Phil and Red's Excellent Adventure

So i got up around 730am and that allowed me enough time to make the train with about 10 minutes to spare. We took off an headed for the airport. Around the second stop, we picked up lots of people. I got to the airport around 11am. I checked into my flight no problem and had to spend the rest of the time killing time. I tooled around on the internet and talked to Yumi on the fone. I managed to kill the time and make it to my flight with about 20 minutes to spare.
The line up for the plan was a disaster. They were calling out the row#s like they usually do, but there was just this giant blob. So, the guy that checked me in showed up, and boy, I hope the airlines pay him well because that guy is very talented with languages. He speaks Mandarin, English, and Japanese fluently. He has a slight chinese accent to his english, since he was chinese. He was very skilled. Im sure he could get lots of money in jobs with his skills. He basically herded everyone into the correct areas.
The flight home was 11 hours. I tried to sleep. I had a little pillow, one of those eye masks and earplugs, but I was always attentive. I was resting and trying to sleep, hopefully that was good enuff. That was for like maybe a total of 3 hours throughout the ride.
I ended up watching Herbie: Fully Loaded. It wasn't terrible, but it wasn't great. It did what it was supposed to do. However, the second movie I watched, was just utter crap. XXX: State of the Union. I was just appalled at how bad it was. I really just want to ask the director: Lee Tamahori, and the writers: Rich Wilkes and Simon Kinberg....WTF were you thinking? Did you actually thing this was a good thing? It was utter crap. I had so much more thought up to talk about this ,but I realized how much i would talk about this utter crap and realize it was just a waste of time. This movie sucks. Its worse than the first one, if thats possible.
After that load was finished, I looked at the Chinese guy next to me, held out a thumbs down and gave a rasberry, he laughed and said, "Yeah, that movie was shit." I'm serious. he said that!
I then tried to sleep.
When I took off my mask, they were wrapping up "March of the Penguins" The one film I wanted to watch. Damnit!
I finally got home. Gettnig thru the customs checkpoint was easy this time, however, getting my baggage wasn't. The machinese weren't working properely so the luggage wasn't coming off. And because of this, there was a huge line at the bag checkpoint.
My mom was waiting for me and my dad was circling. We headed out. I had pizza for dinner, it was yummy but overcooked.
Well, goodnite. I am really really really tired.

Posted by Phil at 09:14 AM | Permalink

Yumi and I made plans to meet up at the Minami Koshigaya train station for our day together. I got there and there was an LDP, Liberal Democratic Party, rally there. Its the reigning party of Japan. The one Prime Minister Koizumi is in. Its pretty much the only party that really matters there. They have been in power for like 50 years unbroken except for about 4 years in the 90s.
Yumi was surprised to see the rally because the place was really crowded and she was also kinda star struck because the people standing on top of the van spouting lies to the Japanese people were quite famous. Yumi sees them on TV almost everyday, when she's in Japan. They are always in the news. I got some video.
We decided to go to Asakusa, which has a very old/traditional street. It also has the largest lanterns in japan apparently. The old traditional street was covered with tourist shops dealing in traditional styled items. Mostly made today. They also had a bunch of Power Rangers and Ultraman toys. I totally wanted to see Voltron, but to no avail.
We walked around the city. Walked down by the river. Bought things for family and friends. It was a good time.
We headed back and Yumi had to go to her folks to attend to some family matters. I went off to Omiya station to buy an Airport destined train for tomorrow. There was only one train from Omiya and that was at 9am so I would have to hang at the airport for 4 hours. Great. Just what I wanted.
After that I met up with Yumi later and we had dinner and hung out. We then had to say our saddened goodbyes. Being with her the past week was wonderful.
well, goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 09:05 AM | Permalink

Yumi and I saw Charlie and the Chocolate Factory today. Looked for socks with the little toe slots in them. Found some. Went out for dinner and drinks with some of Yumi`s friends.

Posted by Phil at 11:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Yumi and I went to Tokyo Disneyland today. It was alot of fun. Most of the rides were the same as Disneyworld and Calif Disneyland, but they got a new Nightmare before Christmas ride. The Japanese love this movie.

Posted by Phil at 11:38 PM | Permalink

Yumi and I went to the zoo today. Then met up with Rumi for dinner and drinks. Met her new boyfriend.

Posted by Phil at 11:40 PM | Permalink

I headed from Kyoto to Saitama today. Got help thru the JR information office on a location for a cheap hotel for 4 nights. Met up with Yumi, spent time with her. Wonderful.

Posted by Phil at 11:43 PM | Permalink

Got kicked out of my automated hotel at 1030am. Jeff and I went to a re-sale place for awhile. Then decided to head out to Nagoya for some shopping. Neato. Ate at CoCo Ichiban - curry place. Yummy. Came back and called my Yokohama contacts about my change in plans.

Posted by Phil at 11:47 PM | Permalink

Went to Hikone today. Met up with Jeff. Super Hotel is almost fully automated. Nice to not site see. Just chilled. Dinner with wife and mom-in-law. Watched 4 episodes of 24 season 4...nice relaxing night.

