What A Wave Must Be

Late day. It’s nice to not be on schedule again. Started the day out with dim sum with Ma Ma and Uncle Adrian. Haven’t seen either of them in five years, so that was nice. Then we went shopping around Tai Koo’s big shopping center. Not much interesting there. I futzed around with the idea of reintroducing polo shirts into my wardrobe. I’m not sure if this is just a fleeting idea, or if I’ll actually go on with it. I’m planning on going down to JC Penny’s when we get back home and I have my days to myself again and buying a few and trying them out. I’m not sure if I’ll like wearing collars again. That’s really the only thing that’s keeping me from wearing polos. I’ve worn collars for the better part of everyday from Kindergarten to eighth grade. That time made me hate polos fiercely. However, I’m considering them again for use in college.

After shopping we took the MTR to Central and walked to the Victoria Peak Tram. When we got to the top, we walked around the whole mountain. That took about an hour or so. We got a taxi back to the hotel and rested around for a while. Then we went to dinner.

Dinner was a family reunion of sorts. For the first time in twelve and a half years, all four (read: my only four) direct, first cousins were gathered in one place at one time. That four includes me, my four-year-senior cousin Kimberly, and then two others, Herman and Clement, who I think have the most unfortunate names ever, and of whose ages I am not certain.

What I find the most interesting is that my entire family, on my dad’s side at least, is near-sighted. Kim and I wear contacts; everyone else wears glasses outright. I wonder why so many Asians are near-sighted.

And that was the sum of the day. Nothing else to report.

So we woke up early and had breakfast in the hotel’s restaurant before boarding a shuttle to the Osaka-Kansai International Airport. For the record, I think that Japanese airports are much better organized than any other airports I’ve ever been to. Japanese security has been the fastest security I’ve ever passed though.

We arrived in Hong Kong at some indefinite point in time. I haven’t ever adjusted my watch, so when I’m in the air, time sort of stops for me and then jumps to the proper time when I’m on the ground. We took the express train to the island and then got a taxi to the hotel. The hotel on a whole is relatively nice, though it isn’t nearly as nice as the hotel I stayed in last time I was in Hong Kong. The room has a nice modern/contemporary feel to it, accented with hardwood instead of brushed metal. The wood gives the place a much warmer feel.

I futzed around the internet for a while until around 6 when we went out. We went over to Kowloon and walked through a street market. It’s really amazing how cheap stuff in Hong Kong is. I bought two shirts, a set of Nightmare Before Christmas figurines, and a Jack Skellington dash ornament. That cost me around $15 US. Like I said, insane. I’m planning on giving some of the figurines as gifts and keeping at least one and the dash ornament for myself.

After that we had dinner at a Malaysian café. I had curry beef. It was good. Not much else to say about that really. Not spectacular food, but not detestable either.

So I’ve four more days of Hong Kong left. I’m really anxious to go home. I can’t imagine how we’re actually going to fill four days. I expect we won’t.

First stop of the day was an old train going through the mountains behind Kyoto. Not much of real interest aside from some nice views of a river. After the train ride we walked a path through a bamboo forest to a small town on the outskirts of Kyoto. There, it proceeded to rain the heaviest rain I have ever seen. And I’ve seen some heavy rain. Luckily, the downpour lasted only about ten or twenty minutes and then cleared up entirely.

We took the bus to a yakinikku place for lunch. The restaurant gave each table a plate of raw beef, chicken, and pork and a little barbecue set into the table. I think that the Japanese are the only people that can get away with charging you more for cooking your own food. Regardless, the food was good.

After that we drove a long way down from Kyoto back to downtown Osaka. There, we had three hours’ free time in the heart of downtown. I ate dinner at this nice little ramen joint called Shiawase Ramen. Their namesake dish is what makes them famous across Japan. It’s essentially just a pork ramen, but it is insanely good.

After that I went to a record store and proceeded to leaf through the JPop and game/anime soundtrack sections. This store had a lot more of Ayumi’s work than the one I found in Kyoto. I didn’t buy any of that, though. What I did buy was a compilation of the best OpEds from Naruto. I like anime OpEd compilations because they’re a good way to sample a bunch of different J-bands without having to shell out money or time acquiring singles or albums. I’m a little disappointed that I can’t use the included DVD unless I find a region-free DVD player. I am not so disappointed though as the whole CD+DVD set cost just about as much as a normal CD album.

And with that, my tour of south Japan ended. Now it’s off to Hong Kong to see the relatives and muck around the place where my parents spent their childhoods. That should be fun.

First stop of the day was a Buddhist shrine in Kyoto. All the basic Buddhist fare featured.

After that we had free shopping time. I bought more cell phone accessories. This time individual chibis of Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Gaara. I plan to give these and the ones I bought yesterday to everyone back at home as gifts. I also found a plush of Totoro, which is going to Jon once I get his address. I feel accomplished in that I found gifts for everyone. I also bought an exact replacement of my red beads. I’m happy.

After that shrine, we went to see the Golden Pavilion. Again, standard fare. I took more pictures of it.

Then it was a long drive to an undisclosed location for a traditional Japanese ryokan and hot springs. I’m too modest (read: uninterested in being seen by and seeing strangers naked) to go to the hot springs, so I’ve just been enjoying the tatami mats and sliding doors.

