Japan- Hirafu, Hokkaido…After the culinary paradise that was Korea it was off to the home of another of my favourite kinds of food-Japan. I simply couldn’t wait to eat all the sashimi and sushi that I knew was to be had in this fascinating country. Our arrival wasn’t without its highlights as a headache that Kate had developed on the short flight over from Korea turned nauseous. As we lined up to clear customs Kate complained that she felt ill, within seconds she was literally running to the toilets and only just managed to avoid throwing up on the arrivals hall floor! Great stuff Kate.
My good friend Matty Jones was waiting at Chitose airport to pick us up and take us back to his place where we were to remain for the next couple of weeks. At this stage Matt informed me that he didn’t actually live in Sapporo where I thought we were staying. He actually lives in a small town called Hirafu which is a snow town near the famous resort town of Niseko. After a short unscheduled stop along the way, so Kate could spew again, we arrived in Hirafu. I should mention that in order for Matt to pick us up it was about a three hour round trip by car, so thanks Matt, we appreciated it!
Hirafu lies between an amazing mountain for skiing/snowboarding called ‘Anapouri’ and a sacred mountain named ‘Yotae’. This is a seriously beautiful area and reminded me quite a lot of New Zealand in some ways. The region is dotted with ancient volcanoes and crystal clear lakes. It certainly wasn’t what I had in mind when I had thought of coming to Japan. The day after we arrived we set off to one of these lakes called Lake Toya to camp out for the night and have a bit of a swim in the lake. It was a beautiful night and not too cold as it was still only earlyish autumn. We had a swim in the lake which was surprisingly warm and extremely clear. The rest of the night was spent sipping on a few Asahi’s (the first of many I must say) and catching up around the fire. Not a bad intro to Japan!
As we were staying in Matt and Hana’s very comfortable house Kate and I reveled in the blissful domesticity of it all. After nine months we finally had access to things like a fridge, a supermarket and even an oven! Whoa, settle down I hear you say, but we had seriously missed such ordinary, mundane things such as these. We did a lot of lounging round the house and cooked almost every night. Matt and Hana didn’t seem to mind and it was nice to sit down to dinner at a table in a house each night.
One thing that we discovered in Hirafu is a game called ‘parkgolf’. It is a Hokkaido invention and probably one of the best, and most fun, games I have ever come across. It’s like a cross between golf and croquet, but it’s not lame like croquet. Basically you get a big mallet, shaped like a golf club, and a ball about the size of a tennis ball but which is actually quite heavy. The course where you play is like a scaled down version of a golf course, complete with bunkers, fairways, rough and greens. However a par four is only about 70-80 metres. The hole is a lot bigger than real golf and you use just the one ‘club’ for driving, putting and pitching. It is so much fun because it is so much easier than real golf but still challenging enough to make it interesting. We ended up going for several rounds at various courses and it was tremendous fun. Kate surprised herself by getting the hang of the game quite quickly and, yes, she did beat me on our first round. Beginner’s luck! On one occasion one of the guys we were playing with, Chris, hit a hole in one. That’s certainly the first hole in one I’ve ever witnessed and it was a beauty. You don’t see too many of those in real golf!
On another occasion I stupidly agreed to help Matt’s cricket team out in a couple games that they had scheduled up near Sapporo. My cricket is exceptionally average but after assuring me that everyone was crap and it’s just an excuse to drink I reluctantly volunteered. Our first game was against the Pakistani’s, they even had the Pakistan national cricket team’s outfit on! Now I love a good stereotype and I have to say that, true to the historical image I had of Pakistan when it comes to cricket, they cheated like crazy! Our so-called team was definitely a social ‘we don’t care if we win, lose or draw as long as we drink’ type team, but when it came to this bunch of shameless win-at-all-costs cheaters everyone quickly fired up in order to wipe the smug looks off their cheating faces. Unfortunately we still sucked and crashed to a pride-sapping defeat. This is in spite of Hana’s brother’s inspiring captains’ knock of fifty-something. Yes, I batted and yes, I failed miserably making a paltry one before getting bowled, losing my footing and falling on my arse. That must have had the cheating mob quaking in their boots.
Thankfully I was spared the humiliation of having to bowl and all too soon the smug cheaters had reached our total and were grinning like Cheshire cats. Oooh, it hurt, and this whole regrettable incident reminded me exactly why I don’t play team sports. It sucks losing! Especially to cheaters but there you go. In the next match we suffered a staggering ten wicket loss to a very amiable and good-sporting Indian team. Well, at least they were good about the whole thing!
After getting humbled in cricket Jones and I drove into Sapporo city in search of ‘The Dog Bowl’ Skate Park. This place was a helluva lot more fun than stupid cricket and I had a lot of fun here. One thing I will say is that Japanese skate parks tend to be quite pricey and if you pay by the hour they really stick to it. Very unlike the way it’s done at home.