Posted by Phil at 11:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Started out today at 9AM to do some sightseeing...but at 12pm, after about the 5th temple or shrine...I said, "I dont want to do this anymore, I'm bored."
I was burnt out on sightseeing temples and shrines. I couldn't take anymore pictures, everything was so beautiful, but it all looked the same in a way. I couldn't take it. I was on overload.
So, I just walked back thru downtown.
Crashed at an internet cafe for about 3 hours. That was a cool experience. It was like a comic and internet shop. They had everything.
Later on in the evening, when it got dark, I hit up the Gion part of town which had a lot of traditional tea houses and old stuff. This is the old town area. I thought I may see some Geisha, but I didnt.
This was a cool area.
Saw a Lamborghini Diablo. That was neat.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 01:22 AM | Permalink

How do you take enough pictures and enough video to capture the beauty of an entire country let alone a small county or even just a temple?
Phew. One long long day. I woke up at about 6AM and took a quick shower and headed out for my day of Kyoto sightseeing around 645am. Grabbed some breakfast at the Lawson convenience store and tried to catch the #205 Bus. I dont know why I constantly think that bus stops should be directly opposite each other on both sides of the street. Just something i picked up from college in AA, I guess. All the bus stops here in Kyoto at least are set at around the opposing corners of interesections. Took me like a few stops to figure that out.
This City Bus Map i got at the TIC the first day I was here with Gary and David was a real big help. Its got all the bus routes. Its a little confusing, but not after awhile. I just kinda wish they had the kanji written down so I could match it up with the digital signs at the front of the bus.
My plan today was to hit the Northwestern side of Kyoto then down to the western side of Kyoto and then come back to the central and then to the hotel in time for Shorinji Kempo practice.
I arrived at the Kinkakuji Area, The Golden Temple area, around 720am thinking for some stupid reason that they would be open..eventhough the Lonely Planet says 9am. I guess I got up early to get a head start on everything only to realize i got up too early. So, I walked around aimlessly looking at the entrance and exit and the stairs. Very pretty stairs. There were also old Japanese people doing some morning exercises there as well. Now, in Japan, since they dont have Taiji, they dont do really anything kool in the morning. Its not like they are doing Shotokan Karate or anything. So I just saw them trying to stretch and walking while swinging their arms big and wide...power walking. How I detest power walkers. There was a couple people power walking backwards. That was kinda funny. Now come to think of it, I think I did see a japanese woman doing some taiji. She was stepping down the gravel entrance pathway while doing what looked like a beginner`s attempt at "Parting the Wild Horse`s Mane"...thats a nice way of saying, "Knocking your opponent over and cracking his head on the pavement".
Around this time the people working there started to get annoyed at my intrusive white presence and they started bowing to me and were all like, "Good morning, Jackass, we open up at 9am. Thank you so very much, Jackass." So, I bowed and replied, "I`m sooo sorry for being a gaijin, i beg your forgiveness, please except my apologies. Thank you so very much. Good morning."
So, I sat down at a little pavillion thingy and i realized, Dude...I dont want to sit here for another 1.5 hours for this place to open. So I looked at my trusty walking tour map that I got from the TIC, good stuff. I compared the opening times for other places on this walking tour in the Lonely Planet Guide. RyoanJi opens at 8am. Sweet, it was 745am, so i powerwalked my patoot out of there.
As I was walking down the street I was seeing alot of school kids not in school. I was like, this must be field trip day or something.
I got to RyoanJi in about 20 minutes. This is the location of the very famous Zen Rock garden. The first of its kind apparently. You know, either I am not enlightened buddhistly or i dont have great design appreciation becuase, man, when I saw this site, i was like...this is it? This is what is so famous? What a rip. I found that the temple and the location that plays host to this sight were much more beautiful than that actual garden. I read something about the gardener...no one knew who he was. He made this garden and offered no explanation. He prolly did it as a joke and people took it wrong.
(Dont be calling me some ignorant yankee for not seeing the beauty its existence, it just didnt do anything for me. There was far more other things that I saw here that did it for me though. And no, it wasn`t McDonald`s.)
The area surrounding the rock garden was absolutely gorgeous though. Man, so many places in this country are so pretty. How do you take enough pictures and enough video to capture the beauty of an entire country let alone a small county or even just a temple. Its gotten to the point that I am like, why bother taking a picture, I cant duplicate its beauty. The dilemma of the ammateur artist.
So, I get into the RyoanJi. First major site is this pond filled with lillipads and a couple cranes. Then there was this little bridge leading out to a small island in the center that contained a micro Shinto shrine. Then on after that was to the Zen temple containing the famed, and my personal view of overrated, Zen Rock garden. There were some shoji sliding wall/doors that had paintings and such. The foliage around the temple was another sight all its self. Oh yeah, the temple`s architecture was pretty as well. It was around 845am so I started heading out. The walk back to the entrance was scerene and picturesque and I didnt know how to get video of it all. so pretty. So green. So relaxing.
I left and thats when the throngs of people started showing up. Well, not the throngs, but the older white women with too much make up on and baggy clothes. I hopped a taxi back to the Kinkakuji sight seeing area. I arrived got out and walked down the walkway and I got there just as they were swinging the doors open and allowing the hundreds of japanese tourists and schoolboys and girls that had lined up for entrance. I was impressed with the size of the crowd. Got my ticket and then headed in. When I saw the Golden Temple, I was just standing there awestruck. It was absolutely beautiful. Very amazing. For those of you that dont know what the golden temple is, it was a three storey villa that. after the owner died, was turned into a buddhist temple. The owner had completely covered the entire temple, starting at the second floor, in gold. It was...i cant really explain it. I stood there for about a minute before I got bumped into and then I scurried to find a spot to take pictures of the thing. I took a bunch. The stereotype of japanese people just taking pictures was in full effect. All i heard besides the pleasant cawing and scrapping of tourists was the snapping of lens shutters. I took lots of pictures of this temple. Then i followed the set path onto the other sights of the area. All the while as I walked thru the path, I was always pretty much just looking at the golden temple. Once we got out of view from it, I couldnt really see anything, the morning sun shining off the gold burnt my retinas. Not really.