Dinner was interesting tonight. We all dressed up in yukata and had this really traditional Japanese dinner. Then we did karaoke. Dad and I sang Massachusetts by the Bee Gees. I was contemplating singing Bohemian Rhapsody and doing my interpretive dance, but I decided to not. This night has once again affirmed in my mind two truths: first, Cantonese should not be allowed to drink any amount of alcohol; second, karaoke should be banned for it’s severely psychologically destructive powers.

Side note: Must everything in Japan talk? We walked through several gates today that talked when you passed through them. The escalators in train stations talk too when you walk through them. The people-movers in the airport talked when you stepped on them too.

First stop of the day was a park in Nara. Nara is known for one thing and one thing alone: the deer that are allowed to roam freely around the town are so civilized and domesticated that they will bow their heads to you profusely before eating the food in your hand. It’s really sort of surreal. We walked through the park and there were all these deer just standing around. People would get out their cameras and the deer would stop walking and look straight at the camera while keeping perfectly still. When you held out some food for them they would walk up to you, bow their heads several times, and then eat the food. It was really surreal how much these deer had been domesticated just by being allowed to roam around the city.

There was also a temple at the park that we went to. It was nothing special really. At the gift shop I bought several good luck charms: one for driving and one for academics. I also bought a two nice cell phone accessories. One has chibis of Naruto, Kakashi, and Gaara on it; the other has chibis of Ed, Al, and Roy.

After the park in Nara, we drove up to Kyoto. The hotel in Kyoto was amazing. It had free high-speed internet. It’s bathroom was also enormous. And it had an LCD TV.

We went to see Nijo-jo before dinner. That was standard fare as I’d already seen it all already.

One of the main reasons we were in Kyoto was to eat at this particular tonkatsu don restaurant. I must say that the food there was really good. The tonkatsu were really tender and had really crispy skin, a combination I gather is very hard to pull off effectively. The sesame sauce was also really good.

After dinner I went shopping in the surrounding shopping district. There was a record store so I decided to go in and see if I could find anything. I was surprised to still see ULTRA BLUE on the front racks. I was also surprised to still see (miss)understood on the display racks in the JPop section. I looked around a bit and found a good collection of Ayu’s music. I was really surprised to still see a copy of I am…, A Song for XX, and A Best on the shelves. There were also copies of her most recent singles and her past two albums. Utada’s section was a little sparser, but still well represented.

However, I didn’t buy any of their stuff. What I did buy was a CD by a duo calling themselves Chemistry. The album is a remix album of their latest album fo(u)r. The remix is called Re:fo(u)rm I like plays on words like this. The music is somewhat like a mix of pop and light rock. It’s somewhat weird.

I also bought an album by a band called Indigo Blue. This album I like a whole heck of a lot. The band is a guitarist and violinist and a singer. The singer sings both in English (really well, by the way) and Japanese. I love that whole CD to death and I’ve only had it for this short time. Luckily I have my laptop so I could listen and rip them to the iPod.

No jetlag! At least for the first night. I managed to sleep straight through the whole night. I may get sacked by jetlag tonight. I sure hope not.

I love breakfast in Japanese hotels. There traditional continental fare like bacon, sausages, ham, eggs, and hard-boiled eggs. They also had a lot of Japanese breakfast food including rice, miso soup, grilled salmon, and various pickles. Japan is perhaps the only country where I enjoy breakfast buffet.

The first thing we did today was go down to the Black Gate Market in downtown Osaka. That was somewhat interesting. There wasn’t really all that much there aside from grocery stores and things of that same ilk. I was thoroughly bored for that section of the day. After that we went to a restaurant for the express purpose of eating unagi don for lunch. Apparently, north and south Japan differ in unagi cooking styles. One guts the eel by cutting it down the stomach and steams the eel before grilling it; the other cuts the eel down the back and doesn’t steam before boiling. The story is that the latter, out of respect for the samurai tradition, opted to not kill the eels in the same way a samurai kills himself in hara-kiri. I don’t remember which is which, but the important thing is the difference.

The restaurant was in a sort of underground shopping center thing that was also linked to several subway stations and the shinkansen station. There was a store that sold video games so I went in and rifled around for a copy of Naruto 4 for Adam’s Gamecube. I did manage to find one, which was pleasant. So now when I get home we can all play that.

After lunch we picked up 27 other tourists and started a long drive to Kobe. In Kobe our express purpose was to eat Kobe beef teppanyaki. The rest of the day was just seeing minor sights in and around the Kobe area. There was a somewhat interesting bridge that had walkways on the underside you could walk around. When dinner came around, we all piled into the bus to go to the teppanyaki restaurant where we would eat Kobe beef.

The teppanyaki joint was essentially Benihana on crack. The table was a basically a counter around a large frying grill. Our chef had a large assortment of knives and spatulas (spatulae?) that he used to cook up the various foods. There were some vegetables, the beef, and then some fried rice. The fried rice was a gift from God, it was so good. I would go back to that restaurant and order whatever dinner it was we ordered just to have that fried rice again, it was so good. The beef itself wasn’t really anything special. The main draw about Kobe beef, I gather, is that it’s really really really tender. I’m not enough of a beef connoisseur to notice differences in tenderness, so the beef just tasted like beef to me.