Tokyo Stories

Tokyo was the main attraction of my Jap trip. I had allowed for about a month to let myself be swallowed up by the city and in turn soak up all the stimulouses through my various senses.
Having seen 'Lost in Translation' a hundred times, I had built up the city in my mind. No doubt it lived up to the description of my peers and mass media, but somehow I wanted to penetrate it beyond the cliche and maybe I did. Looking beyond the bright lights and packaging it was hard to find something real. The mass of salarymen and service people zoombie-ing through their everyday jobs so they can then purchase that thing they saw on their mobile phones, doesn't leave much room for individuals to follow their self indulgent passions in life.
Everyone has to be so busy in Tokyo to keep up with the rest of the busy people around them.

Then there's me.

Standing still.

Watching.

Lost.

Where was my Bill Murray?

















I guess the best way to tell my Tokyo story is through the various people that I came across and how they fit into the big picture.

JAGI
My first Tokyo point of reference is an old friend from Melbourne. JAGI is an artist that I have known for years around the laneways of Melbourne. Upon hearing that I was to visit Tokyo during his stay, he immediately invited me to stay with him in his humble little Sakura guesthouse in Naka-Meguro. He and his awesome housemates got me a little orientated.

Seb No.1, GettyImages Photographer and Ai, Porcelain Jewellery designer

Seb No.2, Short film maker and JAGI, Artist

The 2 Sebs.
We stumbled across the 2 Sebs from Berlin in the living room on my first day and had coffee and cigarettes with them and Ai (girlfriend of one of the Sebs, who happened to be a porcelain jewellery designer in Tokyo) The 2 Sebs have been working in and out of Tokyo for the last 2 years and know the place quite well, but still speak minimal Japanese.
JAGI arrived with no Japanese language knowledge and in the 2 months that he's been in Tokyo he's picked up a midget's handful of phrases. He had various Melbourne friend's couches to crash on... that is until they went back to Melbourne. And he had various crazy Japanese dudes to hang with... that is until they got a full time job. So due to his language barrier and lack of playmates he has been more than happy to stay indoors and work on his artworks.






I managed to drag JAGI out for a day trip to Tokyo Towers and the tank aquarium in the same building. Unlike the wonderland Osaka Aquarium the Tokyo 'Aquarium' is sadly clastrophobic.
JAGI was originally scheduled to fly home the week that I got into Tokyo so I was able to stay with him for my first 3 days there. After that he was meant to move out so I shifted off to my second point of contact Rei in Meguro and JAGI managed to couch it at his guest house for the rest of his stay.

REI
Rei is a wonderer who wondered down to Melbourne last year and onto my myspace. Somehow we met up and I showed him around town with the promise to come and visit him in Tokyo when the time comes. His mum owns a small fashion boutique and gave him and his bro an apartment to kick back in. Ordinarily Rei has the appartment to himself, but his bro just got back from college in Hawaii for the summer so I could only crash there for the weekend. It gave me sufficient time to line up other couches to surf to.

Rei, Sushi chef
The two brothers were total opposites. Rei is as messy as his bro is analy clean, Rei is as much of a wonderer as his bro is structred. But they both love to work out, get wasted and party. I didn't get to hang out with them much in the end and I think Rei is currently getting wasted and partying in Melbourne as I type.




We had ourselves some good 'ol yakkitori fun!

MINH
My first Tokyo CS host. A soccer crazed, piano playing, French-Vietnamese in Japan looking to be the next Japanese TV star... In the meantime he works at a bank and have recently been approved to act as a priest to perform wedding ceremonies for Japanese couples on weekends for kicks and cash.

Friend and Minh, Japanese TV star (in the making)
Minh is quietly extroverted in many ways. He fell into a coushy job working in a salaryman environment during the weekdays to support his Tokyo lifestyle. In his own time he is quietly plotting to take over the Japanese TV stations and marrying unsuspecting Japanese couples wearing nothing but his priest robe over his birthday suit. Originally he was free to host me till we got sick of each other, but due to the European soccer championships and a visiting girlfriend I was only able to stay for a few night before setting off to hunt for another Tokyo couch to crash to.

STU
My second Tokyo CS host and saviour. Stu was kind enough to offer me a semi-permanent Tokyo Oasis for the rest of my stay; he also took onboard a couple of Kiwis for the week.

STU, Salaryman/freelancer

Bret and Iyella, Kiwi travellers
Stu lives in a surprisingly semi-spacious appartment located in Higashi-Matsubara which is a quaint little suburb 2 stops from the young and hip Shimo-kitazawa area. Stu has been in Japan long enough to have the country and it's people sussed out. He started off in Osaka living the easy life where he even worked for a short time as the only gaijin in a 'host' bar. He then moved to Tokyo to make some cash. Stu along with many others juggle the life of a salaryman with other side projects, in Stu's case he works as a camera man and occasional VJ. I was lucky enough to have met him right after he resigned from his daily 8-7 salaryman position. So he should have had some free time on his hands, but his days were already booked up with video shoots, edits, meetings and other various happenings. We managed to get together for a meal or 2 around the neighbourhood.

SHOTARO
This extra-ordinary ordinary Japanese is my friend Daphne's ex-boyfriend Jono(Who is studying in Japan and have been advising me throughout my trip)'s friend from Melbourne Uni's boyfriend.