The rest of the area was quite pretty as well. I tried to get fotos of everything kool. I headed out after about an hour. I went to the bus stop that I got off on. I took the bus to an exchange point and picked up another bus to go to the Arashiyama section of Kyoto...the Western area. This had another walking tour. A much longer one thru a monkey filled park, a giant bamboo forest, a bunch of forest nestled temples that were just awe striking. I think I went to like over 10 temples. It got to the point that after all those temples, I just didnt really go into any of the other three that were there. I mean, all the temples and shrines are pretty much all constructed in the same way. Its exactly the same thing in China. What is really cool, though, about seeing these temples is how they incorporate their construction with the immediate surroundings. And that is what I find so beautiful and amazing about these temples...the location. The last one I went to before not going into the others was the massive Nison-in temple system with an extensive graveyard set up. There was just no way to get pictures and videos of all the wonderful sites there. It also had a little lookout ledge up in the hillside that offered a gorgeous view of the city, however, there were too many trees in the way. I wanted them chopped down.
I left that temple system all happy. I ate at this little resturant on the path to the other temples. It was very yummy. I skipped the next 3 temples, but i did walk up to their gates to check their layouts, pretty much the same. So I headed onto the last one that was considerably different. The Adashino Nembutsuji. This is a temple that honors all the homeless, those with no next of kin, and poor souls who died with no one else caring for them. There were thousands of these little stones set up and a couple really extravagant buddha statues. Something I have noticed alot in these temples is that people have put little red clothes on the buddhas to keep them warm in the winter and cold nights.
After this place I walked back down to the Arashiyama station where i got let off and picked up a bus back to the center of Kyoto.
I headed for the Nijo Jo and got there around 2-230pm. A shogunate castle in Kyoto that rivaled that of the imperial castle in Kyoto. (the Imperial castle nowadays isnt that great of a spectacle because its a rebuilt one that just isnt oldschool)
Nijo Jo was impressive, not as massive as Himeiji Castle, but just as powerful in presence. All the artwork inside the temple wasnt very well preserved, unfortunately. It was just really old and showing it. It also had nightingale floors to act as warning alarms against silent intruders, ninjas! There were two parts, there were the offices and such areas and then the interior palace. The garden of the place was really awesome as well. Some wonderful views in this location. Gorgeous.
After this place was spent, i left around 4pm when the place closed. I headed towards the Imperial Castle. On the way there I stopped at McDonalds out of curiosity for how it tastes in Japan. Its very salty here. Everything. At least, I am infering that from just one sandwich and some fries. It was great on the fries, but not the burger.
I also got some fotos transfered to a disc because my 1GB stopped working the other day, but now it works and I had filled up my other two cards with me. I went to a fotoshop across the street from McDs. It was cool, you plug your card into this computer and you say what you want it to do, it calculates the price for how many pictures you got and then burns it to disc. Only problem is you can only put on card on one disc, you cant do 2 cards on 1 disc, which is what I wanted to do. Oh well.
I headed to the Imperial Castle. Now, for any imperial possesions, they want you to get permission/make reservations to enter the grounds before hand. So I was all like, "Screw that, Yo! If I need special permission/reservations to visit your place on my time, then you obviously dont deserve my patronage. Yeah, suck on that, you lousy Imps!"
So I just hung out at the "free to the public" park/garden. Very very pretty. It was real nice. It was around 500pm so I headed out and headed for downtown Kyoto. My ghetto hotel is just on the south side of downtown, i was on the north side. I walked all down thru it while doing some window shopping for some sort of gift to give to Suzuki sensei tonite at practice. Downtown Kyoto was really cool. Very cool vibe. Lots of lights, lots of shopping, lots of crazy japanese styles - clothes and hair. It was pleasant. Didnt get any fotos or video though. Dont know why. I will tomorrow.
I picked up something for Suzuki Sensei. I finally arrived at my hotel after a long walk at about 6pm. I paid my hotel bill because the machine was working today. It took me a while to get the girl behind the counter to understand because I think it was the daughter. She kept pointing at the receipt trying to tell me its been paid, and I am like, no its not. Your mom told me to pay it today. So she finally figured it out after 10 minutes.
I relaxed in my room for about 45 minutes while I watched some crazy Japanese game show. They are just as annoying and crazy as the one in Lost in Translation. However, I wish they still had Takeshi`s Castle still on. I would totally love to see that. Thats the Japanese sports gameshow that SPIKE TV took and added a comedic english dub too. The events themselves are ridiculous and pain inducing enough to make you laff your butt off, but the enlish dub adds more stuff too.
I headed out to SK. Practice went well. Met a dude from New York named Dante. He was real cool. He has been in Japan for 1 year. Has a wife now and other things. Likes it. Wants to learn more of the language. He helped me with some things that the sensei was talking about.
Near the end of practice i couldnt continue, i was breathing heavy and everything. So much walking and siteseeing. I was tired. I think I impressed the sensei with my flying skillz. It was fun. These kenshi, even the old ones, are out for blood at all times. I was like...YIKEs! They are too fast, I cant block! There was also this little yellowbelt boy when i was there. I walked in, changed into my new dogi. He saw me and came up to me, and I was like, "Hello" and then he poked my balls. I was like, WTF! so I kicked his ass and threw him around.
I was so tired that I was happy when class ended. I walked home and took the subway back like I did there. I took a well needed shower. I bought a beer and some chips. Chilled out in front of the TV for about 20 minutes and then past out. Goodnite all. Take care.