On one particular evening Matt took me to an indoor skate park/bar in a small town near Hirafu called Kutchan. When we arrived to skate the place the woman behind the bar informed us that it would cost $25 for a skate! 25 bucks?! Was she drunk or what? We simply couldn’t believe any skate facility could charge so much for what was basically a very average indoor bowl. After furious haggling she finally agreed to let me skate for an hour for about $12.
Well, here’s some advice sister. Next time you try to rip foreign skaters off you might want to get the cash off them first! Seeing as this woman tried to rip us off so blatantly we returned the favour by skating for an hour or so and then jumping in the car and bailing-ha ha! Sucked in lady, that’s what you get for trying to rip innocent skaters off. We certainly didn’t run out the door either, we just calmly strolled past her out the front door and into the car never to return! 25 bucks, what a joke, Beijing Woodward (see previous posts) has to be one of the best skate parks on the planet and they charge $10! Amateurs…
One thing I will say about Japan on this topic is that, skate parks aside, it’s not as expensive as you might think. Certain things can be, but in general most prices are comparable to Australia and even New Zealand. I think it’s more to do with how expensive our countries have become rather than Japan getting any cheaper. That’s not to say that things are more inexpensive than at home, it’s just that they’re roughly about the same. Anyway, after two glorious weeks of lurking in Hirafu and hanging out with Matt and Hana having a great time doing not much of anything, it was time to embark on the final leg of our journey. We booked direct flights to Tokyo in order to save a whole day missioning down there on the train. This was to be our final destination before setting off for London and we had five nights booked in a reasonable hotel in the Hiragishi-Shinjuku area of Tokyo. So it was with some sadness we said our farewells to Matt and Hana and thanked them for being such gracious hosts, particularly as Hana was 7 months pregnant whilst we were there! Thanks guys.
Tokyo…After a rather bumpy flight and hair-raising descent into Tokyo through some pretty rough weather we arrived, safe and sound in the Japanese capital. This city, as if you didn’t know, is simply amazing. We had booked 5 nights at a relatively sweet hotel near the chaos that is the Shinjuku area of the city. We were also very close to most of the city’s best shopping and entertainment districts. There is just too much to see and do in Tokyo in the amount of time we had here and I definitely plan to go back and have a bit more time to look around.
The shopping in Tokyo is unreal and one of the most fun things about here is the fashion of the locals. The people in Tokyo have to be amongst the best dressed people on the planet. It makes you feel pretty shabby wandering around in jeans and a hoodie when all around you everyone else is dressed up to the nines. That said there was some pretty crazy gear that people, particularly the girls, were wearing. As we walked around the famous shopping district of Harajuku and the rather unfortunately named ‘Takeashite’ street, there was all manner of people watching to be done. My favourite was probably the girls dressed as gothic/fairy/nurses, what a combination. On the weekend we went to Yoyogi park where young and old locals gather to socialise and dress up in their chosen fashion. We saw the now rather elderly, Japanese Elvis/rockabilly/biker dancers. These guys are quite famous and even appeared on a commercial on NZ TV years back advertising ‘primo’ chocolate milk. Anyone old enough to remember that? They are still to be found in the park there every Sunday hip-swiveling and pelvic-thrusting away like it’s 1959. They are pretty funny to watch, but I think they’re still going for the tough guy rebel-without-a-cause thing as some were swigging from bottles of Jack Daniels and sneering away in between their dances. I think some of them might be taking themselves way too seriously as it’s hard to look tough when you’re a fifty year old Japanese guy with a slicked back quaff dancing to rock and roll music in a park! Anyways there was all manner of odd-balls there and I saw demonic nurses, guys with dogs the size of horses and other assorted oddities and it was great fun having a little picnic on the grass and watching it all.
Funnily enough we bumped into an old friend of mine from Melbourne in the park for the second time since we had arrived! Caleb had turned up on the street in Harajuku a few days earlier as he was in Tokyo for a book launch that he had collaborated on back in Melbourne. Here he was again and it’s pretty strange to think of Tokyo as a place where you can just bump into people from home, not once, but twice!
After another catch up and a couple beers it was time to head off back into the shopping streets of Harajuku. I had fortunately received my tax return money literally the day I arrived in Tokyo so I was keen as to find some cool stuff and throw my money away on it. Tokyo didn’t disappoint and there was literally more stuff than I could carry to buy. Unfortunately as we already had some very heavy packs I tried to control myself, but it was hard. I am now the proud owner of a rather large and extremely well-made Kimono which will now be used as my bathrobe. I probably didn’t need the Japanese head-bands to go with it, but hey, it’s Tokyo, you’ve got to come away with loads of random Japanese tidbits right? Well, I think so anyway. I probably did more shopping than Kate as there were heaps of skate shops around with things that I hadn’t seen anywhere else. From long hoop-socks to caps, to even a bag to hold my skateboard, I went nuts. I guess I should thank the Australian Taxation Office, but bugger it, it was my money to begin with!
