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Published: January 5th 2007
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Again, bidding you a warm welcome from the land of booze and rudeness...
To pick up the (en)trail at the point we last left it... the following weekend was to be had in a city by the name of Osan. It is famous for being an industrial city and having the US Air Force base there, yet still not a lot is to be seen. However, we found some adandoned buildings and factories to take photos of. The day passed by and photos we taken, a restaurant was found, food taken and beverages consumed. All in all a good day.
Next of course... I made my way to the land of the rising sun. Departing for Nagoya to see a friend of mine whom I met whilst studying Korean in Seoul. The first night was spent on my own in an Okonomiyaki restraunt... Then to the hotel, which had a bath (as they do... but I don't have one over here...)! The following morning I met the aforementioned human being and partook in luncheon with said being and present boyfriend. That was good, we had a Nagoya special; "Miso-katsu."
After this I got on a bus and made
Komakai...
Japanese hotel fridge auto-billing system my way to Tokyo to meet Hwanchi (see previous blogs about heavy drinking). When I arrived he was nowhere to be seen so I made my way to a public phone and discovered that he had not arrived yet... so a little walk around Shinjuku allowed me to discover a fairly cool guitarist playing on the street... after purchasing the CD I went back to the station and located Hwanchi (and disovered why he was late... he'd been at the pub, which is where we went next...).
This being our first night was a bunch of catching up and D&M type of stuff... It also involved the consumption of a hefty amount of grog... and the sampling of raw horse, which is much better than the idea sounds :P. After returning home we opened the bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue I'd decided to take along... exceptional drink that one.
The following day, after a couple of hours shut eye we decided that at least a little sight seeing was in order. Hence, Asakusa, a small tourist street. Kind of cool, but like every tourist spot... so we found a little, out of the way pub to have a
glass of "Hoppy" (some sort of beer derivative) and some old man food. Next we moved up to Ueno Park, quite a beautiful sight in Tokyo... there were loads of homeless, a few trees, a massive queue for the museum and a street market down below. The market was absolutely full of people, being the time of the year that Japanese business folk receive their bonuses. After a little trek around the market we decided to do it "Ajoshi sutairu" (Ajoshi is the Korean word for a middle aged man, and sutairu is the Japanisation of 'style') which involved finding the nearest 'sit down, eat flame grilled chicken and sink piss' venue, not such a difficult thing to do. A few beverages were consumed here before deciding that we should be accompanied by others... promting Hwanchi to call a friend of his... who just so happened to be receiving more of the fabled raw horse from his home town, one of the places in Japan famous for this very dish. We we presently invited to his home to take part in said morsel and a few more beverages, this we did.
On the way to his home we stopped
Basashi
Raw Horse by the supermarket to arm ourselves with weapons of mass self-destruction and picked up various goodies. Hwanchi asked me if there was anything I would like to challenge... and as I browsed the shelves I found a Sake from his home town entitled "Demon Killer." This was just too much to pass up and I bought the rather dainty 2 litre carton... It was delicious but dangerous and after a fair helping I was roughly the most frontal-lobe-disinhibited I've been for a while. A pleasureable experience until the following day.
After finally dragging a half dead carcass attached to my conscious out of bed at 4pm we set out about organising our new year's eve... Hwanchi seemed to believe this involved a healthy portion of the previously mentioned whisky whilst attempting to contact Maya, a friend of ours from our time in Korea. She was glad to oblige and sat down for a drink or two at a local bar... This was followed by our trip to Roppongi, the foreigner district of Tokyo, on Hwanchi's orders. He wanted to eat fish and chips!!! Hence we made our way to an Irish bar... the streets were abound with nothing but
Maya
Yeeeeeeaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh!!!!!!! foreign folk and police to make sure they didn't kill anything. Arriving at the bar we decided too many folk were present and after grabbing a Kilkenny (!!!!!) we made our way outside... by the way, both wearing our Socceroo's tops (kindly donated by Hwanchi)... We were approached by various folk strangely believing that Hwanchi could speak English... After a couple of pints and a CROWNIE(!) we made our way to the nearby toilets as the old man needed to visit and discovered that a local club "Gaspanic" was doing pizza and seeing as beer will make you eat nearly anything we decided to grab a slice of salami and cheese each... and it was good (at least at the time). Following this we made our way back to the Irish for countdown and grabbed another pint in just in time to scream with the rest of the folk and then make our way back outside to our comfortable (not so noisy) seated position and consume said pint. Then deciding we were hungry again went off in search of another pub that would do fish and chips... we found another Irish and went inside... having neither Kilkenny nor fish and
Tokyo Tower
Yeah... I've seen it... wooo.... chips we had a pint of Carlsberg and used a lot of their party poppers. Then we went back to a Ramen place next to the previous Irish pub and had some fairly amazing Ramen and Gyoza (Japanese made, Chinese style dumplings). Then we had another couple of pints and decided to head home... on the way we found ourselves a kebab truck and stopped for a kebab... hehe (I told you about beer).
The following day began after 3.5 hours sleep as we'd previously made arrangements to see my Korean friend Gyeongmi. We met her and another friend from Korea for luncheon and coffee... after a few hours of random babble we begged our pardon and did a little shopping. Then... of to Korea Town for a little Korean style food and drink. This was fantastic, and I finally got to pay for something. You see... Hwanchi although being Korean by ancestory) is Japanese and hence treats visitors to his country. So it is decided that he will certainly be coming to Australia and we will be giving him all that our country can possibly offer.
This was followed by a return to his local district. There
Crown Princes
Or something along those lines... I called my host family from high school for a merry chat and spoke for a while. They are all well and working in their various pursuits. After this it was back to Ajoshi Stylin for our final night of insanity in each other's presence.
The next day we met Charles (my Malaysian buddy from Aus) for coffee and a bit of a chat. He seems in a little trouble and we're all in to help him out in any way we can.
After this we ventured to the bus station... taking us back to Hwanchi's home town and the origin of my flight, Nagoya. There we stayed at his parents house... but getting there was slightly delayed... you see there was an accident on the freeway killing two and we had to take a bit of a detour... However we finally made it and then I made my way to the airport after around 2.5 hours sleep again...
Anyhow... that wraps up my trip to Japan, hope you've all enjoyed.
Take care!
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