Blogs from Saitama, Japan, Asia

It was inevitably one of the coldest nights of my life. At around 11pm I found myself a little spot on a baseball pitch. I camped up and it seemed mild enough before snuggling into my sleeping bag. The fact of the matter is I usually work up such a profound sweat setting up camp that the climes around me can be quite deceptive. But I was also content enough by the fact that I was wearing 8 layers of clothing. The cold couldn’t possibly antagonise me. Fast forward 2 hours from my initial naivety and my water bottle had ice flakes in it. My body had spent the best part of 20 minutes trying to convince myself to get up, pack everything away and get moving. But my mind was telling me otherwise, trying to ... read more

Saitama prefecture sits northwest of Tokyo, so in an effort to reach Chichibu in the mountain range again to the far northwest of the prefectural border I went at it in what will soon become my natural anti-clockwise fashion. It made sense to approach Saitama first like this as when my journey / if my journey should draw to a close it will do so with the likes of Shizouka (Mt. Fuji) and Kanagawa (Yokohama), so after such gratuitous eye candy it would seem a drag to venture all the way over to Saitama, commonly known by folk as ‘dasaitama’ (uncooltama) due to its lack of attractions. So the draw was minimal. So it was now, later or never in which to venture around the prefecture. Never not actually being an option I chose ... read more

Chichibu Within a mere 90 minutes of Ikebukuro station in Tokyo, it is surprising that photographers' and hikers' paradise Chichibu isn't discovered by more tourists yet. The rural town of Chichibu is located on a plateau surrounded by mountains and the train ride quickly gets very interesting once you have left the urban jungle that is Tokyo. Chichibu used to be well known for silk production but never really recovered from the crash in raw silk prices during the early Meiji period which led to the Chichibu rebellion. The surrounding mountains and the resulting isolation has resulted in the preservation of lots of traditional customs. Chichibu is best known for its important 34 Kannon Temple Pilgrimage and its many festivals. The town itself feels like it is still stuck in the Showa period with loads of ... read more

...and I didn't sound like an idiot!! In fact, the man (who is a staff member at TIU), told me 「あなたのはつおんはすごくきれい！」or "Anata no hatsuon wa sugoku kirei!" OOOOORRRRRRR "You're Japanese pronunciation is very pretty/clean/good!" (There are different meanings for the word "kirei") I was blown away. I had actually briefly met this man once before with a Japanese friend, Marina, but I didn't get past "hello" with him the first time. Obviously, when he approached me and said hello, I was already shocked that he remembered me... but then he started asking me about whether I'd studied Japanese before, and when: I understood everything he said, and I was able to reply in what I guess sounded to him like well-pronounced child's talk. Now, the Japanese are famous for their politeness, and also for their assumptions ... read more

Round 2 go! Ok, as promised I'm getting another message out to you, and this time it didn't take four months to prepare. Let's get right into what I introduced at the end of the last blog. So as the summer started and the festivals began across Japan I was in full adventure mode. It was really heating up in April here in June and we had already planned a thousand things to do over the new few months. It was tough to remember that I wasn't just on vacation and that I had to work five or six days of each week, since my focus was often on all the sporting events, trips and parties that were jammed into any free time I had. But that's not to say that my school wasn't a huge ... read more