lot of things, but were always in a rush, no time to stop (like an hour to visit whole museums). There were places I could’ve spent half a day visiting but only had an hour. On some days we would spend more time on the bus than actual visiting (i.e. 2+ hours ride to Mount Fuji, 45 minutes to visit). My mother’s knees really acted up, so she skipped on some locations and stayed on the bus. It was pretty much always a tight schedule, with nearly 10-12 hour days of traveling-visiting, quite exhausting in its own way.

 

We were a group of 27, and I was the youngest (at 46!), so it wasn’t a sustainable pace for a lot of them. I wanted to take a lot of pictures, but traveling with such a large group of people walking around with tablets, shoving their way in the frame, and then not get out of the way when there’s a dozen other people wanting to take snapshots. And sometimes, between keeping this group together, or herding cats, the cats would be better. Most of the time it was someone in the washroom or souvenir shop at the last minute (again). The tour guide was flabbergasted at the amount of pit stops we asked for, though he was more used to European French than French Canadians in the sense that we drink a lot of coffee/juice/water at meals, while Europeans drink far less during meals. Also, people would not listen, even when our guide clearly repeated several times some information, someone would ask again. And the constant complaining of some of them, as there pillows are never right, or that they can’t eat this or that. Food allergies are one thing (one to eggs, another to garlic, already staple ingredients), but not liking fish when visiting Japan is just making things difficult.

 

I know chambers of commerce have a hand in promoting travel, but for Tokyo, it got a little ridiculous. Yeah, I heard of Giza, but even if we walked by stores the likes of Gucci or Louis Vuitton, we already have those stores over here, we normally can’t afford them, and besides we didn’t have time to properly shop around (30 minutes to shop four blocks worth of stores?!). Then there was that shorter street that apparently is really popular with teenage French girls, so me being a middle-aged male Canadian engineer geek didn’t “appreciate” it as it should. We walked through a lot of shopping malls/districts but could never find a proper kitchen knife shop like I wanted too (only a small one, outside of Osaka with limited choice). As a geek, I would’ve loved to go to Akihabara, but we just drove by it. Felt like we skipped by other iconics, like ignoring the Tokyo Skytree (though I have some pictures).

 

Finally, distances involved. Even in the 21^st century, this is a pretty freaking big planet to fly over. Even at a 1000kph, 10-12 hour single flights, 22 hours of total flights and layovers is exhausting. I never felt jet lag as large as this one. Just so you know, I woke up a 2pm yesterday in Quebec City (mom’s place), and had my next flight home at 4pm.

 

 

Now for the fun bits!

 

General observations:

 

TLDR: Japan is quite different. Weird in some ways, and makes perfect sense in others.

 

Japan feels just as exotic as it feels familiar. Depending on the city, you could feel the American influence or European influence in building style. Large cities feel American (big buildings), while smaller towns are much more European (houses packed tight, with walls separating them).

 

There sure are a lot of small cars over there, literal box cars, known as Kei cars/K-cars. And flat nose trucks only, which makes sense with all the tight roads and corners. It was explained to us that the small cars (660 cc) are cheaper to license, cheaper toll on the highway, cheaper on gas, cheaper to park, and basically make sense for a city car. It’s the sort of car I would normally drive 99% of the time. Car colors were curiously 90% white, silver/grey or black. Just a few blue or red ones.

 

Now that I saw the mountainous geography, a lot of elements in Japanese movies/anime make more sense. Those hills are insane! It’s not the height that’s a problem, is just how freaking steep they are. Seriously, 45 degrees everywhere?! No wonder the highways are so sinuous. And it makes for incredible dense forests. The trees aren’t that big, some quite tall and skinny, but they’re packed tight. Couldn’t see through them most of them. The only large trees are in the cities or temples, where they are maintained.

 

Japan is crazy clean. You never have to look for a public washroom as they’re everywhere, they’re clean, and they’ll have toilet paper. They have electronic bidets everywhere. Only twice have I not seen them. You get used to them really fast. You look around the streets, and they’re almost perfectly litter free. Then you notice the absence of trash cans. With seems counter intuitive. Japanese frown on eating on the go, so you east/drink everything you have at the point of purchase where there is a trashcan, and to carry with you any trash you have on you. Even on Mount Fuji there were signs advising people to carry their trash back with them. And you know what, it works! I doubt it would ever work in America (something, something attack on our “Freedom to litter”). Only time I saw someone being dirty (smoking in public space, throwing away cigarette butt, spitting), quickly realized he was Chinese.

 

Japanese food and cooking is also quite an experience. For people who are so generally slim, there sure are a lot of desserts sold everywhere. Then again, their traditional desserts aren’t at the same level of sweetness as we’re used too. Either agar-agar based, or mochi based or red bean paste filling (similar texture as dates), and a whole lot of green tea flavored stuff. Rice and miso soup are staples of every Japanese meal, and I really got used to eating miso soup regularly, even at breakfast (even during continental buffets with European/American style options). It’s interesting that since most people eat with chopsticks, everything is meant to be bite sized on your plate or easy to pick up. Also, tempura fired food is just as likely to be eaten cold as warm. An amazing amount fish of all sorts and derivatives (like baby sardine spread), mushrooms and pickled vegetables.

 

Television. As an anime fan, I was expecting more of it on TV (maybe during days or times I wasn’t watching). In the hotels, there was only a handful of available channels. I quickly noted all of the outside TV antennas everywhere. Cable TV is not all that popular, so most people are quite content with over the air channels. Both analog and digital.

 

For souvenirs, everywhere boxes of sweets, but I was quite full after every meal that nothing interested me. As for items, wooden dolls, Daruma dolls, chopsticks, fans, key chains and toys pretty much everywhere. Didn’t expect this many chopstick only stores. Interesting, and real pretty designs, but not worth it enough for me. A lot of 200-300-400 yen toy vending machines (thanks for the tip @Pegazus). Got me a few that can work as proper minis with a better paint job (my Shin Godzilla is mostly an unpainted mini with a dark wash, I also never quite realized how much of Godzilla is mostly tail). I wanted some unique Kit Kat bars, and I found plenty. Though the most unique flavors were at the airport, only a handful of flavors were available else where. Overall I brought back 17 different flavors (and know I missed at least one local one, Tokyo Rum Raisin).

 

For pictures, I’m kicking myself for not removing my polarized filter more for all the times spent inside and on cloudy days. I had a lot more fuzzy pictures than normal. Picture taking was allowed in most places, but a few that contained “national treasures” had “no photos allowed”. Not too bad, but some really places are pictureless save for a few pamphlets.

 

[Part 2 on the next page]

Edited October 29, 2017 by Cranky Dog