Posted by Phil at 03:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Left Fukuoka today and headed via Shinkansen to Himeiji Castle. I love the Shinkansen. So cool.
Himeiji was a blast. Gorgeous and breathtaking. The castle was huge!
After I spent time at the castle, I hopped on a another Shinkansen to Kyoto.
Arrived in Kyoto and found my hotel. What a rat hole it looked like, but at $140US for 3 nights, it was fine with me. But, it was run by cool people - it was a family shop. I walked in and gave my reservation. I heard Queen playing in the bar area. First thing she said to me, "Do you like Freddy Mercury?" and I was like, "Who in their right mind doesn't."
Then she looked at me with curiosity and asked, "Where are you from?" And i said, "USA". She then said, "I will give you 10% Discount." She went back to her stuff. "I was like, um Thank you, but why?" She said, "I like you." So, I ended up paying about $120 US dollars for 3 nites. Not bad.
i chilled out the rest of the night trying to think of what to do tomorrow. Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 01:37 AM | Permalink

Spent today chilling out and watching the Shorinji Kempo movie, playing with Kay and Kyle, and visiting the post office.
I also set up reservations at hotels across Japan and contacted people. When Mitch came home from work, we went out to the mountain top again and encountered a motorcycle gang. I took fotos of the city with a tripod. Some good shots. Hope they come out.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 01:53 AM | Permalink

Did a bunch of sightseeing in places today. Saw the largest wooden sitting Buddha in Japan. Pretty neat. Also visiting a Japanese crematorium. Found out that Shinto priests and Buddhist monks in Japan are very well off. They make a lot of money.
Saw the new museum that opened up. Its entirely encased in glass. Just saw the building didnt go inside.
Mitch and the family took me to the mountain out behind their house and the overlook on the city was beautiful .I tried to take fotos, but it was pointless without a tripod. I think we will come back tomorrow.
This road in the mountain would be perfect for drifting races.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 01:56 AM | Permalink

Woke up this morning when Kyle, Mitch's son, walked into the room I was sleeping in. He just stood there staring at me. I said goodmorning. He looked at me and took a dump in his pants. Then he slowly turned away and walked away. So I closed the door and slept a little longer.
Got up and Mitch had gone to this audition. So I played with the kids and ate soem breakfast and fooled around for a bit.
Then the kids, Kimi and I headed out to the big park to meet Mitch for lunch. We walked around and stuff. Very pretty. After lunch at a chinese resturant, we headed out to Daifunzi which is out about an hour away. It was a Shinto place and it was really pretty.
Took lots of pictures obviously.
goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 02:00 AM | Permalink

Got up and met with Neal. We took a trip out to the Kotehira shrine which is a very pretty shrine at the top of a hillside and there are lots of stairs to get to it. Its very pretty. We also went to one of the oldest Kabuki playhouses in japan. Then we headed back to our hotels.
I got some cash then we met at 2pm for catching a train to the Okayama stop where we will pick up a Shinkansen.
We got on the wrong car and ended up going to the wrong city because the train detatched and hook up wiht another train so we went the wrong way. We doubled back and got Okayama. We then grabbed our shinkansens. I went to Fukuoka and Neal headed to Kyoto.
i got to Fukuoka around 6pm. It took me about 2.4 hours.
I met Mitch at Mister Donut. He took me to his radio station where he had to do a show that nite. I just tooled around on the internet and junk.
After the show, we went to this little resturant/bar that was hip, but quite small. It was cool. Food was great. People were nice.
Then headed back to Mitch's and i fell asleep.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 02:04 AM | Permalink

Today was the last day of the Hombu study sessions. There was a juho practice in the morning and then free practice afterward. It was alot of fun. Some great skill I saw there. I got thrown around pretty good by the presiding senseis and had my wrists cranked a little too much by the italians. The cranking wasn't very good, but all the rest was. You know, I dont really know what it is about me and the Italians and why we just dont get along. First, the italians screwed up an entire week for us at the Shaolin Temple, then they claim our soldiers tried to assisinate one of their journalists who got out of captivity because her hostage takers were paid off, then they, claimed by me - so it may not be right, with what I felt as negative energy during the randori practice, and now they are cranking my wrists really hard during juho. Yikes.
Gary got his 5th Degree certification and Tony and David both got their 3rd Degree certifications. (Go-dan and San-dan).
Afterwards we hung out. Had dinner. Walked around. I did laundry at this hole in the wall place.
Then i got back and met some people at the bar next door to the place we went to last night.
Met lots of British kenshi. It was fun.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 02:25 AM | Permalink

Today was the 2nd day of the study session. On my way to Hombu in the morning ,I found myself walking with Hagata Sensei and his family. We walked by the Tadotsu dojo. Thats where Kaiso used to teach. It was neat.
Practice today was lots of fun. Lots of practice. It coulda been longer though, i guess I was spoiled with 7 hours a day at the Shaolin Tagou school. The juho practice was great. I did alot of flying. I wanted all the practice at flying I could get.
Goho practice in the morning was terrific as well. We did stuff on sparring and things of that nature. It was really good practice.
That evening was the friendship party where everyone had dinner out on the lawn. They also had some skits and stuff of performances. The best one was by far the British Shorinji Kempo practice. Think of the ultimate british stereotype and have them doing martial arts practice. It was good. Quite funny.
The party ended with Yuki So and a group of merry...bandoliers? i guess, doing some traditional Japanese dance with drums and cymbals n stuff. It was a blast.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 05:19 AM | Permalink