We dined on as much sashimi as we could find, including a restaurant in the uber-rich district of Ginza. It was our last night so we splashed out a bit and it was well worth it. The blokes that prepare the sashimi are like some kind of fish carving artists. The way they slice and prepare the sashimi is all done in front of you at a kind of bar where you sit and watch as your sashimi is assembled. It’s awesome to watch and literally this guy had me drooling as I watched our meal being made. Sashimi certainly isn’t cheap but having a much higher quality of fish makes it so much more satisfying than going to one of the cheaper places. It was a pretty awesome Last Supper as we were embarking on our 27 hour hell-mission to London, via Kuala Lumpur the following day.
It’s hard to look back on the previous nine months when it’s your last night before returning to reality. Even now it’s hard to know where to begin. This trip has been full of so many ups and downs, highs and lows, that it’s hard to remember it all. Even though we were both sad that our trip was ending we both were looking forward to having a place to call home again, even if that place is on the other side of the world to our real home.
So there you have it team, the blog is at an end. If you’ve managed to read all or even most of these posts then you are obviously an avid reader or Kate’s Mum. At more than thirty posts with an average of two to two and a half thousand words each this blog was certainly a lot more work than I envisaged when I agreed to do it. Having said that it has been fun sharing with you all some of our adventures and hopefully it has helped to keep you better informed about just what it has been like for us on this trip and what we have done. If this is the case then this blog has been more than worth it. Thanks to you all for reading, as there won’t be a next time I’ll just say good-bye and I hope to see you all again before too long. Good-Bye! TC.
Hirafu
Camping at Toya Lake. Sunset over the lake.
Tim and the fire.
Hana and Matty.
Marie and Woods.
Us.
Retardy the cat.
Retardy strutting her stuff with her retarded leg.
Japan's supermarkets are heaven - full of sushi and a huge fish section! Even at the corner store they had heaps of sushi packs - yummy!
Local drummers at the Tour de Haikaido cycle race.
Cooking up a storm in the kitchen. It was really nice to being able to cook after 10 months of eating out for every meal.
Matty shooting off
The park-golf crew.
Me. I have to point out that I did better than Tim by 1 point. I'm never forget this win! hehe
Chinchilla - an animal that looks likes a cross between a rat/possum/guinea pig
A close up.
View from the one of the mountains. We took a cable car up and back down - we were too lazy to walk down the hill.
The walk up the hill from the cable car - we didn't get far and just sat down and enjoyed the view. The hill was filled wth bamboo which i think dies when it gets covered in 5 metres of snow.
Hana and I.
Tokyo
Crazy building in the city.
Entrance to Takeshite Street. Down this street are a lot of hip young girls who are dressed crazily.
A good lunch - $12 for this! Bargin!!
City lights.
On one of Tim's skate trips he saw these large mascot girls/dolls.
Having lunch at Yoyogi park in Tokyo.
Waiting for our ingredients....
Cooking up a storm
The famous crossing in Shibuya where millions of pedestrians cross everytime
Another photo of the intersection.
View of the famous intersection from a window of a mall.
This was our last night in Japan (our next mission was a 23 hour flight to London Heathrow) and to celebrate our 10 months of travelling we had sushi at a high-end sushi bar. It cost about $60 in total but we had the best sushi we have ever had in our entire lives - it was worth every penny!
This was one of the many funny signs we saw in the subway. No one talks on their mobile phones on the trains at all and obviously this is why...
A protest again the Nike skatepark.
A cat in it's own pram!
It looks soooo cute!
Dancing Elvis's
Protest against Nike's skatepark. Some of these protesters were dressed up while others had these strange mascots like you can see in the middle of the picture.
Another protest pic
Unfortuately I didn't get the best shot of this but the guy holding the sign has a green kermet-the-frog mask on.
When we were entering the park we saw these guys chanting and holding this wooden shrine. Some of them were not wearing pants and instead were wearing a white g-string cloth.
The Elvis guy in the background is spraying hair spray on this slicked back hair while another guy on the seat is drinking Jack Daniels.
Waiting for our train to Narita Airport. We took a bullet train to the airport which took 1.5 hours so you can imagine that the international airport is kilometres away from Tokyo city (150km or more)
Look at all our bags... My backpack got sooo heavy that I bought a small trolley to carry it. After 10 months travelling I had accumulated a lot of stuff.....
Goodbye Asia, goodbye Tokyo!
The view from the bullet train on our way to the airport.
