Travel Journal – Wednesday 16/4 – 08
Konbanwa minna-san!
Kyo no postu wa nihon-go imasu!
Nantoka na! Jodai wa, jodai!
No, today’s post won’t be in Japanese because my Japanese sucks. Yeah it really sucks! Thou I manage with my English and my beginner Japanese, it’s not the best. I can understand them pretty well, but speak, well, that’s really, really hard. I’m bad at starting the conversation in Japanese and when I do they tend to talk so fast that I barely hear them and then I say something they say something and then we’re both confused. Thou always have a notepad and a pen always available, together with some basic skills makes it possible to overcome most obstacles.
Let me tell you a little about my usual gear, so you can get a picture about how I’m equipped. I’ll skip my clothes, they are there, and they vary. First I have a green pouch1, this one have my notebook, two pencils, some maps, some numbers, my cards, money and my Cash Book where I write how much money I spend on different things and some small things. I have my buff (the thing I have like a headband on my picture) a pair of sunglasses I bought before I went here2. I also have my backpack. IN this I have some important papers, maps, and my computer along with it’s adapter. If I think I need it I have an umbrella too along with eventual cloths to change to if I’m going to a Onsen or a Sento3 and in my belt I have my digital camera so I easily can get it and photograph whatever I want and easily and quickly get it back and forth. I also always wear a clock, with the local time and my cellphone (even thou it doesn’t work) with the Swedish time. By the way, do not send me any messages or call my cellphone. If you send me messages they will be sent to the service station where they will wait for about 7 days, if it can’t reach me it will disappear, and in some cases they charge you for it. That’s about it, I almost never wear anything else if I don’t need it for something.
Well, this day started about the same as all the others. We got up, the weather was just as yesterday. But one thing that were different were that we were a little slow. We all lay in our beds talking to about 10 and then we got up. I talked about getting breakfast and Danielle talked about Asakusa, a temple in Tokyo she wanted to go to, to eat some sweet beanlike things. She doesn’t even drink milk or eat anything made from animals. However, she had been to this temple before but just wanted to go there to buy some things and to withdraw money and eat. During the morning we also talked about taking a shower, we were all dirty and sweaty, but the nearest Sento didn’t open until 16 so we decided to try and maybe find a Onsen instead. Oliver decided to go alone, as usual, while I agreed to team up with Danielle and se the temple in Asakusa.
Let me tell you a little about Oliver.
He’s from a little city in France called Nice or something, I don’t know the spelling. And he’s been travelling for a while and I don’t know anything more than that. He knows some Japanese, he’s far better than me, and knows about 800 kanjii4. The purpose of his visit is very similar to mine, he want to improve his Japanese and meet people. But he’s a little of a loner, at least during the day. During the day he walks around in Tokyo and watches the parks and temples and during the night he’s out in Roppongi5 or Shibuya6. He usually comes home around 00:00 but sometimes he comes home earlier and other times a little later, depending on how he feel about the company he managed to get in.
However, we went to Asakusa, which is a temple area with a giant temple with a gigantic tower and a gigantic lantern gate, I have a picture of it, it’s really humongous. The Japanese temple is guarded by two monstrous giant guards (those who have read the GANTZ-manga knows what I’m talking about). They had unfortunately put up a steel net around the Guardians here, most likely so nobody would try to climb over and destroy them or something. But the area before the main temple had a lots of shops full with souvenirs and Japanese stuff, both traditional and modern. I found lots of candy shops where I looked around for eventual candy to buy for Robert, but I don’t think he like traditional old Japanese candy. I was almost about to buy postcards too, but I decided to buy them on Friday and post them then too. I’m going to send about five cards, I’ve promised about four people to send those pictures and I think I will send one back home too. We’ll see. I’m trying to keep my expenses down. I will send at least two.
Danielle and me hanged around there most for quite some time, and by the way we managed to get some cash from her Travellers Check’s too. After Asakusa I got a train card. It would be easier than to buy a ticket each time, and a little bit cheaper, than but not as cheap as the JR Railway Pass. However we used the subway to get there, which was new for me. It’s a little bit cheaper than the JR Train. I’ve learned that we have a Metro (Subway) and a Monorail (Upper train) and the train. Then we have the Shinkansen and Hondai/Narita lines. The last one in two lines is just back and forth from the airports.
However, other than this me and Danielle spent the evening sharing a bottle of wine and playing cards. Yeah, the liquor here is pretty cheap. Even thou most is Japanese or general Asian stuff. But it seems like they have quite a lot, and most is pretty cheap too. They have their liquor in the super market. Almost every convenience store has a shelf or two to liquor while the supermarket has about twice as much Liquor as they have sodas and soft drinks. They have Liquor Stores too, but those are like… expensive compared to the other ones, still cheaper than Sweden thou. Not than I’m going to buy so much anyway. That wine bottle cost about 45 SEK and was considered quite good and had a medium price, according to Japanese.
Well, I don’t have anything more to write about today, other than that we had fun and than we bought the tickets for the show today too. Yeah, and during the evening clouds pulled in over Tokyo, so probably it will rain tomorrow.
Best regards,
Herid Fel
A bag I wear around my MIDJA ↩
I almost always have them hanging from my neck ↩
Onsen is a hot spring, natural warm wather, and an Sento is a public bath house, with water that’s warmed by gas or electricity ↩
I know about 30, and Kanjii is the advanced Chinese signs ↩
A very, very new and popular district where they have lots of clubs ↩
A popular area with many bars and places to hang out ↩
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