Got up early this morning and walked around Muragame. Got some money finally from the ATM at the Post Office and also checked out the castle that they have there. It was kinda small. Well, what was left of the castle anyway. Gary, David, and Tony were taking their belt exams in the morning, so thats why all the rest of the kenshi didnt need to be at Hombu until the afternoon.
Headed to Hombu with two Toronto people around 11am. We took the long way, we went into the back entrance. There was a park n stuff. There were also three caged monkies. MONKIES! Entering the Hombu was cool as well. They had the two Kongo statues on either side. Everything was very clean and pretty. I didnt get the same feeling or awe that I had when I visited the Shaolin Temple in China. I guess its prollyh because SK isnt that old and not as famous. I walked around and took some pictures and looked at things. I changed into my dogi in the bathroom. I had lunch there in the cafeteria where I met up with Tony and David and Neal. After lunch i hit up the SK shop. Bought some bumper stickers and some souvenirs. There was a bunch of fotographs by the SK Fotographer on display of Kaiso and other kenshi throughout the years. There were these three great pictures of Kaiso with Sonny Chiba. There was a movie that Sonny Chiba did called "Shorinji Kempo" and it was based on Kaiso and his creation of the system. It was released on DVD in the US, but I haven't seen it yet. It was titled "Killing Machine" here in the US, which totally is opposite of the point of the film. I want to pick it up. There is alot in there that actually happened, alot of the true stuff had also been dramatized, and then there was stuff that never happened, but it was a movie.
After lunch, we had introductions in the big room. Then we had a long warm up session that I thought was kinda lame. He had us punching the floor. And a bunch of Brits and Italians were trying to be all macho so they actually were putting all their force into the floor. Dumbasses. The whole point of the execise was to just get proper alignment going, not to actually punch the floor as hard as you could.
I met a couple later that night at this bar that I went to with David, Tony, and Neal, this guy's hand had swollen up at the knuckles, it looked as if his hand was 2x the size of what it should be. Whatever.
The resturant was really cool, an Izakaiya.
After the warm up, Shodan and Nidan stayed in that room for Goho & Randori (sparring/freeform) practice. It was taught by the French Sensei. The Japanese Sensei teaching in Japan. He was using his french minions. He is thought to be the Goho/Randori expert in SK. He is very good. Best I have seen. I really enjoyed that practice. There was lots of good energy flowing around. Always working with other people. However, I found that the Italians, and a few other nationals, seemed to have a slight negative energy to them. It was strange, it felt as if the italians were out for blood. I dunno.
After the practices were over, the session ended and we took off.
In the evening, I went to the Izakaiya mentioned above. It was really really nice. Very good food and yummy beer. Those british folks showed up and we chatted alot with them. Good group.
I headed back and checked email and called Yumi again.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 05:25 AM | Permalink

Got up early and we cleaned and picked up the room. Tony said that the convenience store down the street had an ATM set up, so I was like, sweet! I booked over there and checked it out. It didnt work. CURSES!
The bus from Fukui to Tadotsu, well, to Muragame...the city next door, was supposed to leave at 10AM. I was in charge of checking out of our room. I went down there and went to pay the bill for the dinners. There was no bill/chit in the little box and the guys were like, OK, thank you. I was like, fellas, we had 3 dinners and 2 beers, i need to pay for it, where is the bill. They looked surprised and nervous and set for searching for it for like 10 minutes. They came back and said, "Oh, its ok. No need to worry." I was like, whatever, and boarded my bus.
10AM rolled around. We sat there. At about 1030am, Dan, the brit I was sitting next too was fed up and went to find out the reason for our problem. Apparently, a couple people skipped out on paying their food bill and didnt fully check out yet. I was like, MF! I went to the front desk and the same guys were holding it and when the saw me, they got embarrassed. I paid the bill and got back on the bus. Then about 15 minutes later we were still sitting there and Dan went to check again. There was still an outstanding check. So we were gonna take a collection to pay it off when the travel agent with us just paid it. We finally left in the buses at 11am.
We were all happy to get going on the 6-7 hour bus ride. Then we stopped at the bottom of the hill at the Lawson's Convenience Store. AIYA! Everyone on the bus was like, WTF!?!? Some of the Swedes were got the driver to stop so they could get some water since they were hung over. Swedes. One of the brits on our bus got off and went to tell them off and to hurry up.
Finally we were off.
We stopped off at about 4 service centers. After the first hour, then after the second hour, then 20 minutes after we left the last center, and then one more time when we were about 1.5 hours from our destination. Jeez.
The ride itself wasn't too bad. I slept a little. Had some nice conversations with Dan and Kavita. Both brits sitting on either side of me....I am surrounded by redcoats!
We got to our destination, Muragame at about 7pm. Its the next town over from Tadotsu and Hombu. About two train stops away. The town was quite big. I checked in. Tony had already been there because he traveled by train on his own and had gotten there much earlier. I had to borrow money from Tony because the hotel people were only accepting cash because of a special deal with the SK Headquarters. I hope that Post Office ATM works tomorrow. The room is small, but not that bad. I walked around a bit with Tony and David searching for a place for some dinner. We ended up in the red light district but left it. Gary wasn't with us because the branchmasters had a special meeting. I bought a fone card and called Yumi. I then hung out with Tony and David. Tony had his computer set up onto the internet. I got to email people n junk.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 05:35 AM | Permalink