I was told that he is one cool Jap who has awesome taste in music/films and had just scored his first full time salaryman position. We had a couple of random gasbagging sessions over Izakaya meals. I had only had the chance to meet him after work each time, so he was always dressed in the uniform of the salaryman suit. The first extra-ordinary thing about Shotaro is that he is an extra tall Japanese with a curly head of hair, instantly standing out from the rest of the salarymen.
His polite and liberal opinions makes him a very easy going character, so..so..so..so.. The extra-ordinary fact that he had traveled solo around some random places and also chased his girlfriend half way across the world to Melbourne makes him a very brave, very emotional, very rare Japanese individual.
His salaryman role demands the hours 9am-8pm, sometimes later and Saturdays. This is the place where people literally 'work to death'. Everyday he has to commute an hour each way to his place of work crossing through the city along with millions of other Tokyo salarymen.

Ms Lynda Vang
A mutural friend Reese brought us together knowing that we would get along like two Japanese school girls. So thanks to Reese I had joined forces with Lynda, my weekend playdate partner in crime. Together we explored the parks of Yoyogi and Harajuku one week, and flea marketing and Shinjuku the next.









Lynda is living the life that I had unsuccessfully applied for this time last year, teaching english in Japan with the well known JET programme. She is lucky enough to be stationed just outside of crazy Tokyo, perfect for weekend excursions into the big smoke. She had finished her university degree in Canada and was looking to get away from her small town of Edmonton in search of independence and something else.
She came to Japan with hopes to explore the country and it's people, but have found it hard to get close to the locals and have instead built a strong network with fellow JETters. Her year in Japan is quickly coming to an end with still so much to do before she returns to the comfortable and familiar. However she has plans to move to Shanghai with her partner, maybe this will give her another chance at finding that something else.

Taste of Kyoto

FRIDAY
The all night bus between Hiroshima and Kyoto dumped me at a blurry carpark on Friday morning at 7am. I had before me a very specific set of instructions to find my Kyoto couch manned by the very capable Mr Jean-Baptiste.

[2] From Sanjo/Sanjokeihan station (bus, subway, train
keihan line) to my place:
This station, the center of the lively area, is on the
east side of the bridge, in front of a yellow book
shop. From the book shop, go north (where the
mountains are) along the big river kamogawa, for about
6 minutes. You will pass a Fresco opened 24/24. You
have to turn right not the next street, but the
second one (150 meters after). There should be a
bridge on your left and vending machines in the
corner. So you turn and walk for 200m on the right
side, pass a Michelin ad, a bakery, and 20 meters
after, there is a mansion called Maison FUJI (in
katakana, it says メゾンフジ), with a spiral
staircase directly on the sidewalk. I'm here on the
4th floor.

After getting a little lost and found then heaving 30kgs of luggage up 3 flight of stairs I was delighted to be greeted by a very sweet French (self-declared) geek. He warmly welcomed me with a breakfast of Natto and rice.
Now I have been warned about this thing called natto that only the crazy locals can love. It's fermented soy beans in this sticky, stringy, spider webby goo. On it's own it tasted like dirty dishwashing sponge that's then been covered in stringy silky spider webs. The taste gets a little dulled out when accompanied with rice, but still not that pleasurable to my untrained palette.

Post Natto session JB brought me to the center of Kyoto and went on his geeky way for a day with his computers. I went for a wonder around the ancient imperial capital of Japan. Kyoto also houses the last of Japan's geisha schools, though you'll be lucky to spot a genuine geisha as it's common for women to wear kimonos around town.


The city is a must-see destination for tourists in Japan. It offers everything you'd want to see, experience or buy in one sweet spot. Kyoto has many specialty crafts (wooden combs), food and of course shops and temples/shrines.



Surrounded by water and mountains it wont take long to get away from the crazy commercial center and escape to somewhere green. I was lucky that JB had 2 bikes for us to excursion around on. We did a night ride along the river to Fushimi Inari Shrine the thousand gates that tunneled up the mountain out onto a sparkling view of the city.



SATURDAY led into a lazy afternoon stroll along the Philosophers path (哲学の道) popping into temples along the way and stopping down a cute little French cafe 'Pomme' to read our horoscopes and muse about the big carp in the canal.





Dinner at the best ramen joint in town.

SUNDAY was a day with jam packed plans of bike riding, building seeing, mountain climbing and monkey watching.
We stumbled across this flea market in a shrine as we rode along our merry ways.
Check out http://fashiontrophies.blogspot.com/ for all my new finds.


It was the perfect day for wanderings...





We rode up to the West-end gate of Kyoto and chilled at a traditional snack bar with a helping of their exquisite sticky desert Dango served with salty sakura tea and refreshing green tea.


The delicious pit-stop gave us plenty of energy to power on. We were destined for Arashiyama (嵐山), a serene ride through the bamboo forest and onto the Monkey mountain.






The playful monkeys were really chilled, and some were cheeky enough to try and survey my bag for foodage. I was tempted to pet one, they look so soft like chinchillas...
To top of the Kyoto experience we went out for a meal of yakiniku (焼肉). Perfect ending for just a taste of Kyoto. Many thanks to JB for sharing Kyoto with me, I'm sure to return for more.