Justine and Dylan’s Travel Blog

Japan is turning out to be quite an interesting place. Which is pretty much as expected. In as far as the unexpected can be expected. You get the point.

So, interesting: not just the things we’ve seen, but particularly daily logistical activities. A good example: imagine going to the supermarket where you pretty much have no idea what’s on the inside of the packets of stuff you’re buying (pretty much all writing is in Japanese characters). Unless the packaging is transparent of course, but most of the time all you have is shape, weight and perhaps some funky drawings on the outside (ah, takes me back to trying to guess what my Xmas presents were before being allowed to unwrap them). Another example, ordering at restaurants: an instant give-away of a cheap and often nasty eatery in western countries, the good old pictures of meals on offer out the front of the restaurant, have suddenly become our saviours and a not to be underestimated factor in deciding where to dine for the evening. Some marketing strategies will never be the same.

However, the confusion that is caused by the total lack of understanding of any kanji on signs, menus, timetables, labels, television, etc are sometimes surprisingly offset somewhat by the complete efficiency with which some things are run (like trains, trams, buses, hotels, supermarkets, etc) and the easy availability of anything you could need (supermarkets, department stores, restaurants, etc). (As an aside: kanji is one of three sets of characters the Japanese use. Fortunately Justine has been able to translate the hirigana and katakana ones from her highschool days… mind you this is only of limited help: being able to translate a Japanese character set into a western one only gets you halfway as it still doesn’t help much with translating the Japanese in western characters into English!) After puzzling together how to pay for buses or trams and how to work out where your next train is leaving from, public transport has become a breeze (some aspects of it are pretty impressive actually) . Supermarkets aren’t so daunting any more once you work out where everything is and that the check-out persons don’t actually expect you to reply to the torrent of gibberish (uhm, I mean Japanese) they bombard you with. All as expected really

Anyway, interesting places we’ve seen so far. Day 2 saw us training 1150km in 8 hrs to the other side of the country to the island of Kyushu (gotta love the shinkansen, or super express, trains) and we’ve been steadily working our way back towards Tokyo ever since:

• started in Fukuoka (aka Hakata) with sidetrips to Kumamoto castle and Hiko-san for a walk (cut short somewhat, very short actually, by the two inches of snow it piled on us during the 20 min bus drive from the station to the starting point of the walk… I guess winter is not officially over yet everywhere
• then off to Hiroshima, with sidetrips to Miyajima (floating torii) and Sandan-kyo (very scenic gorge, but also cut a little short, this time due to long travel times, some snow and construction… we did pretty much have the place to ourselves though, strangely enough!)
• currently in Takamatsu (on island of Shikoku), with a sidetrip today to the Iya valley (unfortunately the bits you can visit by train and bus, such as Oboke gorge and the Iya vine bridge are HIGHLY overrated… the bits you can get to by car are probably less touristy and overhyped, but we can only guess) and to Kompira-san (in Kotohira), an amazing temple complex situated on a hill. Think lots of temple buildings surrounded by forest, linked by stairs. Lots of stairs. All good practice for Nepal next month is what I was thinking (and that we should’ve drunk less beer and kept up our walking since leaving Patagonia…)

The next legs should see us going to Kyoto, Takayama, Matsumoto and Tokyo, so although probably a bit more touristy than what we’ve seen so far, we’ve still got plenty of Japan to see…