Got up at about 515 to get ready for the Taikai. We were supposed to go at 7AM, however, the powers that be were like, lets change it to 6AM. So, thats why we got up so early. We arrived at the Sun-Dome which was an hour away. I thought it looked neat, but alot of folks I talked too thought it was ugly. Oh well. I bought myself a new Dogi. It was expensive because it was the "deluxe" model. The cadillac of dogis. Its an offwhite color and it seems to fit well. I just hope it fits better in the pants than my old one.
The actual Taikai itself I found to be quite boring. There really wasn't much to do. The first thing that was going on was the Japanese Embu competition that was the preliminaries for the embu competition later that day. The embu competition later in the day would be Japanese and foreigners. Apparently they allow the foreigners to do their embus without preliminaries. Its good and bad in a way.
The first thing and pretty much one of the only main things that I took part in was the International Branch procession. Basically, its like the Olympics when they have all the different countries come out with their flag in front of the audience to display who they are. That was an interesting affair.
We lined up in the bleechers with our country and prepared to go down onto the main floor but there was something else we needed to wait for. First off, there was a laser light show with really tense driven music. A bunch of kids ran out onto the main floor and laid down. Half were in red shirts and the other half were in black shirts. They made the interlocking circles of the new SK Logo. Then they were all given green and red glowsticks and held them up in the air and waved them back and forth in time with the music. That went on for awhile and then they got up and left.
The second thing was a caligraphy guy. This was actually quite cool. The brought out these massive pieces of canvas/paper/sheets or whatever. This old guy grabbed a giant calligraphy brush and wrote some characters down. It took him awhile. I mean, it was a great gesture and it was cool to see, at first. It took the guy awhile to write the stuff out. Not the best filler for a shower...lots of boring dead time. But when it was finished they dropped down two already made sheets from the cieling with the same things on it. That was pretty neat. So they had two copies.
After this was the part where all the countries come down. As we waited, they started the music that we will be doing this to. It came blaring on and I immediately busted out laughing...along with a bunch of other folks. Queen's "I was Born to Love You" came blaring. I was like, "WHY THE HELL ARE THEY PLAYING QUEEN!?" It was hilarious. I wish I had that on video. So, we headed out onto the floor. For some reason the US was called out first. I guess its because the US had some part to play in the creation of Shorinji Kempo...a very indirect part of course. We headed out there and did this whole thing. The whole while, about 20 minutes, they just kept replaying the same song. Strange thing is, I dont think I ever heard this song before, but its unmistakeably Queen or just Freddy Mercury.
Once every country was out the Japanese kenshi filled in the open spots. We were all lined up and did our meditation thing. We then had some speeches given by the president, Yuki So, and the sponsors. It was cool to see Michael Eastwood up there interpretting Yuki So's speech, she requested him. One of the sponsors fell asleep on stage and another sponsor looked like he was gonna die.
We did chingon. We also were doing the warm up. Everyone was doing the punches and kicks together and it was so packed that we were almost kicking the people in front of us.
After the ceremony, we got to have some box lunches. After lunch there was the embu competition with the foreigners. After that, there was a deal where foreigner kenshi would do this Foreigner Kata Demo. So i headed to the other side of the stadium with Neal and Gary to do this thing. We got there and waited around for awhile and were given different directions about things by different people, it was very confusing.
After all the boringness and junk we had to deal with today, and somewhere around the Fukui Girls Highschool Drum Corps performance that I made the decision that I am never gonna come back to another taikai unless i am doing an embu. Everything was just so lame. I was wondering why i dropped so much cash on this.
After the drum corps were done we went out onto the floor. This was an interesting thing. We went to different areas on the main floor and waited there for our partners. Then a large group of little kids, like 5-12, scrurried onto the floor. The foreign kenshi were gonna do paired formwork with little kids. I found and picked out this little scrawny yellow belt no more than 6. I was looking at him and was all like, "You're mine!" We did our kata practice. I totally kicked his ass. I felt so good about myself.
After that kata thing, they brought out the Shorinji Kempo Demo team for a performance. These were the best of the best, the hardest train kenshi, etc etc. The demo pretty much blew. I thought the one cool part was the one guy vs 5 guys. All the other stuff was pretty lame i felt. Especially the knife encounter. If someone attacks you with a knife, they aren't gonna wait, they are just gonna keep slashing until they hit something.
After that, I changed and prepared to leave, they handed out some more awards. McCollach Sensei of Toronto got an award for spreading the Shorinji Kempo ideal for their constant events that he puts on. They mentioned that the 2009 Taikai would be held in Indonesia. The Indonesian Federation was on stage and gave some speeches.
Then there was the finale. Oh man did it suck on so many levels...but, it was still fun, the most fun I had all day, and I laughed pretty hard. The lights went down and the glowstix came out. We moved to the main floor. The Shorinji Kempo theme song, written by one of the guys from Toto, started up. There was a large japanese woman on stage and some white dude sporting a full blown mullet...and I am talking 100% mullet. This thing...man, at first, I thought it was a wig, someone was like, "Why would you wear a mullet wig..." I was like, "Why would you have a real mullet?" He was like, "Point taken". This thing was like , gosh, i can't really explain it, but it was nasty. Anywho. The japanese kenshi that I saw were going absolutely bonkers. This woman must have been famous or something. I can't see how the white guy coulda been famous. The guy was a total tool. He had a lyric sheet as he was singing along. I was like, "LEARN THE DAMN LYRICS BEFORE GOING ON STAGE, YOU HACK!"
The chorus group was just as funny. All these girls dressed in cute blue outfits. Then it was brought to my attention that there were three boys in the group. I found them on the ends. They were wearing matching blue hats and shorts. I felt so bad for them. I truly did. It was a good laugh though.
After the song was over, people were going around popping balloons and taking fotos with people. I saw in the corner people were taking fotos with the president, Yuki So, and then when the took off, I saw a funny site. She was standing there flanked by two tuff looking SK guys with armbands and earpieces, like they were her body guards. It was really funny.
After that we took the bus back to the hotel. And what a long ride it was. Traffic sucked and just took awhile. Then we got back to the hotel and took another bus into the city for this local festival. They had a little stage wtih some Tyko drums and singers, etc. It was nice. Had some local food and beer and sake and hung out. There were also a pair of visiting Geisha and Maiko. Maiko is a Geisha apprentice. I got a foto with them. The evening was kool. I searched for a workable ATM with Michael Eastwood, but found none. Aiya. You would think that Japan, being the technical/futuristic capital of the world would have international hook ups on their banking systems, but apparently not. Its like, the only drawback that I really encountered with Japan. And its really not a problem because all the post offices are equiped with Internationally connected ATMS. I couldn't find any at the times so far and i just thought, Hell, if I can connect my card in China, I should be able to do it in Japan. But nope. Oh well. I got my money when I really needed to.
Went back to the hotel and used the toilet. Many toilets in Japan have heated seats in them so you dont shriek at cold toilet seats. It gives the toilet that "Just sat in feel". And while other groups partied, i helped Tony and David practice for their exam. Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 05:40 AM | Permalink

Last night, we decided to get up early and take an early train to Kyoto around 7 so we could do a bit of site seeing before we hop the bus to Fukui. I set the alarm for about 615. I woke up at like 530am because of the dramatic change in times and because the train outside the window was making a slight noise as it went over the trax. Nothing majorly bad, just that i was sleeping lightly and it produced a slight rythm that woke me up. The room, by the way was small. The toilet was amazing...i mentioned that already though.
We met and had some japanese breakfast. It was good. We paid and took off to the train station. We then waited about 20 minutes or so at the train station waiting for a train to Kyoto. Gary kept leading us back and forth across the platform looking for the correct car cue. it was funny. In the end, we ended up where we started at. But when the train came, we had to run to grab it because it stop on the other side of the stairs. The stations here are big. We must have been cued up in a different train line.
Gary was also playing with his cellfone. He rented one from the internet that you can use internationally. Pretty kool deal. Akari had called him. He allowed me to use it later in the day to call my contacts here in Japanland.
When we got to Kyoto, we dropped our bags off into some lockers and then walked around the city. Our primary objective was the Kiyomuzi Ji, a giant buddhist temple on the outskirts of the city.

Posted by Phil at 10:29 AM | Permalink

I was woken up by the train outside of the hotel around 530am. Grabbed a shower. Met up with Gary and David and had a nice Japanese breakfast at the hotel. We hit up the train station and took a train to Kyoto. Once we got to the massive kyoto train terminal, we dumped our bags off in lockers and went for a quick morning of sightseeing before catching the bus to Fukui. We walked around the city for a bit on our way to the major stop that we were taking. We stopped at one large Buddhist temple/school. Then made our way to the Kiyomizu Temple in the east. There was this long, narrow uphill street lined with tons of little tourist shops. We got to the Kiyomuzi Temple and it was gorgeous. This huge huge temple set up on the eastern outskirts of the city and it seperated the city from the wooden areas and mountains. It was huge. Gary kept telling David about how he wants him to build a deck like the one that was there at the temple. David is a carpenter and builder. He was geeking out about the temple. He was looking at how the temple was made by caressing the wood and looking at all the edges and grooves n stuff. It was quite humorous.
We took fotos and looked at stuff and then hit up the LOVE SHRINE. There is a shinto shrine just to the right of the temple and looks like it was attached but its not. It was just there by chance. The shinto shrine is dedicated to the LOVE god or something. They had this statue of a guy with the "Hammer of Love". They also had the LOVE STONES. They were two stones sitting at about 30 meters apart inbetween two altars. It said that if you could walk from one stone to the other with your eyes closed then your love will be realized. So i tried it. I was going to have to walk thru a throng of japanese people, so I closed my eyes, held out my hands and started walking. I kept repeating the word, "Sumimasen" which is excuse me. I only bumped into like one person. I heard a group of Japanese girls giggle at me off to my right. I found the stone and was all, "Im badass."
I found a giant Preying Mantis on one of the altars as well. I was like, "Zorack".
After all the sightseeing, we grabbed some food at the cafe and we headed back to the train station. We searched for our chartered bus all over the grounds and on the map. The map didn't have a directions on it, so we figured we were in the right spot. But the bus was on the south side, we were on the north side. So we rushed thru the station to the south side and found the charter bus. We got on it. Our bus was sorta empty, it only carried about 15 of us. The other buses were crowded. We headed out for Fukui. The total trip was about 4 hours plus a service stop. Fukui was far and out of the way of everything. Some people were very frustrated and said that the planning of this trip was done very badly. They think that there was some political reason that they chose Fukui for the location of the Taikai. I think so as well, but I wasn't bored one bit by the distance. It offered me a great glimpse of the japanese countryside, which I wanted. It was very beautiful. Drives thru the mountains and rural areas. Very very pretty. I liked it alot. It reminded me alot about my trip to Yunnan in China when we had to drive everywhere in the buses. The scenery was so good that the distances didn't bother me. I used Gary's fone to call Mitch and Jeff.
We arrived at the hotel/Ryokan, which is a hotel, but with traditional styled rooms. So we had tatami floors and japanese western toilet and baths. There was also an Onsen in the hotel (traditional public bath). The first thing David did when he got into the room was to check all the wood work to see how it was made and look at its construction. The first thing Gary did when we got into the room was get a giant splinter in his foot from the Shogi track. He wasn't able to get it fully out until tomorrow.
We walked around the area and had some dinner in the resturant. They had a buffet and it was ridiculously overpriced. I wanted to pay for the bill right now, but they were like, No, we put it to your room. So when Gary came later, i needed to get them to bring up the correct bill. That took awhile. Very frustrating to make them understand that I need to put another dinner and beer onto the chit card. Oh well. I figure they wont make any mistakes when I try to pay the bill when we leave.......
After dinner, Tony arrived. He was visiting his in-laws and finally reached the hotel. We chatted a bit. Then I went to the Japanese bath. You go into this room with a bunch of other dudes, strip down, then wash yourself off at these faucet areas and clean all the dirt off of you, then you hop into the bath with the others. So you dont get the water dirty in there or spread germs. Apparently getting soap in the water is a big no no.
Right when I stepped in the water, immediately, I felt really relaxed. The water was really hot and I was right by the jets. However, the water was so hot that it made the room very humid. Since I am not really used to that, after about 5 minutes in the water, i started to feel sick. After about 15 minutes i needed to leave. I felt absolutely terrible. The humidity was just too much. For the rest of the night i was really tired and felt sick. I took a shower to cool off a bit. That helped a little.
I talked with Tony a bit then fell asleep at like 9pm.
Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 06:59 AM | Permalink

I left Detroit on the 7th and reached Japan on the 8th. So...read the 7th's entry.

Posted by Phil at 08:09 AM | Permalink

Well, today seems me shluffing off to Japan. I have been home from China for about 3 weeks and I am already heading off back to Asia. To a better place this time...hopefully. I got to the airport and thru the security checkpoints with no difficulty. So, I had about 2 hours to kill before the plane was gonna leave. I did some airport shopping. Found some earplugs that I forgot at the house and looked for a money belt. Found both, however, the money belt was more of a sack, but it fit underneath clothes better than a fanny pack.
I then hit up National Coney Island for a coney dog meal and a nice tall 22ouncer of beer. A nice relaxer before a long plane ride.
I took my time getting on the plane. By the time I got on, most everyone was there. David and Gary already were. David was sitting next to me and Gary was on the other side. So, I gave him a shout out. "Yo! What`s up, Sensei Man!? Hows trix." Not really. I waved.
Yumi told me to be careful because many Japanese women like foreign men and are always on the look out. I was all like, "Just like you, huh?"
She was all, "Baka!!"
soooo cute!
I first got realization of this when i sat down in my airplane seat. The lady sitting across the aisle from me was totally flirting with me. As I sat down, a glaze came over her eyes and she was all into me. Yumi was`t kidding. I did my best to disuade her efforts. I let her down easily. She was 68.
The plane ride was a little rough. Since we were going with the sun, it never really got dark until we reached Japan. It was tough though, even with all the windows closed I could still feel that the sun was out. Going home is much easier. However, I was able to get some shut eye on this trip. But not much. I was alwasy in that half and half zone where you are partly asleep but also awake. I even had one of those eye cover things. A sleep mask. Thankfully it didnt have any ruffles on it.
It went much much easier than flying to HK that first time. Maybe because I was used to it, or because that flying time was only 13 hours instead of the 15 it was last time. Anywho.
They played a couple movies and one TV show... First off, they played the first TV episode of Bewitched. Man...after not seeing that show in years, you realize just how bland and unfunny it was. Then after that they showed "A Lot Like Love" which wasnt really all that bad, a bit of a different romantic comedy plot so it was kinda refreshing. Then they played the "Bewitched" movie. Yikes. What a hunk of crap. There was a couple hidden gems like Steve Carrel as Uncle Arthur, a few Will Ferrel bits, and Jerry from Strangers With Candy as the paranoid neighbor. Other than that I felt bad after watching it. They should have totally played Batman Begins. Hopefully that will be playing on the ride home. Talk about an awesome movie. They should just loop that movie over and over again. That would make the plane ride so much better. They only have to show it like...4 times. Totally hardcore.
The food on the plane wasn`t terrible either. I didnt eat the fish though. Ever since I saw the movie "Airplane" whenever there is fish on the airline menu, I stay away from it. I dont want no eggs coming out of my mouth, thank you very much. And I sure as heck dont want no Vietnam vet with a drinking problem flying the airplane.
We finally landed in Kansai/Osaka Airport. It had just stopped raining. We waited in line to get our passports checked. I didnt fill in my address in Japan on the entrance form because I didnt know it and I would never be at a fixed address. But Gary gave the guy the hotel name that we would be at for the night when he started getting all testy with me. "What`s your address in Japan." -Um...I dont know. "Whats your address in Japan?" -Dude, I just said, I dont know. I didnt make the reservation. "Whats your address in Japan?" -Um...Gary!
We got it taken care of. We then got our money exchanges taken care of. I converted some US currency but couldn:t find the ATM machine that was mentioned in Lonely Planet Guide. So i figured I would get it later since Japan is such a technological and business utopia requiring it to have ATMs that are internationally connected everywhere you turn...
We went to get our railpasses. We turned in our receipts and got our passes. We talked with the lady and she told us how to catch the train we wanted. We went to the platform and waited in the cue. The trains are always on time in Japan. Well, 99.9% of the time. I bought a coke that was like in this fake plastic metal canister. It was funky. It kept it really cold though. And you know what else is awesome about Japan? BEER IN VENDING MACHINES!!! It was awesome. And aint just talking about the little 12 ouncers...I am talking about the Tallies...or 22 oucnes...whatever the metric conversion is. It was shnazy. Really neat.
We took one of the semi-express trians thru the Kansai area to Osaka and our hotel. Got off the station and got hang of our surroundings and found the hotel. As we walked in, they recognized us because we were the only white people staying there that nite. We walked in and pulled out our stuff. The rooms were quite small but that only seemed to bother Gary and David, I was just happy to be in Japan. It was really cool so far. I was digging it. Well, to be fair, they didnt complain so much as they just stated surprise at the compactness. And it was compact. THese rooms were for just one person. (rooms at the Alpha-1 in Marugame were smaller)
What was amazing to me about these rooms was the toilet. Yes, the toilet amazed me. Now, the Japanese aren`t really known for any special types of toilets, I mean, their ethnic toilets are like the chinese toilets, holes in the ground. But most places have western style toilets. But these business hotels had western toilets fully equiped with the following:
-bidet with adjustable water pressure squirt
-a colonic wash with shockingly warm adjustable water pressure squirt
(i swear David and Gary heard me shriek like a girl the first time I tried it)
-two toilet flush options - big and small
-pre-emtive flush when you sit down
-three sea-shells... to be honest..i didnt know how to use the three sea-shells.
Yeah, i didnt try the bidet at all because that one was designed for women. The pre-emptive flush is a noisy flush that helps to cover up the sounds of bowel movement to stop the person from being embarrassed. Gary told us that in some places, women can buy little speakers that make flushing sounds that cover up their noises so they dont get embarassed...and this is in a women`s toilet.
After the bathroom experience, we took a late dinner and beer at a little pub down the street. GOt some nice noodles and beer. Very good. Then we went back to the hotel and I slept away. Goodnite.

Posted by Phil at 09:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)